Some How I Will Make This Happen

I have to be sure to go this game—Game of Thrones jerseys at the Staten Island Yankees.  —Luis

Meet George R.R. Martin Night

Fandom Awakens

The internet almost broke last week with the debut of the Star Wars: The Force Awakens trailer. It was viewed over 30 million times in the first 24 hours, and caused Disney stock to go shooting through the roof. I was excited for this movie before, but am even more excited now. 

J.J. seems to have locked into what every Star Wars fan has been asking for and looks to have delivered an epic. Soaring John Williams music, desert locales, outer space dogfights, new droids, well-designed villains (Kylo Ren’s triblade), and the return of some original classics (I nearly lost it when Han says “Chewie, we’re home"). This is going to be huge. I wish it were December already!  —Luis

Time Traveling Fun

Mark Millar and Sean Murphy’s Chrononauts is a little bit Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid meets Back to the Future. Which is to say, it’s a lot of fun. Corbin Quinn and Danny Reilly are very much like the Newman/Redford characters in Butch Cassidy (and The Sting). Their relationship is the engine that drives the book. As they get deeper and deeper into shenanigans, you wonder how it's going to play out. While Millar's stories of late have seemed very made-for-the-screen (hard to argue with his thinking seeing how many of his stories get made into movies), this series is pure sci-fi comics gold. Murphy's pencils are great as well. As good as he was on The Wake, he seems even better here. I can’t wait to see the way this series plays out.  —Luis

Fight Owens Fights

A buddy of mine in the office is a huge independent wrestling fan. For months now he has been trying to get me to watch old Kevin Steen matches. I like wrestling, but I like it to be well-produced WWE-style, so I tend to shy away from the independent promotions. Kevin Steen then signed on with WWE and got placed at NXT as the renamed Kevin Owens. Now I see what all the fuss is about.

Since his debut in December, Owens has steam-rolled the competition. He is incredibly agile for someone his size with a remarkable sense of ring psychology. His mic work is already that of a seasoned veteran. I feel like we are watching the birth of a superstar. All of which leads me to his NXT title match with Sami Zayn (which the WWE greatly packaged, leaning heavily on the past history and friendship of these two men). 

No one expected Zayn to drop the title he had fought so hard to finally snag from Neville. Yet here he was in his first title defense getting absolutely mauled by Owens. The sheer physicality of it all was amazing. Zayn selling every powerbomb as if he were near death. The refs stopping the fight and awarding the belt to Owens was reminiscent of the classic Bret Hart vs. Stone Cold match. Owens has star written all over him. I’m sure his stint at NXT will be short lived as the WWE knows they have a main event wrestler in their minors.  —Luis

The Reviews Are In...

NYCC should pay you to do such strong work on their behalf. Seriously, very well done.  -Colin, Maxim

You have completely outdone yourself!!!! This issue is amazing!! -Hilary, Wired

Great issue! LONG too. You guys must have worked really hard! -Mikey, Zinio

Awesome! I always look forward to reading these. Nice job—this issue looks great! -Alexander, Scholastic

Check it out for yourself:

Art Department Weekly | Issue 77 Vol. 6

Reign of Boos

This past weekend, the WWE put on their annual Royal Rumble. The general mayhem of the Rumble always makes it one of my favorite events of the year. This year even more so as Daniel Bryan was returning, and I was sure that was going to lead to great things. I mean they wouldn’t make the same mistake as last year and have an unpopular big man win (read: the returning Batista in January 2014).

Coming into the event everyone expected Roman Reigns (the new WWE anointed big man) to come out on top. Daniel Bryan entered early (10th) had some nice moments but got eliminated by a strong Bray Wyatt. Once the “Yes movement” unceremoniously ended, the crowd turned rabid. They booed every move lustily. When it became apparent that Reigns would win, the heel-loving Philly crowd really let the WWE have it. Not even a surprise appearance by the Rock (trying to give his real-life cousin a positive rub) would help. It was as angry a crowd as I can remember. 

The WWE really dropped the ball on this event. What the fans wanted wasn’t taken into account at all. Hopefully they start paying attention soon.  —Luis

Comic Con Is Finally Up!

Check out our 52 pages of coverage:

Art Department Weekly | Issue 77 Vol. 6

(We redesigned a little.)

Similar Suits

Batgirl’s redesigned costume (by Cameron Stewart and Babs Tarr) has been incredibly accepted and applauded by the comics community. It’s one of the fresher redesigns I’ve seen in years. After years of Spandex hell, and just simply being a copycat of Batman’s outfit, we have an original take that lends itself more to a real-word Yvonne Craig-style costume. I couldn’t be happier with this. 

On the heels of that costume's popularity, Marvel has decided to redesign the nearly perfect Spider-Woman costume. The’ve gone with a very real-world jacket, tight leather pants combo that Stewart and Tarr perfected. Here, though, it seems forced and copycat-ish. The logo looks great when the jacket is closed, but is unnoticeable when opened. On top of that her slouchy belt simply doesn’t work. This all led me to ask “Did Jessica Drew’s Spider-Woman really need a redesign?” I don’t think she did. Marvel took one of the more identifiable costumes in comics and simply genericized it in the guise of making it real-world. This was a big swing and a miss for me.  —Luis

A Little Slower

When my husband saw me laying out this spread, he was like, "We should have one of those."

I guess we will in nine months... I'm so exhausted. All I want to do is finish this issue (and make it the most amazing issue in the history of publishing (no lofty goals there)). —Madeline

The Food Issue

Check us out on Issuu—the Food Issue is now up:

Art Department Weekly | Issue 76 Vol. 6

Working on a Big Issue

I stopped to talk to a lot of vendors and artists on the floor. This should be a really big issue. Here is a sneak peak of my hair and makeup coverage... —Madeline

Costumes at NYCC

There were so many great costumes all four days, so I'm sure our magazine version of this story on Issuu (http://issuu.com/artdepartmentweekly) will be packed with bigger photos. Here is a sneak peak...

Entertain or Go Home

With costumes and dancing, this might have been the most entertaining spot on the floor

Just Dance 2015 is the sixth installment Ubisoft has published in the Just Dance line. While there doesn’t seem to be any reason to exhibit this game at NYCC, I found it to be a welcome addition to the floor. There was plenty of space to sit in front of the stage, the combination of costumes at times was ridiculous, and the crowd felt free to boo the people on stage who could not figure out how to select a song—which just made them dance that much harder when the song finally came up.

To earn points in the game, players mimic the on-screen dancers in an array of modes and songs. The Brotherhood of Asssassins (pictured above) chose “I Love It” by Icona Pop.

If nothing else, it was fun to guess which song a group would pick and see which players from any given group would end up being the most enthusiastic. Some people were ready to leave it all on the stage for a little applause. —Madeline

Building Action

Lego Reboots Bionicle in 2015

If you’ve walked the Lego section of a Target or Toys R Us in the past year, it might be hard to believe Bionicle was the big reveal at Comic Con. Lego seems to have a license for every nerd franchise on top of the Chima and NinjaGo brands advertised through weekly cartoons.
Why relaunch Bionicle?

Boys are clamoring for this, according to Rob Johnson, a Lego Brand Manager on site. (To prove the point, a recent college graduate practically had his face pressed to the Bionicle display glass in longing.) The line originally launched in 2000 as a subset of the Technic series. Bionicle was replaced by the Hero Factory line in 2010. Johnson assured me the new Bionicle is vastly different from Hero Factory with 25 unique pieces created just for Bionicle. 

The attractive colors and ease of building are meant to allow younger kids to crash the pieces together and help older kids unleash their imaginations when creating monsters and vehicles. Johnson assured me 7-year-olds had no trouble building the sets in focus groups. “Durable” and “easy-to-build” were Johnson’s go-to expressions for describing Bionicle—both incredibly appealing terms to someone who has spent hours putting together Chima and superhero movie playsets just to watch them hopelessly fall apart minutes later. —Madeline

Three days of video coverage in about 6 minutes

It was a very different experience to be rolling instead of shooting stills...

Make Mine Marvel

Live Tour and Costumes Galore at the Merry Marvel Booth

As far as breaking news or major announcements, the Marvel booth was not the place to be. 

The convoluted comic summer tentpole Secret Wars had already been announced, so Marvel didn’t have a lot to talk about on that front. Even though I feel like I would have loved someone to walk me through how Secret Wars is going to unfold, and what, if any, long-term ramifications will come from it.

Marvel’s biggest comic announcement was the upcoming Spider-Gwen series. Spider-Gwen has been a runaway success since her book debuted in early 2015. 

Beyond that, the big hit at the Marvel booth was the star power that the cast members of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. provided. It was impossible to walk the show floor when Clark Gregg stopped by the booth for photo opps and signings. The atmosphere was electric, and Gregg truly looked like he enjoyed himself. 

Marvel’s other major announcement came from Marvel Universe, a traveling live action show. Think Disney on Ice with heroes instead of princesses. 

Marvel seemed to be holding a well-attended costume contest literally every few hours. Fans seemed incredibly excited to be on stage in large groups, taking photos in front of the giant Secret Wars back drop. 

There was also a rather large roster of creator signings and artists sketching. The writers were some major Marvel classics (Peter David, Chris Claremont), but the artists seemed to be on the lesser-known range. The lines were pretty long, though, as fans literally had long boxes full of books to sign. I personally received a Cap sketch from Korean artist Younghoon Ko. 

Nothing major really announced, but when you’re the biggest dog on the block, sometimes just showing up is enough to scare the major players into thinking you have more going on. —Luis

Bandai's Big Hero

The Bandai booth historically is all about the Power Rangers. Their partnership with the Power Rangers franchise has been going strong for over 20 years. This year, Bandai had a new star, Baymax. Their collection of Big Hero 6 collectibles were a huge hit with young fans and collectors alike. The Deluxe Flying Baymax with lights, sounds, and Hiro seemed to be one of the biggest sellers of the show.  The line also included sharp-looking sculpts of the rest of the characters of the movie. I wish they had more action features and articulation, but I understand wanting to keep the price point down and make them more accessible to their younger demographic. —Luis

Year of the Bat

DC’s Influence Omnipresent

Walking away from the convention, one fan asked, “Where was DC?” Everywhere. Convention-goers were greeted daily by amazing, giant Teen Titans Go balloons. Cosplayers were dressed as the Joker and other Batman characters. An original copy of Action Comics #1 was on display in the collector’s section. DC wasn’t loud, but it was everywhere.

For the second year in a row, DC eschewed the conventional show floor space for the area below the main entrance. There they displayed all of the cinematic Batman costumes in honor of Batman Year 75.

There, DC also had a hands-on demo of their Infinite Crisis MMORPG. Fans seemed to enjoy the game experience and the alternate takes on the characters. 

In Artist Alley, DC writers were signing their books and artists were sketching at a dedicated DC booth. This was easily my favorite place to be as I was able to talk art with Cliff Chiang and all things Batman with Scott Snyder. —Luis

NYCC for ADW

I not only have so many photos (and videos—hello 5D), but so many interviews I can't wait to share. It's crazy that I somehow forgot how much fun it is to ask people questions and build a story. And the vendors had so much to say!

Summer Is Here!

Our Summer themed issue has arrived:

Art Department Weekly | Issue 75 Vol. 6