People have been wondering when DC would make some kind of move aimed at Marvel’s assault on their Lantern Ring promotion…and now they have. But instead of lashing out, they’ve done it in a, dare we say, grown up way — offering two new rings for an even LOWER order threshold on books that are already going to sell: they’re offering retailers Flash Rings with 10 copies of THE FLASH #1 and Green Lantern rings with 10 copies of GREEN LANTERN #53. Read between the lines of the following:

We swung by our very own Dan DiDio’s office to get his thoughts on the incentive, and he was happy to share.

“These rings are not only very cool, but they’re a big thank-you to our fans, who’ve helped make BLACKEST NIGHT a huge success. We’re hoping we can all keep the momentum going once the BLACKEST NIGHT ends and the BRIGHTEST DAY begins.”

Thanks, Dan! But there’s more. We gave Geoff Johns a quick call to get his thoughts. Geoff?

“One of the many great Flash Facts about DC Comics is that they actually do support the retailers with promotions like this that not only make our whole business a bit more fun, but also bring the promotion to every single reader. Of course, the proof is in the content and I couldn’t be prouder of the work Francis Manapul and I are doing on THE FLASH and Doug Mahnke and I are creating on GREEN LANTERN. Thanks to everyone, retailers and readers, for an amazing 2009 and here’s to an even better 2010!”

While Bluewater is often just thought of as that make-a-buck-quick company that puts out the funny bios, they’ve been getting a lot of heat lately for a business plan that asks for a huge investment by creators. The new round of controversy began when Newsarama ran a fairly benign interview with publisher Darren G. Davis. The comments to the article indicated an ongoing problem of creators not getting paid, which led to another story, called BLUEWATER Responds to Claims of Non-Payment by David Pepose:

Earlier this week, we ran a story on Bluewater Productions, and their expansion from political biocomics to series ranging from Logan’s Run to Lady Gaga to Jesus himself. Yet a number of commenters raised questions about Bluewater, particularly alleging that the company had not been paying creators. When readers raised questions, we got answers — here’s the formal statement from Bluewater president Darren G. Davis when asked if this was true:

While asking a publisher for a statement isn’t really investigating whether there was any wrongdoing, especially when the exact same statement ran four months ago even this defense was troubling:
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As promised, photos of DC Blackest Night tie-in comics covers returned to Marvel, via Tom Brevoort’s Twitter.

You kids play nice, now!

NY Mag’s Jada Yuan has been attending the Sundance Film Festival and since San Diego is now completely Sundance-ified, here’s what we have to look forward to:

Yesterday, on day four of the Sundance Film Festival, this intrepid Vulture reporter was kept from covering a red carpet for The Runaways because it was overcapacity — which pretty much sums up the infuriatingly overbooked Sundance experience. We’ve seen ticket-holders get turned away from screenings, and last night we watched Shaun White nearly get shut out of a party for Oakley. (To his credit, he just stood there without making a fuss, and the door guy eventually figured things out.)

Shaun White, you may recall, is a 2006 Olymipic snowboarding gold medalist, 2010 Olympics favorite and pretty much the king of Sundance. More from Yuan:

If and when you do get into a party, do not assume you will be allowed to take a bathroom break.

After round eighteen of arguing with security guards who didn’t think that actually being inside a party had anything to do with our ability to cover a party, we went to what was supposed to be the relatively sedate “Variety’s Ten Directors to Watch” panel and after-party at the huge new St. Regis way up in the hills of Deer Valley, Utah. The invite said 6:30 p.m. to 9 p.m., but by 6:45, the room had exceeded its capacity of 250 people, and guards had set up a velvet rope between the party and the only bathroom. Anyone who dared try to exit to pee risked having to stand in a reentry line for over an hour, requiring several gentlemen to offer to pee in the corner.

It’s gonna be grim.

The latest batch of Xeric Grant winners has been announced — since its foundation in 1992, the Xeric has recognized a fairly amazing lineup of cartoonists and comics. Here’s some more comics we’ll be looking for in 2010:

Sarah Becan – The Complete and Definitive Ouija Interviews

Bryan G. Brown – First Fight

Sixta C. – Soldiers of God

Ben Costa – Shi Long Pang, The Wandering Shaolin Monk

Blaise Larmee – Young Lions

Lane Milburn – Death Trap

Stefan Salinas – Within the Rat

Nathan Schreiber – Power Out

The Xeric Foundation has announced its most recent grant recipients. A total of $32,042 was awarded for eight comic book projects. The Foundation has awarded in excess of $2.3M to comic book creators and nonprofit organizations since its first grant cycle in September 1992.

Established by Peter Laird, co-creator of The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the Northampton, MA based foundation offers financial assistance to self-publishing comic book creators in the US and Canada and to qualified charitable and nonprofit organizations in western Massachusetts.

The next deadline and review dates for comic book grants are March 31, 2010 and May 1, 2010, respectively. The charitable organization grants are decided annually in March and announced separately.

You have seven days to go back and re-watch old episodes to get caught up in time for the season premiere next Tuesday night (fittingly on Groundhog Day).

The Helper Monkey has been watching selected shows from all five seasons as a refresher course and has a few observations.

– The show is so much better without Charlie and Claire.

– Season Two Ben Linus/Henry Gale was just a tease of things to come. Michael Emerson = Show MVP.

– Jacob may not have “touched” Juliet in the Season Five flashbacks, but, according to Ben, he did cure her sister’s cancer.

– What DEADWOOD alums will appear in the final season? Surely there’s a role for Ian McShane as Daniel Faraday’s father or Charles Widmore’s brother.

Start your countdown clock….

[Posted by Mark Coale]

§ ICv2 briefly interviews Chip Kidd on his STRANGE TALES cover for Marvel.

§ It seems that imagining sex lives for Disney characters just never gets old — even The New Yorker thinks this trope is funny. They did at least update the references. :

—When Mickey leers at Minnie in the waterfront bar, let’s have him squeak, “You know what they say, baby. Big ears . . .”

—In the “Brokeback Mickey” flashback, when Mickey makes tender love to Donald Duck, let’s have Mickey murmur, “Leave the little sailor hat on.”

§ Marvel hired 144 new talents in 2009 C.B. Cebulski reveals.

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Via PR, Dunamic Forces and Mark Millar are auctioning off the name of the hero in Millar’s new NEMESIS book for charity. More here.

Have you ever imagined yourself as the star of a comic book?  Award-winning writer Mark Millar is offering YOU that chance!  Millar’s upcoming comic book, “Nemesis” (illustrated by Millar’s co-creator, best-selling artist Steven McNiven), is about the fight between America’s smartest cop and the world’s one and only super-villain.  Who is that cop?  Well, that’s where you come in!

Dynamic Forces will be hosting an auction to name that cop, and the winner’s name will be immortalized as the hero of the story!  Best of all, all proceeds raised from this once-in-a-lifetime event will go directly into a special fund that will assist handicapped children.

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And now every time I get a little burnt out on what I “have” to do for work, I shut out all the external pressures around covering comics as an industry and read some comics that no one told me too. You should try it sometime too!

– Kiel Phegley

“The dominant tech culture says everyone should just give away their content and their expertise,” Lanier told me this week. “Then they are supposed to make money later through personal appearances, or selling T-shirts or whatever. That doesn’t really help the photographer or the graphic artist who is trying to make a living right now.”

–From an LA Times article by James Rainey on the bleak financial picture for creative types.

And at this his face totally changed, and he said “What are you talking about?!” and so I told him I would be leaving the show, because; and that was as far as he let me go, and he said, “STOP! You cannot! You cannot leave this show! Do you not understand what you are doing?! You are the first non-stereotypical role in television! Of intelligence, and of a woman and a woman of color?! That you are playing a role that is not about your color! That this role could be played by anyone? This is not a black role. This is not a female role! A blue eyed blond or a pointed ear green person could take this role!” And I am looking at him and looking at him and buzzing, and he said, “Nichelle, for the first time, not only our little children and people can look on and see themselves, but people who don’t look like us, people who don’t look like us, from all over the world, for the first time, the first time on television, they can see us, as we should be!

– Nichelle Nichols on Martin Luther King Jr. telling her not to leave Star Trek. [via]

Hey there! It’s said that thinking in new patterns helps the mind to stay limber. In that spirit, we’re presenting a NEW BEAT FEATURE called Born Apart! Here we’ll post two completely unrelated images just to get the old braineroo doing some jumping jacks. We’ll search high and low for the most RANDOMLY UNCONNECTED COMICS COVERS we can find. So here we go and let’s get thinking!

It is coming. And nothing will be the same. At least for bloggers, who will not be able to speculate endlessly about Apple’s expected announcement of an iTablet-like device on Wednesday. The device — a larger, even more readable version of the existing iPhone technology — is expected to have huge ramifications for the print industry — Apple has supposedly already had talks with major publishers and periodicals, including HarperCollins:

A book is like a garden carried in the pocket… or perhaps on a tablet. It appears HarperCollins isn’t the only publishing company being associated with Apple’s upcoming tablet. A BusinessWeek report says that McGraw-Hill and Hachette Book Group are in talks with Apple to bring an assortment of textbooks and trade publications to the tablet in digital format. The availability of educational material could make the tablet a shoo-in for the education market.

John Wiley & Sons titles may also make an appearance as well. “We have had ongoing conversations with Apple about their interest in including educational content,” Peter Balis, director of digital content at Wiley, told BusinessWeek. “We will continue to support their efforts in whatever iteration it takes next week.”

Gizmodo has been following major media canoodling with the Tapplet for a while:

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A classic LOVE AND ROCKETS cover.

The cover to the second issue of Titan’s WWE comic.

The Space Prize is presented each year to the best in comics collected at the previous year’s SPACE festival in Columbus, OH in the categories Minicomic, Short Story and Webcomic and a Grand Prize. This year’s SPACE will be held on April 24 and 25, 2010 at the Ramada Plaza Hotel & Conference Center in Columbus. More info here. And the winners are:

General Category:
1st Place:
The Dreamer #1-5
Lora Innes-Artist, writer
Tom Waltz- Editor

2nd Place:
Tiny Life 1)a
Nick Jones and Nicolas Colacitti

3rd Place:
The Second Part of the Secret History of the Ineffables
Craig Bogart

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Our web woes last week left the links stacked up like cordwood. So to keep you busy the rest of the week, here’s a bunch of things we clipped over the last while….

News:

§ Ada Price previews The Big Graphic Novels of 2010 some of which are periodicals, but, okay.

§ Writer Derek McCulloch (Stagger Lee, Pug, Gone to Amerikay) has a POD collection of his short stories available: Stories of a Callow Youth

§ Some folks were tweeting obliquely about MARVELMAN recently.

§ Marvel has made some promotions. Tom Brevoort is now a Vice President, Executive Editor, as has Axel Alonso, and Steve Wacker has been promoted to Senior Editor. Alonso and Wacker both got their first rise to prominence at DC, while Brevoort is a Marvel man all the way. Congrats to all three!

§ Congrats to Jennifer de Guzman on the arrival of Mateo Bernard de Guzman Belew.

§ Congrats also to Brian K. Vaughan and wife Ruth who just had a baby boy.

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Most probably building off the pop culture phenomenon Jersey Shore, Gareb Shamus and the Wizard Convention tour are hitting New Jersey — but the locale will not be the piquant environs of the A.C., but rather Edison, an industrial/shopping complex near the spot where Thomas Alva Edison claims to have invented the light bulb in Menlo Park. Actually, Edison’s nickname was the “Wizard of Menlo Park,” so it is obviously a place where magic can happen.

The cumbersomely named New Jersey Comic Con Wizard World Convention is the NINTH announced WIzard show for 2010, and will take place October 15-17 at the New Jersey Convention & Exposition Center. These dates are, of course, one week after the great NYCC/Big Apple Con showdown when both Shamus and Reed Exhibitions have conventions planned for the same weekend and same street 20 blocks apart. Because what the Northeast needs is ANOTHER comics show right after the double whammy of these two shows.

Now, speaking as someone who grew up in the Garden State, all we can say is…a three-day show in EDISON? Sure, it is a transportation hub — but is anyone going to go to Turnpike Con for three days? And right after the two biggest local shows of the year?

On the pro side, according to the PR, the Shamus family has lived in New Jersey, making it an ideal spot for a fest.
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The ComicPRO retailer organization has announced the formation of their Industry Appreciation Awards to honor individuals who have improved the direct market. PR below, more info here.

The direct market remains the way most comic-book stories get from creator to fan. ComicsPRO, the largest organization of direct-market retailers, wants to honor those people who stand in that gap and help smooth that process. From publishers, distributors, marketers and more, a lot of people are involved in bringing the stories we all love to market. ComicsPRO would like to stand up and recognize those who have been simply the best at what they do, making the comic-book direct market more successful for all of us.

ComicsPRO has created The ComicsPRO Industry Appreciation Award to honor these individuals, and the first winners of the award will be announced at this year’s ComicsPRO Annual Members’ meeting in Memphis, TN from March 25-27. 

There are two categories for the Industry Appreciation Award, one for professionals who are still active in the business of comics and one for those who have passed away and left an indelible mark on the profession of comic book specialty retailing. After a period of accepting nominations from members, the ComicsPRO Board of Directors presents this final ballot. Members will vote for one Award recipient from each category.

The 2010 nominees for the ComicsPRO Industry Appreciation Award:
o Neil Gaiman
o Steve Geppi
o Paul Levitz
o Dave Sim
o Bob Wayne

The 2010 nominees in the posthumous category for the ComicsPRO Industry Appreciation Award:
o Will Eisner
o Carol Kalish
o Phil Seuling
o Julius Schwartz

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Whatever it is.

Actually, it’s part of a Wolverine cover art auction for the Hero Initiative.

Via Occasional Superheroine.

Well now, this is sure to make you feel better about yourself.

Friedman explains:

I created these lovely faces for this new book cover from Fantagraphics, designed by Alexa Koenings and due out next month. The idea was conceived by the author, journalist/historian Ben Schwartz, to be an homage/parody of THE BELIEVER covers, although I had no intention, or interest in parodying the regular Charles Burns portraits. The faces are not meant to be any one in particular, rather I wanted to capture certain “types’ who write Comics Criticism. Full disclosure, Ben Schwartz has written about my work several times, an excellent profile of my book “Old Jewish comedians” for the LA TIMES, even interviewing Jerry Lewis, Freddie Roman, and an angry Jack Carter about being in the book, as well as an extensive profile of my work for COMIC ART MAGAZINE.

Via

The blue cat alien can beat

the scar-faced psychopath as AVATAR just passed DARK KNIGHT on the all-time box office list.

Topping the frame with an estimated weekend gross of $36 million for a cume of $552.8 million, 20th Century Fox and James Cameron’s “Avatar” has jumped past Warner Bros.’ “The Dark Knight” with $533.3 million to become the second highest grossing film ever at the domestic box office.

So now James Cameron has the #1 and #2 top grossing movies of all times. King of the world, indeed. We haven’t really been following the AVATAR Phenomenon here, but Geoff Boucher rounds up all the cults, depressions, deaths, and political conroversies. To be honest, when we saw the movie, we weren’t convinced it was going to go as far as it has — whether you think it’s the same story as DANCES WITH WOLVES, POCAHONTAS, FERNGULLY, LITTLE BIG MAN, or whatever, it is a very popular one, the great white man who learns to live and love from the noble savages. Has there ever really been an outsider who learns the ways of the tribe and then goes on to lead the tribe? It happens in myth quite a bit, but in real life, it usually has to happen by force. Call it a fantasy then — cultural Mary Sue.

Semi comics-related bonus: Jeet Heer talks AVATAR.

The Diff’rent Strokes Curse strikes again.

Brangelina, please….don’t let the magic die!

We need you!

Isn’t one broken heart enough?