CBR's Interview With Thomas Jane

I'm a fan of Thomas Jane's work. I even liked him in the Punisher and thought it was a shame that they made some poor choices in the script and didn't get a chance to make a sequel. HUNG, for which he has received a Golden Globe nomination, was a heckuva fun show on HBO, too.

I've never really sat down to hear about his comic book credentials. When I saw this pop up in my iTunes, I decided to play it. I was about to just comment on this to bust on the fact that they label him in the video as THOMAS JAYNE, but then it kept playing. Seeing him talk about growing up wanting to be a comic book artist as he started talking about Dave Stevens...and then seeing his eyes well up as he expressed what kind of man his friend and creator of The Rocketeer was...I thought this was worthy of attention for far better reasons then joking about a typo.

Ultimate Comics Walk-Up Sales For Oct 15th, 2008

From Lee Newman of Ultimate Comics, the list of top-selling books at one of their locations in North Carolina for what was released on 10/15/08. Pull lists are not included, as this is meant to capture what is being bought off the shelf.

1. Presidential Materials: Barack Obama
2. Amazing Spider-Man #573
3. Final Crisis: Legion of 3 Worlds #2
4. Final Crisis: Rogue's Revenge #3
5. Presidential Materials: Flip Book
6. Amazing Spider-Man #573 Stephen Colbert Variant
7. Ultimate Origins #5
8. Presidential Materials: John McCain
9. Scooby Doo #137
10. Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen Special #1

Presidential Material - JUGGERNAUT!!!! Yay, unfortunately this will slow down as I will not be reordering any more, the time is past. If I could guarantee delivery and sales for before the election I would, but to reorder at this point would be fiscally irresponsible (editor's note: did political debate talking points slip in here?)

Amazing-Spiderman - Despite what the interwebs say, when you take Peter Parker put him in his proper setting and thro in Venom and the Green Goblin to boot, he sells comics. Since the Colbert variant was a seperately ordered item all together we had ample quantities and I tracked as if it were another title.

Final Crisis Tie-Ins, these are the best of the bunch and written by Johns, none of the others perform as well. Wonder why that is?

Scooby Doo - Kid's books, if you buy them, they will come. This one often makes the top ten as does Tiny Titans. Now if I could just convince more kids to buy Billy Batson.

Jimmy Olsen - Yeah, have Robinson write a phenomenal comic book and it sells well, even when it ties into the odd Atlas Arc.

Not mentioned in Lee's notes: looks like maybe some readers that left the Ultimate titles are wandering back to see its death and rebirth.

Ultimate Comics Walk-Up Sales For Oct 8th, 2008

From Lee Newman of Ultimate Comics, the list of top-selling books at one of their locations in North Carolina for what was released on 10/8/08. Pull lists are not included, as this is meant to capture what is being bought off the shelf.

1. Presidential Material: Barack Obama
2. The Stand: Captain Trips #2
3. Secret Invasion: Inhumans #3
4. Ender's Game #1
5. X-Men Original Sin #1
6. Deadpool #3
7. Presidential Material: John McCain
8. Dark Tower: Treachery #2
9. Final Crisis: Revelations #3
10. Trinity #19

Presidential Materials - Being in a college town really helps come election time. The best selling items that this new location (9th Street, Durham) has ever had are the Obama by Ross Tee Shirt and the Obama comic book.

The Stand - Stephen King sells all kinds of books everywhere.

Inhumans - Fluke? Don't know, like last week's House of M: Civil War, this is a book that was not as popular as it was this week. I haven't read it yet, maybe something important happened.

Ender's Game - Good old Orson Scott Card, even when he removes North Carolina from the comic, it still sells really well. I was not old enough to realize the Ender's Game phenomenon when it happened last time... It will be interesting to see if it's success is a regional or countrywide thing.

X-Men Original Sins - Crossover appeal, plus a decent issue of Wolverine Origins not featuring Deadpool leading into it made this one sell really well.

Deadpool - A steady behemoth. This one sells more each time it comes out and has the most beautiful legs.

If Lee hadn't explained the college connection, my jaw would have absolutely hit the floor to see those Presidential Material books so high on the charts.

Happy to see that Deadpool's audience is building. Not surprised that an X-Men event is selling well, but can't comment on it until I read some of it.

The Stand doing so well has to be a bittersweet success for Marvel, with King moving his comic book adaptations to another publisher soon.

Hate to see the homophobe scoring a hit, but Ender's Game was a really good sci-fi novel.

Bob Fingerman Is Back!

Where did he go, you say? Well...I don't know. He's been a busy man with writing prose work (BOTTOMFEEDER was amazing) and then the HC graphic novel, RECESS PIECES (damn funny read), last year.

But IDW is bringing him back for serialized work and I'm thrilled!

Without further ado, a preview page Bob shared of FROM THE ASHES #1: