There’s some amazing fan art out there these days. Some of it is from professionals who also happen to be fans.
Graphic designer Khoa Ho has released a series of moody black-and-white designs highlighting the origins and/or secret identities of Batman, Superman, Iron Man and the like.
Here’s his website.
I still remember feeling slightly amused and slightly insulted by the warning included in the printed program for an Indianapolis science fiction convention in the early 1980s.
It said, in effect, that just because a female attending the con was dressed like a character out of the Elfquest comic books – remember, this was a long time ago – that didn’t mean she was a piece of meat to be manhandled – well, fanboyhandled, really. Women at conventions might appear to be the flesh-and-blood embodiment of your fantasies, but They. Are. Not. Yours.
In effect, keep your hands – and your thoughts – to yourself, fanboy.
After my initial reaction to the warning passed, I realized that, yes, the warning was probably necessary. We were talking a few hundred young males who, in many cases, had little experience with the female of the species when she wasn’t on the movie or TV screen. As a young male who actually had met and talked with women and genuinely enjoyed them on every level – as equals, supervisors at work, romantic partners and partners in crime – I wasn’t the target audience for the warning.
Thirty years later and a cool and curious thing has occurred. Women make up a pretty good percentage of the fandom that has sprung up from movies, TV, books, comics and gaming. Some days it feels like they make up a slight majority of that fandom.
And while cosplay at conventions has moved well beyond elves in loincloths, the “hands off” warning still applies. The woman in the Power Girl outfit, complete with cleavage window, is not yours for the taking.
The controversy that’s broken out in fandom in the past couple of weeks is an outgrowth of that same stunted attitude on the part of some male fans, but frankly this attitude, this situation, feels more toxic than anything I’ve seen in decades.
Although there’s been a Neanderthal-ish attitude in online comments sections since the first sci-fi website was built, the especially poisonous vibe came after particularly apt criticism by writer Janelle Asselin of a Teen Titans comic cover. In an April 11 column on Comic Book Resources, Asselin noted several things wrong with this cover:
Not the least of which is the typical-for-comics-yet-absurd-fanboy-wetdream portrayal of Wonder Girl, whose rack is improbably huge and whose head is bigger than her waist.
So noted.
But, incredibly, Asselin’s critique was followed by a heaping, steaming load of bullshit from fanboys who, on various online soap boxes, insulted and threatened Asselin and her fellow female industry figures with everything from shunning to beatings to rape.
Of course these cowards wouldn’t actually be able to say or do any of this stuff in person. I’m sure it made them feel incredibly daring and manly to say it from their hunched-over, masturbatory stance in front of the Dell computers in their mom’s basement.
The whole thing set off a lot of back-and-forth and, happily, lots of people sprang to Asselin’s defense. Among the best of them was writer Greg Rucka, who wove a tapestry of insults and profanities aimed at the idiotic fanboys in question that still has me chuckling. Rucka’s rant was inspired in great part by this image:
The answer to that t-shirt – or at least one of them – is at the top of this column. I wish I could figure out who to credit for the image, but I first saw it on daggerpen.tumblr.com.
Who would not want the presence of women in fandom? Women are in most cases smarter than men. They aren’t the war makers, they aren’t the dominators and those who demean everyone around them to make themselves feel better. Their very presence elevates the level of any conversation, including those in fandom.
Or it should, anyway. If they aren’t so put off by ignorant comments online that they don’t avoid the conversation entirely.
So fanboys, grow the hell up or take your attitudes elsewhere. I can guarantee that you’re not going to win that online argument with a smart, driven fangirl. You’re not going to win the hearts and minds of fandom with your disgruntlement.
And you’re sure as hell not going to get Power Girl, or even that cute elf, to bend to your will.
I’ve noted here, more than once, that I don’t attend a lot of comic and sci-fi conventions anymore. I had a lot more time for it when I was younger. Friends and I traveled around the Midwest, from Indy to Chicago to Columbus and points in between, attending Star Trek, Doctor Who, sci-fi and comic cons.
In more recent decades my friend Andy and I attended the Star Wars Celebrations, which started out as once-every-three-year cons that coincided with release of the “Star Wars” prequels.
So this weekend’s Indiana Comic Con seems smaller in scale than most of those cons but still fun.
One element of cons that’s greatly increased since I was regularly attending cons is the amount of cosplay, or elaborate costumes patterned after popular or enduring characters from movies, TV, fiction and games.
So while my favorite thing about attending Indy Comic Con yesterday was going with my son – a Star Wars Celebration veteran from when he was a pre-schooler – was seeing some creative costume work.
Here’s a sampling:
The best Catwoman I saw.
A good Bane. Man, this costume would be warm.
Awww.
Lots of good Batman-related cosplay here.
A very good Natasha/Black Widow.
And here’s a variation on Black Widow, worn by artist Alexandria Monik.
More thoughts and photos from the convention to come.
I’ve noted it here before – as have many elsewhere – but it’s hard to overstate the importance of Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine to a generation of movie fans and, in particular, horror movie fans.
When FM appeared on newsstands in 1958 – before I was born, no less reading it – the Shock Theater package of old Universal horror films was playing on TV stations around the country, often hosted by an over-the-top character like Sammy Terry here in Indiana.
FM, published by Warren Publishing and edited by Forrest J Ackerman, greatly appealed to the audience of horror movie fans – including me, when I discovered it a few years later.
My relationship with my collection of FMs was a complicated one. I never had a complete run of the magazine, although I had most of them, between buying them new each month on the newsstand and buying back issues.
Then, possessed of the insane writer/designer spirit that led to my actual career, I cut up many of my issues, rearranging photos and articles in scrapbooks in my own fashion.
I bought many of the old issues again, years later, before selling off most of my collection a couple of decades ago.
I kept my copy of “The Best from Famous Monsters of Filmland,” however, and wanted to mention it here in this edition of the Essential Geek Library.
Published in June 1964 by Paperback Library with a cover price of 50 cents, the book was a paperback-sized, 162 page reprint, basically, of some Famous Monsters articles from 1958 through 1960.
Individual articles bore such titles as “Monsters are Good for You,” “Alice in Monsterland,” “The Frankenstein Story” and “Girls Will Be Ghouls.”
Littered with Ackerman’s trademark puns – “Kong-fidentially Yours” – the book offered not only an enthusiastic defense of monster movies but inside information, including the number of models and armatures that were used in making “King Kong,” (27, Ackerman says. In a visit to his house in the Los Angeles area in the 1980s, I got to see one of those armatures, which was nothing but a metal skeleton with bits of material clinging to it by that point.)
I’m not sure when I picked up my copy of “The Best of …” but I’m guessing it was years after publication. It’s in pretty good shape but battered by years of reading, over and over again, by me and the previous owners.
Online sources indicate Warren and Forry published at least three paperback reprint collections of FM articles, following “The Best From …” with “Son of …” and “Famous Monsters of Filmland Strike Back.”
They were just what all of us monster kids wanted and we loved ’em.
Here’s the latest irregular installment of my view from the perspective of a longtime fan. So if you don’t want to hear it, you’re welcome to come back for the next entry. No hard feelings.
Back in my day (and ohmygod yes I did just write that, but mostly for the ironic effect) young fans or geeks or indoor kids or whatever we wanted to call ourselves appreciated classic books, movies and TV.
I mean, what choice did we have? We could slip back into the past with classic Universal monster movies or we could thrill to “Island at the Top of the World.” We could delight in “The Twilight Zone’s” dated pleasures or stay rooted in the present-day of “Manimal.”
I loved the TV and movies of my time, like “Star Trek” and “Star Wars,” but also loved the classics, like the aforementioned Universal movies featuring Frankenstein or the Wolf Man as well as the films of W.C. Fields, the Marx Brothers and Abbott and Costello.
I like to think of myself as living in the present day. I love the online world, from my ability to blog here to Twitter (two accounts). I can enjoy the treasure trove of information and entertainment available now thanks to the Internet that I couldn’t have imagined when I was young.
But …
Really, there’s no excuse for being ignorant of what’s come before.
Two things I’ve read recently bring this to mind.
With the release of the “Robocop” remake, a writer on io9 “discovered” the original 1987 movie and wrote, in pretty funny terms, about how awesome the movie is. It was pretty amusing and I didn’t really mind it, but I was thinking, “Really? You can watch any movie or TV show you want now, on several devices, and you seem shocked by your initial exposure to a very high-profile satirical science fiction movie from less than 30 years ago?”
Far more egregious was a recent AV Club roundtable about the 1970s series “WKRP in Cincinnati.” The series, about a radio station, was an MTM production and ran for several years. It’s not like nobody remembers it.
But one writer for the AV Club, who almost certainly wasn’t born when the series originally aired, was very dismissive of the show. She said the look and feel of the show and the characters were so dated she couldn’t get into the story.
Again I’m wondering how this person had never seen a bit of, or even heard of, the series before … and how that qualified her to take part in a roundtable discussion of the series.
Yes, I know. It’s a different world now. The young shall inherit the earth and all that.
But can’t they educate themselves on their way to the throne?
Those of us who grew up in the 1960s have to be forgiven for occasionally wandering through the world of 2013 and wondering if we’re dreaming.
In the 1960s, comic books and science fiction and horror movies were an almost underground part of the culture, barely more tolerated by adults than eating paste or girlie magazines.
Now, science fiction and fantasy rule TV, from “The Walking Dead” to “Game of Thrones.” Books with sf and fantasy themes like the “Hunger Games” trilogy and the “Harry Potter” books top the best-seller lists.
And at the movies … Marvel’s merry marching movie machine rolls on. The sequel – sequel! – to “Thor” comes out tomorrow. It’s already playing in some theaters. And it’s the latest in a years-long chain of interconnected movies exploring the Marvel universe.
And today Marvel and Netflix announce original series like “Daredevil” and “Luke Cage” are coming, with a “Defenders” team-up series to follow.
If, before “Iron Man” debuted in 2008, anyone thought “The Avengers” was below-the-radar fun only enjoyed by geeks, you can only imagine what a head-snapping development a “Defenders” series would be.
DC is still plugging along with big-screen Batman and Superman movies, but doing impressive work on TV with “Arrow” and other series like “The Flash” still coming.
I sat down and watched an episode of “Arrow” tonight with Green Arrow and Black Canary, for pete’s sake. Tell me who thought that would have been possible a few decades ago.
And the picture above.
On Halloween, Italian astronaut Luca Parmitano, aboard the International Space Station, dressed up like Superman and took advantage of the lack of gravity to fly around.
I don’t care that he looks more like Lex Luthor. He’s flying like Superman!
It’s a good time to be a fan.
Sure this recurring feature on the blog is Comic Book Odd, but there’s really nothing odd about the history of female characters being treated as punchlines for jokes.
It’s not a surprise, really. Comic books were mostly written and drawn by guys, particularly in the Golden Age and even into the Silver Age. And although girls bought comic books at a much greater rate back then than in later years, boys were still the targeted readers for comic books.
So you have panels like the one above, poking fun at Janet Van Dyne – AKA The Wasp, one of the founding members of The Avengers.
And this one, taking a shot at everybody except Wonder Woman.
Thank goodness the days of treating women as second-class characters in comics is over, huh?
Right?
How did a horrific health threat change Halloween as we know it?
We’ve noted before that Halloween has shifted from a holiday for kids when I was young to one for adults. It’s a billion-dollar industry now, with teens and 20-somethings – and older people too – vying to see who can wear the grisliest or sexiest costume.
Above is a detail from a 1981 costume catalog from Collegeville, a Pennsylvania company that started out in the early 1900s as a manufacturer of flags but ended up being second only to Ben Cooper as the store-bought costume supplier to generations of kids.
But a 1989 article in The New York Times profiling Collegeville put a twist on Halloween trends that I’ve near heard before.
That’s the year that someone tampered with Tylenol capsules, secreting cyanide in the over-the-counter medicine and causing the deaths of seven people.
The Times – this is in 1989, remember – theorizes that the resulting scare might have prompted parents to keep kids home from trick-or-treating, years after the first rumors of razor blades in Halloween apples couldn’t kill the holiday.
But The Times maintains it also sparked interest in at-home Halloween parties, which prompted interest in more elaborate costumes for kids, which led to more costumes for adults, who had to be on hand for the party.
Here’s how The Times reported it, back in 1989:
When people in the Halloween business explain why, they quickly get around to a key date – the fall of 1982. That was when the chilling news broke that seven people had died from Tylenol capsules laced with cyanide. The infamous Tylenol scare almost completely destroyed Halloween. Some towns outlawed trick-or-treating that year, and parents everywhere kept their kids from venturing into the streets.
As a result, costume makers were devastated. But then some bizarre events began to unfold.
Children wanted to do something on Halloween. So if they couldn’t go asking strangers for bags of sweets, then they were going to party. Partying became much more popular. At the same time, parents got fussier about what their children wore. ”When they went door to door, the kids could wear a costume that you just get by with,” Mr. Cornish said. ”But when you went to a party with all your friends, you had to start dressing up a little more.”
As parents watched their children go to parties, they got envious. They wanted to dress up as the grim reaper or Yosemite Sam, too. So the morbid events of that year turned out, in the long run, to have been just about the best thing to happen to costume makers since Halloween was invented. As Bob Cooper, the president of Ben Cooper Inc., a Brooklyn-based costume maker, put it, ”There’s been a change in the way that the holiday is celebrated.”
I’m going to extrapolate here and suggest that since 1982, people have mostly gotten over their fear of tampered treats, so that’s no longer affecting Halloween.
But an entire generation of people born after the Tylenol tampering case are very accustomed to teen and adult Halloween parties now. They’ve been high school students, college students, members of the workforce and now, more than 30 years later, they’re parents.
And elaborate costumes for kids and adults, along with parties and trick-or-treating, are the norm for them.
So perhaps something fun and good came from something horrible.
(Image from plaidstallions.com)
I was a big magazine reader when I was a kid. Between the magazines that were delivered to my house, the magazines in the school library and the magazines at the pediatrician’s office, I looked at a lot of magazines.
I can’t swear that this was a Halloween-season ad, but it sure seemed like it: An ad for GTE fluorescent light bulbs that made use of a Universal-style Frankenstein monster.
I remember the ad so vividly. And thanks to the Internet, I can now determine that it appeared in magazines in 1970.
Lookin’ good, Frank.
What would Halloween be without monsters? And what would monsters be without Forrest J Ackerman?
Some of you might not recognize the name, but Ackerman – known as Forry to fans and friends – was the editor of Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine from its founding in 1958 until publication ceased – at least under Ackerman, and at least for a while – in 1983.
Ackerman’s publication came at a fortuitous time for his fortunes and for monster movie fans in general. Famous Monsters coincided with the airing of the “Shock Theater” package of old monster movies – including classic Universal monster films from the 1930s and 1940s – on TV.
During the 1960s in particular, monsters were a booming business, spawning model kits, movies, TV shows like “The Munsters” and magazines like FM and its many imitators.
Ackerman, who died in December 2008, was a corny, pun-making treasure trove of movie and science fiction literary history and he brought it all to the magazine.
I met him only once, during a trip to California in the 1980s. My friends and I got to go through his house, dubbed the Ackermansion, which was filled with many thousands of movie props, posters, books and magazines. I still can’t believe Forry let virtual strangers wander around through his museum.
Besides the overwhelming number of books and posters, the house had priceless movie props. I got to see the spaceships from “Earth vs. the Flying Saucers” and metal armatures for stop motion models from the original King Kong.
I don’t know that Forry ever made Halloween a big deal – every day was Halloween for Forry and Famous Monsters – but he sure contributed to the delight and love and knowledge that many, many fans had for the spooky trappings of the holiday.
keithroysdon 