Kieron Gillen's workblog

 
             

   
 
 

8/02/2004

 
It's been a long time since I've plugged Ninth Art here, so let's have a good look through this week's update.

Being euro-centric, black-and-white loving, indie autobiog comic reading homosensualists one and all here at Ninth Art towers, we all gather on a monthly basis for The Ceremony. We invoke the sacred hand-gesture, stuff significant pages from CEREBUS down our pants (Obviously, it's A DISTANT SOIL for the ladies) and light the pyres with all those unsold back-issues of POWER PACK. And by flickering shadow-light, we remove our hoods and commence our next phase of Operation: Destroy All Super-heroes.

John Fellows among other take on the weekly releases in the Forecast, while having a sly dig at Ninth Art's detractors.

"My internal opinion-clock is either spot on, or royally fucked. Here I am thinking about this column for two weeks, greedily trapping every random idea or loose phrase that floats up from the mire of my nine-to-five hivemind, and these fuckers beat me to the punch."

John Parker on comics journalism, offline and on.

"In amongst all that negativity, however, every month there is a little optimism. In PREVIEWS each month, in amongst the long-running titles and the high-profile new launches, there will always be fair number of new titles that don't have a hope in hell. The ones with minor (or worse, entirely new) characters, by creators you've never heard of, in a genre that's never sold, with no promotion beyond a couple of largely unnoticed interviews that the writer arranged himself. Unloved, unpromoted and largely ignored, their first issues are nonetheless shoved out into a marketplace that couldn't care less."

Paul O'Brien doing his insightful, vaguely depressing, opinion column thing while still getting in a few good gags. O'Brien's a fascinating case, in that he's one of the rare people who actually changes my minds about my beliefs on a semi-regularly basis.

God, I hate him for that.

I don't think I've ever plugged his X-Axis here so I will now. I don't even read any of the comics he reviews, and I still enjoy it. In fact, I probably enjoy it more. (It's down at the time of writing, but should be up later, apparently).

"From out of nowhere came... the Blogosphere! Its growth, exponential! Its appetite... insatiable! Resident expert Hector Reeder casts his eye over the latest Grant Morrison JLA plo - Sorry, over the 'Future of comics journalism."

And the mysterious Hector Reeder examines the curious beast that is the Comics Blogosphere in an extended piece of carefully judged flame-bait.

Ninth Art: Serious Comics Journalism, Criticism and Commentary, every week, for God knows how long. Hail them.


 

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