Oh yes! Just added to our HeroesCon 09 Guest List, as part of Indie Island, is a star-studded indie cavalcade of ingenious independent impresarios. That may be overstating it a little bit, but hey–this is the Internet, after all. But enough of this blather: witness!

LIZ BAILLIE is totally awesome, believe you me. She’s the author of the My Brain Hurts series, as well as the new Sing Along Forever, and is a regular contributor to indie anthologies like the AWESOME Anthology!

FRED CHAO is just as awesome as Liz, but a little taller. He’s also the cartoonist behind Johnny Hiro from AdHouse Books–I believe a collected edition might be coming out later in the year. EXCITEMENT!

RACHEL FREIRE is a relative newcomer, but HER new book FCHS from AdHouse looks kind of amazing. It’s also written by our old chum Vito Delsante, who is also kind of amazing. So are you!

CARLA SPEED MCNEIL is returning triumphantly to HeroesCon after like… jeez, I can’t even remember when she was here last. It might have been LAST MILLENIUM!! Either way, she’s been producing her acclaimed self-published series Finder since the latter days of the 20th century–it’s already classic!

JIM OTTAVIANI is so friendly it reminds you of how you wished you were more nicer to people. Not you of course, but other, less nice people. When he’s not saving puppies from burning orphanages, he’s the writer behind the science-inflected Bone Sharps, Cowboys, and Thunder Lizards, and Suspended In Language!

MK REED is know both far and wide for her excellent writing, especially on her Ignatz-winning story in Papercutter #8, not to mention Cross Country and I Will Feast On Your Whore Heart. Whoa, MK, language!

Whew! Okay, still more to come as I work my way through this stack of forms, but I’m starting to, if not catch up, at least get into a rhythm. Signs point to TWO updates to our Guest List next week! See you then!

Well, I said it briefly yesterday, but now I have said it in a much more longwinded fashion: Claudio Sanchez is a super-nice guy, the signing we hosted yesterday went almost impossibly smoothly, and everyone had a great time.I mean, check out all these peeps:

Okay, there are 40-something photos, most with wearisome descriptions and anecdotes, all yours for the viewing over at our Flickr site (I just noticed we’ve crossed 1200 photos!!). I sincerely hope you enjoyed them. I’m home sick today, and it was extra hard to think of anything to say when I was so busy pitying myself. The things I do for you!

Oh, but before I forget, for those of you who couldn’t come but want a piece of the action:

Before he left to go play last night’s Coheed & Cambria show at the newly named Bojangles Arena, Claudio kindly signed the rest of the “bloody” Kill Audio vinyl figures we’d gotten in for the event. If you’d like one of these tour exclusive fellas, drop Shelton an e-mail or call us at 704.375.7462 with your charge info to order one. We’ll probably charge you $5 or $6 or so, depending on where you live–and of course you can just pick one up in the store anytime, until they’re all gone. Okay–go drink in the photo report!!

by Carlton Hargro

I’ve always liked Nick Fury but never really liked a comic book starring Nick Fury.

For me, Fury was sort of like Dr. Strange — good for an occasional guest appearance, but not good enough to support a monthly comic book. Maybe it’s because, just like Strange has an almost limitless array of powers, Fury has a limitless supply of resources as the head of Marvel’s resident espionage organization, S.H.I.E.L.D.

But based on the quality of Fury’s latest title — Secret Warriors — I just may change my mind about Marvel’s No. 1 spy.

If you’re not familiar with the premise behind Secret Warriors (which is written by Secret Invasion architect Brian Bendis and Jonathan Hickman, of Image Comics fame), here’s the gist: Before Secret Invasion, Nick Fury figured out the Skrulls were hiding among us, so he created a team of heroes who weren’t known by the bad guys. And then helped beat up the bad guys. After Secret Invasion, Fury continues to lead his super team, but now he’s going against Norman Osborn’s Dark Reign, among other baddies.

So why does this Fury vehicle work where others failed? Well, first, instead of having Nick run S.H.I.E.L.D. and hang out with thousands of faceless agents, Hickman and Bendis have pared down his crew to just a handful of folks. Second, Hickman and Bendis can just plain write. Their characterizations are accurate; the dialogue is witty and entertaining; and the plot is engrossing and offers several real surprises. On top of all that, the art by Stefano Caselli is great … clean, yet detailed.

Bottom line: Buy Secret Warriors No. 1. It’s good … even if you don’t dig Nick Fury cmics.

Carlton Hargro is Editor-in-Chief of Creative Loafing Charlotte.

WHOA NELLIE!! I’ll be posting a longer photo report to our Flickr site later in the week, but I thought I’d give you a little teasie-poo real quick. Holy cow did a lot of people show up to meet Claudio Sanchez of Coheed & Cambria today, with a few of them waiting for us to open the doors at 10am–even thought the event wasn’t scheduled until 2.30!

Claudio Sanchez was a super cool dude is the short version–here we see him with Shelton and Shelton’s granddaughter Faith. I’ll expound on his coolness in my full report, but that’s the short version. Faith asked me how to spell “evil” earlier in the day, for a drawing she was doing. Ah, inspiration.

As I type, the band is about an hour or two from taking the stage at Cricket Bojangles Arena, and we hope they rock everyone’s faces right off. Before he left Claudio signed up a slew of the tour-exclusive Kill Audio vinyl figures, which we’ll be selling for $50 a pop while they last. Let us know if you want one! And look for that longer post later in the week!

Boy 2008 sure was stinky wasn’t it? That year deflated faster than a flan in a cupboard. But now it’s time to look ahead and see what there is to look forward to in the year 2009.

Muppet/Pixar Comics — Boom! Studios were able to gain the license to these properties and in March we’ll see the fruits of that labor. From the looks of the solicits they’ve gone top quality all the way with Mark Waid writing The Incredibles and Roger Langridge doing The Muppets (which I and fellow employee Matt Knapik are very excited about) Plus, they’re $2.99 for 24 pages of story, a great value in these harsh Dickensian times. Due in March.

Blackest Night — I’m as sick as anyone of events, I wrote an article about it remember? But Green Lantern has been probably DC’s consistently best book (and DC’s best line: GL Corps is equally good) so I have a lot of goodwill going into this more than I have had in probably any event ever. Should be out in early summer.

Wolverine: Weapon X — Wolverine is in way, way too many comics if they cut the amount of stuff he was appearing in by a 1/3 it’d still be a lot. So why is this on my list? I’m not much of Wolverine fan, I’m not really looking forward to the movie that this series is being launched alongside of (much like Fraction’s Iron Man book last year.) This is on my list because of Jason Aaron. Scalped is one of my favorite books and always on the top of my list of recommendations for customers. His Ghost Rider is ridiculously fun. And Aaron’s past Wolverine has been darn good. Out in April.

War of Kings — If my Blackest Night recommendation didn’t make me look like a hypocrite here I come with another event. It does seem that Marvel doesn’t have anything like a Civil War or a Secret Invasion this year and this crossover is regulated only to the cosmic Marvel books. The two Annihilation series, Nova, and Guardians of the Galaxy are among the best comics out there and this follows in that esteemed tradition. This will be super fun. Already gearing up to go but the main mini is due in March.

Flash: Rebirth — Geoff Johns, Ethan Van Sciver, and the return of a silver age DC character. It’s worked before. The Flash has been in a bit of a rut for a while and this should jump start the franchise and bring it back to prominence once again. Hitting the ground running in April

Bits and Pieces — Quick hits of other things coming ahead:

Ignition City — Described by Warren Ellis as Deadwood meets Flash Gordon so that’s a good sign. By Avatar in the Spring.

Superman Secret Origin — Origin stories are always kind of fun if a bit overdone but its done by the Action Comics team of Geoff Johns and Gary Frank so this should be good. Coming in Spring.

Secret Warriors — The preview in Dark Reign New Nation was good and Jonathan Hickman is always worth a look. Out in February.

Ultimate Avengers — Mark Millar returns to the Ultimate Universe with this follow-up to The Ultimates 1 & 2 sometime this summer.

Grant Morrison’s Batman — He’s due back sometime in the summer and one has to wonder where its gonna go now that well…Batman is dead. Who’ll be Batman and is Frank Quitely really doing the art like the internet says? We’ll have to see.

by Carlton Hargro

Last week, I professed my love for Mark Millar and Bryan Hitch — the current creative team behind the Fantastic Four.

This week, I’m gonna sing Millar’s praises again … but this time for his stint on Marvel’s monthly Wolverine series.

Now before I start gushing, I’ve got to admit that I don’t normally like Wolverine’s comic book. I like the character, but I’ve always thought that his series was flawed. (I’m referring to his main book, not the Origins comic or that Logan book slated to come out.)

The series started off bad a long time ago when Chris Claremont launched it featuring Logan in the country of Madripoor hiding in his “Patch” alias. The comic was short on action and packed with boring characters and scenarios. Years later, Larry Hama took over and didn’t fare much better.

All in all, I just thought the book — which starred a homicidal maniac — was always way too sedate.

And that brings us back to Millar.

As far as I’m concerned, Millar’s “Enemy of the State” storyline was the best tale ever told in the monthly Wolverine comic. (I’m not talking about the old Frank Miller-drawn limited series.) The story was action-packed, filled with cool guest stars, introduced one of Marvel’s most interesting villains and showed Wolvie being more deadly and hardcore than ever before.

When the 12-part story was done, Millar left and the book went to being sucky again. And I stopped reading it once more. That is, until a few months ago when Millar came back to Wolverine to tell his “Old Man Logan” mini-series within a series.

If you haven’t read it yet, the story chronicles the adventures of a pacifist Wolverine (and his partner Hawkeye) in a post-apocalyptic future where all the heroes have died. Like his previous run on the comic, this arc is wall-to-wall action, blood, gore and violence … and isn’t that what a Wolverine is supposed to be all about?

Looking for introspection? Pick up a Starman trade.

Carlton Hargro is the editor-in-chief of Creative Loafing Charlotte. For more comic reviews from Carlton, visit http://www.charlotte.creativeloafing.com/.

Every Wednesday we run down the 5 most interesting comics or graphic novels coming out for the week.

5. 08: A GRAPHIC DIARY OF THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL
Written by Michael Crowley; art by Dan Goldman
Three Rivers Press
$17.95 | 160 pgs

The 2008 campaign already seems like last year’s news, which I guess it is, but now is the time to start examining what really happened and recapping all it’s iconic moments. Whether or not a graphic novel is the best way to do this or not I’m not so sure, but this new book attempts it with a nice, newsy sense of graphic design. Artist Dan Goldman (Shooting War) takes all the now-classic imagery that made up the last two years worth of news cycles (Palin’s wink, Joe the Plumber, the crazy chick with the backwards B on her face) and recreates them in a style that mixes pop art with CNN info-graphic overload. Here Goldman teams with Michael Crowley, a journalist from the New Republic, as they give the ’08 campaign the old 9/11 Report treatment.

Check out a bunch of pages.

4. AGENTS OF ATLAS #1
Written by Jeff Parker; art by Carlo Pagulayan and Jason Paz
Marvel
$3.99

Jeff Parker’s original Agents of Atlas mini-series from a few years ago was a surprise hit with fans and critics alike. Therefore he now gets a shot at an ongoing series starring the members of a supergroup consisting of characters from the pre-silver age of Marvel (back when it was called Atlas) who have been brought to present day as a top secret S.H.I.E.L.D. task force. The team consists of little known 50s-era characters Namora, Venus, Marvel Boy, Gorilla-man and M-11 as well as the team leader, Jimmy Woo.

3. I SAW YOU…COMICS INSPIRED BY REAL-LIFE MISSED CONNECTIONS
Edited by Julia Wertz
Three Rivers Press
$12.95 | 192 pgs

Here’s a good idea if I’ve ever heard one. Take a personal ad from a local paper or from Craigslist and turn it into a short comic. As the solicitation for this book suggests “these posted stranger sightings and chance encounters lay bare the truths and oddities of real-life loneliness and attractions and bring out the voyeur in the best of us.” Julia Wertz, creator of the auto-bio webcomic The Fart Party, has assembled a collection of creators that range from newcomers like Laura Park to veterans like Peter Bagge for this anthology of stories of love connections, both heartfelt and strange. With contributions from folks like Gabrielle Bell, Jeffrey Brown, David Malki, Alec Longstreth, Aaron Renier, Jesse Reklaw and many more.

2. SECRET WARRIORS #1
Written by Jonathan Hickman and Brian Michael Bendis; art by Stefano Caselli
Marvel
$3.99

The recent Secret Invasion mini-series brought classic espionage tough guy Nick Fury back in full force to the Marvel Universe and Secret Warriors brings him back on a monthly basis as he leads a new team of top secret superhumans in a post-Invasion world where villain Norman Osborn is in charge of Fury’s former agency, SHIELD.

The interesting thing about this series is that it brings Jonathan Hickman, writer of the highly acclaimed independent series Nightly News, into Marvel’s stable of creators. Here he teams up with Brian Michael Bendis on plot, most likely so that Bendis can pull in specific plot threads that he’s been devising for years within various Marvel books. My guess is that the title of this series probably alludes overtly to Bendis’ Secret Wars series which dealt with a lot of secret-ops stuff going on in the MU. Hickman is one of the most exciting new creators out there and joins people like Matt Fraction and Bendis himself in a group of talented writers that have proven themselves on their own books and are now leading the direction of the entire line of Marvel books.

1. SCOTT PILGRIM VOL. 5: SCOTT PILGRIM VS. THE UNIVERSE
By Bryan Lee O’Malley
Oni Press
$11.95 | 192 pgs

Probably the first highly anticipated book of 2009 hits the stands this week. If you haven’t tried out Bryan Lee O’Malley’s Scott Pilgrim series yet then by all means start with volume one and catch up quickly. The fifth volume comes out this week in the continuing story of the affable 20-something Scott Pilgrim who has fallen in love with the cute and mysterious Ramona Flowers but in order to win her heart he must defeat her evil exes in classic video game style.

This book has it all – martial arts, a video game-like points system, romance, rock and roll, recipes and a very modern and unique manga-like sense of storytelling.

In this penultimate chapter in the Scott Pilgrim saga, things start to fall apart for our hero as Ramona’s exes begin to pair up and his own exes start to stir trouble of their own.

AND THEN THERE WAS…

I AM LEGION #1
Second try for us Americans on this series. A few years back DC published a graphic novel of the first part of this European science fiction book illustrated by John Cassady(Planetary). But they never finished the reprints. This time Devil’s Due Publishing starts small by reprinting it in floppy format.

JERSEY GODS #1
A nice Jersey girl meets a God of War and they get married and move down the street from her parents. Some nice looking Jack Kirby meets Darwyn Cooke art from Dan McDaid graces this odd new Image book.

CAPTAIN AMERICA THE TRUTH HC
A new hardcover collection of this newsworthy mini-series that retcons the history of Captain America by showing that before Steve Rogers was injected with the Super Soldier serum it was first tested on African American soldiers. Artwork by Kyle Baker in his most cartoony style.

ASTONISHING TALES #1
A new anthology series from Marvel. The first issue features the daring choice of launching a series with a Wolverine/Punisher team-up. Who’d have ever thought of putting those two characters together, huh? What a risk Marvel is taking there.

INDIANA JONES FURTHER ADV OMNIBUS TP VOL 01
Dark Horse delivers a huge volume of reprints from the old Marvel book that came out in the post-Raiders era. Features art from people like John Byrne and Howard Chaykin.

Yo Yo Yo! Now in the store are some fresh FREE sneak preview passes to the upcoming film “Push.” Each pass is good for two people, but you’d better show up early, because seating is limited. The showing is for Wednesday February 4 at 7.30 pm.

And for those of you who love to LAUGH, we have a very few passes for “The Pink Panther 2,” showing tomorrow night at 7.30pm.

In our continuing efforts to keep our readers aware of how many famous people we know, I wanted to point out that our chum Benji Hughes is going to be on Jimmy Kimmel Live tonight, cold kickin it! If you haven’t heard of Benji before, he’s a Charlotte fixture, and recently his debut double album has gotten reviewed all over the place, including a four-star review in Rolling Stone. More important than that? MY opinion: this album is super great and will be your favorite album to listen to in your car for at least a couple of months, guaranteed.

Check your local listings, yo!

by Carlton Hargro

Am I the only one who’s digging the Fantastic Four these days?

If so, that’s a shame because, under the creative guidance of writer Mark Millar and artist Bryan Hitch, this is the best the book has been in quite years. In fact, I’d say Millar and Hitch’s run on the book to date is just as good as the classic stint by (gasp!) John Byrne.

What makes the work of current creative team so enjoyable? It’s just clear that these guys get what makes the Fantastic Four work.

From a writing perspective, Millar is able to blend the out-this-world cosmic stuff with the mundane family stuff; of course, a lot of FF writers try to do this. Millar, however, succeeds by presenting the cosmic stuff — like alternate dimensions and dating super-human burglars — as mundane and the mundane stuff — like finding a babysitter and the best way to celebrate your anniversary — as incredible. On top of that, while Millar does make use of classic FF supporting characters and villains, he finds a way to blaze a few new trails and tries out some things that have never been done in the pages of the comic before. And for a comic that’s been published for (at least) 562 months, that’s saying a mouthful.

When it comes to art, Hitch’s ultra-realistic style fits well in the FF; his drawings help to ground the reader and make all the extra-terrestrial/space-faring concepts, characters and landscapes more believable. Is this stuff as good as his work on The Ultimates? Yes … for the most part and on most panels. At the end of the day, Hitch at 85 percent is better than most artists at 100.

Now, all that good stuff taken into consideration, I must admit that I’m not happy with the apparent lateness of the book. But, when the comic does happen to hit the stands, the quality is top notch.

So, in conclusion: I like the FF, and you should, too.

Carlton Hargro is the editor-in-chief of Creative Loafing. For more comic reviews from Carlton, visit www.charlotte.creativeloafing.com.