[The very special miniseries continues! See Part One for the official intro and context.]

Day 1: Saturday, July 22nd (continued)

Fairly rejuvenated, we headed north from Pleasant Prairie along Lake Michigan to our next stop, the Milwaukee Art Museum. This stop was literally a last-minute addition to the itinerary. We’d decided months prior which nights would be spent in which cities. Night one would be in Milwaukee, only four hours away. Since we knew the Jelly Belly tour wouldn’t last all day, and since Milwaukee is less than five hours from Indianapolis in good traffic, we knew we had time to kill. Only problem was, we couldn’t find anything up our alley in Milwaukee for the longest time. Other than the same combination found in every major city of zoo, museum, kids’ museum, art museum, and historic sites involving personalities barely known to outsiders, the only tourist attractions of note seemed to be alcohol-based. None of us are drinkers, socially or otherwise, so their appeal to us was minimal.

On that Thursday, a mere thirty hours before we left Indianapolis, I Googled the name of a local advertising museum to clarify something before I added it to the reject pile. Google led me to the Milwaukee Art Museum’s home page, where I stopped short.

Hey, movie fans! Recognize this?

Their feature presentation was a traveling exhibit called “Masters of American Comics”. If you know my interests, you’ll be unsurprised to know that the Art Museum was added to the itinerary the very next morning. The process would’ve been a tad more instantaneous, but I thought it’d be polite to let my wife wake up and be informed before I imposed my will on her.

The museum was easy enough to locate, separated from Lake Michigan only by a cozy stretch of grass, a foreboding metal wall, and standard admission fees. A note to you non-U.S. citizens who might contemplate dragging your kids here with you for a visit: here in the States, any attraction in which a child could possibly have fun (theme parks, zoos, family museums, etc.) will invariably decide that an “adult” is anyone over the age of eight, and will overcharge you accordingly. Conversely, anything you’ll enjoy watching but will bore or annoy your children will admit said children for free: e.g., poetry readings, the Alamo, heavy machinery demonstrations, Scared Straight boot camps, and — thankfully for our budget — art museums.

If you fear open spaces or can’t live without box-shaped rooms, you’ve come to the wrong museum.

Sure, it’s not the kind of ceiling that lends itself to a mural, but it was nonetheless fine for standing and staring in awe.

Once you got past the crazy modern exterior and the intimidating antiseptic interior, the exhibit itself was a blast. The exhibit was comprised entirely of original comics artwork from nearly every decade in the last century.

OPTIONAL BONUS SECTION FOR COMICS GEEKS: (skip down at your leisure)

The creators and works included:

* Over a dozen original strips each from Winsor McCay’s Little Nemo in Slumberland, E. C. Segar’s Thimble Theatre, Schulz’ Peanuts, Frank King’s Gasoline Alley, and Chester Gould’s Dick Tracy.
* Assorted Milton Caniff strips, including Steve Canyon as well as Terry and the Pirates.
* Some strips by an ooold artist named Lionel Feininger. His was the only name I didn’t recognize.
* A veritable Will Eisner extravaganza — dozens of Spirit pages among his other works. The highlight of the entire exhibit for me was the presentation of every single page of original art from my all-time favorite Spirit story, “The Story of Gerhard Shnobble” (which I originally read as part of The Smithsonian Book of Comic-Book Comics).
* A random sampling of Jack Kirby pages — some FF, some New Gods, a little Captain America, one or two pre-Marvel pieces, several others. The most awe-inspiring would be the cover and the double-splash page from Kamandi #1. I never read that series, but these pages made me want to. Writ large, they’re just that cool.
* Lots of R. Crumb pages that my son thankfully overlooked.
* Harvey Kurtzman, the only creator honored more for his writing than for his artwork, is honored via several pages from Mad (including pages drawn by other EC artists) as well as some of his “Little Annie Fanny” strips.
* Art Spiegelman donated a huge chunk of his own artwork, including impressive examples from Maus and his most recent project, In the Shadow of No Towers.
* Mostly overlooked underground artist Gary Panter is given an inexplicable berth to showcase several pages from some old graphic novel. If anyone close to me knows Panter for anything beyond his contributions to the set designs for Pee-Wee’s Playhouse, I’d be greatly surprised.
* Chris Ware showed off his intricate design work from several issues of his rightly acclaimed Acme Novelty Library.

Even the names of the art donors were a Who’s Who unto themselves. In addition to Spiegelman’s and Ware’s respective personal donations, owners of the above-named original artwork included the likes of Mutts creator Patrick McDonnell, Doonesbury‘s own Garry Trudeau, former publisher Denis Kitchen, comics historian Craig Yoe, and onetime Simpsons writer Wally Wolodarsky.

The exhibit concluded with a modest gift shop that combined comics-related merchandise, graphic novels and TPBs of most of the artists in the exhibit, and a rack of random recent comics that must’ve been gathering dust at local shops in Milwaukee. I can’t think of any other way that an issue of New Excalibur would be permitted to approach within a hundred yards of any museum. Anne and my son didn’t want any souvenirs here, but I picked myself up a thick paperback copy of Chris Ware’s Jimmy Corrigan, the World’s Smartest Kid.

According to an ad I saw months later in several DC/Vertigo titles, the exhibit subsequently moved on and was split between two different places on the east coast: one part at the Newark Museum, the other at the Jewish Museum in NYC. They were scheduled to stay put through January 28, 2007. Either half is more than deserving of a visit.

END BONUS SECTION

Oh, hey. Other art besides comics. That’s…that’s nice.

To finish getting our money’s worth, we checked out some suits of armor, one or two sarcophagi, an enormous 500-year-old tapestry, Roy Lichtenstein’s “Crying Girl”, some adventures in German expressionism, lots more abstract art that nobody but me even tried to appreciate, and one or two nudes before we decided we were done.

Some of you may recall seeing this in a movie where Patrick Dempsey owned the place and chewed a lot of scenery…

After relaxing by the lakeside and gawking at numerous nearby upper-class wedding parties (seriously, it was like a matrimonial convention — don’t ask me why the mass appeal among the newlyweds-to-be), we drove back down near the airport to our first day’s hotel, where we had to stand in line at check-in behind several pilots all apparently arriving simultaneously. (I’d’ve loved to see them maneuvering their planes around each other on the field if their arrivals were all that coincidental. I imagine something in the way of an unarmed dogfight, with plenty of plane-fu or copter chop-socky.)

Rather than spend more time cooped up in the car, for dinner we walked to the other end of the block to a teen-run mom-’n’-pop joint called the Hangar. Combine the decor of Dairy Queen with the menus of five concession stands, add some bizarre posters and one chicken statue on the roof. The food was competent for what it was, but it’s hard to respect a restaurant whose receipts misspell its own name.

Right next to the airport, surely luring in pilots and first-class passengers alike.

[Historical notes:

1. During our 2011 road trip to Manhattan, I had the privilege of a reunion with those same original pages from Eisner's "The Story of Gerhard Shnobble", which at that time were on display at the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art. Funny coincidence, that. Less funny: the MoCCA closed the following year.

2. The Hangar closed at some point. Its former address now belongs to a barbecue restaurant called Puddle Jumpers.

3. In 2011's Transformers: Dark of the Moon, the Milwaukee Art Museum played the role of Patrick Dempsey's corporate HQ. It had a much more imposing screen presence than most of the actors.]

To be continued!

Not nearly enough pundits are complaining about Marvel’s all-new White Power Iron Man.

For those just joining the fray: pictured above are the new incarnations of Thor and Captain America that Marvel Comics will be introducing later this year. A recently depowered Steve Rogers will be passing on the Captain America mantle to a black man, most likely his old partner the Falcon. Meanwhile, the Norse god Thor will be transferred into a female identity under as-yet-unrevealed but probably magical circumstances.

The media thought these developments were so vital to our nation’s integrity that I first heard the news from morning-radio DJs while we were on vacation last week in Minneapolis. If commercial radio thinks it’s big news, then clearly it’s Big News whether I agree or not.

In what may or may not be a similarly themed development, the media was alerted today that Hollywood A-lister Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson has reached a deal to star in a film based on a DC Comics character to be named later this week. All hints seem to point toward DC’s Captain Marvel, a.k.a. SHAZAM!, whose skin tone doesn’t match his. Preparing their rebuttal days in advance of the official announcement, comics fans nationwide have rushed to brainstorm their list of nonwhite DC characters that the Rock should be allowed to play. How nice of them to be so vigilant in helping the major publishers keep their cross-media adaptations demographically unmodified. And all without being asked first or getting paid for the job.

It’s my understanding that certain loud, obnoxious parties are up in arms on message boards and social media and such, because How Dare They or whatever. Fortunately these overhauls bounced harmlessly off me and my not-so-fragile peace of mind. Five reasons why:

1. This is nothing new.

Over the past four decades, Marvel and DC have introduced us to countless alternate versions of their headliners in hopes of doing something different, reaching a new audience, and/or simply shocking the easily bewildered news media. An off-the-cuff, incomplete list includes among others:

female Captain Marvel
black female Captain Marvel
southern Captain America
black Bucky
half-black/half-Latino Spider-Man
black Iron Man
black Nick Fury
black Green Lantern
redheaded Green Lantern
Muslim Green Lantern
gay Green Lantern
Asian Atom
Hispanic Blue Beetle
black Firestorm
black Mr. Terrific
black female Dr. Mid-Nite
Hispanic female Wildcat
blond Wonder Woman
’70s Women’s Lib Wonder Woman
lesbian Batwoman
Asian Batgirl
future female Robin
present-day female Robin
bratty assassin Robin
quarter-black/quarter-Korean Green Arrow
alien horse-faced Thor
female Loki
Kid Loki
gray Hulk
teen clone Superman
armored black Superman
evil cyborg Superman
evil alien artifact Superman
electric Superman
long-haired Superman

Every time one of these new characters was introduced, the industry died and comics went away forever. The End.

Oh, wait, no, it’s still here. World governments didn’t dissolve into war-torn anarchy, either. Cool.

2. Radical changes are temporary.

Many of these alt-versions are no longer with us because the Powers That Be decreed a reversion to the status quo, either due to low sales or merchandising requirements. Trying to guess whether any radical change in an existing, corporate-owned intellectual property will be temporary or permanent is a silly game. 99 times out of 100 the correct answer is “temporary”. If you guess “permanent” every time you see a comics-related headline in the mainstream press, perhaps you should ask a friend to introduce you to comic books.

3. Someone else needs the role models more than I do.

In those rare cases where alt-versions stuck around long-term, it’s because other readers find them worthy, presumably many other readers. Several from that list are still around and have their hardcore fans. I’m cool with that. Not every comic needs to be about me. Not every hero needs to be for me. Super-heroes were fantastic role models in my childhood, but super-heroes are not my primary source of wisdom or guidance in adulthood.

Maybe I’m weird this way, but I stopped attaching myself to specific characters years ago. Nowadays my collecting tendencies lean toward specific writers, unusual premises, and/or impressive creative displays. I like the occasional Captain America story, but I don’t understand the compulsion to purchase every single Captain America story that will ever be published, whether or not it’s written or drawn well, whether it’s affordable or overpriced, whether its politics are agreeable or offensive. That kind of zealous, undiscerning idolatry is beyond my comprehension.

For a prime example of a target audience that may better appreciate these new versions, here’s a link to a tweeted photo of some potential new readers. I’m pretty sure those kids were blown away by the idea of a relatable hero with a major public profile. I’m 100% cool with that and don’t see a reason to frown upon them and insist they go read tattered old back issues of Black Goliath instead.

Granted, alt-versions of classic heroes rarely have a long shelf life, but the repeated attempts aren’t offending my aesthetic sensibilities. The solution isn’t to surrender and declare comics a whites-only medium; it’s to try, try again.

Sure, sometimes there can be an underlying opportunistic element to such revamps. Frequently there isn’t. And they may not win points for originality, but that’s not really the goal, is it?

4. The white-dude hero market is far from depleted.

There’s no reason for all super-heroes to be lookalike, sound-alike, act-alike young white males. We have plenty of those. We’re in no danger of running low on those. If your kid suffers from Aryan male inadequacy, your local comic shop should have dozens of other titles waiting to cheer him up and teach him that we white boys can grow up to become productive members of society just like anyone else.

5. I’m not reading Cap’s or Thor’s books right now anyway.

Cap’s ongoing series hasn’t caught my eye, so its current events have nothing to do with me. To be honest, this reduces my chances of hopping aboard even when Sam Wilson accepts the shield and cowl. As for Thor, I’ve never been much of a fan and I’ve no interest in paying four bucks an issue. I’m not saying I will never buy their series again, but my disinclination to follow along has zero to do with their new identities. If something happens between now and then to change my mind, cool.

With or without my participation, I’d love to see either hero’s new version find and sustain an audience once the publicity circus folds its tent and leaves town. In the meantime, I’m glad to see publishers of all sizes already giving me fine reasons to diversify my reading stack. As of this writing I’m buying and enjoying the likes of Captain Marvel, Ms. Marvel, She-Hulk, Buffy Season 10, The Wicked and the Divine, Lazarus, Lumberjanes, and Shutter, none of which star white guys. There’re plenty more where those came from, if you look closely at the comic shop racks.

My one lingering fear in all of this: so far nearly every version of SHAZAM! since the original Otto Binder/C.C. Beck tales has ranged from mediocre to godforsaken to disdainful self-parody. If the Rock sees his way to embodying a not-awful version of SHAZAM!, it’ll be a miracle, but I’d love to see it happen, regardless of Billy Batson’s skin tone.

You’ve heard about that new movie that just opened in theaters this weekend, right? The one where Chris Pratt from Parks & Rec uses those hunky new abs he began sculpting for Zero Dark Thirty and puts them toward attaining leading-man status? And we meet the best CG characters since Caesar and Gollum? And there are about forty other characters you get to meet from the deepest corners of the Marvel universe?

If you believe 25% of my site traffic over the past two days, that movie is called…

Rise of the Guardians!

On a related note, 25% of my site traffic is wrong. Rise was a Dreamworks Animated joint that I reviewed when it was released back in November 2012. It was okay, not great, and certainly not urging the world to learn more about it this weekend. And yet, I’ve had a plethora of visitors convinced otherwise, through no conscious suckering on my own part.

If you can’t tell one astronomy concept from another, you might also have thought this weekend’s #1 movie was…

Guardians of the Universe!

But no, those Guardians are the little blue men in charge of the Green Lantern Corps, which you might remember from that one Ryan Reynolds film –

WAIT! NO! COME BACK! DON’T GO! PLEASE DON’T CLOSE YOUR BROWSER! I promise I’ll stop talking about it now, honest.

Marvel’s newest sensations are also not called…

The Global Guardians!

These folks were imaginative but forgettable third-stringers, occupying the same DC Comics universe as those other Short Guys Who Must Not Be Named. They came from all over the world to unite, network, and fight evil on behalf of their homelands, but they never left Earth and they never had their own series. The #1 movie in America this weekend is a bit broader in scope.

And just to be clear, they’re no relation to…

Guardians of the Globe!

…who are the Image Comics version of pretty much the same concept, but they’ve had their own series and they were co-created by Robert Kirkman, mastermind of The Walking Dead. In that sense and numerous others the Guardians of the Globe trump the Global Guardians, but they’re not completely the same thing. They’re only mostly the same thing.

You’ll also note the movie with the highest August opening in American box office history does not star…

The Guardian of Forever!

…although one has to wonder why this fondly remembered, sentient space-time gateway has yet to pop up in the big-screen Star Trek reboots. Maybe in the third one? If nothing else, somewhere out there should be a fanfic writer who’s pitted the Guardian against the TARDIS for the benefit of a rousing Star Trek/Doctor Who crossover. If it hasn’t happened, hundreds of you should get on that.

And please take heed: if it’s all-CG “guardians” you’re seeking, think twice before flocking toward…

Legends of the Guardians: the Owls of Ga’Hoole!

These are OWLS. Do you remember any recent commercials with owls in them? Yes, they’re cool-looking owls, and yeah, this is arguably one of director Zack Snyder’s best films, and for the record my son can tell you one hundred ways Snyder’s team failed at adapting the original “Guardians of Ga’Hoole” book series, but they’re not the obscure, scruffy, wild-mannered, ragtag team you should have in mind.

You’ll know you went thousands of miles off the right path if you visit your local Family Video and come home with…

The Guardian!

Here, I’m cautioning you about more than just confusing your nondescript titles. I’m just saying that Ashton Kutcher dramas in general are a losing proposition.

Speaking of titles that mean next to nothing, here’s some practical advice about …

Defenders of the Earth!

Maybe including this one seems far-fetched to you. True story, though: when I arrived at work Friday morning, even before I clocked in, a coworker ran up to me and asked what I thought of that new film “Defenders of the Universe”. I gave him the blankest of blank looks until my coffee woke up the decoder side of my brain and helped me figure out what he was trying to ask.

I’m sure he’s not alone in accidentally making up his own misnomer. If other well-meaning folks are likewise half-listening to the TV ads and coming away with “Defenders of the Universe”, it’s not much more of a stretch to imagine them instead coming up with Defenders of the Earth, a short-lived ’80s attempt to reboot Flash Gordon, the Phantom, and Mandrake the Magician as a globetrotting, post-comic-strip supergroup. Following that short trail off the pop-culture roadway will lead to a very abrupt and desolate dead end.

No, gentle readers who have no use for sorting adjectives or celestial body types, the new biggest film of the summer is called…

Guardians of the Galaxy!

It even comes with a built-in mnemonic device: the first and last words both begin with G. And neither of them contain “globe”. No rising, no defending, no Earth, no owls, no Costner.

GUARDIANS. of the. GALAXY.

Hope that helps. Go forth, buy tickets accordingly, and stop confusing Fandango’s search widget with your creative, desperate, near-miss guesses.

Due to family scheduling priorities, I regret I won’t be seeing GotG till next weekend. When that time arrives, if I walk into the theater and the first scene I see is Ryan Reynolds sputtering nonsense at some defenseless lady trapped in his Oscar Madison bungalow, the projectionist and I are gonna have words.

…BECAUSE I’M BATMAN!

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

This weekend was that time again: our annual excursion to Rosemont, IL, for Wizard World Chicago. My wife and I took plenty of photos as usual, many of them usable. We’ll be sharing those over the next several entries, but I’m still too fatigued from the experience to figure out how many entries these will take.

Part two, then: the amazing world of DC Comics. Enjoy!

…BECAUSE I’M LEGO BATMAN!

Batman #3 faces off against Harley Quinn #1 and Poison Ivy #1.

Harley #2 and Ivy #2 somehow manage to subdue Doomsday, the monster who killed Superman. That must’ve been some crossover.

Harley #3 reunites with the Joker and lets the Scarecrow tag along for laughs. And fear.

Harley #4 doesn’t need her Puddin’ or any other backstabbing partners slowing her down.

Riddle me this: why couldn’t the Bat-Villain enter the motorcycle race? Because he didn’t bring a Harley!

Marvel/DC crossover #1: Catwoman and Evil Tobey Maguire from Spider-Man 3 spend the day swapping Hollywood cautionary tales.

Marvel/DC crossover #2: Flash and Cap, who sound like bomb-squad buddy-cops.

Marvel/DC crossover #3: Deathstroke and X-23, patiently awaiting their own solo movies. “Someday,” they whisper to each other.

Batgirl fears not for her secret identity. Endanger her loved ones and she’ll end you. No worries.

Erica Durance arrived hours ahead of schedule for her Saturday signing and attracted quite a line. From outside the crowd, Arrow looks on in silence.

Supergirl and Power Girl team up while Joker #2 lurks in the background.

Dr. Fate, DC’s renowned magical hero, calls upon the power of Nabu to end all these Dr. Strange movie rumors.

Wonder Woman’s first starring role in a feature film was far more entertaining than anyone expected. The role was recast for her next movie due to salary issues.

The original Captain Marvel, a.k.a. SHAZAM! Maybe someday we’ll see someone recapture the magic of the old Beck/Binder classic tales, but it hasn’t happened in ages.

Zatanna, also fed up with all the Dr. Strange chatter. “REVEROF OBMIL TNEMPOLEVED NI HSIUGNAL EIVOM EGNARTS ROTCOD!” she casts in vain.

The real Lobo. Accept no reboots.

To be continued!

* * * * *

Other chapters in this very special MCC miniseries:

* Part One: Costumes! (Movies, Games, Doctor Who)
* Part Three: Marvel and Dark Horse Costumes!
* Part Four: Animation Costumes!
* Part Five: Last Call for Costumes
* Part Six: People We Met
* Part Seven: The Geek Stuff
* Our Least Favorite Wizard World Chicago 2014 Souvenirs

The Avengers! Classic lineup, different take.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

This weekend was that time again: our annual excursion to Rosemont, IL, for Wizard World Chicago. My wife and I took plenty of photos as usual, many of them usable. We’ll be sharing those over the next several entries, but I’m still too fatigued from the experience to figure out how many entries these will take.

Part three, then: representatives from the Marvel Universe, along with a few folks from other comic-book companies. Enjoy!

Venom and Moon Knight welcome you! And they’re watching you.

The early-80s Storm that we have yet to see Halle Berry attempt, and Wolverine between costume changes.

The Scarlet Witch and Ms. Marvel, more Avengers assembling.

Deadpool in all his normal regalia.

Kid Deadpool and Chef Deadpool. Thus is the Crisis on Infinite Deadpools at hand!

Sir Deadpool, Esq., dedicated follower of fashion.

X-23 hangs out with Wolverpool. Or Deadverine. Whichever.

A different X-23 hangs out with her new friends Rogue and Li’l Beast.

The Winter Soldier and the most complex set of Falcon wings we saw on the show floor.

Dani Moonstar from the New Mutants in Valkyrie form, alongside Colonel Stars & Stripes.

Dark Phoenix and Spider-Woman, confirming they’re perfectly content to choose their own comfortable poses.

Tony Stark, with working arc-reactor and repulsor lights connected to a belt-buckle control mechanism. Radioactive fuel sold separately.

This pic of Stan Lee, the White Queen, RoboCap, Iron Man, War Machine, and Bronze Iron Man was 10,000 times cooler before we found out the guy was probably a Stan cosplayer. The dozens of fans swarming him were pretty convinced. There was even a handler somewhere in this mess telling people to stand back and give him space…

Betcha know who Star-Lord is NOW, HUH?

Comics not from Marvel, part 1 of 3: Darth Talon from Star Wars: Legacy, and Darth Revan from Knights of the Old Republic (the comics and the game). Also, special cameo by Finn from Adventure Time.

Comics not from Marvel, part 2 of 3: Hellboy! Plus a luchador.

Comics not from Marvel, part 3 of 3: my wife meets Herbie the Fat Fury! Yes, he’s a real character. Yes, I’ve heard of him. No, he’s not a YouTube star. You’d be surprised what happened in comics back in the ’50s and ’60s. It took me a while to explain Herbie to her, though.

To be continued!

* * * * *

Other chapters in this very special MCC miniseries:

* Part One: Costumes! (Movies, Games, Doctor Who)
* Part Two: DC Comics Costumes!
* Part Four: Animation Costumes!
* Part Five: Last Call for Costumes
* Part Six: People We Met
* Part Seven: The Geek Stuff
* Our Least Favorite Wizard World Chicago 2014 Souvenirs

Sorry, I’d love to spend more at your Artists Alley booth, but I’m too busy being mesmerized by Sharknado.

Food for thought making the rounds in my online circles this week was an essay titled “Denise Dorman Asks — Is Cosplay Killing Comic Con?” The author is the wife of Dave Dorman, a renowned painter with a career spanning over two decades. Their table is a common sight for us at C2E2 and Wizard World Chicago, and doubtlessly a staple at comics and entertainment conventions in other cities. His covers grace several late-’80s comics in my collection and a few items in my wife’s Star Wars library. We’re not talking about an art-school sophomore with iffy talent and no business acumen. He’s a pro.

In the essay, the Dormans reveal the total intake from their first day-‘n’-a-half at Wizard World Chicago 2014 was a whopping $60.00. Their results from this year’s San Diego Comic Con, ostensibly the convention to end all conventions, were technically worse once you factor in the thousands of dollars spent on the experience.

The Dormans’ experience isn’t a singular oddity. The ensuing site discussion, in which Denise herself has participated and clarified some points, has touched on a number of factors that may be contributing to the decline of convention civilization. However, what prompted the most outraged responses — and why I saw a few friends linking to it while rolling their eyes — was the essay’s focus on one theory in particular:

I have slowly come realize that in this selfie-obsessed, Instagram Era, cosplay is the new focus of these conventions — seeing and being seen, like some giant masquerade party. Conventions are no longer shows about commerce, product launches, and celebrating the people who created this genre in the first place. I’ve seen it first-hand — the uber-famous artist who traveled all of the way from Japan, sitting at Comic-Con, drawing as no one even paid attention to him, while the cosplayers held up floor traffic and fans surround the cosplayers — rather than the famed industry household name — to pose for selfies.

I read a few similar complaints in the days following Indy Pop Con back in May (and talked to one of the vendors recently), a new convention where attendance didn’t meet projections and vendors of all sizes were dissatisfied with the results, but the cosplayer turnout was quite strong. At least one artist guest later took to social media the following week and disparaged the cosplay community for the sins of that weekend, as if thousands of Indianapolis residents had walked up to the Convention Center, saw three Harley Quinns walk by in a row, freaked out, burned their Pop Con tickets, and left to go shopping instead.

Cosplay has its ups and downs. So do all the other popular con activities do. Everything at a con is a distraction to someone. Anyone who’s read this site for any length of time knows my wife and I are cosplay fans. Don’t look to us for impartiality. But we wouldn’t be cosplay fans in the first place if we thought they were a menace to fandom and ruined everyplace they walked.

Honest confession, though: I’m personally not spending as much at conventions as I used to. And it’s not because cosplayers mugged me, or tackled me whenever I whipped out my wallet, or bedazzled me so deeply that I totally forgot to buy stuff. From a commerce standpoint, I suppose I’m part of the problem.

Why are some exhibitors reporting poor convention performance? Why have some local cons felt emptier than they should’ve been? Why can’t we all just get along and exchange money for goods and services? Here are some of the ways in which I’m being unhelpful:

* Staggering expenses. Just arriving and entering the doors can consume 60-80% of your budget. Some smaller comics shows will go as low as $25-$30 per one-day ticket, but a single day at one of the grander entertainment expos can land you near the three-figure price zone. Count on that price level for a full weekend pass (especially if ticket-vendor fees are extra) or a ritzy “VIP” pass that offers as many as two useful perks and a dozen disposable features. If you don’t live near the con, then you also have to figure in travel, parking, and overnight accommodations. Don’t forget food and drinks, because you are human, and they’ll be overpriced everywhere nearby. And then you can approach the fun things and see what they cost.

* We’ve already met many of the guests. Part of my fun is meeting creators whose work I really like and buying something from them in person. Now that we’ve attended C2E2 and WWC several years in a row, the same names are popping up on the guest lists again and again, and we’re not seeing a lot of new and different pros joining our Midwest rosters. There’s one artist in particular I’ve met quite a few times and bought a different comic from his assortment each time, but sooner or later he’ll run out of backstock to sell me, and then what can I do for him? Just leave a tip? I’d think it would be tough for artists who attend the same cons repeatedly to discover new customers that way.

* I can’t give all the artists my money. Among the hundreds of Artists Alley dwellers, someone’s not getting my money. I’d love to help everyone and see a lot of winners, but I can only stretch so far. So I have criteria for winner/loser triage. The following are least likely to spur me into spending:

* Any rack where the prevailing themes are zombies, breasts, or zombie breasts.
* Any table where I can’t figure out who you are or what you do because your “display” is papers shuffled around a table.
* Ditto anyone whose “display” is a laptop turned at me. Period.
* Any vendor who’s paying more attention to their phone than to potential customers.
* The same few hucksters whose books I bought at previous cons and regretted ever after.
* Art that’s an obvious, jokeless carbon-copy of a famous work by someone else.
* Novels. (WWC had several in Artists Alley. Interesting idea, but a really hard sell for me given my never-ending reading backlog.)
* Artists who, um, aren’t ready for prime-time. Including but not limited to any local kid with a credit card who bought space on a lark (because some cons really can be that affordable) and is just selling doodles on printer paper.

Basically I’m looking to buy the awesome comics and graphic novels that you wrote or drew, the kind that provide a reading experience, and the kind I can leave lying around the house without having to hide them when we have family visiting. I don’t think that sounds like a narrow target, but when I amble down entire aisles without pausing once to browse, I have to wonder.

“Attention, citizens! Please put away your cash and cards, step away from the tables, and come gawk at us right now. THAT’S AN ORDER!”

* No interest in higher-end items. We middle-class collectors are finicky in our art patronage. Our house currently has very little wall space to display prints or large paintings, and I don’t see the value in accumulating a permanently unseen portfolio. I rarely buy sketches because (a) price, (b) I dislike standing and staring at an artist drawing for minutes on end like a creepy stalker, and (c) if I wanted to be added to a weeks-long waiting list for a commissioned piece, ordering one online would’ve been much more efficient, and could’ve been done without attending. I don’t do that either, though. Hobby spending limits.

(My least favorite story from this year’s WWC: my wife and I saw one couple whose table was in a corner — correction: facing a narrow, dusty, abandoned corner — segregated from everyone else like a schoolkid in a dunce cap. They were easy to miss unless you were vigilant in walking down every single possible aisles, even the wall spaces that looked from a distance like unpopulated storage space. We crept through a narrow passage and there they were, tucked away from all humanity, driven into hermitage by unkind convention planners. I felt sorry for them…but all they had for sale were large paintings.)

* That darn online convenience. This won’t affect my Artists Alley behavior, because I’ll cheerfully buy cover-price items directly from the writers and artists who made them (remember, it’s why I’m there), but if you’re a comic shop owner who’s brought graphic novels to sell at a con for cover price or higher, good luck with that. I already have comic shops near my house, and Amazon robot minions practically perched on my windowsill, buzzing and waiting at all hours for me to click “Add Cart”. I need a reason to buy it from you and not Amazon. “Because Amazon is large and therefore evil” is not a persuasive salesman’s tactic. I realize your job is hard and you have the bills and the booth costs and the mouths-feeding and whatnot, but again: my powers of donation are limited, too. Blame capitalism.

* My interest in your back issues is waning. While I’m thinking about dealers: my long-standing back-issue want-list is comprised largely of two kinds of comics: issues that were part of storylines from previous decades that mean nothing or make no sense if read today; and the really obscure stuff you’ll never, ever bring to sell at a con because no average customers would want them. To this very day my run of Alan Weiss’ six-issue Marvel/Epic miniseries Steelgrip Starkey and the All-Purpose Power Tool is one issue short. I would pay double cover price to buy the last several issues of Steve Moncuse’s Fish Police in person instead of online, and finally find out whatever happened to Inspector Gill. But when I’m surrounded by bulk supplies of Spider-Man and X-Men and Avengers and DC’s New 52 and dozens of Marvel Ultimate trades going for a dollar a pound, I know better than to waste my time searching.

Related note: I also haven’t bought an action figure or an old piece of licensed merchandise in years. At a con or otherwise. I’m at that un-magical age and state of mind where I find myself surrounded by accumulations of cool-looking crap that’s become unwieldy and overwhelming and 90% packed away and tucked out of sight. I’ve drawn a line on how many boxes I’m allowing to pile up in the garage. I’m no longer in the market for collectible leftovers, and that’s what takes up three-fourths of any dealers’ area these days.

* The local Midwest convention glut is threatening to kill us all. My wife and I have attended five cons so far in 2014 and have two more to go. Earlier this year we’d discussed the possibility of trying one of the other cons within driving distance and broadening our jurisdiction in a sense. Five cons later, the money and desire to diversify our portfolio are long gone. We can handle a few shows a year and keep our finances on track, but new cons have been sprouting up around here like dandelions. For years our only annual geek experience was a tiny, fan-run Trek con. Today, we’re now in the midst of a genuine market. We have options, and those options have competition. That temptation to indulge in that strange new sensation has drawn us up to the edge of convention burnout. Something’s had to give. For WWC 2014, it meant spending less on the show floor and coming home with a much smaller reading pile than usual. Past a certain point, I just could not bring myself to browse anymore. And it didn’t help that Gen Con was the previous weekend.

See that kid there in the tiny anime kimono? He’s ruining conventions. LET’S GET HIM!

Those are just my reasons for comics convention spending cuts. Maybe I’m eccentric and these are limited to me and only me in America. Some of them aren’t. As for why other attendees aren’t spending more, here’s a couple more factors that shouldn’t be overlooked:

All those expensive celebrities, and the invading armies of the general public dying to see them.

The conventions want to draw more and more attendees, but that means bringing in people that will attract large crowds. For better or worse, millions of people may flock to Marvel movies, but a fraction of them are buying the books. With mainstream audiences fascinated by press coverage of San Diego and the overall circus atmosphere of costumed fans on the streets, the conventions are bringing in celebrity guests to attract those mundane fans.

And they aren’t comic fans.

Yeah, they know who Superman is, but not who draws him. And especially not who drew him five, fifteen, or thirty years ago. While you can buy merchandise or take a free photo with, say, painter Dave Dorman, few people beyond us hobbyists know who he is. It’s not a personal slight. The mainstream audiences just have no idea or interest in any comic creator/artist/writer outside of Stan Lee. Sure, Dave Dorman painted some Star Wars covers, and people like Star Wars. That doesn’t mean a mundane attendee will be willing to drop $50 or more on a copy of one of his works, as opposed to paying the same amount for Billy Dee Williams’ autograph.

And economics are a determining factor here, arguably even more for mainstream attendees than for those of us who’ve been in The Game for a while. They’re still wrapping their minds around the basic concept of celebrities charging for autographs. The sticker shock of admission, gas, parking, food on top of that will severely limit budgets. My wife and I do a decent job of mixing celebrity encounters with talent purchases, but that’s our compromise. Some people don’t.

To the extent that people wear costumes in order to be noticed is a no-brainer, but they’re part of that mainstream draw now. After dropping that $50 on Lando Calrissian, after paying for getting there, eating and the privilege of walking through the door, non-fan attendees are looking for something free. Taking photos of cosplayers is free. We know the benefits of taking those photos, too. It’s something to show to people who weren’t there. Sometimes it’s a fun, free service for cosplayers who attend alone and have no one to take a photo of them on the floor. And, okay, fine there’s a certain appeal for that ecstatic fan who showed up to meet Matt Smith to be able to also have their photo taken with a hot Loki.

Any of us who don’t run a convention would probably agree that convention planners ought to ease up on treating the creators as just another, higher level of customer to fleece. Certainly some things cost money to provide to hundreds of people — electricity, tables and chairs, internet, etc. — but gouging the talent so that they’re losing money before even showing up seems a lousy answer.

How many of these souls would you trade for the chance to buy copies of Super Stabby Bikini Lady Comix in peace?

What would be a useful answer, then? What should the factory showroom model of the 21st-century comics convention look like?

Should convention companies settle for smaller display fees, give creators a fighting chance to break even, thereby cutting into their own profits and eliminating their interest in the business? Should we hold our breath waiting for a philanthropic showrunning saint to implement that magical paradigm?

Should the burden be left on the creators to steer their own fates, and leave them to abandon the convention scene if they can’t make such trips financially feasible? Are we prepared for a future in which the guest lists continue dwindling until all we have left to meet are celebrities, actors, and a tiny Artists Alcove that’s just three college kids drawing zombie breasts?

Should we settle for smaller shows? Do we revoke the celebrity invitations, make it All About The Comics, return to the field’s insular beginnings, and turn gatekeeper until the general audience retreats and takes their dollars with them? Can we afford to lose their bankrolling?

Which genie do we put back into the bottle first?

…

We haven’t made any firm commitments to our 2015 convention schedule, but I’ll be shocked if we attend the same number of shows. We still have our 2014 schedule to finish. Next up is the inaugural Awesome Con Indianapolis, October 3-5, 2014. Any creators game enough to buy in and show up are more than welcome to try prying my dollars from my warm, lively hands.

Trust me: if anything holds you or me back, it won’t be the cosplayers.

* * * * *

[Special thanks to my wife Anne for cowriting portions of this entry. Her company and invaluable input are my favorite part of any convention experience.]

Of all twenty-six pilots in this series, I had more mixed emotions about The Flash in advance than I did any of the rest. When I began collecting comics at age six, Barry Allen was one of the first heroes to teach me about truth, justice, and sequential numbering in long-running comics. I still have issues #270-350, along with the first 200+ issues of Wally West’s subsequent series (including the weirdly numbered Zero Hour and DC One Million crossovers). The first time he came to TV in 1990, I’d taped nearly every episode on VHS years before DVD was a thing, and when it became a thing and the show was eventually granted its release, finally getting to see the legendarily preempted Captain Cold episode was, pardon the expression, pretty cool. Until several years ago, I was a longtime fan of the Flash legacy.

I entered with trepidation into his new vehicle produced by The CW, purveyors of the frequently aggravating Smallville, which left me with so many negative emotions that to this day I still haven’t convinced myself to try a single episode of Arrow because I assumed the results would be similar or worse. (I haven’t forgotten Birds of Prey, either. Yikes.) Knowing that The Flash was a direct spinoff from a show I’m not watching didn’t encourage me, nor did the announcement that both shows are already planning their first crossover (ugh). Insert obligatory reference here to other problems with translating DC heroes to other media, especially movies.

But it’s on the list. So I gave it a try. And I was happy to be surprised. (Fair warning to anyone who hasn’t seen it yet: one paragraph in this entry covers the specific subject of Easter eggs. If you’re a fan of those and plan to savor them as a surprise someday, consider this your courtesy spoiler warning.)

For newcomers to this little corner of the DC Universe: Barry Allen was an awkward crime-lab scientist (decades before the term “CSI” entered the pop-culture lexicon) who suffered an accident involving lightning and chemicals that gave him the gift of super-speed. Good-natured Barry was inspired by others to use his powers for the good of Central City and became…The Flash, The Fastest Man Alive! In recent times, his past was altered retroactively by the tragic event his mother’s murder under paranormal circumstances, adding a touch of pathos to his story but leaving him nonetheless an upright citizen doing the right thing, battling any number of metahuman ne’er-do-wells, and juggling both his work schedule and his free time spent with a girl he liked named Iris. Also, sometimes there was a treadmill that could handle super-speed users.

All of the above is material from the comics that made it into the show. I hadn’t expected such reverence to the source material. Compared to Clark Kent’s ten-year Smallville journey from mopey mophead to Guy Who Agrees to Wear a Costume, and especially compared to seeing 75 years of Batman stories scrambled and reshaped into Gotham‘s disjointed patchwork monster, The Flash practically treats the books as sacred text. Barry’s a good five or ten years younger, and two established characters aren’t white anymore, but nothing’s harmed in the least. If anything, Grant Gustin’s youthful, hopeful version of Barry’s aw-shucks charm accentuates a much-welcome optimistic outlook lacking in other live-action heroes.

Gustin is surrounded with a supporting cast that click well with him, if not necessarily with each other at times. Jesse L. Martin from Law & Order is once again a detective as Joe West, the overprotective father figure who raised young Barry after his mom’s death. He’s also the natural father to Iris West (The Game‘s Candice Patton), who in the comics would later become Barry’s wife, but in the series grew up as his sort-of sister. (Barry’s tight relationship with the Wests from youth onward is the most affecting deviation from the comics.) Joe’s partner is the clean-cut Eddie Thawne (Rick Cosnett from The Vampire Diaries), a recent transfer from neighboring Keystone City and a name rather recognizable to comics readers. After Barry goes through the paces of his origin story, he befriends and becomes the ongoing project of a science team at S.T.A.R. Labs (a name quite recognizable to Smallville fans), whose very few employees include a pair of young-adult scientists for comic relief and science exposition, overseen by the wheelchair-bound Harrison Wells (NBC’s Ed‘s Tom Cavanaugh) who encourages Barry in all he does but has secrets of his own. Meanwhile in jail for a crime he didn’t commit, there’s Barry’s real dad as played by John Wesley Shipp, a name and face instantly recognizable by fans of the previous TV show.

Unlike most other shows in this project, I’ve now seen two episodes before writing all this down. That might seem unfair, but it’s my project and my rules to warp. The origin story nicely lays out a lot of moving parts and snaps all the characters into their proper playsets, while introducing as our first super-villain the Weather Wizard, a name faintly recognizable to older fans of The Super-Friends. Fans may also note throwaway references to a policeman named Chyre, TV reporter Linda Park, a broken cage with a nameplate reading “Grodd” (another gimme for the Super-Friends crowd), and the prison known as Iron Heights. Episode two brings us the villain called Multiplex (from the Rogues’ Gallery of Firestorm the Nuclear Man); TV’s William Sadler as ignoble rich guy Simon Stagg (who, along with his bodyguard Java, come from the supporting cast of Metamorpho the Element Man); and a casual mention of Iris’ late boyfriend Ronnie, who may or may not be dead and may or may not be related to a certain Nuclear Man. I should also mention the pilot had one scene with very special guest star Stephen Amell from TV’s Arrow.

So far, that’s the only reservation I have about the show: there’s so much material from the comics and cartoons that it’s hard to treat the viewing experience as an hour’s worth of plot and themes and Acting, when the whole thing is designed like a virtual arcade shooting gallery where every name, location, or object I recognize is worth geek points, and maybe after I spot hundreds of them I can trade in for stuffed animals or free pizza. The Flash is so full of Easter eggs that his costume should be made of plastic grass and equipped with a built-in Paas coloring kit. We get it! The showrunners have comics cred! And I know sooner or later we’ll learn that Central City, like every other DC TV/movie city ever, will have hundreds of streets and businesses named after famous writers, artists, and editors. It’ll mean nothing to casual viewers, but I’ll be rolling my eyes when we get to the episode where the Flash has to run down a villain at the old Infantino warehouse at the corner of Broome Street and Fox Lane, which used to be owned by Schwartz Consolidated until they were sold to Bates & Baron Ltd., whose office was on the top floor of Messner-Loebs Plaza over on Guice Avenue, but now the building is rented out to the law firm of Waid LaRocque Wieringo Jimenez Johns Kolins & Manapul. That episode should earn me enough points to win myself a PS3, I think.

Proper nouns notwithstanding, and despite a few one-note supporters that will hopefully have their chances to blossom in the weeks ahead, The Flash is great fun with a likable hero whose chats with his father and his father figure lend the show some proper gravity while he’s learning about great power, great responsibility, knowing your limits before they’re tested, proper police work, and the joys of comic book science.

(Obligatory thing I nearly forgot: the special effects were fine by me. I tend to grade CG visuals in TV shows on a generous curve, wherein anything better than Once Upon a Time gets an easy stamp of approval. I’m willing to grant artistic leeway if it means I can devote more head-space to dwelling on other, more interesting criteria. I daresay, though, in this area The Flash already has a better batting average on my scorecard than Doctor Who.)

(For more information on the MCC 2014 Pilot Binge project, please visit the initial entry for the rationale, the official checklist of pilots, and links to completed entries as we go. Thanks for reading!)

When I was 13, DC Comics Presents #85 was one of many issues I bought that crossed over with DC’s epic event Crisis on Infinite Earths, back when buying tie-in issues was a new concept and I was easily persuaded to spend extra money on comics. For longtime MCC followers who don’t know comics, now you know the origin of the phrase “Crisis Crossover”, which was a thing for a long time.

Reprinted below is an edited version of the 1200-word answer I cranked out earlier this evening in half an hour off the top of my head. My response didn’t require much research, soul-searching, or structural fussiness. It’s rare that anyone asks me a question that spurs such an immediate, entry-length response, so I’m archiving it here for future reference the next time someone asks.

(The full-length, more carefully crafted version would be three times as long and take more hours to fine-tune than I have at my disposal tonight. Another time, perhaps)

* * * * *

Ever since Crisis on Infinite Earths and two Secret Wars events brought in the big bucks back in the mid-to-late ’80s or so, Marvel and DC have each averaged one major company-wide crossover event per year ever since — sometimes in recent years more than one annually. At first each crossover felt like a must-read event, but after so many years you could tell this was becoming a corporate-mandated thing. Usually it’s not one or more writers telling the editors, “Hey, I have this cool idea for a big crossover. Can we do it?” It’s more like, the editors come to the writers and ask, “Okay, so we need to get this year’s crossover going. Whaddya got?” Or worse, the editors ordering them, “We’ve decided such-and-such is this year’s crossover. Deal with it.”

I’ve read complaints over the years from writers who were working on a given series, had their own plots and subplots set up and ongoing, everything mapped out for months and sometimes years in advance, only to have their plans derailed when an editor told them one or more future issues would now be crossover tie-ins. They either had to rewrite their carefully laid plans to accommodate this intrusion, junk their plans and just do crossover story only, or step aside for one or more issues while some other writer took their paycheck for a few months and wrote the crossover issues instead. And I’ve read more than a few comics where you could tell the crossover issues weren’t exactly a happy, welcome challenge for the regular writer.

It’s something that’s come to bug me ever since, every time I see it happen to a series that was going awesomely, and then it turned terrible for the span of the crossover, and then it tried to go back to being awesome, depending on whether or not the crossover had any lingering effects that messed up the writer’s long-term outline. Some writers have even walked away from series altogether when given the ultimatum of “crossover or get out”.

Here’s a hypothetical analogy of how that same approach would work in another medium. This will make more sense to Buffy fans, but the general idea should be easy to spot.

You’re running Buffy season 6. You’ve got a lot of plot lines laid out — Buffy’s return from the dead, the Xander/Anya thing blossoming, Willow and Tara as the doomed lovers later on, the Axis of Evil Dorks putting their heads together, Giles planning his exit, and so on. You’ve decided episode 7 is gonna be the one where Buffy admits she was happy in Heaven until her friends resurrected her under the mistaken, unflattering impression that she was suffering in Hell and needed to be rescued. And you’re gonna make it a musical. Songs are written, the cast is rehearsing, at least one of them is rushed through singing lessons, some light choreography is involved. Everyone’s working hard but really hyped for this thing that all leads up to a key confrontation between Buffy and her friends that’s kind of a big deal, and you’re sure the fans will get a kick out of it and be floored by the emotional impact at the same time.

And then the CW executives show up at your office two weeks before the airdate you picked months ago and they tell you that no, we need episodes 7 and 8 to be a crossover with our new hit series Smallville. Clark Kent should come to Sunnydale hot on the trail of some meteor-freak, and he and Buffy need to meet, flirt, fight the freak, punch vampires, and the fans all die happy. P.S.: Screw your musical plans, and if there’s time for that Buffy/Scoobies argument, feel free to cram it into the last thirty seconds of episode 8, or into one of the Smallville episodes involved in the same four-part crossover. Oh, and did we mention it’ll be four parts? You should probably call their producers and hash out some details. Annnnnnd GO.

This, more often than not, is how comics crossovers frequently work according to the numerous anecdotes I’ve read from comics writers over the past 20+ years, and how I came to loathe them when I could see this kind of nonsense in action.

Also: every crossover crams anywhere between ten and literally five hundred characters into a single story, and the odds of the writer(s) getting all those characterizations correct are a million to one, even if Best Editor Ever is playing traffic cop. The odds of more than three characters getting to do anything meaningful for more than one panel are even slimmer. In most cases what you get is armies of good guys versus armies of bad guys, all of which add up to one very large, busy poster cut into the shape of a comic book. If you replaced 90% of the forces on both sides with faceless henchmen, odds are great that it wouldn’t affect the story one bit, except it would contain fewer merchandise faces. I guess if the costumes mean more to you than the characters inside them, they make for pretty pictures even if their words and actions mean nothing within their own context.

Also also: there’s the part where major crossover events can’t be properly understood unless you buy all the chapters involved, which more often than not will include some books you aren’t already collecting. Publishers want you to buy all the chapters because that’s how crossover bucks are made. Some writers will try to create self-contained short stories that read well with or without the broader context. This attitude is not conducive to short-term flash-in-the-pan sales-spike bragging rights and is therefore not usually encouraged at the editorial level.

As for me, I read the series I like, and if I have to buy other books so that the series I like will continue to make any sense, I get downright resentful, especially if it’s another series — or a dozen other series — in which I will have zero interest under all possible circumstances, crossover or not. Some comics fans apparently love being ordered to try new series and/or will buy whatever they’re instructed to buy. I lost that urge for crossover compliance a long time ago.

The effects in other media aren’t normally so shoddily planned or disruptive from an artistic perspective, but they’re privileged to different circumstances. X-Men: Days of Future Past, even after a second viewing the other night, remains one of the most brilliant crossovers I’ve encountered in any medium in years. It was essentially the seventh chapter in a seven-part crossover that meant more if you watched the first six X-Men movies that led up to it, but those were released over a fourteen-year period, so fans have had time to catch them all at their leisure.

Now imagine if DoFP were the culmination of a twenty-movie crossover, and those twenty movies had to be released in theaters over a precise three-month span, March-May 2014, and they didn’t start writing eight of those movies until November 2013, and also they wanted thirty more mutants added in the mix somewhere for merchandising purposes, but they had to meet that deadline anyway, because that’s what Fox wanted, because $$$$$. No matter what shape they were in, Fox insisted all twenty films had to be released during those three months. By any means necessary, even if it meant using 8mm garage-film effects and any actors available on zero-minute notice, down to the Pauly Shore/Tom Arnold/Paris Hilton level if need be. Period.

Now how much do you think you’d like crossovers?

Ransom Riggs’ Hollow City, one of a precious few 2014 books I actually read in 2014.

Presented below is my full list of books, graphic novels, and trade collections that I finished reading in 2014, in order of completion. Three were part of a 3-in-1 Sci-Fi Book Club edition and made sense to read back-to-back, but consequently took up more reading weeks than I expected. A few other items were pure catch-up of books that had been sitting on the unread shelf for far too long and were technically irrelevant by the time I got around to them. As I whittle down the never-ending stack that’s bothered me for decades, my long-term hope before I turn 60 is to get to the point where my reading list is more than, say, 40% new releases every year. That’s a lofty goal, but I can dream

That list, then:

1. Mike Carey, Peter Gross, Kurt Huggins, et al., The Unwritten: Tommy Taylor and the Ship That Sank Twice
2. Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham, Shawn McManus, et al. Fables, vol. 19: Snow White
3. Cullen Bunn and Brian Hurtt, The Sixth Gun, v. 1: Cold Dead Hands
4. Cullen Bunn and Brian Hurtt, The Sixth Gun, v. 2: Crossroads
5. Nathan Edmondson and Tonci Zonjic, Who is Jake Ellis?
6. Joe Harris and Steve Rolston, Ghost Projekt
7. Alex De Campi, Igor Kordey, et al., Smoke/Ashes
8. Guy DeLisle, A User’s Guide to Neglectful Parenting
9. Kathryn and Stuart Immonen, Moving Pictures
10. Paul Jenkins, Ramon Bachs, Shawn Martinbrough, et al., World War Hulk: Front Line
11. Charles Schulz, The Complete Peanuts 1989-1990
12. Ransom Riggs, Hollow City: the Second Novel of Miss Peregrine’s Peculiar Children
13. Max Collins and Terry Beatty, Return to Perdition
14. Jeremy Dale, Skyward, vol. 1: Into the Woods
15. Greg Pak, Ariel Olivetti, Giuseppe Comuncoli, et al, Incredible Hulk: Son of Banner
16. Greg Pak, Ron Garney, and Jackson Guice, Skaar, Son of Hulk
17. Greg Pak, Brian Reed, Tom Raney, Brian Ching, Barry Kitson, et al, Incredible Hulks: Dark Son
18. Tom Bancroft, Opposite Forces
19. Ken Krekeler, Westward, vol. 1
20. Greg Pak, Jonathan Coulton, Takeshi Miyazawa, Code Monkey Save World
21. Michael May, Jason Copland, Kill All Monsters! vol. 1: Ruins of Paris
22. Bob Mould, See a Little Light: the Trail of Rage and Melody
23. Jim Butcher, Storm Front
24. Jim Butcher, Fool Moon
25. Jim Butcher, Grave Peril
26. Jeremy Dale, Skyward, vol. 2: Strange Creatures
27. Warren Ellis and Mike McKone, Avengers: Endless Wartime
28. Danny Fingeroth, Mike Manley, et al., Darkhawk Classic vol 1
29. Various, Playlist: a Comic Book Anthology
30. Paul Sizer, BPM
31. Jane Irwin with Jeff Berndt, Vögelein: Clockwork Faerie
32. Gilbert Hernandez, Sloth
33. Harvey Pekar and Dean Haspiel, The Quitter
34. Daniel T. Thomsen, Corinna Bechko, Michael William Kaluta, et al., Once Upon a Time: Shadow of the Queen
35. Charles Soule and Renzo Podesta, 27: First Set
36. Charles Soule and Renzo Podesta, 27: Second Set
37. Richard Price, Clockers
38. Charles Schulz, The Complete Peanuts 1991-1992
39. Rick Remender and Wes Craig, Deadly Class, vol. 1: Reagan Youth
40. Jeremy Whitley and M. Goodwin, Princeless, vol. 1: Save Yourself
41. Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham, Russ Braun, Steve Leialoha, et al., Fables, v. 20: Camelot
42. Bill Willingham, Peter & Max: a Fables Novel
43. Donovan Scherer, Fear & Sunshine

Here’s what they look like shelved together:

By way of comparison, my yearly book count from 2008 to the present has trended like so:

2008: 39
2009: 50
2010: 44
2011: 33
2012: 23
2012: 42

You can sort of tell which year Midlife Crisis Crossover began and took a toll on my free time. That’s one of the consequences when you shift your hobbying gears from input to output.

My three personal favorites in the stack:

* Clockers: The widely acclaimed 1992 novel is basically an A+++++ prototype for The Wire, to which Price would later contribute and probably help inspire. The alternating New Jersey street-level storylines of Strike the drug-corner manager and Rocco the murder po-lice are often as detailed, engrossing, and heartbreaking as The Wire could be, likewise bolstered with a large cast of characters and so many lamentably real-life scenes of squalor from a broken world no one wants to see. This is the kind of masterpiece that makes me want to stop collecting comics and graphic novels forever so I can just read nothing but rich, moving, engrossing works like this for the rest of my life. I’m afraid and curious at the same time to see how Spike Lee’s film adaptation treated it.

* Hollow City: In which present-day Jacob Portman and the time-displaced students continue fleeing from the bad guys while trying to find a solution to Miss Peregrine’s ongoing predicament, meeting a few new peculiars in unusual places and times, and running and running and running. The ambiance carries over effortlessly from the series’ first book (as previously covered on MCC), and I’m annoyed that I didn’t see the final-act climactic twist coming, but I’m intrigued by the implications of the very last twist. The final bit of dialogue is such a blatant, movie-ready kiss-off line that I had to laugh, and now I’m excited for more.

* The Quitter: Harvey Pekar, the late curmudgeon and creator of the autobiographical American Splendor goes back to pre-adulthood for the first time to tell the story of his upbringing in ethnic Cleveland neighborhoods, where he constantly started fights, threw away opportunities, and made a lot of poor choices that led to his lifetime spent as a struggling nervous wreck of a writer. If you like Pekar, it’s mandatory reading as the most candid, self-flagellating book he ever wrote. Haspiel remains one of my favorite among Pekar’s illustrators and he’s in top form here — well capturing the anguish, the anger, and the humility that didn’t overwhelm Pekar until years after the sins of his youth had taken their toll. (Full disclosure: I previously expressed my Pekar appreciation in an experimental fumetti post about our 2013 visit to Cleveland, which included stops at his gravesite and his library statue. So I’m a predisposed fan.)

Three least favorites:

* Darkhawk Classic: Writer/creator Danny Fingeroth was a guest at Wizard World Chicago and I felt obliged to buy something from him because of his long career as a renowned Marvel editor during my childhood, but a nine-issue compendium of a ’90s teen antihero with a standard ’90s compound name was not the best way to go. When you’re laughing at a book that’s not trying to be funny, and imagining yourself inserted into the bottom of every page with two wisecracking robots on either side of you, it’s possible you’re just not into that book.

* Once Upon a Time: A prequel to the TV series about the intertwined lives of Evil Queen Regina and her manservant the Huntsman — i.e., season 1’s Storybrooke sheriff. It’s a flashback team-up of one of the show’s best characters with one of its least delineated. Without Lana Parrilla’s delightful malevolence bringing Regina to life, everything felt flat and…well, like a rusty old fairy tale.

* Assorted Incredible Hulk(s): I’m the kinda-proud-ish owner of over 200 consecutive issues of The Incredible Hulk, but walked away in the ’90s when Marvel increasingly opted for “new” directions that bored me. When I discovered the Greg Pak/Fred Van Lente version a while back (which all started with the well-regarded Planet Hulk), I began tracking down collections of other story arcs I missed during their years in control. Some were written by other folks and just weren’t the same; others are nearly meaningless when read out of original publishing order years after the fact. I stopped collecting them all when I realized I was buying them just to own them, as opposed to buying them for reading joy. That young man’s gotta-catch-‘em-all! impulse has been fading for me more and more in recent times.

* * * * *

Jeremy Dale, creator of Skyward, at Indiana Comic Con 2014. Photo by Anne Golden.

Two of the volumes listed above, from the all-ages fantasy series Skyward, were written and illustrated by a young creator named Jeremy Dale, whom my wife and I had the pleasure of meeting at Indiana Comic Con back in March. I viewed samples of his work online on a recommendation from my local comic shop, liked what I saw, and made a point of seeking out his table.

No thanks to the ludicrous overpopulation situation I described previously, meeting him required us to wind our way around the thickening, increasingly disgruntled crowds and to burrow a hole through George Perez’s autograph line, which was scores of fans long and formed a blockade in front of several Artists Alley tables, including Dale’s own. Fortunately the convention map was one of the few things done right and I was able to locate him despite zero visual contact.

I expressed my appreciation, bought Volume 1 from him on the spot, and a few months later picked up Volume 2 the week of release. I was looking forward to seeing where the story and its assorted characters would go in future volumes.

On November 3rd, Jeremy Dale passed away three weeks before his 35th birthday. Words keep falling flat every time I try to articulate my reaction to any extent beyond how that absolutely, irrevocably sucks.

Thanks, Jeremy — for your books, your talents, and your all-too-microscopic time with us.

We spent the early afternoon of Day Four walking into the heart of downtown St. Paul with a light itinerary and a curiosity to see if any surprises were waiting for us. The must-see item atop my list was Rice Park, a modest patch of greenery nestled snugly between eight major structures as a relaxing nexus of life, nature, serenity, and incidental tributes to the great Charles Schulz.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover:

Each year from 2003 to 2013 my wife, my son, and your humble writer headed out on a long road trip to anywhere but here. Our 2014 road trip represented a milestone of sorts: our first vacation in over a decade without my son tagging along for the ride. At my wife’s prodding, I examined our vacation options and decided we ought to make this year a milestone in another way — our first sequel vacation. This year’s objective, then: a return to Wisconsin and Minnesota. In my mind, our 2006 road trip was a good start, but in some ways a surface-skimming of what each state has to offer. I wanted a do-over.

Both acres of Rice Park were designated a public square in 1849, seven years before Central Park received the same nod, but was left more or less fallow until 1860, when landscaping began in earnest.

Near the center is the requisite park fountain, which includes a sculpture called “The Source” that was donated to the city in 1965 by the Women’s Institute of St. Paul. (They may have changed names since then. I couldn’t ascertain their current whereabouts.)

(You’ll note the return of the ubiquitous cranes that followed us through previous entries. The Twin Cities certainly weren’t content to sit still and rot during our visit.)

Between 2000 and 2003 the city sponsored a series of statues called “Peanuts on Parade” in honor of hometown hero Schulz, who was born in Minneapolis and raised in St. Paul. Later those statues were auctioned off, and permanent bronze versions of a few designs were commissioned in 2003 and 2004, including the pianist Schroeder and his unwanted groupie Lucy.

Sally Brown basks in the glow of Linus, her sweet babboo. In a rare out-of-character moment, Linus doesn’t seem to mind. Either he’s given up on resisting or he’s been drugged, and someone’s absconded with the all-powerful security blanket that would’ve shielded him from harm. So now the poor, innocent philosopher is immortalized at his weakest possible moment. Good grief!

In the lead photo that’s me hanging out with Marcie and enjoying the wonder of the printed page. Frolicking behind us is her best pal Peppermint Patty, preparing to kick a football through a window in the new entertainment venue they’re constructing across the way.

Also hanging out on the premises is the unsung hero of the Peanuts comic strip: Charlie Brown’s principal. This innovative, open-minded educator was the first in the nation to staff an elementary school entirely with teachers who spoke in ancient, indecipherable tongues. Scientists could never explain the daily lectures and lessons from all staff members that comprised nonsense phonemes and guttural squawks and…

…wait, no, my mistake: this is a statue of author F. Scott Fitzgerald. Someone figured he might as well be added to Rice Park since was born in St. Paul and lived there till he was fifteen. I guess he’s okay, but he’s no Charles Schulz.

And here’s the star of the show, the center of the universe, the dependable dispenser of folksy, insightful, sometimes awkward wisdom, someone who’s really resonated and meant a lot to me over the years. And sitting next to my wife is good ol’ Charlie Brown, celebrated star of newsprint, stage, and screen. He’s acceptable too, but good luck trying to tell him that.

Snoopy seems comfy and quiet. Too, too quiet. Meanwhile inside his head, it was a dark and stormy night.

…

To be continued!

[Link enclosed here to handy checklist for previous and future chapters. Thanks for reading!]

One of the neatest comics moments of 2014, from Buffy Season 10. Art by Rebekah Isaacs.

Comics collecting has been my primary geek interest since age 6, but I have a tough time writing about it with any regularity for a long list of reasons. I started a “Best Comics of 2014″ entry at the end of January, saved it and then procrastinated the heck out of it. Since my wife and I will be attending the Indiana Comic Con this weekend, comics are foremost on my mind tonight and I think I’m ready to move forward and express a thought or two. At the very least, a lot of lists are in order.

Favorite comics from 2014, in random order:

* Buffy Season 10: I gave up less than halfway through Buffy Season 9, but stuck with the concurrent Angel and Faith series because the team supreme of Christos Gage and Rebekah Isaacs captured the voices, faces, tones, and drama of the Buffyverse better than any previous Buffy comics I’d read, more than making up for the sins of Season 8 even as they sniped at it. When they were handed the reins for Season 10, I knew we were in for even better things, and I have yet to be disappointed. I feel like I should be grumpy about the return of Giles on principle, but the truth is the handling and the results won’t stop exceeding expectations.

* Ms. Marvel: Because Kamala Khan is keen and plucky optimist heroes are such a rarity. She may not share my faith, but the same could be argued of 99.99% of all super-heroes ever. The fact that she observes any faith — and not just the lip-service variety — makes her even more of a standout from her bitter, distracted, or no-opinion peers.

* Silver Surfer: Regular MCC readers know my wife and I signed on to Doctor Who fandom a little over a year ago. In a bit of cosmic-powered timing just for me, Dan Slott and Michael Allred picked the right moment to turn one of Marvel’s mopiest heroes into a fun-loving homage to the Doctor, complete with spirited human companion, far-reaching alien adventures, wit in the face of danger, and an intergalactic travel device that’s more like a supporting character than a prop. It’s the perfect gift from them to me!

* Moon Knight: In which Warren Ellis, Declan Shalvey, and Jordie Bellaire reminded me of a halcyon time when creators tried doing something different — not just with super-heroes, but with storytelling devices in general. Few are the artists who put page design and pacing to better use than static comic-strip squares or uniform, repetitive storyboards. Frankly, I’ve grown really tired of storyboard-style comics. It’s great to see chances being taken. Successfully, at that.

* Daredevil: Still Mark Waid and Chris Samnee. Still there, still got it, and ol’ Hornhead’s still unflappable even in darkest times. The story featuring the return of Matt’s mother, in which we learn why she abandoned her husband and son way back when, was one of the year’s best even though it was an Original Sin crossover. Astounding feat.

* Avatar: the Last Airbender Free Comic Book Day 2014: Previously reviewed. Still sticks out to me. months after the fact.

* Wild’s End: Mild-mannered British animal citizens versus deadly invaders in Dan Abnett and I. N. J. Culbard’s adventurous cross between The Wind in the Willows and The War of the Worlds that’s fuzzy and thrilling at the same time.

The resourceful runaway ensemble of Wild’s End. Art by I. N. J. Culbard.

2014 honorable mentions: Alex + Ada; The Autumnlands: Tooth and Claw; Beasts of Burden: Hunters & Gatherers; Lazarus; The Royals: Masters of War; The Wicked + the Divine.

Special awards for books that nailed deadlines and held my interest all year long: The Virginia Romita Traffic Management Award goes to Daredevil for publishing fourteen issues in 2014, plus a reprint of digital material, all of which I bought cheerfully. Special commendations for two other series that had a full twelve issues on sale in 2014: Batman ’66, and Hulk (counting issues of the preceding Indestructible Hulk). With eleven issues each in 2014, honorable mentions go to Astro City, Manifest Destiny, and She-Hulk.

Series that were canceled or ended as planned: The Manhattan Projects (returning soon in a different form, thankfully); She-Hulk; The Unwritten Apocalypse; Young Avengers.

New things I tried but dropped (among others): the Amazing Spider-Man relaunch; Batman ’66 vs. the Green Hornet; Dead Boy Detectives; Gotham Academy; Roche Limit; Rocket Raccoon; Serenity: Leaves on the Wind; Ten Grand; Three; Trees.

Books I was following but dropped in 2014: Atomic Robo (unshakeable resentment over the Last Stop Kickstarter letdown), Deadpool (started taking itself way too seriously); Green Hornet (despite Mark Waid); Iron Man (“Mandarin” is a trigger word for me); Lumberjanes (darling for what it is, but I’m just not the target audience); Magneto (crossover intrusion); Rocket Girl (delays between issues); Shutter (hard to explain why); Suicide Risk (unwelcome plot twist); Swamp Thing (crossover intrusion); United States of Murder, Inc. (delays); and the entire Valiant Comics line, which is now ALL about crossovers.

* * * * *

And that’s kind of an overview of my 2014 comics highlights. Here’s what I’m following as of this writing, broken down by publisher:

Marvel Comics: All-New Hawkeye, Captain Marvel, Daredevil, Hawkeye (leaving a light on for that one final issue), Howard the Duck (one issue in and it’s already my fave new series), Hulk, Moon Knight, S.H.I.E.L.D., Silver Surfer, Unbeatable Squirrel Girl (this was my fave new series till Howard #1 came out this week, so now it needs to retaliate with triple awesomeness).

DC Comics: Batman ’66, Secret Six. (Nope, still feeling zero New 52 love, though a few of their announced post-Convergence books sound shockingly promising.)

DC/Vertigo: Astro City; Suiciders.

Image Comics: Alex + Ada; The Autumnlands; Copperhead; Danger Club (nearly done); Descender; The Dying & the Dead; Lazarus; Manifest Destiny; Rumble; The Wicked and the Divine; Wayward; Wytches.

Dark Horse Comics: Angel & Faith, Buffy Season 10, Darth Vader, Ei8ht, Star Wars.

IDW: Little Nemo: Return to Slumberland.

Miniseries in progress: Bill and Ted’s Most Triumphant Return; Graveyard Shift; Groo: Friends and Foes; Millennium; Monster Motors: The Curse of Minivan Helsing; Princess Leia; Sandman: Overture (I’m only skimming each issue of this as they’re ready, in hopes that I’ll live long enough to read all eight together in one sitting someday before I die).

Following in trades: Fables, The Sixth Gun.

What I’m not collecting: Nearly all team books; crossovers; team-book crossovers; books that super-prioritize sex, sexing, sexosity, and sexological sexitude; crossovers crossing over with crossovers.

Source: Incredible Hulk #205, cover-dated November 1976.

Hey, kids! If you’re chasing your dream of becoming a world-class martial artist like Bruce Lee or Jim Kelly or Chuck Norris, you’ll need proper footwear. And what better footwear than used sandals once worn by the great Oriental Fighting Masters? Either they outgrew them, saved up to buy better ones, or died fighting in them, and now they can be yours for just three bucks and a crude outline of your own foot on notebook paper, so we can tell which dead masters wore your size. We’re located up in scenic Connecticut, where all the most renowned sensei live. Send us your allowance today!

Source: Iron Man #113, August 1978.

Before Chris Pratt was a Hollywood superstar, before someone dared Marvel to turn Guardians of the Galaxy into a box office smash, once upon a time Marvel decided there should be super-heroes that look like Star Wars. Presto: Star-Lord! He had a costume and he had space adventures. He had the blue-and-yellow color scheme of the X-Men’s original suits, red goggles that could’ve been ruby quartz like Cyclops’, and superfluous forehead ridges like Wolverine’s first catlike togs. STAR-LORD. He never starred in his own comic! STAR-LORD. The artist used to be the publisher at DC Comics! STAR-LORD. No one cared!

Then times changed, and other creators’ discarded leftovers were turned into solid gold. The forgotten heroes of yesteryear are like ugly thrift-shop goods, and Marvel Studios is like Macklemore with a platinum Visa.

Source: Power Man and Iron Fist #123, May 1986.

Back in the ’80s Marvel created a separate comics line for younger readers. Kids and adults alike could enjoy the Marvel universe together, but Star Comics were only for kids. The first wave saw a few titles like Planet Terry and the Richie Rich ripoff Royal Roy canceled after a handful of issues, but this subscription ad shows the Year Two lineup of merchandise posing as reading matter, from the two Star Wars cartoon spinoffs to the long-running Heathcliff, whose comic-strip fame helped him outlast the rest of the line and persevere through a fifty-six-issue run. The Star line tried a couple more original concepts, the derivative Top Dog and Trina Robbins’ Meet Misty miniseries, but not much caught on. But for a while you could have them delivered directly to your mailbox and personally crumpled by your neighborhood mail carrier.

You’ll note the list includes He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, a kids’ comics based on a kiddie cartoon based on a line of kiddie toys. To this day I remain amused at any and all repeated efforts to turn a guy named He-Man into the star of serious graphic literature, which DC Comics is still attempting to this day. Perhaps America will treat him with reverent gravitas once that long-gestating, still-hypothetical John Woo film version gets off the ground and He-Man and the Masters of the Universe becomes the next Guardians of the Galaxy.

Guys. GUYS. You notice he’s called “He-Man”, right? Good luck fabricating a grim-‘n’-gritty justification for that. Don’t forget you’ll need extreme backstories for Battle Cat, Man-E-Faces, and Fisto, too.

Source: The Liberty Project #6, Eclipse Comics, November 1987.

Marvel Comics is two-thirds of the way through reprinting all twenty-four issues of Eclipse Comics’ monumental Miracleman, but I’ve been on standby awaiting new material because I still have my original copies — the first sixteen issues written by co-creator Alan Moore as well as the final eight that were written by a young rookie named Neil Gaiman. Running across this old house ad reminds me how cool I thought the book was when I was a teenager, and how much I miss the pen-and-ink work of artist John Totleben, who drew Moore’s final issues in an era when inking in general and technique in particular were things that mattered and made a difference.

Part of me would like to see Gaiman and his artist/co-conspirator Mark Buckingham (best known today for Fables) finish the stories they’d planned twenty-five years ago as much younger men, but part of me is a little skeptical about trying to go home again.

Source: Incredible Hulk #205, November 1976.

But hey, if bringing back old comics doesn’t pay the bills, if creating your own works is a dead end, why not change career tracks and consider a life in automotive customization? Now you can paint flame streaks and viking battles and dragon warriors on the side of every vehicle you and your buddies drive, and get paid! No college required! No Wikipedia studies necessary! There will always be paint, there’ll always be cars, and there’ll always be guys trying to impress chicks, even during recessions. Only loyal readers of Marvel Comics were privy to this top-secret special offer to unlock their destinies and become the next Boris Vallejo or Michelangelo or Pimp My Ride host.

…

These are some of the reasons why buying back issues at conventions is more fun than reading reprints in trade paperbacks or from digital retailers. Their reprints almost never include the original ads, because of either copyright issues or elitist sensibilities. Look at all this vital history you’re missing that The MAN doesn’t want you to see. I bet The MAN owns twelve pairs of vintage Kung-Fu Sandals and doesn’t want other grabby collectors muscling in on his turf.

Netflix Daredevil makes his Midwest convention cosplay debut.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: my wife and I went to C2E2 and took photos! Other chapters in the series:

Part 1: Costume Contest Winners
Part 2: The Rest of the Costume Contest
Part 3: Edge of Deadpoolverse
Part 5: More Comics Costumes
Part 6: Mystery Science Costume Theater 3000
Part 7: Last Call for Costumes
Part 8: Stars of Comics and Screens
Part 9: Random Acts of C2E2ing

Today’s feature: the publisher, the studio, the universe…it’s Marvel!

Peggy Carter, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D., and her good friend Angie. Hayley Atwell was one of the con’s big-name guests, so it made sense that Agent Carter was one of this year’s most popular costume choices.

Kate Bishop, known to us comics fans as Hawkeye.

Miles Morales, the Ultimate Spider-Man.

Drax, Gamora, Groot, Star-Lord, and Nebula from Guardians of the Galaxy.

Doctor Octopus, planning dastardly deeds while waiting for his Sony movie reboot.

The Punisher hangs out near someone I thought was Lady Death, but might not be after all.

Classic Kingpin, years before he started delegating all leadership tasks to Wesley.

Soon to star in a major motion picture: Ant-Man! Sadly, that movie is not The Avengers.

The Beast can be verbose and vicious at once.

Another Beast teams up with Nightcrawler and Mystique to form their very own Blue Mutant Group.

This staunch supporter of Senator Robert Kelly will never be a fan of Blue Mutant Group.

Marvel monster meets movie monster in Lizard vs. Predator.

Loki is ready for her closeup. In the distance, an Elseworlds Hawkman watches like a hawk.

Groot and Dancing Baby Sapling Groot learn to get along with Disney’s Maleficent and swap stories about their shared corporate overlords. Maleficent dishes out the gossip, while Groots everywhere agree, “I am Groot.”

So many Agent Carters in the house, a sure sign C2E2 was no mere man’s world.

Another Kate Bishop partners with her frequently battered mentor Clint Barton. Hawkeyes United!

To be continued!

A lot of folks think guarding a single galaxy is an impressive feat. Try being a Guardian of the Universe for a day.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: my wife and I went to C2E2 and took photos! Other chapters in the series:

Part 1: Costume Contest Winners
Part 2: The Rest of the Costume Contest
Part 3: Edge of Deadpoolverse
Part 4: Might Marvel Costumes
Part 6: Mystery Science Costume Theater 3000
Part 7: Last Call for Costumes
Part 8: Stars of Comics and Screens
Part 9: Random Acts of C2E2ing

Today’s feature: costumes from comics besides Marvel — their Distinguished Competition as well as a few other popular print sources.

Green Lantern, favored errand guy for the Guardians of the Universe, hangs out with his best frenemy Star Sapphire.

Robin and Batgirl ’66 represent for old-school heroics.

Lobo represents for slightly less old-school antiheroics. Or plain ol’ villainy, depending on which side of his bike you stand.

Uncle Fester is a clown for Wonder Woman’s amusement.

Slade Wilson from Arrow threatens the line Friday before opening.

A more traditional Slade Wilson, a.k.a. Deathstroke the Terminator, trades war stories with Hellboy.

Batman Beyond! Or maybe another alt-future Batman. Since I don’t follow the New 52, for all I know this could be today’s Batman.

Scarecrow from the Arkham Asylum brings his own concoctions to help him get through the long convention weekend.

The military types from the manga and anime Attack on Titan are easy to spot once you learn their shared fashion guidelines.

Several Judges from Mega-City One, including a Judge Minion, surround Solid Snake from Metal Gear Solid. Snake hid under a box. It was his only defense.

Prince Robot IV from the Image Comics sensation Saga. Behind him in blurs is Madcap, a fun ’80s Captain America villain.

The foes from MAD Magazine‘s “Spy vs. Spy” have feuded for decades and still refuse to negotiate a treaty, even though their opposing governments probably made peace back in the ’90s.

To be continued!

My wife and I enjoying ten seconds of proximity with Hayley Atwell, winning star of Marvel’s Agent Carter, Marvel’s Agent Carter: the Winter Soldier, and Marvel’s Agents of C.A.R.T.E.R.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: my wife and I went to C2E2 and took photos! Other chapters in the series:

Part 1: Costume Contest Winners
Part 2: The Rest of the Costume Contest
Part 3: Edge of Deadpoolverse
Part 4: Might Marvel Costumes
Part 5: More Comics Costumes
Part 6: Mystery Science Costume Theater 3000
Part 7: Last Call for Costumes
Part 9: Random Acts of C2E2ing

Today’s feature: the writers, artists, and renowned actors we encountered on Friday and Saturday. The photo op with Hayley Atwell, a.k.a. Peggy Carter, agent of S.H.I.E.L.D., was the weekend’s finale to a long line of nifty creative types in the house.

Before the exhibit hall opened Friday, I knew where stop #1 would be: the autograph table of actor Chad Coleman. Most recently known as Tyreese on AMC’s The Walking Dead, to me he’ll always be Cutty from The Wire.

Our longest autograph wait at this show wasn’t for a TV star. Meet Dan Slott, the Marvel writer in charge of Amazing Spider-Man over the past several years. His inspired version of Silver Surfer, with artist Michael Allred, is a blatant, welcome, delightful homage to Doctor Who, which makes sense since he’s an unabashed Whovian supreme.

I’d been trying to narrow down what I wanted to say when it was my turn, but all that got tossed out the window when he saw my wife’s Doctor Who shirt, lit up, and began showing us phone pics of Who stars he’s met at other recent cons. I had no problem stepping back and enjoying this fun treat, especially since we’re both jealous that he got to meet David Tennant and we haven’t. Yet.

We wandered over half the exhibit hall before making our way to Artists Alley and meeting lots of cool folks making cool books. Among those we met:

Writer, professor, and comic shop owner Christy Blanch! We saw her moderate two panels at this year’s Indiana Comic Con, and on my last birthday we visited a Muncie comic shop she co-owns with husband/writer Mark Waid. I understand the already impressive store has relocated into even larger digs, so now we have to revisit Muncie sometime.

I first saw Gene Ha in person at a DC panel at Wizard World Chicago 1999 (my very first road trip with Anne!), but never met him till now. He’s illustrated many praiseworthy things (tip of the iceberg includes Alan Moore’s Top 10 and a Shade miniseries for DC) and has launched a Kickstarter for his new graphic novel, Mae.

Speaking of WWC 1999: at that show, writer James Robinson signed my copy of Firearm #1, one of the best Malibu Ultraverse titles that everyone but a few of us oldsters has now forgotten. Sixteen years later I brought that same copy for cosigning by artist Cully Hamner, because that’s how highly I thought of it. Non-comics fans may recognize the Bruce Willis/Helen Mirren/Morgan Freeman/John Malkovich action comedy RED, which was very lightly based on a three-issue miniseries he co-created with Warren Ellis, so hopefully the filmmakers sent him some monies.

David A. Rodriguez isn’t a household name yet, but I remembered reading a sample of his book Finding Gossamyr when it was a decent Free Comic Book Day 2012 offering. Three years and some dollars later, I’m looking forward to reading more of that story in spiffy hardcover.

Speaking of things ordinary people might not remember: Matthew Rosenberg was selling copies of his new Black Mask project We Can Never Go Home, but we’d first seen him at a C2E2 2013 panel about music in comics. I’m still really sorry about those pics.

Speaking of not-ordinary people: we first met writer Brian K. Morris (the one in the fez) at Gen Con 2012, where he cosplayed as the world’s finest version of Uncle Dudley, a.k.a. Uncle Marvel of the SHAZAM! Family. Since then he’s written one novel for Amazon Worlds based on Valiant Comics’ Bloodshot, and one starring his own creation called Santastein. By his side is the fezless Sean Dulaney, from whom I bought a copy of his comic F. Stein, Consulting Detective, also available on comiXology. That’s two — TWO Steins for the price of two!

The first I knew of Jason Howard was Super Dinosaur, his Image Comics title with Robert Kirkman. Lately he’s been killing it on Warren Ellis’ Trees.

When Marvel announced they were launching a new Hawkeye series, I thought it was too soon and it shouldn’t be done. Two issues into All-New Hawkeye, the art of Ramon Perez — alternating pen-and-ink present-day Hawkeyes’ derring-do with painted flashbacks of the Barton boys’ runaway childhood — has shown up my worries as 100% misplaced.

(NOT PICTURED ABOVE: animator Stephen Franck, who’s transitioning to comics with the promising-looking Silver; and writer/lawyer Charles Soule, whom I already met at the last two C2E2s, and even saw at that same music/comics panel with Matthew Rosenberg. A third photo seemed beside the point, but I had to stop by his table because every year he keeps thinking up new stuff for me to buy.)

By the end of Friday, my autograph/swag haul looked roughly like so, give or take a book:

Saturday, we had a few modest objectives, but wound up with far more than expected. In addition to the aforementioned Hayley Atwell, we also had the pleasure of meeting Ming Na-Wen, a.k.a. Melinda May, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. I’m old enough to remember when she was in a few early-season episodes of E.R., but now I know her as the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. agent who gets all the best fight scenes and many of the best overall scenes.

(I nearly cropped myself out of the photo. I know I smiled, but it must’ve been during some other, totally uncaptured second.)

In the afternoon we caught one of several Marvel Comics panels about this summer’s Secret Wars crossover event, this one focusing on the various “Battleworld” chapters. Pictured left to right: editor Nick Lowe as our jolly MC; writers James Robinson, Jonathan Hickman, Charles Soule, and Joshua Williamson; and editors Jon Moisan and Jake Thomas.

After Na-Wen’s line, we attended a panel screening of the first episode of the new Yahoo! Screen sci-fi sitcom Other Space, which is like Star Trek Voyager meets The Office. This was my best chance to see any of the series for now, since, as previously discussed, our PC hates hates hates Yahoo! Screen. My overall impression: I was happier and better amused whenever the pilot sounded less like everyday Twitter quotes and more like surprising punchlines that would never occur to me. There was enough of the latter that I thought it was a great start, impishly directed by Academy Award Winner Luke Matheny (the funny-sweet live-action short “God of Love”), and I hope it makes tons of money for all involved so I can someday watch the rest of season 1 on DVD or on a platform that’s Chromecast-compatible.

The Q&A afterward featured four of the show’s stars and its creator. We’ve met one of those folks before: Joel Hodgson, legendary creator of Mystery Science Theater 3000, who was at last year’s Indy Pop Con. His newest role is an engineering burnout who’s only occasionally connected to reality and every so often isn’t a lackadaisical danger to the rest of the crew. He’s pictured here at the Q&A with costar Milana Vayntrub.

Here’s a much, much better pic of Milana Vayntrub with more lighting and not from fifteen rows away. Americans know her best as the happy AT&T helper from that series of commercials where she plays one of that corporation’s most knowledgeable employees of all time. I understand she’s also appeared in several College Humor videos.

Karan Soni (Safety Not Guaranteed) may or may not be a future superstar thanks to his role in this fall’s Goosebumps movie, but until then he’s Other Space‘s quasi-fearless ship’s captain. His optimism, book-smarts, and problem-solving skills sometimes help compensate for his leadership deficiencies and his crew’s grudges against him.

My number one reason for showing up: he was Dr. Clayton Forrester. He was the voice of Crow T. Robot. He was one of the few main MST3K cast members I hadn’t yet met. And now, at long last, I faced Trace Beaulieu like a man and proudly didn’t squeal like a preteen groupie. On Other Space he’s the voice of Joel Hodgson’s incidental robot A.R.T., who is also cool, but on the other hand DR. CLAYTON FORRESTER. “Big deal” is an understatement.

[happy shrieking deleted]

Seated at his right is a man I had no absolutely idea would be at C2E2. I wish I’d known.

Other Space creator Paul Feig:

He created the cult classic Freaks and Geeks. He wrote and directed many episodes of The Office. He’s responsible for comedies such as Bridesmaids and the upcoming Melissa McCarthy vehicle Spy. He’s the man in charge of the much-discussed Ghostbusters reboot. And now here he was at C2E2, right in front of us, and instead of asking him fifty questions all I could do was shake his hand and thank him while my brain short-circuited and let me down. THANKS, BRAIN.

…

…and those are the people that were. To be concluded!

Even those dastardly Bat-Villains love Free Comic Book Day because it’s the one day of the year they can have nice new things without resorting to theft or deathtraps.

Happy Free Comic Book Day! The fourteenth annual celebration of graphic storytelling narratives and/or floppy funnybooks was a rousing success, far as we could tell from our single stop at Indianapolis’ own Downtown Comics North. In years past I’ve made road trips to visit multiple stores for the occasion, but our schedule was too packed with other obligations and joys. Regardless, ’twas a morning well spent, money well spent for a few items, and an experience fully enjoyed.

The shop opened at 11 a.m. EDT. We arrived at 9:45 to claim our place in the long line outside, where reps from geek-related endeavors hung out with us and added some valuable community spirit, not to mention free posters, prize drawings, and snacks.

See? Wasn’t kidding. One caveat: the donuts were from the Meijer bakery, not from Krispy Kreme. They were great anyway.

The doors opened two minutes early. Poison Ivy minded the front door for crowd management purposes, letting a few of us in at a time so we wouldn’t all stampede inside and crush each other. Reading is fundamental but difficult if you’ve been trampled.

As fans waited their turn on this lovely May morning, cosplayers stood by and provided entertainment, security, and inspirational opportunities for the many kids who showed up and brought their parents as guests. Special thanks are owed to the heroes and villains who brightened everyone’s day:

Spider-Woman and Dr. Strange represent for Marvel’s Avengers while waiting their turn to join the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Kid Flash lives! Take THAT, DC New 52.

The little kid inside me squealed a little at the sight of Plastic Man.

Cable is ready to headline an X-Men movie any day now, Fox.

Spider-Woman negotiated a cease-fire between Penguin ’66 and the Beast, thus closing the harsh divides between Marvel and DC, the Silver Age and the Modern Age, TV and movies, good and evil, and birds and mammals.

Just as I did last year, I kept my free acquisitions somewhat modest and grabbed copies of less than half the available titles. I was excited in advance about a few of these, but I also picked up a few untested items as random experiments because sometimes I like surprises. (I should have capsule reviews posted within the next day or two.)

Not pictured: the stuff I bought with money as a thank-you to my local comic shop owners, including collected volumes of The Sixth Gun and Kieron Gillen’s Uncanny X-Men run, plus an issue of Monster Motors I was missing.

And that’s the FCBD that was. See you next year! Time to dive into the reading pile.

Valeria Richards addresses her troops in Secret Wars #0. Art by Paul Renaud.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: my wife and I observed Free Comic Book Day 2015 this past Saturday. Readers of multiple demographics, thankfully including lots of youngsters, flocked to our local stores and had the opportunity to enjoy samplers from all the major comic companies and dozens of indie publishers. As an incentive for the younger recruits, the shop we visited split the all-ages material apart from the rest and put up “KIDS ONLY” signs discouraging greedy adults from hoarding everything and leaving nothing behind in their wake.

I never grab copies of everything, and this year I took even fewer items than usual because I don’t really have the time or inclination to be the guy who thinks he’s obligated to read and respond to everything. I came away with a dozen comics of varying interest levels and finished reading the last of them the next morning. In my mind, each issue ought to be a satisfying experience for any new reader who opens the cover without any foreknowledge. Historically, each publisher’s offerings tend to fall into one of six story levels, ranked here in order from “Best Possible Display of Generosity and Salesmanship” to “Had to Slap SOMETHING Together, So Whatever”:

1. New, complete, done-in-one story
2. Complete story reprinted from existing material
3. A complete chapter of a new story with a proper chapter ending
4. Partial excerpt from an upcoming issue that will also contain all these same pages
5. No story, just random pinups or art samples
6. Disposable ad flyer shaped like a comic

The twelve comics in my FCBD 2015 reading pile came out as follows, from least favorite to definite favorite:

12. Legendary Comics Preview (Legendary Comics) — This new IP-generating publishing offshoot of Legendary Pictures boasts a committed lineup of top talents — Mark Waid, Chris Roberson, Steven Grant, Pete Woods, Fiona Staples, Matt Wagner, Simon Bisley, Judd Winick, et al. — but for now all we’re given are three unlettered pages from a Pacific Rim sequel, three more from another title, one or zero teaser images from several other projects in early development stages, and ads for a couple of previous books now on sale. The company seems promising, but there’s no real reading here except a few marketing blurbs.

11. Captain Canuck #0 (Chapterhouse Comics) — Canada’s most famous Canadian comics hero (as opposed to Wolverine, America’s most famous Canadian comics hero) is receiving his next reboot written and drawn by Kalman Andrasofszky (X-23, NYX), and with retro backups by Ed Brisson and classic Cap artist George Freeman (Elric of Melnibone, Marvel’s long-ago Jack of Hearts). The four-page reboot excerpt is enough to show Cap is a hero who can negotiate a high-altitude drop, and that’s all there is. The six-page backup is a caption-heavy backstory recap for newcomers like me who know zip about him. I’d rather read a Cap story than read about other Cap stories, but I appreciate the attempted introduction. The back half is filled out with light Official Handbook entries for the supporting players, which I would’ve liked more when I was a young fan of Marvel’s OHOTMU and DC’s Who’s Who.

10. Secret Wars #0 (Marvel Comics) — A ten-page prologue to this summer’s major Marvel crossover event stars Franklin and Valeria Richards, Alex from Power Pack, a talking Dragon Man, and several unnamed underage strangers whose big plan for the upcoming catastrophe is to run and hide. Valeria recaps some relevant Illuminati shenanigans, but I disliked being reminded that these same never-named, unexplained strangers are the reason I couldn’t get into Jonathan Hickman’s FF in the first place. Irrelevant extra: an eight-page excerpt from a Marvel Heroes/Attack on Titan crossover previously released only in Japan. At least I assume it’s an excerpt and not the complete saga. Famous Marvel good guys punch oversize monsters that I kinda recognize thanks to cosplayers, and then more Marvel good guys show up and THE END. Yay fight scenes? I guess?

9. Tales of Honor #0 (Top Cow/Image Comics) — A done-in-one follow-up to a previous miniseries I’d never heard of, which in turn was based on a series of David Weber novels I’ve never read. For rookies like me, there’s a page-long intro crawl twice as long as any Star Wars movie infodump, followed by a two-page mini-encyclopedia cataloging the dozens of planets, chronology of major events, their military rank system, and various other in-depth social-studies aspects of this vast universe, all in near-microscopic magnifying-glass font. I sloughed through the scroll, skipped pages two and three, and still got the gist of their space-skirmish tale, which was a few pages of action plus several pages of exposition, about the same content as an average Star Trek: the Next Generation episode. I imagine this is much cooler for Weber fans than it was for me, but at least it had a beginning and an end.

8. The Phantom (Hermes Press) — I’ve never been a fan of the original comic strip, but I’ve dabbled in a few comics starring the Ghost Who Walks, depending on the talents involved. Two short stories are reprinted from comics that came before my time, but one of them features art by a young Jim Aparo, who would later become the definitive Batman artist of my childhood. His style wasn’t yet solidified, but I can see glimpses of the swashbuckling excitement and the distinctive lettering that would follow in The Brave and the Bold and The Outsiders. So this was kind of an unexpected treasure.

Lucifer goes on his next road trip in “The Ride: The Devil Don’t Sing No Blues”. Art by Tomm Coker.

7. I.C.E.: Bayou Blackout (12-Gauge Comics) — Credit where due: a Jason Pearson cover is a surefire way to lure me to your comic. Inside is chapter one of the third arc in a gung-ho action-cop series I’ve never heard of, which has one interesting cop-bonding scene bookended by a pair of shootouts, but writer Doug Wagner (The Ride, assorted Batman comics) knows there’s more to comics than explosions, and knows how to set up a cliffhanger ending, even though it would mean a bit more if this weren’t my first exposure to them. Anyone who likes old Stallone films or Miami Vice could dig this. Even more to my liking is the backup, a not-for-kids tale of “The Ride” by writer/artist Tomm Coker (DC/Vertigo’s Blood & Water) that loosely connects a fast car, the legend of bluesman Robert Johnson, and soul-selling devil-trickery, all rendered in the kind of intricate black-and-white linework rarely seen in today’s computer-coloring dominion.

6. Terrible Lizard #1 (Oni Press) — Imagine a rebooted Devil Dinosaur and Moon Boy, except Devil is an orange (not red) T-Rex and Moon Boy has been fired and replaced with a lonely teenage girl. A time-travel experiment brings the dinosaur king to the world of today, the two isolated outsiders bond, add some outlandish monsters, and the rest sells itself. Props go to Marvel writer Cullen Bunn and artist Drew Moss for some inspired all-ages Godzillaesque fun.

5. Hip Hop Family Tree Three-in-One (Fantagraphics) — Excerpts from Ed Piskor’s cartoon history of old-school rap seem to start and stop at random points, but if you’re interested in detailed biographies of larger-than-life personalities like Kool Moe Dee, Def Jam founders Russell Simmons and Rick Rubin, NWA’s DJ Yella, the actor formerly rapping as LL Cool J, and tons more where those came from, skip these out-of-context samples and go buy Piskor’s books today. You won’t regret it. Also in this hefty 56-page giveaway is a short story from Dash Shaw’s Cosplayers — neat comics about people who love comics — in which an odd shop owner relays his theory linking various unexplained phenomena to Jack Kirby’s 2001 sequel. It’s as trippy as it sounds, and I think I’d like to see more.

Even warrior-school teachers need a spring break, in the Avatar: the Last Airbender story “Sisters”. Art by Carla Speed McNeil and Jenn Manley Lee.

4. Avatar: the Last Airbender (Dark Horse Comics) — I’ve never seen a single episode of the popular animated series, but my past notes show this as Airbender‘s fourth consecutive thumbs-up FCBD entry, this time teaming Gene Luen Yang with Finder creator Carla Speed McNeil. Ty Lee goes home, reconnects with her sisters, foils circus evil, and learns that individuality and group membership each have their benefits and aren’t always mutually exclusive. Of the two backup stories, Paul Tobin and Colleen Coover’s “Bandette”, about a whimsical young thief, is the more charming of the two; the other, based on the game Plants vs. Zombies, I so didn’t get at all, enough that it knocked the book a couple of spots down the list. I guess you had to be there.

3. All-New, All-Different Avengers (Marvel Comics) — I have high expectations for anything with Mark Waid’s name on it, and for the most part those standards are upheld in this self-contained sneak preview of the post-Secret Wars Avengers starring Ms. Marvel, young Nova, Ultimate Comics Spider-Man, the current versions of Thor and Captain America, same old Iron Man, and Marvel’s newest big-screen sensation, the Vision. It’s funny and thrilling and at some point Mahmud Asrar turned into a top-notch artist when I wasn’t looking, but it bugs me that, in the same universe where the old Avengers were constantly knocking and grounding the Young Avengers for their inexperience, now we have an A-team staffed by three rookies whose front-line positions are a triumph of zeitgeist over historical consistency. And this is coming from a reader who really likes Ms. Marvel’s series and has three Ultimate Comics Spider-Man trades in his reading pile. The book’s other half is an Inhumans done-in-one by Charles Soule and Brandon Peterson that’s professional in every way, and does a much better job than Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. has of making the Inhumans not-boring. I still rebuke Marvel’s insistence that I have to like them, but at least the story held my attention from start to finish, unlike some S.H.I.E.L.D. episodes.

2. Doctor Who (Titan Comics) — Three new stories starring the three most recent Doctors! Twelve’s is a not-bad science lesson about the chemistry of quartz that could be a decent insert in a kids’ educational magazine. Ten and his comics-only companion Gabby Gonzalez limit themselves to a quiet night in the TARDIS laundry room but still run afoul of an exotic presence, so that’s a silly treat. The winner is Eleven and his own comics-only companions Alice and Jones in the most meta of all FCBD titles, about a fiendish alien invasion spread entirely through free books. It’s a gutsy move to make reading a weapon of the enemy on this special reading holiday, but cowriters Al Ewing and Rob Williams clearly enjoy playing with narrative in more ways than one.

“The Death of Kevin” somehow fails to be a 75-part crossover event with limited-edition gatefold die-cut holofoil hologram IMAX 3-D scented edible variant covers. Art by Faith Erin Hicks and Noreen Rana.

1. Comics Festival 2015 (Beguiling Books/Toronto Comic Arts Festival) — The best comic in the stack is a non-licensed indie anthology of creative coolness from a crowd that includes Kate Beaton, Mariko Tamaki, Gillian Goerz, Svetlana Chmakova, the Cory Doctorow, Jen Wang, and, best-of-show in a tough competition, Faith Erin Hicks taking an overdone superhero trope and its corporate implementers to task in a new Superhero Girl short called “The Death of Kevin” that needs a few awards heaped on it. But really, the entire one-shot is an A-plus grab bag.

And that’s the free reading pile that was, which I’ll admit has given me a few spending ideas. See you next year!

In Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #1, our hero prepares to juggle her super-hero life with her big move to college. With the support of friends like Tippy, she’ll be fine as long as she doesn’t sign up for too many credit-hours.

Meet Squirrel Girl. Unless you’ve already met. Either way: Squirrel Girl!

Squirrel Girl was the joint invention of Spider-Man’s co-creator Steve Ditko and author Will Murray, who previously ghost-wrote dozens of Destroyer novels but this one time in the ’90s had an itch to do something different. That plan came together and Squirrel Girl is unquestionably different from Remo Williams. In 2015 someone wise at Marvel Comics promoted her to the front lines and she now stars in her own ongoing series, the optimistically named Unbeatable Squirrel Girl.

The premise: Doreen Green is a young lady with the powers of both a squirrel and a girl. This includes squirrel communication, which allows her and no one else to understand her crimefighting ally Tippy-Toe, who’s mostly a normal squirrel except for all the impressive lifesaving stunts she can organize with other squirrels. After traipsing through various corners of the Marvel Universe over the past several years, Doreen is now living on campus at Empire State University (Peter Parker’s alma mater), majoring in Computer Science, living in a dorm with her roommate Nancy, and continuing to punch evil in the face on the side. In five issues she’s fought three different longtime Marvel villains, touched base with other heroes, saved the lives of everyone on Earth without expecting any gratitude, and refused to let any challenges ruin her chipper attitude.

In Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #2, Our Hero infiltrates Tony Stark’s armory to save the Earth. At first Tony can’t be bothered to show up in person because he’s afraid she’ll show him up, so he sends his empty pre-programmed Iron Goons instead because some billionaire chumps don’t recognize talent when it’s standing in front of them and trying to steal their stuff.

For a time Squirrel Girl was a member of the Great Lakes Avengers, a branch of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes that never receives any respect because they’re all goofy. Squirrel Girl may or may not be goofy, but she’s now one of several Marvel super-heroines — along with Ms. Marvel and Captain Marvel — to earn a solo series. Squirrel Girl lacks the marketing advantage of a legacy built on someone else’s super-hero name. She’s put herself out on a limb by wearing a costume made of browns rather than primary colors. To readers who only want Serious Heroes who do Serious Maiming with Serious Grimness to Serious Psychos in their Serious Leotards, she is the enemy of all they hold dear and a threat to the fabric of graphic storytelling itself.

In Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #3 Our Hero and her partner must weigh heavy issues of morality, priorities, and squirrel wartime strategy systems.

I’m pretty cool with that kind of joyful subversion. Unbeatable Squirrel Girl keeps rising to the top of my reading pile every month thanks to writer Ryan North, artist Erica Henderson, colorist Rico Renzi, her modest supporting cast, surprising performances by super-villains we know and hate, and, of course, Squirrel Girl herself.

In Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #4 Our Hero meets her fiercest foe yet: GALACTUS! The most dangerous being in the Marvel Universe is so bold, he announces his intentions on social media and gives us all the time in the world to prepare for his arrival and our collective destruction. Because the big baby thrives on world energy and on attention.

The latest issue, #5, is a variation on a classic Batman: the Animated Series episode called “Legends of the Dark Knight”, in which the story isn’t about the hero so much as it’s about other people’s interpretations of the hero. Through this and the preceding issues, Squirrel Girl’s greatest traits shine through: idealistic verve, unflappable persistence, imaginative resourcefulness, unique powers, the loyalty of squirrels who’ll do anything she asks, and a moral compass as big as her heart. Once she’s a little older and more established and headlining her own Marvel motion picture, she’ll grow to become the kind of upstanding citizen who has no problem being a role model and inspiring a whole new generation of Squirrel Girls to follow in her footsteps, though they’ll hopefully develop their own powers and motifs instead of stealing her intellectual property, because that would be wrong.

Mostly Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #5 is about her roommate Nancy listening to a room full of trapped Squirrel Girl fans describe their skewed memories in the styles of other artists. Meanwhile, this heavyweight team-up is a scene that totally happens.

Unbeatable Squirrel Girl is an unpredictable 21st-century all-ages joy that deserves to be much, much, much higher in the sales charts. If words like “fun” and “heroism” and “positivity” mean anything to you — I mean, really mean things deep down — then Squirrel Girl’s picture needs to be next to the definitions of those words in the dictionary inside your head. If those words aren’t in your dictionary, then you should fire your mind palace’s curator.

This month in Star Wars #6: Boba Fett tries to prove he’s not a loser by going after Luke Skywalker. “Go big or go home,” I guess. (Art by John Cassaday and Laura Martin.)

Marvel’s takeover of the Star Wars comics license from Dark Horse is nearly halfway through its first year, having published a combined eighteen issues to date between three ongoing series and one miniseries thus far. In our household I’m the one with the lifelong comics habit, while my wife is the dedicated Star Wars fan. I have dozens of longboxes; she has a six-foot shelf overflowing with hundreds of Expanded Universe novels. Strictly speaking, Star Wars comics are among those few releases that hold potential interest for both of us. Her enjoyment of Dark Horse’s output outlasted mine by a wide margin, but we’re in a new era and a new universe now, with different creators, different priorities, and different results.

Fair warning for context: I’ve seen all six films multiple times (a couple of them way too many times), but Star Wars is not one of my primary geek specialties as it is for her. My perceptions of George Lucas’ favorite galaxy are skewed because I experienced the original film trilogy in the following order:

1. Heard about the original Star Wars from friends while my mom went to see it without me
2. Bought and read the Empire Strikes Back novelization from a school book fair
3. Saw Return of the Jedi twice in theaters, then read the Goodwin/Williamson comics adaptation
4. Years later, saw Star Wars
5. A decade or so after that, possibly after high school, saw ESB

Despite several attempts at reading random issues, I never got into Marvel’s original 114-issue Star Wars series, not even for Jax the giant green bunny. I read a smattering of Dark Horse works and liked a few things here and there, but I mostly bought them for my wife until and unless she told me to drop titles at her discretion. When I heard about Marvel’s acquisition and reboot using several of their top creators, I think I was more excited than she was. Then again, I’m not the one who just had thirty-odd years’ worth of treasured, memorized, extensively researched Expanded Universe history and intricacies tossed into a garbage chute by Lucasfilm Marketing. (Been there, done that, felt that pain. Welcome to my life as a fortysomething comics fan.)

In my skewed opinion as an old guy who likes comics more than Star Wars, Marvel’s current titles rank as follows from least best to definite best.

4. Star Wars

My wife says this one’s her favorite of the lot, and I think I understand why. Writer Jason Aaron has captured the voices of the Big Three characters and found exciting things for them to do that weren’t already done in the original trilogy. Or maybe I’m misinterpreting and I’ll hear all about it when she gets around to reading this. I can understand how a hardcore SW fan might be fine with stories focusing on Luke, Leia, and Han above all others. My problem is, in all my life from childhood onward, I have never ever ever ever cared about Luke. I get that Luke’s Force-fueled deeds and his glowy super-sword make him the obvious hero of the bunch, but since I never saw his initial whiny reluctance evolve into compassionate swashbuckler in chronological order, to me he’s always been the least interesting member of the ensemble.

So far the series has been mixing and matching pieces for varied effects — Han and Leia on a wild AT-AT ride, a Luke/Vader first meeting that predates ESB, C-3PO babysitting the Millennium Falcon, Boba Fett popping in ahead of schedule for his fan club, and so on. The art by John Cassaday has its energetic moments that work best whenever his facial expressions appear freehand and natural and not traced from photos or stills. But since the Big Three are immune to permanent consequence, it feels like they’re shuffling and reshuffling the same old deck without adding any new cards to it. Even the controversial surprise ending to #6 bounced right off me because I know there’ll be either a logical explanation or a swift elimination forthcoming. Such awareness tends to nullify dramatic effect, a common issue with “midquel” stories that are bookended by fixed points in time.

Princess Leia #4 aces the Bechdel Test as Her Majesty continues to role-model for her subjects despite the destruction of their homeworld. (Art Terry & Rachel Dodson and Jordie Bellaire.)

3. Princess Leia

Of all the Mark Waid comics I’ve ever read, this may be the least Mark Waid-iest. Usually the hero has first-person narrative captions and a clever sense of humor, but Waid is staying outside Leia’s head and faithfully portraying her in stately royalty mode as she pulls rank for the sake of rescuing the scattered remnants of Alderaanian civilization from death and obscurity. It’s kind of interesting to see her in an adventure interacting with other women for a change, but without Han to get under her skin, she lacks a sparring partner who’s anywhere near her equal. The action sequences in #3 livened things up thanks to a wild assist from R2-D2, her noble actions in #4 are the best evidence yet of why anyone still looks up to her, and I’m assuming #5’s finale will surprise me as much as any great issue of his Daredevil run.

Until then, I’ve felt like this miniseries ultimately hasn’t been aimed at me, which is fine and understandable. Oddly, though, it’s also my wife’s least favorite of the four. Neither of us is sure what to make of that.

In Darth Vader #6, Our Villain is aggravated because his evil boss is making him share HIS comic with HIS name on it with other evil upstarts. (Art by Salvador Larroca and Edgar Delgado.)

2. Darth Vader

They had me at “Kieron Gillen”. In his quest for revenge upon the anonymous pilot who shot his TIE Fighter out from under him, Vader is regal and menacing and frustrated and conniving all at once. He’s also outnumbered by a supporting cast of malcontents that won’t stop growing. He’s assembled his own covert-ops team that includes an amoral female Indiana Jones and unrepentant evil-twin versions of Artoo and Threepio, nicknamed BT and Triple-Zero, who may be the most disturbing Star Wars characters I’ve ever seen. The last two issues threw yet another batch of players at us, summoned by Emperor Palpatine to bolster the Sith ranks, upend millennia of Sith standards, and probably annoy a lot of fans who are now being told the sacred “Rule of Two” is more of a guideline than a rule.

Gillen usually writes with a long game in mind, so I’m curious to see where this influx of personalities is eventually headed, as I expect it won’t be long before casualties start mounting due to backstabbing. While I appreciate that lots of new faces increase the odds of actual drama and tension occurring, Vader is in danger of becoming a second-stringer in his own title. I trust he won’t let that come to pass.

“…but no one ever taught me how to survive.” Thus the young fugitive in Kanan: the Last Padawan #2 struggles with a new reality in the wake of Order 66. (Art by Pepe Larraz and David Curiel.)

1. Kanan: the Last Padawan

In which Greg Weisman, one of the minds behind Disney’s Gargoyles and a onetime co-writer of DC’s Captain Atom during my teen years, creates an origin story for one of the main characters from the hit animated series that we quit watching after a handful of episodes. On Star Wars Rebels, Kanan is a former Jedi who still has his connection to the Force, a working lightsaber, a strange idea of what “former” means, and glowering postures that marked him as the strong, silent, bitter type. I never read the prequel-to-a-midquel novel A New Dawn that was supposed to make Rebels mean something to me, and so none of it never did, Kanan included.

His comic is the exact opposite. Commencing partway through Revenge of the Sith, Kanan’s tale follows the loyal trainee through the last days of the Jedi Order and watches helplessly as Order 66 immediately and irrevocably turns his entire world upside-down. Friends become enemies, order becomes chaos, and life becomes a nightmare as the lonely young survivor finds himself on the run from Clonetroopers who were secretly, genetically bred to end him and his kind. The first issue established such a strong connection between our hero and his master, Depa Billaba (with some of her previous history retconned away), that the ending of #1 was rather suspenseful even though it technically wasn’t a surprise. #2 sees Kanan on the run, torn between warm memories and imminent threats, navigating military traps and survival ethics alike.

Kanan the frightened teen fugitive is in such a different place from Kanan the older, disenfranchised sourpuss that beyond this point we truly have no idea what’ll happen next. In this seemingly narrow time frame between Revenge of the Sith and ESB, Kanan’s future is wider open than the futures of the Big Three. More to the point, the groundwork laid in #1 gave us a proper emotional underpinning so we have reason to care about his circumstances and fear for his fate. That’s what drama feels like, and for my money that’s why Kanan: the Last Padawan is the best Star Wars series of the moment.

(Opinion subject to change after the first issue of the Charles Soule/Alex Maleev Lando miniseries hits stores in July. Updates as they occur.)

Except where noted, all art in this entry is by Sal Buscema, Dave Simons, and George Roussos.

Behold the big save-the-day rallying moment from What If? (vol. 1) #44, cover-dated April 1984, which left an indelible impression on me when I was eleven. Three decades later you can take this dramatic splash page totally out of context and pretend it’s symbolic of you as the one true arbiter of What America Is Really All About, Spider-Man and alt-universe Sam Wilson’s army are your friends who agree with you on everything as far as you know, and the other Captain America is everyone whose idea of America is the exact opposite of yours, thus making them evil impostors who must be crushed. With all those Zip-a-Tone layers giving it more lighting depth than any other page in the issue, I have no idea why no one ever turned this into a poster.

Painted cover art by Bill Sienkiewicz.

Then the real Cap wakes up. Heroism ensues. Cap and the surviving heroes have to go take back America. Some old What If? stories had pessimistic endings where everyone died and the villains won and the moral of the story was, “Be very grateful the original stories didn’t go like this.” But this wasn’t one of those one-shot nihilist funnybook stories. Big surprise: Cap and his amazing friends save the day, and then it’s up to the guy dressed in flag regalia to deliver the big speech that reverses the damage, because we all know Spidey would mess it up, the cops would probably start shooting at him, and J. Jonah Jameson would write another nasty editorial about it while cackling uncontrollably.

So it’s up to Cap to assure Americans things are swell again and none of this ever happened. That’s what his disillusioned audience is expecting, anyway. Cap veers off-message and goes in a much firmer direction. And when words fail a duly chastised America, the convocation ends the only way it possibly could: with a song.

…and that’s where the story ends.

Cap’s speech is a little harder for me to read today than it was in sixth grade. At the time, to me this was unlike anything I’d ever encountered. I doubt this story will ever be reprinted, and there’s no way it could withstand a 21st-century reboot. I haven’t collected a Cap series in years, so I couldn’t tell you the last time Marvel printed a Cap story whose main message was “America rules!” or “I love America!” or “America is kind of not-terrible! Yay!” For all I know maybe the new Cap’s whole America motif is purely vestigial and the days of a sincerely patriotic Cap are gone. Or maybe the opposite. Couldn’t tell you.

It’s weird revisiting artifacts from a point in history when citizens didn’t spend the entire week of July 4th brainstorming reasons why America sucks — i.e, not too different from how they spend the other 51 weeks, except for July 4th they redouble their lists because it’s all one big competition to see who can become the greatest Independence Day Grinch of them all. Yes, we get it, America’s not perfect, terrible inexcusable things happen all the time that shouldn’t, someone should pass a “No Child Happy to Live Here” law, things would be so much better if Canada conquered us and paid for all our medicine and forced us to watch all their low-budget sci-fi shows.

But there are things America gets right and does well. No, I’m not listing them for you. Today’s a holiday and I’m off the clock. Because freedom to celebrate, freedom to type and post, freedom not to type and post.

Happy July 4th to our American readers, stay safe, enjoy your weekend, and if a guy in a Captain America costume asks you if you’d be okay with some martial law, chances are he’s not Chris Evans and you can legally sock him in the jaw.