To revisit an earlier post of mine, the exact line in the V for Vendetta novelization is “I fell in love with you Evey.”

---

The downside of kids digging manga in book-stores: Gee, I really would have liked to have browsed your manga section, seen what was new, see anything I might like to spend some of my money on…
But, of course, it’s kind of hard to browse when you can’t even reach the shelves because there are so many kids sprawled out on the floor, incapable of moving aside after you say a polite “excuse me.” And if you do manage to reach the shelves, the books are so badly out of order because the kids don’t work there and don’t have to clean up so what do they care, that you can’t possibly find anything.
(And I’m one of those pro-manga, pro-kids-reading-comics guys, and this annoyed me.)

---

Once upon a time Mike insisted that I post some scans from a Harvey magazine about the forthcoming Baby Huey live-action film. He’ll be pleased to know thatit is now available on DVD.

(This may actually be old news, but screw it.)

---

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go let the last of the alcohol leave my system while I watch my brand-spanking new Bill Hicks DVD.

So, I went into the comics shop today to spend the money I got for my birthday. Aaron was working by himself because Mike was out selfishly getting his car fixed. He eventually showed up, but not before I had to explain to several customers who kept asking me questions about what books shipped and where they were that I didn’t actually work in the store anymore.

My big expense was some Detective 100-pagers that I’d had my eye on for awhile but could never afford because the presence of Manhunter back-up stories had jacked the price up. Now, don’t get me wrong, I think the Simonson/Goodwin Manhunter is great, but damn do they make the books more expensive than they need to be.

I bought a bunch of other back issues as well, prompting this conversation with Mike:
Me: Wow, DC Comics Presents starring Superman, the Phantom Stranger and the Joker! Fantastic!
Mike: Alex Saviuk drew it.
Me: Oh. Never mind.
Mike: But check out number thirty-two.
Me: Yet another Superman kissing Wonder Woman cover?
Mike: Kurt Shaffenberger Wonder Woman.
Me: All right, I’ll get it.

And now I’m off to eat German Chocolate cake.

(31, for the curious)

Feeling rather dull and listless today, so I’ll just spout random utterances until it’s time to go to work…

Yesterday both the Kammandi Archives and Marvel Masterworks: Captain Marvel were released. As I said at the time, it’s almost as if Marvel and DC were in a competition to how many works that don’t need to be made available in a hard-cover format they can churn out.

The Teen Titans/Outsiders Secret Files is almost worth getting just for the fact that it maintains that the Brotherhood of Dada (my personal favorite DP villains) are still in continuity.
–Speaking of which, once Byrne’s Doom Patrol series is cancelled, DC writers and artists are just going to pretend it never happened, aren’t they?

I’m not one to normally recommend the title, but the last two pages of the most recent Batman: Gotham Knights is already one of my favorite comic book sequences.

Chikyu Misaki from DC’s CMX line appears to be very good. Cute art, cute characters, an actual story in the making, and a nicely absurd premise. These are some of the things I look for in manga.

So, flipping through the most recent Essential Ghost Rider I realized I may have to change my assessment of the Ghost Rider film trailer from “terrible and by the numbers dumb action movie” to “improves upon the source material.” I mean, I can sort of see someone enjoying these comics in an ironic, so-cheesy-it’s-fun kind of way, but nobody actually thinks this stuff is good, do they?

---

Books I really do need to sit down and write reviews on:
Full Moon Fever
The Passion of the Keef
Young Magician
Queen Bee
Coyote
Gunslinger Girl
Hip Flask
Capote
Dead West

---

Moving on to Netflix…

I really wish the system would stop trying to get me to rent The Dish. I hate hitting the “not interested” button, preferring to use it to try and train the program to stop recommending films with actors I dislike, but I’m really not interested in the film and it keeps coming up on my log-in page.

I started watching the Lost first season discs and, well, damn. It’s good, isn’t it? Maybe not Homicide good, but still one of the better beginnings to a TV show I’ve seen in a long time. I think I want to get a few more discs in to see if they maintain the quality before decided whether to just go ahead and buy the damn set for myself or start watching the second season. (Yes, I know, already missed the premiere…that’s what repeats are for.)

I didn’t expect to like it, rented it anyway, and ended up really enjoying Nine Dead Gay Guys. It’s almost like a gay version of Snatch, done on a tight budget. Very absurd and occasionally surreal crime comedy. And any film featuring a character called “The Desperate Dwarf” and featuring the “really hard Red Bull test” as a plot point has to have some appeal.

On the other hand, I’m slightly disappointed that they apparently only have the edited version of Bear Cub available to rent. Given the number of what are, essentially, heterosexual soft-core porn titles in their catalogue, it’s frustrating that they chose not to carry the unrated version of that film.
(Not that I was only interested in it for the nudity and sex! I just hate watching something when I know it’s not what the creators intended me to see.)

Well, they weren’t entertaining at the time. But now I get to write about them on-line. It’s my own brand of passive-aggressive vengeance.

Me, answering the phone: Hi, [Store's Name], how can I help you?
“Yes, I’d like to buy some of the items you have listed on e-Bay.”
Were you the winning bidder in one of our auctions?
“No, I want you to end the auctions early so that I can buy the items directly.”
I’m sorry, but we don’t do that. If you’re interested in purchasing the items, you need to place a bid in the auction.
“Well why won’t you do it? I do this all the time with people selling things on e-Bay.”
For one thing it’s an unethical business practice, and for another it violates e-Bay’s terms.
“So what if I offered you $10,000 dollars for them, would you end the auctions early then?”
Are you going to offer me $10,000 dollars for them?
“No.”
Then let’s keep this conversation confined to reality, shall we?
“So, what is it going to take to get you to sell the items to me directly then?”
Tell you what…call me back after the auctions are over, and anything that doesn’t get bid on, I’ll entertain an offer for.
“But everything I want to buy has already been bid on!”
Oh, well, then I’d suggest trying to out-bid the current high bidders. Good-bye.

---

“Excuse me sir, but how much are you asking for a near-mint copy of Stupendous Insect Fellow #200?”
Let me check…$80.
“And what does The Guide say a near-mint copy is worth?”
Let me look that up…$90
“Will you accept $70 for it?”
Actually, I have a very-fine copy for $70.
“No, I want the near-mint copy for $70.”
So…you want me to sell a book that we’re already charging less than The Guide price for, for the same amount we’re asking for a lesser condition book?
“Yes. Will you?”
No.

---

“Does anyone ever actually buy any of the adult comic books?”
Yeah, all the time. In fact, sales on the Eros books help subsidize the less profitable Fantagraphics titles.
“Okay, sell me a bunch of Eros books then.”

---

“So, did they kill Hawkman or what?”
“So, are they introducing a new Hawkman?”
“So what happened to Hawkman?”
“Is Hawkman dead?”
“Why didn’t they give us any advance notice that they were going to kill off Hawkman?”
“If Hawkman’s dead, why is he running around in JLA and Rann-Thanagar War?”
Because. They. Didn’t! Kill! Hawkman! It’s just another god-damn storyline tease!

---

“I’m looking for some comics for my kids.”
Sure, what were you looking for.
“Marvel super-hero ones. But, not any of the new ones. I only want the ones that are okay for kids.”
(Actually, we get this quite a bit. What people mean by this is “Comics written after I stopped reading them are not appropriate for children, because I simply assume that is the case. And I’m certainly not going to let the guy who sells comics for a living offer any input on what my kids may or may not enjoy.” The funny thing is, we can always tell when these people stopped reading comics, by what their cut-off for “appropriate” material is. So if they stopped reading comics in 1968, nothing from the seventies on up is okay for kids. If they stopped in 1982, anything more recent than Secret Wars is right out. It’s another symptom of the “my children should be nostalgic for my child-hood” thinking that comes up whenever the conversation drifts towards comics for children.)
So…which super-heroes in particular, then?
“Iron Man and Frank Miller era Daredevil.”

I think that’s the only time in my life I’ve heard a Frank Miller comic described as being for children…

I can’t remember the last time we were actually able to unload all the boxes and get everything organized and ready before we opened the doors, yet somehow we managed it yesterday.

It was a remarkably snark free day, as well, apart from the previously mentioned discussion of what a new issue of All Star Batman foretells for the next week or so of online comics discussion. Mike kept pointing out pages and dialogue he was certain were going to anger people unreasonably. I saw stuff in comics that will almost certainly anger people too, particularly Kirby purists, but it was in a book that doesn’t come out until next week, so you’ll all have to wait until then to get your ire up.

Which isn’t to say the day was completely free of aggravations. A not insignificant number of items were missing from our shipment. I also discovered a new variation of “reading the comic when you have no intention of buying it,” namely “tracing pictures out of the comic when you have no intention of buying it.”

Highlights of the week were probably Full Moon Fever and the new Keith Knight book, The Passion of the Keef. Oh, and a bunch of super-hero comics came out too.

Speaking of which, I finally finished reading the comics that came out last week, and I’ve noticed a glaring and improbable continuity error in one of the Seven Soldiers books:

Lies! A damnable, dirty lie! There’s no possible way Ted Grant lost to a match to a one-eyed mook who hangs out with a freakish super-genius baby!

Let me elaborate on that last post a little:

When the tranny in a thrift-store wig is the normal person in your group, your little coterie has gone way beyond the boundaries of “charmingly eccentric” and are deep into “freaking weirdo” territory. And I’m not making fun of the tranny. As I said, she was the most level-headed and well-socialized member of the group. It’s her friends that have made me realize that there’s a whole other level of strange behavior from comic fans that I wasn’t previously aware.

Other highlights of the day included:

The born-again Christian gamers trying to convert people in the store.

The yelled conversation about anime, including why it’s “immoral” for copy-right holders to try to protect their copyright. Not loud. Not enthusiastic. Talking to the person standing less than five feet from him as if she were fifty.

Cryptic message being left by co-workers, none of whom could remember who wrote it or why. These messages would contain lots of information, but none that was actually needed. Like one that contained a name, a phone number, and the title of a comic. And? Did this person want to buy? Sell? What? And as is the wont of my co-workers, no one could remember whether or not they were the ones who wrote the note in the first place.

This winner of a conversation: “Do you have any Western Cowdude comics?”
Hmm, let me check. No, we don’t have any at the moment.
“So, where would they be?”
Well, if we had any, they would be in this box. But at the moment we don’t have any.
“Do they still make them?”
No, they haven’t made them in about forty years.
“So when do you plan on getting some new ones in?”
…Unless someone has a collection of them and brings them in to sell to us, we won’t be getting any.
“So do you have any Western Cowdude comics?”
…? Uh, no. Sorry. If we had any, they’d have been in this box which I just checked for you.
(Five minutes later, to one of my co-workers): “Do you have any Western Cowdude comics?”

And this was all combined with the normal Wednesday crush and the normal Thursday crush. So, yeah…one of those days.

I’ll sum up my day so far in one word: fuck.

(postmodernbarney.com) presents: The People Kid Chris Got To Deal With While Dorian Got Caught Up On Inventory Related Tasks!

• People who wanted to know how much their “really old” Spider-Man comics are. The ones with the “holographic” covers.

  How can you tell your comics are worthless? They say “collectible” on the cover.–Kid Chris

• People who kept describing the Rock-N-Roll biography comics as “ragin!” Without any detectable irony.
• People looking for war comics to send to soldiers in Iraq.I’d think the last thing they’d want to read is a war comic. They’d probably like some rock comics more.–Kid Chris
• People who wanted to negotiate the prices of bags and boards.
• Customers who “help” put back issues away, who of course put them in no determinable order whatsoever.
• People coming in and using Wizard as a shopping guide, then getting testy when we happen to be out of whatever book Wizard says is “hot” this week.
• People arguing with him about the actual content of comics.
  “Hey, I’m looking for a comic, it came out in the mid nineties, it’s about this girl with like demon wings and she’s got a little demon pal and she fights demons.”
  Kid Chris: Darkchylde, maybe?
  “No, that’s not it. I think it might be called Darkness.”
  KC: No, it’s not Darkness. Here, this is Darkchylde, it came out about ten years ago, it’s about a girl with demon wings, she has a little demon pal and she fights demons. I’m pretty sure this is probably what you’re looking for.
  “No, that’s not it.”(As an aside, I’m now desperate to know how many other comics came out in the mid-90s about girls with demon wings and demon sidekicks who spent all their time fighting demons, since he couldn’t possibly have been looking for Darkchylde…)

  The other one he got was:
  “What’s the name of the first Sin City book?”
  KC: Well, the current edition of the trade is The Hard Goodbye.
  “No, I’m pretty sure it’s just Sin City.”
  KC: Uh, we have it right here, it says on the cover The Hard Goodbye.
  “Well, then that’s not the first one. Do you have the first Sin City comics?”
  KC: Actually, the first Sin City comic ran in Dark Horse Presents.
  “No, it was just in a comic called Sin City.”

• People looking for Sin City and 300, getting testy when they find out we’re a)out of 300 and b)only have a limited selection of Sin City trades in at the moment. Especially when it’s obvious that the people asking for 300 only care about it because a movie is coming out (they tell us this, by the way. “It’s going to be a movie, I want to get it before it gets expensive!”), and a good number of the people looking for Sin City are “artists” looking for stuff to trace. And, I half suspect, people looking for tattoo designs.
  “I want Nancy on my back!”
  “So…you want me to cover your back with black ink and only leave a couple of white spots that vaguely suggest a female form?”
  “Yeah!”(And, as an aside again, why is it that the sudden interest in Frank Miller isn’t translating to any of his, you know, good comics? Why are people only asking for Sin City, 300 and occasionally Hard Boiled. Why isn’t anyone asking us for Martha Washington comics? Hell, I’d even settle for people asking for Daredevil, but as it is I’ve had customers insist that Frank Miller never worked on any superhero comics…)

What with all the “outraged” letters to Young Avengers over the implied relationship between Asgardian/Wiccan and Hulkling, and even with the knowing references to their relationship that Heinberg keeps putting in other character’s mouths, it would be nice if Marvel had the guts to just actually have both characters come right out and say, on panel, that they’re a couple. As it is, with the coy references, it’s a bit like watching Harry Hamlin in Making Love doing his “I’m a writer, I have to be open to new experiences” speech, rather than just come out and say he likes to have sex with men.
(And if my guess as to the nature of Hulkling’s powers is correct, namely that he is all or part Skrull, it’s only giving Marvel a further out. “They’re not a gay couple. They’re an inter-species couple!”)

Comics that seem to attract more than their fair share of the “read but don’t buy” crowd:
Metal Gear Solid
Street Fighter
Darkstalkers
Anything X-Men related
Robin
Nightwing
Inu-Yasha
Psychic Academy–the problem with “readers not buyers” on this title has actually tempted me to take it off the shelf and only bring it out for people who specifically request it.

The buying habits of the mint-hounds:
I’m opening up this discussion to other people who have, at any point, worked in comics retail. The mint-hounds, the “particular” buyers, the high-maintenance customers…you know the type. They pull every comic off the shelf to carefully inspect the spine on each one for tiny imperfections. They won’t buy back issues in anything other than “gem mint” condition.
Is it just me, or are they always, to a man, Marvel comics buyers? I never have anyone worrying about the condition of Silver Age Superman comics, but boy-howdy, that copy of last week’s Wolverine had better look as if it was never touched by human hands. Is there something about Marvel fandom that attracts these sorts of obsessive types?
And does anyone else have any customers that they suspect are buying certain back issues, not because they want them, but because they don’t want anyone else to have them?

Stories I couldn’t make up if I tried:
“Excuse me, but where are your Fantastic Four comics?”
Well, the new ones are on the shelf right here, and the older issues are right over here.
“Oh, no wait. These aren’t what I wanted. I want the Fantastic Four comic books.”
These are the Fantastic Four comics. Was there a particular one you were looking for?
“No, I just want the comic books. These all say ‘The World’s Greatest Comic Magazine’ on the cover. I don’t want a comic magazine, I want a comic book.”

“Do you have any comic book boxes?”
Sure, I have lots of comic boxes. Did you want a shorter box like the ones here on the counter, or did you want a longer box like those on the table?
“Is that what they all look like?”
Well, yes. They’re all just white card-board.
“Oh, I don’t want anything like that. Don’t you have anything that’s a little more chick-friendly that would look good in my house?”

Last week, on the whole, was hell. This week isn’t shaping up to be any better. I must find goofy comic-book panels to cheer myself up.

Anyway, here are some of the events of the last week I found notable:

I had a customer return a manga book because the creators weren’t Japanese. Hah! Take that, anglo-phone manga creators!

If “customers” are going to give me attitude about the store, I’m sorely tempted to give them something to give me attitude about. I want people in costumes strolling around the store talking loudly about the sexual perversions they wish to perform on the under-age female super-heroes while death-metal blares on the stereo system at maximum volume while I play Magic at the register.

When the first word out of the mouth of a child that has been dropped off at the store while his parents go to the gift shop two doors down is “library,” you know you’re in for a fun forty-five minutes.

“Which Sin City poster is this one?”
Well, let me look, there’s usually a description of the poster on the end…yep, it’s the Jessica Alba poster.
“Well, which one is that?”
…It’s a picture of Jessica Alba, dressed as a cow-girl, dancing. It’s the same image that was used for one of the movie posters.
“But what if I get it home and it’s not the right image?”
…So, there are pictures of half-naked, sweaty, bumping-and-grinding Jessica Alba that you’d be unhappy with?

“I need 23 current comic boards.”
Well, I’ve got a packet of 25 boards right here.
“No, I only need 23 boards.”
It’s actually cheaper to buy the packet of 25. That’s only $2.25, while the individual boards would be $2.30. It’s only a nickel, but still cheaper.
“I ONLY WANT 23 BOARDS! STOP TRYING TO PRESSURE ME INTO SPENDING MONEY ON THINGS I DON’T NEED!”

Comic book message boards:
“Infinite Crisis is going to ruin the DC Universe and drive all their readers away! I’ve already stopped reading all DC books and only come here to tell everyone how bad the books I don’t read are.”
City of Heroes message boards:
“Issue Five is going to ruin the game and drive all their players away! I’ve already switched over to World of Warcraft and only come here to tell everyone how bad the game I don’t play anymore is.”
These are the same people, aren’t they?

First statement of almost every customer picking up the V for Vendetta trade paper-back:
“Hey, this movie looks like it’ll be really good!”
Statement almost every customer makes upon putting the V for Vendetta trade back on the shelf:
“This doesn’t look anything like the movie.”

Today it was just me and Kid Chris in the store all day.
Every time a customer would ask one of us for help with something, immediately two or three other people would also chime up and ask for help.
Two of us in the store. Three to four simultaneous requests for customer assistance.
All day.