DAY THREE - PAGE 5
As I mentioned some time back, DC comics was celebrating 75 years of putting out funnybooks, so we stopped by for a retrospective panel on the history of the company. When a company's that old, it's tough to find someone who is both breathing and able to remember when DC opened their doors, so the panelists mostly consisted of folks who were major players from the mid-60's forward. One of these was an artist (we'll call him Adam) who was very influential in moving comic book art to a more "realistic" look. Until Adam arrived on the scene (from a commercial art background) the comic book industry didn't realize there was more than one way to draw a comic, and it took guys like Adam (or, more specifically, Adam) to show them how it should be done. We learned all this from Adam himself, who was the most outspoken of the panel members and had a pretty firm grasp on his significance in the history of comics.
From there, we went to another DC-themed panel, this one promoting upcoming DC-Warner Brothers direct-to-video animated releases. The panel was actually focusing on short subjects that would accompany each feature-length offering, and would spotlight different DC characters such as Green Arrow, Captain Marvel, The Spectre, and Jonah Hex. Actor Thomas Jane, the voice of Jonah Hex (and one-time portrayer of The Punisher back in 2004), was there, and seemed to be having a pretty good time. Maybe too good a time for what the occasion warranted, but perhaps he's just naturally gregarious. Actor Jerry O'Connell (the voice of Captain Marvel in an upcoming video release) stuck his head in the door on his way to hyping Piranha 3D, and actor Neil McDonough (the voice of Green Arrow) phoned in from his cell phone to say hi, because he got stuck in traffic. It must be weird being an actor in a venue where people recognize you and then want you to autograph a headshot of a Jonah Hex or Captain Marvel.
Also on the panel was the producer of these animated films: Bruce Timm. He seemed a lot more relaxed and outgoing up there with Thomas Jane than he had when I had approached him on the Exhibition Room floor. Because there was no pencil and paper in front of him, it was clear that he was able to attend this panel because of the time he had gained by not doing my sketch. I wasn't bummed... I can always say that I allowed Bruce Timm to pal around with The Punisher. A thank-you card would have been nice, though.
A brief comics history lesson: since his creation and up to the early sixties, Batman was, for the most part, drawn in a cartoony manner. His character evolved into a not-quite-so-campy version of the Batman portrayed by Adam West in the 60s TV show. He was a hero of Gotham City, waving from parade floats, granting interviews, and probably attending weekly Kiwanis meetings. It wasn't till the seventies that Batman really adopted his more spooky "Dark Knight" persona and started scaring both criminals and citizens alike.
We decided to attend a panel discussing this change in the way the character was handled, entitled "Taking Back The Knight: Batman in the 70s and Beyond." The panel consisted of the DC editor-in-chief at the time, the chief Batman writer of that era, and one of artists most associated with the Batman "creature-of-the-night" transition. The artist was Adam, whom we had previously seen at the "75 Years of DC Comics" panel. This Batman panel sort of became Part 2 of the previous DC panel... we learned from Adam that, after he came along and saved DC Comics (artistically), he rolled up his sleeves and re-defined the Batman character into the successful money-printing machine it is today. By the end of this panel, Adam had convince me to write him a residual check every time I read a DC comic, and double it if it features Batman.
All material copyright 2009 Chuck Thornton