Do Anything Exhibit in San Diego

I was recently asked to write a post on the Pittsburgh Small Press scene for a gallery show currently running in San Diego, California. The show, DO ANYTHING, is curated by my friend Chris Kardambikis and features a number of Pittsburgh artists. My article was posted on the show's Tumblr page, but I wanted to archive it here as well. Some of the topics I cover here I have already written about in some detail in previous posts.

For more info on DO ANYTHING check out their Tumblr at http://doanythingexhibit.tumblr.com/

Here's the article:

When Chris asked me to write a post on the Pittsburgh small press scene for this exhibit I was both flattered and a little overwhelmed. I don't know what's happening in other cities, but Pittsburgh is exploding with DIY publishing in a wide variety of formats and fields. Try as I might, I will not be able to mention everyone currently involved. So, rather than try to make this a comprehensive listing I decided to instead offer a little historical perspective.

I've been involved in the comics and small press scene here for a little over thirty years. The phrase “Elder Statesman” has been uttered about me by a number of people. I don't know about that, but I have been witness to a tremendous amount of change in self-publishing and the 'zine community.

I first started publishing mini-comics way back in the late 80's. These were the days when once you wrote and drew your own comic you then had to figure out the layout and then spend hours at the local copy center doing paste up, making copies, collating and stapling your own books. A lot of people still do this, I realize, but back then it was really the only option.

There was a huge, by the standards of the time at least, underground community of self-publishers selling their mini-comics and fanzines through the mail. A magazine called Factsheet Five provided a place to get your work reviewed and advertised. There were others, but F5 was the big one. A very small handful of friends and I jumped into this headfirst, following in the footsteps of Underground Comix pioneers like R. Crumb, contributing to music and comics 'zines as well as publishing our own.

This brings me to what I see as probably the biggest change since then. There were, to my knowledge at the time, four people in Pittsburgh participating in this scene. I know better now, but then we simply had no way of discovering or communicating with them other than random encounters at comics shops or finding a local address in one of the 'zines. The Small Press Artist's Alley was not yet a part of conventions around here either. Other than minor feedback from the few people who ordered our books we were operating in a vacuum. Those days are gone. Last year I attended a 'Zine Fair at a small gallery on the city's Northside and was thrilled to see over fifty vendors with an amazing variety of product: Comics, music 'zines, poetry chapbooks, art 'zines, political commentary, feminist essays, autobiography and fiction. I would have killed to have found that kind of community in 1989.

A mini-comic called Grey Legacy that I produced with my friend and collaborator Fred Wheaton ended up winning one of the very first Xeric Grants from Peter Laird in 1993. This gave us the opportunity to experience self-publishing on a national scale in the pre-internet, pre-Print-On-Demand era. We were guests at the very first SPX in Bethesda. I don't have a list of guests from that show, but there were maybe twenty of us, including established creators like Dave Sim and Steve Bissette. Nowhere near the hundreds who participate now. Nowhere near as many as at the Pittsburgh 'Zine Fair for that matter.

I'm not the only Xeric winner in Pittsburgh. Tom Scioli, one of the contributors to this exhibit, won in 1999 for The Myth of 8-Opus. I wrote a cover feature on him for a local newsweekly at the time. Pittsburgh is also home to Rachael Masilamani, 2001 Xeric recipient for RPM Comics.

At the same time that I was publishing Grey Legacy I taught a class on Comics For Kids through a local community college. One of my students was a very young man (like 8 or 9 years old), named Eddie Piskor. You can see his work in this exhibit as well.

In 1997 I started working at Phantom of the Attic Comics (nominated for the Eisner Spirit of Retail Award in 2009). Phantom has always been supportive of the small press and while working there I have seen the scene explode. Our store has become one of the centers for this activity and, I like to think, has helped foster the community by carrying their product and facilitating connections. It was there I first met Chris Kardambikis and saw the amazing books being produced by Encyclopedia Destructica. It was there I saw Unicorn Mountain go from an idea in Curt Gettman's head to an amazing series of art books. Jim Rugg brought us early mini-comics years before he became a well-known professional. Pulitzer-nominated editorial cartoonist MattBors sold us mini-comics versions of his now nationally syndicated strip Idiot Box while he was a student here.

In addition to Phantom Pittsburgh is home to Copacetic Comics. Proprietor Bill Boichel is a long-time fixture of Pittsburgh comics and runs one of the most idiosyncratic and Indy friendly stores you'll find anywhere. We also have the Toonseum, one of only three museums in the country dedicated to comics art. Both of these serve to connect and expand the comics community here. 2009 saw the launch of PIX, the Pittsburgh Indy Expo to huge success. We're not SPX yet, but the first two years of the show have been very strong.

I continue to see new work by local artists, self-published and digital and fully believe we have not seen the end of successful comics in Pittsburgh. It is very gratifying on a personal level to see this world I have been involved with for so long continue to grow and expand and begin to be taken seriously. An exhibit Like Do Anything would have been unthinkable not that long ago.

Comics and Taking Chances

Recently, in a comics-related Facebook group I participate in, there was a discussion about Marvel and DC not taking chances or risks with their publications. This sparked a fairly long discussion where many people listed things they believed were examples of risk-taking, both current, such as DC's New 52, and past, Watchmen being named. I wanted to post several comments, but much of the conversation had gone by before I read any of it. The more I read, the more thoughts and ideas on the topic I had, more than there would have been room for on the thread.

Hence this blog entry.

It seemed to me that the entire conversation had a narrow focus that only applied to already established comics fans. I also realize that I disagree with many of the things that were stated in the discussion. I don't want to single any of my friends out in a “NO, You're Wrong!” kind of way. This is a big topic and there are lots of ways of looking at it. So, I apologize if it seems like I'm bashing anything anyone said. These are my thoughts and I welcome discussion on the topic.

I think, at the heart of this discussion, is the age-old question all diehard comics fans ask; How can we get more people to read comics? We love them so much, why can't other people? What can we do, as individual fans and as an industry, to turn more people on to the medium we love?

One of the answers is the belief that if the companies took more risks they would attract more readers. While I agree with this in principle there is a problem with the definition of what “more risks” actually means.

DC's New 52 was a risk, and in the short term it has paid off, for DC and for comics retailers (and for some fans, depending on who you talk to). But, it was a risk within the bounds of the established comics fan base. The real risk was alienating already established fans. As someone who spends a lot of time on the retail side of the comics counter, what I've seen is renewed interest on the part of lapsed fans. Some old faces have come back. Sales have been good, but only to people who already read, or have read, comics. I have not seen hordes of uninitiated new readers storming the castle for the new issue of Ravagers. Or Batman for that matter. The convoluted and overlapping continuities still prevent new readers from embracing comics.

The introduction of gay characters, whether it is the Golden Age Green Lantern or a continuation of the Northstar storyline are not risk-taking moves. There have been prominent gay characters for years. I recently read an article in an issue of Amazing Heroes from 1987 that focused on gay characters in comics. This has been true at both Marvel and DC for a long time, but even more so in independent books. A significant portion of the entire cast of Love & Rockets have engaged in various alternative sexualities for three decades now. But that's not news, because outside of comics no one knows what Love & Rockets is. For that matter, lots of people within comics have never read it to know how naturally the topic has been part of that series since the beginning (and that's part of this whole issue I'm going to come back to). Gay characters are showing up in the news right now because it is part of our national conversation, and while I'm all for diversity, I don't see this as particularly risky. It will attract attention for a day or so, a few extra people will buy the comics because of the press, most in the mistaken belief that “someday this will be worth something!” and then never come back. It doesn't produce new, regular readers.

Before Watchmen is not a risk-taking venture, nor does it speak to new readers. The whole Alan Moore/creator's rights issue aside, this project only speaks to established fans. It is capitalizing on an old, successful product and capitalizing on the controversy this will stir within the comics industry. Yes, we sold a ton of copies of the Watchmen TP when the movie came out. That was because it was a self-contained story with a beginning, middle and end for $19.99. I can probably count the number of regular, returning readers this produced on one hand. A very small percentage of people who saw the movie and bought the TP will even know Before Watchmen exists, and even if they are interested it will cost them $135.66 (plus tax in some states), to read the whole thing. How many casual fans of the movie do you think are going to shell that out?

Which leads me to the mistaken belief that the success of comic book characters on the big screen translates into increased sales at the retail level. With rare exceptions, they don't. Watchmen did, for the reasons stated above. Scott Pilgrim did for pretty much the same reasons. But, given the enormous success of The Avengers movie, those hordes of new customers aren't showing up looking for comics. I'm not sure what I would show them if they did. None of the current Avengers books resemble the movie. They are all part of ongoing, convoluted continuities that are difficult for the long-term reader to follow, let alone a newcomer. What Avengers graphic novel would you recommend to a new reader who loved the movie? Try to keep in mind that this person doesn't have the background you do. I love Avengers Forever, but it would be incomprehensible to the uninitiated. Even when someone new has an interest there are very few good jumping on places for them. Their first attempt at reading comics makes them feel stupid and like an outsider to an exclusive club. They are unlikely to come back.

And that's one of the main problems with Marvel and DC. They continue to write stories that are aimed at a small and ever-dwindling fan base. Their stories are so intertextual and dependent on prior knowledge as to be impenetrable to new readers. The only risk-taking that takes place is changes to characters only a few people care about in the first place. This doesn't target new readers.

Which, after a lot of rambling, brings me to the main point of this article. What do we mean when we say we want more people to read comics? Do we, as readers and consumers, love comics? Or do we love superheroes? I ask this as someone who loves both. In my experience, the vast majority of people out there in the wider world, the people who consider themselves to be readers, those who buy books, the people we as an industry should be courting, simply don't give a shit about superheroes, Marvel or DC. It's harsh to say that about something we all love, but it's the truth. Oh, they'll go see the movies and enjoy them, but one look at a superhero, with the capes and tights and all of the other tropes we all accept as part of the genre, and they will dismiss it. It has been true for a long time that most people see the superhero as parody, and simply can't take it seriously as a genre. Whether it's true or not is immaterial. On any given day you can see superhero parodies on TV and billboards and magazines, advertising plumbing and pizza and anything else you can think of. Our culture does not take the superhero seriously, even though we believe it should. I say all of this as a fan of the genre who believes there are great superhero stories out there and that there can be more. But if potential readers, many of whom already have a negative connotation to the subject, are only exposed to Marvel and DC continuity they are never going to become regular readers of comics. As long as comics as a whole are perceived to be nothing but superheroes then we still have a long uphill battle ahead of us.

The problem with Marvel and DC is that they don't think of themselves as major publishers. They are owned and backed by Disney and Warner Brothers respectively, with huge budgets and fingers in multinational publishing interests. But Marvel and DC continue to create content like they were a small press fanzine aimed at a loyal but miniscule market. They simply don't entertain the idea of publishing anything that isn't part of their respective universes (Vertigo, and to a lesser extent Icon, excepted).

Neither of them would have published Robert Kirkman's Walking Dead, because it wasn't part of their universe. If they did (under Vertigo, at best), they probably wouldn't have offered the same kind of rights Image did. Walking Dead is obviously a major success. We regularly sell more copies of the individual issues of it than we do of a huge number of Marvel or DC books. The sales of TP collections go beyond that. Walking Dead isn't even that far removed from the kinds of genres traditionally dealt with in comics, but probably still not something they would have taken a chance on. This is a failure of imagination and foresight on the part of the Big Two.

Imagine if you will, a major book publisher, Random House or Penguin Putnam for example, in an effort to combat dwindling sales and woo new readers, decided to only publish Westerns. There is a small but loyal audience, after all. Now imagine that they decide to make all of their new Western books inter-related and ask their authors to do crossovers and continuing stories so that readers can't get an actual complete story without reading several or all of the books in the line. It's an absurd thought and one that is obviously doomed to failure, but that's the exact model Marvel and DC use.

And we wonder why more people don't read comics.

To truly be risk-takers Marvel and DC need to start thinking of themselves as actual, major, mainstream publishers. They need to offer complete graphic novels of a wide variety of genres that can appeal to as wide a demographic as possible. They then need to put the power of their corporate backers into advertising these books at the same level they market everything else. Ads in Entertainment Weekly, on TV, wherever. They need to launch a campaign that lets people know that comics aren't what everyone assumes they are.

Smaller publishers are already doing this, but they don't have the financial clout to make much of an impact. I was thrilled to see Ed Piskor's upcoming graphic novel Wizzywig be part of a two-page spread in Rolling Stone, being spoken of in the same vein as upcoming novels and music. Ed has produced a comic that appeals to a demographic no other comic has approached, and as a result he is finding an audience that goes way outside the usual comics consumer. Books like his will do more to reach out to new readers and new comics fans than all the crossover events and gay superheroes put together. But there needs to be more content available to keep these potential new readers. Will the fans of Wizzywig become fans of the superhero genre? Probably not. So? Do we love comics, or do we love superheroes?

The Big Two need to launch publishing branches where they can be known for publishing comics that appeal to a wider audience: different genres, different creators with different storytelling and art styles. That would be an actual risk on their part, that handled correctly would produce huge dividends, not only financially but for the art form.

But we, as fans, can't expect them to take risks if we're not willing to. When was the last time any of you, those of you who believe you are fans of comics, taken a risk at reading anything other than the comics you already read? Yes, I'm calling you out. Don't get me wrong... as a reader, of comics and books, not everything is going to appeal to you. There are genres that simply aren't my thing, no matter how well-reviewed or written something is. That's okay. But if we want Comics with a capital C, Comics as a storytelling medium, to thrive, we have to support the idea that comics can be more than what Marvel and DC offer. Writer Jeff Lemire is receiving tons of accolades for his new Animal Man series in the New 52 for very good reasons. If you like that book, have you tried his Vertigo book Sweet Tooth? Have you read Essex County, (his best work in my opinion)? Do you even know what Essex County is? Have you looked at Craig Thompson's Habibi, probably the best single graphic novel of 2011 in terms of story, art and taking full advantage of comics as a storytelling medium? How about Bottomless Belly Button by Dash Shaw, for all the same reasons in 2009? Are you going to be interested in what Ed Piskor is doing in Wizzywig when we have him in the store to do a signing, or are you going to pass it by because it doesn't have Wolverine in it?

I'm not even trying to say you should read all of this, or that given your specific tastes that you would like it if you did. But we will never answer the question of why more people don't read comics until we are able to address exactly what we mean by that. I've stated my reasons why I think the potential audience for comics, those people out there who are voracious readers but don't care for superheroes, don't take us seriously. So, when you're talking to your friends who don't read comics, what are you prepared to recommend? Stuff they will never have an interest in, no matter how good we fans think it is, or a graphic novel more in line with their particular tastes.

Marvel and DC need to take more risks, no question there. So do readers.

Favorite Comics Part Seven: Nexus

To be honest I really don't remember a lot of the details of the plot of Nexus. Written by Mike Baron and drawn (mostly) by Steve Rude, it was one of the earliest of the Direct Market books, originally published by Capitol in black and white and then quickly moving to First Publications and full color. I tapped into Nexus early, with the black and white issues (picked up at Eide's on one of my earliest ventures into the city to find a comics shop, if memory serves).

To summarize; Horatio Hellpop, also known as Nexus, has terrible dreams about mass murderers, dreams that he is compelled to act upon. Wielding tremendous “fusion casting” powers Nexus tracks these genocidal villains across the universe and kills them. He is essentially an assassin, and though his victims are all guilty of horrendous crimes (sort of like Dexter with superpowers), the tragedy of Nexus is that with each victim he takes a step closer to being a mass murderer himself.

I still think of it as one of my favorite books from that time, but recently, in preparation for writing this post, I flipped through a lot of the early issues and the rest of the run and was surprised at how little of it looked familiar. The characters were all well-known to me and as I browsed most of their primary relationships came back. But the stories, the specifics of the ongoing plot remained vague.

While the basic idea of Nexus killing killers provides a structure for the stories, that's not really what the book was about. It was a story about relationships, religion, politics, and societal pressures. It was about free will and moral ambiguity. Though the basic premise of the series was dark, the book was also a tremendous amount of fun. In this way, unlike so many comics that focus on dark themes, Nexus embraced the whole spectrum of life. The joy and love and friendship and laughter that suffused every issue showed the human spirit and reminded us of what we stood to lose when evil prevails.

Nexus himself could be a bit of a downer. He did carry a terrible burden after all, and feared allowing himself to genuinely care. Over the course of the series the amazing supporting cast humanized him, bringing out of his self-imposed emotional exile to join life more fully. Sundra Peale was the love interest, but she was so much more than that. Sundra had a rich life outside of her relationship with Horatio, and of the two was the more self aware. She was independent and confident and self-reliant. Horatio's best friend Dave was centered and calm. Dave's son Fred, who went by the warrior name of Judah Maccabee, was loud, brash and hedonistic. There were many, many more. Baron's skill at presenting richly imagined and thoroughly complex characters cannot be overstated.

And then there's the art. I'm just going to say that Steve Rude ranks among my all time favorite artists. His influences are diverse; comics artists Jack Kirby, Alex Toth and Russ Manning are the most obvious, but artists such as Andrew Loomis and Norman Rockwell are also evident. But Rude takes these influences and makes them his own. When I first saw Nexus I didn't really put any of this together. The sheer power of his graphic design was enough. 






I love the clean lines. His ability to convey emotion through body language and facial expressions is unparallelled. There is a lithe sense of motion in every action, even when characters are at rest. His use of solid black is fearless. Solid black foregrounds are butted directly against solid black midgrounds and backgrounds, and due to his composition it never flattens out.

His color work is pretty awesome as well.

Rude's art has always been something I have aspired to. I think he was a more direct influence on my collaborator Fred, at least in terms of visual world-building, than on me. Nexus subtly influenced our development of the world of Grey Legacy. We were telling a very different type of story, but the pieces are there. The mix of the serious with the absurd certainly was there (though Douglas Adams was responsible for that aesthetic for us as well). Some of our alien species are, well... cartoony. This was a conscious decision on our part. I remember, during one of our early convention appearances someone looking at our art and really taking us to task for this. He just couldn't wrap his head around our more “realistic” looking characters existing in the same world as Lesterfarr and Bilmar. The contrast really bothered him, but it was exactly the look we wanted.


At least some of that came from Rude. The various alien inhabitants of Ylum (Nexus' world, pronounced Eye-Lum) were a mix of the very real and the slightly absurd. The drawings of Dr. Seuss were a huge influence on Rude's designs. It wasn't just background characters either, but many of the central cast. Dave, Judah, Mezz, Tyrone... all of these had an air of whimsy in their design. But that whimsy never undermined the seriousness of their characterization.

I'm pretty sure I haven't done justice to this. Nexus is a series I would love to turn more people onto, but these days it's really difficult to do so. The books are simply not readily available for new readers. The whole series is being collected into beautiful hardcover editions, but at fifty bucks a pop they are only for people who are already fans of the series. A trade paperback edition of the first few issues has been released, but the color issues were reproduced in black and white, and the strength of Rude's design was marred by the addition of unnecessary gray tones. Dark Horse Comics has released the last few Nexus stories over the years, including a brand new one scheduled to appear in Dark Horse Presents soon. Dark Horse has been releasing great color omnibus editions of many of the great books of the 80's at reasonable prices. Come on, let's see a Nexus Omnibus. Unless the rights are tied up elsewhere I can't see any reason not to. I would sell the Hell out of that at Phantom of the Attic.

Nexus is copyright Mike Baron and Steve Rude.

Visit Mike Baron at http://www.bloodyredbaron.com/

Visit Steve Rude at http://steverude.com/

Favorite Comics Part Six: I'm not a curmudgeonly fuddy-duddy

So I've been asked why everything I've been talking about or reviewing in this series are books from the early 80's. It's a valid question. I don't really think of myself as one of those old guys who seem to believe that “everything was better in my day!” I don't really believe that. I've tried to spend my life not being stuck in the past, believing that my glory days are behind me. I've always been critical of those people who get into music in high school and thirty years later are still only listening to those same bands. Not that I don't do some of that, as anyone who has had to listen to Alice Cooper, or KISS or David Bowie around me will attest to. But in the thirty-plus years since I first discovered those bands I have maintained a hunger for new music, and continually explore stuff that's new to me, whether it's a brand new band that catches my ear, or artists from the past that I simply missed out on or wasn't old enough, or wasn't even born yet to have ever heard.

The same is true of comics. Thanks to reprint editions of old comics I'm always reading something I missed before. Thanks to working at a comics shop I'm exposed to new books and series every week. I still love that joy of discovery when I find something new that really moves me or excites me.

But that does happen less often than it used to. That's true of music and comics. Some of it is a simple truth of age. I've read and heard a lot more stuff now than when I was twenty. I don't think that makes me jaded. More discriminating, perhaps. It takes a lot more to impress me, simply because I've seen a lot of really amazing work.

I think for all of us though, there is a time in our lives when we are first really discovering our passions, and those things that move us then become part of our personal DNA. Nothing will ever have quite the same impact on us again, and we will hold on to our nostalgic memory of those experiences as a wonderful time in our life.

For me, at least in terms of comics, that time was the early 80's. I was in my early 20's and comics may have lost me as a reader if the explosion of the Direct Market hadn't happened. I was reading X-Men (though the post-Paul Smith issues were gradually losing my interest month to month), and Marv Wolfman and George Perez's New Teen Titans. Frank Miller's Daredevil and the Wolverine mini-series both enthralled me and had more adult themes and sensibilities than most comics prior to that. I was reading a lot of Marvel comics at the time, but was growing disenchanted.

As I've said elsewhere, I know that many of the new Direct Market comics I began to discover at that time weren't really much different than Marvel and DC, conceptually speaking at least. But it felt momentous. Suddenly it felt like comics could be anything. The titles I've been discussing here, and those I have yet to write about, reignited my love of comics as a medium at a time when I may have “outgrown” them. Were they actually better than what came before? Are they better than what has come since? In a lot of cases, probably not (though I would make the case that they are better than a lot of what came before and after). Regardless of their quality, these were the books that were formative to me, as a fan, as an artist, as a writer and storyteller.

What's great about this hobby is that we all have those moments and those books that are meaningful. Heart books, as I referred to them when I introduced this idea. I ignored the entire Image Comics movement of the early 90's and have no emotional connection to those books or characters at all. But, I've talked to enough people whose opinion I respect to know that those books were the same for them that my books were for me. They are different books, but we share the same kind of experience. That's the kind of thing that should unite us as fans of comics.

The danger is getting tied to that one thing and never moving forward or discovering something new. I don't want to discourage anyone from listening to their old, favorite band, but there's great new music being made. If you loved Spawn in the early 90's, by all means, reread them and enjoy. But check out the amazing new work coming out every week. Don't shut yourself off to new experiences, whether it's something brand new, or an old series you've never heard of before.

Everything is someone's heart book.

R.I.P.

I found out yesterday that an old friend succumbed to her ongoing battle with cancer this week. I don't want to go into a lot of detail about her here in this forum. Most of what I remember and cherish is personal and private, to me and to her, and I don't want to exploit that.

And though I don't want to make this about me, this is really weirding me out more than a lot of deaths I've experienced. I've been very blessed not to have lost a lot of very close people. A number of older family members, usually after a long siege of sickness, usually cancer. I don't mean to diminish those experiences because every death is significant. But for most of these it felt as though their time had come and there was some relief that they weren't suffering any longer.

That was true for my friend as well. She has been fighting this battle for a few years now, and though I have seen pictures of her thin face and bald head from the chemo, I have't actually seen her in person since well before she was diagnosed. So, in my head she is still the vibrant, beautiful twenty-year old I met close to thirty years ago.

We were friends, we were lovers, we were never actually boyfriend and girlfriend. We were, as the current term says, complicated. We both moved on with our lives and stayed in touch through other relationships, and in her case, marriage. There were never any regrets or questions about what we had been, or of who we were to each other. She was my friend, first and foremost and I loved her dearly.

So yesterday I played a bunch of music I associate with her, and I cried and I smiled and I shook my head at some of the dumb, wonderful shit we did together and wished we had both been better at communicating more frequently.

So, here's to you, AJA. Thank you for making my life richer. I'll miss you, pal. I love you.

Favorite Comics Part Five: Coyote

Marvel Comics responded to the explosion of the Direct Market by launching a creator-owned line of comics under the Epic Comics imprint. The first book they published was Dreadstar by Jim Starlin. An introductory chapter to this, entitled Metamorphosis Odyssey, had already been serialized in Epic Illustrated, the Heavy Metal-like magazine Marvel had been publishing. I had read these, but quite honestly, Dreadstar just never really clicked for me (though I read quite a few issues before I realized this).

Their second book, Coyote by Steve Englehart, really grabbed me.

Englehart was an established comics writer by this time, having written many books for both Marvel and DC. His run on Captain America featured the Secret Empire storyline wherein Cap became so disillusioned with American politics that he briefly gave up his identity to become Nomad, the Man Without a Country. This was after witnessing the suicide of the villainous leader of the Secret Empire. While never made explicit, it was strongly implied that this man was Richard Nixon, president of the United States. This story appeared during the height of the Watergate scandal, and the issue with the suicide appeared about a month before the real Nixon resigned. Englehart went on to collaborate with artist Marshall Rogers on Batman, creating a seminal run that is still influential (collected in the Batman: Strange Apparitions TP). He left comics to write a The Point Man, a well-received fantasy/occult novel.

In various interviews I have read from that time Englehart had no plans to ever work in comics again, due to ongoing issues with creators rights. He did create the character of Coyote with Rogers for Eclipse Publishing, a Direct Market company that offered full ownership of properties to the creators.

Coyote was serialized in black and white in Eclipse Magazine, later collected in color as a trade paperback called I am Coyote, which is how I first saw this story. Roger's art Coyote was dark and creepy, layered with zip-a-tone gray tones (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Screentone... for you youngins who don't know what that is). In B&W it looked great, but reproduced pretty muddy when color was added.

Unfortunately, the art didn't really capture the spirit of what Englehart wanted Coyote to be. He was tired of the Batman-like dark avengers of comics, living in alleys and creeping around gothic rooftops. Coyote was a creature of the desert southwest, set in Las Vegas. Bright sun, bright neon and wide open spaces.

When Englehart was asked to contribute a new comic to Epic, where he would own his characters and stories, Coyote was the concept he chose. Rogers was not available at the time (and installments of the original series had run increasingly late).

Artist Steve Leialoha came on board with a much lighter style, more iconic in approach. Coyote himself seemed lighter, in mood as well as physical mass.

Wraparound cover for issue #1 by Steve Leialoha

Coyote was the modern incarnation of a god-concept. Sylvester "Sly" Santagelo was lost in the desert as a baby, found and raised by the Native American trickster god, Coyote. He was raised with totem animals and spirits in a world filled with magic. He entered the real world as a young man, seeing it for the first time. In spite of his upbringing he was enthralled by our mundane world, seeing the magic in it that most of don't. He was youthfully arrogant, filled with a sense of his own power (“Coyote is so sly,” he often said of himself), even when he screwed up. He was happy-go-lucky, filled with a sense of wonder. He believed anything was possible and that he had the power to make happen whatever he wanted. He was overtly sexual. His ongoing affair with NaTalia and Cassie was one of the first openly polyamorous, and interracial relationships in comics.

Is it any wonder he appealed to twenty-one year old Wayne?

Leialoha left after only two beautiful issues. Issue three was drawn by Butch Guice. His Coyote was bulky and muscular, looking much more like the standard superhero comic than what we had seen before, and the style really didn't work.

The rest of the series was drawn by Chas Truog, who went on to be the artist for Grant Morrison's awesome Animal Man series (which featured a story called Coyote Gospel). As much as I love Coyote, and as much as I love Animal Man, I'm not a fan of Truog's art. I find it serviceable, but fairly bland.

As an aside, Truog did a couple of covers for the Alien Nation: The Public Enemy mini-series I inked back in the day.

Coyote ran for sixteen issues, and in terms of plot it was, quite honestly, a clusterfuck. Englehart seemed to just be throwing whatever he could think of into the mix and seeing how his character reacted to it. There were evil scientists and magical threats and aliens from Venus, all working together as part of an international cabal known as the Shadow Cabinet. There was a middle eastern hero known as the Djinn, Israeli spy organizations and cyborg Soviet assassins. There was a man who had half his brain living in another dimension. It was gloriously weird and reckless fun and I loved it.

I have no idea if it was any good or not.

Like too many series, it ended with no real resolution. I like to think Sly Santagelo is still wandering around Vegas and the surrounding desert, getting into trouble and getting laid and not taking any of it very seriously.

Reading this series served to turn me onto Native American mythology. I found a book called The Trickster by Paul Radin that changed the way I looked at the world and mythology. There was a great book called A Magic Dwells (from a quote by Hermann Hesse), that detailed the Navajo emergence myth. Coyote led me to read a lot about the concept of the Holy Fool and the Puer Aeternis, which tied well into the Percival Grail stories I was discovering at the time. These kinds of connections happened more and more often with the things I read and the stuff I was interested in, one leading fairly seamlessly into another. That's still true.

I'm not as naïve as I was then, nor quite so youthfully arrogant. I still see our mundane world through eyes of magic (at least I try to). Sometimes I'm pretty sure at least half my brain lives in another dimension. I fully believe the world is gloriously weird and fun. I try to convey those ideas in whatever I do. Talking about Comics is a great way of tricking people into learning about something else.

I am so sly.

Podcast interview

I was recently interviewed by Jim Rugg and Jason Lex for their "Tell Me Something I Don't Know" podcast.


You can listen to it on their website at http://tmsidk.podbean.com/


Or you can download it for free from Itunes at http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/wayne-wise/id516288911?i=114398878


While you're there check out the other interviews with Tom Scioli, Farel Dalrymple and Cecil Castelucci.


You should also really check out the pages for both Jim and Jason as well. Both are gifted artists with a whole lot of great work out there.


http://jimrugg.com/


http://www.awefulbooks.com/


You can listen to it here as well, but really... go check out all these other people too.

Podcast Powered By Podbean