SPECTATORS - Part 98
Plus, win every issue of BKV's run on ULTIMATE X-MEN!
Are you ready for a wholesome, family friendly, totally safe for work installment of Exploding Giraffe?
Artist/co-creator Niko Henrichon, letterer Fonografiks and I remain dedicated to making Spectators exactly the kind of aggressively adult story we set out to tell more than two years ago… but this week, as our spectral protagonist Val thinks back to watching Terminator, her first R-rated movie, we’re actually going to keep things as “PG” as possible.
No ess eee echhs or other graphic content in today’s new pages or bonus content, but feel free to forward this to your guardian should you require Parental Guidance:
And we’re here every Monday evening, so if you ever miss a missive, please check that your overprotective sp@m folder hasn’t censored us. You can also get caught up directly in our Archives and blah, blah, away we go…
Dang, I forgot that there was one borderline naughty word in this week’s pages, but I hope Niko’s glorious colors made up for my filthy script.
Val’s vibrant flashback continues next Monday…
I was very sorry to learn that we lost comic legend Ramona Fradon, who only recently retired from drawing at the age of 97.
Here’s my one piece of original art from this beloved co-creator of characters like Metamorpho and Aqualad, a particularly splashy splash page from 1979’s Super Friends #27:
You can study some more original artwork from Ms. Fradon’s fellow pioneering comic creators in these past posts…
While you were at Dune Part 2 this weekend, my cinephile middle schooler dragged me to see Perfect Days, the latest from director Wim Wenders.
I was worried that this film (rated PG!), which follows a humble toilet cleaner in Tokyo as he experiences the beauty of everyday life, might be a little… twee for my taste.
But it was magnificent, a genuinely profound examination of existence that I’ve been unable and unwilling to stop thinking about since its final shot. Highly recommended for all human beings.
Which reminds me: What’s your favorite PG-rated movie of all time?
And I’m talking straight PG; no G-rated Pixar flicks or PG-13 Spielberg jams, got it? Google is your friend, etc.
As thanks for your careful consideration, our intern Genesis the Exploded Giraffe will randomly select one of you commenters to receive my comp copy of this $125 Ultimate X-Men Omnibus Vol. 2 (available at your local comic shop right now) that Marvel Entertainment was kind and/or contractually obligated enough to send me:
Look at the size of this absolute juggernaut, in which I’m lucky enough to be sandwiched between the writing of my friends Brian Michael Bendis and Robert Kirkman:
I hadn’t read much X-Men as a kid (I preferred “solo” characters like Spider-Man or Batman), but I quickly came to admire the titanic amount of memorable s3x and viol3nce that creators like Chris Claremont and John Byrne were somehow able to smuggle into an all-ages series, one that still managed to be regularly approved by the prudish old Comics Code Authority.
I was originally only going to write one arc of this “Ultimate” title (a gig that began back in 2003 after a bizarre meeting on the Fox lot; a story for another day), but I ended up staying for over twenty issues, in no small part because I got to work with some of the very best artists in the industry.
I usually show off original art from comics that helped make me the creator I am, but today, I thought I’d share some pages from comics that I helped make, specifically from my time with Marvel’s merry mutants.
(And if you’re a fellow collector who happens to own any other pages from these ancient issues I wrote in my roaring 20s, and you’re interested in potentially trading or -gulp- selling, please tempt me in the comments! I have a problem.)
The following bonus nonsense is just for you generous subscribers in The Tower, but everyone else, have a pure and virtuous week, and I’ll see you back here next Monday when Niko and I will return to our regularly scheduled smut.
Hi, Tower chum. How was your weekend?
Good news, it’s time for a somewhat special installment of…
Come Up and See My Etchings
Most superhero comics are about punching, but X-Men is about kissing.
Those are my core values, anyway, as demonstrated in this pyrotechnic moment between Angel and Dazzler pencilled by genius collaborator Stuart Immonen, one of the greatest storytellers in the history of comics, and inked by the equally gifted Wade von Grawbadger, from issue #63 of our run on Ultimate X-men:
In that same spirit, I own no artwork depicting Wolverine popping his trademark claws, but here’s a quiet moment of PG-rated romance from Logan by the incomparable Eduardo Risso:
I don’t have many covers in my immodest collection of comic art, but I was able to nab one personal favorite from an issue of Ultimate X-Men…