Tales of Syzpense #53

Letterhacking, the 5 Spirit of Comics Retailer Award finalists, foreign editions, the opening of the Creators Lair, and a Spinner Rack con job

Letterhackin’

Marvel Executive Editor Tom Brevoort has a Substack newsletter, Man With a Hat, that I look forward to every week. And it really does release every week, too, without fail arriving on Sunday morning.

Tom always previews new Marvel releases that he edited, and also discusses other comic-related issues and stories in great detail, but the primary lure of the newsletter is the lengthy section that is Tom replying to fan mail. I enjoy the Marvel history he drops in his replies, along with the occasionally prickly response to more inane or accusatory letters, too.

I like to read the newsletter over a cup of coffee and just sort of luxuriate in the nice flashback it gives me to comic book letters pages of old.

(And I’m in part envious because the abundance of letters Tom gets helps suggest lots of material for his newsletters, rather than just having to create something from a blank screen.)

Letters pages in comics are something I still love seeing, in new comics like pretty much everything Robert Kirkman publishes to older comics, where often the letters page was as compelling as the contents of the story itself.

I was thinking about all of this this week after I got a letter from Andrew J. Shaw about our series, The Cabinet.

Andrew is one of the most prolific letter-writers in modern comics… and he’s also one of the most consistently negative. I used to get his letters all the time at IDW, and while at Skybound, and he almost uniformly disliked everything he read. It mostly amused me, because he would also keep reading a series he said he hated, and he’d keep writing.

While I am amused and not offended by Andrew’s offerings — he’s opinionated and often very harsh, but for my money, once you’ve spent your money on a book, you’re entitled to any opinion you might have, even if it’s one I vehemently disagree with — not everyone in the industry feels the same way. Here’s a 2015 peak under Andrew Shaw’s “villain mask” if you want a bit deeper look at the person who sends these kinds of letters with great regularity.

Here’s what Andrew sent to me:

 ANDREW J. SHAW writes: I Like everything about it, Except the dialog and execution! Okay, maybe The Cabinet's color scheme is kind of childish and annoying, too. I find it confusing; I find it strange (if not unique); I also find that while the last 2 or 3 issues have been off-putting, that there is still Tremendous Potential here. Looking forward to at least trying Volume 2 next year! I think the dialogue has to be more forthcoming (understandable), and the coloring less gimmicky! Course, there are a lot of time travel vehicles--series/ shows/ books--in recent history; everything from Image's own Rifters, to Dr. Who?, Voyagers, Sliders, The Cabinet, Time After Time...well, I could go on. I don't see why you need Two writers for this either; that can screw up a script! Too many cooks in the kitchen (Cabinet) and the like. I want to like this series again, but I need to understand it too; this was the only really wonky issue I read today.

I obviously disagree with pretty much all of this but I also read all of it with a smile on my face.

As I say, I grew up as a fan of letter hacks: often, letters written to Marvel and DC from regulars like T.M. Maple, “Uncle Elvis” Orten, and others (alongside future comic pros from Dean Mullaney to Beau Smith to Kurt Busiek to Scott Tipton and beyond), were a highlight of an issue. The exclusion of letters pages from many reprints has been a shame. It’s great when they do appear in reprint books, as they do in Marvel’s Rom Omnibus series or in Abrams ComicArts’ Marvel Value Stamps: A Visual History. (And in case you’re curious, no, I never did write a fan letter to Marvel’s Rom series. I only wrote a few letters in my life: one was when I was 8, when I sent in a hand-written multi-page letter about a Fantastic Four storyline. The letter never got printed—I’d be surprised if it ever even got read in full, it was surely the ravings of a Marvel Zombie without a firm grasp on brevity or sentence structure—but Marvel was kind enough to send me a No-Prize, which was about the greatest (non-)response they could have given me.

Marvel’s No-Prize envelope

I also wrote two other letters that did get printed — one in Swamp Thing #118, the other in Brian Michael Bendis’ Fortune & Glory #3. And yes, both are embarrassing to re-read now. Especially Swamp Thing, which I originally came to long after the Alan Moore run had ended and so I thought the Nancy Collins run was the series’ high-water mark. It’s good, don’t get me wrong, but like the rest of the world, when I finally read Moore’s run on the series, it was an absolute revelation to me.

Anyway. Point being, receiving letters about comics, or social media posts, e-mails, whatever, are always (well, often) a fun, welcome thing. It’s nice to know that someone felt strongly enough about something you made to send their thoughts along. So I hope that continues on, and by people who maybe look a bit more charitably on the efforts behind making a comic than Andrew J. Shaw.

Incidentally, to wrap all of this up together, Tom Brevoort sent me something a year or two back and he mailed it in an old Marvel No-Prize envelope. I almost didn’t want to open it because a true No-Prize should be an empty envelope… but open it I did, since what was inside it was something I valued even more than the envelope. But I was completely enamored with the envelope choice, too.

UPDATE: After I’d put together the above, I got a late-breaking second missive from Andrew J. Shaw, this one reviewing Self Help #1, and you know what, I think Andrew might be softening a tad. Not sure how I feel about that…!

ANDREW J. SHAW writes: Hey, remember me? I did check out Self Help as well, but then I had already ordered it before your e-mail. I think SH has potential; I had never actually heard of any of the creators! Is that a good sign or bad? I think good. Be interesting to see how the rest of the story goes; this is a miniseries isn't it? I bet the two of them switch lives, Darren and Jerry; unless there's a murder coming next issue.

I mean, sure, the above review likely won’t do a whole lot for the egos of Owen, Jesse, and Marianna, but Andrew has always had specific tastes, and he seems to read way more comics than novels, so it feels like an innocuous comment, as far as his comments usually go… I love a happy ending to a story!

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Gained in Translation

Another thing I’m fascinated by in comics? Foreign reprints. I don’t care where they’re from or how far away from the originals they get, I love ‘em and am always happy when I come across a reprint while traveling abroad. (I love even more when my stuff is translated into other languages — there’s a Japanese edition of ZvR that is especially great. I first saw it in a photo posted by Kojima, before I even knew it existed, so that too was pretty cool. )

Anyway, these two books aren’t foreign editions that I picked up myself; rather, they were a gift from designer pal Ian Chalgren, who was recently in South America on a family vacation but still took time to hit some comic shops like a proper nerd. And even better, he sent me a couple Brazilian digests, each of which features four assorted issues. And some good ones—the X-Men edition alone features a Frank Miller Daredevil issue, Jack Kirby’s Eternals, a Paul Gulacy-drawn issue of Master of Kung Fu, and that great X-Men issue by Claremont/Byrne/Austin that’s featured on the cover.

One of the details I always enjoy are the re-positioning of characters on the covers, as well as the occasional re-draws of existing images to… better fit their audience or line up properly with their cover proportions or just because an editor wanted the image tweaked? Who knows? Who cares? (Well, the original artist might.) But Bronze Age comic covers are so firmly lodged in my head that not only knew the source of these two images (Incredible Hulk #253 and Uncanny X-Men #140, respectively). I also knew from memory that the Hulk image was slightly amiss. And it’s true—here’s the original Al Milgrom cover:

The Hulk digest does get bonus points from me since it features a reprint of a Rom comic (#13). I think that issue’s original cover, below, would have made a much better, if maybe less commercial, cover for the reprint.

Another amusing thing you see at times in these reprints, different sound effects. It doesn’t happen all the time, and there are necessary reasons for it at times but still, it makes for another fun point of comparison.

Finally, at the back of the Hulk issue is an ad for the Mexican Spider-Man comic series where Gwen Stacy lived. Which is a whole other fascination of mine.

Anyway, now you know—if you’re ever overseas and stuck trying to find a proper souvenir for me, well, I’m easy — any old foreign comic reprint will make me happier than any tchotchke from an airport gift shop.

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Catch the Spirit

I’m one of the judges for this year’s Will Eisner Spirit of Comics Best Retailer Award, which is handed out at the Eisner Awards ceremony the Friday of Comic-Con later this month. And after a process of evaluating all 28 nominated shops’ videos and support materials, the list of worthy nominees (all 28) has been wheedled down to the Will Eisner Spirit of Comics Best Retailer Award five finalists.

It’s been a great process, and such an exhilarating reminder of how strong, and how varied, the comic retailer community is. Congrats to all 5 finalists.

The five Will Eisner Spirit of Comics Retailer Award finalists, presented here in random order but all five look stellar (as do all 28 of the original nominees)

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Not-So-Secret Lair

Anyone in or around San Diego this weekend (that means you too, Orange County, and, why not, LA County and Riverside, too) is welcome and encouraged to come hang out with us here:

And it’s far from just me showing up — check this out to see all the attending comic pros.

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BookTalk

Abrams ComicArts sent me this week some pictures from the printer showing off the first official bound edition of my coming Mighty Marvel Calendar Book: A Visual History book. I know that the Amazon site still shows the in-store date as mid-December but the book is done and coming your way in mid-October instead. I’ll likely first see a printed copy during the Abrams panel at Comic-Con in a couple weeks but for this one, I may also have to do an official unboxing video when comp copies arrive.

And then sometime prior to October, I’ll share details of a handful of special, one-of-a-kind packages involving this book, the replica calendar itself, and an even more special element, too.

But until then, a few other book-related notes:

Author and friend of the Syzygy family, Rio Yours, stopped by Brian Keene’s newish comic-and-book store, Vortex Books and Comics, and posed with his favorite new comic series. Meanwhile, Rio’s latest novel, The Bang Bang Sisters, is out next Tuesday, July 18. I was lucky enough to read it last year and it’s like getting an adrenaline shot while blasting your eardrums with electric guitar riffs. Rio constantly delivers in his books and this one is maybe the fastest-moving action-film-on-paper that I’ve ever experienced.

And it’s not releasing til October 23 but word and solicits are out for this Dark Horse book, designed by our own Ian Chalgren and Dark Horse’s John Lind. Ian’s cover alone sells me on this book.

On its way ahead of both of these books, albeit perhaps only being released in French for now, is a 112-page graphic novel just gorgeously illustrated by mi Locke & Key hermano, Gabriel Rodriguez. It’s coming in September from Les Humanoids. I was a silent partner on this book and so got to experience Gabe’s amazing pages as they rolled in. This one—like everything Gabe does—is really something special.

In Syzygy News (should SyzNews be first rather than all the way down here? Am I bad at the self-promotion thing? Hopefully you’re still scrolling on your way to this week’s Spinner rack entry, anyway.), we finished and uploaded Self Help #3 this week:

Self Help 3 covers by Marianna Ignazzi and Stephen Byrne, with trade dress designed by Ian Chalgren

And also Lore #2:

Lore 2 covers by Ashley Wood

And while details are still somewhat under wraps, artist Jacob Phillips posted this image and note to Instagram this week:

"Just finished drawing the last page of MEGALOPOLIS – the graphic novel adaptation of Francis Ford Coppola's upcoming movie. I have been drawing this book (on and off) since December 2022 so it feel real good to get it finished. I need a pint."

148 pages! Created and written by Francis Ford Coppola and adapted to graphic novel form by me, with art and colors by Jacob. It’s gonna be something special. It already is.

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The Spinner Rack Con Job

I wanted to put together an entire group of convention-related covers… until it occurred to me that there really aren’t enough covers that fit that description. But I have a work-around after I get to the few I did find — and one of them features an image of a trade show on the cover but definitely not a comic-con, anyway. Still, there were a few — one of which I was involved in (Brian Lynch and Stephen Mooney’s great Angel: After the Fall #26):

So, because there aren’t really enough convention-related comic covers to suffice, I thought I’d also add in classic convention program covers here, even though many of these are too wide to fit in a normal comic spinner rack. But if you want to track them down and have a magazine-sized rack, these will do just fine:

Anyway—I know these aren’t comic books but they really do feature some great comic art, and they serve to get me even more excited for the rapidly approaching SDCC show.

Next time around, I’ll share my panel schedule and also an announcement of a new book I’ve been working on for well over a year and am immensely excited to share with the world, too. I will say for now, that the book and this coming Comic-Con are related in a particular way, too. Next time.