PIPELINE COMMENTARY AND REVIEW #91
28 February 1999
by Augie De Blieck Jr.
http://www.nic.com/~augie/pipeline
NEWS WEEK
Lots of interesting stuff in the news file this week. So let's have fun
with these blasted gits, shall we?
THE CUMULATIVE ATTENTION SPAN OF A GNAT
Whatever's in the water over there at Awesome, it sure is catching.
First we have Rob Liefeld. We generally know what to expect from him
already, but he sure is outdoing himself this year. So far we've had one
issue of RE: GEX, the series which he said he has zillions of ideas for and
could be his masterpiece. He was so sure of this, he even struck a movie
deal, which he would write and direct. After one issue of that, though, he
got bored and solicited for ROB #1, a semi-autobiographical book. That's
not out yet and already he's announced this third new project for the year:
taking over on CABLE.
So for those of you keeping count: In 1999, Rob Liefeld has solicited for
three different comic book titles, and produced 20 actual pages of work.
Now Ian Churchill is following suit. THE COVEN just wasn't good enough for
him. No, sir.
Let's read from Michael Doran's NEWSARAMA column, shall we?
Awesome Entertainment has announced the debut of an all new Ian
Churchill created mini-series entitled Lionheart. Written by
Churchill's Coven partner Jeph Loeb, the mini "chronicles the saga of
an ancient power that has been handed down throughout the ages, and
the woman who now shares its amazing properties."
So on top of the fact that Churchill can't manage to produce 6 continuous
issues of a series, he's now changing gears to a new series which bears a
description which would label it a WITCHBLADE clone, at best. Of course, I
believe ShadowHawk (with Alan Moore, Kurt Busiek, and Jim Valentino) beat
them both to the concept, but then someone probably beat them to that
concept long ago, too. In any case, I'm sure the breakout success that
Michael Turner and Joe Madureira have had drawing half-naked women with
oversized chests has nothing to do with this decision.
But, wait! It gets better! Churchill says this won't mean the end of THE
COVEN! (Heck, no. Should this series bomb, he'll need something to fall
back onto and proclaim his one true love.)
Rob Liefeld is also quoted as saying this:
"A special Coven: Origins issue written by Jeph and Ian will ship in
June and the Coven is also featured prominently in the pages of Coven
vs. Re: Gex, a 2-issue mini-series on sale in May and July. Ian will
then return to the Coven in late summer/early fall just in time for a
major new storyline."
So the two also-rans of the AWESOME set -- RE: GEX and THE COVEN -- will
meet up in a mini-series designed to be short enough for someone at AWESOME
to actually finish! Fancy that!
The sad thing is that they may just be the smarter people for this.
Mini-series sell better than titles with long histories. Heaven forbid
anyone buy THE SAVAGE DRAGON, right? It's almost at issue 60! It's
ancient in this day and age! (BTW, see the letters pages of the most
recent DRAGON issue for a beautiful rebuttal of this numbering system by
Erik Larsen.)
I'm surprised people still read SPAWN, but then nothing has really changed
in that series in more than 60 issues, and Todd McFarlane is introducing
something like 3 new Spawn-related series in the coming months, so maybe it
is starting to fade.
WEEK OF DEATH
I can't take it anymore. More of my favorite and potentially-favorite
projects died out this week than I care to count. But being the dedicated
columnist that I am, here's where the death toll stands:
* Sierra fired its programming staff in charge of the upcoming BABYLON 5
space simulator. The fate of that program is unknown, although it was far
enough along that they might cobble something together to release anything.
It remains to be seen if this is for the best or not.
* CRUSADE, the B5 spin-off series, was officially declared dead by its
creator, jms, this week. The Sci-Fi Channel couldn't afford to grow its
audience and bring in a loyal fanbase, so they had to pass on the series.
(I suppose they've never heard of deficit financing? I'm just being
cranky, is all.) TNT wouldn't finance any more of the project unless it
involved naked babes and four-letter words. UPN wouldn't buy it for fear
of having something intelligent on its schedule. And The WB wouldn't buy
it unless James Vander Beek starred. So rather than pour some model into a
skin-tight bodysuit in an effort to gain an audience at the expense of its
intelligence, jms closed it down. We wish him well on his future projects
and remember fondly BABYLON 5 as the shining beacon of light that it was --
a fully-realized 5 year story arc with the courage of its convictions.
* Chris Eliopolous' DESPERATE TIMES comic has ended with the fourth issue.
We wish him well in selling the strip into syndication. I look forward to
reading the further adventures of Marty and Toad in the local papers. =)
* MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATRE 3000 will be ending at the conclusion of the
upcoming 10th season. And there are still so many really incredibly bad
movies to make fun of, too. MST3K will live on with the web, but weekends
won't be the same with Mike and Tom and Crow. =( And whatever happened to
that MST3K comic book series? Oh, wait, that was an Acclaim property,
wasn't it? Nevermind. . .
UPDATE FILE:
Martin Wagner, who left HEPCATS because he can't stick to a schedule any
better than anyone mentioned in the first section of this week's column,
has found his new career in film. He's scheduled to storyboard Robert
Rodriquez's next film, described as a kids' adventure movie. With this
announcement, you can expect the movie to begin filming in 2005, just as
soon as Wagner has finished 30% of the storyboards and proclaimed financial
trouble since Rodriguez wasn't able to pay him on-time for his 6
sorta-continuous years of work. In response, Rodriguez will cite creative
differences, noting that Wagner hasn't been able to be creative in more
than a decade.
JUST PLAIN BIZARRE:
And this bit from Diamond Online from the Bizarro Pipeline file:
The title of Comics Journal #212 Year In Review (DEC981287F/$5.95) has
been changed to Comics Journal #211 Year In Review.
And they thought Todd McFarlane couldn't count !
THANKS
Special thanks to Michael Doran's NEWSARAMA and Beau Yarbrough's THE COMIC
WIRE for the newsbits in this week's issue, as well as Diamond Comics
Distributor.
http://www.mania.com
http://www.comicbookresources.com
http://www.diamondcomics.com
-Augie
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