The latest TwoMorrows Tune-In Podcast is all set for you to download! On the show this month, host Chris Marshall talks with comic book legend Nick Cardy and editor, Eric Nolen-Weathington on their new book Nick Cardy: Behind the Art. Chris also goes over all of the June and July releases and has hint as to what’s to come in September with the Modern Masters series. So click here already:

http://twomorrows.com/blog/category/tune-in/

It was only about four weeks late, but last Friday night, we had our Kirby Five-Oh release party at Casa Morrow. In attendance were local Kirby fans Glenn Musial (with wife Jean), Russ Garwood, Ed Stelli, Pat Varker, Modern Masters mogul Eric Nolen-Weathington (with wife Donna and kids Iain and Caper), along with four Morrows (moi included), and BrickJournal editor Joe Meno just for good measure. I played chef, grilling burgers (both real and veggie), hot dogs, and chicken (using wife Pam’s secret marinade), and everybody basically chowed down on a ton of food and had a great time catching up with each other.

Glenn, Russ, Ed, and Pat are the stalwarts who, in the early days of TwoMorrows (and up until we moved to our new location about four years ago) would head over whenever a new issue of the Jack Kirby Collector shipped, and help me stuff them into mailing envelopes and sort them for the post office. In return, we’d swill down pizza and shoot the bull about everything from comics and movies to TV, wrestling, and whatever else each of us was into that given month. So this get-together was a nice chance to catch up, since we haven’t all been in the same place at the same time for at least a couple of years (since our last get-together).

Why four weeks after the actual release of the issue/book? Cause that’s how long it took us all to arrange a day when we could all be in one place. Glenn just got back from Rome (Italy, not Georgia) the night before, so he was undoubtedly pretty jetlagged, but didn’t let it show. Pat regaled us with more stories of his close friend (and international rock star) Tori Amos, Russ (who manages our local comics shop, Capitol Comics) clued us in on the latest in retailing, and Ed told us about his latest eco-vacation trip. We closed the night with a short video of Jack Kirby’s panel appearance at a 1980s comic con, and vowed it wouldn’t be another 50 issues before we got back together.

I can’t thank my wife Pam enough for all the hard work she put into this shindig, from making potato salad to planning what to have on hand for that many people. And thanks to all the guys for the years of helping me get TJKC out to our readers, and the continued friendship.

Westfield Comics has posted a sneak peek at BACK ISSUE #29, showing Al Nickerson’s Claremont/Byrne X-Men article with a few images, at:

http://westfieldcomics.com/feature/211

So scurry on over and take a gander, and look for the printed issue to hit stores in mid-July (it’s in Previews now, so order quickly!).

This weekend, we’re celebrating Free Comic Book Day by offering FREE publications, both in comic book stores worldwide, and online at www.twomorrows.com.

On Saturday, May 3, 2008, our new COMICS GO HOLLYWOOD publication will be available free of charge at comic book shops. This 32-page comic-size book was assembled exclusively for Free Comic Book Day by our regular magazine editors, and reveals secrets behind your favorite on-screen heroes, and what’s involved in taking a character from the comics page to the big screen. It includes storyboards from DC’s animated hit “The New Frontier” (courtesy of DRAW! magazine), JEPH LOEB on writing for both Marvel Comics and the Heroes TV show (courtesy of WRITE NOW! magazine), details of an unseen X-Men movie (courtesy of ALTER EGO magazine), a history of the Joker from his 1940s origins to his upcoming appearance in the Dark Knight film (courtesy of BACK ISSUE magazine), and a look at Marvel Universe co-creator Jack Kirby’s Hollywood career, with extensive Kirby art (courtesy of my own JACK KIRBY COLLECTOR magazine).

This one-shot sampler of our magazine line is also available in print form free from our website (a shipping charge applies), or as a free downloadable Digital Edition just by logging in and adding it to your shopping cart, and checking out. Also, last year’s FCBD publication, COMICS 101 (featuring how-to and history lessons from top comics professionals) is also available for free in print or digital form at www.twomorrows.com.

To give readers a chance to sample complete issues of our publications, we’re again offering free downloadable Digital Editions of these recent issues of our magazines, only from May 3-4:

Alter Ego #65
Back Issue #21
Jack Kirby Collector #47
Write Now #14
Draw #12
Rough Stuff #3
BrickJournal Vol. 1, #9

We’ve also added several new Digital Editions of past issues of our magazines (each available for $2.95 per download), just in time for the FCBD event, and the newest episode of the TwoMorrows Tune-In podcast (hosted by Chris Marshall) has just debuted, featuring behind-the-scenes info on our upcoming publications.

So be sure to go to your local comics shop, and stop by our website and load up on free stuff!

Best regards,
John Morrow
TwoMorrows
10407 Bedfordtown Dr.
Raleigh, NC 27614
919-449-0344
fax 919-449-0327

At the New York Comicon, we unveiled a limited edition portfolio, done in conjunction with the release of KIRBY FIVE-OH!. Called KIRBY: DEITIES, it’s not sold in stores (only from our website), and is a remastered version of Jack Kirby’s 1971 “Disneyland Portfolio”, featuring ten 8-1/2″ x 11″ full-color plates in an illustrated envelope, and is limited to just 200 copies.

On April 9-11, 1971, Jack Kirby was a guest at the Disneyland Convention of Nostalgia, held at the Disneyland Hotel in Anaheim, California. For the event, Jack printed a limited edition portfolio of some of his 1960s concept drawings, done while he was still working for Marvel Comics. The originals were inked by Don Heck and Frank Giacoia (and Jack himself), and hand-colored by Kirby, but due to budget restraints, the portfolio’s eight plates were printed in black-and-white only, with no envelope. This remastered version has been renamed Kirby: Deities, since the characters Jack created were all proposed “gods” in a new pantheon he was developing in his mind in the 1960s. This version includes two color plates that weren’t in the original 1971 B&W version of the portfolio. The 9″ x 12″ black-and-white envelope art was inked by Mike Royer, and was originally used on the mailing envelopes for Jack’s 1971 Kirby Unleashed portfolio.

The price is $19.95 plus shipping, and can be ordered now at this link:

http://twomorrows.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=677

But hurry; we sold a lot at the New York Comicon, and once the remaining copies are gone, there won’t by any more.

Check out our 1:00 PM panel listing on this sign from the New York Comicon. Sheesh! (They didn’t even spell “Moron” right…)

Finally back from the Big Apple, where we had a really successful NY Comic Con; way better than last year’s con in terms of sales and attendance (probably partially due to our primo location right up front this year), and I had an absolutely fantastic time!

Because of the high costs of attending this con, we cut every corner we could. My pal Jim Amash crashed here last Wednesday night, and we got up and left about 5am, driving my fully-stuffed minivan the 11 or so hours from NC to NY (saving shipping and airfare). We stayed with Barry Pearl, a friend of Jim’s (thanks for the hospitality, Barry!), and took the train in on Friday and Saturday, to save on hotel costs (I thought San Diego’s hotels were expensive, until I tried booking one in Manhattan!).

Got to meet some folks I’ve corresponded with over the years, but had never seen face-to-face. It was cool to finally meet Klaus Janson and Alex Jay, plus I managed to convince Mike Gartland to attend, and got to see him for the first time in beau coup years. (Thanks for the comics and companionship, Mikey!)

Jim Amash has spent years interviewing classic pros for Alter Ego, but this was the first time he’d gotten to see a lot of the amazingly talented elder statesmen of comics that he’s become friends with via phone. If it’s possible, I think Jim had a better time than I did at the con; the look on those guys faces when they realized Jim was there was priceless.

Thanks to the Kirby Museum’s Rand Hoppe for helping us find our way around the area and set-up our stuff, and taking us to some fantastic restaurants (best Thai food I’ve ever had was on Saturday night). He and his wife Lisa are two of the most delightful people you’ll ever meet, and they introduced me to Richard Bensam, who I really enjoyed getting to know a bit. Rand brought his large-format scanner to our booth, and scanned Kirby originals for the Museum all weekend.

Lessee… I finally got to meet Michael “Doc V” Vasallo, as well as Nick Caputo, both of whom have been longtime contributors to our mags. George Khoury was there helping out the whole time, manning the booth, and finding bargains for me on the show floor. Jon and Andy Cooke were everywhere, promoting their fabulous Will Eisner documentary, and we discussed some plans for things that we’ll reveal in the near future. As always, it was great breaking bread with Draw’s Mike Manley and his buddies (and thanks again, Scott, for the offer of a place to crash).

Our panel on Sunday was well attended, as was the Jack Kirby Tribute Panel, hosted by Mark Evanier (with panelists Joe Sinnott and Dick Ayers). Mark was signing his KIRBY: KING OF COMICS book at the Abrahms booth with Joe Simon, and had some of the longest lines at the con.

We debuted the new issue of ROUGH STUFF, plus the BEST OF WRITE NOW volume and MODERN MASTERS VOLUME 16: MIKE ALLRED, and sold a lot of copies. Plus, we had a couple of boxes of KIRBY FIVE-OH! hot off the presses, and those sold out by the end of the day Saturday. We also had our Con special KIRBY: DEITIES portfolio (limited to 200 copies), and sold most of the ones we brought, with no pre-release promotion. (We’ll be making the remaining copies available online within a week or so, so stayed tuned.)

All in all, a good convention. Even with the high costs, it easily outperformed WizardWorld: Chicago for us, and unlike WW:C (where you’re stuck in Rosemont, a sleepy suburb of the Windy City), there’s so much to do and see in Manhattan, that it’s a much more desirable show in terms of food and entertainment outside the hall.

Here’s the Pros and Cons from my vantage point:

PROS
Great weather (except Sunday, which still wasn’t so bad)

Big crowd both Saturday and Sunday (and Friday wasn’t too bad)

Free move-in assistance provided by the con for anyone in a non-commercial vehicle

Easy, fast move-out on Sunday

Getting to see friends that don’t usually make it out to see us at the San Diego Comicon each year

Parked my van on the street on Sunday, and it was intact at the end of the day

Seeing so many pros like Joe Simon, Joe Sinnott, Stan Goldberg, and Dick Ayers being literally mobbed by fans

CONS
REALLY expensive booth costs (we paid 150% of what we pay for a same-size corner booth at the San Diego Comicon, and SD delivers twice as many attendees)

Ridiculous rental charges for booth carpet, tables, electricity, and chairs (at San Diego, all that is included in your booth cost; for NY, we had to lug our own tables and chairs, and we skipped the carpet, but had to shell out for power)

Disgusting bathrooms at the Javits Center (somehow San Diego manages to accommodate twice as many people adequately in this regard)

The “professional only” Friday hours (10am-3pm), for us at least, are basically a waste of time. There’s plenty of time to chat with pros during the regular con hours, and by not letting the public in until 3pm, we’re losing 5 hours of potential sales. I personally hope they do away with this in the future.

Overpriced, weak food at the Javits Center (and the hot food court wasn’t even open on Friday or Sunday)

Manhattan parking is nonexistent on Friday and Saturday (unless you want to shell out $65 a day for a garage)

Panel rooms are kinda far off from the action on the show floor, and they embarassingly got our name wrong on the schedule signage. (Either that, or Pete Von Sholly was there causing mischief, and I didn’t know about it.) Thanks to Rand and Tom Kraft for their “Sharpie fix” of the typo.

Shoplifters: I’m continually amazed at how brazen these guys are. They just walk up, pick up a couple of books as if they’re going to buy them, casually look over our display for a couple of minutes, then wait till we’re busy and walk away without paying. They’re usually in packs of 3 or more, to make it harder to spot. I chased down one guy who walked off with a copy of KIRBY FIVE-OH! and some Alter Egos, and he pretended like he didn’t speak English, only saying, “I just grabbed!!” when I confronted him. (The guy was at least twice my size and coulda squashed me like a grape, but when somebody swipes a Kirby book, I see red and don’t think about the consequences…)

Will we be back next year? I’m 99% sure we will, although I hope they’ll find a way to make it more affordable. I know the San Diego Con is run by a nonprofit organization, and NY is all about making a buck, but if they want to continue to compete, they really need to consider ways to make it reachable by smaller publishers. It was weird to see companies like Top Shelf and Continuum sticking with the much cheaper, half-size small press booths in NY, when they’ve got huge double-booths (and probably much better sales) in San Diego. But I know where they’re coming from; it’s a great con, but it’s expensive to attend.

A great time was had by all at today’s “Live From Kirby Plaza” event in England. Chrissie Harper and Paul Gravett did an outstanding job putting together a fantastic tribute to Jack Kirby, and it was a blast to get to speak (via Skype) to the assembled crowd of Kirby fans in the UK. Also on hand via phone was Mark Evanier and the Kirby Museum’s Rand Hoppe, and the whole shebang will be transcribed in the upcoming 15th Anniversary special edition of Chrissie’s Jack Kirby Quarterly, due out in the Fall. Thanks to both CH and PG for asking me to be a part of the festivities!