Evan Dorkin's Blog, page 26

The Return of the H.O.F. House-Clearing Auctions

It's been a while but we've started putting lots together again to try to make some room and make a few bucks.

Up for grabs art-wise are several Marvel character drawings (The Rhino, The Thing and Crystal), some Mad spot illustrations (inc.a Star Wars piece) and a Milk and Cheese sketch card. Save for the larger, detailed RHino piece, the art is starting very low, some at only $10.

Collectibles on the block include a Trendmasters 21" Iron Giant figure (loose), A Bowen/Graphitti Crypt Keeper statue, an Astro Boy ceramic bank, a lot of Tezuka super-deformed figures, some vintage Pogo figures, a copy of the recently-published Henry Kuttner hardcover pulp collection, and a copy of the Golden Age Marvel Comics Omnibus (retail $125, starting bid $40). Also a lot of Nintendo Pokemon games, a Gerry Anderson toy lot and some Batman Kurbicks. I think that's everything. Anyway, if you're curious or interested in looking, here's the link to the auctions.

Thanks for looking and for any bids any of you might toss our way.

Two Commissions

These are two commissions done for the same person -- Pantha from the Teen Titans, and Marrow, from the X-Men. I felt like I'd seen Marrow before but had no idea of the character's name (I have a feeling I saw an action figure or something like that) and Pantha was a complete unknown quantity to me. I'm semi-familiar with a lot of characters created after I quit following the books through comic shop and internet osmosis, but I couldn't have told you a thing about these characters if you put an Ultimate Nullifier to my head.

It turns out Marrow has been redesigned and goofed with so many times (not to mention the fact that a lot of artists fudge -- I mean interpret -- her so she appears differently even without a do-over) that it was difficult for me to know just what she should look like, so I opted for a mash-up of sorts. Her entire face was reworked at one point, apparently they prettied her up so she could be on team X-Men (pity the ugly superhero -- all the skill in the world won't help you if you're not hot. It's a lot like the music industry, come to think of it).

Anyway, the customer was very happy with the pin-ups, which is always good to hear. The next one up is a Joker/Harley Quinn piece. I'm trying to polish off the last few commissions I owe people asap -- if you're one of the folks waiting, I appreciate your patience and apologize for the wait. It'll be worth it, honest.

A Preview and Two Interviews

Digital Spy UK asked me a few questions about the upcoming Milk and Cheese collection, you can read the interview here.

And the Fright Channel/Horror Haven posted a two-part audio interview I did with them at NYCC about Beasts of Burden. That one's here.

Speaking of Beasts of Burden, Comic Book Resources has two preview pages of the next story Jill and I did for Dark Horse Presents #6 here.

We Pause Now For Station Identification

The Sandman

I drew this a while back but never had Sarah scan it until recently. Anyway, yee-ha, it's William "Flint" Marko, aka, The Sandman.

The Sandman was one of my bestest most favorite villains from the Marvel Age of Comics, he's also my favorite character in comics to be named "The Sandman" (There are at least four of them kicking around that I'm aware of: Marvel villain, DC gas mask-wearing hero who then started wearing yellow tights and running around with a kid, DC 70's dream hero who ran around with "weirdies", DC/Vertigo goth guy...any others?).

The Sandman could turn to sand (duh) and form sand hammers and giant sand fists and stuff, a really neat-o visual and bit of business. It's interesting that he started out as a Steve Ditko-designed Spider-Man villain, and then waltzed over to the Fantastic Four book, where he was re-designed by Jack Kirby as a member of The Frightful Four. He retained the patented Ditko horizontal wiggly hair weave for men, but lost the iconic striped shirt that Marko always managed to buy and wear whenever he escaped prison. Maybe his mom bought him a lot of them and he stashed them all over New York City. Stupider things have happened in a comic book. The Kirby redesign was insane, green and black and complicated with a weird, uncomfortable looking mask and bulky collar. The Wizard, leader of the Frightful Four, created the get-up for The Sandman with belt controls that could augment his sand powers. At least they did later on, he could create oil slicks (sure, sand is oily) and flatten out very thin (?) or whirl around or..oh, I don't know. Some dumb shit. That's all Marvel Team-Up #1 stuff (where we see his mom, no, for real, the same woman who I think may have bought him a lot of shirts in the mid-1960's. Check the Marvel Universe Updates, they might have something to say about that).

For all I know, the Wizard made him wear the crazy duds because he's a total dick. The Wizard wears an idiot outfit himself, and so did fellow Frightful-Four member Paste Pot Pete -- later to be known as The Trapster, which is only a good villain name if you used to be called Paste Pot Pete. Don't get me wrong -- I'm actually one of the few people out there who actually likes the whacked-out Kirby Sandman costume. People have always seemed to hate it. Just because something's an idiot outfit doesn't mean I don't like it, I love that the Wizard wears a giant egg-shaped helmet that looks like it would break his neck. And the funny undies that go with his armor. Purple looks good on a flying a mad scientist, everyone knows that, they teach that at F.I.T. And The Trapster's silly hood and collar, lovely, really lovely. So, you see, I love that stuff, I really do. It's just crazy, that's all.

The Wizard really is a dick, though. When I wrote a Thing mini-series for Marvel some time back (art by Dean Haspiel, who originated the project) I wanted to have the Frightful Four old-timers get into an argument about the costumes, and establish that the Wizard was super-anal about how they must wear their costumes at all times when on Frightful Four business, including casual meetings. He'd get crazy if they didn't put their masks on, or left their gloves off, things like that. Whatever.

Back to the subject at hand: I can't think offhand of any other known-quantity villains that were designed by Ditko and then radically re-costumed by Kirby. It's interesting to compare the design approaches and aesthetics of the Big Two Marvel artists/creators, if I had more time, intelligence and computer savvy I'd plop some images down and ask you folks to sit tight and listen keenly. Not happening, of course. All you get is the drawing and a little blather.

Anyway, I dig the Sandman (crap, no pun intended, honest --!).   

New Release Dates For Milk and Cheese Hardcover

The folks at Dark Horse Comics let us know today that the Milk and Cheese: Dairy Products Gone Bad hardcover collection will be shipping earlier than originally scheduled. 

The book is now scheduled to ship to the Direct Market on November 23rd, and to the book market (and presumably Amazon) on December 6th.

So, some good news for us and for folks thinking of picking the book up for the holidays as a gift for themselves or for others.

Spread the hate!

Two Interviews With The Cartoonist Whose Blog This Is

Short craft-oriented interview at David-Wasting-Paper.

Longer, career overview-oriented interview at the Wales-based web magazine Mass Movement. There's also interviews with members of Seaweed and The Melvins and other bands, as well as comics writer Pat Mills. And other stuff.

More Shocktober Rambling

The snow let up enough yesterday that we were able to take Emily to a friends house for their annual Halloween party, which was nice as Em really wanted to go (she was dressed in full cowgirl gear, which Sarah handmade and embroidered -- save for the gun, hat and boots -- it looks great) . The weather kept a number of folks home, mainly those from New Jersey, which got hit hard by the storm, the power's still out in places. It really was nasty out, another memorable weather day in a year of memorable weather.  Anyway, a nice night and a welcome evening out of the house for all of us. Ended up talking horror movies for much of the night, along with discussions of old, dead comedians (one guest had written some stand-up material for Dick Shawn back in the 80's), abandoned Staten Island cemeteries, updates on people who weren't there, and how we're all getting older and hitting the age where you tend to talk about how you're getting older, although you're not exactly old.

When we got home it was relatively early (for me, at least) and I was in no mood to work (when am I ever, ha ha...ugh), so I fired up the Netflix and stumbled across Mario Bava's Planet of the Vampires, a movie I've wanted to see for decades. And I enjoyed the hell out of it, for what it was, if you know what I mean. I like Bava, he couldn't make a home movie with a puppy and a baby without it being slightly unsettling, and this 60's SF/horror thing delivers brightly-colored, wildly-designed weirdness. You want the plot? Two spaceships end up on a misty, set-laden planet after answering a distress signal. Shit happens. Read the title if you need a hint. Although the titular vampires aren't the usual variety, in fact it's a misleading title, I'd say. Anyway, reasons to see it: awesome 60's Euro-art direction (the ship's interiors are nifty, the alien landscape sets are very Star Trek colored rocks and mist), good-looking guys and gals in crazy leather space outfits resembling a mix of the movie X-Men costumes, Judge Dredd casual wear and a spacey S&M club, a few not really scary cute moody moments, cool-looking weapons, and if you're into seeing where filmmakers get their ideas from, a few plot elements that obviously inspired the early sequences in Ridley Scott's Alien, specifically the distress  signal/landing/exploring the terrain/what they find stuff. The dubbing is better than average for the time, the acting is more like "let's pretend we're spacemen" than actual acting, if you know what I mean. Maybe you don't, but for me, there's a type of spaceman movie where the actors seem to almost be playing at spaceman than acting as spacemen -- does that make any sense? Ditto jungle explorer movies involving dinosaurs or monsters or lost tribes. For me, at least, the actors seem to be running around like big kids playing in the woods. Maybe it's just me. But I enjoy that kind of movie partly because it looks like fun and because I wish I could dress up and run around on the sets playing spaceman. Because I'm a child. Anyway, it's short, to the point, the build-up is better than the wind down to the more traditional finish. It's a time piece, it's goofy harmless fun. 

Afterward I watched Burn, Witch Burn, -- which I had the nagging feeling that I'd already see --  but whatever the case, it's based on a nifty book, Conjure Wife by author/actor/imbiber Fritz Leiber. Maybe it seemed familiar to me because I'd read the book and it follows it closely in places. Maybe I have a terrible memory and watched it once already. I liked it quite a bit, well-directed and acted and creepy and cool. The screenplay was by Richard Matheson and Charles Beaumont, I think someone else worked on it but they didn't write for The Twilight Zone so I don't know who they are or remember their name. I'm a geek, not a detective. Of course, Beaumont may not have actually touched the screenplay, but that's another, actually sad, story. This flick is ripe for a remake, a smart remake, upping the politics, snark and bitchiness of academic life, of husbands and wives and rivalries, where the wives are using sorcery to upgrade and maintain their clueless husband's positions and status at the university. You can see where it can play with male/female role issues and wedge in some pointed commentary about marriage and social/academic politics while unwrapping the nuts and bolts genre stuff. Also, CGI would enable effects-happy filmmakers to attack some of the elements of the story that 60's filmmakers couldn't pull off, and thankfully didn't try. Anyway, nifty little flick. The film does a swell job of building tension and paranoia, it's smart and paced well, the villain of the piece is memorably nasty and well-played. This might make a good double-bill with The Curse of the Demon for a "do you believe in the occult" night of old, fun horror movies.

The night before last I stayed up too late to watch Burnt Offerings, a movie I'd been curious about since I was a kid, because the T.V. commercial scared me and images from it have stayed with me. Digression alley: I was talking to a friend at the party about old horror movie ads that scared us, these invariably only ran on the local NYC syndication-heavy channels, mainly WOR (ch 9) iirc. I distinctly remember being terrified of the ads for Phantasm, Dawn of the Dead, Suspiria, Chosen Survivors, Zombie...there were certainly others but the memory banks are failing. Maniac, I think, that loathsome Joe Spinell mess. Mother's Day, for sure, and It's Alive. Anyway, Burnt Offerings -- no great reputation, some folks hate it (some folks hate apple pie and babies, though), but I figured I'd get it under the belt after all these years of wondering what it's all about. I ended up liking it for the most part, it has some unsettling moments, I don't mind the slow burn, the kid actor isn't irritating, and comparing it to The Shining -- which Burnt Offerings and the book it was based on predates --  is interesting. Supposedly Stephen King has said the book was an influence, certain elements are certainly there -- small family in big, troubled house, relationships fray as obsession and possession and the supernatural crap kicks in, the caretaking element, a son in danger from his father, dangerous plant life, etc. It's not spectacular and it's slow, you'll yell at the characters to just leave the friggin' house at some point,  and Oliver Reed's sweating might distract you more than Karen Black's eye. Reed is actually the rational one (!) but like Nicholson in The Shining, he brings baggage to the role and you keep wondering when he'll go bugnuts. I think Reed, Black and Bette Davis chew up less of the scenery than one would expect (they do bite off quite a bit), and despite the big names and familiar faces (Dub Taylor -- who the hell puts Dub Taylor in a horror movie even for five minutes? Hubba Bubba!) it didn't feel like one of those schlock horrors where some know actors are slumming through and you can't pay attention because you keep thinking, "Holy shit, there's Jack Palance -- what's he doing here?" Acting honors go to Eileen Heckart for a short but crucial turn as one of the home's owners, sister to the hamming it up Burgess Meredith in a wheelchair ("Holy shit -- what's he doing here?").  He does the typical creepy old dude thing that, if I were dealing with him, would make me walk quickly to my car and get the hell out of the place. Heckart manages to do the "I've got a secret, heh heh heh" bit really nicely, putting a more urbane and modern spin on what's usually a gothic old crone routine. She's like an evil real estate agent just barely hiding a smirk as she sells someone on a very sour lemon, a fairly banal take on evil that really worked for me. Anyway, no great shakes, you'll guess some plot points way ahead of the characters, but I think it's a decent spook bit.

Earlier this week I watched Ghoulies because I'm an idiot and while it wasn't what I expected it was as bad and stupid as I expected. I did laugh a bunch of times and enjoyed the cheesy 80's-ness of it all.

Hoping I get enough work done today to justify seeing another potential piece of whatever. Feel free to chime in with whatever you've watched in the last day or two for the season, or what you have lined up for Halloween night.

Shocktoberfest

I've been thinking about horror movies a lot lately, to the point where if I had the time and opportunity I'd be camped out on the couch marathon-watching all sorts of crap featuring monsters, mad scientists and maniacs while inhaling boxes of Count Chocula. Part of it is because of the season, part of it because I'm doing some thinking about some upcoming scripts that are horror-oriented, and part of it is because we subscribed to Netflix recently.

After years of not having cable or broadcast television and the DVR and a variety of instant choices -- and not going to see movies in the theater since sometime around 2004 or so --  I haven't been on top of much of anything, movie-wise, horror or otherwise. I don't really follow Hollywood goings-on via the computer, a lack of time, a lack of interest, as well as a lack of knowing where to get the best information. Since I wasn't watching anything, there really seemed to be no reason to find out what was coming out. And to be honest, I'm one of those boring old duds who doesn't get excited about what I do see trailers for. Movies I would have seen in the past don't knock me out, things I'd see out of curiosity like Tintin, look like garbage. I don't care about torture horror movies, not a big fan of CGI horror or horror with a big budget (which is an essay in itself I don't have time to write --  as a general rule, I think horror films should lean towards cheap/un-slick production, use as many "real" effects as possible, and when it comes to the actors, cast as many anonymous folks as possible, eschewing big-names who bring distraction and expectations into a movie -- unless the movie works smartly against those expectations). I'm generally as bored with re-imaginings and remakes and re-contextualizings as I am in superhero comics. I just want a good story, some characters who aren't all douchebags, and something creepy or scary or dreadful rather than simply loud and violent and confusing. Any deeper meaning is a bonus. Dawn of the Dead as consumerist commentary? Okay, whatever, if it doesn't work as a zombie romp than all the smartypants critical theory subtext  games in the world don't mean jack. I just want a good horror movie, first and foremost. Or a watchable bad one, even. At least give me something I haven't seen before. As with martial arts movies, I just want to be knocked out by something and not bored to tears. You'd think that wouldn't be so hard to to, but everyone agrees that most everything everyone makes is lousy (what those things are and why they're lousy varies, of course), so obviously there's a trick to it or something not many people have figured out. Or care to figure out. 

I like almost all kinds of horror movies although my head's usually geared towards the 30's-40's (Universal/Lewton/poverty row outfits), the 70's-80's (grindhouse/drive-in/VHS onslaught) and Asian offerings. I'm interested in recent stuff, because while I realize there's been a horror boom going on,  I haven't seen much of anything (horror or otherwise) since the 90's. I've been turned off by most of what I had seen in the 90's on up -- I don't love the slasher stuff and I generally avoid the torture stuff, I won't go near sparkly vampires or Wes Craven-affiliated anything, and as I mentioned before  pretty much avoid remakes. Not because they're remakes in and of themselves, but because everyone seems to go the same route with them judging from the trailers and word of mouth -- take the old story and throw a ton of CGI effects at it and cut the footage up more violently and haphazardly than the movie's victims. True, you can't judge everything from trailers, like they say you can't judge a book from it's cover, but I don't have to eat shit to know it's not for me, I can smell it just fineto know to stay away from it (this analogy is not guaranteed by law to actually be worth anything).  Anyway, I tend to prefer the supernatural or super-normal (to quote the old radio show Lights Out) in horror movies, although I'm not unwilling to watch the maniac with a weapon and a grudge hoo-ha. I just generally don't get super-excited by someone with a cutlery collection attacking people as if they know they're in a movie and have to stage shit cleverly. Unless it's clever, and fun, or crazy, like Dr. Phibes or Theater of Blood or some of the less sloppy and -infuriating giallos.

Anyway, this is a long-winded attempt to just say, hey, I feel like bullshitting about horror movies and not annoying my wife with it, she's got enough on her hands. I am trying to watch something here and there when time allows, in the past month I watched The Mummy's Ghost (Universal, 40's, not good), revisited Waxworks (80's, not good but dopey, amiable fun) and Tobe Hooper's The Fun House, which I've been curious about despite it's reputation. It was on the cover of Fangoria magazine back in the day and I never got around to it. It was duller and worse than I'd expected, I almost fell asleep and nothing in it rose to any occasion, even as exploitation. A tedious, nothing film.  

Curious as to what folks are watching for Halloween, what they like, don't like, think is overpraised, under-praised, and what they'd recommend from the past decade that I might check out. I already know I want to watch the original Let The Right One In, maybe Drag Me To Hell because I like Raimi's early stuff, maybe The Devil's Backbone or whatever that was called, despite my feeling that del Toro makes seriously uneven films.  If you want to know more about where my head's at, I think people who defend Romero's Day of the Dead as brilliant are crazy, that Savini's remake of NOTLD is vastly underrated, Fulci is a hack, Romero isn't as good as some folks say, Tobe Hooper kind of stinks, Carpenter can't direct action and lost it before some say he lost it, Wes Craven generally stinks (I like The Hills Have Eyes, he did that one, right?), Argento's film's usually make me crazy in a bad way, I like Bava, I prefer Amicus to Hammer, I think Dracula is an important but not-very-good film I think Phantasm 2 is perfectly fine and 3 and 4 are terrible, I didn't like Ginger Snaps even though I was supposed to and am some kind of moron for not liking it according to the internet, I like most of Cronenberg's movies, I thought The Ring wasn't very good but had some great scenes and a sense of dread -- neither of which the American remake had in the least bit,  I loved The Shining and couldn't watch more than the first part of the tv-movie version, hated Nightbreed, thought Hellraiser was okay, never understood why some folks consider Pumpkinhead a classic, didn't like American Werewolf in London, I like slow zombies but don't mind running zombies, I didn't like Return of the Living Dead when I first saw it but eventually came to love it, I don't hate the sequel like everyone else does, and I don't like the third one like everyone else seems to, some films I used to like a great deal that I don't think hold up so well on repeated viewings include Nightmare on Elm Street, Silence of the Lambs and The Howling, I like everything about The Blair Witch Project except for 95% of the actual movie, I haven't seen The Walking Dead but am curious despite not enjoying what I read of the comic, I hated the Tales from the Crypt TV show, I like werewolves and zombies and ghosts and monsters but am not into vampire stuff or the fans of vampire stuff (especially post-Anne Rice), my favorite way to see horror movies is in an old theater with an appreciative audience, I can sit through almost anything to completion even if I can't stand it, except my friends got me to give up on The Mangler while we were watching it because it was just so dull and terrible, I cannot believe there are sequels to The Mangler.

Whew.  Anyway, that's off my fanboy chest after bubbling up for a few weeks. Now I can go back to work, free and somewhat refreshed after all that rambling. Feel free to chime in with any comments, suggestions, mild insults regarding my stupid opinions. Just remember that's all they are, opinions. Although the Mangler is crap. I bet even the editor didn't sit through it.

Some Milk and Cheese News

This past Friday I received an advance copy of the Milk and Cheese: Dairy Products Gone Bad hardcover from Dark Horse. I'm very, very happy with the book, and am glad the wait and free-floating anxiety over how it would print is over. Now I just can't wait until the damned thing comes out



I've been meaning to take a picture of the actual book but we had house guests and I'm trying to catch up on work and...uh, well, I also don't know how to upload photos from the camera. So, ha ha on me, Mr. Marketing King. Anyway, maybe these links to some pictures editor Scott Allie took of the book will work and provide an idea of how the finished product looks:

Fig 1. Assistant editor Daniel Chabon with the book in question.

Fig 2. A flip-through shot showing the color section and endpaper design.

Anyway, the main thing is that I have one and you don't, and you funnybook-enlightened folks who want a copy to brighten up your stodgy comic book shelves will have to wait until December 21st to buy it in a comic shop (or January 3rd or thereabouts if you pre-order the book through Amazon).

I have to say It feels really strange having all this material finally collected between two covers, almost 23 years to the day I awkwardly wrote and drew the first Milk and Cheese comic (October 26th, 1988, to be exact). 23 years! Holy crap. And I was 23 when I did that first strip, wasn't I? Numerology is bullshit but that's still pretty funny. Half my life ago. Cripes...

In related news, the Milk and Cheese pin-up auction to help with Steve Niles' dog Sonny's cancer treatment is now live. If you can't bid on the piece, or any of the other art Steve is offering up (some from his private collection, some donated by artists such as Mike Mignola, Guy Davis, et al) maybe you can donate a few bucks if you're a fan of Steve's work, or dogs, or you're just a charity donating fool.

And finally, there's whatever this is:

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Half my life later.

Cripes...