Okay, it's time for the crappest game of Hangman in the history of crappy Hangman. Today Marvel released the above image with the below text:

"Megastars Jeph Loeb and Ed McGuinness (HULK, Superman/Batman) reunite this December for an action packed story of epic proportions. Want to know what it is? Find out in two weeks at the Cup O’ Joe Panel (Saturday, July 23rd at 2:45PM PST) during Comic Con International in San Diego!"

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Link: http://www.aintitcool.com/node/45198

What do Joss Whedon, Harry Knowles, Stan Lee and Morgan Spurlock have in common? Apart from being Geek gods they are also the creative talent behind the big screen documentary Comic Con Episode Four: A Fan’s Hope. The documentary will focus on seven fan's journey to and through the San Diego Comic Con, directed by Spurlock with Whedon, Knowles and Lee acting as executive producers.

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Link: http://www.comic-con.org/cci/cci_eisners_main.shtml

So this year's nominations for the Will Eisner Awards have been announced and overall it has once again made me realise that I inhabit a very small section of the comic book community. I primarily pick up Marvel and DC books, what most people would call the big two. I also get comics in about equal quantities from some of the samller publishers (smaller only compared to Marvel and DC, not really indy publishers) including Dark Horse, Image, Avatar and Boom Studios.

From this years list of nominations I have read precisely five books namely Thor, All Star Superman, Locke & Key, The Twelve and Invincible Iron Man. So really I can only comment on these books and their authors and artists. J.M. Straczynski who writes both Thor and The Twelve has had a great year especially with his BAFTA nomination for The Changeling and has been someone I've followed since his Babylon 5 days so I'd like to see him win something, not for The Twelve though as this hasn't finished yet. It's been a great well heandled series but I think you need to see the whole story through before winning an award for Best Limited Series. Just for his work on Thor alone I feel he deserves the Best Writer award, he has reinstated a dead character and made them feel vital and important without being contrived, not an easy task.

Of course also in the Best Writer category is Locke & Key scribe Joe Hill, he's burst onto the comic scene and hit the ball out of the park on his first attempt, unsurprising considering his impressive lineage being the son of Uber Author Stephen King. Of course Hill should be judged on his own merits and Locke & Key is easily the best debut comic I've evr read and has certainly smashed it's way into my top 50 comics of all time. So this put's me in a dilemma do I choose Hill or Straczynski? The compromise is this; Straczynski for Best Writer and Locke & Key for Best Limited Series, right that's that one sorted.

Invincible Iron Man is nominated in the Best New Series category and although I've enjoyed the writing and story by Matt Fraction in this series but the art has caused me some grief. I find the endless ridiculously recognisable photo referencing Salvador Larocca uses in his art drives me to distraction and brings me out of the story. For this reason I can't really root for it in it's category and I think it has some tough competiton in the form of Echo by Terry Moore of Strangers in Paradise fame and Air by G. Willow Wilson.

Most of the other entries are either new to me or I don't feel familiar enough to comment on and this disappoints me. I've been really trying to spread my wings in terms of the titles I read, making every attempt to try more 'indy' titles and anything really that I wouldn't 'normally' read but I can see from this list that I'm still a far way off from exposing myself to the very best the industry has to offer. When the Oscars come around I always endeavour to watch all or as many as possible of the films nominated in the Best Picture category and I feel I should at least do the same with comics so between now and the Eisner Awards 24th July 2009 at the San Diego Comic Con I will attempt to read all the titles in the Best Continuing Series and Best Limited Series categories. I'll let you know how I get on.

Those Listings in full:

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