Hey! While I’m thinking about it, I wanted to point out that our bros at the Dollar Bin podcast recorded a TON of panels at HeroesCon, which they are putting up on their site one by one. You can find them in more or less one place here, and I’ll try to update this blogpost as well. Many MANY MANY thanks to these guys, including Adam, Brian, Devin, Kris, Ted, and probably a bunch I’m forgetting. They worked super hard over the weekend, not just recording panels, but miking them and just generally being super awesome. You would be well-served to check out their podcast, whether it’s Heroes-related or not!

Okay, panels up there so far:

“New Power Generation” Panel, featuring Matt Fraction, Brian Bendis, Ivan Brandon, Jonathan Hickman, Ed Brubaker, and Matt Brady.

“DC Universe” Panel, featuring DC editors Brian Cunningham and Ian Sattler, with special guests

“Marvel Pint O’ CB” Panel, featuring Matt Fraction, Brian Bendis, Ed Brubaker, and Mark Waid

Mark Waid Interview

Well as I write it’s Thursday afternoon, and most of us have gotten our voices back and don’t groan and complain about our sore legs anymore. After months and months of hard work, HeroesCon 09 is by all accounts an unqualified success. We’ve heard pretty much 100% positive reports from all the dealers and pros we’ve talked to, not to mention from those who bought small press tables. And fans as usual have been ever-so effusive with their praise. I have to tell you right here that there is nothing NOTHING that we like better than hearing from you guys after the show–it makes all the late nights and sore legs worthwhile.

I’ll write a short con report here, but for the full story I suggest you consult the TONS of photos we uploaded to our Flickr page this week, many of which are slowly but surely being outfitted with little descriptions, etc. That will probably take awhile (there are 245 pictures so far); but in the meantime feast your peepers on this con link roundup I put up to help you out. Lots of good reports there as well–heckfire, you could burn a solid 8-hour day reading the Twitter search by itself. NOT THAT I DID THAT OR ANYTHING.

This year we were in Hall A, which posed a bit of a challenge in changing our seating plan–even more challenging when we moved things around to create a big space to hold a Red Cross Blood Drive, but I flubbed updating all the seating locations correctly. So that was the big problem on Friday, but fortunately most of the people I had to move around were very patient with me and I sure did appreciate it.

In fact, that was probably the only real problem all weekend, except that finding a particular person throughout the weekend could be tricky if they’d been moved a couple of times. Friday had a good turnout, and Saturday was great, although at first it was hard to tell–our hall this year was 20,000 square feet larger than last year’s, so at first I was worried until Shelton reminded me.

Another thing we did this different this year was to set up some stanchions where we knew there would be massive lines pretty much all weekend long, which proved to be a good decision on our part. We try to be pretty careful about no playing favorites, no “guests of honor,” that kind of thing, but when 200 people are in line, you’ve got to put that line somewhere, you know?

All in all the pros seemed to have an even better time than usual–as someone that answers maybe 75% of the complaints in the room, I just plain didn’t hear that many. Maybe people were just going over my head to complain to Shelton about me? IT WOULDN’T BE THE FIRST TIME, NOSIR. We kind of pride ourselves on our hospitality, so maybe shouldn’t feel surprised, but it’s still nice to have so many guests come up and thank us for having them–heck, it’s US who should be thanking the PROS, am I right?

All this friendly mutual-thankiness-society goodwill came to a head Saturday Night at our Annual Auction, where I started out reprising my role from last year of auctioneer, but was quickly heckled off the stage in favor of the lovely Allison Sohn, who–let’s face it–is just a better auctioneer than I am, all around. She was DYNAMITE up there–not only does she know all the artists, but all the bidders as well, and would occasional cajole them into bidding wars. I hope we can trick her into doing it again next year–this year’s auction raised an incredible 20% more than last year’s, which was already among our best ever! WHAT?! Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Allison Sohn…

That’s not a great picture of her, but you can gaze on her up close in this one, in the aforementioned giant Flickr set! Anyway, after a long and successful auction, many of us retired to the Westin bar, and then magically awoke the next morning with no idea how we’d ended up back in our rooms, or even if these were, indeed, our rooms. But fortunately HeroesCon didn’t open on Sunday til 10.30 for pre-reg, so by then we were looking sharp again.

Sunday is typically the “deal-making” day of the show, as traffic is typically down from Saturday. Dealers want to haul home as little as they can, and clever dealhunters are out in force looking for bargains. This year was no exception, and even the staff had a less stressful day. We gave away a bunch of door prizes, the Quickdraw contests drew over 200 fans, the panels seemed to go off without a hitch. The most talked about panel was without a doubt Rantz Hoseley‘s unveiling of his new Longbox application, which has been compared to a kind of iTunes for comic books–the early scuttlebutt is incredibly positive, especially compared to past initiatives of this kind. There’s even rumor of interest from the “Big 4” companies, which is great for Rantz. Also talked about was the screening of the upcoming Jeff Smith documentary “The Cartoonist,” Ben Towle and Craig Fischer’s Ditko panel, Andy Mansell’s panel-by-panel look at Brave And The Bold #4 with creative team Mark Waid and George Perez. Jeez there are so many good ones, I can’t list them all.

In fact, I’d better wrap this up! For the complete skinny, check out those Flickr pictures and con links, which tell the tale better than I could. In the meantime, I’ll leave you with this image from our Dead Dog Party, former employee Matt Fraction ringing up current employee Matt Knapik for a copy of Casanova. Priceless!

In true Comics Reporter style I thought I’d amass some of the links I’ve found or that people have sent me to HeroesCon reports. While I can’t vouch for the content at some of these links (I mean language, some of these guys use teetee-caca language), most of the ones I’ve looked at are pretty awesome, not to mention complimentary (that falls under the “awesome” subheading anyway).

In no particular order:

Great CLT Blog photo slideshow
CBR coverage of Rantz Hoseley’s Longbox announcement/panel
CBR coverage of DC Nation panel
Comics Reporter mid-weekend coverage
CBR talks to Mark Waid about Dr. Strange
Nick Mizgala Flickr set
Newsarama coverage of BOOM! Disney licenses
Newsarama coverage of Dark Reign panel
Newsarama coverage of Ares/War Stories
Newsarama coverage of DC Nation panel
Newsarama coverage of DC Universe panel
Newsarama coverage of Pint o’ CB panel
Comics Reporter coverage of HeroesCon and Wizard
CBR coverage of Owly on Kindle
Twitter search for #heroescon
HeroesCon Flickr group
Kivus Flickr set 1/2
Kivus Flickr set 2/2
Van Jensen on Smith/Longstreth panel
CBR on NPG
Sidebar podcast
Jim Amash blog post
Vito Delsante Vlog on FCHS
Dean Trippe photo set
Van Jensen Publisher’s Weekly con report
Creative Loafing photos
Red Moon report part 1
bodhipuff’s photo report
Alec Longstreth con report
Evan Dahm post

Okay that’s a lot of reading for you–get to work! And if you know of one you don’t see here, feel free to post a link in the comments section!

Yes, I still like the Fantastic Four by Mark Millar and Bryan Hitch.

I heard a dude in the comic shop the other day say he hates this current incarnation of the FF and prefers Dwayne McDuffie’s version of the book. I just don’t get it.

As much as I liked having Storm and the Blank Panther hang around Ben and Johnny, McDuffie’s stuff relied on nostalgia for characters that not many people cared about (like Gravity). Millar and Hitch, on the other hand, are serving up a thoroughly modern and fresh take on a comic that is pretty hard to pull off. And, even after more than 500 issues of the series, the current creators are finding new wrinkles on the team and their supporting characters.

Now, on the other hand, I am looking for some closure on the whole “Thing getting married” storyline. Just tell me why his latest lady is crazy/evil already. And (SPOILER ALERT) how many times are we going to decimate Latveria? Living in Kazakhstan next door to Borat would be better, I think.

Still — while I know writer Jonathan Hickman is gearing up for his run on the book right now — Millar and Hitch are creating some cool stories and pictures every month.

Well, I’m in the middle of preparing my con report, having already posted 245 photos to Flickr, descriptions of which are appearing as I write them. I’ll be blogging about it here as well, but in the meantime I wanted to share with you what Chuck Rozanski said in this week’s Mile High Comics newsletter.

To preface: if you’re not aware of Chuck, Mile High Comics is one of the oldest and most venerable comics shops in the country, and Chuck Rozanski is a popular face at shows all across the country. Not only because dealers love selling him back issues, but he also happens to be a cool dude, too. Here’s what he had to say–I’d just link to it instead of cutting and pasting it in toto, but Chuck’s newsletter is e-mail only as far as I can see:

“After a wonderful weekend in Charlotte, we’re now getting ready to head for the airport. HeroesCon turned out to be just as fantastic a comics convention as I had anticipated, with many thousands of fans from throughout the nation attending. While HeroesCon was originally intended as a regional convention, it is rapidly becoming an alternate destination for those dedicated comics fans who want to attend a large convention without all the media overlay that now dominates other large comics shows, such as San Diego and New York. It is a real blessing to be in a place where the vast majority of attendees are there because they love to read, as opposed to watching television, going to movies, and/or playing video games. I can pleasantly engage in all of the above on occasion, but my basic bias is definitely toward reading, so I find it quite refreshing to attend a comics convention where the entire emphasis of the convention is on comic books. Is it any wonder that HeroesCon is my favorite convention of the year?

“Aside from just having fun here in Charlotte, we also purchased a huge number of back issue comics from the dealers exhibiting at the show. This convention was really a test of our new online pricing structure, as I had to explore whether our wholesale back issue comics suppliers would be willing to lower their prices enough that I could maintain our prices at their new, much lower, levels. Blessedly, the answer turned out to be a resounding “Yes!” While I did run into several instances where I just could not work out deals with folks because they still had their comics priced at pre-recession levels, I found more than enough dealers who were willing to be flexible enough to spend my entire buying budget, and then some. I ended up buying about 30,000 back issue comics and trade paperbacks in Charlotte, including well over 10,000 Silver Age and Bronze Age comics! That was more than enough pre-1980 back issues to completely restock us from the debilitating effects on our online inventory resulting from our sales of the past two weeks, so I am feeling quite happy this morning. While there were certainly a few issues where I found out that I am going to have to raise our prices slightly over the next week in order to maintain our inventories, in most instances I am going to be able to keep our present extremely steep discounts in effect for you.

“While I purchased Silver Age and Bronze Age comics quite well in Charlotte, my assistant, Will Moulton, was also purchasing this past weekend at the WizardWorld convention in Philadelphia. Will was able to also buy about 30,000 comics (with an emphasis on issues that we’re seeking from the past five years…), but his real score was a single deal containing over 3,000 scarce and out-of-print trade paperbacks. If you’ve been looking for any books for your library, the next couple of weeks are going to be a great time for you to shop with Mile High Comics!

“I’m going to have to cut things short now, as we still have to turn in our rental van, and then head for the airport for our flight home. Before I go, however, I want to close out today’s newsletter with a special thanks to HeroesCon owner and founder Shelton Drum, and his entire crew at the wonderful Heroes Aren’t Hard to Find retail comics shop. Thanks to Shelton and his wonderful crew, we all have the opportunity each year to attend a comics convention that retains the wonder and magical atmosphere of Phil Seuling’s legendary 1970’s conventions at the Commodore Hotel in New York, and the incredible early 1980’s conventions in San Diego. Being able to step back in time, and to once again experience the joy that I felt at attending the greatest comics conventions of my youth, is such an incredible treat that I am forever their debt. Shelton, you’re the best!”

Holy Cow! What a sweet post by Chuck! Shelton was super flattered by it, especially the part about Phil Seuling and the early San Diego shows, where Shelton was set up as a young man selling comics, before he even had established Heroes Aren’t Hard To Find! Okay more con report coming soon.

[pictured at top of post, from left: Chuck, his wife Nanette, and our Warehouse Manager Seth Peagler, together in our warehouse after loadout of HeroesCon]

Okay I’ve spent most of the day answering a TON of e-mail and checking out the TON of Twitter posts and retweets and so forth regarding the show. I have to say that, while we’re all ridiculously tired, and I can barely stand up from 4 days of walking back and forth over 100,000 square feet of concrete floor, we’re incredibly encouraged and enervated at the very VERY warm and congratulatory messages we’re getting. By all accounts so far HeroesCon 09 was a huge success, which makes all the hard work over the last few months worth it!

I’ll be posting a short series of photo collections and reports over the next few days, but in the meantime I wanted to say thanks to everyone who came this year, from fans to dealers to pros! HeroesCon runs 100% on the support of our community of family and friends, and believe me we appreciate it.

UNRELATED–there was a problem last week with our server which has prevented us from being able to upload this Wednesday’s New Releases–we’re working on it and hopefully will get them up tomorrow. Sorry for any inconvenience!

I’ll leave you today with this photo in our store of employee Matt Knapik and X-Men writer Chris Claremont. Note that Matt is holding a copy of X-Men #4, the first issue after Claremont left the book back in the 90’s. It’s a nerd joke, but everyone around in the store was cracking up at this. Matt went on to explain the current X-Men continuity to Chris, which was twice as hilarious. If you’ve met Matt, you know how entertaining his explaining of anything can be, so watching him explain the X-Men to probably the best-known X-writer ever was pretty hysterical to the rest of us.

I never thought I could actually enjoy a comic book that follows the adventures of the Punisher in the regular Marvel Universe.

I was a big fan of Garth Ennis’ Max Comics version of Frank Castle; his take was pure — gritty, dark, violent and as realistic as a funny book can get. So the idea of the big guy with the skull on his chest running around with superhuman superheroes just seemed silly. And yes I know that’s how he started out — back in the pages of Spider-Man — but after Ennis amped up the real-world elements, I just couldn’t see the point of going back to “Fantasy-land.”

My trepidation about the wackness of a Marvel U.-based Punisher was realized when Matt Fraction launched his super-duper edition a year or so ago. Fraction played the book for laughs, but the lack of seriousness made it hard to care about the stories. Ultimately, it didn’t work.

These days, however, there’s another Punisher comic on the stands; this one is written by Rick Remender and the art is by Jerome Opena. And this one is actually good.

From a story standpoint, Remender’s approach to Castle is similar to Ennis’ … in that he’s stripped the character down to his purest form. The dialogue is sparse and to the point. His actions are portrayed as deliberate and methodical. His emotions don’t register. This isn’t the Punisher played for laughs. This is a “normal” guy on a mission to murder some abnormal bad guys. (It’s particularly cool how the Punisher uses some iconic Marvel-style weapons to battle a cadre of villains.)

From an art standpoint, Opena renders everything in a gritty, rough, shadowy style — and that further helps to ground situations that could easily turn ultra-fantastic. Honestly, Opena is one of the best artists drawing comics today. I can see this guy moving to more high-profile Marvel books soon. For now, you can enjoy his handiwork in these blood-soaked pages.

So, who’s reading the new Robert Kirkman comic Destroyer?

I get the feeling this is a book that — because it doesn’t star an A-list character and because it’s a coming from the sometimes overlooked Max mature readers line — folks can and will easily pass up. But, really, you should pick it up. It’s an entertaining read, and if you like Kirkman you’ll really dig it.

Two issues into the five-issue limited series, Destroyer tells what appears to be an out-of-continuity tale about the old Timely Comics hero called Destroyer who, now a senior citizen, is dying from some kind of heart problem. But on his way to the grave, he plans to take some bad guys with him. Simple story, eh? Well, that simple story works perfectly with Kirkman’s easy-going writing style. The scribe is no Alan Moore but, with minimal captions or thought balloons for exposition, his approach to writing is ultra-economical; he basically gets out of his story’s way and lets it tell itself. Other writers could learn a lot from Kirkman’s skill.

The script’s simplicity is outdone only by the art’s simplicity. Artist Cory Walker is from that “clean” school of drawing, only leaving the most necessary marks on the page to illustrate a panel. And the lines Walker does decide to put down are some of the most confident strokes in the business.

Take my word for it. Buy this book.

I used to loooooovvve the original New Mutants series waaaaayyy back in the day (I’m old enough to have actually read the book as it came out).

I fondly remember issues featuring stuff like the Demon Bear, the Mr.T-esque villain Axe and even a guest appearance by Team America, among other cool items from the first series. Sure, it was a little cheesy (cheese, by the way, is tasty), but the stories were solid (this was Chris Claremont on his “A” game) and the art, by Bob McCleod, was tight.

That said, simple nostalgia over the old series would not get me to like New Mutants No. 1 if it sucked. Luckily, it doesn’t suck.

The first issue of the team’s newest incarnation is right on the money in terms of tone, direction and respect for current X-Men continuity. I especially love how well writer Zeb Wells handles the relationships between the team members; it’s obvious that they respect and actually like each other — which makes their re-teaming even more logical.

One other thing I dig about this comic is that it shows some of the more administrative aspects of being on a X-Men team. In one scene, Cannonball fills out a “roster request form.” And in another scene, we see Beast handling design and creation of the group’s uniforms. Maybe I’m the only one who gives a crap about Cyclops’ paperwork, but mundane stuff like that just makes the comic experience more “realistic” for me.

On the art-side of things, Diogenes Neves does an outstanding job of rendering great human figures, emotion-filled facial expressions and detailed backgrounds. I’ve never heard of this artist, but I’m impressed by the work here.

All in all, speaking as an old fan, I can honestly ay I’m excited about the promise and potential of this new series.

Oh, and Team America rocks!

Now up over on our Flickr photostream–an exhaustive photo report on last Saturday’s Free Comic Book Day! Without a doubt this was our most successful FCBD event ever–the number of people in our store was MASSIVE all day long, really stunning, and with the roster of talent we had signing and doing free sketches, there were just as many people OUTSIDE under one of the four tents Shelton set up for the event.

If you weren’t able to make it, or just want to see a really nice comics shop with a hundred people inside, I invite you to mosey over and check out the Flickr set we’ve created to venerate it! Tons of pictures of fans, guests, and a bunch of the sketches.

And thanks to everyone who made this year’s Free Comic Book Day such a massive success! Not just the many MANY fans who showed up (although thanks!, or the 14 different guests who generously gave their time and drawing power to us for the day (thanks to them also, of course!), but to our bedraggled Heroes staff, who did a really amazing job getting the store ready and then being friendly and helpful all day long!