Guy Fawkes night

Remember, remember, the Fifth of November,
Expense claims, moats and cooked books,
I see no reason, why such high spenders,
Should ever be let off their hooks.







New research by leading academics at the University of Woolamaloo's Department of Historical Thinggies & Digging Old Stuff Up has revealed that Guido Fawkes, who lends his name to the traditions carried out in these islands on this day, was not as previously thought primarily motivated by religion as a dangerous Catholic fundamentalist terrorist, but was in fact driven chiefly by outrage caused by the seamy, selfish, profligate indulgences of the MPs of his era exploiting their overly generous expenses system. Thank goodness that in our civilised, modern era our politicians are too mature and noble and the system too accountable for them to behave in such a primitive manner.

Alan Moore speaks

I was kept very busy this week finishing editing and setting up my mate Pádraig's incredibly Massive Mega Moore Marathon - its a new (15, 000 words or so, phew!) interview with Britain's Wizard in Extraordinary, Mr Alan Moore. In fact its so big I had to break it into three sections across three days on the Forbidden Planet blog - part one is mostly concerned with the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, especially the new third volume Century, the first volume of which comes out this month (Century 1910), the second next year (Century 1969) and a final part which is set in the present day after that.

It will surprise no-one who knows Alan's work to learn that the subjects and themes and references covered are diverse, from the Threepenny Opera to Jack the Ripper and Monty Python. Part two is where Alan talks about future projects and other works (including doing some work for a local youth culture mag which included Alan telling the kids the truth about drugs! Brilliant), taking in magic and James Joyce along the way, with the third and final part, which I posted up yesterday, is where Alan graciously agreed to take some selected questions sent in by readers of the FP blog. Its enormous but fascinating reading - many thanks again to Alan and for it.

On a related note, earlier this week we found out that media analysts Cision had posted a list of the top fifty blogs in the UK. As you might expect its dominated by politics blogs and blogs from established traditional media like the BBC and the Guardian. And in there at number 31 a solitary entry from the worlds of comics and science fiction - the Forbidden Planet blog. Needless to say I am surprised and delighted - I started that blog just over four years ago, now we have several contributors and its grown a lot (so much so that its a real juggling act for me to balance keeping the blog fires stoked and working on the main webstore; usually that means I end up doing a lot in my own time to keepit going, as do some of the contributors). And its nice that its grown so much since I started it and that a lot of folks in comics and SF communities check it out, but to see that its in the top 50 of all UK blogs? That its up there with Guardian blogs? Wow. Just goes to show that if its done correctly (and honestly) a good blog presence can be more effective (and cheaper and more enjoyable for you and your readers) than huge amounts of advertising. That's the sort of thing that can happen when you embrace blogging culture as a company instead of screaming hysterically at it.

Century: 1910

Oh yes, special treat arrives in the post today, an early copy of the next League of Extra Ordinary Gentlemen book by Messrs Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill, Century:1910, which is out here towards the end of May (so lucky, lucky me, got one of the earliest copies in the kingdom, oh its good to have contacts!). This third volume of LOEG is going to come in three volumes covering a century, from the 1910 book, then late this year the 60s and next year the early 21st century. I've been really looking forward to this, started reading it on the way home from the Book Group meeting tonight (we were doing Kurt Vonnegut's fascinating and darkly humorous Galapagos), superb stuff, as ever Alan puts layers upon layers of historical, social and cultural references while Kev's artwork is as brilliantly detailed as ever, demanding close attention for small components as well as the larger parts carrying the main narrative. Must force myself not to sit and read it all in one sitting, ration it out for a couple of evenings...

Who Watches the Watchmen - Japanese style

A Japanese trailer for the Watchmen movie, via Michael Moran at the Times' Blockbuster buzz:

Vertigo

I was lucky enough to get a copy of the new Vertigo Encyclopedia from Dorling Kindersley. For those of you who don't know your comics, this is the imprint of DC Comics which not only published 'mature' titles (a general, catch-all term often used in comics publishing, basically it means comics aimed squarely at an adult audience) but contributed much to making them acceptable in mainstream circles, helped not a little by the works of Alan Moore and of course one of my all-time favourites, Neil Gaiman and the Sandman series. If you're familiar with DK books it won't surprise you to learn that its a very well illustrated volume as they have a very good name for visual design in their adult and children's works.

The book has large section on the major Vertigo titles such as Hellblazer, Sandman, Preacher, Lucifer and so on, with a synopsis of the main plot points, character guides and more important information on each series - makes it very browsable and easy to dip into. The one-off titles and mini-series are also pretty well served considering the space restrictions. I started by looking up some of my favourite series, then checking out the smaller entries which gave me a nice little memory rush as they reminded me of quite a few I'd read and enjoyed years ago and which had slipped my mind (I hadn't thought of the gorgeous Moonshadow in ages, for instance). Good Xmas gift if you are looking for ideas in a few weeks. A contact at Dorling Kindersley emailed me at work to say they had made a video about the creation of the book, which they've put up on YouTube:

Who watches?



Rorschach walking the mean streets of New York (actually a backlot in Vancouver) on the set of the Watchmen movie. I'm still not too sure how the graphic novel will translate to the big screen and am trying not to get excited about it, but then I see a pic like this from the film's blog and I think, hmmm, maybe, just maybe it will be okay - after all I was worried about V for Vendetta and the film version turned out to be excellent.

"Feed your head"

Interesting post on Alterati (via Boing Boing) comparing the late consciousness and drug guru Timothy Leary's little-known foray into comics with Neurocomics from 1979, exploring his 8-circuit model of the brain (best understood after a generous spliff, methinks) and comparing it to the Promethea series by the great, transcendental, bearded god of comics, Alan Moore, along with a link to a torrent of a scanned version of the comic:

"Promethea is a survey and summation of western occultism through a very self-conscious and post-modern lens, and the techniques that Alan Moore and the artists he works with throughout the Promethea run appear in somewhat abbreviated form in Neurocomics, but they are there. I would not be surprised if Mr. Moore was at least aware of this particular work, as the delivery of highly symbolic and succinct chunks of information in Promethea and the delivery of psychological models through astrological contexts are remarkably similar. But where the 8 stages of evolution and the astrological model of personality types are condensed into a few short pages in Neurocomics, Alan Moore tackles the whole foundation of the occult tradition of the West."