Graphic NYC Honors Will Eisner Week

Friday, March 5, 2010

This week, the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, The Will and Ann Eisner Family Foundation, and seven locations throughout the country celebrate the life and works of the late, great Will Eisner! This second annual celebration encourages a widespread knowledge of the graphic novel and comic book, in honor of the trailblazing Eisner. Graphic NYC celebrates the father of the graphic novel in our own inimitable way: with a profile on March 9, in honor of the father of the graphic novels' birthday.
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DC Comics’ pulp ‘Wave’ takes the super out of heroes

Image via Wikipedia

By Bill Radford 
The Colorado Springs Gazette
March 5, 2010

It’s a world with heroes — but no superheroes.

The first issue of "First Wave," a six-issue miniseries from DC Comics, arrives in comic book shops this week, ushering in a whole new universe.

The "First Wave" universe has its roots in the pulp adventures of yesteryear. There is a Batman, but there’s no Superman, no Wonder Woman — the "First Wave" heroes are merely mortal.

Standing above the rest of those heroes is Doc Savage — sort of "Superman with a lowercase ’s,’" said Brian Azzarello, who crafted the "First Wave" universe and is writer of the miniseries. Doc Savage may not have powers like Superman, but "physically he’s the best, mentally he’s the best," Azzarello said.

Batman, meanwhile, is the new hero on the scene.

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Will Eisner Week Educational Materials: Notes on Will Eisner's The Contract With God Trilogy

By Tom Kaczynski 

March 3, 2010 11:42 PM

"Architecture is the simplest means of articulating time and space, of modulating reality, of engendering dreams" - Ivan Chtcheglov, 1953.

With A Contract With God (1978), the earliest book of the trilogy, Will Eisner was inventing a new format: the graphic novel*. The 'graphic novel' coinage was a kind of sleight of hand that turned ordinary comics into works with ambitions of becoming literature. As such it's describing the content, rather than a medium. It was the literary ambition of A Contract With God that set it apart from the cheap children's comic-books that dominated the market at the time. Eisner of course cut his teeth on comic-books having previously drawn the iconic and long running series The Spirit. In creating a graphic novel, Eisner was distancing himself not only from other comic-books, but also from his own formative work. But, new terminology was insufficient to distinguish the work from its cousins and Eisner relied on a number of formal and visual inventions to underscore the difference.

The Spirit (1940-1952) superficially resembled most of the comic-books on the stands at the time. It mostly consisted of colorful 8 page pulp romps full of crime and violence. But, unlike the vast majority of 4-color funnies The Spirit stories were intense nuggets of clever writing, brilliant layouts, and inventive typography. They were packed with innumerable characters and locations. The sheer density of the stories was matched by the density of the art. Pages were filled with 9 to 14 (or more!) panels filled with frenetic action, detailed sets and wrinkled suits.


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Toy-A-Day Day 153: The Spirit (Will Eisner)

The Spirit (Denny Colt) is a crime-fighting fictional character created by writer-artist Will Eisner. He first appeared in Spirit Section #1 (June 2 1940), a seven-page insert into American Sunday-newspaper comics sections. He currently appears in comic books published by DC Comics.

The Spirit chronicles the adventures of a masked vigilante who fights crime with the blessing of the city's police commissioner Dolan, an old friend. The stories range through a wide variety of styles, from straightforward crime drama and noir to lighthearted adventure, from mystery and horror to comedy and love stories, often with hybrid elements that twisted genre and expectations.

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Sucking "The Spirit" Out of Will Eisner's Vision (The Stute)

Image by Steve Rhodes via Flickr

My city screams...for better plot development

Matt Neuteboom

3/20/09

Did you manage to catch a viewing of "Watchmen" while on Spring Break? If you're a Stevens student, that should be an automatic "yes." While I would love to sit down and dissect the ups and downs of that brilliant movie, this week it is my unfortunate privilege to review a different comic book movie: "The Spirit."

I wish "The Spirit" was half as awesome as Watchmen, but the two simply cannot be compared. "The Spirit" is Frank Miller's creative reinterpretation of Will Eisner's post-WWII comic about an ex-detective named Danny Colt who returns from the dead as the superhero The Spirit (Gabriel Macht). The Spirit seems to be some sort of weird Batman spin-off, except for the fact that he walks around in broad daylight and his closest friend is a cat.

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TODAY! The Spirit of Comics: The Life and Art of Will Eisner--A free presentation by Danny Fingeroth

Image via Wikipedia

@ COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY ON MONDAY, MARCH 23, AT 8:00 PM.

New York, MARCH 17, 2009

THE SPIRIT OF COMICS: THE LIFE AND ART OF WILL EISNER

Only one name stretches from the beginning of the history of the comic book through the modern era of the literary graphic novel: WILL EISNER.

On Monday, March 23rd, comics writer and critic DANNY FINGEROTH will give an illustrated presentation about the life, work, and influence of the great writer and artist.

Taking a tour through Eisner's life-in effect, a journey through comics history-the presentation will serve as an introduction to those who'd like to know more about how the graphic novel phenomenon (which has spawned hit comics-based movies like THE DARK KNIGHT and WATCHMEN), and will offer new insights for those who may already know the work of Eisner and his creative descendants.

ABOUT WILL EISNER:
Born in 1917, Eisner was raised in the tenement Bronx of the Great Depression. He was a pioneer in the creation of comics of the “golden age” of the 1930s and '40s, achieving immortality with his noir crime fighting superhero, THE SPIRIT. In 1978, Eisner reinvented himself-and the medium-with his graphic novel A CONTRACT WITH GOD, the first of a series of works focused on early 20th century Jewish life in America. At the time of his 2005 death, Eisner was working on THE PLOT, a comics-form refutation of the resurgent Protocols of the Elders of Zion.

ABOUT DANNY FINGEROTH:
A longtime writer and editor at Marvel Comics, Fingeroth has spoken about comics at the Smithsonian Institution and The Metropolitan Museum. He recently curated and moderated an enlightening series of talks with comics creators (AL JAFFEE, JULES FEIFFER, and HARVEY PEKAR) at the YIVO Institute. He's the author of DISGUISED AS CLARK KENT: JEWS COMICS, AND THE CREATION OF THE SUPERHERO (Continuum) and THE ROUGH GUIDE TO GRAPHIC NOVELS (Penguin).

Monday, March 23, 8:00 pm
Columbia University
Broadway and 116th Street
New York City
Schermerhorn Hall
Room 501
FREE ADMISSION

FOR MORE INFORMATION:
212-854-2581
mg27@columbia.edu

‘The Spirit’ Producers Explore The Origins Of Will Eisner’s Femme Fatales, And We Get The Scoop! (Splash Page MTV)

By Rick Marshall
February 10, 2009
Splash Page MTV

This week, the producers of Frank Miller’s big-screen adaptation of “The Spirit” return to Will Eisner’s classic hero with a three-part story that kicks off in issue #26 of DC’s ongoing “The Spirit” comic book series — but this time, their focus will be on the hero’s notorious femme fatales. MTV News sat down for a chat with film and comics veteran Michael Uslan and his longtime creative partner F.J. DeSanto to discuss their upcoming run on “The Spirit” and why an examination of the series’ leading ladies is way past due.

“This is the most daunting, challenging, terrifying thing I have ever done in my career,” said Uslan of taking the reins on DC’s “The Spirit” series — no throwaway remark, given Uslan’s role as producer of all the various Batman movies (as well as many other comics-inspired films of the last few decades) and his long list of comics writing credits.

“To me, The Spirit is the greatest creative work ever to come out of the comic book industry,” Uslan told MTV News. (Read on for more from Uslan and DeSanto on their three-part story arc in “The Spirit.”)

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Write Now: RIP February 2009 (Magazine Death Pool)

I'm sorry that this magazine died, but this post announcing its demise on Magazine Death Pool made me laugh:

Write Now!: RIP February 2009

After a mere 20 issues over six years, Write Now! magazine, geared for "writers of comics, animation and sci-fi" closed down.

If I put the lame film version of The Spirit on my cover, I'd worry about carrying on too.

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Students Make Better Spirit Posters Than Frank Miller (Big Head Design)

Frank Miller set tongues wagging when Odd Lot Entertainment released his first image of "The Spirit" and it was downhill from there. But one of the positive twists in all this is that Odd Lot opened the door to students at a number of art and design schools to come up with their own campaigns for the movie. There is a lot of talent out there, as you can see above and by clicking HERE and HERE.

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NY Times on Frank Miller's "The Spirit" Movie: "108 overstuffed, interminable minutes"

By A. O. SCOTT

December 25, 2008

"... I’m just trying to figure out why, somewhere in the middle of “The Spirit,” Samuel L. Jackson and Scarlett Johansson arrive on screen decked out in swastikas and jackboots. Nothing in the logic of the film explains it, but then, to use the phrase “the logic of the film” when talking about “The Spirit” may be to take the “oxy” out of “oxymoronic.”

To ask why anything happens in Frank Miller’s sludgy, hyper-stylized adaptation of a fabled comic book series by Will Eisner may be an exercise in futility. The only halfway interesting question is why the thing exists at all."

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Samuel L. Jackson Did His Own Makeup In The Spirit (io9.com)

By Meredith Woerner

Dec 17 2008

Director Frank Miller rewrote the Spirit script to accommodate ScarJo and let Samuel Jackson improvise — and even reinvent his character's look. We met the director and cast, and learned just how much they collaborated.

Letting Frank Miller gallop across The Spirit film set unedited opened the doors for the actors to do so as well. In a press conference for his newly released film The Spirit Miller described how one should adapt a comic to film:

As far as what translates from comics to film, I find that they are the better source material, and would cite marvel's recent Iron Man and Incredible Hulk as wonderful witty jobs at adapting them. I think if they get too presumptuous, comic book movies tend to fall apart.

That's all fine and dandy to say, Mr. Miller, but revelations throughout the conference revealed that you and your cast went a little willy nilly with changes and additions. Case in point: the lovely Scarlett Johansson's part, Silken Floss, was completely rewritten and expanded once the gorgeous ScarJo wanted in on the project. And that was only the beginning of the actors dictating changes to the movie.

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TV Stars * TV Producers * Movie Stars * Movie Directors, Producers, documentary Filmmakers and Screenwriters * Politicians and Political Writers * Stand-Up Comedians * Health Experts * Magazine Editors * Radio Stars * Bloggers, Podcasters and Web Producers * Novelists * Musicians and Music Journalists * Sexuality Experts * Culture and Society Experts * Food Experts * Biographers, Historians and A.J. Jacobs * Athletes and Sports Experts * Photographers * Journalists * Crime Experts * CEOs and Business Experts * Comic Book Creators * Cartoonists * Will Eisner Co-Workers, Friends and Experts

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Samuel L Jackson's make-up fun (Metro.co.uk)

Samuel L. Jackson image by Getty Images via DaylifeFriday, December 5, 2008

Samuel L Jackson has revealed he enjoyed wearing make-up for his latest film role, in his words, "a little too much".

The actor, known for his tough guy roles, wears outlandish costumes, head gear and make-up to play villain The Octopus in The Spirit - a film adaptation of Will Eisner's comic books.

Speaking at the launch party for the film, directed by Frank Miller, Sam said: "Frank wanted the eight teardrops tattooed onto my face and the rest of it he kind of let me do, so when it came to eye colour or eye shadow or eyebrows.

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TV Stars * TV Producers * Movie Stars * Movie Directors, Producers, documentary Filmmakers and Screenwriters * Politicians and Political Writers * Stand-Up Comedians * Health Experts * Magazine Editors * Radio Stars * Bloggers, Podcasters and Web Producers * Novelists * Musicians and Music Journalists * Sexuality Experts * Culture and Society Experts * Food Experts * Biographers, Historians and A.J. Jacobs * Athletes and Sports Experts * Photographers * Journalists * Crime Experts * CEOs and Business Experts * Comic Book Creators * Cartoonists * Will Eisner Co-Workers, Friends and Experts

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Movie Review - Lionsgate's 'The Spirit' (Newsarama.com)

Frank Miller image via Wikipedia

By Lucas Siegel
18 December 2008

I went into director Frank Miller's big screen adaptation of comic book legend Will Eisner's The Spirit with few pre-conceived notions. Having only read a small number of Eisner's original comics, I didn’t know much about the character going in. But on the other hand, with the previews and trailers seeming to indicate this movie would be Sin City 1.5 in terms of art direction, I knew enough about the comic books to know that this style might conflict a bit with the source material.

Despite this conflict, or perhaps because of it, somewhere inside The Spirit is a great film. Its potential can be seen in bits and pieces all over the screen, making it all the more disappointing when it just never quite follows through on that potential.

First, comic book fans should know ahead of time that there are some major changes from comic-to-screen. Changes to characters are made to seemingly make them work better for a two-hour live-action movie, and possibly to make The Spirit more familiar to fans of other recent successful superhero films, leading to a few awkward moments.

Some of the acrobatics that title character performs for example just seem strange. Not cool ... not “wow” ... just strange. Most of these moments occur in the high-action scenes, and can pull the viewer right out of the rest of the movie.

These moments, however, were contrasted by mostly great dialogue by director/screenwriter Miller, and some effective one-on-one interaction between the various actors. The scenes between The Spirit and each of the film's bevy of leading ladies always entertained. Each of these women had their own unique strength and style, and they all stood out at one point or another as if they were the star of the film.

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TV Stars * TV Producers * Movie Stars * Movie Directors, Producers, documentary Filmmakers and Screenwriters * Politicians and Political Writers * Stand-Up Comedians * Health Experts * Magazine Editors * Radio Stars * Bloggers, Podcasters and Web Producers * Novelists * Musicians and Music Journalists * Sexuality Experts * Culture and Society Experts * Food Experts * Biographers, Historians and A.J. Jacobs * Athletes and Sports Experts * Photographers * Journalists * Crime Experts * CEOs and Business Experts * Comic Book Creators * Cartoonists * Will Eisner Co-Workers, Friends and Experts

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The 12 comic-related gifts of Christmas

Cover of
The Best of the Spirit

Written by Jim Beard

Toledo Free Press

You only think your true love isn’t into comics. With the incredible expanse of comic book themes, characters, and licensed tie-ins being published, there’s never been a better time to gift that comic-enthusiast or potential comic-enthusiast on your list. Here’s a handy list of 12 tomes with which to surprise and delight this year:

4. “The Best of The Spirit” (DC Comics, $14.99)” Another book to absorb before the film adaptation arrives this month; this archive is the cream of the crop of Will Eisner’s trendsetting Spirit stories. If you know fans of hard-boiled mysteries, these 22 tales are for them.

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NEW SITE: Sheena Queen of the Jungle

Jerry Iger took credit for creating it, although Will Eisner said that was crazy, he created it, but whatever the true story, guys still dig Sheena's curves and cunning. So who can resist a new Sheena web ste with lots of art?

Check it out HERE!

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