Comic Pants Podcast #12 (12-08-06)
Episode number twelve of the Comic Pants podcast is now live. ‘Tis the season, and David Martindale, Dave Farabee, Nick Budd and Randy Lander offer up some of their picks for gift-giving in this holiday season. Whether you’re looking for something for the comics fan who has everything, trying to tempt a significant other or friend into trying comics out, want to pick up something for the kids or perk up those superhero movie DVD gifts, we’ve got suggestions.
As always, commentary is welcomed and encouraged. Let us know what you thought of the podcast, give us some of your holiday gift picks, and if you’ve got suggestions for future podcast topics, leave us a comment! And listeners who write in could win cool comics every week! Please drop us a line at comicpantsfeedback@gmail.com to give us some questions or comments for the next show.
Use the podcast feed buttons on the sidebar to subscribe, listen via the flash player below, or directly download the MP3 here:
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Always listening to the show. Don’t like the new down load method, but hey. So amazon.com has all the Starman trades cept for volume 3, which has a CRAZY price. Can you think of any reason why the rest are easily available and this one is not?
08 Dec 2006 at 12:30 pm
QuoteActually, you can still download it as you used to by clicking the download link next to Play in Popup, I think… the Rapid Share is if you’re having trouble with downloading normally.
08 Dec 2006 at 12:49 pm
QuoteSeems like I heard something about DC letting the Starman trades go out of print. Apparently, volume 3 is sold out now, so the only way you get it is to pay a jacked up price for a used copy.
08 Dec 2006 at 4:45 pm
QuoteIt’s just weird that of all the trade to go out of print, it’s volume 3.
08 Dec 2006 at 10:40 pm
QuoteAh, Scene of the Crime a fine, fine chunk o’ comics.
You know, newuniversal, ironically, it even closer to Heroes than Planetary is- it’s also about people in the real world getting strange superpowers all of a sudden, and even has an archaeologist exploring possible connections. Ellis inadverdently tapped into the zeitgeist here.
09 Dec 2006 at 12:16 am
QuotePretty cool show. Liked how you included a whole variety of media, not just comics. I’ll admit it makes me envious to hear all the cool stuff that’s out there right now and not being able to check it out. Oh well…
09 Dec 2006 at 8:22 am
QuoteI posted about this in an older thread where the feature was requested, but I thought I would mention it in the most recent article as well. We now have a spoiler tag option. To use it follow this example:
[spoiler]Darth Vader is Luke’s father[/spoiler]To get:
Show ▼
09 Dec 2006 at 11:35 am
QuoteWait, he’s Luke’s FATHER?? Thanks a LOT, D3!
09 Dec 2006 at 2:55 pm
QuoteIn the podcast, D3 said that he’s tried to read the Battle Royale manga but couldn’t get into it.
Battle Royale was actually a novel before it became a comic and an English version is available. It’s a pretty decent book and I enjoyed reading it. I haven’t read the manga so I don’t know if they’re exactly the same or if they diverge in some aspects.
09 Dec 2006 at 11:35 pm
QuoteI can’t believe you forgot Mike Kunkel’s Herobear and the kid. This is THE comic-book Christmas story. Disnay-like story and art without any annoying mice. The TPB is 208 pages with tons of extras.
10 Dec 2006 at 8:52 am
QuoteThe manga is basically a massively overlong, hyper-fetishized version of the movie, so if the movie got you off, so will the manga.
And I use the term “got you off” because, well, I thought Battle Royale was little more than slaughterporn gussied up as hamfisted satire.
10 Dec 2006 at 4:02 pm
QuoteWhen you were talking about no Harry Potter comic, there’s always the Vertigo series BOOKS OF MAGIC- which I believe is entirely collected in trade now.
10 Dec 2006 at 9:57 pm
QuoteI would add the Courtney Crumrin digests as suggested gifts for significant others or teenagers who may not generally be into comics.
10 Dec 2006 at 10:52 pm
QuoteFirst off, great podcast again guys!
I do have another suggestion to give to your significant other and that would be Blankets. I assume that you are all familiar with this but I think it’s really touching and a perfect gift to give someone who doesn’t read comics and thinks that comics are all about superheroes. Or you could give your girlfriend the Hellboy Right Hand of Doom
11 Dec 2006 at 9:34 am
QuoteYou got that thing I sentcha? How exciting! Maybe next time I won’t write it in such a conversational voice.. “er..” and “6 ish”. biggity bam!
I first noticed comic book reading discomfort with Absolute Authority. Can’t read ‘em in bed.. too heavy. Make fun of my girlish wrists, I don’t care. I think you guys mentioned a book pedestal in a previous podcast, and I thot about how funny that would be for a comic.
“I will now read from the Book of Alias, issue 12, page 16: And Jessica Jones did say, ‘F**k’.”
Obviously, this isn’t that big deal (”My comics are too gloriously huge to read in bed!”).. but the 700+ page “Invincible” book made me think.. how big is too big?
I read $0.50 books in the bathroom. My LCS has a few long boxes with comics from the last 10 years that I browse through for things. I was curious about Brubaker’s “Authority”, but a single ish for 50 cents, I can do that. Will I buy the new “Deathblow” at $3? No.. but at 50 cents I’ll try it. I read that DC Focus series with the sick kid who became invulnerable all at $0.50 a piece. Hell, I read “DC Brave and Bold”, discounted from 99 cents to 50 cents! What a deal!
I guess it’s a collector’s mentality. But it’s not really about comics; I just like my stuff to look nice. So water spots (from washing hands) on my ‘nice’ books aren’t so much appreciated. It’s silly, I know. My LCS also hands out that Comic Shop Newsletter thing for free, so I read that in the bathroom too. I don’t leave any books in there tho. No good space for it.
Good friends of mine are getting “Midnight Nation”, “Birth of a Nation”, “Catwoman: When in Rome”, “Courtney Crumrin” and “Blankets”. But the mention of the “Art of…” book sounds like a really good idea. Maybe I’ll keep “Midnight Nation” and get him a “Art of..” book instead. Cause gifting myself is awesome.
I got a brother with a 3 year old daughter. I really wanna get him Andi Watson’s “Little Star”. Also, “Mom’s Cancer” is a great book to give the non-comic book reading adult — especially one with ties to the disease. That book can lead to interesting conversations. The structure lends itself to a new reader (comic book reader).
11 Dec 2006 at 2:37 pm
QuoteOh, also.. every time I flip a pillow to get the “cold” side, I think of “Blankets”. One of my favorites.
11 Dec 2006 at 2:38 pm
QuoteGet ready, one of Randy’s patented mega-long response to everything coming:
James Doe wrote:
I can’t believe you forgot Mike Kunkel’s Herobear and the kid. This is THE comic-book Christmas story. Disnay-like story and art without any annoying mice. The TPB is 208 pages with tons of extras.
I loved Herobear at first, but the constant delays, republishing and reformatting, etc. just lost me. I never did read the collected edition… it held up, huh? Maybe I should seek it out at some point. Kunkel’s art was certainly nice to look at.
Dan Coyle wrote:
And I use the term “got you off” because, well, I thought Battle Royale was little more than slaughterporn gussied up as hamfisted satire.
Oh yeah? Well maybe *you’re* little more than slaughterporn gussied up as hamfisted satire!
Seriously, I can get where BR is just way, way too over the top for some… but I was surprised to find myself really engaged in some of the best extended fight sequences I’ve seen in all of comics and a loving attention to detail on things like guns, swords, etc. It’s not asking big important questions or anything… but neither is it just exploitation trash. At least, as far as I’m concerned.
Oh, and I really disliked the movie. Bored me to tears. But I liked the manga, which used the same structure but had a lot more room to maneuver and more interesting characters. Take that, film! The comics medium schools ya again!
Dan Grendell wrote:
When you were talking about no Harry Potter comic, there’s always the Vertigo series BOOKS OF MAGIC- which I believe is entirely collected in trade now.
I dug BOM at the time, and especially that first Gaiman volume, but it’s got a very different vibe from Harry Potter, at least what I’ve seen of it. It’s probably as close as comics get, though, and the visual similarity would no doubt woo some casual Potter fans looking for something else to feed the addiction.
Jofo said:
I do have another suggestion to give to your significant other and that would be Blankets. I assume that you are all familiar with this but I think it’s really touching and a perfect gift to give someone who doesn’t read comics and thinks that comics are all about superheroes. Or you could give your girlfriend the Hellboy Right Hand of Doom
Blankets is a good call. I was going to make a joke about your girlfriend beating you do death with the Right Hand of Doom when she realized how much money you spent on comics, but then I realized something. Something I wish I’d realized before now… we kinda dropped the ball on assuming that every comics reader would be a male trying to get his girlfriend to read comics.
That’s the most common permutation, but I know from experience at the shop that there are plenty of women who do all the comics reading and try to lure their boyfriends into reading. In that case, I would suggest any woman reading comics could probably lure the average non-comics reading boyfriend in with The Walking Dead Vol. 1 (for the horror movie buff), Wanted (for the action movie fan), Preacher Vol. 1 (for the Tarantino lover) or Watchmen (if your guy is the literary type). Any other suggestions out there in CP reader land?
Tim.Agen wrote:
You got that thing I sentcha? How exciting! Maybe next time I won’t write it in such a conversational voice.. “er..” and “6 ish”. biggity bam!
Aw, conversational voice is nice. Fits in with our, well, let’s call it charmingly casual style for the podcast.
Drop us a line at the feedback address with your snail mail address and we’ll send you some free comics swag as thanks for writing in!
Obviously, this isn’t that big deal (”My comics are too gloriously huge to read in bed!”).. but the 700+ page “Invincible” book made me think.. how big is too big?
It’s a reasonable point… but we haven’t hit it for me yet. I truly expected that Uncanny X-Men Omnibus to be too big to try and read, but man did I love that format. Ditto for Absolute New Frontier.
Also, “Mom’s Cancer” is a great book to give the non-comic book reading adult — especially one with ties to the disease. That book can lead to interesting conversations. The structure lends itself to a new reader (comic book reader).
Y’know, there’s probably a whole list of books like this, books that are good when targeted as specific non-readers and accessible to the newbie. Maus is probably in that realm as well.
11 Dec 2006 at 9:12 pm
Quote“Seriously, I can get where BR is just way, way too over the top for some… but I was surprised to find myself really engaged in some of the best extended fight sequences I’ve seen in all of comics and a loving attention to detail on things like guns, swords, etc. It’s not asking big important questions or anything… but neither is it just exploitation trash. At least, as far as I’m concerned.”
Yeah, I’m having a hard time with Kazuo Umezo’s The Drifting Classroom, which is drawn with considerable skill and has an intriguing mystery at its center, but more often than not takes way too much pleasure in pounding on its characters. The premise is an entire school is transported to a mysterious place, an apocalyptic desert. The adults are quickly (and far too easily) moved off the playing field, leaving the 14-and-under kids to fend for themselves, and as you might guess, it’s Lord of the Flies writ large on crack. The third volume in particular ends with something so horrific it comes perilously close to being exploitative.
Then again, there’s some beautiful imagery, and the world the kids are transported to gets more compelling with each volume, as I try to figure out what, if anything, is out there. It helps the scenes of children geting beaten, stabbed, smashed, often by each other, go down a little better.
But if you have a young child, you really don’t want to read this.
12 Dec 2006 at 1:06 pm
QuoteI know this is asking a lot, but any chance you guys can post your recommendations? I got home last night having listened to your podcast in my car and happily told my wife that I had a bunch of ideas for her for Christmas. So, of course, she asked me for a list this evening and all I could come up with was right hand of doom and sketch books. (And I don’t much want the right hand of doom.) So, I’m tentatively planning to listen to the first half hour again with a pencil and notepad, but a written list might help a lot of folks …
By the way, I really enjoy the podcasts. Picked up the first trade of DMZ after your recent “books of right now” cast and really enjoyed it.
12 Dec 2006 at 11:26 pm
QuoteErhm…. we could have, but Randy foolishly threw away the podcast notes after he made the image and synopsis for the podcast last week. Sorry about that! I know some of the stuff we recommended was the New X-Men Omnibus, the Alias Omnibus, Absolute New Frontier, the first trades of Y The Last Man and Fables, Green Arrow: The Longbow Hunters… um… and more stuff.
13 Dec 2006 at 1:50 am
QuoteHow about: Scott Pilgrim Vol 1, Planetary Vol 1, Star Wars Clone Wars (digests), Bone Complete Edition, Runaways HC Vol. 1 & 2, Batman Handbook: The Ultimate Training Manual, Peanuts HC and Absolute Sandman…I know there were more but this is some of the stuff that came to mind.
13 Dec 2006 at 2:45 am
QuoteHey, thanks for trying. After posting my message, I realized it was a ridiculous request. Something along the lines of, “Hey, could you make your free service more convenient for me?” For what it is worth, I listened to the first few minutes of the Podcast over again and got the big things — The Tick vs. Season 1 and The Batman Handbook.
I’m not sure I understand the draw of these Omnibus collections. I’ve got two copies of Watchman — a trade and the original issues. My copy of that trade is just beat to hell. The cover is bent, several pages have marks where my fingers stuck to the pages and pulled off ink, etc. I’ve looked at the originals a little, but mostly I just keep them protected so I’ll always have a nice copy of the story and art. But why, exactly, would I want to add a third, “Omnibus” edition? I wouldn’t want to actually read it and risk messing it up. But it’s not the original issues. You can’t really display these things very effectively (the art is all inside). So what is the draw? Just curious.
Thanks again.
15 Dec 2006 at 10:50 am
QuoteI don’t know what the draw is for everyone on the Omnibus format, but for me, it’s the bigger size of the art and the extras, plus I just like the way they look on my shelf together. If you’ve already got the story twice, I don’t know that I can see buying it again. But for me, if my Watchmen trade was all beat up and I had some extra cash, that *might* be enough to make me trade in for the Absolute.
15 Dec 2006 at 10:55 am
QuoteI love the Omnibus Format because it does look great on the bookshelves and then there is the fact that the quality of the books in hard cover with over-sized art and other extras is just fantastic. Not to mention that it’s a lot more presentable than long boxes are. Gives comics some weight in more ways than one too.
Great show guys! Good to hear from Dave F. Shigeru loves Owly and I’ve thought of getting the Concrete trades recently. I’ll check out Scene of the Crime too.
Also, The Fountain HC, Black Hole, 100% and Life & Times of Scrooge McDuck are all great.
15 Dec 2006 at 8:48 pm
Quote