Vertigo Resurrected

One of the biggest releases today, in terms of content and value, is Vertigo Resurrected, which costs only $7.99 for 92 pages, featuring stories and art by Brian Bolland, Brian Azzarello, Essad Ribic, Bill Willingham, Garth Ennis, Jim Lee, Steven Seagle, Tim sale, Peter Miligan, Eduardo Risso, Bruce Jones, Bernie Wrightson, Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely. Vertigo Resurrected would be worth the price for half of these creators!

All of the stories by the creators I've listed above have appeared elsewhere, but this was some time ago and they've never been represented until now, so I'm going to guess that these stories will be new to most people. The only new story, the lead John Constantine story titled Shoot, isn't really new in the sense of just having been recently written and drawn, it's new because it was written by Warren Ellis and drawn by Phil Jimenez years ago, but never saw publication. Shoot was written and drawn and was going to be released as an issue of Hellblazer, but then the Columbine shootings happened and because Ellis and Jimenez' story was about school kids shooting other school kids, DC / Vertigo didn't think it would be a good idea to release that story at that time. Sadly, Shoot isn't dated at all and is definitely a powerful story (no pun intended).

7 Psychopaths

7 Psychopaths collects the mini-series by Fabien Vehlmann and Sean Phillips that was originally published in France three years ago. The premise is quite simple: Seven men (well one of the seven is a women) are gathered to assassinate Hitler. The first thing that one thinks of when they hear this premise is of the movie Inglorious Basterds, but since 7 Psychopaths was released three years ago, it predates the release of Inglorious Basterds (even though Tarintino worked on Inglorious Basterds for years before it finally hit theaters).

Why are seven crazy people gathered to perform this mission? Well because they're too crazy to think about the odds on being successful. The primary entertainment of 7 Psychopaths (beyond the great art of Sean Phillips, of Criminal fame) is watching (reading) this group come together. Published by Boom! Studios, 7 Psychopaths is in full color for only $9.99 - a better deal you won't find!

Vegas Valley Comic Book Festival 2010!

The annual Vegas Comic Book Fest, held the first Saturday of November for the last few years, is just three weeks away!! Held at the Clark County Library (1401 E. Flamingo Road - basically right behind Alternate Reality Comics' new location on Maryland & Flamingo) on Saturday, November 6th from 11am-4pm. Attendance is free and so are the panels and movie screening that will be happening throughout the day.

This year, for the first time, local comic creators have banded together to create an anthology comic called Tales From The Boneyard, which will be on sale at the show, with Pj Perez (who spearheaded the production and is a contributor and creator of The Utopian, which he recently completed) and many other of the cartoonists featured within also appearing at the festival. The image here is of course the cover of Tales From The Boneyard, painted by local artist Danny Roberts.

Some of the other comic creators that will be at the Vegas Valley Comic Book Festival 2010 are: Keith Knight (K Kronicles and Knight Life), Eric Shanower (Age of Bronze and writer of Marvel's Oz comic books), Ryan Claytor (And Then One Day and other self published comics from his Elephant Eater line of autobiographical comics), the Fillbach Brothers (Roadkill, Werewolves On The Moon Versus Vampires - they also live here in Vegas), and Laurenn McCubbin (another local cartoonist, she recently drew an issue of Madame Xanadu), Derrick, of Comic Oasis (a great comic shop on the Northwest side of Vegas), is bringing in cartoonists Sean Galloway, and Adam Beechen and Ryan Benjamin (the creative team of the new Batman Beyond comic). In addition to Galloway, Beechen, and Benjamin appearing at the Vegas Comic Fest on Saturday, they'll also be at Comic Oasis on Friday, November 5th.

As if the above mentioned guests isn't enough excitement, this year the free movie screenings will be for Tron, Star Wars The Empire Strikes Back, and the documentary, Comic Book Literacy, as well as several free anime screenings, free panel discussions and creator spotlights, artist portfolio reviews, creator signings, and this year in addition to the local comic book shops (such as Alternate Reality Comics, natch!) that'll be setting up, there will also be a couple of food trucks that have become really popular.

Closing out the Vegas Valley Comic Book Festival 2010, will be a free live performance by Kirby Krackle and as anyone who loves either of their CD releases would tell you, I couldn't think of a better topper for what is sure to be a really fun day! Hope to see all of my wonderful Ich Liebe Comics! readers on Saturday, November 6th at the Clark County Library!

1969 in 2011!

The second volume of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Century, titled 1969, will be out in 1969. The extra time for production is needed to find only the best LSD tabs for inclusion with every copy, so remember to put this title on your pull and hold lists at your favorite comic book store (Alternate Reality Comics in Las Vegas, cough, cough, nudge, nudge, wink, wink!)!

Superior #1; Millar & Yu

I just got done reading one of this week's best new comic book releases, Mark Millar and Leinel Yu's Superior #1. Actually this was my second reading of Superior #1 because, yes, it is that good. Superior is another creator owned title from Mark Millar (Kick Ass and Nemesis) for Marvel's Icon line, but while Superior has some "language" it doesn't have any of the shock value elements of most of Mark Millar's other comic book work (and this is not me saying there's anything especially wrong with comics with shock value elements, just that Millar is able to tell other kinds of stories).

All one needs to know about what Superior is, is that it is Mark Millar's updating of the Superman and Captain Marvel characters in a "real" world scenario. This is one of those titles that I'm sure that anyone who reads the first issue will definitely be eagerly awaiting the following issues!

Alternate Reality Comics - new sign & window decor!

After some huge turbulence with the first sign company I went through, I, just in time fired that company (Signs West) and went with a friend of mine, Evan, who did up the window perfs (they're like vehicle wraps) and Valley Signs & Lighting for my big lighted sign up top (with huge Epstein). Thanks to my artist / friend Ron Horsley (who also designed my website and provides other cool art for my store) for) the cool versions of Epstein (that's the name of Alternate Reality Comics' mascot) and to Evan, Camila, Michelle Irish, and Paul for installing my window perfs on a very long Sunday! Double thanks to Michelle for recommending Valley Signs for my other exterior sign - I couldn't be happier with how it looks! I hope Ich Liebe Comics! readers and present and future visitors of Alternate Reality Comics also approve! Please click on photo image to enlarge the photo, or better yet, stop by in the near future if you haven't already done so because I believe you won't get a true sense of how great these signs look until you've seen them in person!

Brightest Day #11

Although a lot of my favorite comics / graphic novels to read are of the non superhero variety, there really is a lot of good superhero comics out these days. One of the very best is Brightest Day, with the last two issues being especially good. I think the last two issues of Brightest Day (issues #10 and #11) are as good as they are because they don't try to feature too many characters, but at the same time there's a lot going on and really has a forward momentum that isn't just spinning its wheels or is just page after page of story padding.
















If you count Brightest Day, there are four Green Lantern titles: Green Lantern, Green Lantern Corps, and Green Lantern Emerald Warriors. I often say that there shouldn't be this many titles for one character or group of similar characters, but the Green Lantern titles are one of those exception to the rule, in that they are all very good, with top notch creative talent.

Just a look at these three pages and cover from Brightest Day #11, should show anyone who loves great epic superhero comics, that Brightest Day is just a fantastic looking book.
















If you've dropped Brightest Day from the comics you've picked up on a regular basis, I can understand that with the sea of titles out there tough choices have to be made, I just think you may want to look at Brightest Day again and give that hard cut to another title that you're maybe just getting out of inertia. And there's a couple of double page spreads in Brightest Day #11 that I haven't reproduced here that just have to be seen!