Episode 1804 Talkback - It Was Comic Talk All Along
i_am_scifi
Posts: 784
Who's been pulling every evil string? It's been Comic Talk all along! We give WandaVision the full spoiler filled treatment this episode (spoiler talk begins at 11:50 and concludes at 53:38), while also discussing the first few episodes of Superman & Lois, the new season of The Flash, and we even dabble into the upcoming Snyder Cut of Justice League. On the comics front, Ian discusses Infinite Frontier #1 from DC, Chris goes gaga for Radiant Black, Chip Zdarsky's Stillwater, Larry Hama and Dave Wachter's Iron First and Christopher Priest's Vampirella, and Murd dives deep into the first two issues of the original Nova. Plus some new GI Joe acquisitions by Shane, delving into some TwoMorrow's magazine content, the return of Chandra Free's The God Machine on Kickstarter, and a Muddle the Murd! (1:59:06)
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For once I don’t actually need it (I’m actually caught up on WandaVision), but thank you @i_am_scifi for tagging the start and end times of the spoiler discussion in the podcast notes. I really appreciate it.
I've mentioned it before, but I was able to visit with and interview Paul Norris at his home after the 2006 San Diego Comic-Con (he was about a 45-minute train ride from SD). While I was there, Paul let me make a full-sized Xerox of the one piece of original art for an unfinished 12-page surrender pamphlet he was able to keep (the image of it that ran in A/E was from a high quality print of the page which was much cleaner but wasn't found until well after my interview). I was hoping to run the interview in A/E with the story of the surrender pamphlets and his time in Japan and Korea, but unbeknownst to me at the time, my recorder (I was still using analog equipment back then) crapped out on me, and the recording ended up being a garbled, unusable mess. Then Paul died about a year later. I kept in touch with his son, Reed, but I was too embarrassed and depressed about the botched recording to ever follow up on it. So I'm very glad that Richard (who I worked with on the Star*Reach Companion) put this article together. I mean, it's Reed recounting his father's story rather than hearing it directly from Paul's own lips, but it's a truly fascinating story about the power of the comic book medium, and I'm happy it's finally out there.
One of the aspects @wildpigcomics didn't mention, and which especially hit home with me, was that Paul and the other artists actually collaborated on the project with a few English-speaking Japanese POWs to make sure it would be easily understood. One of the POWs was even a fellow artist, and struck up a friendship with Paul. Like Chris said, the two biggest roadblocks to the success of the pamphlet program were cultural pressures against showing weakness (i.e. surrendering), and Japanese propaganda amongst its people. Just as we turned the Japanese soldiers into caricaturistic evil “yellow devils” in our own propaganda, the Japanese leadership assured their soldiers that American troops would torture anyone they captured and devour their children. But those pamphlets were able to cut through a lot of that, and they saved thousands of lives on both sides. Comics for the win!
“New GI Joe acquisitions”, eh @ShaneKelly ?! Could it be the Joes’ Headquarters while burst through those suspenders?
Another very enjoyable episode guys! I was really hoping that there would be some discussion/feedback on the two massively-funded Kickstarter comic projects that just hit the stores - Nocterra and BRZRKR. Any plans to cover these in a future episode? Have and of you guys tried them yet? Just curious to hear your reactions/assessments after reading them. Keep up the good work!
Yes, lots of familiarity with Nova's origins. I think his earliest origins even date back to fanzines Wolfman was doing in his youth. I recall some of this being reported on but is there a lengthy article? I'm curious if the characters that appeared later (Condor, Sphinx, Crimebuster, Diamondhead, Comet, etc.) were part of Wolfman's fan created team from his youth.
And, yes, Spidey did eventually crossover in Nova by issue 12 (my first issue!) "JASON D!!"