Posts Tagged ‘ watchmen ’

Collected Edition Blog browsing on Monday afternoon

March 16, 2009
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Besides comics, I’m a big sports guy and right now is the best time of year: NCAA March Madness (including The Frozen Four), NBA and NHL games are getting hot and heavy due to playoff seeding, MLB Spring Training (including the WBC) and finally getting in gear is the NFL draft (which is very important to anyone who follows the Detroit Lions). But I digress, let’s get to some comic book collected edition news:

  • 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: George Khoury – Extraordinary Works of Alan Moore

December 4, 2008
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Podcast: Play in new window | Download

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!

Enough “Graphic Novels”

March 10, 2008
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watchmen.jpg

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.