Thursday, May 24 2012
We Will Avenge Them Or… Be Avenged?: The Individual in the US Experience
The Avengers highlights a persistent anxiety about equality in the U.S. experience.
Wednesday, May 23 2012
Road Diary: My Exclusive with “Before Watchmen” Editor Will Dennis and More
The story of my road trip to DC Entertainment, my first look at the new New 52 and an exclusive with Before Watchmen group Editor, Will Dennis.
Wednesday, May 16 2012
The Very End of Empire: PopMatters’ Exclusive with “Shade’s” James Robinson
James Robinson begins, and there's a kind of building-up. In my mind I imagine great machines powered by steam, machines of bespoke engineering from a bygone day, now already just slightly out of reach…
Thursday, May 10 2012
Black Panther: The Next Avenger
The politics of Marvel's Black Panther would make this unsung character a smart addition to the next Avengers movie.
Wednesday, May 9 2012
To Dial 4376: The PopMatters Exclusive Interview with China Miéville
“I completely feel like a kid writing it,” China says with a smile that transcends the phone line we are using to have this conversation. “The biggest reason for me to do this title is this feeling of being a kid coming up with these absurd superheroes; the joy we all have is in inventing superheroes”…
Friday, May 4 2012
“A Terrible Privilege…”: Why It Needs to be “Joss Whedon’s” Avengers
There's a reason Robert Downey Jr. refers so poignantly to his Iron Man armor as a "terrible privilege". But to understand that, you'll need the full backstory on not only the Avengers, but on Free Comic Book Day as well.
Wednesday, May 2 2012
The Ethics of Brand Extension: An Exclusive with MAD’s John Ficarra
It's going to be an interview with John soon. Poor guy, he doesn't yet know it's going to be about the ziggurats. But he'll figure it out soon enough…
Wednesday, April 25 2012
No Invisible Gorillas Read HST in the Making of this Issue: “MAD #515”
MAD #515 is the summer issue, and it's exactly what you'd expect, "The Hunger Pains", Siri parody ads for the iPhone 4S, and "The 50 Worst Things About America"… wait, what now?
Wednesday, April 18 2012
A “System” of Torture?: ‘DMZ’s’ Argument Through Comment, and Comics
Brian Wood's DMZ is a work of extremes, but its parallels to our real-life "civil liberties crackdown" are integral to the story.
Thursday, April 12 2012
The Summer’s for Distant Things: An Open Letter to Archie’s Alex Segura
The last time we spoke, Alex Segura and I, we spoke about his having written Archie Meets KISS, already a critical piece of Archie Comics-lore. After yesterday's release of the hardback collected edition, I've had a few thoughts. About the summer, and about ourselves.
Wednesday, April 4 2012
Noirlands: The Exclusive With the Creators of “Voodoo Child”
Writer, DJ and journalist Selwyn Hinds collaborates with comics industry giant Denys Cowan to produce Dominique Laveau: Voodoo Child, a book as much about post-Katrina New Orleans, as it is about a young woman's journey into the past to redeem that past. This book couldn't have come at a better time. This couldn't be a more demanding interview.
Friday, March 23 2012
Talking Suicide with Adam Glass: Act One of a PopMatters Exclusive
Filmmaker and series regular writer of DC's New 52 Suicide Squad, Adam Glass, offers a sincere, focused and above-all revolutionary reinterpretation of the action-thriller genre in a PopMatters Exclusive conversation.
Wednesday, March 21 2012
Aww Yeah, Dickens!: Ending the Never-ending with “Tiny Titans #50”
Art Baltazar and Franco remind us that comics is the art of not-yet-but-soon. But not without reminded us of the great cultural debt we owe to giants like Will Eisner and Charles Dickens.
Monday, March 19 2012
Civil Unrest, Panel by Panel
Writer Mark Long reconstructs childhood memories to depict Houston's monumental and harrowing events in a black & white graphic novel called The Silence of Our Friends.
Wednesday, March 14 2012
Cover Charged: Notes on the Rise of Conditionality at DC
It's not simply a change in logo, for DC. It's that this change in logo captures the unique power of comics as a medium hinged on the promise of conditionality, and this idea of conditionality is littered in these issues of DC's New 52.
Wednesday, March 7 2012
Fearful Symmetry: John Carter and the Struggle of the Individual
Is John Carter a simple action movie or an indication of continuous struggle over values in the United States?
Wednesday, February 29 2012
Another Season Darkens the Soul’s Hue: the Peter Milligan Exclusive
The recent storyarc of Hellblazer, "Another Season in Hell", returns Vertigo alumni Peter Milligan to one of his most enduring formative works in founding Vertigo title, Shade: the Changing Man. Some 20 years after, this is why Milligan's comics is still art.
Wednesday, February 22 2012
“Didn’t Think It Was Really Possible…”: The Manapul & Buccellato Exclusive
The Flash has always been, not so much about moving forward, but about how creative teams execute that vision of moving forward. In a PopMatters exclusive with writer-artists Francis Manapul and Brian Bucellato, we uncover exactly how this New 52 team is effecting this change.
Wednesday, February 15 2012
Buckets of Bloodlessness: How “Uncanny X-Men” Misses Its Grand Guignol
Uncanny X-Men isn't half the missed opportunity it first appears to be. It's art lies exactly in the tension of walking a highwire of commercial interests and unchecked creative impulses.
Thursday, February 9 2012
“Blue Estate”: A Sardonic Pulp Paradigm?
It's the turning of the final tide, the groundbreaking Blue Estate wraps issue #8, which closes the second volume of the collected editions, and launches issue #9, which opens the final volume. The stakes, and the value, couldn't be higher.
