The Sunday Spotlight: The ‘He’s Coming Toward You, Carl!’ Edition

Once more into the never-ending world of comics news, with the Sunday Spotlight serving as a catch-all thing for all the bits of comics news that caught my eye this week…

The Good Omens Kickstarter, adapting Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman’s prose into comics form by Colleen Doran, blew through its target and eventually ended with just shy of £2.5 million in pledges.

Good Omens rescheduled, an artist relieved, and an example of doing it right…

However, there’s going to be a bit of a delay on getting the book finished, Doran’s had a fair few life problems since the KS ended and it’s pushed her schedule back. She tells you all about it on her substack here (which you should be subscribing to). I won’t go into the reasons why and all that, suffice it to say it’s the sort of life stuff that can hit us all, at any time, and no one should ever criticise people when these things do happen. The good news is that she’s surrounded by understanding folks, epitomised by the first paragraph of her piece detailing the problems and the delays…

“A couple of weeks ago, Neil Gaiman gave me a call to let me know he was not worried about me flaming out on Good Omens despite my truly awful 2023, and if I needed more time or some help to please take it. Shortly before that, the folks at Dunmanifestin, the publishing arm of the Terry Pratchett Estate, dropped me a line to say the same.”

And that’s EXACTLY the right response. And one I hope, I trust, all the Kickstarter backers will be echoing. Like I say, like Colleen says, these things happen to everyone, to anyone, at any time, and we owe it to everyone affected by these sort of shitty life moments to deal with things with understanding and humanity.

 

Comics Cultural Impact Collective announces next events looking at the health of the comics industry…

The Comics Cultural Impact Collective, dedicated to improving comics for creators and getting the word out about the medium in as many different and creative ways possible, is due to hold its second online discussion event on Tuesday 7 May at 7:30pm (GMT). If you haven’t already read their report into the first roundtable back in January, you really should – it breaks down the discussions that were had into plenty of pieces to think about and develop. You can find that report here.

Again, the evening will be all about the conversation, bringing people together to see how best to move things forward for all. The hope and expectation is that the conversations will lead to planning and schemes, schemes that can then be supported through actual funding, something that the comics industry is notoriously terrible at sourcing.

On the evening, they’ll he hosting the following breakout rooms to choose from:
– Comics in education (schools, higher/further education, formal & informal settings)
– Comics publishing (publishers, booksellers, reviewers, distributors, libraries, etc)
– Comics as communication / applied comics (ie. storyboarding, graphic scribing, comics journalism, graphic medicine, academic, policy & science engagement etc)
– Support for comics creators (increased opportunities, financial & legal advice, career advice, training, wellbeing, pastoral care)
– Support for comics orgs / infrastructure (festivals, shops, websites, journalists, museums/archives etc)

All you need to do is REGISTER!

 

Kate Charlesworth’s Sensible Footwear/United Queerdom up for the Max & Moritz prize…

Kate Charlesworths‘ Sensible Footwear is a great book (have a read of this Guardian review to get an idea of the why), an absolutely comprehensive history of British LGBTQ life through Charlesworth’s personal lens that ends up both informative and absolutely joyous. Published by Myriad Press in English, it’s now been translated into German and is nominated for the International Comics Salon Erlangen‘s Max und Moritz Prize for best factual comic.

Here’s Kate’s reaction…

“I’m incredibly honoured and proud that United Queerdom (aka Sensible Footwear’s German edition) has been shortlisted for the International Comics Salon Erlangen’s Max und Moritz Preis for best factual comic, and that I’ll be a guest at the festival next month.
Absolutely thrilled!”

Definitely a book you should be exploring, English or German editions – it’s up to you!

 

Another Jamie Smart book? US readers – have you woken up to this great talent yet?…

The tenth book in Jamie Smart‘s incredibly funny, absolutely madcap, utterly brilliant, and totally beloved by millions Bunny Vs Monkey series comes out just in time for Christmas shopping in October 2024.

American readers, if you have a child or know of one that adores Dog Man and the like, then I promise you that you need to get them into this series, and Jamie’s fabulously anarchic Looshkin as well – they are a perfect gift!

 

 

The Comics Journal talking to cartoonists, friends, and colleagues have their say on the loss of Trina Robbins…

I put up my own tribute to the wonderful Trina Robbins the other day after her sad passing on 10 April 2024, but The Comics Journal has a round-up of reactions from more than 30 friends, cartoonists, and colleagues about Trina, including Lee Marrs, Mary Fleener, Raina Telgemeier, and Willy Mendes, amongst many more. But this from her longtime publisher, and friend, Ron Turner sums it all up nicely…

‘To say that she will be missed is like saying there will be no sunrise. A prolific artist, Herstorian and wonderful mom, it has been a pleasure to work with her for 54 years on various important projects.

‘We met on a phone call in 1970. She had the original art for a feminist comic and I was looking for a feminist comic. I went to her house in SF, near City College. She had the art and baby Casey, I had the thousand in cash and we traded art for $$. Casey was very observant riding on Trina’s hip. That began a 54 year contribution in which It Ain’t Me Babe was the first all-women’s comic. Followed by Wimmen’s Comix, the AIDS benefit book Strip Aids, and most recently Won’t Back Down, a book to benefit Planned Parenthood, just released.

‘She never gave up the cause of women’s rights and was a strong intelligent spokeswoman for
human as well as feminist causes. We will miss her terribly.’

 

 

Free Comic Book Day post-mortem – is this the dumbest idea ever?…

Free Comic Book Day 2024 was yesterday. And we hope you enjoyed it. A day of celebrating all comics and hopefully succeeding in expanding the reach of the medium we all love. Of course, I hope you also did the thing I forgot to remind you of last week and tell you to make sure you spend a few extra bucks when you picked up your free comics, because that’s vital to making sure that it’s a damn fine day for the comic shops. Problem is, all those free comics they hand out every FCBD? Well, they’re not free to the shops – they have to pay both for the comics and the cost of shipping said comics. And that’s why it’s vital to drop those few extra bucks, pick up that graphic novel you’ve been looking at for a while, that sort of thing.

But one thing that just left me slack jawed with bemusement this year was FCBD getting in bed with comic graders and slabbers CGC, who will readily take your FCBD comics and slab them – even throwing in a FCBD label as well.

If there’s one thing that’s absolutely counter to the very fundamental idea of FCBD and expanding the media by attracting more READERS to our medium, it would be the very act of making bloody comics completely impossible to read – don’t you think?

 

And finally – no spoilers please – Doctor Who begins 11 May 12.00am GMT…

Yes, it’s time to get excited for a new season of Doctor Who. The Bruton household certainly is, both here in the US and in the UK.

But a reminder to everyone… Doctor Who Season 14 premieres on May 11, 2024, at 12.00am GMT on BBC iPlayer, and on Disney Plus for US viewers around the same time. So that means that East Coast US gets it 7pm EDT on 10 May, and here in sunny Nevada I’m going to be watching it at 4pm PST.

So, if you do get it early or if you stay up in the UK to catch it at midnight on iPlayer… please, please, please be kind to those who have gone to bed and will watch it later on Saturday 11 May. No Spoilers PLEASE!