Neilalien : A Doctor Strange Fansite : A Comic Book Weblog  

Jonathan Ross working on "In Search of Steve Ditko", a one-hour Ditkomentary for the BBC! [Best Of Most Of]

Altered Ditko from Strange Tales #84 01961 to Monsters On The Prowl #24 01973 reprint: Bad guy decides to claim Mars for HYRDA, not the Commies [Best Of Most Of]

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Dr. Strange by Michel Fiffe Great Doctor Strange illo by Michel Fiffe [Zegas]

Had the pleasure of meeting and talking with artist Michel Fiffe the other night at the Nick Bertozzi/The Salon/CBLDF benefit party in NYC. Michel counts Steve Ditko as one of his influences, natch! Some more Fiffe links to definitely check out:

"Broken", written by Dean Haspiel, published in Image's Negative Burn #3, featuring a Dr. Strange homage [Zegas]

"The Sell Out", early short story inspired by Ditko's Mr. A/Question [Zegas]

Strange M.D. Doc parody [Zegas]

Spider-Man get-well card [Zegas]

Fiffe is currently working on his Panaroma webcomic via ACT-I-VATE [Panorama] [Panorama Part 2]

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Free Comic Book Day is this Saturday 5 May!

Spider-Man 3 also out this weekend [Official Site, Trailer]

Posted 30 April 02007 - Permalink

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Meet Me At The Sphinx: That wacky 24-year three-way crossover [Again With The Comics: Part 1: Fantastic Four #19] [Part 2: Doctor Strange #53] [Part 3: West Coast Avengers #22]

"The Amazing Steve Ditko", 01974 British fanzine, at auction [EBay] [via Ditko Comics]

Steve Ditko Man-Bat house ad [Waffyjon's Comics Ad of the Day]

Creators doubting viability of working alone for a year on a 150-page OGN without paychecks or publicity; in search of a "post-manga" single/monthly or serialization format [Blog@Newsarama] [Becky Cloonan] [Corey Lewis] [The Beat]

Batch of "On Cartooning" creator interviews from last year for PBS P.O.V. [Chris Ware is a good one] [Tintin In America essay] [via Kottke]

Mini-comic, print zine and DIY publishers have mostly moved to the web [APE report at Slave Labor Graphics blog] [via The Beat]
Also: Webcomics = no constraints of specific page counts.
Also: Mini-comics online shop USS Catastrophe to close [Comics Reporter]

Posted 27 April 02007 - Permalink

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David Goyer would love to do an R-rated Doctor Strange movie [Moviehole]

Captain America alive and well and groping women in Florida [The Smoking Gun]

Comics writer, futurist and public intellectual Warren Ellis talks the creator-owned and pure sci-fi Doktor Sleepless [Comic Book Resources]

Life imitating art: Mineral found with composition close to kryptonite's fictional list (sodium, lithium, boron, silicate and hydroxide (but no flourine)) from the Superman movies [BBC News]

Marvel Then And Now DVD out in the next week; Stan Lee, Joe Quesada and Kevin Smith chatting [PR at Comic Book Resources]
Sales will benefit The Hero Initiative.

Posted 25 April 02007 - Permalink

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I Donut Has Bonez

[A lolsuper inspired by lolcats.]

Posted 23 April 02007 - Permalink

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"Spider-Man: The Musical" Broadway show going forward: U2's Bono and The Edge writing music and lyrics [Newsarama]
Some of the titles of U2's songs for the show have been leaked to Neilalien:

Spider-Man sings "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Swinging For"
Uncle Ben's ghost serenades "Beautiful May"
Doctor Octopus seduces Gwen Stacy with "Ock-Tongue Baby"
Webbed-up bank robbers lament "Sunday Sticky Sunday"
Peter Parker sings "I Will Wallow"
Flash Thompson pines for Betty Brant with "(She Moves In) Mysterio Ways"
Daredevil wishes for a place "Where The Streets Have No Crime"
Electro belts out "Fried (In The Name Of Love)"
Aunt May's doctor warns of yet another medical condition in "New Tears May"
Ben Reilly sings the sad song "Clone"
Stan Lee sings "With Or Without You" to Steve Ditko

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Steve Ditko Stories: Jim Starlin visits the Ditko studio in 01964 [Best Of Most Of]
Steve Ditko Stories: Blake Bell visits the Ditko studio in 02001 [Best Of Most Of]
Congratulations to Blake Bell re: nine years of the Ditko Looked Up website!

Doctor Strange prototype seen in Ditko's 01954 The Thing #17 cover [Ditko Comics]
And a Photoshop challenge to redo this cover as Doctor Strange!
Update: And Howard Hallis has taken the challenge!

New Avengers #29: Not enough Night Nurse [Again With The Comics]

Mixed love/hate discussion re: Leinil Yu's New Avengers art [Scans_daily]

Marvel's July 02007 solicitations includes Super-Villain Team-Up/MODOK's 11 #1 (OF 5) [Comic Book Resources]
One of Neilalien's most highly anticipated books of the year. Written by Fred Van Lente (Action Philosophers).
Also: Dr. Strange in July's Silver Surfer: Requiem #3 (of 4) [just July's Marvel Cosmic books]

The Pantheon of Super-Heroes: Superhero comics need to know where they stand: mythic, human, and not embarrassed of themselves [Blood, Blade & Thruster]

16 Panels That I Don't Think Work All That Well [Jon Morris at Comixpedia]

Marvel's April 01984 Direct Market sales numbers revealed [Tom Brevoort]
The deal with the devil to save comics/Marvel/DC with the DM was looking good back then. Neilalien wants to add the info shown here for Doctor Strange #66 to his Doc Historical Sales Numbers Page.

Large deadly standalone wheels: a concept used in comics three times too many [Bully Says: Comics Oughta Be Fun!]

Bulgegate: Interesting charges of homophobia, false equivalence: Straight male comicspundits go "eww" over realistic sports-cup-wearing jock-bulged superheroes as if that was equivalent to uber-exploitive superheroine T&A [Postmodernbarney; workplace warning: bulge images of varying bulginess]

Posted 22 April 02007 - Permalink

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Marvel House Ad For The Roger Stern/Frank Miller Doctor Strange Run That Was Not To Be

Dr. Strange house ad by Frank Miller

Ever since Comics Should Be Good mentioned it recently, Neilalien's received a few requests for an old fave around the orbital HQ: the great house ad by Frank Miller for a Roger Stern and Miller run on Doctor Strange. The ad played in February 01981 Marvel issues (this scan taken from Doctor Strange #45). Stern/Miller was supposed to follow the Claremont/Colan run, but alas, Miller ended up being unavailable to work on Strange- but we got Marshall Rogers instead, nuff said. Clicking on the image above will deliver an embiggened one.

Posted 16 April 02007 - Permalink

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Author Kurt Vonnegut has died [New York Times obituary]
"His harshest critics called him no more than a comic book philosopher". Hmmph.

Zatanna and Dr. Strange Enjoyable Doctor Strange and Zatanna illo by Rachel Zimra [Comicartfans]

Mindless Ones!!! [Again With the Comics] [Again With the Mindless Ones (Nextwave #7)]

The Doctor Strange entry at Comicvine has a little list of Doc in alternate realities which includes those realities' numbers [Comicvine]
Doctor Strange in other continuities [Wikipedia]
Full list of Marvel alternate multiverse numbers; Dr. Doom became Sorcerer Supreme on Earth-938 [Wikipedia]
Marvel editor Tom Brevoort doesn't like the "Earth-616" designation; an exclusionary nerd secret handshake? [Brevoort Marvel.com Blog]

Writer David Sexton interview fleshes out Mystic Arcana, Ian McNee, making new sense of Marvel magic [Comic Book Resources] [thanks Sanctum!]

Essential Doctor Strange Volume 3 TPB lurks pre-orderably [Amazon.com Canada] [thanks reader Matt!]
Nada on Amazon.com USA yet. September 02007, 616 pages (Marvel-616?), collects Dr. Strange #1-29, Annual #1 and Tomb of Dracula #44-45.

New Avengers #29 preview, out this past Wednesday [Comic Book Resources]

Connections between Lost and Watchmen [Lostpedia] [via LinkMachineGo]

Gary Friedrich sues Marvel, Sony, everybody, re: Ghost Rider copyright [Reuters] [via Comics Reporter] [CBR]

Renee Montoya has officially donned the mask of The Question, nuking both characters [Fortress Of Fortitude]
Why I'm not all that jazzed to see Renee Montoya as the Question [Comics Crew]

If we can't get comic racks back on every corner, then let's go for online/digital distribution [Pipeline column at CBR]

Frank Quitely interview [Newsarama]

Matt Dembicki and Jason Copland talk about their story in Postcards: True Stories That Never Happened [Blog@Newsarama]

Do pros win or lose when they interact with fans online? [Howling Curmudgeons]

Web 2.0 is filled with comics-making applications [ToonDoo] [Comeeko] [Stripgenerator] [via TechCrunch]

Classic animated Ramones Spider-Man video lives online [Veoh] [via Comics Alliance]

Posted 14 April 02007 - Permalink

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Doctor Strange in Fallen Son: The Death of Captain America #1 [Every Day Is Like Wednesday review]
Wolverine recruits Doc and Daredevil to help him find out if Cap is really dead. Apparently Doc's 'Cloak of Levitation in astral form' also appears. Fanboy grrr...

Ditko's "The Hidden Doom", war 4-pager from Battle #63 [Golden/Silver/Bronze Age Message Board]

Lettering: A Lost Art infoburst [Comicraft's Rich Starkings defends against a frustrated Greg Rucka] [Eddie Campbell] [Engine thread] [via Comixpedia and The Beat]

Stuart Immonen on Computers and Art; against the stigma of photoreferencing [Comics Should Be Good]

Interesting bunch of comics visual-narrative tips for writers [Jesse Hamm] [writers, Mark Waid, defend in the comments; collaboration vs. writers should "mind their own business" 'tude]

Ode to the discarded tool, the thought balloon; captions/noir voice-over narratives are not inherently more moody [Andrew J. Bonia]

List of Jesus figures in superhero comics [Comic Book The Blog]
Includes God figure Sise-Neg from Doctor Strange, and a funny Doc anecdote re: resurrection in comics.

What's with all the people clamoring for Lois Lane to get a spanking!? [Ami Angelwings' Super Cute Rants of DOOOM XD] [via LinkMachineGo]

Spider-Man Week In NYC is 30 April - 6 May

Posted 6 April 02007 - Permalink

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I Saw You: Comics based on Craigslist Missed Connection posts [Flickr] [via Waxy]

Posted 4 April 02007 - Permalink

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Doctor Strange Historical Sales Numbers
A new Neilalien Doc Info Page under construction, and one he's wanted to make for a long time. (Any help from Doc fans/scholars would be appreciated: Please keep it in the back of your minds to email Neilalien the issue number, if while you're reading or doing research with old original Doc comics, you happen to come across an issue with one of those U.S. Postal Service Statement thingies in the back or on the letters page. Neilalien would like to find a few more. And if anyone knows of any more sources for old sales numbers, please tell!)

Doctor Strange #52: Master of the Pimpin' Arts [Blockade Boy]
When Doc wore vests, two-layer cloaks, and muttonchops.

The Girl Who Wanted to Buy Green Lantern [Myriad Issues]
Stopped by a cheesecake cover.

The Return of Jean Grey: The First "Ret-Con?" or "When I Stopped Caring About Super-Hero Comics" [Best Of Most Of]

Posted 2 April 02007 - Permalink

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