[00:00] Intro: Welcome to The Corner Box, where we talk about comics as an industry and an art form. You never know where the discussion will go or who will show up to join host David Hedgecock and John Barber. Between them, they've spent decades writing, drawing, lettering, coloring, editing, editor-in-chiefing, and publishing comics. If you want to know the behind-the-scenes secrets, the highs and lows, the ins and outs of the best artistic medium in the world, then listen in and join us on The Corner Box.

[00:31] David Hedgecock: Hey, everybody. Welcome back to The Corner Box. I'm one of your hosts, David Hedgecock, and with me, as always, is my good friend.

[00:38] John Barber: John Barber.

[00:39] David: Hi, John.

[00:40] John: See how I jumped right in there with my name.

[00:42] David: Yeah, okay, smart ass. I got distracted for one second, and I'm never going to be able to live it down.

[00:48] John: I've never been distracted on the show, by anything else.

[00:52] David: No, never. What's frustrating is that Ed didn't edit that out. He just left it in. So, I just looked like the idiot that I am. Anyway, hey, everybody. Welcome to the show. We’ve got some breaking news. We’ve got a big announcement to make for everybody. I've been looking at our ratings, John, and our ratings are maybe not as high as they probably should be. So, I've got a solution. Being the comic book guys that we are, whenever sales go down, there's only the one solution that we can do. So, that's what we're going to do, right, John?

[01:21] John: Yeah, a new #1, but you'll have to know all the previous continuity. You'll have to have heard every other episode.

[01:28] David: 1000%. It's just going to be called Season 2 Episode 1, but it'll just be Episode 63.

[01:34] John: We should really call it Season 2A, or something like that. We should split this one up. It's for our contract. We get two seasons out of this for what we're paying ourselves.

[01:45] David: We can get infinite seasons out of it, for what we're paying ourselves. Hey, John, you know what we could do? We could have a 0 Issue, John. Oh, we should save that for next year, though. We should save that one for later. We can't pull all the tricks out of the bag in the first season.

[01:57] John: I guess not.

[01:58] David: We're going to start Season 2 Episode 1 and get a new #1 in the air very soon.

[02:03] John: We actually have some ideas to make things a little different, but still, hopefully, if you like anything about the show, we'll keep.

[02:11] David: Yeah. Well, I mean, our three listeners love everything that we do, John. We just want to try to get a fourth, that's all. John, you have some good ideas for new stuff that we're going to do for Season 2. Should we tease what we've been planning, what we've been thinking about?

[02:22] John: One, we want to keep up with interviews, get some more interviews. That part, we don't want to change. I think those are always fun, but we wanted to do more deep dives into certain comics, classic comics, influential comics. Do you want to say what's coming up?

[02:39] David: Yeah, our Season 2 Episode 1 is going to be our first attempt at a deep dive. We're going to bring in a special guest, John. Chase Marotz, former long-time editor at IDW. Very accomplished human being. Smart dude, too. He's going to do a deep dive on Batman: Knightfall.

[02:56] John: I'm excited.

[02:57] David: I’m so excited. He's been telling me little bits and pieces about what he's been reading, and it's going to be a fascinating journey that we're about to go on, John.

[03:05] John: Well, I'm interested where he goes and where he lands on Knightfall and stuff. I'm interested where we all do, because I think it's weird. So, we're all probably coming at this thing from different places. So, I'm excited.

[03:15] David: Me, too. I can't wait to find out what's going to happen. If no one else is entertained, John, at least, I will be, and really, that's all that matters.

[03:22] John: Funny thing, you've mentioned a couple times, me getting rid of books when they're not perfect. I had the old DC Knightfall books. There were three of them, but they only didn't have every issue. They just had highlights, and you were actually just talking about reading something like that, and I was like, “oh, that's great. I've actually got those books here.” At one point in my life, I decided, “I should just get rid of these, because if I'm ever going to read Knightfall again, I want to read the whole thing,” and now they have better paperbacks that have the whole thing, and now these chickens are coming home to roost, as I realize what I've done.

[03:55] David: Yeah, John. You're going to have to spend a bunch of money. Those omnibuses aren't cheap. They're highly sought-after. I hope, if people are going to follow along in their own Batman: Knightfall reading, they should go grab those omnibi now, because those things aren't cheap, John.

[04:09] John: Luckily, I've got an app. I might just break my back and come at it from that angle. I'll come at it from the, guy who has also just broke his back, angle. Spoiler alert, if you haven't read Knightfall, by the way.

[04:21] David: Oh, geez. Yeah, giving everything away. We're going to focus a little bit more. We're going to do some lost treasures, John.

[04:26] John: Yeah, that's the thing I think is really fun, is talking about some overlooked comics, and the thing we've talked a lot about, the idea of there being a way for comics to become important again, after they've drifted off and people have missed them, the way movies do. The way books can. I mean, even video games, I think, have an easier time at that than comics, sometimes. More hype around releases and stuff.

[04:49] David: I've already got some good stuff for this, too. I'm excited for this one, too. I think we have good ideas, John. Let's hope people listen. Did you see that we were right, John?

[05:02] John: Sure. In particular, or just in a general sense?

[05:04] David: Filip Sablik and Jamie S Rich are working together. We nailed it.

[05:09] John: That’s it. We were the ones.

[05:10] David: If we had had our podcast come out anytime around when we had actually prognosticated that, we would have looked like Nostradami. Nostradummies? I don’t know, but instead, our podcast came out the same day that they announced that they were working together. So, it just looked like we were repeating what everybody was saying, but we said it earlier, John. We just didn't broadcast it at an appropriate time. That might be one of the reasons why we only have two listeners, but they're starting a new publishing company, and John, I think that you also guessed correctly that it had a strong media tie-in involved.

[05:57] John: Yeah, I wish him all the luck and everything, but after all that wait, the news is just, they started another company, in the same way that people start comic book companies. So, that's cool. I mean, it's great. I mean, more cool comic book companies by cool people is good stuff. The Hollywood angle is, somebody that has some really specific knowledge on comics, and comics-to-media, and stuff. So, that's cool. I don't really have much to say. I actually suggested this as a topic, but my whole thing was just like, Good, cool, neat. I'm glad that worthy people are finding success. That's cool.

[06:28] David: Jeremy Haun. I don't really know much about him.

[06:35] John: He is an artist. He's a terrific artist.

[06:37] David: So, he's an artist, but has he done Marvel, DC stuff, or has been in the indie scene? I don't know. That was a curious one for me. Probably should’ve done a modicum of research to find out who he is. I recognize the name, but I don't recognize him as someone who has done--

[06:51] John: Yeah. He did Batwoman for a while. He just recently did Knight Terrors: Black Adam. I mean, he was around, at least, since Civil War, back at that time. He's a long-time veteran. He worked on, I remember, some stuff of that era at Marvel.

[07:09] David: Oh, okay. Alright. Cool.

[07:10] John: Yeah. He's super talented.

[07:12] David: Yeah, I got the impression that he's going to be some creative director around there. So, that sounds like he's well-suited for that. Well, I wish him luck. I'm interested to find out what the name of the company's got to be. They didn't announce that part, which I found curious.

[07:25] John: It is interesting. I didn't realize that.

[07:26] David: Yeah, the Filip Sablik Jamie Rich company, apparently. Rich Sablik.

[07:30] John: They should name the company just everybody's name that's there, and then every time somebody new gets hired, it gets added to the name, they have to reincorporate it, file new papers, and everything.

[07:40] David: Don't think that's a sustainable business model, John. What's funny about the announcement, though, is that it is a very typical Filip Sablik type of announcement, where, no offense to the other guys, but it's a couple of schlubby comic book dudes, and then, Filip Sablik, Mr. Universe, with his coat, buttoned-up shirt, looking all handsome and debonair, and his hair is all slick, and got that half smile that makes the girls swoon. That son of a gun. It's pretty funny. He's very image conscious. I wish I had half of that. I wish I had a third of that. A quarter of it.

[08:20] John: That's why you’re on the radio. Jeremy's also a writer, as well. I didn't remember to say that, but he writes a lot of comics.

[08:29] David: Completely off my radar. I'm going to have to go check him out, see what that guy's up to.

[08:37] John: One of the things we talked about doing was a look back over the past year, but especially, this past summer, which we haven't really had a chance to talk about very much because the summer has flown by, and we worked together a couple of times. We had a bunch of interviews, which has been great, but we didn't have our usual catch-up after Comic Con, or anything like that. Literally, this call right now is the most I've talked to you since before Comic Con, I think.

[09:01] David: We've been busy, John. We had all these interviews and stuff, but it was good. It was good stuff. I've been busy with my Kickstarter campaign. By the time this comes out, I think it might be over. I don't know. If you go to Kickstarter and search Miss Mina on Kickstarter, it will hopefully still come up, but I've been busy making comics. As the long-time listeners know, my first book, Super Kaiju Rock ‘n Roller Derby Fun Time Go, we ended that campaign in May. All the books came in. We've been busy packing and shipping the last week or two. Then, we've been getting ready for the new campaign, Miss Mina and the Midnight Guardians. As we're speaking, it's launching, Tuesday, August 27th, 2024. So, yeah, I've been more busy than I'm used to.

[09:45] John: Just signing in. I was like, “oh, no. Did I forget to get Miss Mina?” Went on there and it automatically logged in on the login of a mutual friend of ours, Nate Murray. I had to log in with him to check something during our own Kickstarter. Somehow, it remembered his login. So, if it had been live right now, man, you would have gotten a pledge of $300,000.

[10:08] David: That would have been great.

[10:10] John: Yeah. So, there would’ve been news about this eclipsing Larry Hama, with a $4 million pledge by one person.

[10:17] David: Only three pledgers and $4.7 million worth of […].

[10:23] John: I love that the other two people are each putting in 350,000 in that scenario. There's two people that see somebody went in for 4 million, “I better go in for almost 400,000.”

[10:35] David: Yeah, I like that competition for my Kickstarters. I want that in my life. Anyway, these things are a lot of work, but I'm very excited. The new book is super cool. Got a fantastic art team, the Xong Brothers. Yeah, you read it, John. Thank you for the quote. I know you meant every single word of it.

[10:52] John: I did.

[10:54] David: Anyway. So, what is the aftermath, for you, from San Diego, or just the summer, in general?

[11:00] John: I really enjoyed San Diego Comic Con. I came out of it really excited again. I had a couple of years ago. Last year, I really didn't, and this year, I did. It was great. Nothing particular happened. I just see people I wanted to see. Some of those magical moments that we've been talking about. I actually ran into the same Scott Tipton near the end of Comic Con, this time, as I did at Wonder Con. So, that was funny.

[11:23] David: Did you make him go have salad with you?

[11:25] John: No, but he was looking at the same 12 comics for $20, or something, that I had walked into and bought, the moment I walked in, on Thursday. So, I was carrying around a bunch of comics all day. He was, intelligently, doing it at the end of Sunday.

[11:39] David: All the good stuff is gone by Sunday.

[11:41] John: Yeah, that is true. I got all the good stuff. I saw Klaus Janson at the Eisners, where I think he got an Inkpot award, or he got the Hall of Fame. I forget, but I saw him, but I didn’t have a chance to say hi to him, because I was talking to our other mutual friend, Riley, of IDW. I was hoping to see him afterwards. Didn't see him, but then I ran into him the next day, and I got to say hi to Klaus Janson, who I hadn't talked to in a long time.

[12:01] David: Did he remember you?

[12:03] John: Talk all the time, yeah. Signa, our own Kickstarter, which is shipping soon, Signa, our editor, Mason, was in line to get an autograph from Todd McFarlane, because he had brought with him the Spawn promo poster he had when he was a kid. So, it's super beat-up, but just on the off chance he would be able to see Todd McFarlane, and he did. He got a wristband, the whole deal. So, he was talking to Todd McFarlane at the same time I was saying hi to Klaus Janson. So, ironically, I was seeing the, empirically, best artist who's drawn a Batman/Spawn crossover, at the same time he was talking to Todd McFarlane.

[12:41] David: Jesus. Joke took 7 minutes. It was not worth the journey.

[12:48] John: See you next season, everybody. Bye. Here's a highlight, and it goes into your wheelhouse. That Deadpool drone show at Comic Con was amazing.

[12:57] David: Man, I only saw a video of it online. I didn't know that it was going to be a thing. The video looked incredible. It looked super cool.

[13:05] John: I just got to the CBLDF party. So, I was up on the roof there when they started doing it. You're seeing it from the back. It was positioned the wrong way. So, everything was backwards. I'd never seen a drone show, either. I heard people say they were cool, and I was like, “yeah, whatever. Bunch of helicopters flying around,” but no, it was amazing. It was full color images in the sky, and the Wolverine/Deadpool stuff was fine, but honestly, when Galactus rose up from the shore, and then Johnny Storm flew into the sky and lit a 4 into the sky, and it looked like it was burning, because, I don't know, the drones were sending out smoke or something, that was amazing, and that was the most excited I've been about a Marvel movie since Endgame, maybe. It was just, wow. Seeing that 4 get burned into the sky, in a way that would have been impossible three years ago, it was amazing.

[13:59] David: Yeah, that drone technology scares the heck out of me, because it's just too good. It's too good, and I have an evil mind. So, I think of all the ways that these things could be used for evil.

[14:10] John: Sure.

[14:13] David: Yeah, I had a good show, too. I enjoyed San Diego Comic Con. I thought it was a good show. I was only there for a sum total of four or five hours, but I showed up, I think, on Friday, and then I went again for a little bit on Sunday, and I had a good time. Oh, I was definitely there on Friday, because we had a panel together, John.

[14:29] John: Oh yeah, that's right. I forgot our panel together.

[14:32] David: We did. We talked about 3D comics, and mostly, my entire contribution to that was for me to let everybody know that I had pre-ordered a CGC slabbed 9.8 copy of New Mutants #98 3D. I don't have my copy yet, John, and it's starting to make me itchy.

[14:50] John: I've seen video of them. They're printed, or whatever. They're on their way. So, that's coming.

[14:55] David: Hooray.

[14:56] John: I would say that is very near.

[14:58] David: I figured they were already out. I just haven't gotten my copy. I ordered my copy off of eBay, and if you order a bunch of stuff, advanced orders, everything just comes whenever the last book shows up. Does that make sense?

[15:09] John: Oh, yeah.

[15:10] David: So, I ordered some stuff out of the August catalog and ordered some stuff out of the September catalog. So, I'm not going to get any of my August stuff until all the September stuff basically ships. It works for me because I tend to read things in chunks anyway, these days.

[15:23] John: You can read all the New Mutants 3D comics, at once.

[15:27] David: Yeah, I can't wait. I sent you a picture the other day, since we're talking about Deadpool. I did get a New Mutants shiny foil facsimile copy, and then, John, I got it signed by Rob Liefeld, and he did a chisel signature on it. Do you know what that is?

[15:41] John: No. Tell me what that is.

[15:42] David: If you look at a Rob Liefeld comic book, and when he signs the art, he does a special version of his signature. It's chunky and scratchy, but it's very specific to Rob Liefeld. You see it, it just says Liefeld. You just know, “that's a Liefeld comic book cover.” So, he's turned that into an entire cottage industry on Whatnot, where he just signs stuff using special-colored pens, this chisel signature, and then he has variations of it, where he's got a blood splatter behind it, or he does dots around it, calls it the Kirby dot signature, and stuff like that. So, I love this stuff. I'm 100% in. As you know, if it's Rob Liefeld, I’m in. Anyway, I got my chisel signed New Mutants 98 shiny foil facsimile, and I am very happy. That was something that actually came out of San Diego Comic Con. I didn't get it at the show, but it came out of the show.

[16:34] John: How many dimensions is that?

[16:36] David: It's not as good as the book you made, John.

[16:39] John: Oh, good.

[16:40] David: Only 2D.

[16:41] John: Only two. Which two did they pick?

[16:43] David: I assure you that one of the several 3D books that I bought will eventually have a chisel on it. I'm sure of it.

[16:51] John: Thank goodness.

[16:52] David: I do need that in my life.

[16:57] Hey, everybody. It's me, David. I realized that I haven't done enough talking about my new project, Miss Mina and the Midnight Guardians. So, we're launching the Kickstarter on August 27th of 2024, and it's going to be running for three or four weeks. I hope you all go check it out. Get on Kickstarter, and type Miss Mina, and it'll pop up in the search engine, or you can just go to www.funtimego.com, and it'll point you in the right direction from there. Alright, I hope you check it out. I'm really excited about it. It's 1801 and Miss Mina and her band of misfit monsters are battling forces of the vampire King Dracula, trying to stop them from taking over the world. It's got some high action, high drama, and lots of cute chicks. Alright, thanks, everybody, and I'm out.

[17:59] David: You know what else has been happening this summer that I've been enjoying? The launch of the Image Comic Book company, the sub-imprint there that those guys are doing, the Geiger stuff, and Redcoat. So, Ghost Machine, a sub-imprint of Image, they’re a little company there. They've been putting out some good books. Geiger’s good. Jason Fabok, holy moly, that guy, he is pouring his heart, he's got to be, he is pouring his heart and soul into that Rook comic book, and it look gorgeous. I'm not super into the story. It's just another Geoff Johns joint, for me, but man, the art’s great. He is really doing a fantastic job with art, Jason Fabok. He's climbing up my list of guys that I'm super into right now. So, I'm really enjoying that, and the Redcoat, the Bryan Hitch Redcoat stuff was also really good, but I know it's all the same writer for all that stuff, but the Redcoat stuff, I don't know why, it feels like it's differently written, or I don't want to say better written, but I'm enjoying it more.

[19:04] John: I agree. I really enjoy that comic. This is something I did after Comic Con is, I went through, and I read 2 feet of a stack of comics that I'd had sitting out. I got caught up on every current comic that I bought. I mean, no joke, was around 100 comics that I was sitting there and reading over the course of a couple days, when I was doing that. It was a lot.

[19:26] David: Where did your family go? Did they go on vacation or something?

[19:28] John: Well, I went on vacation, and my thought was, I was going to read a bunch of the stuff I got a Comic Con, but then I brought my new comics there, and I wound up reading a bunch of those there, and then we got back, had a day where we were exhausted from the vacation. I saw the huge stack of stuff from Comic Con that I need to read now, but what I was getting at was, Redcoat was great. I'd read the first one, maybe, but then, the next couple of issues, and I was like, “man, that's a fun comic.” I don't like it whenever Benedict Arnold shows up in a comic book, because whenever I think of that, I just imagine a kid in the 50s, insulting another kid, and being like, “oh, you Benedict Arnold,” but he is not somebody you talk about very much. He's actually super fascinating, and the whole story of the actual betrayal that he did was huge. So, that part is interesting. Just that funny part of the JLA: Earth 2, the Grant Morrison/Frank Quietly one, where they go to the evil earth and the $1.00 bill has Benedict Arnold on it. That's awesome. I've always loved that. So, he's not the star of Redcoat but he does show up.

[20:43] David: Yeah, he seems like more than a big player. He's definitely got a role to play. Oh, you know what else I did at San Diego Comic Con, that I wanted to mention? I completed my Dazzler run. I've been looking for a copy of Dazzler #35. I had an old beat-up copy. You're looking at it right now, aren't you?

[21:06] John: Oh, no. I was looking up the thumbnail, made me think was a different cover. Sorry. It is actually more funny, but it isn't the cover I thought it was.

[21:16] David: It took a bit to get that one. All the Sienkiewicz covers, that he did for Dazzler, they're all a little harder to find, because the print runs started to get a little lower, and Sienkiewicz, that's the man, and I think his Dazzler covers is some of his best stuff, some of his best cover work. I love those things. Anyway, I put together a run that's very fine plus, almost near-mint, but not quite. So, this was the last one that I needed, and I got it. I got a great price, too. That was the other part of what I was trying to do, is do it without spending a bunch of money, which was easy, and then suddenly, everybody thought Taylor Swift was going to be Dazzler in the Deadpool movie.

[21:55] John: Oh, that's right. That's horrible.

[21:57] David: And it got very hard, for a little while there. I was like, “I'm not paying that price for that comic book. I will wait for the price to come back down,” and it did.

[22:05] John: Yeah, I'm trying to figure out which issue is, but there's an issue of, okay, it's Issue #30, Dazzler in front of a car with an arrow coming in, pointing to California, and then these two faces behind her, one of a woman, one of a man. The man is Dazzler editor, Ralph Macchio, who I used to share an office with.

[22:26] David: Is it really?

[22:27] John: Yes.

[22:28] David: A handsome devil.

[22:30] John: It isn't one of those ones where it's like, “oh, yeah. He drew him.” No, I think that is a stunningly good portrait of Ralph Macchio.

[22:40] David: That’s hilarious. I didn't know that.

[22:42] John: He was the first person that hired Bill Sienkiewicz. He hired him on some of the […].

[22:45] David: Oh, that's fascinating.

[22:48] John: That is why you see Sienkiewicz on a bunch of weird Marvel books around that time. He's doing Dazzler, he's doing U.S.1 covers, I think, and Starriors.

[23:01] David: Ralph was just throwing him a lot of stuff, just giving him work?

[23:05] John: Yeah, I’m sure he had a lot of work. He was New Mutants Bill Sienkiewicz by this time. This is 1985. Elektra: Assassin wasn't out yet. He was probably working on it.

[23:18] David: Well, the Dazzle #30 says 1984.

[23:20] John: Okay. There was no resource management at play. There was no thought that the best cover artist should be on the best comic.

[23:30] David: I love that. I mean, it's obvious this guy, regardless of where he is in his artistic journey, being cream of the crop, it's obvious this guy can. If you look at the covers before Sienkiewicz, and you look at the covers afterwards, it's not even close. It's ridiculous how much better he is than everybody else in this run. I just like the comic. It's fun. I've always really liked that character, Dazzler. So, I was glad to finally get that run done. How crazy is it that the hype around a movie can generate, I'm not kidding, man, not that these books were very expensive, but the prices doubled. Everything on these books, the prices doubled everywhere, to the point where I actually sold some stuff because I was like, “man, I know I'm going to be able to buy this again for half the price.”

[24:15] John: That's wild. Just the rumor of a movie, a baseless rumor or whatever, one that proved not to be true.

[24:20] David: Proved not to be true, but that movie was good. What did you think of Deadpool? Did you watch it?

[24:24] John: I haven't seen it yet.

[24:26] David: Oh, you haven't seen it yet? I've seen it twice.

[24:29] John: I saw the drone show. I figure I got the gist. I assume you liked it?

[24:33] David: It was made for me. That movie was made specifically for me. Everything about it was 100% what I wanted. I've heard people say this, but it's like the most fan service-y, fan service film of all time. It's just shot after shot of cool Wolverine covers or interiors. Every single possible cool comic book interior that you can remember was in that movie, shot for shot. They did it so many times. I loved it. I loved every single one of them. It was the most, you haven't seen it, are you going to see it?

[25:11] John: Yeah.

[25:12] David: Alright. I don't want to give anything away.

[25:14] John: I mean, I’ve seen all the cameos by now. I don't think that's going to surprise me.

[25:18] David: It is just literally the most hyper violent live action cartoon I've ever seen. Just over-the-top violent humor. It was like watching a modern live action version of the Road Runner versus Wile E. Coyote. It's just constant violence, and cartoon level of violence. I was laughing and just completely entertained the whole time. I really liked it.

[25:45] John: I'm not as excited by hearing all the fan service-y stuff as I once would have been, but I don't know, this movie might be really doing it differently than other ones. I mean, obviously, it's more irreverent and wittier, I think, than a lot of the times, where it's been like, “hey, there's a guy. Remember that guy that was almost in that movie or was in a movie? Look. Remember that?” I haven't seen the new Alien movie yet, either, and I was excited that they finally made a third Alien movie because they only ever made two Alien movies ever, and it's nice that there's a new one. Looking at the trailer, and I was like, “oh, yeah, that's it. Oh, that's like that shot in that movie I like.” I don't know. Again, maybe it's great. I haven't seen it. I'm not actually complaining about movies, but this is what's made me slow to go see those movies, is the thing I liked about Deadpool, when it came out, was that it was a really different take on superhero stuff, and the thing I liked about Alien and Aliens was how different they were from each other, and how different they were from other stuff going on, at the time. This is not a criticism of these movies I have not seen, that I think I will see, but I've got a huge stack of comics to get through. So, that's going to be my priority for right now, because there's nothing in comics that was ever like, “well, this is like that thing that I saw that I liked one time.”

[27:08] David: Yeah, nothing like that in comics. What were we saying about new number ones? I've got a really fun stack that I'm about to dive into. I've got the entire Squadron Supreme, all the Squadron Supreme stories and storylines, going all the way back. They collected that in a single omnibus, and I got it for a good price. So, I've got that one on my table. I've got the volume one Micronauts omnibus that I still need to read. I've started. I'm about halfway through, but I'm still working on that one. This is another thing I picked up at San Diego Comic Con, was the China Miéville/Keanu Reeves prose novel.

[27:50] John: That came out just at Comic Con.

[27:52] David: Yeah, which I think is a version of BRZRKR, the Keanu Reeves comic book. I think maybe the character’s in there or something, but I'm looking forward to it. I really like China Miéville, as a writer. Do you remember that Dial H for Hero run?

[28:08] John: Yeah, that's right.

[28:09] David: That was the most inventive 12 issues worth of comic books I've ever seen, man. That was some inventive hero making, man. That was a great little run that he did there. I really liked the BRZRKR graphic novels. I got them because Ron Garney was on the art. I'm always there for Ron Garney. China Miéville was the reason why I wanted to pick up the prose, because I like his writing a lot. I think he's got some talent.

[28:34] John: Yeah, I never like the celebrity comic book tie-in stuff, with the exception of BRZRKR, which I think's been really good. One, there are really good people on it. I've never heard anything bad about Keanu Reeves, even from people that have interacted with him. Not just the general stuff, but when that novel came out, the thing that really impressed me about it, I saw some article in New York Times or something like that, where Keanu was just like, “Yeah, my name’s on the cover, but China wrote it. I had a couple of ideas that, a couple of suggestions in the beginning, but I was just blown away by everything he wrote,” in a really deferential and cool way, where it wasn't somebody taking credit for something somebody else had done. I like to see that. Keanu's name is on there because it was his concept and it sells the book, I guess, but he's not gunning for that credit for having it on there, and I appreciate that, and I imagine that must be how other BZRKR stuff tends to work, too, and Keanu Reeves won an Inkpot Award at San Diego Comic Con. From now on, Keanu Reeves is going to be able to get into Comic Con every year.

[29:39] David: Wow. That lucky son of a gun.

[29:42] John: Pretty sweet. No, he did get an Inkpot award. That part was true. So is the part they he can get in every year.

[29:49] David: What did he get an Inkpot Award for?

[29:50] John: For BZRKR. I think it’s just the positive attention you put on comics, that kind of thing. It would be one that would be crappy if it wasn't somebody that seems to be a genuinely decent person. In between this, something horrible is going to happen.

[30:07] David: Yeah, guaranteed. We're talking all positively about them and then, sometime in the next three weeks, something horrible will have come up. Hey, John.

[30:20] John: Yeah.

[30:21] David: Have you heard of Felix Comic Art?

[30:22] John: Yeah, I've heard of them.

[30:23] David: You’ve got a murderers row of talent over there, John. They sell original art. I don’t know if they're an art agent, as well, they set people up with books and stuff, but they definitely sell the original art, and they've got cool guys like Daniel Warren Johnson, Ryan Ottley, Nick Pitarra, all those guys, and the Felix guys have been posting some art on their feed, and basically, as far as I can tell, some big, deep pocket dude has been paying all these guys, like Daniel Warren Johnson, James Harren, Ryan Ottley, to redraw pages from Batman: Dark Knight Returns. So, you're getting the page where Joker breaks his own neck to kill himself, by Daniel Warren Johnson. It's awesome. So, I don't know who this guy is, but I am so jealous. I wonder if he's trying to put together the whole four issues, but if he was doing that, I’ve got to imagine that each one of those pieces has got to cost a couple of $1000, at minimum. So, let's say it's $3000. That's 200 pages to do all of Batman's Dark Knight Returns. That's $600 billion, or something like that. The math is mathing hard there. What is to stop somebody like Marvel or DC just going back and having a different artist draw New Mutants 98 and just put it out? Just have somebody, literally, just shot-for-shot, redraw it.

[31:54] John: Two things there. We actually did that on GI Joe, where we had a bunch of artists come in and redraw the Silent Issue, #21. We've done that. Also, friend of the show, Dave Baker, did that, as well, with his book, Shitty Dark Knight. He did Shitty Watchmen and Shitty Dark Knight. These are actual published books that exist in real space, and it was him and a bunch of other artists, going in and redrawing those comics, poorly. I mean, based on the title.

[32:26] David: I just love that idea of having Jason Fabok draw New Mutants 98, basically shot-for-shot, or alternately, give Jason Fabok the script for New Mutants 98, if one exists, don't let him look at it, and have him draw it from the script. That seems like a thing that I want in my life.

[32:46] John: Remember that, wasn't it a Dark Knight page that sold for a half a million dollars or something? If you look at it that way, think of how much money you're saving by have somebody else draw it.

[32:58] David: I don't know how the math works on that part of it, but yeah, you're right.

[33:01] John: I mean, I guess in a lot of ways, that's the bargain basement way of collecting Dark Knight art. No, I'm kidding, guy who did that. That's a cool thing, or girl, or anybody.

[33:19] David: What else have you got for me?

[33:20] John: I have been actually just reading a bunch of comics, lately. I've been having a great time doing it, working on comics. It's been a great season with you here, for the past year. I feel like I'm leaving year one of this podcast in a better place than I entered it. I'm excited, and happy to move forward. Got to clean my office, but other than that, I'm […]. Thanks for doing this podcast. Thanks for everything on this. We're not going away. We'll be back.

[33:47] David: We'll be back next week.

[33:48] John: Yeah. I don't want to make that sound like, “and then I quit.”

[33:52] David: We're comic book artists, monthly, but we're doing it weekly.

[33:55] John: Also, every seven days.

[33:59] David: Jesus. Yeah. So, there you go. Let's put an end to this season, John, right now. A great way to end the season.

[34:08] John: See you all back here next year. Is there a year in between or do we just go?

[34:12] David: No. Everybody comes back next week. People can't get confused. It's just a new #1, that's all. If you've already got it in your pull box, you don't have to do anything. The new #1’s going to show up in your pull box next week, just like it always does. Just have a different number on it. That's all. Everyone's going to be fine. See, here’s the thing. #1’s a jumping-on point, John. So, we've got to have a jumping-on point for people, even though it's going to be exactly the same thing, next week, as right now.

[34:35] John: No. We’re going to talk about Knightfall next week. 

[34:39] David: Yeah. No, that's good, Thanks, John. I had a fun first season. I can't believe we actually made the whole season. We did not miss a single week, John. 52 weeks. More than 52 podcasts. So, not only did we not miss a week. We doubled-up on some weeks. That's how dedicated you and I are to this audience, John. These three people? We care about them. Thanks, everybody. We'll see you here next time, next week.

[35:08] John: Bye, everybody.

[35:09] David: Bye.

Thanks for joining us, and please subscribe, tell your friends about us, leave a review and comments. Check out www.thecornerbox.club for updates and come back and join us next week for another episode of The Corner Box with John and David.