By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 4/11/2016
While many remember The Death of Superman story line at DC, I remember the death of Superman’s red trunks in during The New 52 with more anger– it seems as though the publisher is trying to leave behind a key element of the character’s design. Artist Tom Derenick (Batman/Superman) has posted a better look at Jim Lee’s […]
By: Jerry Beck,
on 3/29/2016
Hanna-Barbera characters like you've never seen them before.
The post DC’s ‘Hanna-Barbera Beyond’ Will Remix and Reimagine Classic Characters appeared first on Cartoon Brew.
Add a Comment
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 2/19/2016
In his video introducing DC's Rebirth publishing plan, Geoff Johns calls it a "third rebirth" for DC. At first I thought this referred to the original DC, Silver age Flash and...something else? But he was actually referring to reimagining Green Lantern and the Flash characters with better, more motivated origins. Perhaps more accurately, from an external viewpoint, its the third rebirth of DC in the Diane Nelson era, following the New 52, DCYou and now a new line based on core characters. Or as he put it, in the video's most quoted line, "It's not just an event, it's a mission for us."
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 2/18/2016
Is April Fool’s Day to be renamed Harley Quinn Day? Maybe after the HARLEY QUINN AND THE SUICIDE SQUAD APRIL FOOL’S SPECIAL #1 comes out on April 6th, The cover by Jim Lee is being unveiled today at ComicsPRO. The interiors are by writer Rob Williams with art by Lee, Scott Williams and Sean “Cheeks” Galloway. […]
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 1/26/2016
Over the next eight weeks, you can expect a cavalcade of Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice promos and interviews and articles and whatever else the internet is able to throw at you. I’ll surely ignore most of it after this point, as I think often movie marketing hits the point of negative returns after […]
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 11/19/2015
Sometimes great things are worth the wait.
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 7/24/2015
At SDCC '15 I talked with the Burnside Batgirl crew about their creative origins, how the look that launched a thousand cosplays came to be, how to handle creative criticism, and their earliest con experiences.
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 7/14/2015
Jim Lee
By Nick Eskey
One of the happy-highlights of San Diego Comic-Con is when DC Comics co-publisher, writer, and artist Jim Lee just sits down and draws. Well he doesn’t just draw. The talented artist also has the chops to be a regular comedian. Every year on Sunday, his “Drawing with Jim Lee” is a highlight of the convention.
The panel this year had a slight hiccup however. From what we were told, he had it on his schedule that it would start at 3pm to 4pm, not 1:30pm to 2:30pm. We wouldn’t have to wait till 3pm, but he wasn’t going to be there till 2:15pm. A number of people left, but a majority stayed the extra forty-five minutes.
When Mr. Lee did show, a wave of applause went through the room. He took to his chair, and looking out at the crowd said, “Thanks for staying. It’s a real testament to your guys’ love of a free sketch.” Everyone erupted with laughter.
He continued to thank the crowd as he pulled pencils, “Pigma” pens, inks, and brushes out onto the table. “Now, you see this? It’s a Pigma marker. It gives you a fine tip and you can go thicker. You can use it for defining, or shadowing… They always send me a bunch of these, so I use them. I’m still waiting on this year’s crate.” More laughter. “You’ll have to excuse me, it’s Sunday at Comic-Con, so I’m not all here. But really guys, I do enjoy this panel a lot. Compared to the other days, this one is just very intimate, and a fun atmosphere. So thank you.”
He proceeded to trace the lines on a “Wonder Woman” sketch that he had started earlier. “I thought I would get some drawings done beforehand so I had more to pass out to you all. So I… I got ONE. Yay!”
As he put the finishing touches on, he addressed the convention staff. “Is there anyone in here that works for Comic-Con? Do you know the difference between ‘Law’ and ‘Justice?’ Well, Law is what should be done. Justice is what needs to be done. So I know there’s some sort of rule forbidding panelists from handing out food to attendees in the room. But I got all these ‘Twix’ bars I want to give out.” Low and behold, Twix bars were passed out to everyone in the room. “We did an ad campaign back in June that took up a whole page… So yeah. That’s Law and Justice.”
While he finished his Wonder Woman, he had the crowd ask him questions. One person asked if he still did personal drawings from his Marvel days. “I’ll occasionally draw Marvel things for friends who like Marvel… It’s fun to draw these characters every now and then.” He was then asked if he would draw one. “Fine, I’ll draw Wolverine… but he’s got to wear the Batman suit.”
Jim gave out the first sketch, and then began on the second. He began with a circle, and built upon it. “Trace basic shapes. They are like the blue print.” With the skeleton of the drawing done, he started the detailing. “Wolverine is like Batman. But smaller nose, bad breath, and… 2.8 billion dollars.” As he began the lining, he added “Batman is a lot like Wolverine, but less feral in nature… DC has less angry characters.”
It’s obvious how much Jim Lee enjoys his art, and sharing it with others. The amount of care he puts into his work looks effortless. It comes from years of practice. As he’s working on Wolverine’s nose, he smiled and said, “Add the nose and the teeth that make him look like he’s going to drop a deuce.” The room erupts again in laughter. “No, see? He’s kind of hunched over. He’s about to sit on the toilet.”
“Add the nose and the teeth that make him look like he’s going to drop a deuce.”
Finished, he gave Wolverine away, and took the request of doing “Harley Quinn.” As he drew, an attendee asked, “With nine kids, what do you do to relax?” Jim Lee looked at him, and laughed a little. “I make nine kids… No really. What do I do to relax? I draw. When I draw, time goes by. I fall into my pocket dimension, which is full of shirtless, muscular men.”
As he finished the drawing and was going to give it out, another person asked, “Who’s your least favorite character to draw?” Without hesitation, he answered, “Spiderman. I do believe he’s one of the best creations of Jim Lee, but I don’t like drawing Spiderman. He has all that webbing…The webbing, it creates the form of the costume. And when it moves around and curves, it’s just hard to plot.”
For his last drawing, he asked who he should draw next. A flurry of responses came through. But the one he latched on to was “Aquaman.” “Look, this girl is putting her hands together and pleading! That’s the international sign of ‘I have to draw this.’”
While he drew the last sketch, the question of “What’s your favorite part of the costume to draw” came up. And this was probably my favorite response of the night. Jim Lee answered, “Oh you’re not going to trick me with that.”
The Jim Lee Sunday panel is probably the favorite of many. The fun and playful atmosphere is one that can be greatly appreciated on a Comic-Con Sunday. Though it doesn’t really explain much of the techniques in his drawing, it does allow everyone to see one of comic’s greats make wonderful art. Let’s all hope it continues for a years to come.
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 7/11/2015
Moderator Victor Lucas and Lego Artist Nathan Sawaya
By Nick Eskey
“Lego” is the toy that let’s allows kids and adult to build from premade manuals, or to create out of their imaginations. Complete miniature sized cities, even worlds, can be made. But what about a something larger than life?
Nathan Sawaya is the artist behind the nationwide touring exhibit “The Art of the Brick.” Instead of tabletop pieces, Nathan has created life sized sculptures that defy everything people think of when they hear “Lego.” One of his best pieces is a scale sized T-Rex skeleton. His exhibition has been touring city after city. Soon we’ll be treated to his newest work, a collaborative effort with Jim Lee and DC Comics.
Yesterday at San Diego Comic-Con, Nathan Sawaya and Jim Lee were present to talk about the upcoming exhibit and more. Nathan first explained how he always had a love for Legos as a kid. When his parents refused to get him a dog, he took his sets apart and made one instead. Later in life, he kept his love of the toy alive as a hobby, building after work on his free time. Eventually his few statues turned into over a hundred, and later a touring exhibit.
Co-Publisher of DC Comics Jim Lee
Jim Lee and DC Comics came into the picture when Nathan wanted to build a particular piece for the exhibit: the Batmobile. However Nathan wasn’t comfortable with designing it. He asked Jim for help, and after the comic artist checked out the sculptures and spoke of bigger things with the Lego artist, they approached DC with an idea. And so, the “DC Comics Meets Lego Arts” exhibit began.
Nathan and his team spent the last year putting together this exhibit, using much of DC’s well loved franchises. He said only one thing is still needed to finish it up. Yup, the very Batmobile it started with. This is where Jim Lee took to the sheets of paper taped to the wall. “We’re going to design it here today with your guy’s help.”
Jim Lee making the Batmobile from a shoe
The first thing he asked of the crowd was what shoe we wanted to use. “One of my tips is that cars all start as shoes.” Jim showed the room by taking suggestions such as slippers to high-heels, and then transforming them into Batmobiles. The panel’s moderator gave the suggestion of a “Dr. Martin” boot, and Jim “kicked” into gear. As Jim Lee sketched, Nathan quipped “I hope he doesn’t decide to change the color to something like chartreuse, cause I bought maybe a million black Lego bricks.”
As one would imagine, the process of building one of these sculptures isn’t always easy. “I have to glue the bricks together. If I make a mistake or if things don’t look right, I have to chisel it apart. And I hate capes by the way.” One of the hardest pieces he had to make for the project he said was the “Superman #1” cover when DC was Detective Comics. The background was in 2D, with Superman and the car he’s holding in 3D. “And of course that cover has a cape,” he said.
Jim Lee and Nathan Sawaya
One of the greatest things though about the project said Nathan and his team was the ability to bring such icons to life in such a new way. “Warner Brothers and DC gave us such leeway so that we can show these characters and give them new life.”
What does it take to be a Lego artist? An engineering degree perhaps? Sometimes it just takes imagination and hard work. “I started life as an attorney,” said Nathan. I would come home and work on my Lego sculptures. I had a website that exhibited my work. When my website broke because it got too many hits, I knew I had to make a life change. So I quit my job, and started making art.” As for his scales, the reason why he does life sized sculptures is because he feels he expresses himself better that way. “The larger the sculpture, I might have to use support beams made of Legos. But because I glue the pieces, that tends to be enough.”
When the DC Lego art exhibit launches this November, it will start in Sydney, Australia. From there it will go on its worldwide city tour. As an extra treat for the audience, Nathan revealed a piece that will be a part of the tour: A two faced Batman and Joker.
Never before has art, Lego, and DC been merged into a cohesive medium. I sure can’t wait till it eventually makes its way here to San Diego.
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 2/13/2015
The Multiversity has easily been among the best of DC Comics’ output since it debuted last August, and with each succeeding issue, it keeps getting better and better. Embracing everything that is weird and wonderful about the DC Universe has made it an utterly unique experience, with its most recent Guidebook issue even being hailed by Robot 6 as the “most DC Comic ever”.
Despite lots of critical acclaim that has it standing shoulder to shoulder with other great superhero comics like Ms. Marvel, the one thing that Morrison’s opus hasn’t quite done is rack up massive sales. They’ve been moderately successful, but slowly diminishing to where Thunderworld sold just under 48,000 copies (and the Guidebook selling under 39,000 per Comichron)
But if there’s one creator that can spike sales with some level of frequency, it’s Jim Lee. He’ll teaming up with Morrison for next week’s Mastermen, which focuses on the Nazi Justice League ruled Earth 10 and the Freedom Fighters.
Via Buzzfeed, here’s a preview of the upcoming issue:
THE MULTIVERSITY: MASTERMEN #1
Written by GRANT MORRISON
Art and cover by JIM LEE and SCOTT WILLIAMS
1:10 B&W Variant cover by JIM LEE
1:25 Variant cover by AARON KUDER
1:50 Variant cover by YANICK PAQUETTE
1:100 Variant cover by GRANT MORRISON
On sale FEBRUARY 18 • 48 pg, FC, $4.99 US • RATED T
Superstar writer Grant Morrison joins legendary artist Jim Lee on Earth-10 for one of the most dynamic, action-packed issues of this entire world-shattering series – THE MULTIVERSITY: MASTERMEN!
Imagine a world where the Nazis not only won World War II but went on to direct world culture for the next 60 years with the help of an orphaned, alien super-weapon known as Overman! But hope is not lost! Rising from the ashes of oppression are a diverse band of heroes raging against the fascist regime – a band of heroes known as THE FREEDOM FIGHTERS!
What nightmarish parallel worlds haunt the dreams of Overman? Who is the mysterious figure called Uncle Sam? And when the dust settles, will the actions of Phantom Lady, Black Condor, Human Bomb, Doll Man and The Ray be enough to stop Leatherwing, Blitzen and the other “heroes” of Earth-X?
Learn all this and more in this exciting issue that acts as chapter seven of the critically acclaimed MULTIVERSITY storyline
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 12/29/2014
Guest post by T Campbell.
Can the soul of Western civilization be found in a pair of red briefs? Was our first great superhero at his strongest, his noblest, his superest, before modern interpretations stripped him of his underwear? Is there a connection?
A generation ago, when those red briefs were an inseparable part of Superman’s design, he was the most familiar superhero by a wide margin, leading the field in film adaptations,[1] headlining cartoon shows,[2] and even winning over famous media critics who were fiction writers in their own right. Even now, if you believe superheroes have anything to say to American culture or the human experience, you sort of have to start with him, because he’s the prototype.
Umberto Eco called him “the representative of all his similars” [3] and Harlan Ellison described him as one of “only five fictional creations known to every man, woman, and child on the planet.”[4] Born in the early hours of a visual, easily reproduced medium, he was popular enough to codify most of what being a superhero meant. The Oxford English Dictionary even mentions him by name in its definition of “superhero”:
su·per·he·ro ˈso͞opərˌhirō noun: superhero; plural noun: superheroes; noun: super-hero; plural noun: super-heroes. a benevolent fictional character with superhuman powers, such as Superman.[5]
And yet, Batman emerged a year later with no superhuman powers at all, and he was far from the only superhero to flout that membership requirement.[6] What really seemed to make a superhero a superhero, in the minds of the public, was the benevolence, the codename and the costume.
Superman is a strong man created by weak boys. Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster were nerdy teens when they came up with their first “Superman,” a madman with mental, not physical, powers.[7] Their second draft, far closer to the version we know, had what appeared to be a streak of white in his hair and a bare chest.[8] And those trunks, which persisted through other versions for eighty years.
Lacking any personal experience being strong, S. & S. took Superman’s powers from their beloved science fiction, and his costume from the circus.[9]
Underpants on tights were signifiers of extra-masculine strength and endurance in 1938. The cape, showman-like boots, belt and skintight spandex were all derived from circus outfits and helped to emphasize the performative, even freak-show-esque, aspect of Superman’s adventures. Lifting bridges, stopping trains with his bare hands, wrestling elephants: these were superstrongman feats that benefited from the carnival flair implied by skintight spandex. Shuster had dressed the first superhero as his culture’s most prominent exemplar of the strongman ideal, unwittingly setting him up as the butt of ten thousand jokes.
Grant Morrison [10]
Actually, Siegel and Shuster thought of Superman’s other clothes as the mockable ones. To fully understand the significance of Superman’s costume, look at him when he’s out of it—when he’s Clark Kent.
In virtually every version of Superman, Clark is an exercise in patient self-restraint, the ultimate man pretending day by day to be the ultimate common man. In his early days, this restraint was a superstrongman feat all its own, because Clark was extra pathetic—the better for Siegel, Shuster and the readers to identify with him.
I had crushes on several attractive girls who either didn’t know I existed or didn’t care I existed. So it occurred to me: What if I was really terrific? What if I had something special going for me, like jumping over buildings or throwing cars around or something like that?
Jerry Siegel [11]
Kent looked like Shuster, who later lifted weights for five years but never developed the bodybuilder’s confidence.[12] If Kent’s daily humiliations echoed Siegel’s past, they also predicted part of Shuster’s future.[13] When Shuster’s worsening eyesight drove him out of cartooning, he went back to deliveries, showing up at his former publisher carrying a package and wearing a ratty, worn-out suit.[14]
It’s not hard to imagine nerdy Shuster stammering “Sign here, please” in the same voice that Kent used to ask Lois, on their first date, if it wouldn’t be “reasonable” to let a bullying gangster have just one dance with her.[15]
Yet Shuster also drew Clark with a rock-hard physique that threatened to burst out of his jacket and pants at any moment. Every so often, after meekly tolerating an editor’s blustering or Lois’ icy contempt, “Clark” would crack a smile: if only they knew. For him, the angst Siegel and Shuster had felt in real life was just a pose, a suit he put on sometimes. And then he’d hear someone in trouble and strip off his shirt to reveal the S-shield underneath. The red trunks would soon follow. Underwear, for the underself.[16]
It was all just a game. Everything was going to be all right. Superman cheerfully presided over a world of bright rainbow colors where hurts and humiliations were temporary. Indeed, after a couple of years he developed a code against killing—a code most superheroes also followed.[17]
They also imitated the briefs, especially his most immediate peers—the original versions of Batman, Robin, Hawkman, Hourman, Starman, Dr. Fate, the Spectre, the Atom, and the Star-Spangled Kid all rocked the look as seen below. [18] And yes, more than half of those heroes also followed his “Somethingman” naming convention.
The 1960s and 1970s still saw plenty of new trunks-wearers among Avengers like Giant-Man and the Vision, mutants like Magneto, and gods like Orion. The Thing wore only trunks, and the Hulk torn purple pants. Other gods and mutants (Thor, Darkseid, the early X-Men) wore onesies broken up with a belt.[19] Strangely, two X-Men who each disdained the other’s sense of style—Cyclops and Wolverine—went full trunks-over-pants from the 1970s into the 1990s.[20]
This tendency to assign the look to gods and mutants, though, instead of more central figures like Captain America, Mister Fantastic, and Spider-Man, may have been an early sign that it was on its way out. These newer Marvel characters stood out from the first generation by being more fully realized people in their civilian identities, if not eliminating the dual identity altogether. Of the marquee Marvel heroes, only Thor, whose fashions and godly nature made him the exception that proved the rule, was introduced with a Clark Kentish self-denying secret identity.[21]
Superman’s influence continued to erode as the decades wore on. Newer heroes showed less interest in the code against killing or in names ending in “-man.”[22] And costume redesigns left the trunks behind. The X-Men got into black leather for a while, and their later, more colorful costumes still left the briefs out.[23]
Tim Burton’s 1989 Batman film “de-briefed” comics’ second most famous underwear wearer. Batman never went back to the briefs in any succeeding movies: they began to fade from the comics as well, as shown in this sample of Ben Moore’s larger survey of Bat-suits seen in various media, covering the period from 2005-2012.[24]
The look could still show up in the deliberately retro stylings of a film like The Incredibles; despite fashionista Edna Mode’s disdain for capes and insistence that “I never look back, darling, it distracts from the now,” her creations had an old-fashioned flair that matched the traditional values of their wearers, the kind of nuclear family that seemed to headline most sitcoms from the 1950s to the 1980s.[25]
Superman, for many years, seemed content to be a bit old-fashioned. His brand hadn’t been about “cool” for a long time: it was more about safety and stability. The comic-book Superman of 1962 or 1988 was more scientist than slugger, often approaching problems from a cool remove. His peers honored him as the one who came first, and therefore someone who didn’t need to follow the trends. He had, after all, defined them.[26]
Nevertheless, as superheroes and popular entertainment in general grew increasingly impatient with the “no kill rule,” the temptation to challenge Superman for wearing last year’s morals was overwhelming. The movies of the 1970s and 1980s danced around the issue by making Superman’s foes inanimate[27] or leaving their fates uncertain.[28] But many of his best-loved adventures, the ones that could claim to influence his canon, saw him sorely tempted to end a life—or even saw him succumb.
However, this was always an ending for the character as we knew him, as proved by what came next. In one such story, Superman instantly punished himself by giving up his super-powers and retiring.[29] In another, he died along with his foe.[30] In a third, he had a mental breakdown and went on a long journey of soul-searching before returning to duty with an even firmer vow, “Never again.”[31] In multiple stories of a world not our own, a world gone wrong, Superman deciding to kill is his first step toward villainy.[32] And at least once, he used magicians’ stage tricks to fool the world into thinking he’d broken his rule—just to show how terrible a Superman unchecked by restraint would be.[33]
The conservatism is unmistakable but charming. Nearly all fictional franchises create a moral universe that rewards readers for following them, and Superman is no exception. However much he struggled with it, refusing to kill would always be The Right Choice. Other heroes would always look to him for guidance, saluting his cape as if it were the flag. Underwear on the outside of your pants totally works.
The super-briefs stayed on for generations, in comics, movies, TV, Halloween costumes and branded, official kids’ underwear—an incentive to finish toilet training if ever there was one. [34]
And then everyone seemed to reject them at once. In 2011, Jim Lee redesigned all DC Comics’ top-selling characters, giving them the scratchy, slightly self-conscious “edginess” that had made Lee famous.[35] But the artist who had kept Cyclops and Wolverine in trunks now broke precedent. The red of Superman’s trunks shifted to his belt, and its buckle took a shape echoing the chest symbol. The trunks vanished.
I think you have to go for the core elements that are critical to the costume and freely change what looks dated… For me, the red trunks on Superman, you didn’t notice. It gets colored in blue anyhow.[36]
In the same year’s Action Comics, Grant Morrison and Rags Morales emphasized the populist strain in Siegel’s early, Depression-era stories. Theirs was a Superman for the 99 percent, and his costume was the believable result of a reporter’s salary: a screen-printed T-shirt, short cape, and jeans. [37] Morrison explained:
We felt it was time for the big adventures of a 21st-century Paul Bunyan who fights for the weak and downtrodden against bullies of all kinds, from robot invaders and crime lords to corrupt city officials. The new look reflects his status as a street-level defender of the ordinary man and woman.[38]
The filmmakers of 2013’s Man of Steel found the trunks clashed with their concept of the costume as alien armor. Even director Zack Snyder, whose adaptation of Watchmen had featured two trunks-over-pants designs to the comic books’ one,[39] now found himself breaking precedent.
The costume was a big deal for me, and we played around for a long time. I tried like crazy to keep the red briefs on him. Everyone else said, “You can’t have the briefs on him.” I looked at probably 1,500 versions of the costumes with the briefs on.[40]
Who stole Superman’s undies? Morrison takes responsibility for his part in it, Lee shrugs about careless colorists and readers, Snyder bows to the input of unnamed advisors. Their earlier output, though, suggests they had no dislike for the design, just a need to follow popular taste rather than acting as if Superman still shaped it. But fashion, as ever, sends a message about its wearer.
In Man of Steel, the blue is navy, the yellow rusty and gritty. Smallville’s Clark operates without a costume at all. Both versions of Superman are painfully unsure of themselves, closeted, desperate, and far less successful than earlier versions at preventing collateral damage.[41] Smallville averaged one death per episode in each season.[42] Superman’s first TV outing, The Adventures of Superman, averaged none—and lasted six seasons to Smallville’s ten.[43]
Analyst Charles Watson puts the Man of Steel death toll at 129,000, with the last of those deaths by Superman’s own hand.[44] Contrast this with Superman: the Movie, in which Superman saves everyone at risk from a devastating earthquake except Lois Lane, whom he then rescues via time travel. Man of Steel opened in eight times as many theaters as Superman: The Movie.[45] An influential new beginning, and by his old standards, an inauspicious one.
Man of Steel Superman may scream in anguish after killing General Zod, but unlike in the other stories where he crosses that line, he seems to get over it pretty fast. One scene later, he’s cheerfully knocking an Army drone out of the sky. He actually seems more relaxed and happy after the killing is done! No doubt Lois’ approval helps, but even so.
Man of Steel screenwriter David Goyer appears to be weaving some acknowledgments of that issue into its sequel.[46] He would like to assure you that the Superman you remember from your childhoods isn’t gone—he’s just not fully reborn yet.
Our movie was, in a way, Superman Begins; he’s not really Superman until the end of the film. We wanted him to have had that experience of having taken a life and carry that through onto the next films. Because he’s Superman and because people idolize him, he will have to hold himself to a higher standard.[47]
It’s true that Smallville and Man of Steel focus on a young Superman who hasn’t had a chance to become the graceful legend of earlier works. But these have been the portrayals to reach the widest audience in the last decade. [48] Even in current comics, though they have a lighter color scheme and mood, he’s an impulsive younger man with a quick temper.[49] The latest Superman project to be announced, TV’s Krypton, will take place thirty years before his birth.[50]
Put it all together and you’re left with the impression that Superman’s 21st-century caretakers would rather invoke the smiling, life-preserving, cool-headed circus superstrongman than actually show him. Will the next film change that? Will it give him the power and certitude to preserve all intelligent life in his path with a calm soul and a wink at the viewer? Or is that Superman no longer filmable, a relic to be tossed out like a pair of outgrown briefs?
Tights may tell.
[1] 1978’s Superman: The Movie earned nearly six times its budget and spearheaded the only superhero film franchise of the following decade.
[2] Some variation of Super Friends, always with Superman as the headliner, appeared on TV from 1973-1986.
[3] Eco and Natalie Chilton. “The Myth of Superman. The Amazing Adventures of Superman. Review.” Diacritics, 2(1), pp. 14-22. Spring 1972.
[4] Ellison, Foreword to Dennis Dooley and Gary Engle, Superman at 50: The Persistence of a Legend, 1987.
[5] Oxford English Dictionary entry, 2014. Found via Google search, November 22, 2014.
[6] Batman later used gadgets as sort of substitute super-powers, but other figures—the first Atom, Wildcat, and the Spirit, among others—used nothing but ordinary fists.
[7] Jerry Siegel (illustration by Joe Shuster), “The Reign of the Superman,” Science Fiction: The Advance Guard of Future Civilization #3, 1933.
[8] Les Daniels, Superman: The Complete History, 2004, p. 17.
[9] Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, Action Comics #1, 1938.
[10] Grant Morrison, Super Gods: What Masked Vigilantes, Miraculous Mutants and a Sun God from Smallville Can Teach Us About Being Human, 2012.
[11] Gerard Jones, Men of Tomorrow: Geeks, Gangsters and the Birth of the American Comic Book, 2005, p. 63.
[12] Tom Andrae with Geoffrey Blum and Gary Coddington, “The Birth of Superman,” Nemo #2, 1983.
[13] Craig Yoe, Secret Identity: The Fetish Art of Superman’s Co-creator Joe Shuster, 2009; Brad Ricca, Super Boys: The Amazing Adventures of Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster—The Creators of Superman, 2013.
[14] Joe Simon, My Life in Comics, p. 188, 2011.
[15] Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, Action Comics #1, 1938.
[16] Alex Ross for Alex Ross and Paul Dini, Superman: Peace on Earth, p. 7, 1938.
[17] Editor Whitney Ellsworth was the driving force behind this rule, as early as 1940, years before the Comics Code Authority.
[18] Art by Jerry Ordway, Who’s Who in the DC Universe #12, 1986.
[19] Tim Leong, “A Venn Diagram of Superhero Tropes,” Super Graphic: A Visual Guide to the Comic Book Universe, 2013.
[20] Art by Jim Lee for X-Men #11, 1992.
[21] Dr. Donald Blake is more complicated than we can cover here,
[22] Wikipedia’s “List of notable superhero debuts” shows a tapering off of such names after the 1960s.
[23] Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely, New X-Men #114, 2001; Joss Whedon and John Cassaday, Astonishing X-Men #1, 2004.
[24] Selected from Ben Moore’s 2012 “Batman Infographic: Every Significant Bat-Suit Ever,” found at Screen Rant, http://screenrant.com/batman-infographic-every-batsuit-benm-144238/.
[25] Brad Bird, The Incredibles, 2004.
[26] Image by Jim Lee for DC Comics.
[27] In Superman: The Movie and Superman Returns, natural disasters are the chief problem; in Superman III and IV, the main villains are destroyed but arguably not truly alive.
[28] Superman II.
[29] Alan Moore, Curt Swan and Kurt Schaffenberger, Action Comics #583, 1986. Source of the image below and the last “Silver Age” Superman story.
[30] Dan Jurgens, Superman #75, 1992. The famous, notorious “Death of Superman.”
[31] John Byrne, Superman #22, 1988; Jerry Ordway, Adventures of Superman #450, 1989; Roger Stern and Kerry Gammill, Superman #28, 1989; George Perez, Action Comics #649, 1989. John Byrne’s last Superman story, and a heavy influence on Man of Steel in terms of who Superman kills and why.
[32] Central premise of the video game Injustice: Gods Among Us, released in 2013, ongoing storyline in the Justice League/Justice League Unlimited animated series (2001-2006) and invoked in the climax of 1996’s Kingdom Come by Mark Waid and Alex Ross.
[33] Joe Kelly and Doug Mahnke, Action Comics #775, 2001. Adapted into a 2012 direct-to-DVD animated film, Superman vs. The Elite.
[34] Photo from http://savinginsalinas.blogspot.com/2011/09/yard-sale-finds.html. Superman has had many adaptations but this was true of virtually all of them until 2011.
[35] Geoff Johns and Jim Lee, Justice League #1, 2011 (image source), and George Perez, Superman #1, 2011. Lee’s career goes back to 1987.
[36] WonderCon 2013 panel, “WC13: Jim Lee Talks DC, Answers Fan Questions and More!,” Comic Book Resources, March 30, 2013, http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=44604.
[37] Grant Morrison and Rags Morales, Action Comics #2, 2011.
[38] Dareh Gregorian, “Bird? Plane? Superdude!,” The New York Post, July 18, 2011.
[39] Nite Owl wore them in both versions, but Ozymandias picked them up in the movie. Comics 1986-1987, film 2009.
[40] Reed Tucker, “‘Steel’ this movie,” The New York Post, November 25, 2012. Image from Man of Steel, 2013.
[41] In addition to the film itself, see Emma Dibdin, “‘Man of Steel’: Zack Snyder defends Superman’s ‘collateral damage,’” Digital Spy, August 30, 2013.
[42] According to smallville.wikia.com. In some seasons it was as high as three.
[43] 1952-1958; 2001-2011.
[44] Graphic by Chris Ritter, “The Insane Destruction That the Final ‘Man Of Steel’ Battle Would Do To NYC, By The Numbers,” Buzzfeed, http://www.buzzfeed.com/jordanzakarin/man-of-steel-destruction-death-analysis, June 17, 2013.
[45] Box Office Mojo. http://boxofficemojo.com.
[46] Devin Faraci. “Find Out Superman’s Situation In BATMAN V SUPERMAN,” Badass Digest, December 15, 2014.
[47] 2013 speech at the BAFTA and BFI Screenwriters’ Lecture series.
[48] 2006’s Superman Returns was far less profitable and problematic in a different way.
[49] Johns, Lee, and Morrison have confirmed this is deliberate.
[50] Lesley Golberg, “Syfy, David Goyer Developing Superman Origin Story ‘Krypton,’” The Hollywood Reporter, December 8, 2014.
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 11/17/2014
Grant Morrison’s Multiversity mini-series has proven to be an unexpectedly fun rfrolic thruogh the various realities of DC’s multiverses. Well, perhaps unexpected is not the world, since Morrison actually excels at this kind of thing and he’s does it before —Seven Soldiers—and probably will do it again. Actually, since this has been in the works since at least 2009, maybe Morrison already did it before. Tt’s Multiversity—anything is possible.
Anyway, the series continuing with an issues drawn by Jim Lee that takes us to a dimension where The Nazis won. This is the seventh of 8 connnecting one0shots ritten by Morrison with art by various folks, depicting various alternative realities of the DCU. Elsewolrds will never really die, will it?
Uproxx has the advance information:
THE MULTIVERSITY: MASTERMEN #1
Written by GRANT MORRISON
Art and cover by JIM LEE and SCOTT WILLIAMS
1:10 B&W Variant cover by JIM LEE
1:25 Variant cover by AARON KUDER
1:50 Variant cover by YANICK PAQUETTE
1:100 Variant cover by GRANT MORRISON
On sale FEBRUARY 18 • 48 pg, FC, $4.99 US • RATED T
Superstar writer Grant Morrison joins legendary artist Jim Lee on Earth-10 for one of the most dynamic, action-packed issues of this entire world-shattering series – THE MULTIVERSITY: MASTERMEN!
Imagine a world where the Nazis not only won World War II but went on to direct world culture for the next 60 years with the help of an orphaned, alien super-weapon known as Overman! But hope is not lost! Rising from the ashes of oppression are a diverse band of heroes raging against the fascist regime – a band of heroes known as THE FREEDOM FIGHTERS!
What nightmarish parallel worlds haunt the dreams of Overman? Who is the mysterious figure called Uncle Sam? And when the dust settles, will the actions of Phantom Lady, Black Condor, Human Bomb, Doll Man and The Ray be enough to stop Leatherwing, Blitzen and the other “heroes” of Earth-X?
Learn all this and more in this exciting issue that acts as chapter seven of the critically acclaimed MULTIVERSITY storyline.
By: Maryann Yin,
on 11/3/2014
Channing Tatum (pictured, via) will star as Gambit for a X-Men spinoff movie.
Tatum has also signed on to serve as a producer for this film adaptation. Screenwriter Josh Zetumer has been brought on to oversee the script. Chris Claremont, the Marvel Comics writer who created this character with Jim Lee, penned the first draft of the script.
Here’s more from Deadline: “The storyline is being kept under wraps. The character, which also goes by the name Remy LeBeau, has the ability to charge matter with volatile kinetic energy, causing the object in question to explosively release its charge on impact. The character materialized in a short burst in 2009’s X-Men Origins: Wolverine.”
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
Add a Comment
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 10/21/2014
I imagine that every sentence of this ICv2 interview with DC Comics co-publishers Dan Didio and Jim Lee will be gone over with a fine tooth comb. I think it’s the first time the two have sat down for a somewhat frank interview in six months at least. And what a six months it has been! Certainly, from the scrum of New York Comic Con, the essential public personas come out, Lee, the glass half full cheerleader, DiDio, the without me the glass would break authority figure. Lee addresses the new demographics with a shout out to Batman editor, Mark Doyle, whose future—at DC in Burbank or leaving the company— is still very much up in the air:
7Lee: There’s also a diversification within the audience itself the past couple of years. You’ve seen more women, more female readers, in general. When we launched Batgirl and Gotham Academy, those books struck a different note, different tonality, and that was in large part due to editor Mark Doyle bringing these projects together with different kinds of creators (see “Two New Batman Ongoing Series” and “New Batgirl Costume”). It was our way of broadening the base of the Batman family of books but doing it in a different way to attract a different audience.
But then DiDio refuses to throw licensers under the buss on recent fluffs like those awful shirts:
Who approves DC licensed products with regard to those issues and are you happy with the way that’s going?
Didio: Actually, we are. We have a strong relationship with our consumer products division that runs those areas. You have to understand that they’re seeing tens of thousands of products that they’re proof-reading and checking for information over a period of time. We have departments that work very closely with them within DC Entertainment, and they’re constantly working the system to make sure they’re aware of our audience and presenting the proper material to that audience.
Lee hints that Vertigo has some big plans and may even be in a position to start competing with Image for creators:
If you look at what we’re going to do in 2015 (which I’m not at liberty to discuss at this moment), possibly first quarter next year, you’ll see that we’re going through a major effort to rebrand the imprint. That’s going to come about through the projects themselves.
We’re working on a hit list of the top creators in the business and we have some exciting news to unveil in the early part of 2015.
But then DiDio insists that everyone loves the new royalty plan….
When we created the original royalty plan it was based on a periodical model. We’ve grown from periodicals to graphic novels and adding a digital component, and now we’re working with different types of products combined with books, so we need a level of flexibility and this allows it. I think what’s important is the talent themselves can feel that they’re truly participating and receiving the benefit of the success of the property.
The response from the creators was positive?
Didio: Oh, yes. We’ve had a strong response and it was positive all the way through.
I can say that there has been a strong response from freelancers I’ve talked to, alright, but it hasn’t been all that positive—the net effect has a been a rather large drop in royalties for many folks.
Anyway, Lee and DiDio have overseen a very successful era at DC (whether you want to admit it or not) and the move to the West Coast is bringing many changes. Like…what comes after “Blood Moon,” the pseudo bridging event that is being run by temporary editors which the survivors of the great migration make their way west in a Green Tucson. Props to Milton Griepp for getting them to sit down and talk even if it is the last report from a world that will soon be forever a memory.
(Thanks to all of you who went me the link)
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 4/1/2013
On March 30th, WonderCon attendees got treated to a bonus feature in a Spotlight panel with Ann Nocenti, Jim Lee acting as her interviewer. The two had so much shared history that they reminisced about the “good old days” at Marvel as well as plunging into the current artwork that most impresses them on their work for DC. The panel opened with a tone-setting description from Nocenti of her time as a Marvel writer and editor, “back in the day when Marvel Comics was so much fun”, when you could “smoke and drink and have guns in the office”. Lee confirmed that the gun in the office was an observable phenomenon, and Nocenti added by way of explanation that guns were needed for “reference”.
Lee started off by introducing Nocenti as the “self proclaimed female token writer at DC” and asked her how her current state came to be, considering that in her Marvel days there were several women on staff. Nocenti commented that though there were women at Marvel, she recalled that there were never any women at comic cons back then, unlike the demographic at WonderCon. “It must have been rough on you guys”, she teased Lee. Some of her workmates at Marvel, she explained, were Mark Gruenwald, “the soul of Marvel Comics”, Larry Hama, who was known for “pounding, crazy music” in his office, and Peter Sanderson, a “living archive” of all things Marvel.
Nocenti obviously had fond memories of the bullpen days at Marvel, stating, “The physical bullpen made the place creative”. She had a steep learning curve upon arriving at Marvel with a fine arts background, and had a lot to learn under her first editor Jim Shooter, someone who she described as “having a beautiful sense of story” and who ingrained in her the need for a “can’t/must” moment of conflict for a hero. The maxim still holds true for Nocenti, she confirmed. “He’s right”, Lee said, “Conflict is one of the key things in drama”. “Louise Simonson also had a huge influence on me”, Nocenti added, a woman who had the “power to cloud men’s minds” according to legend, by infusing even her most severe criticisms with a “cheerful attitude”.
Nocenti shared some of the lessons she learned from editing at Marvel with the audience, including the need for the editor present a fan’s perspective to the writer or artist: “A good editor has to understand that a writer is working so hard, and is so over worked, that they need ideas thrown at them from a fan’s perspective”. But from the editor’s perspective, she observed, it often leads to bizarre conversations and often caused her to ask herself “Did I just say that?” when generating “wacky” ideas with writers. Nocenti particularly enjoyed crossover development in the bullpen, and feels that she wasn’t alone in that enthusiasm, sharing “really exciting creative meetings” where “everyone would want to play at the same party”. Her advice to editors is to “learn everything”, like a “captain knows how to run a ship”, and she feels that this approach was encouraged at Marvel, but is less common today. This enables an editor to “know what everyone’s going through”.
Lee presented Nocenti with a copy of a comic they had once collaborated on together, though she confessed she didn’t recall the book, X-Men #39. After flipping through it and chatting together, Nocenti declared, “This looks like a great story. I want to buy this and read this!”, to the audience’s amusement. Lee’s questions, however, led Nocenti into darker recollections, about the “mini implosion” period at Marvel that led to her departure. Ron Perlman, she narrated, came into her office one day, wanting to meet her, and was fairly charming, but the “next thing we knew, he had gutted Marvel” financially. It was a “very traumatic” experience for “old timers”, she commented, and brought to her attention a famous quote from Dorothy Parker: “Don’t put all your eggs in one bastard”. After leaving Marvel, Nocenti worked in journalism, teaching, and filmmaking, gaining a wealth of experience that she now finds useful for life back in comics.
Writing a story about Catwoman in Arkham Asylum, for instance, she said, is drawn from a combination of her experiences working “at a place like Arkam” in her youth, and also from later editing Prison Life Magazine, which contained the work of prisoners. She observed a psychological feature that she’s incorporated into comics, the fact that it’s often “one small thing” that drives people crazy, not necessarily the bigger issues in life. Her experiences as a journalist and activist also led Nocenti to visit China, and some of her observations there led directly to her recent writing on GREEN ARROW, particularly noticing the pervasive “firewalls” on internet access in China and the sense of surveillance. Though she enjoyed working on GREEN ARROW, Nocenti explained that she “just couldn’t find her connection” to the character and was happy to move on to writing CATWOMAN, a character who she felt immediately in sync with. Her work on KATANA, too, keeps her imagination on its toes, drawing on the “idea of ancient clans, where the rich hire Samurais and ninjas are like spies”.
Lee and Nocenti spent the remainder of the panel showing and discussing process artwork and completed panels from upcoming CATWOMAN and KATANA stories, and enthusing over their finer features. The images included the set up for what Nocenti described as a “big gang war” for Catwoman and scenes in Arkham with “old torture devices”. Nocenti’s work on KATANA is based on her own obsession with martial arts and Kurasawa and martial arts films. “All comic book writers are doing really is unloading their personal obsessions on the page”, she confessed. This leads the writer to worry that readers might not find it interesting, she said, but in the case of Katana, Nocenti’s obsessions have translated to plenty of interest from fans. Nocenti regularly practises karate and judo around the house to see how Katana would move and act, and makes things even more “realistic” through watching martial arts films. It’s clear that her adaptable nature, shown throughout her varied career paths, is still going strong, and that her personal enthusiasm for her projects is still one of Nocenti’s most defining features.
Photo Credits: All photos in this article were taken by semi-professional photographer and pop culture scholar Michele Brittany. She’s an avid photographer of pop culture events. You can learn more about her photography and pop culture scholarship here.
Hannah Means-Shannon writes and blogs about comics for TRIP CITY and Sequart.org and is currently working on books about Neil Gaiman and Alan Moore for Sequart. She is @hannahmenzies on Twitter and hannahmenziesblog on WordPress.
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 5/11/2012
Oops these events came in the emailbox a bit late but still deserve some attention:
Richard Feynman’s Birthday at AIP
May 11, 2012, starting at 6:30pm
Center for History of Physics,
One Physics Ellipse,
College Park MD 20740
In celebration of Richard Feynman’s birthday — and because we were looking for an excuse — the Center for History of Physics at the American Institute of Physics is happy to host a talk, discussion, reception, and book-signing with Jim Ottaviani and Leland Myrick, the writer/artist team behind the smash graphic novel biography FEYNMAN (New York: First Second, 2011). You are invited for an evening of history of science fun, here at the American Center for Physics. Admittance is free!
Johns and Lee Signing at Midtown Comics
WHO: Geoff Johns, DC Entertainment Chief Creative Officer, is one of the most prolific and popular contemporary comic book writers in the world. He is the author of the New York Times bestselling graphic novels BLACKEST NIGHT, GREEN LANTERN: RAGE OF THE RED LANTERNS, GREEN LANTERN: SINESTRO CORPS WAR, JUSTICE SOCIETY OF AMERICA: THY KINGDOM COME, SUPERMAN: BRAINIAC and the upcoming BATMAN: EARTH ONE.
Jim Lee, Co-Publisher DC Entertainment, the artist for many of DC Comics’ bestselling comic books and graphic novels, including ALL STAR BATMAN AND ROBIN, THE BOY WONDER, BATMAN: HUSH, and SUPERMAN: FOR TOMORROW. He also serves as the Executive Creative Director for the DC Universe Online (DCUO) massively multiplayer action game from Sony Online Entertainment (SOE).
WHAT: DC Comics made history and set the world on fire when it introduced DC Comics-The New 52 less than a year ago. The new #1 issues introduced readers to a more modern, diverse DC Universe, with some character variations in appearance, origin and age. The launch of Justice League paired Johns and Lee together for the first time to work on some of the most iconic characters in the world including Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman. Now, the release of one of the first collections of the DC Comics-The New 52 series — Justice League Volume One: Origin — gives audiences a great opportunity to jump in at the beginning and explore this new universe.
WHEN: May 11th, 6 pm – 8 pm
WHERE: Midtown Comics
64 Fulton Street
New York, NY 10038Oops these events came in the emailbox a bit late but still deserve some attention. Wonder if anyone will show up to that Midtown signing?
By: Neil Gaiman,
on 11/22/2009
The more serious they try to make Batman and Superman’s costumes, the sillier they look.
Nothing says “stuck in the past” to me like people hung up on wanting to bring back briefs. But then, I’ve also always been a “no cape” person even before The Incredibles.
Is it sad that today’s superhero fan can make exception for superpowers but can’t get past the red undies or a cape?
‘Realism’ is a fickle thing.
I think it’s still worth noting that Golden Age superheroes wore trunks over tights like acrobats or circus performers. Not wearing the trunks would be… very revealing for a man. I guess we’re now so far from Superman’s original cultural context that most people are incapable of seeing his old costume as anything but “underwear on the outside.”
For what it’s worth, I think Derenick’s turnaround here looks a lot better than the cover by Janin released previously. Maybe it’s just that he used a lot more ink for shading, so the overall impression isn’t such a blue onesie.
I agree with Tim. Whenever anyone tries to “fix” Superman, they tend to break him even more.
Superman, to me, is a cartoon character, and changing his costume so drastically is kind of like getting rid of Bugs Bunny’s ears. Bugs has had many designs over the years but nobody has ditched the ears.
Superman is an old-fashioned character – he’s the guy superheroes are named after! – so his costume should have an old-hat feel. And Kate it’s not about being “hung up” on it – the red trunks aren’t going to make me read the lousy Super-books either way. But the traditional costume had a very simple red-blue-yellow rhythm that worked well and endured for decades, and tinkering with it, uh, has *not* resulted in any kind of successful, enduring looks.
Could maybe Jim Lee not design the new costumes on any iconic characters? Seriously, they just look cheesy as hell.
I can believe a man can fly before I can believe a man in American society would wear the trunks. It’s not about science, it’s about what the trunks look like to an observer. Arguably, he could have one of those frilly Victorian collars, since what he wears apparently doesn’t matter, right?
“Arguably, he could have one of those frilly Victorian collars, since what he wears apparently doesn’t matter, right?”
It does matter. He’s an icon. What he wears is practically synonymous with who he is. More people wear Superman merchandise than have ever read a comic book.
If red underoos don’t look realistic, then don’t fucking draw him in a realistic style. Pretty simple.
Red boots
Red boots
Red boots