The original version of this piece appeared on my blog, The Matt Signal, on Aug. 23, 2013, shortly after news broke — and stink rose — that Ben Affleck would be playing Batman in a yet-to-be-named live action movie. Seven years later, we find ourselves in a similar situation, so I think itâs time to…
In 2012, 10 years after the first Free Comic Book Day, Diamond Comic Distributors rolled out Halloween ComicFest, a similar promotion in which comic shops gave out free (to customers) books on the last Saturday in November. While not having quite the same cache as FCBD, it capitalized on a holiday when kids and fans…
In the summer of 2018, times were strange but good. Since my youngest had been born only that spring, he was still pretty attached to my wife, Christi, which led to a new division of labor, in which I got our eldest son to bed while Christi went to bed early with the baby. Now…
Taco Bell. Just the name brings up images of garbage food you get at a drive-thru at 2AM and savor every bite of. Not every menu item is good. Iâd even say most of them are bad. But some of them are great. Just like characters in the X-Men franchise! Today I bring to you…
There was once a dark age. A time when there was no internet. A time when the knowledge of comic book charactersâ backgrounds could not be found in wikis, but in the memories of fans and in specially printed comics. Comics called handbooks or guidebooks. This week, DC released a guidebook to its âDark Nights:…
Nothing is so important that we must sacrifice decency or respect for others. Last Time on âWhy, Willâ Imagine this conversation 50 years from now: âPep Pep, was there *really* a coronavirus pandemic? And more than 150,000 people died? And the United States kinda did nothing?â âThatâs all true, kiddo. It was a nightmare. Daily!â…
The following contains spoilers for last week’s Marauders #11 For a woman who can walk on air, Kate Pryde has always had to carry a heavy weight. Since her introduction in 1980, Kate has been, in addition to her day job as a member of one x-team or another, an authorial stand-in for creators from…
This article has gone through a few changes. Originally it was a profile praising Marvel’s Black Cat ongoing series and highlighting it’s unlikely continued success both with sales and cultivating a loyal following. It explored how a low-profile creative team managed to weather the comics market’s highs and lows better than dozens of other series…
Next Saturday, Aug. 22, is DC FanDome, described in a press release as a â24-hour, immersive virtual fan experience which brings the universe of DC to life and features the stars, filmmakers and creators behind its biggest films, TV series, games and comics.â (Notice how comics are last.) Itâs like many of the virtual cons…
When someone says âRobert Kirkman,â what title springs to mind? For most people outside comic fandom, and many in, itâs likely his cross-media hit, âThe Walking Dead.â For many other comic fans, it might be his superhero title, âInvincible.â There might even be some people who jump to âOutcast,â his demonic possession drama that was…
Heroes die. We must be ready to let them go. The Splash Stanley Martin Lieber was born Dec. 28, 1922. He died Nov. 12, 2018. In the 95 years in between, Stan Lee was an entertainer, a creator, a publisher, an entrepreneur, a charmer, a bit of a grifter, a figurehead, a lovable scamp and…
The Dawn Of X era has revitalized a franchise in a way rarely seen in the media. It is truly the Fast Five of the comic book industry, taking a property that was long in the tooth in a new and exciting direction while setting it up for major commercial success. But the question remains,…
Remember 2013? When Lance Armstrong copped to being a drug cheat and âStar Trek Into Darknessâ beat âThe Final Frontierâ and âFaith of the Heartâ as the worst Star Trek thing ever made? And you could go outside? Those were the days. The Splash The hallmark of a Zack Snyder movie â outside of his…
I love ranking things. Everyone loves ranking things. Weâve built a social media empire around the idea of ranking things. So lets rank all the X-Men titles in the Dawn Of X era, shall we? This is not just one opinion, this is the definitive opinion. We polled out writing staff and got twenty members…
Click. Journey back with us for a moment, back through the decades, to February 2020. A young coronavirus had just notched its first recorded U.S. death. The Senate voted against impeaching President Donald Trump. Kansas City won its first Super Bowl since 1970. Sonic the Hedgehog whizzed into theaters, those places we used to go to watch…