Lone Star Press

The HBO mini-series based on the Pulitzer-Prize-winning biography of one of the forgotten architects of the American Revolution is a terrific look into a world alien to a modern audience. The seven episodes which run an hour or more detail the early days of the American colonies as they transform into United American states. The sets range from sweltering Philadelphia meeting rooms to ships at sea to the court of the King of France with a stunning realism and grit. Early on, there is a scene with a tax man being tarred-and-feathered that is brutal and horrifying in the matter of fact presentation.

The cast is amazing with Tom Wilkinson as the magnetic inventor and diplomat Ben Franklin. Stephen Dillane plays a Thomas Jefferson with the cool confidence of a rock star before the term was invented. David Morse makes a surprisingly soft-spoken and engaging George Washington. A calming influence, Laura Linney struggles and suffers as Abigail Adams. But the star here is Paul Giamatti who plays John Adams with a sweaty, mumbly, trembling and shouting enthusiasm that makes the essentially unlikeable character uniquely sympathetic and utterly human.

The extras featured on the DVD boxed set include a Making of… segment that touches on the craft of re-creating a world over 200 years old. And there is a feature on author David McCullough who describes the joy of rediscovering the relationship between John and Abigail Adams through their letters. His enthusiasm and approach to the work of writing about history is inspiring.

John Adams is a joy to behold and is easily more accessible and endearing than any history book should be. If we had more features like this, we might see the Fourth of July as something more like a Special American Day and less like the chance to have another furniture sale. Good stuff.

Once upon a time, people were at home on Sundays and pre- cable and pre-HBO there was a virtual monopoly held by the big three TV networks. Yes, in the 1970s, people killed time on Sundays watching the NBC Mystery Movies. There were a few different series based on different investigators. The Sunday Mystery movies had Columbo, McCloud, Banacek and a few more in the mix with something a little different every week. This was the world of 1972.

Litely lifted from the Clint Eastwood movie Coogan’s Bluff, the McCloud mysteries focus on a Deputy Marshall from New Mexico matching wits with bad guys like Milton Berle on the mean streets of NYC. McCloud is played with extry twang by then TV veteran Dennis Weaver who film school geeks will recognize as the target of trucker hostility from the first Steven Spielberg feature film called Duel.

Anyway, the NY setting is quaint and comparatively uncluttered with much of the series shot in Manhattan. The eleven mysteries still work well enough. The hippie culture is pretty well represented on the margin. The country twang is dialed up to eleven, but Dennis Weaver is charming enough. So charming that in later episodes, he gets more and more rope to play with. His son is in an episode. And Good Christ, the last of the mysteries has a Dennis Weaver song. Its like a kidney punch. Its a good mindless bit of TV history and a text book example about how to construct a mystery.

The last collection in the long line of trades brings the story of Yorick Brown the last man in the world to a stop, not a conclusion, but a stop. Y: The Last Man is the story of the last man standing after a plague like something from the Bible kills every man on the planet except for our hero. This final part of the story has Yorick finally catch up to his girl Beth and the Israeli Army catch up to them. Shots are fired, characters die, Yorick hits the end of the trail, and the last chapter is an extended epilogue.

But the wrap up is too cute and too meta by half. The source of the world-wide death of the men has had a half dozen theoretical explanations over the course of the series. And in the end, they are all given equal weight and they all count. That writers gimmick is fine when it works as the Magic Briefcase in Pulp Fiction because its use is limited to an object to be obtained. In this case, it is the inciting incident that starts the series and as such should be explained. I have a problem with a mystery with no solution, or worse six of them.

That said, most of the Y: The Last Man series works as mundane SF, but the end of a story is the hardest part to pull off.

As usual, Pia Guerra and Jose Marzan, Jr do an outstanding job on the art chores and the story moves. But for a final chapter, its not really final at all, Whys & Wherefores just runs out of pages.

Okay. The Pantheon book is at the printer in Hong Kong. When will it be available? What will it look like? Will it be in English? We will pass along all of the answers as soon as they are available to us in the LSP bunker.

In the mean time, I finished another digital compilation of the SideChicks webcomics. There are no new pages in this book because the penciler bailed. Here is what the cover looks like. It is available for .99 at Drive Thru Comics. And a low-rez version is available for free at WOWIO now. Here is the solicitation info–

‘JUST BUSINESS- Part One– In this issue, Shawn Collier also known as TOMBOY is guarding a rich target after a swanky Washington DC party. When a costumed menace named SandStone breaks down the front door, the two fight in the shaking shell of the house. After finding that the target was killed, Shawn is cut loose by the bodyguard agency. So, she hits the road to find SandStone and to get her job back. TO BE CONTINUED in SIDECHICKS #3! Art & story by Francisco Rodriguez de la Fuente and Bill Williams. Cover by Walter Geovani and Williams.

If you’re rich and powerful in a world of heroes and villains with incredible abilities, you’ve got a whole bunch of new headaches to worry about. Like kidnappers who can walk through walls. Or super-assassins who can take you out with a single, impossible shot. Or ticking off the wrong maniac with muscles of steel. But if you’ve got the money, there’s a place you can turn. Personal Security Services is an industry leader in super-powered protection. What’s more, every one of their operatives is exactly the sort of beautiful, poised woman who blends in perfectly in the rarified circles of the rich and famous.

The stories of the women that work for PSS, sometimes known as the SideChicks, unfold twice every week at the Lone Star Press website and at GraphicSmash.com.’

Many people who work in comics (even at the edge of the underbrush where I live) are reluctant to say much about other people’s work. This happens in part because they may be friends or they may be future employers. So for a variety of reasons, we refrain from criticizing the work of others. Then a mini-series like Amazons Attack comes along and changes the way I see things.

Amazons Attack is a crime against trees.

From the wrong-headed intro to the deus ex machina ending when one of the Greek Gods comes in to stop it at six issues, this is an ill-conceived project which breaks the rules of clear storytelling. In the opening scene, a father and son are at Lincoln Memorial alone in the middle of the day. That end of the National Mall is almost never empty, that having been the site of MLKs I- Have- a- Dream speech among other things. I may forgive minor flubs, but I will still point them out. Anyway, platoons of Amazons and hardware and monsters gate into the scene behind the two. The father reassures the son. And an Amazon cuts his head off. Then the little boy is beheaded and then the statue. Within the first few pages, troops under the direction of Wonder Womans mom are executing children. Just let that wonderfulness sink in for a minute. Then ask yourself who this is supposed to appeal to.

Some of the characters in the series are mortally injured in another book. Then we see a body and some other hero tries to save him in yet another book. There are footnotes to the other books, so as an experience, it feels like reading a novel but having to skip a chapter here and there. So, the Washington Monument gets knocked over, the Capitol Building burns, the Presidents plane is caught and crashed by a squad of women on pegasus. Thats right, the Amazons have super-sonic ponies. Wonder Woman comes to sword point with her mother only to be saved by Superman so that she can get in the exact same position a few issues down the trail. You cannot have a Wonder Woman story without Circe, so she is busy sorcering up in the background. And finally one of the Greek Gods comes in and puts the Amazons in time out and thats it. The End.

The art is interesting. I have no beef with Pete Woods who can do some phenomenal noir work. But the polished art cannot save a story with that many moronic points and holes.

I have seen how these mussy bundles of story come together. Modern comics especially the crossover/ spin off books get their start in editorial meetings. The editorial staff will come up with a book to fit the publishing schedule and maybe they have a decent idea for what the book should be about. Then, they make a call here and there to find a writer suitable to the project. These hand-picked writers will get a plot and a start point and an end point and a hand full of things that have to happen by the last issue. How the writer pulls the pieces together to fit the rest of the Universe is their problem. For a writer, these jobs are a beautiful gift-wrapped box full of ass. Sure, the gig is pre-approved, but you have to find a way to execute the hand full of ideas in the book and manage to not embarrass yourself along the way. Sometimes, it is impossible. Witness this trainwreck.

Will Pfeifer can write well. His run on Catwoman was interesting. This unconnected set of dots masquerading as a story is certainly not representative of his talent. Which is too bad. Maybe this mini-series could have worked is it had been launched under another process. Amazons Attack will keep anyone from spinning anything out of Wonder Woman for three years. Which is a shame.

Judd Apatow is in the middle of an amazing run of movies that would have to be considered the best B- Comedies of the new century. He of course has his fingerprints on Superbad (2007), Knocked Up (2006) and The 40-Year Old Virgin (2005). These three movies are clearly the modern equivalent of the Holy Trinity of comedies from the long long ago, Caddyshack (1980), Meatballs (1979) and Animal House (1978). While Bill Murray sneaks into two of the earlier films, these comedies have little in common except for being the best quotable movies of that era. Gunga-galunga.

When Forgetting Sarah Marshall starts, Jason Segel stars as Peter, the boyfriend of TV star Sarah Marshall who plays a forensic investigator on a generic cop show on one of the networks. Ex- Veronica Mars star Kristen Bell plays the woman at the heart of the heartache with the intensity of an LA social climber. The Baldwin du jour starring in the clips of the show nails the ham-fisted density of David Caruso from CSI:Miami. Anyway, Sarah dumps Peter and hilarity ensues as he tries to get over his famous ex-girlfriend. After a month of hilarious weeping and dating, Peter gets away to a Hawaiian hotel they always planned to visit. Unfortunately, Sarah is there with her new boyfriend an insufferably dense British rocker. And Peter is alone. Painfully.

Mila Kunis plays Rachael the hotels customer service rep and the new love interest for Peter as he stumbles from one painfully funny scene to another. Bill Hader shows up to play Peters stepbrother and give hilarious advice. Ultimately, Peter has to learn to get over his famous ex despite being around her constantly and get on with his life after Sarah. This being an Apatow- produced movie, there is full-frontal nudity of the male version and loads of simulated sex. I am sure that some of it will lead to You-Tube driven VM- fan wankery. But, there is a sweet message at the heart of the movie that drives the comedy as Peter learns to get past his famous ex.

In my opinion, Forgetting Sarah Marshall fits into the best of the Apatow produced movies coming in as maybe the fourth best film and acres ahead of the unfunny Walk Hard. It opens in a couple of weeks. See it. Just do not say I did not warn you about the male junk.

As an infoholic, I swim through a sea of analysis and commentary about sales trends and viewing habits and general media stories. So, I think I’m able to connect a dot here and there that might fall outside of the normal discourse on the world of webcomics. The trends are based on human behavior, so trends from one media might transfer to another.

There are genre shows and themes that seem to be played. Have we all seen enough of the vampires, zombies, serial killers, westerns & lame romantic comedies? Sure, until the remake of 3:10 to Yuma comes along or a Bill Willingham vampire short story or a show like DEXTER.

The excellent Showtime serial killer drama called DEXTER follows the adventures of a serial killer who chases other serial killers. Partner him with a spunky FBI sidekick and you have the engine that drives Silence of the Lambs. But DEXTER spins out in its own interesting way. The second season wrapped up on 12/ 16/ 07 with 1.4 million viewers, making it a hit by Showtime’s standards. It was also a high point for ratings for the network and the series. Then something interesting happened.

The Writer’s Strike opened holes all over the network television schedules, including CBS. So, that network cut out some of the more lurid scenes and repurposed the cleaned-up episodes of the first season of DEXTER on Sunday nights. On 3/ 16/ 08, Dexter pulled 6.42 million viewers to come in third in the time slot. That’s not a huge number, but in the era of dwindling returns DEXTER on CBS is a minor success.

I was curious about the show in a minor way and caught the first few episodes on CBS. And I was hooked. Michael C. Hall’s DEX is wonderfully awkward when confronted with emotion and is cold-bloodedly efficient when plying his trade. So, I had to hit three Best Buys to find a box set of the first season on DVD, so I could run through the rest of the series.

Now, I could have gone and bought all of the episodes on iTunes, but I like the permanence of the boxed set. It is easier to loan out. And to my mind, there is something a little odd about gathering about the computer screen to watch TV. The iTunes effect is stunning by itself and would demand a mind sharper than mine this morning, so I leave that factor out to cleanly explore the remaining distro channels. Just to be clear, iTunes saved the American version of The Office, so it’s cool with me. Plus I can use it to download obscure Thin Lizzy tunes.

From a marketing standpoint, DEXTER is an example of the success of cross-platform distribution. The first run is on pay-per-view-TV and the second is free and the third is a collector’s edition. The people watching the show on CBS had certainly had the opportunity to see the episodes on DVD or Showtime. Assuming anything while doing analysis is risky, but I think it is realtively safe to assume that the bulk of the people watching the show on CBS were new viewers to the material. That means that 3 to 5 million people were seeing DEXTER for the first time on the free TV channel. When programming/ content is released in a few formats, you would tend to get new customers in each channel. DEXTER viewers get a different experience from Showtime to DVD to CBS.

Now, this is mental version of the lazy eye illustrations. Can you see the parallel between webcomics and programming like DEXTER?

In a recent note to Brian Hibbs, I outlined the process for success for independent creators. (Not that we’re pen pals, I was just helping him understand how Project Wonderful works.) We give away SideChicks through a couple of different websites and through WOWIO in the hope that people will try the content and will want to buy a print version from a retailer like Brian in the end. In an era of $3 comics, I think that it is important to give new customers a chance to try before they buy.

Watch DEXTER.

And read SideChicks.

Hello out there PANTHEON fans. If you check Page 313 of the March 2008 PREVIEWS for product shipping in May, you will find the listing for the Pantheon trade paperback called PANTHEON: Welcome to the Machine. The order code is SEP073843 (due to the resolicitation) and the cover price is $19.95. If you want to get a sneak peek at the contents of the trade, you can check out the color versions of the PANTHEON pages at the WOWIO website listed on the post below. We will be doing a print run based on the order from Diamond and I expect these things to move. So, order from your local retailer now.

UPDATE-
The Lone Star books on WOWIO are hitting the top ten on that site, earning a few bucks for the creators and for charity. Thanks to everybody trying a digital comic!

***

I feel the need to make a tremendous apology and explain the circumstances around the release of the first Pantheon trade. The Pantheon trade has been delayed to the Spring. I took way too long in producing the color pages for the trade and blew the deadline. Rather than rush the project through the printer and risk a bad job, I have decided to wait.

By way of compensation for your patience, all of the individual Pantheon issues are available for free on Wowio. Advertisers support that small digital distribution outfit and publishers get a share of that ad revenue. Bottom Line: You get free downloadable pdfs and we get paid. Currently, we have almost thirty bits of fiction on Wowio with the rest of the Lone Star catalogue scheduled to be posted in the next few months. Books and comics include material from both Lone Star Press and Clockwork Storybook. The books free to readers include previously out of print books and comics such as…

Posted-
Beowulf: Monster Maker by Bill Willingham
Beowulf: Hyde and Seek by Bill Willingham
Down the Mysterly River by Bill Willingham
Gods- New & Used by Mark Finn
Beneath the Skin by Matt Sturges
Midwinter by Matt Sturges
Banana-Tail by Mark McKenna

Pantheon #1- #13
Pantheon: Ancient History
Heroic Tales #1- #10
Ex Parte #1 & #2
Strange Heroes #1- #7
Force Seven #1- #3
Ace of Diamonds #0
SideChicks #1

Pending-
Force Seven #4

Special-
Mantlo- a Life in Comics

I got a hold of David Yurkovich and talked to him about his tribute book about the career of long time comics writer Bill Mantlo. Bill created a lot of the comics I loved in the 1970s and 1980s and eventually left comics behind to become a lawyer. One day while he was rollerblading, he was struck by a hit- and- run driver and has been left with permanent medical problems. Proceeds from the Mantlo tribute book go to defray the expenses of Bill’s long- term care. I have waived my usual setup and management costs to make sure that every dollar that comes in goes right to his brother Michael Mantlo.

And here is a bit from a press release that I cannot get run on the comic book news sites…

“Wowio is a win/ win/ win for us,” Lone Star Publisher Bill Williams said. “The fans get free books. Advertisers get eyeballs. Lone Star gets a check and the freelancers get royalty checks. There is something on the list for everyone. I think fans of Fables would be very entertained to read Down the Mysterly River by Bill Willingham. Short story fans would love the work in Beneath the Skin by Matt Sturges. And aspiring creators could do a lot worse than learning from Bill’s original scripts in the Pantheon script book.”

“Of course, comics fans get a look at the Pantheon mini-series, this time in color. While the first trade paperback was delayed, the heart of that material is available for free through Wowio. It’s a great time to be a comic book fan.”

The Complete Lone Star List-
The WOWIO Home Page

ABOUT LONE STAR PRESS:
Lone Star Press is an Austin- based independent comic book publisher celebrating ten years of making books and comics. Among the comics published by Lone Star are Bill Willingham’s PANTHEON, HEROIC TALES, EX PARTE and FORCE SEVEN. Lone Star Press produces the webcomic, SIDECHICKS which is also available on Graphic Smash.

ABOUT WOWIO LLC:
WOWIO opened shop on the Web in August 2006 dramatically expanding access to important written works by eliminating the economic, geographic, and logistical barriers of readers while also ensuring that content owners are fairly compensated.

WOWIO is one of the few sources where readers can legally download high-quality copyrighted ebooks from leading publishers for free. Readers have access to a wide range of offerings, including works of classic literature, college textbooks, comic books, and popular fiction and non-fiction titles.

WOWIO is a privately owned company with headquarters in Houston, Texas.

I went to Office Depot because they ship via UPS from there. But they did not offer ground service, this being Christmas and all. So I paid 3x what I should have to get a box of fun to Las Vegas. I’ll be spending my post holiday bucks any place but Office Depot.