I Hate To Say I Told You So, But...

Last time round, I said that the DC Villains Month had cut the legs out from under a couple of their newer, struggling titles.

And lo! Here among the solicitations for January:

Katana and Vibe also gone, without even an official notice to wave them off. 

AND ANOTHER THING... (Warning: contains exclamation marks. Lots of 'em)

Look, I know it seems that I'm spending a lot of time pummeling DC Comics, but this is something that just bugs me.

Batman: Black & White is a really enjoyable book. Honest, it is. But this is the contents page of #2:

I mean, look at the talent there! And a cover by Jim Steranko!*

But also look! There's a listing of all the DC executive staff! And look! Just under that! There's a listing of all the DC executive staff! Again!

I know, I know. That indicia is in every book the company publishes, and the same sort of thing is in every Marvel book - every comic book available these days, in fact. I know it's the result of some kind of in-house decision, or slip-up, or something, and there's absolutely no malign intent.

It's just that having that same listing appear twice on the same page makes me think DC consider Jay Kogan or Alison Gill or Jeff Boison to be twice as important as JG Jones or Rafael Albuquerque or Alex Nino or dammit Jim Steranko.

I know that's probably not the case.

But this is the second month in a row this has happened in this book.

It annoys me.

That's all.












*Admittedly, the cover is of a Batman who looks like he's got some weird kind of Crown of Thorns thing sticking out of his cowl, but what the hell. It's Steranko!

GLAD IT'S ALL OVER

It’s another Hypothetical Comic Shop post! Remember, the HCS  doesn’t actually exist no matter what you think!

We sold the last copy of the DC Villains Month 3D covers on Saturday; it was the one remaining copy of Batman/Riddler that had stayed on the shelf for a week or two, sitting there sadly like a fat lass at a disco while the Harley Quinns and the Joker’s Daughters were whisked off their feet by tall good-looking lads.

So what was the impression left by the month? Well, it didn’t increase our sales of DC books, as, along with almost every other retailer in the world, we didn’t get anywhere near the number of copies of the 3D covers that we’d ordered. Furthermore, because the covers gimmick far outweighed the content of the comics, the 2D covers didn’t sell nearly as well as they usually would in an ordinary month. We were scrupulously fair with the 3D covers and made sure that everybody who’d ordered them got as many as possible, but where standard copies had to be supplied, quite a few were refused. I have no problem with a customer who does that: they ordered a certain product in good faith, that product was not available and they had every right to refuse what they felt was an unsatisfactory replacement.

As a result, the extra revenue from the higher price on the enhanced covers has been more than negated by the number of unsold standard copies we have (although, as a shop that specialises in old comics, we hope to shift those standard covers either as back issues or when we put them on sale online).

What’s really struck me over the course of the month is something we won’t really feel the effect of for another few weeks: the number of standing orders that have been cancelled as a result of Villains Month. The nature of the event has meant that most regular titles have had to either interrupt their storylines or bring them to an end, then see those storylines replaced for a month by material created in the most part by different talent than usual and therefore in a different style than usual. All this in the service of a short series that’s really only of interest to those who read the ongoing series it spins out of.

God, that’s complex.

So what we’ve seen a lot of is regular customers coming in, some of them excited by the cover enhancements, some of them not caring either way, but all of them deciding that the break in storylines is the ideal place to drop a title or two. Or three. Or, in a couple of cases, all of them.

That isn’t going to help us, especially in the next two or three months while the cancelled items are still filtering through the direct market system (though that system was kind of torn up and spat on by Villains Month’s infamous allocations). For a while, we’re going to be shelving extra copies of low-selling titles. Maybe they’ll sell off the shelf. I doubt it. If they were going to sell off the shelf we’d order more copies for just that purpose. Experience has told us these titles don’t sell off the shelf, so essentially we’re eating them (unless, as above, they shift as part of the long tail that’s a major part of the shop’s business model).

It also isn’t going to help those low-selling titles: the Katanas and the Vibes and the Stormwatches are going to take a hit, while the more recently-launched books – I’m talking very directly here about The Movement and The Green Team – have been dealt a major blow far too early in their lives, and it’s one they’ll likely not recover from. To disrupt the flow of a struggling new book while it’s still trying to build an audience, and moreover to not give that book a look in on the promotional stunt it was withdrawn to accommodate, is pretty much slitting that title’s throat.

The Movement: will soon go
 to live on a farm

There’s another aspect to this: those low-selling titles tend to have a small but very loyal following. The Movement and The Green Team actually attract exactly one standing order customer each, and are the only titles those two customers read. So we’ve not seen those customers this month, and we’ve been told by one of those two that he’s now fed up with buying titles that last less than a year (yes, we’ve tried guiding him toward books with a greater chance of survival, but some people have very very distinct tastes) and is unlikely to replace the book when it reaches its inevitable early end. So that’s at least one customer gone. Yes, a very low-spending customer, but a customer nonetheless. Every single one is valuable. Every single loss is a blow.

So generally, the month has been an overall loss. It’s been ameliorated a little by the increased sales on Marvel’s X-Men and Avengers books as they dive into yet another crossover (surprisingly, the bright yellow trade dress on the Battle Of The Atom books has been a terrific eye-catcher, while people have stared at the shelves for ages before asking where the 3D covers are). What we’ve taken from it is that these annual gimmicks only work if they’re inclusive: they have to be a continuation of, or close adjunct to, the regular content, and they have to be available to everybody.

There’s been something else we’ve learned recently, though; the shop’s location – and indeed the nature of the business itself - means it’s never really attracted very much in the way of footfall, outside of the regulars who make the trek to see us. In the last few months, as our area’s begun attracting a new, younger type of resident, we’ve been getting more requests for the material we’ve not traditionally stocked, material outside of the basic spandex melodramatics. If this keeps up, as I hope it will, we’re gong to see a major shift in our customer base and what they consume, and that, with luck, will make us less reliant on the books from the two major publishers.

Which will mean that in a few years time, when there’s another gimmick month like this September, we’ll be able to do what we really wanted to do this time around: just not bother with it.

And you know what else? If you’re short-sighted like I am, those covers give you one hell of a headache. 

The Hypothetical Comics Shop stays open late on Wednesdays, unless there's something good on the telly.

Normal Service May Possibly Be Resumed

We've been having a bit of a rest.

We'll make up for it.

‘THE FIRST JUMPING-OFF POINT FOR RETAILERS’

The first in an occasional series of ‘Hypothetical Comic Shop’ posts. It does not reflect the opinions of any actual comic shop, no matter what you may think.

Here at the Hypothetical Comic Shop we’ve been discussing the September DC Comics Villains Month, just as many other comic shops have been doing over the last few weeks. There’s no need to go into details of what the September books are because if you’re interested enough to be reading this, you’re interested enough to know what’s going on.

Now, we have a number of problems with the September books. Some of them are unique to ourselves – for instance, how do we enter these strangely-numbered books onto a custom-made database that doesn’t accept anything but whole numbers? – but most are being experienced by shops all over the place.

Here’s the first problem: how do we communicate these books to our customers? We have scarcely enough hours in the day to do our normal job of selling comics. We’re now going to have to explain to each of our customers (excluding the ones who spent all day and all night on the internet and know about these things before we do) what September’s all about. We’re going to have to field their queries, some of which we won’t know the answer to and for which we’ll have to spend time finding those answers.

We’ve started to do this already, talking to our regulars, getting an initial feel for what’s happening (and that initial feel is: it isn’t good, of which more in a minute). For some, who haven’t had time to listen to me doing a show-and-tell without the show as we have nothing yet to show, or who haven’t been able to quite grasp the concept, we’ve printed off the full solicitations from the web. Twelve pages per customer. That’s another expense for us.

Teen Titans 23.something, featuring Deathstroke.
The guy's own book's just died. How do we sell another issue?

When the relevant Previews hits, we’re going to use the shop copies to give people more idea of what they’ll be buying, should they wish to buy them. We’ll be asking them to place solid orders for the books they definitely want. Why we’ll be doing this will be made clearer below.

The initial reaction, as hinted above, is not good. I’d say that around sixty per cent of those made aware of September have been unimpressed. They’re not impressed by the concept, by the covers, by the price rise – even though it’s only temporary. Most of all, they’re not impressed by the fact that there will be no issue of certain titles in that month. And this has led to disgruntled customers telling us to cancel their orders for those titles. What’s worse is that the missing titles are in the main B-list books: Vibe. All-Star Western. Already low-selling, borderline-cancellation titles are taking a hit. You couldn’t design a more efficient way of guaranteeing a book’s death.

Some customers have already decided they’ve had enough with the publisher as a whole and have cancelled their entire DC order. Some have gone so far as to walk away from their orders – DC, Marvel, the lot - altogether. Undoubtedly some will change their mind and re-instate those books, but it’s still a blow to us and probably more so to them.

However: the main problem with the majority of these books is this; we have no idea how many of each to order.

We’ll have a rough idea with those books that retain the creative team of the regular title. I’m thinking here of the Flash issue which has the same creative team as the regular book and seems to be a continuation of the regular storyline, and of the issue of Swamp Thing that does the same, and also, strangely enough, of Justice League 23.3, which is essentially the final issue of the already-dead Dial H title. Our orders will be weighted towards those titles, because we can at least show them to our customers and say 'This is as close as you're going to get this month to the comic you usually read.' Also, we're more disposed to ordering those titles rather than the ones featuring B-list characters and, loathe though I am to say it, B-list creators. 

We’ll probably also weight heavily in favour of fan-favourite characters: experience tells us that the Joker and Harley Quinn are characters that sell well as back issues, so we’ll be ordering quite a few of those.

Green Lantern 23.something. Unknown character in a book partially comprising previously-published
 pin-up pages with new dialogue added. It'll fly off the shelves. 

But even that relatively simple way of deciding order figures has been denied us; DC have added a new wrinkle, the one that prompted the comment in the headline of this post. They’ve announced that because of the cost of physically producing the all-singing all-dancing 3D lenticular it’s-just-like-the-1990s-again covers on the Villains Month books, they’re losing money on each one they make. And because of that, they’ve already set the print runs for each title. What this means is that DC are taking away from the retailer the only certainty that we had about this month’s books, one of the few certainties of the direct market; the certainty of receiving the actual amount that we ordered.

As there’s a fixed print run, and as that print run has already been set before any actual orders have been received, there’s a chance – and it’s a fairly strong chance – that certain titles will be ordered in excess of their actual availability. That will mean the titles that have been over-ordered will be distributed to shops in numbers reflecting a ratio of that shop’s original order. It’s called ‘allocation’, and it’s a bitch.

Say you ordered 100 copies of Batman 23.3. You might receive 100 copies. You might receive 90. You might receive 25.

That’d be fine if you only needed 25 copies of Batman 23.3 but you’d taken a chance that the book would be allocated and so ordered 100 copies. You took a bet and luckily you won. But what if you lost? What if you only needed 25 copies, you ordered 100, and DC had actually printed enough to fill all the orders? Why, then you’d have four times as many Batman 23.3 as you needed, and you’d have to start praying that those puppies sell well because in a few weeks time you’re going to be staring at a bill for seventy-five unsold comics – at a higher price than usual, don’t forget – and it’s pretty unlikely that Diamond are going to either take those unwanted copies back or give you more time to pay for them.

Even that’s not the end of it: allocations usually occur when there’s a physical problem with the production of a book, which results in fewer copies being available than were ordered. They’re not a good thing to happen because someone, somewhere along the line, will end up disappointed. But at least they happen rarely and are out of most people’s control.

But this time they’re not. This time, DC have introduced allocations into the equation very early, and with it comes the ugly notion of market manipulation. Let’s say you’re a big retailer with a good cash-flow and funds to spare. You want your full order of these books, so you order far in excess of what you ordinarily would, in the hope that the allocation system will give you something near the ‘right’ amount. But then you over-order, on purpose, an amount in excess of even your initial over-order. You do this because the higher the orders DC receive, the more likely it is that allocation will occur, and the more likely it is that these now-scarce books will become ‘hot’ and go up in price.  That’ll be great for you because you could afford to gamble on the things and the amount you received, even after allocation, gave you plenty of copies to put on the secondary market and make a killing on.  Not so good, though, for the poor sap who was allocated short and has a load of pissed-off customers who didn’t get their copies.

What worries us most about September is the thing that actually worries us here at the Hypothetical Comic Shop the least (mainly because we’re, y’know, hypothetical): what will the initial sales be like? We’re lucky enough that our imaginary and thus flexible business model can be geared towards mail-order rather than standard retail, and towards back issues rather than new material. Yes, Tuesday is still delivery day and still our busiest day behind the scenes, and yes, a lot of people come in to the shop on Wednesday to see the lovely new comics. But that isn’t as important for us as it is for what we’ve come to call ‘Wednesday shops’- those shops whose business model skews more towards regular sales of new material, and whose major income stream comes from the Wednesday-to-Saturday new comics purchases. It’s bad enough that these shops are subject to revenue fluctuations that can be triggered by something as trivial as there being too many X-books published in one week. In September there’s going to be a lot of flashy stuff, most of it costing more than usual, competing for a limited amount of disposable income in the customer’s pocket, and that’s going to mean a greater than usual amount of other material remaining unsold. That in turn means cash flow problems come invoice-paying time, and for a lot of stores who exist pretty much on a month-to-month basis in a crippled economy, it may be too much to bear.

So what should DC have done? If they really have to celebrate their ‘re-birthday’ every September, what would have been a better idea than Villains Month? Simple answer: Heroes Month. Every one of their regular titles gets a shiny 3D lenticular cover that showcases the star of the book. Would that mean four or five Batman covers? Yes it would, and each one of those would sell like crazy. Back those covers up with decent stories by decent creators – you know the thing, a bit like Marvel and Dark Horse and so many other companies are doing on most of their books – and you’ve got a sure-fire winner. In fact, why not just forget about the ‘shiny covers’ bit and go straight for the ‘decent stories’? You can have that idea, on me. No charge. No, no. I insist. Really, I insist.

The Hypothetical Comic Shop keeps odd hours, but if the lights are on, we’re open.

Speak, Bolt!

Black Bolt, eh? Leader of the Inhumans, with the power to bring down an entire city with a single word. Known, therefore, for being exceptionally quiet. Except for when Kirby wrote the book...

Misplaced balloon fun by Jack Kirby and Chic Stone from Amazing Adventures v2, 1970. Edited, but seemingly not proof-read, by Stan Lee (who also didn't notice this...

...but he had so much more to worry about, eh?)

Yeah, Yok It Up...

Amazing Adult Fantasy #12, May 1963: Stan Lee encourages illegal behaviour among the folk of Dallas, Texas. In November of that year, Kennedy was shot in Dallas, Texas. Coincidence? Or the culmination of a months-long campaign of inculcating crime? Only you can decide. 

Shortly After The Truth About Robbie Williams Was Revealed...

A slice of pop history from Amazing Adventures v1 #4 (1961), brought to you by Lee/Kirby/Ayers. Unfortunately, the baying mob were too late to stop the release of 'Angels'.

It's Every Girl's Dream

Just a few Love Romances covers. Do you think there was a target audience here? I think there was a target audience here. 

MEANWHILE, AT THE TOP LEFT CORNER OF THE PANEL…

Here’s something that’s a fairly recent addition to the Big Two’s comics; the caption as brand identity.

The most obvious use of this is in the establishing caption – a caption that tell you where and possibly when the scene is taking place. Marvel and DC both have distinctive styles for these, with one very important difference.  Here's an example of the caption as used in DC comics. 

This style of lettering and background was first used in the 52 series back in 2006, and it’s been the default style for DC captions since the New 52 reboot of the line in 2011.

There’s nothing wrong with the 52-style caption; it’s clear and it’s legible and it gives a line-wide identity to DC’s product. As soon as you see that style of caption, you know what you’re reading and can have a reasonable expectation of the content you’re being presented with.

Over on the other side, there’s more of a variety on offer. Establishing captions in Marvel books differ from the DC variety in that they vary depending on what you’re reading, on who the writer is, or the editor. For example...

An typical caption from an Avengers title (it's actually from Avengers #3). It tells where the story's taking place, it gives you an idea of what's happening.

And here’s a Spider-Man caption, from Superior Spider-Man #2.

Captions are few and far between in the Spider-Man books, mainly because the primary Superior Spider-Man title has a first-person narrative structure going on which negates the need for establishing captions. If there’s a need to say where the scene is happening, the Spider-Man character says it. 

The flip of this is that where ECs are used, they tend to be an extension of the first-person narrative line and thus of the character. It's shown well in the 'Lunch' panel, with the use of 'the Watson woman' summing up the Spider-Man character's disdain in three words, and in this later sequence (truncated for space reasons, and also to prevent giving away the gag):

I rather enjoy the Marvel caption styles, preferring the variety (and the variety of dramatic tones) presented by them to the generic feel of the DC caps.

However, somebody’s throwing a spanner in the works.

Here’s a caption from Fearless Defenders #1 by Cullen Bunn and Will Sliney. It’s your basic EC:

Nothing wrong there. If anything, it's a short-cut; it saves on a character having to spout a bundle of exposition later in the sequence. It's also miles away from the over-written captions you’d see up until fairly recently – captions like this, from Defenders (the original run) #10, by Steve Englehart and Sal Buscema...

...which pretty much ignores the whole 'show, don't tell' rule by, well, telling (and telling exactly what's in the panel, too. Which saved me capturing the whole thing).

So far, Fearless Defenders, so good. But then this happens:

We’re moving along here from the caption as establisher of place and time to the caption as establisher of person.  Again, it’s not in itself a bad thing. It introduces a character quickly and efficiently. This Annabelle Riggs is new to me, and although I prefer show rather than tell, I can understand the reasoning in giving over a great deal of detail about her in the form of a caption.

Oh, but then this happens:

This moves the role of the caption into an entirely new realm. We’re going now into the caption as establisher not of time or of place or of person, but of personality, of character, certainly of sexual identity and possibly of motivation.

This caption – although it’s entertainingly done and adds something of a comedic, bathetic air to what could be a controversial sequence (though I dearly hope that in this 21^st century in which we’re living, nobody cares who Annabelle Riggs likes) – is very much like the one from the 1970s Defenders comic in that it's very very much tell rather than show. It’s a pretty much redundant tell at that, seeing as we’re witnessing a kiss between Riggs and Valkyrie, who doesn’t get a ‘likes girls’ caption of her own, or a ‘digs guys too’ or a ‘just caught up in the heat of the moment’ or any other declaration of her sexuality. Nor does Misty Knight, the book’s other lead. Nor does anybody else. It would have been nice to see Riggs’ character grow and for the ‘likes girls’ aspect of her to be a natural part of that growth, but instead there’s a "Lesbian Archaeologist" sign taped to her back the moment she hit the stage.

I’m sure that Bunn isn’t singling out a lesbian character for special attention, and part of me feels that the caption is there to make the character absolute, to prevent any future writer of the Riggs character from retconning the “likes girls" part of her away. Look! There it is! It’s in a big caption! SHE LIKES GIRLS! But another, opposing, part of me feels that kind of Broad Stroke instant characterisation isn’t necessary or desirable.  

Don’t let me put you off Fearless Defenders. It’s an enjoyable book, it’s well-written, and it uses a bunch of Marvel’s female characters to good effect. It’s pretty much stand-alone, without the security of being part of the Avengers group or the X-Men group and as such it’ll have a tougher time staying alive than a lot of other titles (the fact that a Defenders title hasn’t made it past a year since the original run doesn’t bode well, either). I actually looked forward to the second issue, which was as much fun as the first. Also, the book has the most entertaining covers. 

So, in conclusion; good book, one not-entirely-necessary caption. Fearless Defenders joins the list of titles that have made me interested in Marvel comics for the first time in around twenty years. Result.

Now then, about the use of individual caption styles within the group style, as seen in Matt Fraction’s Fantastic Four and FF…

(NOTE: In an interview published after this piece was written, Fearless Defenders writer Cullen Bunn has gone into 'The Kiss' and explained the whys and wherefores of the scene. Hunt it down, the guy knows what he's doing. Far more than I do.)

Last One For Today...

...is also the last scan from Love Romances 96. Apologies for the poor quality scan of a book that was literally falling apart. This issue was lent to me by someone who'd heard I'd become infatuated by old romance comics. A little research into it (which I should've done a few posts ago) tells me it's a Marvel comic from around the time they were just stopping being Atlas Comics - this issue was published in November 1961, which makes it contemporaneous with Fantastic Four #1 (and with me).

Credits: Stan Lee scripts, as was generally the case; interior art by Jack Kirby, Vince Colletta and Bob Forgione. I don't think the strip I've been featuring is by Kirby, and it's probable that Colletta was inking, so maybe we should call this as being pencilled by Forgione (I am now expecting to be told that I am wrong, or that Forgione was Colletta, or was Kirby. I am not ashamed of not knowing this).

Anyway, here's the cover, which is pretty damn Kirby:

And here's one final, very pretty interior page:

Seriously, would you look at the inking on this? It's a bit lovely. 

W.O.M.A.N. (I'll Say It Again)

Love Romances 96 again. Still no further information. Slightly disturbing subtext though, don't you think?

It amuses me enormously...

... that one of the main referrals for this blog is something called gogetporn.net. Eagerly awaiting the bump in views that should come from last post's use of 'scat'.

Nobody Goes In There To Clean Up Anymore

From Love Romances 96. No other information available. Still, nice pipe, eh?

Someone Drew Those Specs On With A Sharpie When She Wasn't Looking

Don't know where this was originally published, but it's Gene Colan, and any Gene Colan is Good Gene Colan. 

Have You Tried Looking Behind Your Giant Telephone?

Pre-mobile hijinx from Our Love Story #1. Check out the Kirby shadows on what I hope is a lipstick! 

Don't Forget! My Love #3!

Repeated pleas regarding My Love #3, from the Bullpen Bulletins page in, er, My Love #3. Best not dwell on how many of those comics listed still exist. 

Spittle!

I don't know. Some issue of Stormwatch or other. They all blend into each other these days.

Thirty Seconds Before Being Told "This Carriage Is For Hat-Wearing Gentlemen Only".

Lee/Buscema/Romita, another old romance comic but I can't recall which. And look! None of those newspapers have any text in them! That girl's in trouble and no mistake!

Kirby Squirrels

More proof, if proof be needed...

...That Gene Colan was an absolute genius at drawing normal people. I mean, look at those passers-by.

It'll Go Very Nicely With His Giant, Oversized Shoes and Enormous Red Nose

Three fab-u-lous examples of late sixties dress sense from 'The Hurt And The Heartbreak' in Our Love Story #3, brought to you by Stan Lee, Don Heck and Frank Giacoia

Around The World With Bats

This…

...is the Batman & Robin Annual that's just been published by DC Comics.

It’s quite pleasant, in the way that Batman comics can be when they’re not tethered down by whichever group-wide or company-wide cross-over they’re lashed to in any given month.

The plot’s quite simple and also quite charming: Junior Batman, current Robin and Bruce Wayne’s lab-grown son Damian makes his way across Europe, sending messages to his father via iPad (or whatever the non-real-brand DC analogue for such things is). Daddy then follows this trail, finding unexpected items along the way. Obviously there’s a little more to it than that but you may want to read the comic yourself and it’s not my place to spoil it for you (though I will say that Bruce should have spotted Damian’s plan within one panel of the boy outlining it).

What entertained me most about the book was that Peter J. Tomasi and Ardian Syaf, writer and artist respectively, did a bit of research about the cities Damian and Bruce visit.

For a start, Damian’s first message to Bruce is shot in front of the British Museum (though this is not named as such). This is the panel in question…

…and this is the actual frontage of the BM.

Now, to somebody who’s lived in London for years and years and who knows it pretty well, this comes as something of a shock. Surely every American comic portrayal of my city knows that London is populated by  Cockneys in flat caps, black taxis that look like Chryslers, and badly-drawn Routemasters that could pass for furniture-removal vans?

It gets a little more interesting when Bruce and Alfred the butler get to London themselves, and head for the Lanesborough Hotel. Here’s the comic version…

 …And here’s the reality.

Pretty close, eh? Even more impressive is the part-obscured roadsign on the opposite corner from the comicbook hotel; it reads ‘Lanesborough Place’, which is technically the road in which the Lanesborough stands, although in reality it’s on Knightsbridge.

The only problem I have with this is that it’s too damn quiet. The Lanesborough overlooks Park Lane and Hyde Park Corner, which are not the quiet, Mary Poppins-esque traditional London sidestreets they seem to be from the map. They’re actually part of the busiest three-lane gyratory road systems in the city, and regardless of the hour they and the streets surrounding them are flowing with traffic.

But, you know what, it’s a comic so we’ll allow some artistic licence and move on.

Now it just so happens that Barcelona is one of my favourite cities in the world, second only to London, and it’s one I’ve spent a lot of time in. As we’ve already seen Damian in front of an iconic building associated with a specific city, it’s a good move to avoid repeating the trick. The easy option to identify Barcelona would be La Sagrada Familia…

…but that’s a big old place without an easily-recognisable frontage like the British Museum has; everybody knows the multiple spires, but how many would get it from the main entrance? So instead, there’s this…

…the Lizard from Parc Guell, one of Gaudi’s indelible stamps upon the city he made his own in a way that no other architect has in any other city (except perhaps Oscar Niemeyer with Brasilia, but that’s all harsh and modern and angular while Gaudi’s Barcelona just flows). Here’s the real one:

And it’s here that an element of doubt creeps in. It would be lovely to think that both Mr. Tomasi and Mr. Syaf did this Grand Tour themselves, leaving footprints for their fictional charges to follow. But in putting together this post, my research into photographs for the real locations has been nothing more taxing than dipping into a hotel’s website, or relying on my own knowledge and memories of the cities involved, or, mostly, looking them up on Wikipedia. That’s where (despite having many photos of all three of my own, real photos on real paper in real albums) I obtained the pictures of the BM, of La Sagradi, and of Parc Guell.

Admittedly, even this low level of picture research is more than you’d usually get in an American superhero comic (see above re London pictorial clichés), but it’s still a slight disappointment – even if it’s a self-inflicted one – to let go of the idea of the two men, separately or together, clutching suitcases and ramming trilbies down onto their heads as they dash for that all important Spain – Greece connecting flight.

It’s in Greece that Mr. Syaf actually does let me down a little. Admittedly, the landmark in this sequence isn’t named as such, but it’s pretty much obvious it’s meant to be The Parthenon. 

Except, this is a fairly cut-down Parthenon:

See? Just not enough columns!

Eventually Bruce ends up in London again, where he meets up with Damian and where Alfred’s been indulging in his old career of acting, because if you haven’t acted in years all you have to do is turn up at The Globe and they’ll let you take a major role in that night’s performance because after all it’s only Shakespeare and…. Gahhhhhh!

  

Now then: the comicbook Globe...

... is very much like the real one...

...and that’s underlined by the fact that Bruce and Damian wait for Alfred by a fence outside the main arena. Even if you only take the Wikipedia photo as reference, the point of view’s been changed enough to keep the building fresh but still recognisable. Good work, Mr. Syaf.  The only thing that spoils this is, again, that The Globe is on a busy stretch of the South Bank, a pedestrianised stretch that is very nearly always full of people enjoying a stroll by the river or taking in some ART, for the South Bank is very much the cultural centre of the capital and you can’t walk more than ten paces without hitting some street theatre at the very least. Also, it’s a bugger to cycle along; too many changes of level and banks of steps, but that’s true of the river in general – it’s impossible to go more than ten minutes without having to lose sight of the water. But that's just something that annoys me, and you probably don't give a monkey's, do you? 

One last thing: Bruce Wayne is a rich man. A very rich man. Possibly one of the richest men in the whole fictional DC Comics world if not actually The Richest. I can quite happily believe this. What I can’t believe is that he’d wear an off-the-peg suit. Especially one of these…

 Ted Baker! Ted bleeding Baker! Might as well send Alfred down to French Connection while you’re at it! Actually, Alfred's right, it'd be perfect for travelling because you wouldn't care about getting it creased up, or spilling airline food down it. And that applies anywhere in the world. 

A Boy, A Girl, A Tree, A Bike

My Love #6, 1970

No sarky comment on this one; it's just a lovely splash page that has a tree in the foreground with a bike leaning against it. You wouldn't get that in any other 1970's Marvel comic. Also; Gene Colan and Sal Buscema did quite a few of these romance stories, but I can't think of them working together on any of the Marvel superhero titles. Not that it matters; Colan was a master at drawing the human form in civilian clothes, and seeing these non-costume figures just underlines the fact that the loss of this genre from the main publishers was one of the worst things to happen to the American comics industry.

She'd asked him...

... which member of his family he'd sleep with if he really had to.

Stan Lee/Gene Colan/Frank Giacoia,
Our Love Story #3, 1970