§ John Jakala runs into the kind of people who reflexively defend the superhero genre while observing:

The superhero comics that do stand out are generally well-written and have something interesting to say about the human condition other than “Wouldn’t it be cool if we brought back a bunch of old characters no one’s seen in a long time?”


§ Tom Spurgeon has a very lengthy post-bang interview with San Diego CCI’s David Glanzer, and Glanzer gives out lots of vague sound bites, which Tom tries to penetrate to no avail, although it’s unlikely that detailed answers to the questions would be pertinent at this point. But it does prove that much of SDCC is an optical illusion:

GLANZER: I am not saying there is no special concern for those companies. What I was trying to say is that each company, publishers, and retailers included, may have different reasons for attending the show.

A imagine the reason for a retailer to be at the show will differ from a publisher who has no retail outlet. It doesn’t mean one is more important than the other, it simply means they might have a different criteria by which they must judge the success of their presence at the show.

In 2006 we had 155 booths dedicated to comics (Golden/Silver/New Comics), in 2008 we had 173 booths. In regard publishers, in 2006 we had 363 booths that were taken by publishers and in 2008 that number increased to 403 booths. And we still have publishers and retailers that are on our wait list for space.

1 COMMENT

  1. John Jakala said:

    “My eyes start to glaze over whenever someone feels they have to defend superhero comics.”

    Then HE’S the one displaying a “reflex,” is he not?

    I read the original article he linked to and thought it was OK aside from not putting forth an adequate definition of “realism.” Yet there are elements of what I’ve termed “thematic realism” as a common element between Zola’s naturalism and Kafka’s surrealism, so the guy’s not technically wrong.