A few new bits and pieces

Well, I'm sure it won't have escaped your notice that the Blog has been a little sparse of late. For this I am truly sorry. My time on-line these past couple of weeks has been a little limited. I'm in the process of moving over to wireless broadband, and it's not been going 100% to plan. I hope you'll all humour me while I try to get this sorted.

So, I've not got a full entry to put up, right now. But I do have a few tidbits of info that might interest you. First up, a few people have mailed me recently asking me why I'm not hyping Alan Davis' new Clan Destine limited series? Funny, I thought, because I've actually blogged about this series three times, now. But as this week saw the release of #3, I thought what better time to give it a bit of a plug. Here's the cover, so you know to look for it:




And yes, that is Excalibur, as we've mentioned before. But no clones or copies, the REAL original Excalibur. How is this possible? Well, during #2 Newton Destine took Dominic back to his dimension of residence, after and attack on the family home resulted in Dom's enhanced senses short-circuiting. However, once there, a ruck kicked off between Newton, and the seeming ruler of that dimension - who blasted Dominic into an open dimensional gateway. The way that time flows differently in so many of Marvel's alternate universes (As anybody who used to read Excalibur or read Judd Winnick's eXiles, will know)Dominic has found himself suddenly crashing into the middle of Excalibur's 'Cross-time Caper' from the late 1980s.

Yes, accidentally falling into one of Davis' past stories, on another book! Ingenious.

This series has been solidly good, so far, and I would implore more people to pick it up. Clan Destine was one of last books to be planned for Marvel UK, and eventually saw print through Marvel US. However, political reasons led to Davis leaving the book, despite having planned around two years' worth of storyline. You can now pick up the original series in hardback format for around £20 (ISBN-10: 0785127429, ISBN-13: 978-0785127420). I'd very much recommend that. It Davis doing some of his best work.

If sales go well, we've been promised more, so this should be an incentive. Support British heroes, wherever you can.

Now, it wouldn't be fair to plug one British-based Marvel title and not the other. I came across something a couple of weeks ago, from a couple of guys who do a regular podcast under the name Geek Syndicate. A few weeks back they did a phone interview with Wisdom and Captain Britain and MI:13 writer Paul Cornell. It's quite an interesting interview, podcasted here in full, which covers a lot about Paul's TV work (And obviously Doctor Who figures heavily in that) but also has quite a bit on his writing Wisdom and the upcoming new Cap series.

It also has a rather cryptic clue as to who the final member of the new team will be...

Well worth a listen if you've got sometime spare. You can find a direct download on their site
(http://www.geeksyndicate.co.uk/ - It's Episode 72) or you can do a search for Geek Syndicate in iTunes.

And whilst still in podcasty mood, you could also go over and take a look at John Siuntres' Word Balloon podcast. A couple of weeks ago he did an interview with Comicraft founder and former Marvel UK editor and letterer Richard Starkings. He talks a fair bit about his Marvel UK days, the lessons learned and foundation of Comicraft, and his book Elephant Men, from Image comics. It's a strong interview, and the detail he goes into about what he feels about the importance of graphic design in comics is both speaks incredible common sense and is fascinating to hear.

You can find it here: http://wordballoon.blogspot.com/search?updated-max=2008-03-27T01%3A13%3A00-05%3A00&max-results=3

Or you search iTunes for Word Balloon.

And finally, I was in Shrewsbury this weekend, visiting a friend from university. I'd just like to give a bit of shout out (Note: Who the hell do I think I am? Pete Tong, or something?) to Paul, Tracy and Shane from Infinity & Beyond (http://www.infinitybeyond.co.uk/) the comics and collectibles store, there. Running and maintaining a store of this kind in the UK is no easy task, but I&B has been doing this for 16 years, this year. They're a friendly bunch, with a good range of titles and recently moved to a larger store. They also have a very dedicated independent comics section, too - Something of a rarity these days, for sure. You can even get a coffee while you're reading your weekly books - How sound is that?
I've always been very much of the belief that 90% of the task for a local comic book store comes down to the banter. You will not sell comic books without generating a buzz yourself, talking to your customers, hyping current events and sharing viewpoints on writers, artists and editors. My local Comic Book store is a Forbidden Planet. I've been going there on an off for almost 2 decades now (Which freaks me out a little to think about it), and this is an area I have always maintained that has been somewhat lacking.
So thanks, guys. It was great to talk shop, so to speak. You're doing a great job.
If you happen to be in the Shrewsbury area, I'd definitely recommend dropping in. You'll find them near the bottom of Wyle Cop, near English Bridge.
That's all for now. There should be an update coming in the middle of the week though, Internet connection permitting. In the meantime feel free to comment on any of the existing threads, or drop me a line at the address on the right hand side of this page.
Bye, for now.