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Flex Mentallo #1
by Josh Crawley
On Tuesday, DC Comics announced on Vertigo’s graphic content blog that this year will deliver unto us a deluxe hardcover collection of grant Morrison & Frank Quitely’s flex Mentallo, and the first thing I heard was a collective groan as resale prices on the single issues plummeted.
Don’t get me wrong. I have no problems with that. I really have no problems at all, except that I really hope people don’t have it in their mind this is some grand opus. keep your head on straight, and don’t build up your expectations. It’s not like the Charles Atlas people brought legal action because this was such a terrific work of sequential art that we didn’t should have it. (For a lot more on the legal action, check out Comic book Legends revealed #284, and/or the brief itself, located at The Annotated flex Mentallo.)
That being said, I understand enjoying someone’s earlier work much a lot more than their later work. Also, I’m not trying to keep you from spending your money on comics. I just don’t want comics to let you down!
Morrison also has some kind things to say about the animated adaptation of his All star Superman series on DCU’s The source blog.
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Having exchanged a few emails with Kelly sue DeConnick, I can tell you she’s a charming person. then she says things like this “…there’s nothing innately masculine about heroism. nothing innately masculine about science fiction. nor about power fantasies or revenge fantasies or the pulp aesthetic…” in an interview with Tom Spurgeon, and it reminds she isn’t just lovely, she’s awesome! If you’re one of those people anxious it’s just going to be about Feminism in comics, it isn’t. I just really liked that quote. All around, it’s got some terrific comics-making talk I’d recommend reading.
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For a lot more on comics process stuff, Tamar Curry (doing a guest column for the All about Manga blog) gives ten ideas for webcomic-making beginners. I’d really just like to add that — in a broader sense — lots of of those ideas can be applied to print comics, too.
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While I’m not confused by Disney licensing out their comics to multiple companies when they have their own in-house publishers like some people are (because, really, it’s not like they don’t do that with piles of other licensed merchandise & publications, too), Graeme McMillan shares some thoughts on the matter over on the Robot 6 blog.
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While I don’t usually like to talk about motion pictures too much before they’re out (unless playing Devil’s Advocate), it’s great to see Emma stone as Gwen Stacy, but I’m sad to see she doesn’t have her classic black headband. I’m not going to lie, though: the knee-high boots and thigh-high stockings minimize that sadness a touch.
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Josh Crawley
If you’ve made it this far, I’m guessing you’re wondering why I have yet to mention the new column name. Basically, I think it better describes what I’ve been doing a lot more typically than not (though the extent and quality of that commentary is another matter entirely), rather than what I had intended to originally do. So, that being said, fifth degree isn’t dead, it’s just going to be used much less frequently (and hopefully in a a lot more fitting manner).
And that’s it for this week!
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Josh Crawley may or may not be the keyboardist for Everclear. He strongly suggests you not bet that he is.
Flex Mentallo cover from the Grand Comics Database.