Happy Presidents Day!! To celebrate, we have another big guest list update for our 30th Anniversary HeroesCon! HeroesCon 2012 is June 22-24 get your advance tickets today! Full guest list here.

• RYAN BODENHEIM – Artist: Secret, Halcyon, Red Mass for Mars
• SHAWN CRYSTAL – Artist: Deadpool Max, Dept. Coordinator for the Sequential Art Dept. at SCAD Atlanta
• JONATHAN HICKMAN – Writer: Secret, The Manhattan Projects, Fantastic Four, Secret Warriors, SHIELD
• DAVID MARQUEZ – Artist: Ultimate Spider-Man, Fantastic Four: Season One, Secret Warriors
• MARK MCHALEY – Artist: Voltron, Star Wars Sketch Cards, Indiana Jones Sketch Cards, The Socketeer
• BOB MCLEOD – Artist: New Mutants Forever, Rough Stuff, Incredible Hulk, Amazing Spider-Man
• NICK PITARRA – Artist: The Manhattan Projects, The Red Wing
• SCOTT SNYDER – Writer: Batman, American Vampire, Swamp Thing
• CHARLES SOULE – Writer: 27, Strange Attractors, Strongman
• CONNY VALENTINA – Artist: Published science fiction book cover artist, winner of 2003 Nat con National art award, currently writing and illustrating Tempest’s Reign
• NOLAN WOODARD – Colorist: 28 Days Later, Incorruptible, Irredeemable, Lady Deadpool

There are few things more satisfying than high quality crime fiction (The Novels of Jim Thompson, HBO’s The Sopranos, and Polanski’s Chinatown just to name three).

And there is nothing more embarrassing and ridiculous than cliche-ridden badly done hard boiled crime like Mickey Spillane (OK, it’s kinda funny), Bones (yikes!), Fatal Attraction (GAH!) and sadly I could go on and on.

The essential ingredients needed to produce quality crime writing are a consistent and believable tone, a fully developed central character/narrator and solid cast of supporting characters that allow you to suspend your disbelief until the final page is turned.

In recent years there have been a number of successful crime series in comics–(Darwyn Cooke’s Hunter adaptations, Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso’s 100 Bullets and Warren Ellis’ Fell ) and quite a few crime comics that fall headlong into cliche (the last four Sin City GNs).

One of today’s most popular crime series is Criminal by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips.  For February’s Discussion Group we’ll be looking closely at two of Criminal’s story-arcs and examining what makes the stories work.  How do the writer and artist avoid cliches or how do they use them to enhance the story?  How do the creators use the comic medium to their unique advantage versus a prose writer or film director treating the same material?

Please plan to join us on Saturday February 18th at 1:00pm down at Heroes Headquarters and help us get the facts straight about Criminal: Bad Night and Criminal: The Last of the Innocent. Just leave yer pieces at home, but bring an open mind along with an air-tight alibi (See??? Bad Crime writing is a breeze!!!).

As usual, Heroes is offering the Discussion Group 10% Discount on both books,  Just remember to mention the Discussion Group as you check out.  We’ll see you on February 18th; and as always, Dames are welcome (Dear God, somebody stop me!)

Another day, another big guest list update! Joining our guest list today are some familiar faces that we look forward to seeing each June and some folks who are attending their very first HeroesCon! Click here for our entire guest list and look for another announcement next week!

• BOB ALMOND – Inker: Stan Lee’s Guardian Project, Black Panther, Heroes For Hire, Warlock
• JAMIE COSLEY – Creator: Cody the Cavalier
• JEREMY DALE – Artist: GI Joe, Skyward, Mice Templar
• SHANNON GALLANT – Artist: GI Joe, Torchwood, Shrek, Monsters vs Aliens
• CHRIS KEMPLE – Artist: Red Vengeance, Fallout, Negative Burn, Fantastic Worlds
• BOB LAYTON – Artist: Iron Man, Hercules, Colony
• JEFF LEMIRE – Writer: Animal Man Writer/Artist: Sweet Tooth, Essex County, The Nobody
• JOSE MARZAN JR. – Inker: Y: The Last Man, Jack of Fables, House of Mystery, The Flash
• JOE STATON – Artist: Green Lantern, E-Man, Dick Tracy, Scooby Doo
• TIM TOWNSEND – Inker: Wolverine and the X-Men, Amazing Spider-Man, New Avengers, Captain America
• LEE WEEKS – Artist: Daredevil, Incredible Hulk, Spider-Man
• BRETT WELDELE – Artist: The Surrogates, Spontaneous, Pariah, The Light

Happy Friday! Yesterday afternoon we put our initial Indie Island guest list on the site! There were some techinical difficulties but everything looks A-OK now (please let us know if it looks wonky in your browser). It’s a great start and we already have more great guests that need to be announced so look for more updates soon! Mark your calendars, June 22-24, 2012 is going to be a fantastic weekend!

Happy Friday! Yesterday afternoon we added 10 more names to our great and ever-growing guest list! We can’t wait for HeroesCon’s 30th Anniversary show!  How about you? 

• TIM CALLAHAN – Writer: Grant Morrison: The Early Years, CBR, Tor
• CLIFF CHIANG – Artist: Wonder Woman, Beware the Creeper, Human Target, Doctor 13
• TOM FOWLER – Artist: Venom, Hulk: Season 1, Mysterius the Unfathomable, MAD Magazine
• NATHAN FOX – Artist: Haunt, Flourescent Black, Zodiac
• SANFORD GREENE – Artist: Rotten Apple, Deadpool, Wonder Girl, Methodman GN
• SUNNY LEE – Artist: Gen 13, Wolverine, Superboy
• KEVIN MELLON – Artist: Heart, Lovestruck, S.H.I.E.L.D.
• CAT STAGGS – Artist: Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, X-Men Archives and DC Legacy card sets
• JOE QUINONES – Artist: Wednesday Comics, Star Wars: Knight Errant, Amazing Spider-Man
• ROBERT WILSON IV – Artist: Knuckleheads, Laser Joan

Thanks so much to everyone from our great community that came out to the 35th Annual Charlotte MiniCon this weekend. It was fantastic to see so many enthusiastic comic fans at our biggest MiniCon ever. The beautiful Palmer Building was packed and we can’t wait to do it again next year! Special thanks to Cliff Chiang for making the trip down to Charlotte from New York! We’re happy to say he’ll be back down for HeroesCon 2012 in June! Click the photo below to see our MiniCon photo set featuring Cliff and all the other great comic creators that came out! You may even find a photo of yourself if you were there. Follow us on Twitter or join our Facebook page to hear about special events like this first!

Original comic art dealer Jason Schachter has assembled some of modern comics most talented artists under the banner of Essential Sequential.  We’re happy to announce that this stellar group of artists are coming to HeroesCon 2012! Mark your calendars and plan to be here for our best show yet! HeroesCon 30th Anniversary June 22-24, 2012!

Along with previously announced guest Tim Sale, Jason is bringing:

Mark Chiarello: Art Director for DC Comics, illustrator, painter (Star Wars), cover artist (Vigilante, Terminal City, Johnny Double), co-author of Heroes of the Negro Leagues, Artist of Batman/Houdini: The Devil’s Workshop

Peter Nguyen: Color Key Artist at the Academy Award winning Blue Sky Studios (Rio, Ice Age) , cover artist (Detective Comics)

Andrew Robinson: Creator or Dusty Star, cover artist (Conan, The Fifth Beatle, Starman, Hawkman)

Dan Panosian: Co Founder of Drink and Draw, artist (Conan Road of Kings, X-Men Origins: Sabretooth, and countless others)

Eric Canete: Animator (Tron, Aeon Flux, X-Men), artist (Iron Man: Enter the Mandarin)

Mike Choi: Artist (X-23, X-Men, Witchblade)

Reverend Dave Johnson: Eisner Award winning Cover Artist (100 Bullets, Punisher Max, BPRD, Deadpool), Co Founder of Drink and Draw

Allesandro Vitti: Artist (Captain America & Hawkeye, Secret Warriors)

Matteo Scalera: Artist (Valen the Outcast), cover artist (Irredeemable, Elric)

Charlotte MiniCon is this weekend! Sunday, January 22nd, 11AM-5PM at The Palmer Building: 2601 East 7th Street  Charlotte, NC 28204

This exclusive silk screen poster (modeled for scale by handsome and personable Heroes staff member Brent Bagwell) by Cliff Chiang and Dustin Harbin will be available at the show for $10! Get here!

Also appearing:

Rich Barrett (Nathan Sorry)
J Chris Campbell (Wide Awake Press, Neatobots)
Sanford Greene (Rotten Apple, Wonder Girl)
Dustin Harbin (Diary Comics, Dharbin)
Jason Latour (Wolverine, BPRD, Loose Ends)
Eraklis “Herc” Petmezas (Mr Lune, Last Cigarette)
Bridgit Scheide (Brother Nash,Womanthology)
Andy Smith (War of the Green Lanterns, JSA, WWE Heroes)
Budd Root (Cavewoman)

Not only will you find great comic creators at MiniCon, the show will also feature dealers selling comics from the Golden Age through today, along with other great collectibles. If you’ve never been to the MiniCon or enjoyed the nice environment of the Palmer Building before, there’s no better time than this year. Come help us celebrate the 35th anniversary of this classic event, and make sure to bring the whole family! It’s going to be a rockin’ good time!

After each day of HeroesCon comes to an end the place to be is the Westin. Whether you just want to hang out in the lobby bar or you’re attending our Annual Art Auction the Westin is where it’s at.

Reservations at the Westin Charlotte are now open at the special HeroesCon rate of $119/night! We strongly suggest you reserve your rooms as soon as you can because although we have access to nearly the entire hotel, we sellout and fill the place every year. If you’ve never stayed at the Westin before, get ready for luxury, the place is NICE!

You can go to our Hotels page to see a complete list of area hotels we recommend, including the Westin; or just click right here to go right to the reservation page. If you have any problems, or if particular nights are listed as sold-out, please let us know so we can address that. They group the rooms in blocks so sometimes they’ll show up on the computer as sold-out, but Shelton has a magic wand to wave at that stuff.