The Sunday Spotlight: It’s Your Weekly Comics Roundup Time

Another week rolls by and what do you know, it’s another Sunday Spotlight, shining a light on some comics news you may or may not have seen this week…

 

Broken Frontier Awards 2023 Announced…

I told you before about the great work that Andy Oliver and his team at Broken Frontier are doing with comics of all stripes, but particularly highlighting the sorts of work I love and have been trying to tell you all about whenever I can – the small press, the self-published, the micro-published – a source of endless invention and originality.

And now we have this year’s BF awards – proving beyond any doubt that the breadth and depth of talent working in comics at all levels. Last year was another stellar year in comics, no matter where in the world you are – quite different from The Guardian/Observer declaring this not a vintage year recently. I know whose view I trust – and I’m definitely with BF on this one.

Obviously, head here to see the entire awards and nominees – all of which are well worth your time and trouble seeking out – but here’s a few headlines and takeaways,with the new inductees to the BF hall of fame being Britain’s Thought Bubble and Canada’s Toronto Comic Arts Festival (TCAF).

Now, what really makes me think this is an excellent set of awards is the sheer variety of creators and publishers here – from the very smallest to the very biggest – huge international publishers all the way down to self-publishers, all aspects of comics are included. We had Alice Oseman winning best writer for Heartstopper, published by Hodder, Nicole Goux winning best artist with Avery Hill’s Pet Peeves – two very different sizes of publisher right there.

Breakout Talent went to Pigeon/Kamila Krol for Rusalka: Whispers of the Forest, Strangers Publishing. Best One-Shot was the self-published Don’t Worry, I Die at the End by Beck Kubrick. And best graphic novel of the year went, I am so happy to say, to Paul Rainey for his incredible Why Don’t You Love Me?, published by D&Q and much loved by me in my end-of-year lists as well. Likewise, the best graphic non-fiction was But You Have Friends by Emilia McKenzie, a Top Shelf book we’ve highlighted to you here.

 

Brubaker AND Phillips’ Criminal series getting Amazon Prime Video series order…

As announced by Deadline and confirmed on Sean Phillips’ socials, Ed Brubaker and Phillips’ comic series Criminal has been announced as getting a series order deal with Amazon Prime Video.

Although of course, seeing as this is comics reporting by non-comics media, the actual announcement went like this:

Ed Brubaker’s ‘Criminal’ Ordered To Series By Amazon With Jordan Harper As Co-Showrunner.

I think all involved, especially Brubaker, would be keen to point out that Sean Phillips had rather a hell of a lot to do with the whole series and it wouldn’t have existed without him.

Brubaker has penned the pilot script and will co-showrun the TV series with crime fiction author Jordan Harper. Hopefully, it will manage to transfer the brilliance of the comic series onto the small screen.

 

Michel Fiffe’s art styles… 

Missed this one when Michel Fiffe originally put it out, but he’s dusted it off again and it’s a fascinating look at art…

“This is my personal diagram for comic book art styles. Being a list maker and constantly thinking about this topic, I drew it up with all my favorites as examples. And yeah, this is always on my mind, so I wanted to lay it out to give it some shape, to help me understand.”

 

AI art is simply theft…

There’s a list of artists doing the rounds, 14,000 of them whose art has been ‘sampled’ by Midjourney, the AI program. And by sampled, of course we mean stolen, used, nicked, swiped without permission and used by the program to prop up a system based wholly on the appropriation of the hard work of others.

The list of artists includes big names such as Warhol, Kahlo, Picasso, Banksy, van Gogh. But it’s hardly limited to the world of fine art. Artnews reports that Midjourney’s dataset includes artists who contributed to Magic the Gathering cards, “including Hyan Tran, a six-year-old child and one-time art contributor who participated in a fundraiser for the Seattle Children’s Hospital in 2021.”

And yes, there are plenty of comic artists on there – here’s just a few from the As… Adi Granov, Al Capp, All Jaffe, Alan Davis, Andre Franquin, Angus McKie, Art Spiegelman, Arthur Suydam,  Well, you get the idea. Simply put, screw AI art. It’s theft.

Artist Phil Foglio encouraged other artists to search the list and to consider legal action. Whilst the original version was restricted from view, there’s a version uploaded to the Internet Archive.

 

And if AI art is theft, surely Wacom wouldn’t be so stupid as to… oh, wait…

Wacom put out this ad (I would link it but surprise, surprise, it doesn’t exist anymore) and people, including many, many artists had feelings…

Because yes, one of the leading manufacturers of drawing tablets and tech to encourage real, new, and upcoming digital artists by using AI-generated imagery is so many different ways of wrong.

I could have picked many, but here’s one of the first I saw, the wonderfully talented comic maker and illustrator Sonia Leong… who even went so far as pointing out all that was wrong with it all…

She has this to say:

“Here, I’ve red-lined all the bits a decent human artist would have actually got right, although it was pretty hard not to just circle the whole thing. Using AI imagery that nobody really needs a Wacom for, to sell Wacoms to human artists is just… Astoundingly tone deaf.”

Sherlock Holmes & The Empire Builders signing…

Another great looking signing at Gosh! Comics London now – Frazer Irving, Barry Kitson, and writer Joel Meadows will be there on 20th January to sign copies of the new Tripwire Comics title Sherlock Holmes and the Empire Builders Volume One: The Gene Genie, written by Meadows and art by Andy Bennett.

It’s the first part of the Tripwire Comics Presents imprint from Meadows, whose Tripwire has been an essential magazine of comics and pop culture for many, many years now. Here’s what Joel’s Tripwire magazine said about it –

“Tripwire launches its Tripwire Comics Presents imprint with the first volume of its Sherlock Holmes and The Empire Builders The Gene Genie graphic novel under two exclusive covers. Sherlock Holmes and The Empire Builders is an epic alternate world sci fi adventure featuring The World’s Greatest Detective as people have never seen him before. When Watson leaves Holmes to help Crick unravel the DNA helix and finds himself in the employ of England’s most evil man, Holmes is forced to team up with an unlikely group to defeat this monstrous figure and return England to its status quo.

As well as a 64 page full-length comic story, Sherlock Holmes and The Empire Builders The Gene Genie Volume One will also include an 8 page colour section featuring art by the likes of Liam Sharp, Bill Sienkiewicz, Shawn Martinbrough and Barry Kitson and interviews with the series creators as well as character sketches by Bennett and script pages by the writer”

More details and art at the finished Zoop crowdfunder page here.

 

Comic Zines of the ’80s for your viewing pleasure… oh, ATOMIC!

Tony Foster, currently publisher of ComicScene magazine, used to be, way back in 1987, a young man with a dream of comic publishing – and from that, we got 13 issues of ATOMIC, a great comics zine which feature a plenty of names that went on to make many, many comics, including Craig Conlan, Garry Marshall, John Miller, John Erasmus, and Simon Fraser.

Well, Tony’s put all the issues up on Issu for your viewing pleasure – right here.

 

And finally… lost Grange Hill strip unveiled by Nigel Parkinson…

None UK TV viewers, Grange Hill was a TV show that ran from 1978-2008, 601 episodes, all about life in an inner-city comprehensive school. It was, for a certain generation of kids, me included, iconic and well remembered.

Well, Beano artist Nigel Parkinson unveiled a lost Grange Hill strip, “intended for Fast Forward in 1993 but presented here for the first time anywhere, written, drawn, hand coloured and lettered/ballooned by me.”

Oh, and for your viewing interest… here’s those iconic opening titles and the whole of season 1, episode 1…