The Sunday Spotlight: The ‘I’ve Had Enough Of This Cakewalk’ Edition

Another week goes by, another set of news, links, and events comes your way – why, it must be the Sunday Spotlight…

COMIC ARTISTS AND ILLUSTRATORS KICK BACK AGAINST THE AI STARTER PACK THING…

You’ve seen it, right? The AI-generated starter pack thing? Upload a few phrases into some AI thing and, hey presto, you get an image. Well, let’s just remind you once again that the way they do this is by outright theft of art – they call it scraping, but we’ll keep calling it theft, taking existing art from comic artists and illustrators and using it, no payment, no credit, to make the AI image.

Well, Faced with this starter pack AI crap, illustrators are responding to the starter pack thing by making great art, better than anything AI could do. It started with French artist Patouret and the hashtag #starterpacknoAI and it’s great.

So, once more, screw AI and let’s celebrate making real art.

RAINA TELGEMEIER & SCOTT MCCLOUD INTERVIEWED ABOUT THE CARTOONISTS CLUB AT USA TODAY…

Claire Mulroy interviews comics superstars Scott McCloud and Raina Telgemeier at USA Today about their new collaboration, the going to be one of the biggest books of the year (that’s GNs an what I’m sure some still call ‘proper’ books), The Cartoonists Club, on release right now from Scholastic.

‘In a world where kids can become anything, Raina Telgemeier and Scott McCloud are hoping they become cartoonists.

‘Telgemeier has become a household name for parents whose kids love her graphic novels “Smile” and “Drama.” She’s been called “The Beatles for children.” But decades ago, she was the kid in grade school with an interest no one else liked.

‘Her dad noticed her burgeoning talent for cartoons and gave her a copy of “Understanding Comics” by Scott McCloud, a 1993 history and how-to guide. Now, McCloud and Telgemeier have teamed up to publish a new how-to manual for younger kids. With “The Cartoonists Club” (Scholastic, ages 8-12, out now), kids don’t have to feel like Telgemeier did when she was young.’

‘The Beatles for children’? Oh, I love that. Damn right too.

GO READ – RICHARD SHEAF’S BOYS ADVENTURE COMICS – BEGINNING A SERIES ON COMIC SHOP ADVERTS…

Richard Sheaf‘s Boys Adventure Comics site is another place you should be visiting and reading regularly, full of writing on comics and art of all types. But his recent February post on comic shop adverts, beginning with something from pioneering British comic shop, Dark They Were and Golden Eyed, is essential reading for anyone, like me, with an interest in the history of comics retail.

It’s the start of a series, the sort of cultural history comics needs. The first post is here. Art below from Jim (James) Cawthorn (left) and Bryan Talbot (right).

YO COMICS! KNOCKED IT OUT OF THE PARK – KIDS DO LOVE THEIR COMICS…

The Yo Comics! fair happened in London in March, a great day of celebrating all that’s great in comics for kids.

Broken Frontier have a write-up of the event from Tom Murphy that really gets over the absolute joy of kids and comics, with contributions from Comics Youth CIC, Marc Jackson, Jim Medway, Neill Cameron, Steve Marchant, Josh Knowles, and Mateo ‘Mickey’ Durante, all of them enthusing about the day. Here’s to seeing Yo Comics! return in 2026.

BEANO AND DANDY SUMMER SPECIALS ANNOUNCED – WITH THE DANDY REMEMBERING THAT JAMIE SMART ONCE DID DESPERATE DAN…

This year’s Beano and Dandy Summer Specials are coming soon and available for pre-order now. These were part of any British kid’s requirements for a perfect summer, and I remember the joy of finding them in my local newsagents and devouring them when I was younger. Havign said that, were I that side of the pond this summer, I imagine I’d be picking them up to enjoy as well. Some things just never lose their ability to entertain.

Anyway, the Beano Summer Special promises you ‘the oddest adventure ever’, with Dennis, Minnie, the Bash Street Kids, and all the rest headed to Oz, as in the Wizard of Oz.

But it’s the Dandy Summer Special that caught my eye, or, to give it its full title, The Dandy Presents: Desperate Dan by Jamie Smart. Because, for a fair number of years, comics superstar Jamie Smart was making great strips of Desperate Dan, starting in 2007, giving the iconic character a new look, fabulously silly stories, and all the silliness you’d expect from a Jamie Smart comic. Naturally, the sort of fans that only remember the character and the comic from their own childhood hated it. But hey, what do you know, Jamie’s incredible, million-selling creations since then kind of show that certain fans really don’t know what comics are all about these days.

Anyway, this 68-page special collects just a little bit of Smart’s Desperate Dan tales, perfect for those hordes of kids currently devouring Bunny Vs Monkey.

KYLE BAKER INTERVIEWED AT THE COMICS JOURNAL…

Kyle Baker never gets his dues. A phenomenal talent, whose books like The Cowboy Wally Story, You Are Here, I Die At Midnight, and one of my all-time favourites, Why I Hate Saturn, are brilliant, clever, stylish, and unspeakably funny. His Nat Turner is an incendiary look at the slave rebellion. His run on Plastic Man was epic, his art on The Shadow and Truth: Red, White, and Black was incredible. I love his work. You should too.

Anyway, The Comics Journal has an interview with the man, and it’s good reading.

Go read, then go buy his books, including his latest – Tardigrade…

MORE GREAT COMICS EVENTS IN THE US – CHICAGO’S ZINE FEST 2025 – 19 JULY…

Oh yes, all these great shows dealing with comics and more — although by more, I mean more comics and zines and illustration and not the rubbish meet the Z-lister and pay a load of cash for autographs and photos that some ‘comic-cons’ put on.

Yep, get your fill of zines at the Chicago Zine Fest at Chicago Public Library’s Harold Harold Washington Library, where they’ll be taking over the Winter Garden. It all happens on 19 July 2025 and registration runs to 28 Feb

THE FANTASTIC FOUR TRAILER CAME OUT…

The movie’s due on 25 July, with Marvel’s first family in action against the Silver Surfer and Galactus. With the retro-futurist look, we’re looking at another world in the Marvel Multiverse here, as the Four fight to save this Earth from the planet devoured and his silver herald.

It stars Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby, Joseph Quinn and Ebon Moss-Bachrach as Reed Richards/Mr. Fantastic, Sue Storm/Invisible Woman, Johnny Storm/Human Torch and Ben Grimm/The Thing.

And from the looks of this trailer, it might be rather good…