§ Frank Santoro is firing up his comics making correspondence course for spring, with a May 1 start date.

SANTORO CORRESPONDENCE COURSE FOR COMIC BOOK MAKERS – SPRING 2014 COURSE
Application guidelines:
-3 figure drawings done on blank 3 x 5 index cards
-3 landscape drawings done on blank 3 x 5 index cards
-3 still life drawings done on blank 3 x 5 cards
-send me simple jpgs
– do not post app drawings to your blog pls
-also send me specific url links to any comics work you have done.  Applications due by April 26th. Email me – santoroschoolATgmailDOTcom – and I will send you an invite to the course blog so you see what it’s like. Check out my Layout Workbook series over at The Comics Journal. Overseas students welcome. Payment plans available – I will work with you to make it affordable. Concerned about not having enough time to do the course? Many students have full time jobs. The “learn at home” method works on YOUR time. THE SPRING COURSE BEGINS MAY 1st AND LASTS 8 WEEKS.

 

§ Joe Illidge concludes his interview with Phil Jimenez who is just a classy individual all around:

I’ve always seen myself as a “professional” gay, someone who combines my politics and social outlook as a gay man with my work and how I choose to represent myself in my business. I claim it, find no shame in it, and I’m proud to represent, even if I’m keenly aware that I do so from a place of privilege — I have to be very careful to remember that “gay” doesn’t simply mean white and male, and so if I choose to embrace this advocacy as I do, I have to advocate for all gay people, and make sure the symbols I use in my work represent the many diverse facets of the LGBT community. It’s the least I can do.

 

§ Ursula Vernon has launched a Patreon campaign. Will webcomics take off on this new style of crowdfunding? Because its more focused on the creator and less on getting amazing rewards, we shall see.

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§ Hasn’t Little Nemo been in the public domain for a while? It’s surprising that everyone is doing Little Nemo tributes now, including IDW and Locust Moon comics. Zainab Akhtar previews the Dream Another Dream, the Locust Moon offering and the page above by Jeremy Bastien is but one of several gobsmacking pages already seen. YOW.

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§ Tom Spurgeon interviews Mimi Pond, whose autobiographical graphic novel Over Easy is one of the great pleasure of 2014 thus far.

SPURGEON: I’m always fascinated when someone takes this long to complete a single project. Does the voice change simply for the fact that you’ve worked on Over Easy for as long as you have? Does your perspective change over that period of time? Do you see those youthful experiences differently now than you did 15 years ago?

POND: All I can say is that I’m glad I wrote it all down back then, because I never would have remembered that stuff now. It was good that I got it down on paper. When I went to work in this restaurant in 1978 I knew there was a story. I absolutely knew that this was a story, and I had to figure out what it was and how to tell it. Over the years, it was always in the back of my mind. I would think, “I have got to get on that project. It’s gotta happen. I can’t let my life go by without doing it. It’s just too important.” Eventually, I figured out what the story was, and was able to start on it in fits and starts when my children were very small.

 

§ On a far less classy note, did you know that the National Enquirer nowruns stories about Walking Dead plotlines like this one that says a Daryl-Maggie-Glenn love triangle is in the works. Which makes absolutely no sense whatsoever.

§ Andrew Wheeler writes about gay stereotypes in the Marvel short Hail To The King and why it disappoints him so.

Now, let me put this in generous terms. It is easier to read this as an imbalanced and exploitative prison bitch relationship presented for comedic effect than to read it as a positive presentation of a loving same-sex relationship in which everyone is accorded dignity and respect. And this is throwback, retrograde, oh-so-’80s being-gay-is-something-that-happens-in-prison frat house humour. And this is the first presentation of a same-sex relationship or anything resembling a gay character in the Marvel Cinematic Universe across eight movies, five one-shots, and fifteen episodes of television. And that is the part that burns.

 

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