After a well documented struggle to stay in the Diamond catalog, Claypool Comics has just announced that they are going to the web and shutting down their print operations.

After almost fourteen years and more than 300 issues — one of the longest runs in the history of independent comics — publisher Claypool Comics is telling the world of print, “Thank you and farewell.�? After ELVIRA, MISTRESS OF THE DARK #166 (shipping in February 2007), SOULSEARCHERS AND COMPANY #82 (also shipping in February), and DEADBEATS #82 (shipping in March), Claypool will cut back its line to DEADBEATS alone and put new adventures of that series’ vampire-haunted world on the Internet. Claypool’s trade-paperback comics collections (under the Boffin Books imprint) and back issues will remain available as long as supplies last.

Claypool’s shift from paper to bytes comes after a long struggle for sales. In November, 2005, Diamond Comics Distributors — the major distributor of comic books in the United States — gave Claypool some alarming news: Claypool wasn’t selling enough comics to meet Diamond’s guidelines for profitable distribution. Diamond and Claypool teamed up for a string of promotional efforts, including free comics for retailers, plus various flyers and posters. Claypool’s sales rose, but not far or fast enough. In July of 2006, after discussions with Diamond executives, Claypool publisher Ed Via and editor Richard Howell decided to publish DEADBEATS exclusively on the World Wide Web. The other titles will cease publication indefinitely.

Diamond has graciously guaranteed that the Claypool line will be allowed to finish out its run with enough time to bring both SOULSEARCHERS and DEADBEATS to exciting story resolutions, ensuring that long-time readers won’t be disappointed. ELVIRA — starring the famous video hostess in tales by Kurt Busiek, Paul Dini (in his first comics work), Steve Leialoha, Jim Mooney, Dave Cockrum, John Heebink, Neil Vokes, Mike Manley, and many others — will spend its final issues continuing its tradition of short story arcs and single-issue tales. To emphasize the momentousness of the event, the final issues of each series will feature “Countdown to the End�? cover bullets.

SOULSEARCHERS — created by Howell and best-selling writer Peter David, with art by (among others) Amanda Conner, Dave Cockrum, Joe Staton, and Jim Mooney — features a team of comedically-inept supernatural investigators. Currently, the Soulsearchers are banned from operating their business in their home town of Mystic Grove, Connecticut; nevertheless, they’re tracking down a mysterious, mystical nexus that has been appearing at various places within the town limits.

DEADBEATS, the title moving online, features a gang of passionate vampires and the mortals who try to destroy them. Created, written, and penciled by Howell and inked by Ricardo Villagran, the book features a combination of horror and romance reminiscent of the classic television series Dark Shadows, with enough lusty eroticism to satisfy even the most dedicated Anne Rice fan. The cast of DEADBEATS is battling against an imminent doom predicted from the future, which will destroy almost everyone in Mystic Grove, human and vampire alike, and leave the town a place of despair and desolation. Readers can find new DEADBEATS adventures at the Claypool website (claypoolcomics.com), beginning early in 2007.

To facilitate the reformatting of DEADBEATS series and preparing the way for new readers, Claypool will be publishing an additional BEST OF DEADBEATS (exact title TBA) trade paperback collection in February 2007, reprinting the series’ most important issues. This volume will also feature new material and will be the perfect introduction to the DEADBEATS continuity.

Howell and Via founded Claypool in 1992. They began with SOULSEARCHERS, ELVIRA, and DEADBEATS, as well as the twelve-issue miniseries PHANTOM OF FEAR CITY by Steve Englehart and a variety of artists, including fan-favorite George Perez. The company’s focus on the supernatural anticipated such modern hits as Walking Dead, Fear Agent, and Hellboy.

Claypool’s Richard Howell says, “We’ve been working with Diamond to get our comics out to more stores in more quantity, but ultimately we had to surrender to reality: There’s too much competing product out there for the customer base, the retail base, and the distribution chain — and we’re a small, black-and-white line of offbeat, almost uncategorizable comics. Based on the commitment and intensity of our fans, we’re convinced that our books fulfill a need in the marketplace. We’re just not reaching enough of those readers — or reaching them consistently enough — in their current format. Moving DEADBEATS to the Internet will allow us to reach more levels of the potential readership, lower our overhead, and open new routes towards bringing Claypool-style narrative sensibility to those who’d value it.�?

Diamond Vice President for Purchasing Bill Schanes adds, “We’d like to thank everyone at Claypool for all their efforts over the years and wish them the best of success with their future endeavors.�?

Claypool Comics wants to extend its warmest wishes and gratitude to the many writers, artists, retailers, fans, and others who have helped Claypool over the company’s fourteen-year odyssey. Their loyalty and support have made Claypool one of the most respected publishers in comics, and Claypool’s staff hopes that they will continue to follow DEADBEATS online.

See you on the Net!

While everyone says the SDCC is loud and crazy, the gold standard for insanely multi-media booth babe saturated industry freak shows has always been E3, the video game industry’s yearly confab. Indeed, many of the loudest, craziest booths at SDCC were imports from E3, which is held every year in Los Angeles.

But now it seems that Comic-Con will have the playing field almost to itself, as a kinder, gentler E3, long rumored, has been officially announced

To better address the needs of today’s global computer and video game industry, the 2007 Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3Expo) is evolving into a more intimate event focused on targeted, personalized meetings and activities, the Entertainment Software Association (ESA) announced today.

“The world of interactive entertainment has changed since E3Expo was created 12 years ago. At that time we were focused on establishing the industry and securing orders for the holiday season,� said Douglas Lowenstein, President of the ESA, the trade association representing U.S. computer and video game publishers and the owner of E3Expo. “Over the years, it has become clear that we need a more intimate program, including higher quality, more personal dialogue with the worldwide media, developers, retailers and other key industry audiences.�

Warren Ellis is putting his money where his mouth is with his interets in webcomics, according to a post by Joey Manley at Comixpedia:

I am working with Warren Ellis to launch a free webcomics portal using the new Webcomics Nation Collective Edition Engine. This latest addition to the Modern Tales family will be all free, all the time, and defined by ‘Warren Likes This Stuff.’ He’ll be making a call for submissions soon. Gary Chaloner will be designing the site. This is the first new (as opposed to pre-existing) site to launch with the beta version of the WCN Collective Edition engine, soon to be a commercial product available to anybody who wants to launch a multi-creator webcomics portal (your own Keenspot or Modern Tales, in other words) inexpensively and with ease. The name of Warren’s new site, and its URL, will be announced soon, probably at The Engine.

[The Beat is proud to present the continued Month-To-Month sales by Marc Oliver Frisch. The June sales for Marvel, compiled by Paul OBrien, can be found here.]

DC COMICS MONTH-TO-MONTH SALES: JUNE 2006
by Marc-Oliver Frisch

DC Comics’ major releases in June 2006 were the one-shot DCU: Brave New World, which introduces a number of upcoming series for the price of one dollar, as well as the debut issues of the relaunched titles Wonder Woman and Flash: The Fastest Man Alive, while Green Lantern Corps returned as an ongoing series and a number of prequels, co-written by the film’s director, tied in with Superman Returns. The publisher’s WildStorm imprint, meanwhile, took another stab at fantasy and science fiction, respectively, with new ongoing titles Claw the Unconquered and Manifest Eternity. For the second consecutive month, there were no new series launches via DC’s Vertigo label.

Thanks to Milton Griepp and ICv2.com for the permission to use their figures.

An overview of ICv2.com’s estimates can be found here.

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According to a terse press release on SPAWN.COM, Todd McFarlane Companies is launching a new website covering various kinds of crap:

It’s been obvious for years: Todd McFarlane has his finger on the pulse of pop culture. And we here at the McFarlane Companies are on a constant search for what makes things tick inside the collective psyche of all things entertainment. The natural next step in the evolution of the McFarlane Companies is here, and we’re calling it CultureBoom.com.

Set to go live August 1, Todd McFarlane’s new pop culture megasite is set to become the one-stop shop of choice for everything entertainment. If it’s going on and people are talking about it, you will find it on CultureBoom.com.

The site goes live tomorrow. They’d better have RSS.
[Link via Blog@Newsarama]

Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips’ new Icon title CRIMINAL is going to be showcased in THE WALKING DEAD, in a rare cross company promotion.

Image’s The Walking Dead #30 will showcase the five-page teaser that Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips created for their new Icon book, Criminal. “Sean and I thought long and hard about how to properly preview the book,� said Brubaker. “And we decided instead of just showing the first 4 or 5 pages, we’d make something different, more like a movie trailer on paper. We’ve previously released it as a downloadable PDF, and the response has been amazing, but actually getting it printed in The Walking Dead while the first issue is being solicited, is beyond great, and Robert Kirkman is my new hero for doing this.�

The Walking Dead is one of Image’s most popular titles, while Criminal will debut this October from Marvel’s creator-owned Icon label, so how did this cross-promotion come about? “Promoting a creator-owned book in this industry is an uphill battle, so when I see a book as good as CRIMINAL come along, I want to do whatever I can to promote it.� said Kirkman, “Image has been kind enough to allow me to do this, we’re all in the business of selling comics, more specifically GOOD comics and I think we all feel there’s room for more of those no matter WHO the publisher is. Plus, now Brubaker and Phillips owe me one.�

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In a time tested move to shed his “Kiddie Star Label” HARRY POTTER star Daniel Radcliffe will simultaneously show his stage chops and his doodle by taking on a role as a troubled teen who has a strange relationship with horses in a London production of Peter Shaffer’s “Equus.” The play has long been a venue for young actors seeking to show both their stage chops and their doodle.

The play delves into the psyche of a boy named Alan Strang who blinds six horses with a metal spike. The production is scheduled to open next March in the West End theater district, said spokesman Peter Thompson.

“It is an extraordinary play, and he’s very much looking forward to the role,” Radcliffe’s spokeswoman, Vanessa Davies, said Friday. “He is maturing as an actor and beginning to take on new and challenging roles.”

In one scene the actor playing Strang is required to simulate sexual ecstasy while riding a horse naked. But Davies said nudity was not the focus of the play

Richard Griffiths, who plays Harry’s Uncle Vernon in the movies will play the psychiatrist, making this a Freudian day at the races for Potter-freaks.

Home again and on deadline. It’s odd not to be heading to the nearest Starbucks to get online. Everyone has already hashed out San Diego to death so we’ll only be posting one or two more things, including our Extreme Slam-sized SD Zeitgeist report and a few more pictures.

We’re back on the grid at the Las Vegas airport. Hell is for heroes.

One last video.

We’re in transit today, and to be honest…we deserve a day off. Still working on our big San Diego wrap-up for tomorrow.

Or as Walt Whitman wrote,
Now finale to the shore.
Now, land and life, finale, and farewell!
Now Voyager depart! (much, much for thee is yet in store;)

Well it seems video blogging is the new pink, as Tim Leong at Comics Foundry was maing his own vids guerilla style.

Here he captues the con in all its glory including rare, precious footage of Spurge and The Beat sniping at each other on a panel!

Here, always dapper Tim kicks it up a notch more, capturing the glamour and panoply of the Eisner arrivals.

It seems video blogging is here to stay, just like html and flash before it. It’s too protean a leap for everyone not to take advantage of it.

We took a lot fewer pictures because we were … well, it’s hard to remember what we were doing. Watching panels, editing stories and taping vidblog pieces, actually. We avoided the main floor on Saturday, because it is usually the hottest, stinkiest day of the con, and this year was all that and a bag of pork rinds. Every time we hit the floor, it was a seething mass of tired, cranky humanity. People were just flopped down on the floor, resting or waiting for Jennifer Love Hewitt. The crowds were OFF THE HOOK.

We shot a few pics on the floor and at the Hyatt bachannal however and…here they are

Frank Miller and new best pal Gerard Butler at the 300 panel. BTW, the preview footage looks dark, violent, lusty and savage. NOT for the faint of heart.

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Between the Panels recounts the Talkback panel where folks get things off their chests, attended by 15-20 people. Now bear in mind, 20 people out of 120,000 is a pretty low percentage, and the geek-o-sphere is particularly given over to anal nitpickers who can never be happy, so take the following with a grain of salt:

The Elite security staff was ripped. The recurring theme was that there was no communication and nobody seemed to know…anything. Where to go, who to talk to, or how to enforce order. The latter was of special importance as the rudeness of the red shirt–clad clan was called into question numerous times. Yelling and even physical contact were reported by various con-goers.

Another complaint was the treatment of the handicapped. One lady had the room silent as she almost tearfully recounted her troubled con experience. Her multiple-handicapped son was not given preferential seating, had to endure long lines, and even had to calm his mother down when the experience became too distressing for her. Her car was also towed and was there no tram service at her hotel when she was told there would be. All in all, a bad trip.

Besides the staff and the handicapped, the programming (too many similar events or big events scheduled at around the same time), the crowds (it’s getting too big — “San Diego is not New York or Tokyo or L.A. so they should scale back” was the sentiment), and the parking were other big concerns. In responding to the “too big” complaints, the brass said they were considering making Saturday a registration-only day to cut down on the crowds. It would reduce the throngs, but the programming problem would remain.

One suggestion I thought was good, though it was brushed aside, was the idea of bringing music to the show. A pop culture celebration is not complete without music. A logistical nightmare? Yes. An impossible task in their current space? For the most part, yes. But, it’s a necessary and popular element and it’s missing.

The former comics editor at EW has some pointed observations:

7. Some parents should just be ashamed of themselves. Adam and I crashed the giant ballroom a little early for the Snakes on a Plane panel, and caught the tail end of the Lucasfilm presentation. Needless to say, the 6,000 seat Hall H was filled with every stripe of Star Wars character. We grabbed two seats on the aisle, and happened to be next to this knockout of a girl, dressed as slave-girl Princess Leia. I mean, really, really beautiful this girl was, and not wearing much of anything. Then, she started talking to the 40-something guy sitting next to her. Turns out he was her dad. And she was 14 years old. Now, as awkwardly revolting as it is to realize that you were, innocently and inadvertently, lusting for a minor, that’s nothing compared to the fact that this girl’s father not only allowed her out of the house dressed like an astro-whore, but took her to a place—first among many—where she’d be eyeball-schtupped by men 4 times her age who wouldn’t think she was sad or silly for dressing like that, they’d feel entitled. And, as a father, you’re not supposed to put your kid in situations like that. You’re not supposed to chum the water with your own offspring.

Maxwell covers a day of ups and downs, including the fabled blogging panel in a post he likes to call A Sudden Sense of Bleakness – Friday:

Butcher was passionate about his assertions regarding the independence of bloggers and the necessity of them facing down the big companies and calling their bluffs about media blackouts and the like. Of course, this led to a conversation about comics journalism as a whole, and frankly I’m not sure that most bloggers fall into the category of journalists uncovering stories. I may get back to this topic at another time, but there’s a number of things preventing these folks from acting as “real� journalists, some of which have to do with their actual jobs and that blogging is only half of what they do, resources needed to do these jobs, etc. We were once in the wild west phase of blogging, but now we’re being settled down, barbed wire fences now marking out territories and things are changing. Perhaps we’ll get to the point where a site like Newsarama will become an entity that’s able to fund real journalism (contrary to popular belief, it doesn’t just spring into the world via spontaneous generation.) Until then, it’ll be folks who are passionate and driven by that.

At SDCC movie panels, directors owned up to falling behind schedule because of having . to invent SFX along the way:

Directors also apologized for slipped movie release dates, pointing to difficult visual effects for the delay. “We had to come up with a whole new program to create the fire, and to be honest with you, that’s the reason it’s been taking so long to finish the film,” Mark Steven Johnson, the director of “Ghost Riders,” told the crowd on Saturday. “A lot of the Sony Pictures Imageworks effects were groundbreaking. Sony Pictures unveiled at Comic-Con first-time footage of “Ghost Rider,” an adaptation of Marvel Comics hero Johnny Blaze who sells his soul to the devil to save his father. The event brought out Johnson, along with producers Michael De Luca and Avi Arad and stars Nicolas Cage and Eva Mendes. More than 6,500 fans packed into Hall H, the convention center’s biggest room, to see the fiery visual effects.

Johnson said Cage, who plays lead character Johnny Blaze, wore a green neoprene hood over his head with interactive lights to mark the spots that fire should appear. “We’d get his expressions and movement, then digitally remove his head and put the flaming skull in its place,” he explained.

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Stymied by the stormy waters of the network TV schedule, the much buzzed about AQUAMAN pilot has been a hit on iTunes, where it launched yesterday as part of a content deal between Waner Bros. and iTunes.

Aquaman is a hit–and this time iTunes, not Vincent Chase, can take credit.

The TV pilot based on the all-wet DC Comics superhero was one of the iTunes Music Store’s most-played clips Tuesday, the same day the rejected series became available for download on the online music/video purveyor.

A few announcements that crept out during San Diego that no one blogged because they were at the show.
Amp’d Mobile, Pantheon Books and Warner Independent Pictures team to bring ”A Scanner Darkly” to Mobile Phones:

Amp’d Mobile, the pioneer of fully integrated mobile entertainment, Pantheon Books and Warner Independent Pictures announced today at Comic-Con that “A Scanner Darkly,” the graphic novel based on the current Warner Independent Pictures film, will be available on the Amp’d Mobile entertainment network. This marks the first time a graphic novel has been distributed through the mobile platform in the United States.

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