(NOT) LOVING THE ALIEN

THIS WEEK IN THEATRES...

* The Invasion, a new remake of the Body Snatchers starring Nicole Kidman that will hopefully be kicked out of multiplexes like so much outer-space ass.

THIS WEEK IN DVD REVIEWS...

* The First Films of Samuel Fuller - Eclipse Series 5, boxing up two decent efforts with one full-fledged classic.

* Peach Girl, vol. 4, a dip in quality for the anime soap opera.

Current Soundtrack: background noise

Current Mood: indecisive

e-mail = golightly at confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * ComicSpace * Last FM * GoodReads * The Blog Roll * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

All text (c) 2007 Jamie S. Rich

THE MILK GETS DELIVERED, WE SIT BY THE FIRE, YOU COULD SAY THAT WE'RE HAVING THE TIME OF OUR LIVES

Our story for Popgun is all finished and turned in. We're pretty stoked with how it turned out. Here is the title page:

Joëlle Jones also continues to gather fans. I found this little ode to her online the other day: Jesse Richards lists her as one of his favorite artists. "She specializes in drawing the most incredible women I've ever seen - I think it's the lips."

Of course, a few people like me every once in a while, too. I was well chuffed to see this post from Bryan Berg about selections from two of his favorite writers and the passages that ease the troubled times. (Hint: I come after the Neil Gaiman pages. Neil Gaiman!)

And Love the Way You Lovers, click on the image below to go to Ellerby's blog and see another preview of #5:

Marc also lets loose with some good news, so at least scroll to the bottom!

Current Soundtrack: Longpigs, The Sun is Often Out

Current Mood: fuck summer

e-mail = golightly at confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * ComicSpace * Last FM * GoodReads * The Blog Roll * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

All text (c) 2007 Jamie S. Rich

VIOLENT LOVE

Love the Way You Love #5 is on sale this week. Marc and I definitely have hit our stride at this point, and it's another issue we're really excited about. So, definitely look for it in comics shops tomorrow.

Current Soundtrack: Mansun, Kleptomania discs 1 & 3


Current Mood: ecstatic

e-mail = golightly at confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * ComicSpace * Last FM * GoodReads * The Blog Roll * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

All text (c) 2007 Jamie S. Rich

REST IN PEACE, MIKE WIERINGO

Wow. What a heartbreak of a morning.

When I read the headline at the Newsarama blog that said "Mike Wieringo Passes Away," my soul sank. "Please," I thought, "let this be a play on the title of some book he's working on, a bad joke, anything..."

But unfortunately, it's true. The excellent artist Mike Wieringo has died at the age of 44 from a heart attack. He was a talented guy with one of the best reputations in comics.

I'm sad to say I never met the man in person, but like probably so many people in the industry, I received nice notes from him or saw nice things he said about books I was working on in various places. He worked on one of Oni's Sidekicks books for practically nothing, a volunteer on the project because he was a fan. He was so talented, so sweet...this really hurts.

Please check out his blog. He updated it on Friday. It's weird that his final post was about mundane things, but I guess that's how life works, and hopefully means he was having a good time and doing what was important to him.

This picture really says a lot, doesn't it?

Good luck, Mike, in whatever afterlife you chose for yourself.

YOU CAN TOUCH ME IF YOU WANT

THIS WEEK IN DVD REVIEWS...

* Absolute Garbage, a video collection from one of the best bands of the 1990s, along with a retrospective documentary

* Film Noir Classic Collection, vol. 4, this year's Warner Bros. box, this time with ten hardboiled flicks

* Paradise Kiss, vol. 2 and Paradise Kiss, vol. 3, the last two discs in the top-notch anime adaptation of the Ai Yazawa manga

* When They Cry, vol. 1, the start of a creepy little horror anime series

* The Woody Woodpecker & Friends Classic Cartoon Collection, the massive, yet disappointingly poorly aged collection of Walter Lantz Cartunes

Current Soundtrack: Garbage, Absolute Garbage 2-disc edition

Current Mood: bored

POST SOOTHING OUT

Happy Birthday, Marc Ellerby!

The confessions123.com site has been dismantled, and depending on how you got here, you may notice that you're actually now at confessions123.com if you're actually on the blog right now. (Due to how my domain is hosted, the blogspot addy is also still in effect.) I wanted a more concise and obvious website for myself, the Lance joke that never really took off was lingering far too long. Eventually, I'll restore this to a full-service Jamie Rich base of operations, but that will have to wait until I figure out what I want and then figure out how to make it happen.

In the meantime, I've upgraded this place with links on the side and a little advertisement for myself courtesy of Amazon.

To entertain you, however...they have leaked the real cover for Popgun, the Image anthology Joëlle Jones and I have a story in. It's by my very own Mike Allred!

And speaking of websites, two of my favorite artists have just started sketchblogs. Click Joëlle's name above and you'll be taken to hers. But you know who else?

Chynna Clugston.

That's right. This girl:

Who draws stuff like this:

Current Workload: Proofreading my rewrite on Gatcha Gacha vol. 7; scripting the final chapter of Ark Angels vol. 3; promotion for Have You Seen the Horizon Lately?; pitches and proposals

Current Soundtrack: shuffle


Current Mood: nurturing

e-mail = golightly at confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * ComicSpace * Last FM * GoodReads * The Blog Roll * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

All text (c) 2007 Jamie S. Rich

I'VE BEEN DOWN FOR SO LONG (IT LOOKS LIKE UP TO ME)

Well, well, well, guess what goes on sale this week?

Here is the Oni site.

Read an exclusive preview of chapter 2.

I'm also editing Andi Watson's new Image series, Glister, which is 100% adorable all-ages ghost comics.

Andi has a Yahoo group where you can get a free preview.

In other links...

A new review of 12 Reasons Why I Love Her is up at Savage Critic, coutesty of Graem McMillan: "What tempted me in the first place, and turned out to be the best thing about the book, was Joelle Jones' artwork, which is graceful and cartoony in the best ways, letting the characters act in ways that support (and, in some cases, gloss over rough patches of) Jamie Rich's dialogue"

Also, take a look at this excellent Variety article about Oni and other comic folks and their journey toward the silver screen.

Current Soundtrack: various from Lee Hazlewood performing with Nancy Sinatra. I shall call you Sand. R.I.P.

Current Mood: mourning all this death

e-mail = golightly at confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * ComicSpace * Last FM * GoodReads * The Blog Roll * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

All text (c) 2007 Jamie S. Rich

THE HARSH TRUTH OF THE CAMERA EYE, part infinity

S5-20070802-007-800x600
Originally uploaded by paulbingman

Paul Bingman took this picture of me at the Street Fair on Thursday. If this were video, you would hear the little kids screaming as I try to set my books ablaze by bouncing the sun off of my giant, shiny forehead. Tired of the young boy's small-minded cruelty of making ants sizzle and pop, I'm slowly working my way up to larger objects. Next up: Houses of girls who reject me.

Current Soundtrack: The Coral, Roots and Echoes

Current Mood: the horror!

I WILL BE YOUR FATHER FIGURE

Dude! Me and Michael Cera!
Originally uploaded by The Everlasting Jamie S Rich

I actually posed for a photo. It's not every day you get to meet Michael Cera! He was an amazingly nice guy.

Keep in mind, I've met a lot of people in comics, and there are very few out there, at least on this side of the world, that I'm not going to be all jaded around. (If you knew the big names I've pissed off and who hate me, you'd be either appalled or impressed. Ditto on the male comic book creators I've lied and said I've made out with. Though it's true about Ellerby.) So, you meet someone like this who cracked your shit up from week to week on one of your favorite TV shows, and you just have to crow about it.


Thanks to Chynna for taking the photo. Head over to her Flickr account for more Con madness.

Current Soundtrack: The Editors, An End Has a Start

Current Mood: nerdy

JANE'S ESTRANGED

or

I AM THE ONE IN TEN, A NUMBER ON A LIST

THIS WEEK AT THE THEATRE...

* Becoming Jane, sets Jane Austen a-spinnin' in her grave. Anne Hathaway nobly tries to prevent the dizzy spells, but it's hopeless.

* The Ten, a smug indie comedy about the Ten Commandments from one of the Stella guys, which I'd say is the worst movie I've seen this year. Et tu, Paul Rudd?

* * *

Thanks to the couple of you that were able to come down to the street fair at the last minute yesterday. The whole thing came together very fast. It turns out that it was a First Thursday celebration of the completion of the light rail, getting construction off of 5th and allowing businesses to get back to business. Oni Press was actually set up at the Floating World table while Jason ran the gallery show inside. I popped my head in for a second, saw Corey and Brandon's excellent work, and then popped back out.

There was actually no shortage of traffic there. Most people weren't out to spend money, and many of them were baffled by the fact that we were hawking comics (and more baffled by my novels sitting in the pile), but we sold a few things and it was a chance to talk with a lot of people we normally wouldn't see at comics shows. My sales were good enough to make the five hours worth it, and Joe Nozemack did a lot of networking. At the very end it almost looked like a fight was going to happen, when as we left a drunken meathead backed into Joe's dolly full of boxes while Joe shouted for him to watch out. He was ready to call it a no harm, no foul, though he kept saying, "Oh, that was bad, that was bad." His friend tried to egg him on, but we kept walking and it settled. Never underestimate the potential for violence at an art event.


Current Soundtrack: Midlake, The Trials Of Van Occupanther

Current Mood: groggy

e-mail = golightly at confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * ComicSpace * Last FM * GoodReads * The Blog Roll * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

All text (c) 2007 Jamie S. Rich

EROS IS SICK

I need to write more about Ingmar Bergman and Michelangelo Antonioni, but I need to wait until the time is right, until my brain is in its proper place within my skull. I'd like to maybe watch a film of theirs I've never seen and use that as a starting point. But first, as if by some cruel design, I have to finish a Woody Woodpecker box set that is absolutely painful and no help at all in dislodging Comic Con from my consciousness. I had no idea Woody was so bad, because I loved him as a child. I'd have rather this area of my childhood be kicked around in some manner like they are doing with Underdog in that ridiculous movie that really has nothing to do with Underdog. I suppose this is more honest, as it's the material itself that doesn't live up and not some retread, but at least I still have Underdog, right? I don't have Woody anymore. (To further digress, someone should kick Jason Lee in the nuts. Between Underdog and Alvin & the Chipmunks, the man is embarrassing himself on the path to being the new Cuba Gooding. Way to spoil success, dude.)

Anywayyyyy...

Criterion has posted a beautiful tribute to Antonioni on their blog.

Christopher McQuain writes a personal eulogy.

And Time has Woody Allen discussing his hero, Ingmar Bergman, and Antonioni both. Until reading that, I never connected Woody's one-act play "Death Knocks" to The Seventh Seal. Duh. It's so obvious. Before every seeing a Bergman movie, I played Death in "Death Knocks" as my final project my senior year in drama in high school. I loved playing Death.

Please take the time to read them. I should have also noted yesterday that not only did Bergman's Scenes from a Marriage have a massive impact on 12 Reasons, but so did Antonioni's La notte. It's an aching movie, but gorgeous. I get a little misty just thinking about it. Marcelo Mastroianni and Jeanne Moreau walking through Italy one night, talking over their dissolving marriage, searching for meaning, for love, for whatever it was that once connected them that they can't see anymore. It was the second Antonioni movie I ever saw, after Blow-Up, which I watched for the Britpop connection. La notte was the first I watched thinking, "I'm going to watch an Antonioni movie." I bought the DVD for $5 in a used bin at Music Millennium (the 23rd Avenue location, which is in the process of closing; oddly poetic). It was a random choice bought on the cheap, but I've never stretched a five-spot that far. It reverberates in who I am, as a writer and as a person, to this day.

Current Mood: sad

A DOPE WITH NEITHER GUNS NOR FUCKING IN THE STREET

Updated with Exact Location

Turns out there is some kind of street fair going on in Portland tonight, connected to the usual First Thursday events. (For those who don't know, every first Thursday of the month, Portland galleries citywide put on new shows and open their doors to the public. Being such a comic book town, last month we had three comics-related shows within three blocks of each other.) It also turns out that Oni Press has a booth there, and they have asked me to come down and sign some books.

Details: Starting at 5:00 PM, on 5th Avenue between Davis & Everett, I will be at the Oni Press booth on the side of the event facing North. The signing should go on for several hours.

I am told that both Have You Seen the Horizon Lately? and the fifth issue of Love the Way You Love should be there, as the initial stock is back from Comic Con.

It should be easy to find. Hopefully, we will be near Floating World, who have their own gallery show going on tonight. Corey Lewis and Brandon Graham will be showing art, as well as celebrating Brandon's cool-looking new Oni comic Multiple Warheads. I'll make sure to stop in there to pick up my new comics (Metal Men #1 is calling me), so I'll tell Jason where we are, and if you need to, just go ask him. You should check out Corey and Brandon, anyway. The poster alone rocks:

Current Soundtrack: Sharkboy, The Valentine Tapes; Christina Aguilera, Back to Basics


Current Mood: rushed

e-mail = golightly at confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * ComicSpace * Last FM * GoodReads * The Blog Roll * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

All text (c) 2007 Jamie S. Rich

PROFESSOR, WHAT'S ANOTHER WORD FOR PIRATE TREASURE?

Okay, first up, I have uploaded a gajillion photos. I have my own group where you can see all of mine, though I have also added some to the massive SDCC 2007 pool. I had to unexpectedly update my Flickr account to do this, costing me $25. So, I'm going to do a rare suggestion of maybe dropping a tip in my Paypal account as a gesture to keep this blog as up-to-date technologically as I can. No pressure. Just use my golightly[a]confessions123.com addy. You'll be put on a list that I promise will eventually get something special some day, as soon as I figure out what that special thing is.

Yeesh, that was uncomfortable. Anyway...

I barely every buy anything at comics shows. Here are my three purchases for this year:

* Belle du Jour by Bill Presing
* Edison Steelhead's Lost Portfolio: Exploratory Studies of Girls & Rabbits by Renee French
* The Con-exclusive THB by Paul Pope

I wish I had bought the new Clio Chiang sketchbook. Joëlle picked it up Sunday and I meant to get over there, but I forgot. I also forgot to seek out Cliff Chiang. As far as I know, there is no relation. They just both rule.

These are the books I had come out at the show:

Expect to start seeing them in shops in the next two weeks. They both came out amazing. I am over the moon. Love the Way You Love vol. 5 has a minor glitch, with a chapter-ending caption from #4 appearing in the middle of #5, apparently left in the design template by a certain someone, but it shouldn't hopefully harm anyone's enjoyment of the issue.

Joëlle was selling two sketchbooks: the leftovers from our appearance at CAPE in Dallas last May, and one she made exclusively for the show.

There are still limited quantities available. E-mail me if you are interested. $6.50 each including postage, $12 for both. She makes a different one every time, so if you bought the other one I sold earlier this year, that was the Emerald City edition. Same cover as the SDCC, different content.

She can also make more You Have Killed Me shirts. Inquire about those, too. I will take orders and then confirm with you that the merchandise is available and set up payment.

I should have brought home some of Marc's wares to sell for him over here. I am so brainless sometimes.

I also neglected to mention last time that there were some good business happenings, at least one for each of us at the show, and there will be news soon, hopefully, regarding some stuff with Love the Way You Love and in the long-term, maybe a surprise outside project or two. So, not as cynical as I was earlier about the whole thing, now that the clouds are clearing from my mind.

Current Soundtrack: Roddy Woomble, My Secret is My Silence; The Rifles, The Dreams Of A Bumblebee

Current Mood: recumbent

e-mail = golightly at confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * ComicSpace * Last FM * GoodReads * The Blog Roll * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

All text (c) 2007 Jamie S. Rich