December 10th, 1999 - They Want YOU (to vote, or at least nominate)
It's getting to be that time of year again. Voting season. When the chill hits the air, we start making plans for holiday parties and everyone is asked "What's your favorite ____ of 1999?". The comic industry is no exception, and considering the state of near-feudalism in the industry, we certainly have a wide variety of best-of lists covering every facet of comics.

This year, one of the longer-running industry awards returns after a brief absence. Billing itself as "the only truly international comics awards", The Eagle Awards make a return. Originating in 1976, the Eagle Awards share the name of 50 year old British Comics publication The Eagle, and are being revived after a brief absence to share in the anniversary celebration. The announcement of the winners will take place later this year at Bristol's "Comics 2000 Festival".

Voting has not yet officially begun, however, interested parties are being asked to participate in nominating creators and works for the Eagle Awards 2000. To be part of the nomination process, go to http://www.comics-international.com/eagleawards/eagleawards.html.

December 10th, 1999 - Waiting Just a Little Bit Longer
Fans of Slave Labor Graphics' The Waiting Place may have noticed a little ink on their fingers after reading the recently released volume 2, issue 1. "The first run was printed with too much ink, making much of Mike's beautiful Zip-a-tone work muddy and dark," said The Waiting Place creator Sean Kelly McKeever. "The printer offered to run it a second time for free. By the time we were aware of the mistake the first run was already with the distributors, so SLG decided to let the first run go and then (as I understand it) duplicate retailers' orders with the second run at no charge." The corrected version of the book shipped on December 1st, so fans of the book that would like to exchange their copies can take them back to their local retailers.

The Waiting Place is the story of teenagers trying to escape the boredom of a small, dead-end tourist trap town. It's been lauded by comics professionals such as Warren Ellis and Kurt Busiek, and given top marks by both the Comics Buyers Guide and Comic Shop News. For more information, visit http://www.seanmckeever.com.

December 10th, 1999 - Shiny New Diva
Because of some scheduling foul-ups on the part of our wonderful news editor, there were no news updates for a few weeks, and some interesting news items slipped through the cracks. One of these was the site re-design and re-location of Lea (Clockwork Angels, Cathedral Child) Hernandez's web-site, http://www.divalea.com. The site looks just fantastic, and Lea herself describes it as "girly, but not too; elegant, but not stuffy; and just enough "odd" to leaven the first two," which is a description that fits well. Go check out the site, and be sure to take a look at our mini-interview "Six Of One" with Ms. Hernandez in the Gutter Press section.

December 10th, 1999 - Wizard certainly stepped in it this time.
Wizard Magazine, the self-professed "Guide to Comics" has been drawing fire recently because of their possible conflict of interest regarding their new "Black Bull" line, which will begin to publish comics. While we plan on dealing with this own horrid transgression in our own unique and spunky PopImage way early next year, we were alerted to a much larger, and potentially damaging story by the good folks at comicon.com.

If you flip to page 147 of this month's issue of Wizard (issue 100) you'll find an advertisement for "Sailor and the 7 Ballz", which apparently features Japanese Animation characters Sailor Moon and Goku (of Dragonball Z) in a slightly creepy embrace. It's actually an advertisement for a web-site, for a Graphic Adventure Game. Visiting the site will take you to a homepage that features an overly-buxom Sailor Moon, that suddenly grows a rather large penis. It actually gets far more graphic from there, including an interactive way to masturbate the hermaphroditic Sailor Moon if you have the Macromedia Flash 4 plug-in.

Attention was brought to the offending advertisement by none other than Sequential Tart's Kady Mae on the comicon.com message boards almost a week ago now. Wizard Magazine has yet to release an official statement on the matter, and no information on the incident could be found on their webisite as of 6pm Friday evening. Several comic store retailers in communication with Wizard have reported at Comicon.com that Wizard intends to make a full apology for the advertisement. Wizard has also been telling concerned retailers who've phoned that all unsold copies of the issue will be fully returnable to Diamond Distributors, for credit. Granted, the issue was already returnable due to a $2 price increase after the magazine was initially solicited, but that's neither here nor there (ahem).

December 10th, 1999 - Brian Bendis Batman Update
In an October 4th story, we reported that Brian (Jinx, Sam & Twitch) Bendis had been tapped to write a story for a Batman Chronicles Elseworlds project next year. Bendis announced on his message board this week a few further details about the story.

"The artist is Michael Gaydos. Michael and I went to school together at the institute of art where he was a year ahead of me and kicked my ass and broke into comics working for Tundra while I was slumming at Caliber. Mike did the fantasy scene in the Jinx trade for those of you who have it and now he will make his DC debut on our little six pager in the Batman Elseworlds anthology special with the Pander Brothers and others that escape me."

While he hasn't offered up any details of the 6 page story as of yet, the hard hitting crime/noir writer let everyone know the title of the piece.

"CITIZEN WAYNE. can you figure out what our tongue in cheek idea is..:)"

December 10th, 1999 - Blast off to 1959!

Last year, Larry Young's blockbuster series , "ASTRONAUTS IN TROUBLE: LIVE FROM THE MOON" re-introduced the notion of rollicking, cinema-style science fiction to comics. Taking it's cues from a past that thought we'd all be living on the moon in the year 2000, Live From The Moon brought us a mile-a-minute adventure epic in 6 black and white issues. Now, Young intends to thrill us again by showing us where that future came from this January in "ASTRONAUTS IN TROUBLE: SPACE 1959".

"What better way to start the year 2000 than with a look back at the future?" said Young, who stopped writing dialogue for his upcoming Image book, THE BOD, to talk about his new mini-series. "Taking a cue from George Lucas, series artist Charlie (X-Men: Hellfire Club) Adlard and I decided that we should see a story about the first Channel Seven News Team, and how they discover the answer to a mystery that no one knows is even a question."

The upcoming 3-issue mini-series will have a slightly different tone than the first Astronauts in Trouble series. According to Young, "...this one is a little more a SIN CITY-style murder-mystery than the straight-forward action-adventure [of] LIVE FROM THE MOON."

December 6th, 1999 - Edvin Biukovic Passes Away.
Fan-favorite comic artist Edvin Biukovic passed away this Sunday, December 5th from a heart-failure and resulting lung collapse. He had been hospitalized in Zagreb, Croatia early last week after having been diagnosed with a brain tumor. He was awaiting an operation at the time.

Edvin Biukovic was a talented artist who was best known for his work on Grendel Tales, several Star Wars mini-series, and DC/Vertigo's recent HUMAN TARGET mini-series. Biukovic was awarded the Russ Manning Best Newcomer award in 1995.

Many staff members at PopImage are fans of his work, and had already picked "The Human Target" as their favorite comic published in 1999. We were very saddened to hear of this news, and we'd like to express our condolences to Edvin's family.

Edvin, an only child, leaves behind his parents, his friends, and many fans of his work. He was 32 years old.

December 6th, 1999 - The End of the Fantastic Four?
Comic book series never end, or do they? The end of the Fantastic Four is coming, and it happened 20 years ago.

Jack Kirby and Stan Lee worked on the Fantastic Four for 103 issues (and 6 annuals), one of the longest lasting creative teams in the history of comics. During that time, they created some rip-roaring yarns, and inspired generations of young fans to become comic creators themselves. But, as with all mainstream comics, just because Stan & Jack stopped working on the book, it doesn't mean the book ended. Far from it - the adventures of Reed, Sue, Johnny and Ben are still being printed today. But late next year, Erik Larsen will be ending the Fantastic Four at just about the time Jack & Stan stopped working on it, issue 100.

"The working title is 'Fantastic Four' 100.01 through 100.12," Larsen explained to CBR's Comic Wire. "It's a 12-issue yarn with the very basic premise of what if Stan and Jack planned a grand finale to conclude their run/relationship [after issue 100]. I'll be plotting, partially scripting, doing rough breakdowns and drawing a few pages. The goal here is to make it look and read as much like issues of the FF by Stan and Jack as possible and now that the project has the green light I'll be actively recruiting people who can help do that."

Artists confirmed to be working on the series are Bruce Timm, who did a dead-on Kirby impersonation earlier this year in AVENGERS 1 1/2, and noted Legion artist Keith Giffen. While no other artists were confirmed, it's been speculated that artists Alan (X-Men) Davis and Jose (CABLE) Ladronn will be participating in the project.

But if these issues take place after "FANTASTIC FOUR #100", how are they going to fit into your comic collection? Larsen hopes as seemlessly as possible. "We'll be making every attempt to keep these comics authentic to how things were at the time of 'Fantastic Four' #100 from the coloring on down to format and printing. [Recently released] 'Avengers' #1 1/2 is a decent example that's close to what we'll be striving for."

- With Files from Comic Book Resources' Comic Wire

December 6th, 1999 - DRAGONBALL dinky causes TOYS 'R' US headaches.
The differences between American and Japanese cultural mores reared their ugly heads again this week when toy retailer TOYS 'R' US pulled all copies of DRAGONBALL Z comics of store shelves earlier this week, after a Texas parent complained that the comic books contained "soft porn". VIZ Communications publishes the title, and it's sister-title, DRAGONBALL.

While no nude images have, to date, appeared in the DRAGONBALL Z comic book, the bible belt has never let accuracy get in the way of good moral outrage. The images actually appeared in the DRAGONBALL comic series, which features a young protagonist named Goku who is something of a feral-child and appears naked in several scenes.

Rebecca Caruso, a national spokeswoman for Toys 'R' Us, told the DALLAS MORNING NEWS that the company "decided to take action after determining that at least one of the comics was in poor taste." She said the company "first learned of the problem from an employee," whom she did not identify, "not as a result of a customer's complaint."

But the DALLAS MORNING NEWS says that a Dallas parent, Rick Luther, "was surprised and disturbed by the content of comic books he bought at a Mesquite Toys 'R' Us store, which included graphic images of naked boy and girl characters and behavior he described as borderline soft porn. Toys 'R' Us pulled the comic books off its shelves nationwide shortly after Mr. Luther complained to the store."

Filled with juvenile humor, the Dragonball comic series best seller and cultural icon in Japan for over 10 years. It's sort of unfortunate that a 4 year old wandering around naked, and a few panty jokes are apparently far too risqué for North American viewing audiences. To quote an excerpt of an e-mail I just sent off,

"...if the material (which while juvenile, is clearly inoffensive) were marked as for mature readers/adults only, that would cast a very disturbing pall over the work. The early series is about "bathroom humor", created for the market that thinks that talking about girls underwear and "pee-pee's" is funny -- kids. If the series were for "mature" readers only, then it would basically be about adults getting off to pictures of naked boys, which is Not Cool."

- Files from The DALLAS MORNING NEWS

December 6th, 1999 - Terry Gilliam Gives Good Omens.
Terry Gilliam, director of acclaimed and surreal works including BRAZIL and FEAR AND LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS is attatched to direct a film adaptation of Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett's apocalyptic comedic novel GOOD OMENS. Producers Chuck Roven (12 Monkeys, Fallen) and Peter & Marc Samuelson (Wilde, Revenge of the Nerds) are overseeing the project, for which a studio deal is pending.

- Files from THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER

December 6th, 1999 - Squaresoft Opens Online Store.
Squaresoft, the video game company behind the wildly successful FINAL FANTASY series of video-games recently opened an online store at their web-site, http://www.squaresoft.com. The site offers various Squaresoft game releases including the smash block-busters FINAL FANTASY VIII and FINAL FANTASY ANTHOLOGY.

Perhaps the most interesting part of the store is that it offers for sale various merchandise items which aren't usually available to customers. While video game paraphernalia and merchandise is loads more popular, and accessible, in Japan until very recently it's been difficult to get domestically. However, an exclusive version of the Final Fantasy VIII soundtrack is currently available on the site, with more hard-to-get merchandise on the way.

To reach the store directly, go to http://www.squaresoft.com/store.

December 6th, 1999 - A bit of a Tick on Fox.
Ben Edlund's comic creation THE TICK may be headed for the small screen once more, but this time as a live action series.

THE TICK, a big blue superhero who very successfully parodied the superhero world had a Fox Saturday morning cartoon series from 1994-1996. Recently, the project "has resurfaced as a live-action primetime prospect for the network from Sonnenfeld-Josephson and Columbia TriStar TV," according to The HOLLYWOOD REPORTER. Fox has given a pilot commitment to the single-camera project being developed by "Tick" creator Ben Edlund and Barry Sonnenfeld.

December 6th, 1999 - I Wouldn't Normally Do This Type of Thing
J. O. Ladronn has new work up at his site. The artist, who is often described as having a style that's a mix between Jack Kirby and Geoff Darrow, recently added some artwork to his http://www.starwatcher.org/ladronn.html web-site from the upcoming Thor Annual he's working on. Now, we don't normally just do web-site updates, but I feel that this work is phenomenal, and deserves all of the press it gets. To view these Thor pages directly, go to http://www.starwatcher.org/ladthor1.html. This is going to be one Marvel Annual that will definitely be worth getting.

PopImage news always strives to be an accurate source of information, so if you're an informed party that would like to contradict or clarify any of the information we've presented, feel free. All correspondence should be addressed to Christopher Butcher at cro2@212.net.

Previous News Stories:
Weeks of November 15th and November 22nd 1999- Talking to Darrick Robertson, Changes on the X-Men, Wildcats Goes Monthly...
Weeks of November 1st and November 8th 1999- Princess Mononoke, Gundam Wing on Cartoon Network, House of Secrets Returns...
Weeks of October 18th and October 25th 1999- Super Manga Blast!, Authority Outing...
Weeks of October 4th and October 11th 1999- Garth Ennis not Dead, Chris Claremont on X-Men...