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Conspicuously missing from my Summit City Con recap is my Dave Wachter commission. And that was by design… because it deserves its own blog entry!
When it comes to comic-related money well spent, Dave Wachter will always have my support. I didn’t buy anything at the Summit City Comic Con. Although technically I wasn’t charged for it until this week when the campaign ended, the Athena Voltaire page I got from Steve Bryant was already accounted for when I pledged my support weeks ago. And the commission I requested from Dave was paid for at least a month ago, but, man, was it worth the wait!
I have always loved Marvel Team-Up #122, featuring Spider-Man and the Man-Thing. It’s one of the issues I reference in Deus ex Comica and falls squarely in the category of “indelibly tattooed in that portion of my brain still ruled by a 12-year-old boy.” I also have come to know Dave as a master of monsters. He loves drawing them, and that affection comes through in his painstakingly gorgeous art. So it was a no-brainer to commission him to recreate this classic cover from my youth.
Dave gave me a sneak peak at the piece when we were at the Pittsburgh Comicon. It was basically finished then, but without the lettering and cover dress. He mentioned to me then his ideas for how he was going to do the issue title and all, but it didn’t really sink in for me until we were standing at the bar at the Summit City after-show party and he explained the effort and time he invested in getting that lettering just right that I truly appreciated what he’s accomplished here.
Dave has once again outdone himself.
I am a DCBS convert. I still throw money around in the local comic shops, but for the last year the bulk of my monthly haul and new-release collected editions now comes via UPS from Discount Comic Book Service. But even before I was buying my comics from DCBS, I was friends with Zack Kruse… first through forums and then from con-going.
So when the folks at DCBS decided to put on a one-day show in their Fort Wayne hometown, there was no way I could pass it up. I know I’m not “mention worthy” (or even belong on that great list of guest creators they’ve put together for the show), but I’m still pretty damn excited Zack asked me to be a part of Summit City.
There are so many artists and creators you should be looking forward to seeing at this show: Dave Wachter, Andy Jewett, Jim Rugg, Hilary Barta, Mike Norton, Katie Cook, Shawn Pryor, Steve Bryant, Zack himself, and the list goes on. These are all people with talent to spare!
I’ll of course have copies of my book, Deus ex Comica: The Rebirth of a Comic Book Fan, available for sale at the show. And if you buy a copy of it, not only can you get it signed by me, but more impressively, you can take it over to the book’s cover artist and Eisner Award Nominee Dave Wachter, and he’ll do a free quick head sketch in the book for you!
I’m looking forward to the short road trip and getting to see friends – creators, podcasters, forum family, and fans – who I only ever get to see during “con season.” Although I’m sure there will be deals to be had, Summit City Comic Con strikes me as filling the hole left by the Around Comics guys’ Windy City Comicon going on hiatus this year: A one-day show that is creator focused over vendor gluttony.See you nex
t Saturday!
Shortly after returning to comic books as an adult, I became friends with Dave Wachter. We struck up a friendship through the various forums we both frequented, and when I published Deus ex Comica: The Rebirth of a Comic Book Fan, Dave was my first and only choice for cover artist. I’m humbled by Dave’s talent and honored to have his artwork grace the cover of my book.
Beyond that original work, Tracy and I have commissioned various pieces from him over the years, including a gorgeous Etrigan the Demon and a Ghost Rider among others. His work is absolutely amazing and should be seen by the widest possible audience.
Dave’s been working on The Guns of Shadow Valley for a while now... there is a beautiful con preview book that teased the series before he and Jim Clark decided to do it their way and take the story to the web. It’s my favorite web comic, consistently entertaining and intriguing. And now, it’s been officially announced that The Guns of Shadow Valley has been nominated for an Eisner Award (the comics industry equivalent of the Oscars) in the "Best Digital Comic" category.
Look no further than Dave’s own words to understand why this is such a big deal... These characters, this story, this experience, this is my career, this is my life. That’s why this nomination means so much. We poured our hearts out into this thing, and now the biggest awards in the land have chosen us to place on a platform with some of the best work currently found on this expansive and seemingly boundless thing called the world wide web.
As soon as it was officially announced, Tracy and I called Dave to wish him our best. This is a digital comic that truly deserves the widest possible exposure, and we’re thrilled for him. I hope Dave gets everything out of this experience he wants and certainly deserves.
To Dave: Congratulations, my friend!
To Everyone Else: Go read The Guns of Shadow Valley and spread the word!
The Pittsburgh Comicon events schedule was published earlier this week, and there are some fun panels on the docket. Everything from the amazing Gene Colon to Buffy-verse bad boy Camden Toy, from a CGS trivia showdown to a star-studded “Legends of Marvel Heyday” roundtable!
I’m also excited to see my buddy John Booth doing a panel based on his book Collect All 21: Memoirs of a Star Wars Geek sponsored by the Science Fiction Alliance of Pittsburgh. Look for it to be a fun, nostalgic trip from original trilogy to prequel trilogy and what it means to our generation to have “grown up Star Wars.”
Immediately following John’s solo panel, I’ll be joining him and others for a discussion called “How to Get Published” in Room 3 at 2pm. I’m looking forward to talking about the experience I went through publishing Deus ex Comica: The Rebirth of a Comic Book Fan – willing to discuss everything from the writing process to publishing options to promotion, and anything else the attendees might throw at us regarding getting your manuscript into your audience’s hands!
Incredible folks like Joe Sinott, David Mack, Roy Thomas, and Herb Trimpe are all scheduled to appear at the con. I’m looking forward to hopefully meeting some of these industry icons, along with the opportunity to say “hello” and visit for a while with my friends Bryan J.L. Glass and Dave Wachter!
Should be a fun way to pass a weekend! If you’re in the area, I hope you’ll come out and support the industry and a couple of regional authors!
I love Jeff Parker’s work. Perusing his comic book resume is a venerable list of comics that pepper my personal collection. But I think I am the only comic fan I know who isn’t completely smitten with Agents of Atlas. I want to like it – hell, I want to love it! – but it just hasn’t clicked with me.As someone who has flirted with music journalism, I would say a negative review is one of the toughest things to write. It’s easy to gush about stuff you enjoy, but to put together a thoughtful negative review is always challenging. First, you don’t want to come off like you’re just piling on or being vindictive or just ranting to hear your own voice. Second, you don’t want to be disrespectful to the artist or creator.Chris Marshall recently praised the Agents of Atlas hardcover collections on Collected Comics Library. All of my comic book fan friends gush over the book. I had dinner with Dave Wachter the other night, and as you would expect to happen when two comic fans get together, the conversation eventually turned to what we have enjoyed reading lately. And what title was Dave quick to say: Agents of Atlas. So still I remain, the only person I know with whom that book and team hasn’t connected.But the conversation with Dave may have finally helped me realize why I'm not digging the book. Dave raved that he loved how it combined noir with super heroes with espionage with ’50s style sensibilities, and I think that might be it... for me, the book suffers from an identity crisis. And maybe it’s because I love Ed Brubaker and Matt Fraction’s Immortal Iron Fist so much, but Agents of Atlas also feels like, at its heart, it treads a little too close to that same Eastern mysticism territory.My favorite issues of the series have been the ones where folks like the Hulk and Captain America and Namor have guested. I genuinely feel horrible that I don’t like this book, like there is something wrong with my comic tastes that this creation by a writer I admire and an artist I enjoy, that this team of eclectic characters who seem right up my alley, that this mix of genres I love is somehow not clicking for me. 
Obviously my opinion is firmly in the minority, and that’s ok. I’m not trying to sway anyone from enjoying Agents of Atlas. And I certainly don’t mean any disrespect to the creator because I love most everything of Parker’s I read, I love the work of the artists that bring his writing to life, and every interaction I’ve had with Parker via Twitter has been great. Heck, in spite of never really falling in love with the book, I purchased all 11 issues of the second volume along with the X-Men vs. Agents of Atlas two-issue mini. I just have found that – machinegun wielding, kick-ass Gorilla-Man aside – Agents of Atlas just isn’t my thing. Sorry.
After a lot of tweaking and playing with cover, the final cover art is ready to go for my new book, Deus ex Comica: The Rebirth of a Comic Book Fan, and I couldn't resist sharing it! I hope the combination of Dave Wachter's amazing cover image and the composition of the other elements evokes just the right tone for a book that looks back at Marvel Comics of the '80s and explores my rediscovery of the comic book culture after two decades away.I'm working through the final proofs of the book itself, and ordering details and special offers will be announced next week!
(Click to enlarge)
The hard work behind turning my Deus ex Comica online series into a full-fledged book is almost complete! I have been busy adapting and rewriting the existing installments into chapters and writing eight completely new chapters for the book, resulting in a collection of essays looking back at Marvel Comics of the '80s and exploring my rediscovery of the comic book culture after two decades away.
My friend and editor John Booth and I have been working hard to smooth over any rough spots and tighten down the nuts and bolts stuff. In the meantime, I realized a book about comic books needed an appropriate cover, and I couldn’t be happier to have Dave Wachter of Dial-R Studios be the one to create that for me! I am continually in awe of his artistic gifts and thrilled that he is lending his amazing talents to my little project.
It feels like this book is really coming together, but there is one more missing piece of the puzzle: a foreword for the book. The foreword’s author is a busy guy, but needless to say I am thrilled to have his words open my book! Look for another announcement in the coming weeks revealing the foreword author, and then my self-published book, Deus ex Comica: The Rebirth of a Comic Book Fan, will be available soon thereafter!
In the meantime, enjoy this great sneak peek at the incredible work Dave is doing for the book cover!
I have always loved Marvel Team-Up #122, featuring Spider-Man and the Man-Thing. It’s one of the issues I reference in Deus ex Comica and falls squarely in the category of “indelibly tattooed in that portion of my brain still ruled by a 12-year-old boy.” I also have come to know Dave as a master of monsters. He loves drawing them, and that affection comes through in his painstakingly gorgeous art. So it was a no-brainer to commission him to recreate this classic cover from my youth.
Dave has once again outdone himself.
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