The road to Comic-con International part 2
By now many of you who are NOT going to the big con are just about as tired of hearing about it as seeing posts about the confederate flag or hearing about the fate of Kaytlin Jenner’s dick. Well, all I can say is come back here on the fourth of July for a chance to stick it to the people who are going…and their exclusives and first crack at getting new stuff. I won’t leak too much now, but you will have a chance to loot a coffer meant for the con, perhaps loot it dry…leaving those who are going to wish they had been keeping an eye on us all year.
As for me, it is just about a week away from getting on a plane as I write this. Getting on a plane and running a booth at the largest Comic book convention in the U.S.A. I have done this show about 15 times and every year it is a bit different than the next. The added wrinkle of the show being two weeks earlier sucks. Whats more, that timing puts it directly after the Independence day Holiday, meaning many of the businesses I need open, will be closed either friday, or worse…monday just before I get on a plane. I blame Benjamin Franklin for this. He was a publisher, he should have known how busy summer is for this industry and declared independence in the fall. This would not only have given me an extra day to prepare but saved many lives. The point in the war at in which men were freezing to death at Valley Forge would have occurred in the spring, when it was much warmer. Of course then Washington wouldn’t have been able to carve up the dirty redcoats on X-mass, which is my favorite part of the whole struggle. Merry X-mass you filthy oppressive swine! Have a “silent night”….FOREVER! BLAM BLAM BLAM POW KAPOW STAB STAB STAAAABBBBB!!!”
STAB!
STAAAABBBB!!!
“Now get your ass back to Europe…Napolean is waiting for you! and when he’s done give our regards to Shaka Zulu….dumb bastards”
Anyways…
More or less I seem to be on track with preparations, which usually means some disaster is waiting for me.
The disaster this year could be not in the form of late shipments, forgotten elements of the display, or some injury ( a few years ago I sliced my left hand open two hours before the show and needed 12 stitches. The trip to the emergency room had to wait of course until after the close of the show that day.), but in the form of the crowd that walks through the door. 160,000 or so people will come to this show, and unlike other years, and other comic book cons, and for that matter even other horror conventions I have attended, many or most of these people will have little to no interest in COMIC BOOKS. They’ll be there to hear about Captain America no.3 ( only slightly aware that he is from a comic book), or get plastic crap that is a different color than the plastic crap in sold in stores and therefore “exclusive” in the mind of anyone who’s ancestors paid traveling salesmen for snake oil to cure their impotency. The snake oil cure was a sham, but unfortunately their ancestors managed to complete the act anyway and continue the family line so that in a few weeks their children’s children would spend the equivalent amount of money on another sham. Some will come to hear about things completely unrelated to comic books like a video game they can play and imagine they are fit enough to run up a hill in armor, or run up a hill, or run. Others will attend a panel about a t.v. show that has nothing to do with comic books, maybe some game of thrones panel where they discuss the cgi or stand ins used during the scenes with male nudity.
I’m actually not bitter, if that’s how I am coming across. Whatever, the show have morphed into something other than what it was started as and that’s how the cards lay. There will still be 160,000 people there looking to exchange cash for entertainment and Arsenic Lullaby takes back seat to no entity in regards to being entertaining. Just the same, it would make it easier if a few of the people there came looking for comics.
This week is for getting everything to the printers, silk screener, and other manufactures so that our table is stocked and ready to expand the minds of the masses!
Barring incident these are some of what we’ll have at the good ole Arsenic Lullaby booth (that’s booth number #2200.)
ARSENIC LULLABY LIMITED EDITION TPB
The best of Arsenic Lullaby Pulp edition no.1, Omega and No.Zero ( That’s the Eisner Award nominated Issue with characters that went on to appear on Comedy Central!)
Voodoo Joe vs a 95 year old man in a nursing home! Baron Von Donut and his doomed romance with Ms. Mango! Tex Buckaroo fighting a giant eyeball and MORE!
Limited to 300
( That’s right only 300…I don’t plan on working much on Sunday )
It’s been almost 5 years since any of this material has seen been in print. While gathering it together I was kind of impressed by myself. It goes to show, that despite conventional wisdom you don’t need to be miserable or screwed up to be a good writer. Much of this was done before life really started kicking my ass.
LIMITED EDITION ARSENIC ASH CAN COMIC WITH SKETCH BACK!
ONLY 300!
Now here’s a souvenir for you. Page after page of our most recent best and most despicable stories AND you can have it sketched on the back by ME! (yep this one is limited to 300 also, the plan this year- set up, move units, screw off a lot at the end)
ARSENIC LULLABY “overslept”
Silk Screened Poster!
18×24
Three color silk screened poster featuring one of Douglas’ most striking illustrations
limited to 50! (maybe 55-60…sometimes the silkscreener gives us a few extras, but either way this won’t be around long)
Haven’t done a silk screened poster before, I always meant to though, so I am pretty excited about this.
In previous years an item with a quantity of 300 would be gone sometime Saturday, but that was previous years. This year I’m going to hedge my bets, besides, with the two issues being sketch variants, transactions are going to take a bit longer…that is until I lose my patience or my hand gets sore. Expect the final 100 copies of each to have sketches not that much better than the attendee could do themselves, or done with my left hand.
Other details and updates will be here
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