“News, reviews and opinions from the world of comics”Volume 11 #3 May 2007

Fallen Son Wolverine: By Loeb and Leinil Yu New Avengers: By Loeb and Ed McGuinness Captain America: By Loeb and John Romita Jr. Spider-Man: By Loeb and David Finch Iron Man: By Loeb and John Cassaday

So I know what it must seem like – one month we’re all making fun of Civil War and the next we’re praising (parts of) it. Heck, this month we’re not even picking a side as you’ll see both pro and con points of view about Marvel’s biggest story ever.

Well, Big Planet has always made a commitment to telling you the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Some-times we’ll warn you off books that we feel might not be all they’re cracked up to be, and other months we’ll swear by a writer or a storyline.

We get it wrong sometimes, but at least you can trust that our biggest concern is you being happy with the comics you read and not feeling like we sold you a bill of goods…one with two variant covers.

Even with the varying points of view about Civil War, one thing I will say is that the stories spin-ning out of the war’s end have been really exciting. I applaud Marvel’s choice to really make the effects of the series feel real and permanent. Every title being published is different now that the war is over and things are

especially awesome in books like the Avengers titles, Captain America and Thunderbolts. Starting in April and continuing into May is what is sure to be the next great post-Civil War offering: Civil War – Fallen Son.

Fallen Son is a series of self-contained books examining the effect Captain America’s death has had on the rest of the characters in the Marvel Universe. Conceived by J. Michael Straczynski, written by Jeph Loeb, covers by Michael Turner and featuring a team of all-star artists, each issue focuses on one of the five different stages of grief people experience after a death (Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance). Let the healing begin.

Let the Healing Begin

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I know, I know…I keep skip-ping out on the classic comics covers usually showcased in this section. I’ll get back to that soon. Promise. It’s just that too much good stuff has been cropping up. Stuff like this:

Nick Bertozzi is a supremely talented writer and artist in addition to being a rad guy, a teacher and a father. You’d be doing yourself a real favor checking out any of his work, but this month we see the release of two new graphic novels from Nick.

Houdini: The Handcuff King by Nick and Jason Lutes exam-ines a day in the life of escape artist Harry Houdini, while The Salon is Bertozzi’s utterly amazing tale of Picasso, Braque, Stein, Satie and Apollinaire in 20th century Paris (Mature Readers).

Go right now and check out

Nick Bertozzi talks up his two new graphic novels

samples from both books at Nick’s website: www.nickbertozzi.com and then come back here to read our recent conversation with the man himself.

ID: So I’m sure you’re getting a lot of this, but you’re looking pretty prolific with the two graphic novels getting released in the same month. Do you feel like you’re going to have to keep

up this pace? Like you’ll be up to 7 books a

month by 2009?NB: The books were supposed to come out a year apart and there was no overlap in the

drawing at all. But if it came down to it, I know I

could draw a graphic novel per month. Just kidding!

The Handcuff King looks totally amazing. How was the experience of working with Jason Lutes?I got paid to learn at the knee of one of the best living American cartoonists and work from his thumbnails.

Tell me something I didn’t know about Houdini that you found out from working on this project.He was a jogger!

Now, you know me and how my tastes skew more towards the pro-wrestling, heavy metal parking lot, explosions, heat-vision, exotic dancer, skeet shooting side of things – so when I read the description of The Salon I was a little like “Huh?” because I didn’t show up for any classes in college. But then I read some of you descriptions of the book and was really drawn in by the questions you’re asking about how the real daily life of these artists affected their work. I’m not interested in learning things I already know about an

artist…I’d much rather know what Glenn Danzig does on a normal Saturday afternoon than how he put Samhain together. I can’t wait to read The Salon. That’s not really a question…thoughts?I’ve always felt like there’s been a wall between history and students and I wanted to bring that down with THE SALON and show how an art movement was really born. The news-paper comics that Picasso read, the chamber-pot that Braque used, all these sort of things are important to understanding how Cubism was created.

Nick Bertozzi will be signing all of his graphic novels at the Bethesda Big Planet Comics on Saturday, April 28 from 2-4 p.m.

Come meet Nick Bertozzi!

The Salon has been a pretty long time in the making. When did you start and what was the hardest part of the process? I imagine you had quite a bit of research to deal with.I started THE SALON in early 2002 on serializer.net as a lark. A month or two in I realized what I’d gotten myself into. I had to do a ton of research and figure out the ending.

So what else is going on? What’s really next for you? What comics are you reading? What music are you listening to?I’ve spent a lot of time getting out the word about THE SALON and HOUDINI, but I’ve been drawing Persimmon Cup, a sci-fi/fantasy comic for the online comix collective that I’m part of http://community.livejournal.com/act_i_vate/ . I also just signed a contract for Houghton-Mifflin to draw a Lenny Bruce bio-comic written by Harvey Pekar.

I read anything that Christophe Blain does and I just picked up another volume of ENOMOTO, the funniest comic ever. I’ve been listening a lot to ENO and ELO, but no EMO!

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Rewriting a Civil WarI was preparing an April Fool’s piece for the very, very cool Comics Alliance website (www.comicsalliance.com) when I remembered something very important: Behind every great lie is a kernel of truth. I realized how true this was when I went about rewriting the Wikipedia entry on the Lebanese Civil War so that it reflected the events of Marvel’s Civil War series. I was making the joke that Marvel had simply plagiarized the plot to Civil War by swapping out certain words in this entry on Wikipedia. What I didn’t count on was how easy this would be. I changed 22 words or phrases. Just 22 words or phrases and I got a startlingly accurate description of the Civil War comic. I started to wonder if I had stumbled onto some sort of X-Files-esque conspiracy. Had Marvel really just used a series of historical events to guide their best-selling mega-cross over? Probably not, but the results of my experiment will intrigue you. Compare for yourself paragraph by paragraph.

First the Wiki-pedia version:The multi-sided Lebanese Civil War (1975–1990) had its origin in the conflicts and political compromises after the end of Lebanon’s administra-tion by the Ottoman Empire and was exacerbated by the nation’s changing demographic trends, Christian and Muslim inter-reli-gious strife, and the involvement of Syria, Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).

The Marvel version:The multi-sided Marvel Civil War (1975–1990) had its origin in the conflicts and political compro-mises after the end of Nick Fury’s administration by S.H.I.E.L.D and was exacerbated by the nation’s changing demographic trends, Mutant and Human strife, and the involvement of the New Warriors.

Wikipedia:During the course of the fighting, alliances shifted rapidly and unpre-

Getting to the real truth of Marvel Comics’ Civil War

dictably. By the end of the war, nearly every party had allied with and subsequently betrayed every

other party at least once. The 1980s were especially

bleak, with much of Beirut laid in ruins during the Israeli inva-sion that evicted the PLO from the country.

A number of war crimes and terrorist acts

were committed by all the Lebanese factions participating

in the war. The war deteriorated ever further into sectarian carnage, and in the end Lebanon’s effective independence counted among the casualties.

Marvel:During the course of the fighting, alliances shifted rapidly and unpredictably. By the end of the war, nearly every party had allied with and subsequently betrayed every other party at least once. The year 2007 was especially bleak, with much of Connecticut laid in ruins during the New Warriors invasion that evicted tons of dead kids from the country. A number of war crimes and terrorist acts were committed by the Thunderbolts participating in the war. The war deterio-

rated ever further into sectarian carnage, and in the end Spider Man’s effective independence counted among the casualties.

Wikipedia: By the time of the Taif Agreement in 1989, Israel held on to a security zone in southern Lebanon that it justified as a buffer to prevent attacks on northern Israel. The Israeli Army eventually withdrew in 2000, only to see Syria fill the void from areas it had occupied

UN in the aftermath of the assas-sination of Rafik Hariri.

Marvel:By the time of the Hero Registra-tion Act in 2007, Iron Man held on to a security zone in the Negative Zone that he justified was a buffer to prevent attacks on the United States. Captain America eventu-ally withdrew in 2007, only to see Omega Flight fill the void from areas it had occupied in Canada since the mid-70s. Luke Cage

Iron Man poses with some of his Lebanese teammates during a Civil War.. At least that’s how we think it happened.

in northern and western Lebanon since the mid-70s. Syria did not withdraw its troops until 2005, when it was forced out by the joint pressure created by Lebanese protest and powerful diplomatic intervention from France and the

did not withdraw his troops, and was forced out by the joint pres-sure created by The Avengers and powerful diplomatic intervention from S.H.I.E.L.D. and the UN in the aftermath of the assassination of Captain America.

Big Planet Orbit Volume 11 #3; May 2007 is published by Joel Pollack, Peter Casazza and Jared Smith for Big Planet Comics. www.bigplanetcomics.com.

Big Planet Comics, Inc. 4908 Fairmont Ave., Bethesda, MD 20814, 301.654.6856

Big Planet Comics of VA Inc. 426 Maple Ave. East, Vienna, VA 22180, 703.242.9412

Big Planet Comics of DC Inc. 3145 Dumbarton St. NW, Washington, DC 20007, 202.342.1961

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Marvel Zombies: Dead DaysThis is the prologue to Marvel Zombies by the original creative team of Robert Kirkman and Sean Phillips. Every month I go

off about how amazing Marvel Zombies is and how you’re totally blowing it if you’re not reading this s u r p r i s i n g ,

hilarious and original super-zombie romp. I’m not going to do that this month. I’m not going to tell you that you need to buy this book to find out how the whole mess started. I’m not going to tell you that if you like zombie stuff and aren’t reading this, then you’re nuts. I’m not going to tell you that even if you’re not into zombie stuff and you aren’t reading this, you’re nuts. I’m just going to sit here and wait to read it myself. You can do what you want.

Incredible Hulk #106 & World War Hulk Prologue: World BreakerI’d buy stock in this summer’s World War Hulk story if I could – that’s how sure I am of its impending

awesomeness, especially after the four-page preview that came out last month. I’m not actually suggesting that you buy stock in Marvel by the way…it’s just a saying. When Planet Hulk started last year I was immensely skep-tical. Slowly, but surely I found myself buying into the whole idea of the Hulk being stranded on a gladiator planet by The Illu-minati. It just kept getting better and better, to the point that the Hulk’s reasons for coming back to Earth really mean something. I’m actually rooting for him to get back and kick the crap out of Iron Man and Reed Richards. So I’m telling you right now to read these prologue issues and get on board with what promises to be

quite the slugfest.

Silverfish HardcoverDavid Lapham’s Stray Bullets is one of my favorite (if just a little confusing) black and white crime comics ever. This original graphic novel promises to bring all of the awesome from Stray Bullets in a self-contained environment. I will buy this the day it comes out and you should too.

Runaways #25 & 26It’s no secret how much we love Joss Whedon. Love. Him. Buffy? Angel? Astonishing X-Men? I’m not willing to admit the lengths I’d go to in order to read his comics every month…espe-cially after the jaw-dropping

start Buffy Season 8 has gotten off to. And now he’s added the already excellent Runaways to his credits. If you weren’t already into this Brian Vaughn-created series it is now officially mandatory reading. Issue #26 will feature Whedon writing the Punisher as the kids find Frank Castle during a trip to New York. Joss Whedon…writing the Punisher. Wow.

Amazons Attack Do not sleep on ANYTHING DC Comics is doing these days. Their long-term planning is outstanding and has led to fantastic and intricate story-telling over the last few years. So when the publisher says that Amazons Attack sets up huge events in the DCU for next year, you’d better believe it. Besides, where else are you going to get Batman and Superman fighting hordes of gladiator women?

Batman #666I know my love of Grant Morrison’s Batman boarders on obsessive, but how could I not point out that Batman #666 is a story set 15 years in the future and starring Batman’s son, Damian, as the Caped Crusader? I’m totally listening to Slayer while I read this issue.

Midnighter #7Head’s up! Guest writer alert! Brian K. Vaughan takes over for one issue with artist Darick Robertson to explain exactly how Midnight-er’s powers work in an issue that’s bound to feature lots and lots of violence. It’s a good thing I’ll already have the Slayer CDs out from Batman #666 for this.