This was one of the freebies from our recent visit to BICS 2009. Skizz written by Alan Moore and drawn by Jim Baikie was first published in 1983, serialised over a number of 2000AD issues. The main character is Skizz an alien that crash lands on Earth and is helped by a school girl called Roxy. Its set in Birmingham UK which is very appropriate considering I picked up the book at the Birmingham Comic Con and I have lived in Brum for 11 years so have a certain attachment to it. I can confidently say that this definitely helped me along when reading it. It was nice to see that not only was there recognisable land marks in the art but also regional accents in the script.

When I started reading this book I didn't really know how old it was. I should have appreciated that Moore (see what I did there...), as at first I was feeling a little disappointed that all of the characters were utterly familiar. We have all met them all before and they were pretty unoriginal. The odd thing though was that although I felt like that I still wanted to read on. I think this is testament to actually how good Alan Moore's writing is, not only was I hooked but after checking out when it was written it made me think that the reason we are so familiar with these sorts of characters is because of Moore.

The artwork is not really quite to my taste. I didn't hate it but I felt there was a lot of unnecessary detail that confused the page more than it did anything stylistic. I generally like black and white though and after reading a few pages I got in to reading the art work.

On the whole I enjoyed this. Its a quick hit short story that is well told and has a definite end conclusion, even if it was pretty predictable. I wouldn't say rush out and buy this as its definitely showing its age but if you see it for cheap some where and fancy a quick story in between something a bit heavier then do it. I guess its a bit like picking up a cheap DVD from the corner shop although that does read a lot harsher than it sounded in my head.

Hollywood mining comic books for inspiration is not something new, it's been going on for a hell of a long time all the way back to Flash Gordon and the Saturday morning serials of the 1940's. Lately we've seen a boom in comic book adaptations, superhero chic is in and Hollywood exec's have fully embraced the concept purchasing the rights to every comic book and graphic novel they can get their grubby little hands on. In the last couple of weeks though we've heard there will be a Fear Agent movie, The Walking Dead tv show and now a Criminal Macabre movie looks set to hit the big screen.

What do these books all have in common? They're all very different in their approach but all beautifully executed but the main thing is they're all books I am in love with, you can find each one complete on my shelf perfectly preserved. Surely it must be that Hollywood have started spying on me, either that or they've started listening to the Sidekickcast (very unlikely) and they've thought there's a man that knows what he's talking about.

Of course what is more likely is that having exhausted alot of the mainstream books or publishers keeping hold of their properties for their own movie ventures, studios are now looking elsewhere for their comic book fix. Also they seem to have realised that there are only so many capes and tights stories you can tell before the masses get bored of the genre so they're reaching out to the indy creators and taking the most popular ones first.

I'm not going to keep banging on about Fear Agent (you can read that here) or The Walking Dead (you can read that here) but Criminal Macabre is a fantastic book by Steve Niles which follows the drug hazed exploits of paranormal investigator Cal Macdonald. When I say paranormal investigator I mean drunk private dick of the noir variety who due to a nasty near death experience can now see ghouls, ghosts and things that generally go bump in the night which put's him in a certain exclusive niche form of detective work. Steve Niles is not new to this comic book movie adaptation game as his vampire book 30 Day's of Night was translated into a fairly successful movie starring Josh Hartnett back in 2007. It seems as though he may've been courting this particular adaptation right from the start as he often has his close friend and business partner Thomas Jayne (The Punisher, The Mist) pose as Cal Macdonald for the covers to his books, surely a shoe in for the title role in the film. He would certainly get my vote to play Cal, the part requires a man filled with spit and venom being closer to The Last Boy Scout's Joe Hallenbeck than his film noir roots would suggest.

So let's assume for a second that I do have Hollywood's ear, here are my predictions for the next slew of comic book movie/tv adaptations based on what's on my shelf today:

1) Vertigo's Scalped as a HBO TV series. Jason Aaron's thriller on a native american reservation is a perfect candidate for the adaptation treatment and may already be in the offing.

2) Joe Hill's creepy otherworldly horror Locke and Key should definitely get the movie treatment. Will he follow in his father; Stephen King's footsteps and allow his work to be adapted for the big screen.

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