The Sunday Spotlight – The ‘It Doesn’t Make Sense, Something’s Not Right’ Edition
by Richard Bruton
As the chaos of the world bears down, there’s always comics here to keep you sane. Well, sane adjacent. Whatever, it’s time for the Sunday Spotlight…
MACC-POW! COMIC ART FESTIVAL INCLUDES LAUNCH OF GOOF #2 – 26-29 JUNE…
Another great little comics festival here in the UK, the MACC-POW! Comic Art Festival is happening on 26-29 June in Macclesfield UK.
Guests include Lew Stringer, Tor Freeman, Sonia Leong, Ahmed Raafat, Kev Sutherland, Charlie Adlard, Michael and Keli Lark, John Allison, Emma Reynolds, David Leach, Mister Hope, Nick Moffat, Laura Howell, Ellie Dixon, Mollie Ray, Sean Phillips, Jacob Phillips, Rachael Smith, Mike Perkins, Roger Langridge, Jonathan and Louise Edwards – Felt Mistress, Blakemore, Ilya, RE Burke, Paul Gravett, and Tom Scioli. Plus LICAF and the Graphic Novel Reading Room will be in attendance, along with plenty to do across the town.
Marc Jackson, comic maker and festival creator/manager is also launching the second issue of his anthology comic GOOF!, again packed with plenty of great comic makers, many of them in attendance over the weekend.
The full Macc-Pow Comic Art Festival 2025 programme is now on all the socials and their website. There’s a load of free events of course, but some events are ticketed – you can get those here at Eventbrite.
MATT HOLLINGSWORTH DOESN’T WANT YOU TO BUY THE CHRONONAUTS LIBRARY EDITION…
He’s been working in comics as an award-winning colorist for 20 years plus, but Matt Hollingsworth definitely doesn’t want you buying his work on the new Dark Horse published Chrononauts Library Edition, a Mark Millar-written, Sean Murphy-drawn comic that Hollingsworth did the color art for.
Why? Well, shockingly, it seems he’s not receiving royalties for his color art on the title. He had this to say… ‘I don’t want to be associated with this comic, and won’t receive money if you buy it, so please boycott.’
And then went on to add, in response to a question from a fan, ‘Nothing special. Garbage writing, just Millar writing IP he can sell later, and he refused to pay me royalties. Sean stepped up and paid me extra out of his money to make up for the lack of royalties, and being loyal to Sean, I colored it.’ That was followed by this, ‘Mark Millar doesn’t consider colorists worth paying royalties to, or at least didn’t when I colored this.’
Well, kudos to Murphy for stepping up. But it’s shocking that colorists, and possibly, I’m guessing, letterers, aren’t being paid royalties. They’re an essential part of your comic and yet you treat them this way? Not on at all.
(Picked up from The Comics Beat)
LONDON’S CARTOON MUSEUM ANNOUNCES THE 2025 ALISON BROWN COMICS MAESTRO AWARD…
Named for Alison Brown, former manager at the Cartoon Museum who passed away in 2021 at the way too young age of 39, The Alison Brown Comics Maestro Award competition for 2025 is now looking for entries from aspiring artists under 18.
‘The Alison Brown Young Comics Maestro Award 2025 are now open to anyone under the age of 18 who is resident in the UK. We are accepting submissions of comic strips totaling no more than three sides of A4. We are looking for a wide range of cartoonists from different regions within the UK, and with different backgrounds.’
You need to submit one comic strip of no more than three pages, on any topic, black and white or color. Entries max size of A4 or digitally as a pdf or jpg (under 5mb). Send your strip and your age and contact details of a supervising adult by the closing date of 8 August 2025 to hello@cartoonmuseum.org or by mail to The Cartoon Museum, 63 Wells St, London W1A 3AE.
There’s two age categories, under 10s and 11-18, with the winners in the categories receiving –
Overall winner (any age): £100 / Runner-up (Under 10s) – £50 / Runner-up (11 – 18 years) – £50
Winners and a selection of highly commended entries will be compiled into a downloadable comic anthology.
More info here.
DAVE GIBBONS EXCLUSIVE WATCHMEN ART FOR MUNICH INTERNATIONAL COMICS FESTIVAL – 19-22 JUNE…
Yes, I realise that’s a little late, seeing as it’s the 22 June today, but I figured you’d at least like to see what you probably missed out on…
German and international comics creators appear at the Munich International Comics Festival every couple of years. And this year, Dave Gibbons is one of the creators there for the final big weekend. Joining guests including Paolo Bacilieri, Charles Berberian, Guy Delisle, Denis Kitchen, Ana Miralles Lopez, Paco Roca, Alain Poncelet, and Sylvain Runberg, plus every German creator out there.
Gibbons will be bringing along a special Rorshach beermat for the occasion and a limited edition of 125 Watchmen print of the page zero produced initially as a sample of the art style and now coloured for the first time.
(Hat tip to Paul Gravett for this.)
SOLO BRIAN BOLLAND SIGNING AT THE COZMIC STORE IN GLASTONBURY – SATURDAY 5 JULY…
Brian Bolland rarely does solo signings any more, but he’ll be at The Cozmic Store (High Street Glastonbury, BA6 9DS) on Saturday July 5th from 1.30pm. Bring your comics to be signed or pick up some pre-signed rarities and special items that Brian’s bringing along. I imagine this one will be BUSY, so get there early.
FIRST GUESTS FOR THOUGHT BUBBLE ANNOUNCED…
Thought Bubble, one of the UK’s biggest comic festivals, happens this year on 15 and 16 November, where all the great and the good of comics will be found in Harrogate for a great weekend dedicated to comics.
And they’ve just announced their first tranche of guests and exhibitors… oh, all the exhibitors, over 600 of them right now. See what I mean about the great and the good of comics???? Oh yes, if you can get along to it, definitely get along to it!
All the details right here.
‘GEORGE TAKEI BELIEVES OUR DEMOCRACY WILL BE OK – ONCE THE “KLINGON PRESIDENT” IS OUT OF OFFICE’ – LA TIMES TALKS TO TAKEI ABOUT ‘IT RHYMES WITH TAKEI’…
Over at the Los Angeles Times, Tracy Brown talks to George Takei about It Rhymes With Takei, his second graphic memoir, again with writers Steven Scott and Justin Eisinger and artist Harmony Becker. Whilst 2019’s They Called Us Enemy, dealt with Takei’s childhood imprisonment in US-WWII incarceration camps, It Rhymes With Takei is about the actor and activist’s early life when growing up gay was far less acceptable and common.
“I didn’t want it to be in their face,” says Takei. “I thought I’d use [my name] in the title and make the reader work a little bit … Takai? Takei? May, day, pay, say, gay. Oh, gay!”
