SDCC '11

This year's con is wilder than ever -- everywhere you look there's a parade or a circus breaking out. IGN has some kind of incredibly annoying and loud installation right by the Hilton Gaslamp; Marvel's Monster trucks are roaming down Harbor Ave., loud as a jet fighter. We haven't been on the floor since Preview Night -- preferring to skulk in the alley ways and panel rooms of Old Con. One of the big changes this year is the use of wristbands for exhibitors. This has cracked down on the people who would just borrow an exhibitor's badge to get in early or stay late. It's one of those little perks that rule benders have been taking advantage of for years -- and it's about to end.

Crack open the spinach cans, because he's back! Popeye the Sailor is getting his own comic coming out from IDW Publishing. The Popeye ongoing series will be an all-ages book suitable for children, featuring all the classic Popeye characters and go on sale in 2012.

As the temperature outside hits 312 degrees Kelvin, I sit here in the cool subterranean basements deep in Stately Beat Manor, keeping watch over the reportage coming east from San Diego. While scanning the umpteenth cosplay photo, I got to thinking... perhaps our readers would care to look behind the curtain and see how we actually conglomerate the myriad data feeds which stream into our data center.

Tonight's Eisner Award ceremony will be a bit different: the con has hired a producer to help tighten up the show and keep things moving along. Previous Eisner Award ceremony, although a much loved comics tradition, have been, shall we say...lengthy. The new producer, who has a background in television and live events, is familiar with live awards shows and plays. According to con spokesman David Glanzer, there won't be monumental changes, but "by tightening things up, we'll see thigns run a littlr smoother, and hopefully help make it the event that people really do want to attend." Plans call for some trimming from the obituaries and other staging elements that will cut as much as a half hour from the show.

Seven amazing comics retailers were nominated for the Will Eisner Spirit of Comics Retailer award, including stores from all over the United States. We have personal knowledge of many of these retailers and can testify that they all exemplify the passion and love of comics that is the heartbeat of the industry The winner will be announced tonight at the Eisner Awards.

Since Uncanny X-Men just got renumbered - oh, I'm sorry, "ended" and "restarted" - today's X-Men panel was pretty sure to bring interesting news. It's been pretty clear for the last few weeks that Marvel's big push this convention was probably going to be X-Men, which makes sense, since the line has been losing visibility for years, overtaken by the various Avengers. And now, with a successful new X-Men movie under their belt, the time must have looked right. So what's up?

Today, DC's Vertigo imprint had its big panel of the convention. At it, Max Collins, creator of the graphic novel The Road to Perdition wil be doing a third (and last) graphic novel in the series for Vertigo entitled Return to Perdition.Ongoing series The Unwritten will be moving to an unusual twice a month format, with full numbered issues (32, 33, 34 etc) detailing the main plot alternating with decimal issues (32.5, 33.5, 34.5 and so on) exploring other characters and storylines in the same world. John Constantine's ongoing title Hellblazer will not end, despite the character's ventures into the mainstream DCU.

Star Wars Ruined Comic-Con!

Yesterday's ICv2 Conference on Comics, Media, and Digital kicked off Comic-Con with a look at the business side of things. Over at Publishers Weekly, Calvin Reid and I have a brief recap of some of the stats that Milton Griepp presented at his annual White Paper. Some quick hits: GN sales were up 3% so far in 2011 -- up more in bookstores, despite the Borders disaster, than in comics shops -- while periodical sales were down 8%. The peak of sales for comics and GNs was 2006-2007. Coincidentally that was also a peak year for manga sales, which has declined significantly yet again. But the rate of decline has stabilized.

I announced a new book yesterday! COW BOY, being published by good ol’ Archaia Entertainment. I’m writing, Chris Eliopoulos is drawing! Super-exciting, we’ve been working on it for a wnile. Me an’ Chris aren’t super-duper-megastars, so we figured doing an online announcement before the con started would be better than the weekend, when we could get drowned out by the massive announcements. So…yeah! Cool. In other news…

Folks have been lined up for a while to get into Comic-Con -- camp Twilight must be packing up about now, hopes and wishes high. Meanwhile, the regular line is about to start entering the hall. Earlier this morning, this is how the line looked -- we can't copy but click for the largest version which shows people lined up all the way around the marina.

Must pack. Must. Pack! Why do I never pack early? (Am an expert procrastinator.) Flight leaves at 8:30am! Several piles of clothes on bed! Nothing of use in suitcase! Am spending more time dancing and reorganizing clothes out of the laundry. There may have been some singing.