A week has now passed and the hurricane has seemed to have calmed down. Are these people still going through with their threat to quit? That’s anyone’s guess and I really don’t care if they actually do it. But it is funny to me how some people jump the gun before they see the actual product. And really, they don’t have to buy them anyway. I truly don’t think that the original masterpiece by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons will be diminished in any way. On the business end of things you can debate whether or not it’s a money grab by DC or if DC should be giving a little more cash to the creators. Personally, I vote Yes on both points, but I’m just a small fanboy in a larger sea.

To me this is all just a natural progression of literature in the new media century. I think DC has done everything they can with the original material including reissuing it in numerous trades and hardcovers, a movie and even motion comic, so new additional material is all that’s left. No they don’t have to do it, but they are. Other properties like Batman, Bourne and Bond have gotten the rewrite and movie transfer over the years and no one seems to complain. All of those are evergreen properties and are handled, for the most part, with care. I’m sure Watchmen will be too, otherwise it’s all for nothing and some higher ups may be out of a job. Yes, a lot is riding on the critical success of Before Watchmen. We are going to see more and more of this as old ideas are rehashed and remolded for a new generation. My goodness, just look at what is being done with Sherlock Holmes!

I hope for the best for Moore and Gibbons and I hope they get their due, but now that we have the prequels coming, I have to imagine we’ll see a true sequel. It may take another 25 years, but it will happen.

Let’s first look at the series breakdowns:

• RORSCHACH (4 issues) – Writer: Brian Azzarello. Artist: Lee Bermejo

• MINUTEMEN (6 issues) – Writer/Artist: Darwyn Cooke

• COMEDIAN (6 issues) – Writer: Brian Azzarello. Artist: J.G. Jones

• DR. MANHATTAN (4 issues) – Writer: J. Michael Straczynski. Artist: Adam Hughes

• NITE OWL (4 issues) – Writer: J. Michael Straczynski. Artists: Andy and Joe Kubert

• OZYMANDIAS (6 issues) – Writer: Len Wein. Artist: Jae Lee

• SILK SPECTRE (4 issues) – Writer: Darwyn Cooke. Artist: Amanda Conner

• BEFORE WATCHMEN: EPILOGUE –  Featuring the work of various writers and artists

• CURSE OF THE CRIMSON CORSAIR (2 page back up in all 35 issues) – Writer: Len Wein. Artist: John Higgins.

Deluxe Hardcover
DC is all about the Deluxe Hardcover collected edition these days.  The upcoming Batman: The Black Glove will be 384 pages/$39.99. Under this plan we would have a 3 volume set to collect the entire series. What comics would be in which hardcover (or trade) remains to be seen. I doubt we will see the “DVD extras” that will be in the Absolute, but you will get your fair share. I think this format will be the first one we will see in 2013.

Trade Paperback
Without a doubt the most affordable route would be to buy Before Watchmen in softcover trades. DC could collect each series individually. Let’s assume that all comics will be 30 pages/$2.99. That means:

• Five 4-issue trades; 120 pages each
• Three 6-issue trades; 180 pages each
• One  Crimson Corsair/Epilogue; 100 pages (70 pages/30 pages)

Sounds great, but I doubt this will be the case. That’s just too many trades (9 total) and DC Comics is not going to charge $11.99 for a 4-issue book when you could get so much more money if you combine them. More likely is the possibility that DC will collect it like this:

• Three 10-issue trades (One 4-issue and One 6-issue); 300 pages; $29.99 each
• One 9-issue plus Crimson Corsair storyline (Two 4-issue, Crimson Corsair/Epilogue); 340 pages; $29.99

Why $29.99? Again recent DC history gives us this price point. Resurrection Man TPB is 336 pages/$29.99 so it seems like a good place to start. However, DC has also released new editions of Batman: Knightfall which is roughly 652 pages/$29.99. But that’s too much Watchmen for too small a price for brand new material.

Either way I am excited for Before Watchmen. Not all of the comics, but most.
And it has nothing to do with JMS.

I welcome your comments.

I love Watchmen and their, unexplored, rich history. This could be a fun sandbox that today’s gifted artists and writers can play in. Comic book characters, and all fictional characters for that matter, should be shared and explored once and again for every generation and not lie dormant so uppity purists like The Simpson’s Comic Book Guy can lament about the Golden Age of 1985. The Watchmen belong to us fans now. If you don’t like it, fine. Don’t read it. But don’t tell me it’s going to suck. Not just yet, anyway.

Who knows what a new Watchmen comic will bring? Brubaker on Rorschach? Johns on Dr. Manhattan?

Just be glad Stan Lee isn’t still on X-Men.

This week on the Steve Ditko career retrospective, I take a look at his return to Charlton (although some would argue he never left), his limited time at Warren and his entire time at DC Comics. This includes the great characters he created: Captain Atom, Blue Beetle, The Question, The Hawk and The Dove and The Creeper.  And the history lesson wouldn’t be complete without a mention of Mr. A or The Watchmen.

Much of Ditko’s work from this period has been collected in the Action Hero Archives Volumes 1-2, Creepy Archives Volumes 1-4 and Eerie Archives Volumes 1-2 from Dark Horse, and the upcoming Creeper HC from DC.

All this including IDW’s Fallen Angel Omnibus, Absolute All-Star Superman and the New Releases of the Week from DC and Marvel.

Chris

http://www.collectedcomicslibrary.com/

Links of Note:
Interview with Bob Rozakis on Cancelled Comics Cavalcade

Please visit my site sponsors: In-Stock Trades, Forbidden Planet International (UK), and Library Binding Company.

http://www.collectedcomicslibrary.com/

Today on the show, I take a look back at this year’s comic book related movies and their subsequent collected edition or other periodical tie-ins. This includes a whole host of movies including Watchmen, X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Terminator: Salvation, Star Trek, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, Whiteout, The Surrogates and others including animated movies like Coraline, Green Lantern: First Flight and Astro Boy. It’s interesting to see what, and even if, publishing houses capitalized on Hollywood and vice versa. A few books that I forgot to mention were Jennifer’s Body HC, $24.99, from Boom! Studios and two upcoming children’s animated movies Fantastic Mr. Fox and Where The Wild Things Are, but I do not know if new editions of these classic books are being released.

Also on the podcast, I look on eBay for DC Comics’ ElfQuest Archives to see how over priced they are selling, the old Dark Shadows (Gold Key) comic books gets a new hardcover reprint series from Hermes Press and Silver Surfer: Requiem Premiere HC breaks into Diamond’s Top 300 GN’s for August at #10 with 4,147 units sold.

All this and the New Releases of the Week.

Chris

Please visit my site sponsors: In-Stock Trades, Forbidden Planet International (UK), and Library Binding Company.

• DC Comics has announced their full lineup of After Watchmen. To be honest, first thing that popped in my head when I heard that title was the terrible After MASH TV show. Every book on the list has been collected in some form or another and in this weeks podcast, I’ll briefly go over the list along with what you may want to read Before Watchmen. Look for it on Wednesday.
• A really big deal is being made of Fantagraphics reprinting the work of legendary French cartoonist Jacques Tardi in nice collections. I don’t know much about his work, but my interest is peaked.
• Tom Spurgeon, The Comics Reporter, has finally published his Best of 2008, including many, many collected editions.
• This Weeks New York Times Graphic Books Best Seller List. Watchmen takes #1 in both the Hardcover list and the Softcover (TP) list, but #2 is: Superman: Brainiac (HC) and Jack of Fables, Vol. 5 (TP).
• My friends at the Collected Editions Blog has an op-ed piece on DC Comics’ upcoming Co-Features comic books that will feature Ravager and Blue Beetle in Teen Titans and Booster Gold respectively, and Metal Men in Doom Patrol.
• A book that has nothing to do with comics, but everything to do with Web 2.0 and Twitter.
• Richard, FPI Blog Log, has a nice article on The Greatest Adventures Of Captain Winston Bulldog, a collection of the best strips from Bulldog Adventure Magazine (1993-2005).
• Finally, “I Am The Amazing Spider-Man™” Personalized Spider-Man™ DVD Video won iParenting Media award (whatever that is). Stan Lee endorses it and says he has one, but is that a good thing?

TwoMorrows Tune-In #15 (MP3)

On the show this month, host Chris Marshall talks with George Khoury. This December George presents us with a revised edition of The Extraordinary Works of Alan Moore – Indispensable Edition. George also talks about other hot Alan Moore related topics such as Miracleman and The Watchmen!
Chris also goes over all of the December releases.

Direct Podcast Feed or Subscribe with iTunes

e-mail Chris with questions and/or comments.
He may even read it on the next Tune-In!

There has been a mild buzz around the comic book blogosphere in regards to the ICv2 Guide #52: Graphic Novels report that the number of Graphic Novels published increased 19% from 2,785 volumes in 2006 to 3,314 in 2007,. This should not be shocking to anyone. The amount of material that is being sold has increased from year to year and because of that the way we look at Graphic Novels and how we report on the subject must now change.

The term Graphic Novel has now become too much of a catch-all phrase that has anything to do with words mixed in with pictures. Yes, it’s also a fancy way to saying “comic books”, but even that term implies either superheroes or something you would see in the Sunday funny pages.

Just look at the following examples of what a Graphic Novel is:
Marvel Comics - Marvel Zombies Army of Darkness
Del Rey - Negima v16
Tokyo Pop - Samurai Deeper Kyo v26
Dark Horse - Buffy the Vampire Slayer Omnibus v3
DC Comics - League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Black Dossier
IDW Publishing - Complete Terry and the Pirates v2
Archaia Studios Press - Okko Cycle of Water

Now that we have crossed over the 3,000 mark, it’s time to break Graphic Novels into their rightful segments for statistical analysis (these are just to name a few):
Graphic Novel: A single self contain story IE Pride of Baghdad
Manga: Asian or Asian inspired IE Naruto
Art Books/Non-Fiction/Reference:IE Art of 300 or Spider-Man Encyclopedia
Comic Book Collected Editions: Marvel Comics, DC, Dark Horse, Image Comics, etc.

Comic Book Collected Editions could be broken down further to include genres like Adventure, Horror, Sci-Fi, Crime, and even Humor. Classic Era Collected Editions could also be segmented Pre-Golden Age, Golden Age, 1950’s, 60’s, 70’s and 80’s. The publisher would be responsible to Tag the book into their respective segments, thus insuring accuracy. Diamond would oversee the operation to double check that all books have been tagged correctly and consistently. This could conceivably help consumers in the pre-order phase; they could browse by era, genre, and a host of other Searchable words.

The time to do this is now while we still can or all too soon the market will grow even further and confusion and will abound.