Pixel Scroll 10/11 Slaughterhouse Hive

(1) C. E. Murphy is “home from Octocon” with several good stories.

I brought about eight pounds of fudge to the con, and passed it out to the attendees of the Golden Blasters film festival on Friday night. Probably the best two bits of that were saying to people, “If you’re allergic to anything except gluten you can’t eat this, but it’s gluten-free,” and having one woman LIGHT UP when she was told it was gluten-free and safe for her to eat. (Eggs, dairy, corn, nuts: basically all those things go into my fudge unless I’m making Special Batches.) The other best bit was handing a box of vanilla-and-cranberry fudge over to my friend (and guest of honour!) Maura McHugh, who doesn’t like chocolate and who put on an expression of Noble Acceptance of Not Getting Fudge when I came through waving the batch of chocolate fudge. But I was prepared for her, and she shrieked and leapt up and hugged me. 🙂

(2) A six-part Frankenstein horror series starring Game of Thrones actor Sean Bean has been acquired by A&E for broadcast in the U.S., according to Variety.

The Frankenstein Chronicles was created by British production house ITV, and features six hour-long episodes set in 1827 London. Bean plays inspector John Marlott, on a search for a murderer who leaves behind a trail of mutilated body parts which have been assembled into complete human forms.

Set in 19th century London, the show will include plenty of gas lamps, horses, and opium — a bust of an opium den is reportedly how Bean’s character stumbles upon the trail of Dr. Frankenstein, and or his monster, in the first place.

But does Sean Bean survive the first season?

(3) The other day I ran a news item about Dean Wesley Smith, and in his latest post, “Writing workshops: caveat emptor”, Brad R. Torgersen says how much he learned at the Rusch/Smith workshop he attended.

One of the best things my wife and I ever did, was pony up some cash for my first writing workshop. Having endured years and years of rejection letters, by 2008 I was hoping to bust out of a serious slump. My wife asked the question, “What else can we do?” I’d never done workshops before. They were too expensive, and they required too much time away from work and home — especially the king of all science fiction and fantasy workshops, Clarion. But it was precisely because I’d never done a workshop before, that my wife and I determined to get me to one. She asked me which workshop looked best, for a “get your feet wet” event, and I chose the weekend-long Kris and Dean Show being put on in Lincoln City, Oregon, at the eclectic Anchor Inn — by Kristine Kathryn Rusch and Dean Wesley Smith. This was June of 2009. It turned out to be something of a watershed event, for me as an aspiring professional. In two delightfully exhausting days, Kris and Dean ran the table: from matters of craft, to matters of publishing, as well as self-promotion, book-keeping, personal writerly habits, known pitfalls, and of course myths and conventional (false) wisdoms.

I walked away feeling like I’d learned more in one weekend than in all the many hundreds of hours I’d spent reading “How to write books” books.

Torgersen, noting that most people need to be cost-conscious, offers practical advice about how a beginning writer can decide what workshops will meet his or her needs.

(4) Where better to make revelations about Gotham than at this weekend’s New York Comic Con?

Paul Reubens, the actor best known for his iconic role as Pee-Wee Herman, will play The Penguin/Oswald Cobblepot’s father in “Gotham” season two, star Robin Lord Taylor revealed during the show’s panel at New York Comic Con.

“He will be showing up very soon,” Taylor teased, before letting his fan enthusiasm out. “Pee-Wee Herman is playing my dad! What the hell? Oh my god!”

Fittingly, Reubens has already played the role of the Batman villain’s father before — he appeared as Tucker Cobblepot in 1992’s “Batman Returns.”

(5) Another George R.R. Martin work has been optioned for television – “Cinemax Orders SKIN TRADE Script”.

I am very excited to announce the Cinemax (HBO’s sister company) has optioned the television rights to “The Skin Trade,” the offbeat “werewolf noir” novella I penned back in the late 80s. The deal is closed, and Cinemax has ordered the pilot script. This being Hollywood, of course, you never know where things will end… but if they like the script, we’ll shoot a pilot, and if they like that, hey, who knows, maybe we’ll get a series on the air. Which would be very cool. I have always thought there was a TV series (or maybe a feature film) in Willie Flambeaux and Randi Wade….

“The Skin Trade” has had a storied, and complex, publishing history. It was originally written for NIGHT VISION 5, the fifth volume of the prestigious annual horror anthology from the late lamented small press Dark Harvest, where it appeared together with original contributions from Dan Simmons and Stephen King, some stellar company. The novella was very well received, and went on to win that year’s World Fantasy Award.

More recently, the novella was purchased by Mike the Pike Productions, who played a big part in taking the project to Cinemax. To handle the adaptation, script the pilot, and produce the show (should we get a greenlight), we’ve tapped a terrific talented young scriptwriter named KALINDA VAZQUEZ, whose previous credits include work on PRISON BREAK and ONCE UPON A TIME….

(6) Europa SF profiles Science Fiction Studies Special issue On Italian Science Fiction.

Here is the direct link — Science Fiction Studies #126 – Volume 42, Part 2 – July 2015, SPECIAL ISSUE ON ITALIAN SCIENCE FICTION, Edited by Umberto Rossi, Arielle Saiber, and Salvatore Proietti.

(7) Science fiction writer Patrick S. Tomlinson is quoted in the recent Washington Post article “Most gun owners support restrictions. Why aren’t their voices heard?”

Once again, their voices are missing from the debate.

Gun owners who favor tighter restrictions on firearms say they are in the same position after the mass shooting in Oregon as they have been following other rampages — shut out of the argument.

The pattern, they say, is frustrating and familiar: The what-should-be-done discussion pits anti-gun groups against the National Rifle Association and its allies, who are adamantly opposed to any new restrictions on weapons…..

“There’s this perception that people are neatly divided into folks who want an M1A1 Abrams battle tank to drive to work and those who want to melt every last gun and bullet into doorstops,” said Patrick Tomlinson, a science-fiction writer and gun owner in Milwaukee who favors universal background checks and longer waiting periods for gun purchases. “There seems to be no middle there, but I know there is. I’m in it.”

Tomlinson has two novels out with a third on the way, and his short fiction has appeared in anthologies.

(8) Slate blogger Marissa Visci answers the question, “What Does It Mean When a Book is Stamped With the Words ‘Author’s Preferred Text’?”

Sifting through Slate’s mailroom recently, we found a new edition of Neil Gaiman’s first novel, Neverwhere, with three words printed beneath the title on its glossy cover: “author’s preferred text.” It’s not the first time those words have graced a Gaiman cover—you’ll also find them on the 10th-anniversary edition of American Gods. So we wondered: What does this mean? What is an “author’s preferred text?” And what makes one text more preferred than other texts?

It turns out that the “author’s preferred text” is the director’s cut of the literary world, only far less ubiquitous. The definition is, in part, pretty self-explanatory: It’s the version of a particular work that the writer prefers, editorial interference be damned. The phenomenon is not limited to Gaiman, though he may be its most frequent practioner. Stephen King released a mammoth new edition of The Stand, subtitled Complete and Uncut, in 1990, in which he not only restored gargantuan passages that had been cut in the editing process, but moved the story’s time period ahead by a decade….

For Gaiman, the “author’s preferred text” is, in part, a way of restoring some of the text that was lost in translation during its Americanization. One thing that the new edition reinstates is some of the humor that Gaiman claims was eliminated from the initial U.S. version, as he wrote in his intro:

My editor at Avon Books, Jennifer Hershey, was a terrific and perceptive editor; our major disagreement was the jokes. She didn’t like them and was convinced that American readers would not be able to cope with jokes in a book that wasn’t meant solely to be funny.

(9) And Neil Gaiman will be appearing on stage, unencumbered by editors, at the Richard and Karen Carpenter Center in Long Beach on November 14. Details here.

The bestselling and award-winning author—whose notable works include the comic book series The Sandman as well as novels Coraline, Stardust, American Gods, The Graveyard Book, and extends to screenplays, song lyrics, poetry, journalism and multimedia—appears for one inspiring evening!

(10) Efforts to restore an old B-29 to flightworthiness continue to pay off.

Doc is a B-29 Superfortress and one of 1,644 manufactured in Wichita during World War II. Since 1987 when Tony Mazzolini found Doc on sitting and rotting away in the Mojave Desert, plans have been in the works to restore the historic warbird to flying status to serve as a flying museum.

They now have all four engines running.

(11) Honest Trailers – Aladdin has been created to commemorate the movie’s 25th anniversary.

[Thanks to Martin Morse Wooster, David K.M. Klaus, Roger Tener, and John King Tarpinian for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Brian Z.]

142 thoughts on “Pixel Scroll 10/11 Slaughterhouse Hive

  1. Wow, David. Your dice might be even worse than Kyra’s. I’m beyond forehead cloths and am breaking out the codeine.

    1. The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various
    That hurt.

    4. Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau

    5. XKCD, Randall Munroe

  2. 1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various
    Digger, Ursula Vernon
    Bugger it, I’m voting a tie on this. sandman is More Important, but I have more love for Digger

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson
    Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Peanuts, Charles Schulz
    Zot!, Scott McCloud

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples
    Abstain.

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    XKCD, Randall Munroe
    Hyperbole and a Half, Allie Brosh

  3. 1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Peanuts, Charles Schulz

    If it was Understanding Comics, it would’ve gone the other way….

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    XKCD, Randall Munroe

  4. 1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various

    …whimper…

    If this were based on first issues only, Digger would win. If it were based on awesomeness of the protagonist, Digger would win. And RedWombat beats about half the Sandman artists, maybe more, in any contest (Jill Thompson and P. Craig Russell are the exceptions that jump to mind. And maybe Yoshitaka Amano).

    And Digger woulda beat Saga or XKCD for sure, or Peanuts; can it replace any one of those instead? (Thinking of it fighting Calvin and Hobbes makes me break out in a cold sweat, though.)

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    XKCD, Randall Munroe

  5. 1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    Digger, Ursula Vernon

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Peanuts, Charles Schulz

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    XKCD, Randall Munroe

  6. @Lenora Rose: What about J.H. Williams III? The art on “The Sandman: Overture” is mind-staggeringly good.

  7. Someone’s muscling in on the Official Bracket Forehead Cloth business? This Will Not Do!
    Accept only True Official Bracket Forehead Cloths! Guaranteed organic! Carbon atoms in every single cloth! Gluten Free! Paleo Friendly! No terrycloth animals were harmed in the production of Official Bracket Forehead Cloths!

  8. Round 4 of the Rory Root Memorial Comics Bracket.

    This does not bode well.
    Worse and worse and worse.

    1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various
    Digger, Ursula Vernon
    Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear
    I refuse, tie

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson
    Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Peanuts, Charles Schulz
    Zot!, Scott McCloud

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    XKCD, Randall Munroe
    Hyperbole and a Half, Allie Brosh
    Can I trade Saga for one of these?
    Wicked, wicked dice.
    Okay,
    Hyperbole and a Half, Allie Brosh
    There, I picked one.
    A bitter laugh emerges from the sodden face cloth.

  9. 1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various
    Digger, Ursula Vernon

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson
    Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

  10. Late to the party but …

    1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Peanuts, Charles Schulz

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau

    5. Abstain

  11. 1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    Digger, Ursula Vernon

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Peanuts, Charles Schulz

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    Hyperbole and a Half, Allie Brosh

    That should probably have been harder than it was.

  12. 1. The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various

    2. Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson

    3. Peanuts, Charles Schulz

    4. Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau

  13. Round 4 of the Rory Root Memorial Comics Bracket.

    Forehead cloths available over on the left; a mere 6 1/2 million Altairan dollars each. Cheap at twice the price.

    1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various
    Digger, Ursula Vernon

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson
    Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Peanuts, Charles Schulz
    Zot!, Scott McCloud

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    XKCD, Randall Munroe
    Hyperbole and a Half, Allie Brosh

    Abstain, haven’t read the one and dislike the other.

  14. 1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    Digger, Ursula Vernon

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    abstain

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    Hyperbole and a Half, Allie Brosh

  15. Wow. Nothing I really love is left. And the things I do like are just comic strips…not what I think of when I think of comics. Oh well.

    1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Peanuts, Charles Schulz

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE – I despise Doonesbury with the heat of a thousand burning suns. So this is a strategic vote.
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    Pass – I’m unfamiliar with both.

  16. 1. Abstain

    2. Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson

    3. Peanuts, Charles Schulz

    4. Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau

    5. Abstain

  17. No forehead cloths here. While almost everything left is something I love, I find I have very little emotional investment in who wins.

    1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Peanuts, Charles Schulz

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    XKCD, Randall Munroe

    This last was the only hard one.

  18. 2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons

    This was a close one. But I think the shock I felt the first time I read “I did it thirty-five minutes ago” elevates Watchmen so very much.

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    XKCD, Randall Munroe

  19. My picks got pretty badly beaten last round. Abstaining from a few this time for reasons.

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    Hyperbole and a Half, Allie Brosh

  20. 1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Zot!, Scott McCloud

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

    Tie!

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    XKCD, Randall Munroe

  21. 1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES

    Digger, Ursula Vernon

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    Hyperbole and a Half, Allie Brosh

  22. David Goldfarb – except I haven’t read Sandman: Overture.; I took a look at google images and it looks great in miniature, but.

  23. 1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various
    Digger, Ursula Vernon

    Ouch. Ouch. Ouch. Digger. Ouch.

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson
    Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons

    Abstain; haven’t read Watchman.

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Peanuts, Charles Schulz
    Zot!, Scott McCloud

    Abstain; haven’t read Zot!

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

    Um. Doonesbury.

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    XKCD, Randall Munroe
    Hyperbole and a Half, Allie Brosh

    YOUCH!!!!!! I hate the dice. Hate them hate them hate them. XKCD, mostly because of TIME. Hate them dice…

  24. 1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Peanuts, Charles Schulz

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    Hyperbole and a Half, Allie Brosh

    That was easier than I thought it would be, largely because the thing I loved FIRST tends to win over something that I think is very good, but came to later in life.

  25. I see a certain pattern in the things I’m ending up voting for at this point, but it’s more a matter of what I prefer from what’s left as opposed to what I like best in absolute terms.

    Round 4 of the Rory Root Memorial Comics Bracket.

    1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    abstain

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson
    Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons

    I find that I’m drawn to works that combine heart, snark, and painful truths.

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Peanuts, Charles Schulz
    Zot!, Scott McCloud

    See previous explanation.

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

    Though I do feel a bit bad that a lot of these match-ups are “discrete stories vs. lifetime bodies of work”. It’s too easy to remember the high points of the latter and forget long stretches of mediocrity.

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    XKCD, Randall Munroe
    Hyperbole and a Half, Allie Brosh

    And this is a tie. Both of these works fill the heart+snark+pain metric and both have contributed essential components to my pop culture communication vocabulary. (“All the things!” “Someone is wrong on the internet!”)

  26. 1. The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various

    2. Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons

    3. Peanuts, Charles Schulz
    Have to give it the nod over Zot for sheer longevity. That and Scott still hasn’t told us why it’s always 1965 on Zot’s world.

    4. Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau

    5. XKCD, Randall Munroe

  27. 1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various
    Digger, Ursula Vernon
    All apologies to Digger and Ursula which would at least have tied Watchmen, Doonesbury, or Peanuts in my mind, and beaten Zot or Saga handily.
    At UU young adult camp, from which I am aging out (being 35, the max age), I read from the final issue of Sandman w. Daniel, the one where it goes into 2nd person.

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson
    Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons
    “The score is now Q to 12!” And not even close.

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Peanuts, Charles Schulz
    Zot!, Scott McCloud
    One wishes Digger had found its way into this category, but Snoopy and his rejection letters still carry the day.

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples
    Not entirely fair to Saga, but part of the reason for this is Doonesbury’s treatment of Andy Lipincott dying of AIDS, which was damn near revolutionary for newspaper comics in 1990.

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    XKCD, Randall Munroe
    Hyperbole and a Half, Allie Brosh
    The confusion of the Simple Dog as it tries to figure out to sit down would take it for Hyperbole alone:
    “Go circle.
    Go yes go.
    Still go…
    WHY HAPPENING?”
    http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2011/04/wild-animal-simple-dog-goes-for-joy.html

  28. Greg: While I too love Simple Dog, I think xkcd has way more ambition. And certainly updates more often.

    Oh, man… remembering Andy finally getting the CD of “Pet Sounds” on his deathbed. Someone much earlier said “Doonesbury” never made them cry, and I knew they hadn’t read that arc. Or Lacey and her husband, or the reveal of BD’s war injury…

  29. Again, guys, it’s ok! *i* would vote against me on this one, and not just because I feel a little guilty about the time I trampled Gaiman to get to the free nacho bar.

  30. @RedWombat: You do have the right to vote, you know.

    1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various
    Digger, Ursula Vernon

    And, sorry – I just re-read Digger last night, and it’s great. But it’s not Sandman.

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson
    Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons

    Like someone else said: “I did it 35 minutes ago.”

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Peanuts, Charles Schulz
    Zot!, Scott McCloud

    A futile gesture, but I’m voting for the one that touched me more deeply.

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

    But here I’m voting for the sustained body of work. (Though yeah, it’s easy to remember the high points and forget the low ones.)

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    XKCD, Randall Munroe
    Hyperbole and a Half, Allie Brosh

    Nothing this round is shaping up to be particularly close. But next round we start to see real blood flying.

  31. Apropos of nothing (except perhaps my desire to go 0 for 5).

    1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Zot!, Scott McCloud

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    XKCD, Randall Munroe

  32. Round 4 of the Rory Root Memorial Comics Bracket.

    Round four? What happened to rounds 2 & 3? [shakes head ruefully] The things you miss when you don’t check into File770 every day…

    1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    => The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various
    Digger, Ursula Vernon
    Apologies to RedWombat, but… well… Neil Gaiman, you know?

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson
    Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons
    => Abstain. These two are so different, the fact that both of them are instances of what Scott McCloud calls “sequential art” is pretty much the only thing they have in common. Choosing between ’em is like tryna decide whether a really great ham sandwich is better than a day at the Louvre.

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    => Peanuts, Charles Schulz
    Zot!, Scott McCloud
    McCloud is a better analyst/synthesist than storyteller.

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    => Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    => XKCD, Randall Munroe
    Hyperbole and a Half, Allie Brosh

  33. 1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various
    Digger, Ursula Vernon

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson
    Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Peanuts, Charles Schulz
    Zot!, Scott McCloud

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    XKCD, Randall Munroe
    Hyperbole and a Half, Allie Brosh

  34. 1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Waterson

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Peanuts, Charles Schulz

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau

  35. As previously mentioned, the luck of the dice this round did not match up any of the real titans with each other. This leaves us with Sandman as the only actual graphic novel left….

    1. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY ENORMOUS LIBRARIES
    The Sandman, Neil Gaiman and various 23
    Digger, Ursula Vernon 10

    2. HOMICIDAL PSYCHOS
    Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson 22
    Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons 9

    3. BLOCKHEADS
    Peanuts, Charles Schulz 22
    Zot!, Scott McCloud 4

    4. THE KIDS GO FOR BROKE
    Doonesbury, Gary Trudeau 21
    Saga, Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples 12

    5. THE REAL WORLD, A BIT TWISTED
    XKCD, Randall Munroe 20
    Hyperbole and a Half, Allie Brosh 10

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