The Fountain

Creators: Darren Aronofsky, writer; Kent Williams, artist

Vertigo, 176 pages, color, hardcover, $39.99

So? Darren Aronofsky had one of the more auspicious debuts in indie film history, with hard hitting pics "Pi" and "Requiem for a Dream." He's also a big comics fan inspired in his film work by the works of Alan Moore and Frank Miller, the latter of whom he collaborated with on a number of unproduced film projects including a "Batman" film and an adaptation of Miller's "Ronin." "The Fountain" is his first comics work and it's as impressive as his film debut. As he explains in the afterward, the graphic novel was conceived as a companion to and adaptation of the original  film version of "The Fountain." But when the pic ran into trouble and was shut down by the studio, Aronofsky continued to work on the graphic novel and his passion for the story prompted him to re-envision the picture as a lean, mean indie production that will come to fruition next year with comicbook movie vets Hugh Jackman ("X-Men") and Rachel Weisz ("Constantine") as the stars. That seems to makes the graphic novel a very different animal than what will be seen on the screen, even as the basic story looks similar to what's seen in the teaser trailer for the pic. The story is about one man's search for the key to saving the life of his lover in a relationship that spans time from the Spanish conquistadors' search for the fountain of youth in the 16th century through today's modern neuroscience and into the far-flung reaches of space in the distant future. This is intense stuff and requires a lot more of its readers than most comics even dream of, but is rewarding on an adult level in the way the best books and films can be. Williams' artwork beautifully evokes different tones and styles for the three time frames the comic covers and provides remarkably vivid imagery. The artwork really shines in the oversize hardcover format, making this easily one of the most fascinating books to come from a mainstream comics publisher this year. Grade: A

Colonia: On Into the Great Lands

Creator: Jeff Nicholson

AiT-PlanetLar, 152 pages, black and white, $12.95

So? "Colonia" is what I think of as a true indie comicbook: It's got an interesting and original idea that's like nothing being published by the largest publishers and is something that is impossible to imagine being done in any other medium. This is a fantasy tale of a boy and his uncles getting lost in a fantasy world in which America still resembles its colonial history. But there's a lot of fantasy elements, including talking ducks, pirates and men made of fish that give this a really unique tone. This is the second volume in the series, collecting issues 6-11, and as such there's a sense of coming into the story a bit too late to fully understand what's what and who's who. The book also moves a bit slowly, but that's OK. "Colonia" follows a time-tested pattern that when embroidered with quirkiness, charm and simple but attractive art makes for a relaxing and fun read. Grade: B+

Off Road

Creator: Sean Murphy

Oni Press, 136 pages, black and white, $11.95

So? This tale of ordinary teenage boys dealing with the perils of traveling off the beaten path follows the formula that works really well for a lot of manga. Greg's dumped by his cheating girlfriend and goes out with his pals, one of whom just got a brand-new Jeep. They go off-roading and have some fun, run into trouble and grow up just a little bit in the course of the story. Murphy, who's drawn books for DC and Dark Horse, has an attractive modern style that suits the story well. The result is something like shojo manga for teenage American boys. It's far from deep and not the most memorable story, but it is funny enough to be a nice diversion. Grade: C+

Lots of catching up to do, so let's get to it, in no particular order:

CLAYPOOL IN TROUBLE: Claypool Comics has become the first to run into trouble with Diamond’s new sales minimum, issuing a press release saying that the distributor says it will drop vampire sudser “Deadbeats” and Peter David’s superhero satire series “Soulsearchers and Co.” unless sales on those titles increase. The move comes as the company prepared special “jump in” issues targeted at new readers. Claypool is asking retailers to order an extra copy of each of these issues. The company also will provide promotional materials. Claypool has been around since 1993 and also publishes an “Elvira” comic.

HIT EJECT: Going way back, WB recalled last month the two-disc deluxe edition DVD of "Batman Begins" because of an apparent rights issue with the material in the bonus minicomic. The comic reprints a Secret Origins tale, the first Batman story from Detective Comics #27 and Batman: The Long Halloween #1, so what rights pose the problem is a bit of a mystery. New sets were sent out without the comic and at a slightly reduced price.

TELL CLAREMONT WHAT TO DO: Marvel has decided to let fans choose writer Chris Claremont's next X-Men related project. Fans can head to to choose between titles and concepts for four six-issue miniseries: Days of Future Past, Asgardian War Stories, Next and What If? X-Men.

MARVEL PODCASTS: Marvel also is getting into podcasting, with the first featuring a press conference with Damon Lindelof, co-creator of ABC-TV's "Lost" and writer of the upcoming Ultimate Wolverine vs. Hulk miniseries.

WHO WANTS TO SEE MILLIONAIRE'S ART?: An exhibit of the art of Tony Millionaire is set to open Friday, Dec. 2, at Secret Headquarters in Silver Lake. Millionaire, winner of two Eisner Awards and creator of alt-paper strip "Maakies," will attend an opening night reception from 8-10 p.m. The exhibit will run through Dec. 31.

EVEN ENGINEERS LIKE COMICS: Engineering and design trade publication Design News (published by Variety parent Reed Business Info) has launched a new comic strip called "Slack Variable." The strip is about an over-caffeinated mutant engineering super-monkey and proves that comics really are everywhere these days.

'SPLENDOR' TO VERTIGO: Harvey Pekar is bringing his signature title, "American Splendor" to DC's Vertigo imprint. Pekar will pen a new miniseries working with artists including Dean Haspiel, his collaborator on "The Quitter."

FEGREDO ON HELLBOY: Duncan Fegredo has been announced as the artist on the next Hellboy  miniseries, "Hellboy: Darkness Calls." Hellboy creator Mike Mignola will write the six issue series and provide covers. The series is scheduled for a September 2006 debut.

As if it wasn't hard enough to keep up with reading all the cool comicbooks, graphic novels and collected editions that come out all the time, dozens of articles about comics and comics creators have been so plentiful the past week or so that it's hard to keep track of it all.

Los Angeles-area media has been especially comics crazy with the opening of the Masters of American Comics exhibit at the UCLA Hammer Museum and Museum of Contemporary Art. The exhibit opens today (Nov. 20) and runs through March 12; press previews were held last week but I had to beg off due to a pesky cold that kept me from doing little but work and sleep.

The Los Angeles Times was the big local booster, with a cover story in Thursday's Calendar Weekend section on where to find the best comics and recommendations from Chip Kidd, Brad Meltzer and Adrian Tomine, and a short primer on area comics shops. L.A. Weekly chimed in with 10 Comics that Shook the World, and a much better tour of the best places to buy comics.

That was followed by a cover-featured review in the L.A. Times Book Review of Will Eisner's "A Contract with God Trilogy" and "The Quitter," by Harvey Pekar and Dean Haspiel. And if you blinked, you might have missed a profile of "Persepolis" and "Embroideries" author Marjane Satrapi on the cover the Sunday Calendar section. Not to be outdone, the New York Times Book Review digs into “Absolute Watchmen.”

What makes all this attention even more interesting is the way it's coming just as the holiday shopping season kicks into high gear. That means lots of people are going to give and receive graphic novels as gifts this year — and is a great sign for the future of the medium and its ability to find the new audiences that seemed so elusive a mere decade ago.

Infinite Crisis #1 surprises no one by being the single comic most ordered by specialty shops in October. What is surprising is that those orders totaled an estimated 249,265, which with the $3.99 cover price , likely reorders and sales outside the direct market, makes this a million-dollar book. That was enough for DC to edge out Marvel in the market share race, with 37% to 32% edge in dollar share and a 39% to 37% edge in unit share. It also pushed the market to a 6% growth in periodical comics sales over October 2004, according to ICV2.com. The usual suspects dominated the top of the charts, with Spawn #150 being the best selling indie comic at No. 45 with sales of more than 40,000 copies. Graphic novel sales in the direct market were spread out and buoyed by the release of some high-profile and high-priced books, including Harvey Pekar and Dean Haspiel's "The Quitter," "Watchmen: Absolute Edition" and a new hardcover edition of "V for Vendetta." Still, the top sellers in units were inexpensive, with sampler book "Vertigo: First Offenses" selling an estimated 6,800 copies ordered, followed by "Star Wars: Clone Wars Adventures, Vol. 2" with about 6,500.

"Aquaman" is getting the "Smallville" treatment. WB has signed on "Smallville" writer-producers Miles Millar and Al Gough to create and exec produce a skein based on a young Arthur Curry. The WB net has committed to a pilot and is casting the project. As in "Smallville," the series will focus on the days before Curry puts on the orange and green tights.

'PSYCHO' MAN: Chris Morgan, writer of the upcoming pic "Fast and Furious: Tokyo Drift," has been tapped to write "The Psycho" for Universal. Pic is based on the comicbook by James Hudnall and Dan Brereton.

'BLADE' CAST: Kirk "Sticky" Jones has been cast as the lead in New Line's "Blade" TV project underway for Spike TV. Jill Wagner, Neil Jackson, Nelson Lee and Jessica Gower round out the cast. Production was set to start today, with "Blade" movie scripter/director David Goyer exec producing and co-writing the script with comics scribe Geoff Johns. If "Blade" is picked up as a series, it should debut in June.

FRANK'S PLACE: The lucky Japanese get a "Sin City" bar to help promote the movie for its release in that country. The bar serves food, drinks and has dancers and a gift shop.

GAME ON AND ON: Marvel has extended its deal with Activision to produce "Spider-Man" and "X-Men" videogames through 2017. Deal was previously set to expire in 2009. Activision has sold more than 25 million Marvel-based games, including recent hits "Hulk: Ultimate Destruction," "Ultimate Spider-Man" and "X-Men Legends II."

All-Star Superman #1

Creators: Grant Morrison, writer; Frank Quitely, artist; Jamie Grant, digital inks and colors

DC Comics, 32 pages, color, $2.99

So? If you've been reading Superman comics the past few years, Morrison's take on the character may come as a bit of a shock. Taking the Man of Steel back to his roots and into the future at the same time, All Star Superman is exciting, bold and supercool. To say that it looks fantastic is redundant — it's drawn by Quitely, whose work here has a polish and dynamism that outdoes even his best work on New X-Men. Grant has a lot to do with that; the issue is superbly colored and the images pop off of the page because of it. Storywise, this is a classic Superman with the traditional status quo and robust fantasy world around him. Anyone who knows anything about the character (and that's pretty much everyone on the face of the planet) will understand who's who and what's what. The characterization of Lex Luthor is particularly striking, taking him back to his evil scientist mode and making him a convincing menace for the Man of Steel. There are a few quibbles: for some reason, the story title and credits were removed from the opening double-page spread as it appeared in the Wizard preview and the now wordless spread makes less of a splash as a result. Some will complain about the redrawing of Superman's chest emblem, but it's only an issue if you know about it. This has all the makings of a classic and will no doubt be a huge success for DC — more so if it can avoid shipping delays on future issues. Grade: A

Fallen Angel #1

Creators: Peter David, writer; J.K. Woodward, artist

IDW, 24 pages (CBLDF Preview edition), color, $3.99

So? Fallen Angel jumps from DC to IDW, and makes a strong return with a beautiful first issue that will please old fans and make some new ones. David brings back the character with a plot that will definitely thrill and shock old fans and opens up the series to some terrific stories that would take the title into much deeper territory than hinted at in the DC run. Woodward turns in a terrific job on the art, which is fully painted and gives the book a new tone that suits the new direction of the story. This preview, a benefit for the very worthy Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, debuted at Wizard World Texas. David said he was very pleased with the book, which so far has been ordered in numbers that exceed those of the previous run, even at a higher cover price. This is a book that deserved a second chance and based on this first issue it's good chance of capitalizing on it. Grade: A

Marvel's reported third-quarter results with a drop in revenues and profits that caused the company's stock price to fall. The company announced a $250 million share repurchase program and says it expects 2006 to be a difficult year for toys and licensing.

Marvel's stock price slipped 22% to close at $14.06.

Overall net sales for the quarter were down 40% from $135.1 million to $81.1 million versus the same quarter last year, with net income down 32% from $34 million to $23.3 milion in quarter to quarter comparisons. Year to date net income was down 19% versus 2004 from $94.6 million to $76.7 million.

"Despite the near-term challenges, the management team and board remain confident in the long-term power of Marvel's business model, which will generate high levels of cash in coming years," Marvel Chariman Morton Handel said in the report. The company appears to be looking to 2007, when "Spider-Man 3" and "Fantastic Four 2" are set to debut within months of each other.

Licensing and toy revenues were down from 2004. The "Fantastic Four" movie did well at the b.o. but was not in the same league as last year's "Spider-Man 2." FF movie toy sales totaled $25 million for the quarter, for a total of $66 million for the year

Marvel's publishing efforts saw net sales increase 14% on strong trade paperback sales in bookstores and direct market channels. Net sales were $25.8 million, up from $22.6 million for 3rd quarter 2004; year to date net sales is $69.1 million, up from $63.9 million last year.

Marvel Studios' upcoming slate of features films for 2006 is "X-Men 3," "Ghost Rider," and "The Punisher 2," which has a writer attached and is targeting a fall 2006 release. In addition to "Spider-Man 3" at Sony and "Fantastic Four 2" at Fox, additional pics include "Silver Surfer" and "Wolverine" at Fox, "Deathlok" at Par, "Hulk 2" and "Namor" at Universal and "Black Widow" at Lions Gate. "Thor" and "Iron Man" pics are seeking studios.

The studio also has ten pics it will produce under its credit deal with Merrill Lynch; four direct-to-DVD animated pics at Lions Gate, including two "Ultimate Avengers" pics, "Iron Man" and "Doctor Strange." The studio is working with Moonscoop on a Fantastic Four animated series, and live-action TV projects in development include "Alter Ego," "Blade" and "Skrull Kill Krew."

'HELLBOY' CARTOONS: IDT is producing an animated DVD feature and TV series based on Mike Mignola's "Hellboy" comicbook for debut in late 2006 or early 2007. The company is in talks with cable nets for the series. Pic will be animated by Film Roman  and feature voice talent from the live-action feature film, including Ron Perlman and Selma Blair. That pic's director, Guillermo del Toro, and comicbook creator Mike Mignola will consult as creative producers. The animation will be of the traditional 2-D technique instead of 3-D CGI.

WIZ NUMBERS: Wizard World has announced attendance at its Texas show as 10,500, down slightly from last year's figure of 12,000. Many at the show attributed the decline to NASCAR being in town the same weekend. The company says total attendance for all five Wizard World shows in 2005 — Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Chicago, Boston and Texas — was upwards of 125,000.

Manga is coming to the Sunday paper.

Universal Press Syndicate is offering a pair of TOKYOPOP-produced manga features to Sunday newspaper comics sections starting in January, according to an Associated Press story. The strips are "Van Von Hunter" and "Peach Fuzz" — both from American creators. "Van Von Hunter" is a comedy fantasy about a defender of evil and his memory challenged girl sidekick by Mike Schwark and Ron Kaulfersch of Pseudome Studios. "Peach Fuzz" is about a 9-year-old girl and her pet ferret and is created by Lindsay Cibos and Jared Hodges. The duo won TOKYOPOP's Rising Stars of Manga competition.

The Los Angeles Times, Denver Post, Vancouver Sun, Detroit News and Seattle Post-Intelligencer have already signed up for the strips. Editors at those papers say they want manga to bring in younger readers, something the newspaper biz desperately needs. Newspapers face declining circulation and aging readership and — much like the U.S. comics biz — are looking for ways to replenish their audience. If the strips catch on, the trend could spread to smaller newspapers and open up a new market and audience for manga makers and companies such as TOKYOPOP. The Los Angeles-based company began producing a manga strip for top teen magazine CosmoGirl earlier this year.

Manga strips also have the potential to inject some much-needed energy and innovation into newspaper strips, which are notoriously resistant to change and hypersensitive to controversy. It also may help bridge the gap between the comicstrip world and the manga and comicbook communities, which rarely seem to intersect with the exception of a few crossover talents.

Infinite Crisis #2

Creators: Geoff Johns, writer; Phil Jimenez, Andy Lanning, Norm Rapmund, Marlo Alquiza and Lary Stucker, artists

DC Comics, 48 pages, color, $3.99

So? Things get a lot clearer in the second issue of the big DC event comic, and for long-time fans it gets a lot more interesting. (Spoiler warning!: Highlight the white text if you want to know what's going on). Last issue saw the return of Earth-2 Superman and Lois Lane, Alexander Luthor and Superboy. This issue concentrates heavily on the role of Power Girl, as Earth-2 Superman reveals how he and his colleagues survived the original Crisis and how they plan to make sure the dark and corrupt Earth that emerged from that Crisis is forgotten so the "right" Earth can return. This is big stuff for DC fans, and despite the cynicism that past big event series have evoked, this story delivers in presenting a conflict interesting enough and big enough to really challenge the superheroes of the DC Universe. Of course, it helps immensely to already know a lot about DC history and the Crisis on Infinite Earths series of 20 years ago. Johns does a fine job of explaining as clearly and simply as possible the multiple Earths concept, but it's still likely to be information overload to new readers. (DC has a Crisis Counseling section of its website that brings readers who missed something up to date — an advantage comics fans didn't always have.) But for those who do know their stuff, this issue is full of great little surprises as it acknowledges that there actually has been a history to the DC Universe in the years since the first Crisis. The whole book evokes the original Crisis in its style as well, with a story crammed with dozens of characters and complex pages that explain a lot of the high concepts. Jimenez does a superb job with clean, detailed art that is dense yet not cluttered. It feels an awful lot like 1985, which is either good or bad, depending on how you view the comics industry. Either way, Infinite Crisis is a good example of the kind of megafiction that superheroo comics can deliver and will connect deeply with its target audience of hard-core fans. Grade: A-

'First Round' DVD

Directors: Corey Sosner, Oliver Xavier

Cast: Corey Sosner, Eric von Sydow

Get Me Out of Jersey Productions, color, 13 min.

So? Fan films are in a lot of ways the high-tech decendants of fanzines, allowing die-hard fans with the time and the money to bring their favorite comicbooks to the screen exactly the way they want to see them. The quality of these films has increased significantly and they've become quite popular at cons and even film festivals, despite the obvious legal issues. This pic even has its own page on the IMDB. And for all the things that may be just a bit off or of less than professional quality, there are things these filmmakers often get very right. That's exactly the case with "First Round," a fan-made film that pits the Punisher against Wolverine with cameos by the Kingpin and Jigsaw. Sosner stars, co-directs and produces the pic, which began as an audition tape the actor made for last year's Punisher feature. Sosner didn't get the role, but the audition evolved into this film, which has a good comics pedigree with storyboards from artist Tommy Castillo and cover art from Darick Robertson. (There's even a cameo by Jim Salicrup, a former Marvel editor best known for handling the Spider-Man titles in the 1990s.) There's not a ton of plot (it is only 13 minutes long), but the tone is ripped straight from the comics as Sosner in a good-looking Punisher costume shoots down the evildoers and squares off against Wolverine. Sosner definitely has the right look and uncompromising attitude for the Punisher. Similarly, Von Sydow gets Wolverine right in a lot of ways, from the smoking cigar to the menacing gutteral growl and dialogue peppered with the word "bub." Their fight is surprisingly satisfying with a pretty neat old-school visual effect and a resolution borrowed from Garth Ennis's run on The Punisher that settles the fight in a funny-painful way. There's even a short animated sequence recapping the Punisher's origin with moving comic art images. The homemade nature of the film shows through in the sound work, with dialogue sometimes out of synch with the actors' lips. The visual effects are crude and some shots in the action sequences look overly staged. These are things fans likely will be willing to overlook, given the overall good effect the film achieves. Of course, no DVD would be complete without extras. "First Round" includes a "making of" short (that's shorter than the movie, but not by much) and a preview of a planned sequel called "Eye for an Eye" that will make more use of the Kingpin and Jigsaw and uses scenes shot in Times Square. The DVD is available as a promotional demo for a minimum donation of $15 (to defray future production costs) or the pic can be downloaded to your computer through Sosner's website. Grade: B-

New York Comic-Con continues to add guests of honor to its schedule, with superstar DC artist Jim Lee and "Identity Crisis" writer and novelist Brad Meltzer to be honored at the show. DC also announced Meltzer has signed an exclusive contract with them.

MORE EXCLUSIVES: Artists Bryan Hitch and Pasqual Ferry have signed exclusives with Marvel. Hitch said at Wizard World Texas that he's going to be with Marvel through 2009 and has a huge Marvel Universe project in the works as his follow up to The Ultimates, Vol. 2. Hitch says he's working on issue 11 at the moment, with scripts coming in at a steady pace from writer Mark Millar. Also, the program for WWTX featured art from Hitch that will grace the box for Ultimate Avengers animated DVD coming in February from Marvel and Lions Gate. (Belated reaction from the clip shown of this: Thor fans will be very happy!) Ferry will work on a second Ultimate Iron Man miniseries to be written by sci-fi novelist Orson Scott Card.

DAVID DOINGS: Also from WWTX, writer Peter David announced a number of new projects he's working on for Marvel, including a five-issue Wonder Man series. He also says that orders for the new Fallen Angel series at IDW were higher than orders for the final DC issues, even while sporting a higher cover price.

WORKING TOGETHER: Image Entertainment and Dark Horse have agreed to co-produce a slate of films. The co-production has seven pics in various stages of production with five more in development. Among the pics is "My Name is Bruce," a comedy-horror picture directed by and starring Bruce Campbell as himself.

CHURCH IS ... THE SANDMAN!: Sony has released a picture of actor Thomas Haden Church as the Sandman from "Spider-Man 3," complete with green-and-black striped shirt.

HARVEYS' NEW HOME: The Harvey Awards have found a new home at the Baltimore Comic-Con and the 19th annual awards will be presented Sept. 9. The awards had previously been administered by the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art in New York.