Comicsgirl

My real life has kept me preoccupied for the past couple of months. There are comics I want to review (and to those of you who sent me stuff a couple of months ago up until now — I’m going to get to it! I promise I promise I promise!) and other things, but the end-of-the-yearness has set in. Unless something really exciting happens, this is likely it for me until 2012.

This year is already kind of blurry. It was certainly dominated by Small Press Expo for me but I’m OK with that. It was an incredible amount of fun and I’m already looking forward to next year (we’re already working on it!).

I also read a tremendous amount of comics. There were plenty I loved — many I didn’t expect to — and I still get a thrill picking up new comics. Yes, there was certainly some silliness with regard to the DC reboot, but Wonder Woman has me hooked (in a lazy way — I read it when I remember). It was also an amazing year for indie comics — I am awed by all the talent that’s out there.

I didn’t get to travel to shows as much as I would’ve liked to — most of that was a money issue, but I was feeling pretty burned out on the usual ones. I didn’t attempt to go to the MoCCA Festival or New York Comic Con; KingCon III was postponed and as much as I would’ve loved to have gone to Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Festival, the timing just didn’t work out. SPACE was fun but I don’t know if I’d go back. I always love the Baltimore Comic-Con, but that was more of just a hanging out opportunity for me this year.

(I will totally take sponsorships if people want to send me to Stumptown or Alternative Press Expo next year. Kids Read Comics Celebration is taking place in Ann Arbor on my birthday weekend and that’s a definite possibility. It may end up being mandatory.)

For some reason, in 2011, I expanded my “media” “empire.” I started up a Tumblr account (or started using it?) and a Facebook page. I also appeared on local show Fantastic Forum and Rusty and Joe interviewed me during SPX (I need to learn to speak into the microphone better. Also? No real idea what I said).

I was also greatly honored to be a part of Big Planet Comics Podcast #17 and I do hope they invite me back at some point because it was a great deal of fun (you should always listen to the podcast — even when I’m not on it).

And the photo on this post? Well, that’s me sorting through Dean Haspiel’s minicomics. Now, everything is going to the Library of Congress (I believe all are in the LoC’s possession now), but Warren Bernard just wanted to do an initial sort/inventory before we sent them off to see what was there. And certainly, it’s fresh in my mind, but when I think about all the things I’ve been privileged to be able to do this year, this felt like one of the bright spots. It was thrilling seeing all these incredible comics, even if I didn’t get to keep any of them.

I am lucky to know such amazing people who let me do so many cool things. I hope that continues in 2012.

I think I’ve actually been to the VA Comicon before. Or at least, I’m pretty certain I’ve been to some comic book show in this very hotel (but that was at least 15 years ago, if not longer). It all seemed very familiar.

I wouldn’t really define this as a con, personally, but I suppose they can call it whatever they want. It’s one room of people selling comics — mostly back-issue type stuff, but a few small press people.

Small press people including, of course, AdHouse Books, which is mostly why I went (I figured if I wasn’t going to MoCCA — I couldn’t exactly afford it and it seemed like a hassle — I should still get to have some comics-related fun). I make no secret of my love for AdHouse. I love the diversity of books AdHouse publishes — even if they’re not all going to be to my taste, I know they’re going to be intriguing and original. Publisher Chris Pitzer just obviously loves comics and that shows in the books he releases.

So yeah, I basically just went there to see Pitzer and pick up some AdHouse books and to drop off some copies of Magic Bullet #2 for distribution in Richmond (the people behind the registration table looked at me a bit strangely when I asked if there was a freebie table, then eyed the copies suspiciously. It’s a comic newspaper! It’s cool!).

I tried to hand-sell Remake to two different people. The first young teenage boy wearing a Nightmare Before Christmas hoodie, so I figured he was the target audience for this comic. But he seemed a little put-off by my insistence and ran off with his friend. Then we tried to sell it to a young woman by telling her “It’s like Scott Pilgrim!” After she informed us she didn’t like Scott Pilgrim, I said “It’s better than Scott Pilgrim!” I failed there, too. (It’s not like there was anything in it for me — it’s not my comic. I just like Remake. Sadly, Remake Special wasn’t ready for this show).

I wandered the rest of the show a bit, but it wasn’t that big (about what I expected) and mostly various back issues. Since I just cleaned out a bunch of comics and I’m not a collector anymore, there wasn’t anything in particular I was looking for. But I like shows like this. I liked the few people who actually came in costume. After all, I grew up here, and while Richmond is a different and cooler place than it used to be (or at least, that’s my sense of it), I also know it’s not always easy to find where you fit. If there’s a sense that other people like what you do, that can go along way.

Would I go out of my way to go to this show again? Probably not, but it worked out nicely that I got to go.

A friend suggested I should call this post “MoCCA SUCKED!” just to get attention. But I don’t think MoCCA Festival was really all that bad. Not exactly. Just maybe a little bit off. And all cons and shows should be allowed an off year.

Still, no one seemed particularly excited about it this year. I was, more or less, but it wasn’t the all-consuming “I can’t wait!” excitement I’ve had in the two previous years. Basically, MoCCA (when I finally got it into my head what days it actually was) became a good excuse to get out of town for a couple of days.

I remember spending brunch last year on the Saturday of the show studying a print out of the long list of debuts that Robot6 had posted. That blog had three posts this year, as far as I can tell, on MoCCA, and none of them were that extensive. The Beat had a little bit more, but still, it didn’t seem like there was really that much new stuff. (A lot of the coverage of MoCCA seemed to be more about events surrounding it — pre-parties and signings and after-parties and such — than the show itself.)

And my experience with the show kind of made that clear. I mean, certainly, when you go to a bunch of these things that are all centered along the Mid-Atlantic, you’re going to see the same creators again and again, quite often with the same comics. But I saw very few mini-comics that I hadn’t seen before. When I compare it to last year, where I felt like everything I saw was new and exciting, this just felt like more of the same.

The bigger publishers — First Second, Fantagraphics, Drawn & Quarterly, etc. — were doing good business and my web searches seem to indicate that’s why a lot of people were there. Don’t get me wrong — I was delighted to have Mike Cavallaro sign my copy of Foiled!, but I’m not someone who really cares about getting books signed all that much. If I want books from these publishers, well, that’s kind of what Amazon is for. (I know that sounds terrible, and I’m only partially serious, but you get my point.) The bigger-name guests like Frank Miller also kind of seemed out of character for the show.

So what do I think happened this year?

I think the change to April — even though people knew it since last year — threw some people off. Comics take time and when you’re used to knowing you need to have something done by June, you may be hard-pressed to get it done by April instead, even if you have a good amount of warning.

I also know exhibitors weren’t too happy about various issues last year — floor layout, the heat, and even the building itself. I don’t know their reasons, but there are a handful of people that I’ve seen in the previous two years that weren’t there this year. (A friend overheard on the train home that exhibitor space didn’t sell out — which would explain the random round tables occupying some of the space in the back.)

MoCCA this year faced some competition — both from Boston Comic Con and Stumptown Comics Fest in two weeks. The economy being what it is, I think some West Coast creators that may have done MoCCA otherwise had to pick between the two and stuck with the one that was closer to home. (That happened to me — last year, I had every intention on making it to Stumptown this year.)

And about that: I’m not necessarily blaming this all on the economy, but I have noticed that so far this year, some other events have seemed a little scaled-back. I think last year, we were all hurting but we had plans in place and were able to go through with them. This year, we’re still hurting which meant we had to make some choices. Maybe solo creators couldn’t afford the table fees; maybe they didn’t have the funds to get their comics printed. And so that left the “bigger” indie publishers — who are in the one part of the publishing industry that’s not entirely sucking — to pick up the slack.

I don’t really know, though. I think MoCCA’s in transition and I think that’s OK. It’s still a good show and I think it will continue to be a good show, even if it changes into something else (on Geek Girl on the Street, I mentioned I think there’s absolutely room for a “literary” comic con, and if that’s the direction MoCCA moves in, that’s cool).

Still, I think for me, if next year is a choice between going to Stumptown and going to MoCCA, I’m going to Stumptown (mostly because I’ve never been).

But Drink & Draw Like a Lady was blast and I’m glad I came here just for that.

This will be a quick and incoherent post (if you’d like to read my slightly more coherent thoughts, they’re here) but it was a Good Time so I felt the need to post again about it here.

Yeah, there were the usual suspects, but there were also a lot of newbies. And I mean that in the best possible way. Look, I love (just about) everyone that makes comics but the more you go to cons and shows and such, the more you see the same people over and over again.

A lot of the women at this were young (like I probably have a decade on many of them) and that’s awesome (I will probably be using that word too many times here). I love that many of them came to this by themselves because they thought it sounded like a neat thing. And while there were some “names” there (and I mean that with respect — to me, some of the women there are famous), everyone felt like equals. We were there because we loved comics and we wanted to meet other people who loved comics.

I know some men have kind of grumbled (even if it’s mostly jokingly) about how it’s sexist and exclusionary. And maybe some of them sort of have a point (but I’d also like to point out that men who make comics have no shortage of opportunities to hang out with each other), but this didn’t feel like anyone was being left out. It felt very welcoming and very friendly.

I’ve been reading comics a long time (almost longer than I think some of the attendees tonight have been alive — no, I’m not kidding) and there was a time I figured that such a thing like Drink & Draw Like a Lady could never exist. It’s a powerful and wonderful thing and I’d love to see the concept take off even more (I know there will be one before Stumptown this year). It’s really that good.

(And now, I am crashing. I spent six hours on a bus — when it should’ve been about four and a half hours — in front of a group of guys going to a bachelor party in New York, and oh, from their conversation, it showed. Tomorrow will be a long day at MoCCA and running around the city so I need my sleep.)

I know plenty of people in the area make fun of tourists’ desire to go look at some flowering trees, but it’s nearly cherry blossom season, which is one of my favorite periods of the year. And that means the National Cherry Blossom Festival.

This weekend is the kickoff (yes, I realize that’s not quite April) — and the Family Day is always entertaining and cute.

The next weekend is the Freer’s annual anime marathon. They only have three movies this year, one of which I’ve seen, but I’ll still get up early, head into the city and get in line to see Chocolate Underground. Also that day is Silver Spring’s Big Cherry Block Party, which will be my substitute for the next weekend’s Sakura Matsuri, which I’m missing because …

That’s also the weekend of MoCCA Festival, with Drink & Draw Like a Lady that Friday. I’m still finalizing my travel plans, but I will try to be there Friday night for that. (And there’s also the Tim Burton exhibit at MoMA and Japan Society’s j-CATION – A Taste of Japan event with a show by Asobi Sesku if I thoroughly want to exhaust myself that weekend).

The next weekend I’m going to go see my mom for some downtime and to go to Richmond Craft Mafia’s Spring Bada-Bing.

Then, wrapping up the month is the final weekend of Festival Imagé at MICA. This is tentative because it depends on how dead I feel once the month is over.

Also occurring in April are two events I won’t (or can’t) be going to: Wondercon and Stumptown. One of these years, I swear, I’m going to make it to Stumptown. MoCCA shifting to April prevented me from going this year.

Thus far, May is wide open. And I’m thinking that’s good because I’m likely going to want to sleep through the entire thing.