The bicycle guy character from Portlandia exemplifies the bizarre compulsion that some overly snobbish people have in regards to defining what is and is not hip. So when too many people or the wrong people are doing a thing, soon that thing is OVER. And while I hate to be labeled a hipster snob, I think there’s one thing sci-fi movies and television need to stop doing; and that’s having everything be all about Earth. Listen up everyone: having Earth be a big deal in your sci-fi movie or TV show is sooo OVER.

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In the original Star Trek TV show, the Enterprise very rarely rolls up to Earth. In fact, in the classic show, Kirk & co. NEVER visit an Earth that is contemporary to the 23^rd century, only visiting past-versions of Earth via time travel. In The Next Generation, the Enterprise comes home a little more often, but then only for super-special occasions (picking up Data’s severed head, fighting the Borg, etc.) For the most part, all incarnations of Star Trek TV shows take place in deep space, exploring crazy interesting sci-fi concepts without having to constantly be worried about the familiar. In fact, it’s in the unfamiliar that the wonder and magic of good Star Trek works. And yet, in all the Trek films, save for one (Insurrection) Earth is depicted and somehow involved, usually in a big way.

The reasons for this are probably because we’re told a big blockbuster movie must connect with a mainstream audience, and a mainstream audience has to have things they relate to. Seeing as we’re all from Earth (Well, most of us. Our production manager is half-meteor.) having Earth in a movie is probably a good move to make from a conservative point of view. But you know what? Screw playing it safe! I would argue visual sci-fi (not books!) has gotten so preoccupied with being accessible that truly imaginative sci-fi for the screen isn’t being made.

All the impending big deal sci-fi films this summer not only have Earth in them, but also seem to rely almost exclusively on what Earth is all about. After Earth, Oblivion, Star Trek Into Darkness, etc. seem to be specifically set on Earth. Now, I’m sort of optimistic for both After Earth and Oblivion, if only because they don’t take place in an established franchise. But something called Star Trek should contain some Star Trekking. (I mean, the current tagline for the movie is “Earth Will Fall,” not something like “Space Travel is Neat and Awe-Inspiring”) Further, upcoming sci-fi TV shows across the network spectrum are all totally Earth-centric. From Ron Moore’s Helix, to Stephen King’s Under the Dome, to SyFy’s upcoming Defiance, to Revolution, everything, everything, everything is about Earth and usually on Earth.

What mainstream sci-fi TV or film hasn’t been all about Earth you ask? Well, Babylon 5 wasn’t, Deep Space Nine wasn’t, and despite the fact that Battlestar Galactica was about looking for Earth, not ONE of the characters are actually Earthlings! The same is true of Star Wars. These are TV shows and films populated exclusively by aliens! And spoiler alert: Star Wars and Battlestar Galatica are awesome. Yes, yes, everything is probably an allegory for the human condition we Earthlings are all familiar with, but the creativity required to do a show/movie not about Earth and not set on Earth is truly admirable.

And though Doctor Who frequently shows up an Earth, it is nice that the setting of the show is nowhere specific, allowing it to be anywhere. Like, Doctor Who, Firefly also had this advantage, having the setting really be on a spaceship, not a planet. Firefly also went out of its way to state that Earth is all used up and too far away to actually get back to, eliminating it as a setting in the show.

Farscape is probably the greatest example of pushing the boundaries of what an audience will put up with: the cast is mostly aliens (some Muppets!) and the show is set on weirdo alive spaceship in a distant galaxy. My point with all of this is, it wasn’t too long ago in the cultural memory that we had good sci-fi TV (rarely films) that didn’t take place on Earth. In a sense, it’s as though no risks are being taken in film or sci-fi TV and anymore, and the symptom is an over-abundance of Earth.

This isn’t to say TV and film sci-fi that is all about Earth can’t be good, just that it seems a little played out right now. If one is overly concerned with science fiction having a duty to speculate on contemporary issues (which I’m not sure it does) more creative analogs might be found if we think beyond near-future science fiction, and instead, do some films or TV shows that really test the limits of what an audience can imagine. The announcement that Niven’s Ringworld will become a miniseries on the SyFy channel is certainly a positive step in this direction, as are the numerous other space-oriented SyFy shows in development. But in terms of sci-fi films, it seems like deep-space interstellar non-Earth stories are seemingly nowhere on the space horizon. And even with some of the in-development spaceship-heavy TV shows, I have a hard time believing that the "fate of Earth hanging in the balance” trope won’t somehow get wrapped up in at least a few of the premises.

We could blame everything from the war on terror to the end of the space shuttle program for an overabundance of Earth in film/TV science fiction, but I mostly think it’s just laziness brought on by a policy of viewer appeasement. Movies and TV taking place on Earth are things studios and networks think people want. I’ve written a lot about the homogenization of geek culture and the eerie similarities between contemporary blockbuster films. But this seems to be the one common denominator in science fiction right now: Earth.

Let’s have sci-fi on our screens get bonkers again. Let’s see some crazy absurd aliens again. Let’s truly explore some strange new planets and boldly have entertainment that is literally out-of-this-world.

EARTH IS OVER!

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Ryan Britt is a staff writer for Tor.com.

Bull Durham, which lies about sex less than most pop culture.

This morning’s post on the problems prestige television continues to have with sex inspired a rather epic conversation about the assumptions movies and television shows make about sex and sexuality, and the lies that a lot of them told us. A number of folks were kind enough to help me curate the conversation, including Jess Zimmerman, who Storyfied the section of the conversation on the very specific misconceptions about sex my followers took away from pop culture, Monica Reida, who captured, among other things, a long section of the conversation on young adult fiction, fan fiction, and respect for characters, and Heather McLendon, who produced a comprehensive roundup of the discussion I’ve embedded here*:

[View the story "Alyssa Rosenberg (& others) on sex and pop culture" on Storify]

One thing that was particularly interesting about this conversation to me was gender disparity that emerged in the assumptions people discussed in heterosexual sex (which is the vast majority of sex portrayed on television). Women are set up to be passive creatures who experience pleasure, rather than give it, who acquiesce to sex rather than seeking it out, who are constantly groomed and dressed to be ready for sex, but who don’t necessarily have knowledge of what gives them pleasure that they can pass on to their partners. Men, by contrast, are expected to be sexual ninjas, with an intuitive sense of how to elicit their own and their partner’s pleasure, who face no logistical challenges in the run-up to or aftermath of sex. Sex is spontaneous, solely involves penetration, and requires no foreplay for anyone involved to have any fun. Contraception is invisible. All participants are seriousness potentially to the point of grimness. No one talks, but everyone orgasms. Maybe this is a fantasy of what we’d like sex to be like. But it’s a set of assumptions that leaves out an awful lot of fun and emotional connection—as well as the fact that not all sex, even consensual sex between loving, knowledgeable partners, is good sex.

*Links in these good folks’ names go to their Twitter feeds. You should follow them.

In the past I’ve written in an attempt to pinpoint what I find so troubling about some portrayals of “strong” female characters, especially in American superhero and fantasy comics, but despite having expressed various reasons for these impressions as such I still have never felt that the answers I’ve given were entirely adequate. It’s been an on-going process of self-questioning and observation, and the reason I’m making this post is that I’ve come to realize another issue when it comes to the representation of female strength.

It came to me while I was reading the comic Flipside, which features as its main character a sexy and strong female jester named Maytag. Throughout the first volume, Maytag is repeatedly  confronted with a similar sequence of events. Some bad men confront her, threaten her with rape or call her a bitch, and then Maytag turns their expectations upside down and defeats them (for the most part), while still emphasizing her sexuality or making some sexual innuendos.

Keep in mind that Flipside isn’t a particularly egregious example, as it suffers more (at least early on, I haven’t read further) from a lack of experience and characters overly designed as wish fulfillment, nor are anime and manga completely innocent of this. Also, the act of knocking out your would-be rapists can be empowering imagery. Instead, what I realized by seeing this two-step process over and over in such a short span of pages is that the the seeming need for sexual threats to happen in order to establish a female character as strong diminishes a story because strength winds up being defined as the ability to not get sexually assaulted. In these scenarios, the girl can’t be strong in a world which accepts the possibility of strength in a woman as a believable occurrence, only in a world which has to constantly remind her what a girl she is and how as a girl she’s liable to be attacked.

Another problem is what I would label the “straw misogynist,” or characters who are purposely set up to be extremely sexist so that they can be put in their place when the girl fights back. The way straw misogynists are used in situations like the ones I’ve been describing is that by threatening rape or sexual abuse they immediately bring attention to the sexuality of the girl target, creating this mixed message where the thrill is both in that danger but also in the sexual way the girl fights back. As a result, it ends up conveying something along the lines of, “You might not be able to overpower me sexually, but if you could oh boy would you be having fun!” And even a sexual fantasy such as that is not a problem because it’s just fantasy, but if it’s being touted as an example of how female characters can be strong, then there should be no surprise if some readers reject that notion.

This is not to deny the use of dangerous situations for women in stories, nor do I think that stories need to “ignore” gender. Instead, what I want to emphasize is how showing someone is strong is a different experience from showing someone is strong with constant and persistent caveats to that notion.

Tweet Paul Tobin and Colleen Coover’s Bandette has received four Will Eisner Comic Industry Award nominations for 2013. The digital comic is up for Best New Series and Best Digital Series, and Colleen is nominated under Best Penciller/Inker and Best Colorist. Want to see what all the fuss is about? In light of the prestigious news, Monkeybrain is giving away issue one — free of charge — until Friday night of San Diego Comic-Con. This is a “great jumping on point” for those of you new to the title and impressed with the well deserved recognition.  After that, buy the rest of the issues (it will only cost you $3) so you can catch up  before reading the latest issue that debuts Comixology today. Here’s a sneak peak of the first four pages, buy the rest here.  Beside the fact it’s been waiting in your pocket this whole time, you officially have no more excuses to not read this comic.

BANDETTE #4 $.99 – Ages 15+ Paul Tobin, Writer Colleen Coover, Artist Solicit Text: Battle in the midnight gloom of the famous Père Lachaise Cemetery! Bandette, the world’s greatest thief, accepts a challenge to duel the deadly assassin Matadori! But unknown to either light-footed combatant, the criminal organization FINIS is maneuvering to make sure Bandette suffers a fatal defeat! Can Bandette avoid falling prey to their schemes? Meanwhile, who is the mysterious figure lurking amid the tombstones, and what plot does she have in store for Bandette’s rival in larceny, Monsieur?

 

Henry Barajas is the co-creator, writer and letterer for El Loco and Captain Unikorn. He has also written and lettered short stories for two successful Kickstarter SpazDog Press projects: Unite and Take Over: Stories inspired by The Smiths and Break The Walls: Comic Stories inspired by The Pixies.  He is the Newsroom Research Assistant for The Arizona Daily Star and was nominated for the Shel Dorf Blogger of the Year award for his work at The Beat.  You can follow him on Twitter @HenryBarajas.

Filed under: Marvel, Opinion

When I was a kid, there were two comics franchises that meant everything. The first was Spider-Man. He was my entryway into comic books, courtesy of Todd McFarlane and David Michelinie, and he made an indelible impression. The second franchise ... Read more

 

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Disney’s Alan Horn made it very clear at Cinema Con in Las Vegas this afternoon: the studio will be releasing one Star Wars film every summer from 2015 onwards.

This means Episode VII will get the ball rolling just two years from now, followed by its sequel, just two years from that. In the “off years” we’ll be getting the spin-offs.

We understand that these spin-offs will take place up and down the continuity, and at first focus on established characters.

Whether or not Disney will create a new series after the next trilogy wraps isn’t clear – they could go for a whole run of stand alone pictures, for example, or adopt something more like the Marvel model.

Now, most of this isn’t exactly news but the one-on, one-off schedule is, and seeing as JJ Abrams has seemed reticent about making the 2015 due date for his first contribution to the series, I don’t think it’s too likely that he’ll be sticking around for the whole trilogy.

The post Annual Star Wars Films From 2015, Alternating Saga Stories And Spin-Offs appeared first on Bleeding Cool Comic Book, Movies and TV News and Rumors.

Nintendo is developing a new Zelda game for the 3DS. In Japanese, the game is called The Legend of Zelda: Kamigami no Triforce 2. You probably remember the first Kamigami no Triforce game's English title, A Link to the Past.

The game will feature a new storyline, new puzzles, and new dungeons. Link will also have the ability to turn into a drawing on the wall to make his way around corners.

The game will be out this holiday season in the West, and it will be out in early 2014 for Japan.

According to Nintendo's US branch, it is "set in the world of A Link to the Past." It currently does not have an English language title.

The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past was originally released on the SNES in 1991. Many consider it one of the best Zelda games ever made.

Book publisher Seven Stories Press announced today that it will publish the English language version of the book about independent game Minecraft and its creator Markus 'Notch' Persson at the end of this year. The book is called "Minecraft; The Unlikely Tale of Markus "Notch" Persson and the Game that Changed Everything, and was written by Swedish journalists Linus Larsson and Daniel Goldberg, with the English translation being handled by Jennifer Hawkins.

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Masaki Suda, Shūhei Nomura, Ryō Yoshizawa star in adaptation of Yasunobu Yamauchi's gag comedy manga

Poor Darth Vader, he just can’t seem to find his way to Tokyo Disneyland where Star Tours: The Adventure Continues will soon start offering 3D trips around the galaxy. Today he’s stuck in Nagoya, Japan. Not quite as funny as the others, but it has its moments.

Previously: Darth Vader lost in Japan (one and two)

Star Tours in Tokyo Disneyland – Darth Vader Lost in Nagoya originally posted on
The Disney Blog - Disney News and Information -- by fans, for fans . If you're reading this on a different site, please click the above link to read the original story. Thank you.

                          

I love my job! Why? Because I get to share with you events like the upcoming Artist Showcase with the Disney Design Group, taking place on April 27-28. Not only do you get the opportunity to add beautiful masterpieces to your very own Disney collection, but you also get the chance to meet and hang out with some of our very own Disney artists, including Costa Alavezos, Brian Blackmore, Natalie Kennedy, Randy Noble, Mark Seppala and Darren Wilson. It doesn’t get better than that.

The artists will be taking turns appearing and signing art at the Walt Disney World Resort on Saturday, April 27, from 2–5 p.m. and 6–9 p.m. and again on Sunday, April 28 from 11 a.m.–2 p.m. and 3–6 p.m. Keep in mind, not all artists will be present at all times. Make sure you visit www.ArtofDisneyParks.com for a complete list of signing times, in case there are particular artists you want to see.

Here’s a look at some of the art you can expect to find.

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Disney Design Group Artist Showcase at the Walt Disney World Resort

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Want to see more? You know where they’ll be. I can tell you that there are quite a few other pieces by these artists debuting the same day, and you are not going to want to miss it.

Disney Design Group Artist Showcase at the Walt Disney World Resort by Michelle Harker: Originally posted on the Disney Parks Blog

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While much of the comics and film press has been focusing on various men of metal (iron, steel and adamantium respectively) alongside promising sequels and the lovely Thor, one comic film is being a tad overlooked. Starring Chris Evans, Tilda Swinton, John Hurt, Jamie Bell, Alison Pill, Ed Harris and Octavia Spencer, this looks set to be a very different kind of comic book film, and perhaps a surprise blockbuster.

Based on the popular bande dessinée Le Transperceneige, this is the story of a future world where the remnants of humanity live on board a single train, powered by a perpetual motion engine. The Earth is encased in a bitter Ice Age, induced by a failed attempt to halt global warming. The train, one thousand and one carriages long, holds an entire society within; the last society, segregated by class via position. The further away from the engine, the more poverty and tension can be found. Revolution is in the air.

The comic begins with the arrival of Proloff, an interloper from further down the train being captured by military late at night after breaking into a mid-section carriage. He is treated as if he might be contagious and locked away, while a supporter of train unity, Adeline Belleau, sneaks her way into see him and subsequently finds herself quarantined inside. Both characters have their heads completely shaved early in the story as part of this questionable imprisonment, resulting in that striking cover image of the two of them. (No spoilers!)

Created by Jacques Lob, who is perhaps most famous for Superdupont, Le Transperceneige was first published in 1982. Origially to be drawn by Superdupont collaborator Alexis, the artist sadly passed away not long into the project. The book stalled for several years until Jean-Marc Rochette came on board for art duties. It is, to my mind, one of the greatest sci-fi comics ever written. In all there are three albums/volumes, with only the first written by Lob and – I hazard a guess – it is only the first volume that the film adaptation will cover

Very little is known about the film, with only a couple of teaser posters, one still from the film set, and just recently several passport images of the characters released. The concept art is devastatingly beautiful, and faithful to the original comic. For director Bong Joon-Ho (The Host, Mother) it is his first English language film and the project is a collaboration between his native Korea, the comics native France, and the US with an estimated budget of $39.2 million (the most expensive film in Korean history). The soundtrack (sample here!) is by the wonderful Marco Beltrami, who has worked on the likes of The Hurt Locker and The Woman in Black. One producer in particular stands out – the mighty Chan-wook Park of Oldboy and Stoker fame.

Chris Evans is no stranger to the world of comic book films of course. He has brought Captain America to life in both his title film and the Avengers, as well as dabbling in another pool with The Fantastic Four. Add The Losers and Scott Pilgrim to the mix, not to mention the superhero-esque Push, and we have perhaps the ultimate comic book guy. Snowpiercer is more serious fare though, and it will be interesting to see him stretch himself more in that direction. As the biggest name on the cast list, it’s likely that Evans’ character, Curtis, is the main protagonist and the equivalent of Proloff in the comic.

While character passports have been released for Evans, Swinton, Hurt, Bell, Harris, Spencer, Ewan Bremner, Ko Asung, and Song Kangho, I would bet that the missing cast member – Alison Pill – is likely to be playing the equivalent of Adeline. In an interview late last year, Evans described working with Pill: “She’s fantastic, I did Scott Pilgrim with her. She’s just so good and her character in Snowpiercer is great. She’s perfect in it.”

Ed Harris gave some insight into his character and working with Bong over at Collider:

I play a guy who owns and runs a train.  You don’t see me until the end.  There’s a revolution going on with all the poor people that starts in the back of the train and moves its way forward.  They finally get up to the front where I’m at.  It was trippy.  The sets were unbelievable.  They had these big train cars that they build on a soundstage, and the whole thing was on this gimble deal.  I hope the film works.  I can’t see that it won’t, but it was amazing.  That was really a trip, working on that.  His whole way of working is so different.  He’ll just shoot bits of a scene at a time.  Normally, you’ll shoot a master and shoot the whole scene on one person and then shoot the whole scene on another, but he’ll shoot a little bit one way, and then shoot a couple lines another way.  He just constantly gets the pieces that he knows he wants.  And he had the editing thing down below the stage where the trains were, and the editor was cutting while he was shooting.  It was out there.

Chris Evans too has been totally amped about what will be his third cold-themed movie of the year (Winter Soldier, Ice Man…):

It takes place in the future.  The whole world was frozen over and all of society lives on a train.  It is kind of like an allegory for social classes and class warfare.  The poorest people are in the back of the train and as you move forward in the train the classes rise.  And there is a revolt, a revolution from the people in the back to the front of the train.  We have such a good cast: Tidla Swinton, Ed Harris, Octavia Spencer, and John Hurt.  It was just a great experience.  Director, Bong [Joon-ho], is just so good.  He is so good.   The way we shot the movie is so unique.  Most times when you are doing a movie…like if you and I were doing a scene, we would start out doing the wide shot, do the whole scene, then we would do your coverage, the whole scene, then my coverage, and then the whole scene.  And then the editor would find the cut and would spoon feed the rhythm and the pace to the audience.  Director Bong has storyboards laid out so that…he has already edited it in his brain.  For example, we will shoot the first line on you.  We will shoot the second line on me.  We will shoot the third line over here and you say, “Wait a minute.  Don’t you want the whole scene here?” and he is like. “No.  Don’t need it.”  He has already committed to an edit.  It is brilliant.  It is borderline genius.  It’s like building a house and instead of needing a bag of nails, it is like saying, “I need 53 nails.”  It is literally committing to a vision ahead of time.  The trust that you feel is like, “God, this guy is operating on another plane.”  And I completely surrendered to it.  You just completely commit to his vision and trust that he knows exactly what he is doing because he does.

Snowpiercer/Le Transperceneige as an allegory for social classes and class warfare is spot on, and perhaps why the comic feels as relevant today as it did in the early 80s. I’ve seen it described elsewhere as akin to Dante’s descent into hell which is equally apt as we see just how twisted humanity becomes in the so-called name of survival. It’s a claustrophobic and suffocating tale of human misery and perseverance, and something that has the potential to translate to the screen incredibly well. Certainly the moody and grimy shots released thus far – along with that snippet of the score – look promising, and I have a sneaking suspicion that this film could come out of nowhere this year to steal the glory from the DC/Marvel circus.

Sadly Le Transperceneige is not (yet?) available in an English translation and the French edition is annoyingly difficult to get a hold of. Perhaps a savvy comics publisher might want to pick up the translation rights before the film hits the cinemas? (Hint hint.)

Filming of Snowpiercer wrapped last July before heading to South Korea for post-production, and it’s been picked up for distribution over here by The Weinstein Company. Date to be confirmed but with my ear to the ground I’m predicting late summer/early autumn.

More of those passports and lovely concept art:

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There is a happy feeling in general when comics folks get together these days. Oh there may be the occasional digital kerfuffle, and DC personnel changes allow folks a satisfying tsk tsk or two, but in general more things are working than not. Retailer Brian Hibbs captures this happy moment in his latest Tilting at Windmills column which looks back on a ComicsPRO meeting that was, by all accounts, quite sanguine. I ope I may be forgiven for a longer than average quote just so everyone gets it:

As I probably mentioned last time, one of the largest focuses at ComicsPRO have become the Publisher Speed Dating, where groups of 3-4 retailers move from table to table, meeting with a new publisher every five minutes or so. The time is just short enough that we have to clearly focus on our concerns, but just short enough to keep your brain moving! We were up to 24 participating publishers/vendors this year, and I don’t think there was a single one of them who didn’t also walk away with pages of excellent, highly-focused notes on how to make their businesses stronger as well.

The repeated refrain from every single attending retailer was how well business is doing — I heard so many positive numbers and percentages of growth that one might think people were lying… except that national statistics are backing our individual experiences up — the national market is up a staggering 19.78% Q1 2013 vs Q1 2012, and that’s the “dead quarter.” That’s also after a yearly growth of 14.72% of 2012 vs. 2011, so things are going in what appears to be the overall right direction, and we’re also seeing the second consecutive year’s rise of the total number of comic book stores.

So, yeah, comics are thriving, and even more specifically, print comics are thriving in a way that many pundits did not see coming — unlike virtually other media’s experience in the face of new digital release models, the physical market for comics is growing — in fact, if I’m doing the math correctly, it appears to me that just the increase of physical sales in 2012 was larger than the entirety of the digital market combined! That is phenomenal for a medium that too many people are quick to write off as “dying.”

He goes on to say that most publishers seem to have their shit together, which, despite the tut tutting and tsk tsking here and there is mostly true. Complain as you might about all the comic book movies and TV shows, but the characters are better known than ever, licensed properties in comics are mostly being handled in a quality way, there hasn’t been a new rip-off comics company that fooled anyone in years, and there are more better comics new and old., than ever.

During my trip last month to the Center for Cartoon Studies in Vermont (a trip I still hope to write about before things get totally crazy) I spoke on the Industry Day panel with Abrams editor Carol Burrell, micro publisher Robyn Chapman, Scholastics editor Adam Rau and agent Stephen Barr. The mood was mostly practical and upbeat, in fact we were told we were a way more positive panel than the previous years which had been a real wrist-cutter.

The mood was jovial throughout the day, moving in to the mixer at night, where the students mingled with the industry vets. Towards the end of the evening, and a few $1 raspberry wheat beer sin, one of the students stood in the middle of conversation circle and said “I want to ask you one thing. You sounded so positive today, but is it all a bubble. Are coming going to go away in five years?”

And I replied what I believe to be true. “No. We’ve passed the hump. The tide may go out a bit, but we’ve reached a place where the medium is established, and it’s mostly because of the great backlist of lasting books and the important creators. And the movies and TV will keep driving interest.”

Now maybe I was being a bit too optimistic, but I do stand by that statement. geek culture is here to stay, comics are part of that culture—although kind of in the way that poetry is a part of publishing—small but inspirational. I think Chris Ware may be a one of a kind artist who can never be replicated, but his comics have forged a way to literary acceptance that will be hard to eradicate. On the artistic front, forget it…comics are so embedded in our visual literacy that they will never go away.

So yeah. A happy moment, for sure, a time of challenges and chances, but lots of both.

BUT. See my next post.

To be continued….

Photo: Thank You, the Secret Headquarters spin-off store in LA that opened last fall.

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In the Brian Hibbs column I quoted in my previous post, he also wrote this:

We also live in an industry where a significant number of comics being published today are probably not making a living wage for anyone involved — comics that sell just five thousand copies into a national market are probably netting the creators something less than $50/page — but I generally think that economic Darwinism really does work well in the comics industry, and that most of those poor-selling titles are a result of market rejection of the work itself, not a symptom of dysfunction of market as a whole.

And on his blog, Steve Bissette gets into this a lot more. This is also a period where creators rights at many publishing have been chipped away at to a remarkable degree. Again I’ll offer a longer quote than usual to get to the salient points:

The DC/Vertigo contracts which followed in the early 1990s were actually worse than the 1988 “creator friendly” contracts we saw, introducing a creative “options” clause (in which the creators would have to buy out the option, whether the accepted/paid for work was published or not, rather than benefit from traditional book publishing rights reversion clauses) that I have since seen more mainstream book publishers adopt, much to my chagrin. [snip]

But seriously, the so-called “comics industry” is otherwise in a new dark age. The major players are in Hollywood-la-la-land, and locking down anything that movies—uh, moves, for as little as possible: Silver Age terms for Post-Millennial Media Golden Age non-shares in the bountiful riches.

Page rates are in the toilet; “independent publishers” (i.e., not Marvel, DC, Image, Dark Horse, etc., which is stretching the definition of mainstream, but there you go) are offering rates for work-for-hire gigs that are less than freelancers were earning work-for-hire in the late 1960s-1980s.

What’s worse than the low page rates are the contracts offered (“take it or leave it,” most often) at those rates—I’m now seeing retro-retroactive contracts (don’t get me going). I’ve turned down cover gigs that offered less than I was paid for covers in the 1980s (and those were for “lucrative, prestige” licensed character gigs—you bet your ass the licensor earns more than the freelancers ever will).

The gaming industry has had a further negative impact on these matters; I’d be hard-pressed to cite the worst work-for-hire contracts I’ve laid eyes on, and I’m not in a position to share the many stories I’ve encountered (usually from freelancers terrified to tell those stories, their experiences, for fear of retribution or black-balling—how little times have changed).

With precious few exceptions (and there are, thankfully, exceptions): Self-publishing and creator-ownership is the only way to go, unless servitude and impoverishment is the goal.

This is accompanied by the above cartoon from 1988 that’s every bit as relevant today.

Despite the sales and creative boom for the industry, making a living at making comics is a precarious matter. The top gigs that guarantee a mortgage payment are as highly competed for as ever, but offer less and less creative freedom. At a talk the other night, former DC and Archaia editor Joe Illidge but it quite succinctly: Batman isn’t a character, he’s an intellectual property. That goes for all the top characters and brands. Page rates at the majors that I hear quoted are about the same as when I was editing comics over a decade ago. And below that, at smaller publishers, the rates are as low as Bissette quotes.

And that’s not even counting the vast vast market of great work that’s being done for free on the internet with some hope of monetization down the road.

Now, the good part of where we’re at is that there are more options than ever and gatekeepers are fairly powerless. I disagree with Hibbs in that not everything selling 5000 copies “deserves” a low payout due to low quality. We’re also at the “1000 true fans” moment and some of those comics are among the best being published.

It’s also true that comics often serve as a “portfolio” piece for creators to get a more lucrative job in animation or illustration or film or design where there is a higher economy. But those industries are also seeing a decline not an increase in wages, and making a living as an art director or designer isn’t any easier than it was 10 years ago, either.

What does it all mean?

I have no idea.

We’re at a point where no one knows anything. Every creative industry is in total flux right now. 10 years ago, creators figured out how to promote themselves on the web to build an audience but everyone does that now. The new tools are crowdfunding and merchandising and prints. In the era of self publishing, you always had to know how to run a business and do marketing to be successful, and now the elements of publishing and marketing to be mastered are more complicated and time consuming.

A lot of people are going to have bigger dreams than they can ever live up to. Not everyone is a Kirkman or Mignola or Ware or even a Noelle Stevenson.

I would suggest, however, that the crappy contracts being offered will become more of a conscious choice and less the only game in town. That’s already happening, to some degree. But it’s an important thing to point out, and as more creators become aware of what their rights can and should be, maybe the pendulum will swing back a little here and there.

In the end, I still remain optimistic. For the people with true talent, there are more tools than ever available to find an audience. And that’s the path we all need to keep searching for.

jl8comic:

Many of you have likely heard about the bombing at the Boston Marathon today. I’ve created this downloadable wallpaper to raise money to benefit the victims. All money raised will be evenly distributed between Boston Children’s Hospital and Red Cross of Boston. You can donate here.

Please spread the word, not only for this one, but for all charitable endeavors, including blood donation. The people of Boston need our help. Let’s give it to them.

-Yale

Remake heads to PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and Steam

Last week we posted a teaser for what appeared to be a remake of the classic 1990 Genesis platformer Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse. Well, it's now official, and Mickey will be returning to the titular castle on PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and Steam this summer. Video and more past the jump.

Yes, I know that you've seen those questionnaire at Disneyland, but there's more...

Much more.  Everyone is thinking that the Mouse is going to add a new ride, or land here in Anaheim, but it will be a land, and not just here.

There are at least two other locations that have plans for Star Wars lands to be build over the next 3-5 years.  These two locations are international, in addition to the land here, and a possible one in Florida.  It's always been my hope that Florida Project would get an entire Star Wars theme park, but as of now that's not the plan.  It appears that the financing for an entire new park might be too much given the current economic state of the world.  But lands?  Lands will work just fine for now.  And like the Cars Land area, the thought is to have at least three attractions.

The Imagineers in Glendale are in deep blue sky mode right now and several plans have been presented.  As of a few weeks ago, my Bothans said a final design was yet to be chosen.  Tom Staggs working closely on it, with an eye on a place his sons would love to go and ride/play.  George Lucas is being kept in the loop and Kathleen Kennedy has full authority to nix any plans that don't meet up with her taste.  Of course, Iger has final approval.  But what you've always thought of has been pitched.  From a Tattooine landscape to a Coruscant themed landscape have been presented.  Imagine the characters?  Perhaps a parade themed to land?  The meet and greets would be awesome too.

Depending on how smoothly things go, D23 could be very interesting...

Over the past eight or so years, we’ve all seen a worrying increase in the number of Western game development studios going bankrupt. We’re told this is due to the economic climate and that modern games cost more to make. Much of that is misdirection and plain old-fashioned bullshit.

I should know. I’ve been in the games industry for over a decade. While I’ve spent the bulk of that time working in development, as a designer, I also had a decent spell in publishing too.

In short, I’ve been on both sides of the fence.

In the previous console generation, the size of development teams was far smaller. Because of that, budgets were, too. One major platform, the PlayStation 2, dominated the market with an immense install base. All of that meant you had great profit margins.

By “you,” I mean the large game publishers.

The orgy of cash publishers enjoyed in the PS2 era made the majority of the management in games publishing complacent. A lot of people at the publishing companies made it into positions they wouldn’t normally have achieved. They were carried there by those large profits. Basically, they failed upwards.

These days, the market is much more fractured in terms of platforms. Games cost even more to make. And something has had to give.

Unfortunately, due to the fact that we have a large number of idiots in publishing management, this means that when they’re unable to manage budgets properly—most often the result of their own interference inflating costs—they hit the panic button and shut down the studio that just tried to make a game for them.

You also have insidious shit like Metacritic score targets written into contracts. That practice is done entirely to deny developers royalties if a game sells. And that’s not to mention the fact that, even if you make something that sells hugely and reviews brilliantly, you’re still likely to get screwed (just ask Infinity Ward).

Making this all even worse, game development is misunderstood and misrepresented to the gaming public. Design as a profession is generally thought to be all about ideas (except that it’s not). Singular geniuses supposedly drive the medium forward (actually, they don’t). The lone hero myth in game design—the one that associates one game with one game designer—is there primarily to benefit publishers. Not only does it produce a potent singular PR narrative but it also keeps those who do make games from receiving any meaningful credit or visibility for what they actually do.

Publishers control the narrative of how games are made. So when a large studio goes under, it’s assumed that’s down to the studio making bad creative decisions. Over the past few years, this meme has become worryingly widespread, especially as multiple studios have gone bankrupt.

***

Previously, the worst idiots in game publishing could make catastrophic fuck-ups, but the profit margins would protect them. These days, there is no profit margin buffer. Instead, publishers now resort to human shields.

---

"The lone hero myth in game design—the one that associates one game with one game designer—is there primarily to benefit publishers."

---

Ever notice that sometimes something seems broken across an entire game? Blame the developer, right? Well, not so fast. It might be the developer, but, trust me, those problems are very likely a result of top-down, high-level design requests from the publisher to the developer.

To give you an idea about how bad publisher influence can be, consider this: during production meetings, publishing execs often have someone—often the developer—“drive” a game so they can see how it is coming together. The publishing people all watch and then make passive, aesthetic appraisals of active, functional aspects of a game. This is because the bulk of execs can’t and don’t want to play or understand how games work. They don’t want to play. This would be akin to editors in literary publishing being unable to read or write.

The relative ignorance of people in game publishing has been called out before. As Gabe Newell put it, gamers/consumers have a much better understanding of games than the management at publishers. It’s entirely and utterly true.

I’ve seen that much of this inability by publishers to play games stems from a general insecurity towards the medium of gaming itself. Gaming often has much of its innate worth ignored, in favor of something with more glamor: film.

***

Having film as a touchstone for gaming is very much a thing that comes from publishers. It’s harmful to games, but this is what many of them want.

---

"The publishing people all watch and then make passive, aesthetic appraisals of active, functional aspects of a game. This is because the bulk of execs can’t and don’t want to play or understand how games work."

---

Not only does the framing of games as film excuse this habit of making high-level decisions based on aesthetics instead of in interactivity, but it also affords a modicum of prestige via an association with a medium that’s more established. This is what goes through their heads, but, in reality, this is absolutely killing games and developers dead.

The kind of ruinous top-down publisher decisions that I’m talking about often involve how a game looks and flows. The design changes that result tend to involve the creation of rigid and extended animations, ill-placed cutscenes and, at its worst, the functional simplification of core mechanics in favor of something that looks nicer to watch. The game that we all wind up with usually plays far worse because of those requested changes.

Games are not films, obviously. In terms of their inherent architecture, they are very different. With a film you can add on top of what was already there. Add a scene here; cut a scene there. Edit the movie differently. In games, the initial architecture of the game limits what can or can’t be added after that. This is why you hear stories of Shigeru Miyamato at Nintendo “flipping the table” and starting a game that was well into development from scratch, again. While that may sound crazy, it actually shows that Nintendo understands how games are made. It shows that, in fact, restarting a project will be cheaper and make a better game than adding features onto something that turns into some kind of Franken-mess.

From what I’ve seen and heard, imbecilic publishers tend to vastly underestimate the budget actually needed to create a game of proper scope. So you often end up with a situation where a publisher’s additional requests simply won’t fit well with a game that’s been made to budget. Their changes won’t fit what the game fundamentally is in an architectural sense. Much of what breaks games is very often down to these after-the-fact changes that don’t fit within the context of how the game has been constructed.

***

So you have these ignorant and insidiously-motivated top-down design requests that ruin a game. When the game tanks—invariably due to said top-down design requests—the publisher puts the blame on the developer (who is often contractually bound to say nothing). The developer goes under and the publisher continues on unscathed, ready to do the same again to another studio.

The problem with this setup is that it doesn’t get rid of those who screw up in publishing. It also ruins games, as well as developers, that would have been otherwise good or even great.

---

"When the game tanks—invariably due to said top-down design requests—the publisher puts the blame on the developer (who is often contractually bound to say nothing). The developer goes under and the publisher continues on unscathed, ready to do the same again to another studio."

---

If you were thinking that this is only the case for a few publishers, you’d be sorely mistaken. There is a huge amount of movement between the publishers and, ultimately, they’re all basically the same in terms of workforce. Even those that have run a publisher into the ground find jobs again at another publisher.

***

Given all of what I’ve just written, what does the future hold for gaming?

We know that big budget games currently need to sell millions to just make their money back. And the next generation of games will have to leverage the increased potency of the new console hardware. The result is a dangerous mix where these kinds of big-budget games could become unsustainable with the current “talent” at publishers.

Admittedly, you have the wonderful rise of indies who publish their own games. There is also a general realization among larger developers that following the same budgetary roads so many have been going down in recent years is foolish. It’s therefore likely that publishers, as we know them now, will soon no longer be relevant. (We’re already seeing a botched transfer of some people from publishing into development. They can obviously sense what’s coming.)

If publishers do survive then they need to be managed by people that aren’t inept.

The creation of a big game must involve an informed, sympathetic and symbiotic relationship between a developer and their publishing investor. That’s the only way for a game to become a true success, but it’s not what is happening now.

What we have now is insidiously-hidden, unsustainable exploitation.

Why your games are made by childless, 31 year old white men, and how one studio is fighting back

Cosplayer Teri Christine has a number of clever and charming comic book costumes on her Deviant Art page including a number featuring her young son as The Green Lantern and as you see here, the late Damian Wayne. When I initially stumbled upon this cosplay on Midtown Comics' Tumblr I thought it was adorable to see an actual kid dressed as the badass Robin. But upon clicking on Christine's profile, I found the image below.

It's a reenactment of the soon-to-be iconic death scene of Damian from the pages of "Batman Inc." #8. Thankfully there's no blood or sucking chest wound, but this strikes me as a touch disturbing. On one hand, I think it's just a couple of people having fun dressed as some of their favorite characters, reenacting a powerful moment from a recent storyline. But on the other hand, this is a dead child. Damian is 10 years-old, and seeing this played out with actual people, and an actual child just doesn't feel right for me.

In her coverage of the death of Damian, Geek editor Valerie Gallaher wondered if showing the death of a 10 year-old child was appropriate in a post-Newtown massacre world. She said:

But here is the big elephant in the room and I'm going to just say it: in the aftermath of the brutal killing of so many other children in Newtown, is this a tasteless story? Or more precisely, is the story itself not tasteless -- but the use of it as just another "gimmick" to tickle the mass news outlets (of which I am quite aware I am a part of) into once again realizing that comics exist, tasteless? I only have to point to one of the the NY Post's headlines for the Robin story, "Holy Hit Job!" -- a bizarre nod to the sunny 1960s TV show.

So what do you think? Is this harmless fun or is this as example of muting the emotional impact of the death of a child? Let us know in the comments or on Twitter.

Related Video:

Watch: Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Part 1 Trailer

--

Follow @MTVGeek on Twitter and be sure to "like" us on Facebook for the best geek news about comics, toys, gaming and more! And be sure to follow @eddiewright86 for more fun!

When I wrote my overview of anime in 1977 for the Golden Ani-Versary project, one thing I did not mention was the fact that all three of the major robot anime of that year featured to some extent a the relationship between a boy and his father. In Zambot 3, Kappei’s father had been away for a long time before he first appears. In Voltes V, the father of three of the pilots is missing, and the story goes from defending the Earth with the robot and base he built to finding out that he had been working on a noble task that requires him to be away from his family. In Danguard A, the hero Takuma becomes a pilot in order to fight the legacy of his father as the greatest traitor to mankind. Now the reason I did not mention this tendency in the article was that, upon further thinking, I realized that the “shadow of the (missing) father,” whether to be supported by it or to overcome it, is so ubiquitous that examples of it are strewn throughout the history of giant robot anime.

Here are some additional examples.

• Tetsujin 28: The Tetsujin 28, originally a weapon of war invented by Shoutarou’s father, becomes a tool for protecting peace.
• Toushou Daimos: Kazuya’s father, after having designed and developed the titular robot, is killed during negotiations between humans and the alien Baams.
• Mobile Suit Gundam: Amuro’s father Tem is a workaholic who barely sees his wife and child, and who has also developed the Gundam. When they meet again, Tem has gone insane due to oxygen deprivation. Char Aznable must also work through his legacy as the son of the great rebel leader Zeon Deikun.
• Rokushin Gattai Godmars: Takeru’s father secretly built the other five robots in order to protect Takeru.
• Mobile Suit Z Gundam: Camille, after informing both of his parents that they were cheating on each other the whole time, has to watch both of them get killed one after the other.
• King of Braves Gaogaigar: Mamoru inherits not just the will of his father but also of his entire race to protect the universe.
• Psalms of Planets Eureka Seven: Renton must continuously deal with the fact that his father is considered mankind’s greatest hero.

If you factor in the “shadow of the mother,” the list becomes larger as well, including titles such as Reideen the Brave, Panzer World Galient, Eureka Seven AO, Choujin Sentai Barattack, and even overlaps into some titles mentioned above such as Z Gundam and Voltes V. And I won’t even get into grandfathers at this point.

I intentionally excluded one title from the list above that I’m sure many people think of immediately when seeing the combination of giant robots and a strained relationship with a parent, because I wanted to set some perspective before talking about it in detail. Shinji in Neon Genesis Evangelion is sometimes spoken of as nothing more than a teenager with daddy issues. It’s not too far off, and of course the mother plays a role here too due to the fact that his long separation from his father Gendou is the result of his mother’s disappearance, but I think when this aspect of Evangelion is put into relief against the robot shows that have come both before and after it, you can say that it is the common thread which ties him with a lot of the hot-blooded heroes who are often considered his antithesis. The place where Evangelion differs, then, is more the degree to which the shadow of the father, and of the mother, are explored on the internal and psychological level Evangelion is famous for.

I do have some ideas about how this came about, though I also think the reasons may have changed along the way. With a title like Tetsujin 28, which began as a manga in 1954 and the anime in 1960, its back story contains the specter of World War II. The father becomes symbolic of that past, and so the shadow cast was about carrying their legacy or making up for their failure. The 70s marked the rise of the salaryman, and if you look at those 70s titles, they often feature missing fathers who are off either prioritizing their job above all else or working hard for the sake of their families. In this way, it’s not hard to see the relation to someone like the father Kentarou in Voltes V. My thought is that these series addressed a worry of children in this regard in order to assuage their fears about it, criticize the system, or to just point it out as something to relate to.

I haven’t thought through the transition into the 80s and then through the 90s, but Evangelion is often spoken of as the post-Bubble Economy anime, reflecting the reveal that the salaryman system of lifetime employment was not as guaranteed as people originally thought, which speaks to those reassuring images of the hardworking father from those 70s robot anime. It may also be, then, that a show like Eureka Seven reflects the current generation being told that the previous generations were so much better and greater that they wish to rid themselves of that legacy.

Aaron Diaz, the creator of Dresdan Codak, has put together a proposal for new Legend of Zelda game where Zelda is the hero sent to rescue Prince Link. Here’s what he says on the topic:

Clockwork Empire is set 2,000 years after Twilight Princess, and is not a reboot, but simply another iteration in the Zelda franchise. It just so happens that in this case, Zelda is the protagonist. I’m a very big Zelda fan, and worked hard to draw from key elements in the continuity and mythos.

This concept work is meant to show that Zelda as a game protagonist can be both compelling and true to the franchise, while bringing new and dynamic game elements that go farther than being a simple gender swap.

Here’s my question: If Link is now the prince instead of the hero, wouldn’t this game be The Legend of Link and not another installment in the Zelda series?

source: Indistinguishable From Magic

I've been excited about this post for days, because Mrs Annemarie Brown has been posting these figures one by one over Twitter and such, but I was waiting until the full set was revealed to do one big post about her latest custom creations, a full set of Studio Ghibli-inspired figures on the Vinylmation platform. It's hard to pick a favorite because they're all so beautiful!

The figures are all charming, featuring beloved characters from the beloved movies. Represented are: Yubaba, No-face, and Baby Boh with Jr. Mouse (Spirited Away), Kiki and Jiji (Kiki's Delivery Service), San and Moro with Jr. Kodamas (Princess Mononoke), The Baron (The Cat Returns), Howl and Calcifer (Howl's Moving Castle), Porco (Porco Rosso), Mei and Mini Blue Totoro (My Neighbor Totoro), Arrietty (The Secret World of Arrietty), and finally, Ponyo, featuring some of her sisters on the back side while she chills in a bubble (Ponyo). 

I've attached images that Annemarie sent over to the gallery, so please do yourself a favor and look through them! She even went through the trouble of giving them accurate backgrounds in the images, so you could really enjoy looking and taking in all the details. These really make me wish there were an official set I could collect with the same characters (and more)...!

Read more...

A damning take on Metacritic, and how review scores hurt games

According to former Disney animator Tom Bancroft on Twitter, Disney gutted their hand-drawn animation division this afternoon, and laid off nine veteran animators, including some of the studio’s biggest names: Nik Ranieri, Ruben Aquino, Frans Vischer, Russ Edmonds, Brian Ferguson, Jamie Lopez and Dan Tanaka. Two of the animators who still have jobs are Eric Goldberg and Mark Henn. The news of cuts in their animation division was leaked last week, but I, for one, did not anticipate that all these top animators would be let go. We’ve reached out to the studio for comment.

UPDATE: According to Aaron Blaise in the comments, Alex Kupershmidt was not among those laid off.

UPDATE #2: The Animation Guild reported that 9 veteran animators were laid off today so there are still two names that are unknown.

UPDATE #3: And now the Animation Guild is reporting in the same link above that, “Other veterans are being called in to meetings to discuss pay cuts and/or buyouts.”

UPDATE #4: In light of Disney’s dismantling of their hand-drawn animation division, this Animation Guild post from last October suggests that Disney execs, including Lasseter, had decided a while ago that hand-drawn animation was no longer a part of Disney’s gameplan. In the post, an anonymous staffer at Disney lodges the following complaint to union rep Steve Hulett:

We’re developing a bunch of different projects to show John Lasseter. It’s a complicated process. We pitch to a development group, they tell us which ones they like, then tell us that people who’re pitching need to develop three pitches for John, since he likes artists showing him three things.

And when we do pitch, it’s made clear to us that the stories aren’t necessarily for a hand-drawn project. When we’ve brought it up with John Lasseter, he’s shied away from commiting to a hand-drawn feature …

UPDATE #5: There’s a long-ish piece at Business Insider that explores reasons for the broader company-wide layoffs at Disney. They include the dying DVD market (and sluggish sales of Brave and Cinderella) as well as the $50 million write-down on Henry Selick’s cancelled stop motion project. Of course, the hand-drawn animation division layoffs are simply because Disney is moving away from drawn animation.

Depending on who you talk to, Sorcerers of the Magic Kingdom has either been a success or a great success. Either way, the capacity issues inherent to the game left the park with a quandary – how to provide more, without taking away from the experience of guests. The solution a separate interactive game called – A Pirate’s Adventure: Treasures of the Seven Seas. Other than a title that’s a bit wordy, this game looks like a bunch of fun.

In this video the Imagineers behind the game explain a bit about how it works and what to expect when playing:

Construction on the game headquarters and a few of the stations continues, but soft-opening of the game is expected to begin as soon as early May with a scheduled wide opening this summer.

Imagineers Preview New Interactive Game at Magic Kingdom originally posted on
The Disney Blog - Disney News and Information -- by fans, for fans . If you're reading this on a different site, please click the above link to read the original story. Thank you.

                          

moromi:

mouseofzipang:

mystic-revelations:

Tokyo Street

By puntxote

Okay can I just say something? 

Top left hand corner, Kaworu is saying

「パチンコも最高だね。」
“Pachinko is also the Best”

But one of the letters is cut off on the photo so it looks like it says

「チンコも最高だね。」
“Dick is also the Best”

This is best and valid.

I was going through corrections with a designer.

Client:  Can you add more internet stuff to this box?
Me: What is ’internet stuff’?

Client: You know, like shadows and stuff.

The tragic tale behind the death of City of Heroes and Paragon Studios