Comic News Recap: Invincible Lawsuit, Supergirl Casting, and Jason Aaron's New TMNT Series - The Short Box Podcast Ep. 417

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Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the Short Box Podcast. Season 9.

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The Short Box Podcast is recorded live from Jacksonville, Florida.

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Yo, Shortbox Nation. Welcome back to the podcast. Thanks for joining me. If you're new to the show, welcome to the show. Welcome to the Shortbox Podcast. My name is Bader, and you are now tuned into the best comic talk show that brings you the best conversations about comics and pop culture inspired by comics. This is episode 417. You didn't hear an audio intro or anything fancy this episode because there is no interview this episode. I wanted something a little more laid back.

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a little more relaxed. So I invited some familiar faces, some friends of the show that many of you, if you've been listening for any amount of time, you guys might recognize them. On the podcast, I got the Comic Gents with me, all right? I got Chris Hacker from the Oblivion Bar Pod. I don't got my sound pad machine, so Chris, you're getting a manual clap. Yay! Woo! And we've got- What's up? Glad to be back on the show box. Hell yeah. And we got Greg Licktieg from the First Issue Club. Woo!

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Yay. Hello everyone. Thank you. I like the in-person applause. It feels more personal. Yeah, true. Greg, can you do me a favor really quick too? Since we're here on the short box, can you tell everyone what your catchphrase is on the First Issue Club when you guys start the show each episode? Oh, just like Sue Storm, we love a good read. That's right. That is a fantastic intro. Greg, I've told you this already, but I'm going to say this for the world to hear. I have been binge listening to...

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all episodes of First Issue Club that have come out this year. And I've had a damn blast with it. And that intro, no matter how many times I've heard that pun and that joke, it still hits. It's so good. Well, thank you. Thank you. Yeah, that's a Mike D original. And we're going to talk about it later in this episode, but January has been very good for comic book fans. So it's been a fun, fun few weeks in January. A lot of good first issues. So I'm excited. And that's why those episodes have been so much fun.

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ups and downs we've already experienced in the comic book world. Facts, toys. And this is what I love about recording with other comic podcasts or just other podcasters in general. We do not waste time getting into it. It's like, yeah, butters. So today we'll be discussing, it's like, guys, this is my show. But I love it. But listeners, look, I'm not going to have a long-winded intro. We're just catching up on comic book news. We're talking about what's come out, what we've been reading. Really just a chance for the comic gents to link up.

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I also am kind of treating this like our, and I guess maybe this is a little preview, putting this out into the world. I'm kind of treating this like a trial run for a potential and maybe future little panel idea that I tossed out there. If C2E2 needs some proof that we'd make a good panelist, I can send them this episode. Or I don't send them this episode. Z, exhibit A. Is there an audition? Yeah, this is the audition tape. So depending on how this goes, we'll see. But anyways.

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Jets, I guess let me just ask the most basic-ass question out there. How have you guys been? How has, we're recording this on February 1st, we're a month into the new year. How has 2024 treated you so far? Chris, how about you take that first? Yeah. I mean, over at the Oblivion Bar, we always take every January off. So this has been kind of a somewhat relaxing time, but Botter and Greg, you guys both know me. People, listeners of the Oblivion Bar know this. I often don't just sit still and do nothing. So therefore-

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There was no time for, I wasn't just like sitting on my hands and watching, you know, watching a movie during the month of January, I was recording interviews for when we come back and I was preparing, you know, for the show as we come back in February. So that said, the grind isn't as hard right now, but going into this next month, once we are fully recording each week, putting out movie reviews, putting out comic, you know, creator interviews, all the things, it'll just be, you know, that podcast grind, we love it. So

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So January has been good. 2024 has been, like Greg had said a moment ago, been a great, just a great first month so far. Chris, are you able to share, I guess, can you preview any of the people you've interviewed or what people can expect from the episodes that you're dropping soon? Yeah, so we have the most recent one that's coming up is the interview with Noah Gardner, Ryan Para, and John J. Pearson. They are the complete creative team behind the Infernals that is coming out on February 14 through Image Comics. This is.

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I think I say it during the interview, but it's kind of like Little Nicky meets succession. It's basically the Antichrist is dying and he has three kids who's going to take over hell once he dies. It's essentially that and it's great. So it's very cool to have those three on. I also recently spoke to Tyler Crook, who a lot of folks might know as the artist from Harrow County. He also recently just wrote and drew and colored and lettered a awesome series through Dark Horse called The Lonesome Hunters. He just wrapped up the second arc.

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big fan of Tyler Crook. He is a artist with a capital A. So if you love Harrow County, highly recommend you check out Lonesome Hunters and also Shameless Plug, go check out that conversation. We also have Tom King and Bacquale Evilly coming up here soon, as well as Rom V. We also have Patton Oswalt and Jordan Blum. We just secured Patrick Horvath from Beneath the Trees Where Nobody Sees, which we'll talk about later in this episode. A lot of cool things coming down the pipeline for the Oblivion Bar. Good stuff.

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Greg, what about you, man? How's First Issue Club treating you? How are you guys doing over there? Good. And I'll always say it. Chris's and the Oblivion Bar's off month is more star studded than our regular month. I mean, you just hear the names he threw out. You're just like, damn, you're talking to fucking giants in the industry. Sometimes I want to be like, all right, Chris, we get it. We get it. You work hard. All right? Send good emails. I just want to see the text chains that he has going on on his phone.

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But no, I'm always excited to see who both you guys get on to interview on your shows. We Typically don't do interviews. We are busy in the trenches getting into those first issues A lot of first issues that have been coming out this year already You know the inner John verse is is alive and well and it refuses to not be bad Always good and that's frustrating for my wallet

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and for my free time. So that's exciting to see. You know, we've been good. We finished off 2023 with our best of episode, which was really fun. And we thought we'd start 2024, you know, nice and relaxed and, you know, slowly saunter into the new year. And 2024 had different ideas and they said, no, we're gonna drop all the heat in the coldest months. And so we've just been, you know, hunkering down and covering all that stuff, but.

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You know, we're getting ready for a C2E2. We're getting ready for Planet Comic-Con, which is our local convention here in Kansas City. Planet looks awesome, by the way. Have you guys seen all the people that they've announced for Planet Comic-Con this year? It's wild. Yeah, it's huge. I think they're doing like a Scream, the film franchise, a Scream reunion with everyone. They're doing a Happy Days reunion, which I can finally get my POTC number one signed. And then, you know, there's already...

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Incredible great creators coming we're we're kind of spoiled because we have Scottie Young Jason Aaron and Jeremy Han Living here in Kansas City John Bernthal is gonna be there. Yeah. Yeah, man. It's it's wild. It's well, I'm sorry Simon Beasley Paul Bettany Damn Yeah, it's our 25th anniversary. So they're going a little hard in the paint but You know cross my fingers for some big comic book

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creators to be named later, but we'll see. David is going to be there. That's enough for me. You know what I'm saying? It's like, I think botters coming to line up, man. Like, well, and great. We've talked about this before. Planet Comic-Con doesn't get enough love. It is a great con. It's a great, I would say it's like a great middle con. You can go there. You can have a good time. You're not like packed to the brim. It's, it's just, and you often will get those, like you said, Scotty Young's, you'll get your, uh, you said Colin bun as well goes a lot.

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Oh, yeah. Yeah. I actually met Tom King for the first time at planet Comic Con. So you guys get some really good talent. Charlie Hunnam is going to be there. I'm sorry. This this podcast has now become the bottom reads the planet comic con guest list. All right, bottom, you can stay in my guest room. That's legit. You know, flat. All right. So it sounds like Greg, you've already got your two comic conventions kind of like in my C2E2 and then planet comic con. Yeah. I know I'm doing a collective con in March and I'm

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I'm hoping this year will be my first year at C2E2. And if we could do this panel that I submitted, that's going to be so dope. So to any short box listeners that are planning to attend C2E2, who knows, there might be a panel that you can, there might be an opportunity to watch this episode happen again live. Chris, what do you got lined up for convention schedules? C2E2 is definitely on the board. That's something I want to do. I love C2E2. I've gone, I think, three times to C2E2, and I haven't gone in the last couple of years. San Diego is definitely happening.

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and then New York Comic Con is definitely happening. Those are my three this year. I have the very fortunate circumstance of working for a company that goes to a lot of these conventions. So unlike most folks, trust me, it's not beyond me to know how lucky I am to do what I do with, Comic Sketch Art is the company, but it affords me the opportunity to rub elbows with a lot of these awesome creators and go to these conventions. And it's pretty awesome, I can't deny. I get paid nothing, but it's cool to just be there. So I'll take it.

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You get paid in clout and that is worth it. It's way too gold in today's age. That's right. Get that precious SEO. Very rare times that you can sit there and just have a conversation with Tom King after hours at the convention hall. Like it's wild. I know I've mentioned Tom King a couple of times, but there are more creators that I like besides close personal friend Tom King. Thomas King. I have it. I, we call it, we go live TK. I call him TK. Yeah. Old Tommy boy. You know Tommy, right? My friend chainsaw.

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All right. I feel like I feel like we're making good traction on this episode so far. So we've talked about how our podcasts are doing. We've talked about the conventions we got lined up. Should we talk about our football teams? You know what? I wasn't going to bring that up. I know it's a sensitive, sensitive topic. I'll take the pain. I'll take it in. I'll bring it up. Okay. First of all, I should just say off the top, Greg, congratulations on your team winning everyone at home. I'm a diehard Baltimore Ravens fan. I have the tattoo on my back to prove it. I've loved the Ravens for most of my life.

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Should we talk about Duval County at all? I know they weren't there. No, the Jags don't, the Jags deserve no short box time at all, all right? Okay. They were cooking this year though. They were cooking for a bit. Give them a couple more years and they're gonna be on fire. We've been saying that for the last, we've been saying that for years. This year was supposed to be here. Listen, as a Chiefs fan through the 90s, I know you're paying. What I will say is, you know, I was expecting a little bit more trash talking in our thread, you know, last Sunday, but it was probably one of the most polite.

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Back and forth I've ever witnessed between two diehards of their respective teams It was almost like you guys were like like Greg you'd be like those those those Ravens, man They're really doing it. I think they got it and then Chris would be like, I don't know buddy The Chiefs are looking really good. Oh my god Congratulations on that touch. I'm like what the fuck is going on. I Equate it to like an 18th century duel where we we take off our white gloves. We each select

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You first. No, you should first. No, I should. I don't know. I think that game was very stressful for both Chris and I because we're both longtime fans of this football team and we're both longtime fans of each other. And so we want to be careful what we say. And also, we want to be careful not to say too much because if our team starts shitting the bed, we don't want to have to backtrack too hard. Yeah, exactly. Well, and also, I think for a long time, I put a lot of emotional investment in my football team. Like if you had talked to Chris in 2008,

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I was the biggest Wills McGahey, Ray Lewis, Ed Reed fan on the Ravens. And as I've gotten older, I still love the Ravens, of course, but I've realized that to put that amount of emotional investment in a sports team that you have nothing to do with can be considered silly by some. That said, and you guys know this because you were in the thread, I was in the pace mode. Like my BPM was at a high level, like a high resting level.

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during that game to the point where I was like, I'm invested inherently. I didn't realize that I was there, but here I am and I hate it. I have a headache. My ears are hot and my team is losing and we're not, and neither team is playing well and that's what sucks. Yeah, no, you're, you're right. That second half was kind of, I don't know. What is Kansas like around? I mean, cause this is what, y'all third or fourth time into the Superbowl, right? It's a, it's our fourth Superbowl visit in five years. Absolutely insane.

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Is it still as hype? Like I imagine like just the atmosphere, the energy. Oh hell yes. Right. And you ask any New England fan, you know, is it still magical when you go to the Super Bowl nine times? Fuck yes. Like yeah, it's a fun time. It's like, do you get excited when you find a Candy Mountain? Yeah. I don't care if I find Candy Mountain 200 times in a row. Like it's still fun to go to the big game. Where's the spot to be at?

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to be at like when it comes to my house. No, that's a good answer. That is a good old man answer right there. The Lictide household. Yeah. I mean, there's no there's no bad spot. I can only imagine like all of your bars and restaurants on that day are probably fucking pop. Yeah. How hard it is to get to the Super Bowl. Like how how the NFL is chock full of some of the smartest people in all of sports. And the line between terrible and great is this big.

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Like you could be the best team one year and the worst team the next by a coaching change or a player signing somewhere else. It's literally that close. So for any team to make it to the Super Bowl multiple years, that is the making of a dynasty. And as someone who, as the fan of a team that just lost, especially to the team that's now going to the Super Bowl, I still find it very fun to watch a team and a player like say Patrick Mahomes or a team like the Kansas City Chiefs.

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to succeed the way they are because we are literally witnessing history. There are not many teams like this. Yeah. And I know people say we're in our villain era, and that's fine. But so are the Patriots. And when you start the season, isn't the goal to get to the Super Bowl? Yeah. What do you expect? We try to play hard every game. We got there. I'm sorry, everybody. But I love comic books. Either die here or live long enough to see yourself as a villain.

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And for the five of you that are still listening, now we're going to talk about some comic books. All right, congratulations. That was just a test. You know, we got to weed out the strong. See who the real ones are. I guess I'll leave it up to you guys. How do you guys want to go? You guys want to talk comic books we've been reading or touch on briefly some of the comic book news that have happened in the past month? I say notes. I want to go over some notes here first and then kind of get into our reads there. I like that. And then I've also got some FOC new comic picks from Ben to play.

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at the end of this. So we've got some new com. Yeah, we'll just save all the comic talk later. Not that we're not about to get into it, but let's talk about specifically comic book news, headlines, announcements, things that have happened in the past month, which has been plentiful. There's a lot to pick from. We don't got all the time in the world today, considering I took up almost two hours just fiddling around with tech issues. So I guess how about we each pick one particular announcement, article, something to highlight.

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And we'll go from there. Greg, how about you kick us off, man? What has been the one article announcement news that has piqued your interest or made you happy to be a comic fan? Yeah, the one thing I did find interesting was actually supposedly leaked by Chip Sadarsky in his newsletter that Katie Kubbert is the new editor for Batman over at DC. Katie Kubbert has had a long history in comic books. She did a bunch of stuff over at Marvel with like A Force

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New Avenger stuff and it was phenomenal and now she has moved over to DC to be the top editor for their DC stuff. Not DC stuff, but their Batman stuff. And of course, Katie Qbert is the granddaughter of, oh my God, I forgot his first name. There's so many, there's Andy, Adam, Emma, which one? She's the granddaughter of Joe and the niece of Adam and Andy. Okay. We'll fix that in post. Who was the editor before her?

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On Batman. Before her, his name was Bruce Wayne something or other. Bruce Wayne, really? Just Batman. He's editing his own his own stories. How much prep time does he need? I think it was Ben Abernathy was maybe the editor beforehand. And then rumors is that he's going over to Robert Kirkman, Kirkman Skybound. First of all, props to you, Greg, because that is some that is some real comic fan.

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to highlight, where it's like, there's a new editor being announced. I give a lot of props to people that know the editors off the top there. I know right now, if you were to ask me any of the editors' names, that'd be a little hard pressed. I know Tom Breivor and Heather Amos, that's it. Those are the only two I can know off the top of my head. Is that something that you keep in mind or even reference at all when it comes to picking up a new series or a new number one? Because obviously, I think it's...

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a classic case for most people of like, oh, who's the writer? Who's the artist? And then maybe you might be like, oh, I really like Brad Anderson color. I'll check it out. But do you ever? It's, that's a great question. I always look at writer and artist first. But if a story really gets cooking or loses a thread, I kind of go back and I'm just like, OK, who's in charge of it? Who's the ringleader of making sure everything's supposed to make sense?

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All these books and tie-ins are supposed to be, are vibing and are not. And then I kind of like see, I follow the breadcrumbs of, you know, who's the parent in charge of all these children writing. Who's chaperoning this party? Exactly, exactly. And so, yeah, I mean, to some point, because, you know, Katie has had such a phenomenal track record at DC and Marvel, because she's also been doing like Batgirl stuff.

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For a while and so that's been phenomenal. I don't know if anyone's been reading the Batgirl or Batgirl stuff But it is it is so good so to see that she's also like lending her talents to You know the flagship of Batman like it's it's exciting because you're just like okay So they have some huge stuff planned because you don't bring in that heavy hitter talent if you don't have You know some big ideas you need helped ironing out or formulating

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They're there to facilitate the series, right? They're the ones in one way, especially at the big two, especially with the flagship book like Batman, they are really honestly steering the ship. It's not really so much the writer, it's the editor going, you can play in this sandbox for right now, okay, stay there. And then if you want, maybe I'll let you play over here when that event over there is finished or when that person is revived in something. That's truly what the editor does in these big books.

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All right, I guess this might be a free podcast episode topic idea for any of you two or anyone listening, but I think it'd be a really cool episode idea to highlight all of the biggest wins and losses in comics that have been directly attributed to an editor. One more day comes to mind. I always feel like anytime there's a storyline or a moment in comics or a decision or character death or a revival that polarizes fans,

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it's usually the editor that gets a lot of that flack. The writer will be like, well, the editor team and the team at Marvel wanted me to do this and that. And for some reason, one more day keeps popping in my head. Yeah. When a creative team blames something that they couldn't do on a series on the publisher, they're retroactively blaming it on their editor. That's really, without saying their name, they're like, well, the publisher had, Marvel had this going on and I couldn't do this. That's the editor's decision. And if it's really bad, they blame the editor and cheat. Exactly.

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You know what? Yeah, to make that episode, I'd be even better talking about or highlighting like some of the biggest editor in chief names throughout comics would be pretty interesting. Yeah. Greg, you actually set up a topic that I wanted to bring up to this group because it was new to me as I'm looking for like articles and headlines that spotlight. One in particular that like was new to me and caught my eye and kind of like had me scratching my head was this headline from, what was it? I think Hollywood Reporter.

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that read, Robert Kirkman settles invincible profit suit over series ownership. The long story short of it is that the original colorist for invincible, at least a colorist that had been doing the first 50 issues, William Crabtree claims that he, I guess Robert Kirkman talked him into signing a deal where it looked like Robert Kirkman was the sole owner of invincible.

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So that way he could pitch it to, I guess, Amazon Prime and get film and TV rights and all of that. And I guess it was actually a deal that kind of screwed a crab tree out of any royalties or a large percentage of royalties when it comes to the show. And they just settled it out of court. But it was supposed to go into court and actually play out. But they resolved it for whatever way. And as I'm reading this article, you end up also learning that.

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Crabtree has the same lawyer as Tony Moore, and Tony Moore had a similar issue with Walking Dead. I'm just gonna read a little part I have here. Crabtree's suit nodded to a complaint brought against Kirkman in 2012 by Michael Tony Moore, who claimed he was entitled to as much as half of the proceeds from the Walking Dead comic book franchise. The comic creator was accused of tricking Moore, whose lawyer was also McRae, into giving up his interest in the comic and demanded a rescission of the copyright assignment.

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So this is like the second time Robert Kirkman has talked one of his creators into signing a contract that wasn't, um, that just was not a good move on their part, which kind of like gave up their rights to, uh, revenue and, and royalties and stuff like that, which completely caught me off guard. Like, were you guys aware of this? No, not at all. And this is the yucky part of comics, especially creator on comics. Like we always think about invincible, being this long running, incredible creator, like Robert Kirkman in general, just creating

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some of the greatest creator on comics of all time. And yet, especially when you start talking about adaptations and licensings and all of those things, this is where it gets kind of gross and messy. And, uh, I, on one hand I feel really bad for Crabtree. Uh, and I think there was a similar, I don't think we ever got super, I don't think I ever got in the muck, but Corey Walker, who was the, was the artist on the first four issues of invincible, if I'm not mistaken, four or six issues, he had a similar issue when invincible got

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you picked up for adaptation and kind of thinking about how do you split that up between him who did again did six issues and Ryan Otley who did 120 issues. Like who is truly like the creator on this series. So this isn't, I hate to say that it's not surprising that something like this would happen. I'm just surprised that it got out into the public and that it's actually like public knowledge. I think as comic fans, we're used to hearing, you know, gripes with the artists and maybe the company or the writer in the company, you know, maybe at times also the writer and

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But for the colorists to kind of get screwed out, I thought we'd put this in a particular light that I haven't seen too much of. I mean, yeah, we're all used to hearing the stories of creatives getting screwed out of money and royalty and what they're owed. But this comes as such a shocker for me that it's Robert Kirkman, someone that champions. And I guess maybe I'm building them up too much in my head, someone that signifies and portrays ownership. He kind of lives and breathes the image ethos.

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promoted to such a high, you know, status and image and all of that. So it just really caught me by surprise that Robert Kirkman, it'd be one thing if this was like the only the one time and you know, it was like some shady shit, maybe like, you know, he wasn't completely honest with the contract, but a second time. And also like with another huge, you know, like his other set is two biggest properties. I don't know. I just, it just, it's weird. And, um, I wanted to, and I just realized like, I don't want to just,

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Spitball like what the the suit is about because I don't think all the details are out But I do want to just read this one part I highlighted from the article that explains a little bit more about what's going on between Crabtree and Kirkman It says the legal battle revolved around claims that Kirkman duped Crabtree Into surrendering his ownership stake under the guise of making the title easier to sell to studios the 2005 agreement stated that Kirkman was the sole author of invincible and owner of all rights of every kind in nature

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while characterizing Crabtree's contributions as work for hire, meaning that Kirkman was a sign any rights and colors would have had to the series. And the word duped is like, oh, Kirkman, you duped somebody? Well, let's look at that for a second. This is from 2005. Okay. Invincible was not a TV show yet. It was not anything yet, but a very fun comic book that I love.

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And duped, I believe, is Crabtree's words, not a legal term in the case. That's fair. Yes. And so, I mean, what's happening with Tony Moore and Crabtree right now is money. They want some of that money of the TV show and the comic sales. And they should. I mean, they're creators on the book. But let's not pretend that, like, in 2005, they probably needed a paycheck. And Kirkman was just like, listen, how about we just do this?

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That way you can get some money now and then like, I'll be the sole owner or whatever. It wasn't exactly the, maybe the moral thing to do. Yeah, you know, but at the end of the day, I mean, Kirkman's maybe the smartest businessman in comics right now. I mean, he's building an empire and when you are doing that, sometimes you have to step on people to get to where you want to go. Yeah, like your immediate team. You know what I'm saying? It's like, get yourself a lawyer on that one. Don't, why would you sign anything?

26:55
It doesn't matter who you're. Exactly, Chris. Listen, I love both of you guys, but if we started like a podcast network, we're getting fucking lawyers involved because you don't know what people are gonna be like in 10 years. And Greg, to your point, it sounds like to me, and again, this is all point of perspective. We don't really truly know who's at fault or any of that stuff. Honestly, we may never know, but it sounds like to me what Kirkman did was he said, I wanna own this, here is how you can make money right now. And you know, Crabtree maybe just didn't look at it close enough and now he's kind of left out in the cold.

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some of these phrases they're using from this contract. Like I feel like if you see an agreement that has the words, soul author, owner of all rights of every kind of nature, like you would almost like question it. Like what does this exactly mean? You know what I'm saying? It's like, I've heard these words before. I think this is kind of deja vu right now. And I think we do kind of have our answer here with they settled out of court. If Robert Kirkman knew that he was gonna win,

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He would say, OK, I'll see you February 20 in court, and we'll figure this out. But the fact that Image and Robert Krugman and SkyBand were just like, let's just fucking do this behind closed doors, please, tells me that maybe they didn't think they had a leg to stand on, per se. Snuck up some of that energon money. Or it could have been amicable, where it's like, look, you know what? We can cut you a fat check right now. You know what? We know we did wrong. Here's a fat check right now.

28:17
Probably, who knows if that was the case or not. But Greg, to your point, you're right. The fact that it was settled out of court, definitely, you know, make of it which you will, but I think I'm in the same camp as you on that mindset. Yeah, it adds for juicy drama. I love that. Yeah, we love the tea here. Yeah. Yeah, like I said, it just threw me off when I seen that headline. I was like, wait, not Mike Kirkman. No, not Robert Kirkman, so. Not Bob. Yeah, hopefully it. Bobby, no. Hopefully it was just an amicable resolution. I'll leave it at that.

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Chris, what about you, man? What was the headline or news piece that got your attention this month or this past month? There's not really a ton to dive into quite yet. It was just announced a couple of days ago, but ladies and gentlemen, we have our car Zor-El in the DCU. It is officially called DCU per James Gunn. Millie Alcock from House of the Dragon is officially has been confirmed as Supergirl in the Supergirl movie that'll be coming out, I think in 2025. This of course is being adapted from

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the, I'm going to say his name again. Hey, everyone at home, get your bingo cards out. I said Tom King five times on the show. Take a drink every time. Social Tom King of a call. At least modern masterpiece, super girl, woman of tomorrow. Everyone right now, if you have heard nothing that we've said in the last 40 minutes, hear this, go read super girl woman of tomorrow. It is literally a masterpiece. It is so good.

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And kind of along those same lines, I don't know how... Okay, I'll say this. I'm slightly apprehensive about the word adaptation with that book because so much of that book is its imagery and its inner monologue, which is notoriously hard to adapt in film. That said, James Gunn involved, Millie now joining this because as some people may know, I'm a giant House of the Dragon, Game of Thrones fan. She's great in the four episodes that she's in. She plays a young Raniro in that series.

30:13
I'm just really excited about this. I think so far what I've seen from James Gunn and Peter Saffron and their casting of this universe has been pretty spot on in my opinion. Yeah, I was pretty excited by that piece of news. For a minute I was like, wait, who? And then I was like, oh, yo, she's got the, I think she could get the look down. She's got the acting chops obviously. And like she's a young star too, right? Like not relatively, it sounds weird saying not like well known.

30:39
just like House of Dragons, right? Like how many millions of people tuned in. But you know, she's an up and coming star. And I think it's nice to have some new blood to try to follow and inject into a whole new universe. That's what he's kind of doing too with this universe, both him and Peter Saffron, is that of the castings that they have announced, none of these people are mega stars. They are all middling to rising stars. And I think that's kind of where Marvel is starting to falter a little bit.

31:08
they announce a new character in their MCU, it's always a big name. They're trying to win off of star power. And that's just not the way because you got to pick the right person for the right role. Think about who Chris Evans was when he was cast as Captain America. Yeah. Robert Down Jr. was on the decline. He had done Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and then Iron Man. Or I think maybe Zodiac was in there somewhere as well. Chris Hemsworth was a nobody. Yeah. He did Cabin in the Woods. Scarlett

31:36
What was the movie with Bill Murray? Why am I spacing it right now? Garfield. Yeah, Garfield. There it was. Yeah. Anyway, it doesn't matter. Oh, Lawson translation. Thank you. Yes. Circle gets the square. Yeah, that's right. These characters, these actors were not stars until they became superheroes. It seems like what James Gunn and Peter Safran are doing with the DCU is a kind of a similar format. Why not? Like it worked, right? I think it could work a second time. Absolutely.

32:05
Do you guys mind actually, I'm going to bring up one more that I wanted to just get, I want to hear like your initial reaction. What was your opinion? But the news, I think, I think it's safe to say one of the bigger piece of news in the, like just straight comic book reader world, you know, and I'm not talking movies or television and adaptations, but comic book world was in my opinion, when IDW revealed not only Jason Aaron going to be writing

32:34
issue what 150 ends and they're gonna restart the series but they also announced like an all-star cast of artists that are doing the first issues and we're talking uh rafael albuquerque joel jones cliff chang chris burnham will be doing the first four issues of this new series that jason erin's writing and then rafael albuquerque i think is supposed to be like the regular series artist and that is blowing my mind that

33:00
I'm about to have TMNT on my pull list. You know, we pick it up every month. Like, what was y'all reaction to the news? Well, as the reigning Jason Aaron fan club president, I'm vice president. Yeah, but I was pumped. And this is to say, I am currently reading the TMNT stuff from IDW and loving it. And the fact that I'm getting even more to eat later this year from my

33:29
good friend, Jason Aaron, I'm over the moon. They're so smart and this current series they have going on with Sophie Campbell, it got so many new readers and old readers in the TMNT. And now when you bring in Jason Aaron, who is like maybe the most well-known Marvel writer in the last 15 years, and they're just like saying, oh, by the way, he's gonna write in Ninja Turtles. People's brains just exited.

33:58
their ears. It was like explosive. Yeah. And you know, he's a writer that he's got experience writing team books, right? He wrote Avengers for a long time. That's not even talking about how great his door run is, his door Avengers. What else am I missing? He did X-Men for a while. It wasn't necessarily an X-Men book, but it was Wolverine and the X-Men. Which might've been my introduction. That and Southern Bastard. Don't even get me started on Southern Bastard. It breaks my heart. Southern Bastard was so good.

34:27
Yeah. Yeah. And the fact that we're ever going to get any type of resolution with Southern bastards. I put that to bed. I put that thought to bed. But Jason Aaron is someone that like is, has experience writing team books and what's a, you know, what's a better team than the fucking TMNT, right? Like the four brothers. Right. Come on, man. And this artist lineup is insane. Like I wonder. I want you guys, sorry, I don't mean to catch you off there, but I just want you guys to think back to, you know, let's say when you were five or six years old.

34:55
I don't know when you guys got into comics. Mine was somewhere around in that range initially was like hardcore into Batman, the animated series, Spider-Man, the animated series, Fox kids, all that stuff. If you go back in time and go, you're two of your favorite creators in your life will be writing and well writing. And the other one is writing and drawing both the TMNT and transformers. And you're going to be 32 and you're going to have both on your pull list.

35:20
You would have watched that little kid blow his mind and then probably blow his nose because he's five. But like you would have seen him, his mind would have been blowing right there. Gen X is eating good. 80s babies are eating super good. Like that was one point that I brought up to Declan Shelby was, you know, he's riding Thundercats and the hype has been insane, right? Like the pre-orders are going crazy. All thanks to our Lord and Savior, Rob Liefeld. I'm sorry, can I say that in a different place? Oh Lord. That dude is insane, but that's for another time. But you know,

35:49
Uh, thundercats huge transformers giant. Now we've got like TMNT's got like a second wind Fans that have been like hyper fans that have been following the comic series for years are like, yeah But you know the comics have always been good, but we're like shut up nerd like, you know our boys You know what i'm saying now it's important That's the wild thing is that these publishers are finally going hey You know what would be cool is if we put actual like big talent on our big ip books Isn't that is that weird? Is that a weird like thing? Should we do that like?

36:18
And now they're doing it and wow, who would have thought that it's all selling like hotcakes. Who'd have thunk? But I bring that up to say that this news almost feels like it, does it feel like it overshadows how good that run has been? And I'm saying this from someone that necessarily hasn't read that run, but like Drew and his brother Zach and a handful of people really love what IDW has been doing with TMNT for years. Like for years I've heard how good it is.

36:42
You know this piece of news is enough for me to be like all right sign me up god damn it All you know ten years of how good these stories are it means nothing to me right now I just find it like but Greg good on you for going back and like you know Trying to play catch up and appreciating what they've established so far like how is the series you said the series is good So far what you've been reading right? Yeah, so so Sophie Campbell who's been doing the series from one to one that okay? That's what I mean to say how does Sophie Campbell feel and she's like guys

37:12
I've been here for years, you assholes. I would imagine she's a little miffed, but Chris and I actually had a sidebar about this earlier, and it's just like, we're gonna revisit this series that Sophie Campbell did in like less than five years and say, this was legendary. Like 150 issues on one series? Like that, most creators don't get past 20 issues, and she's down here slinging ink.

37:41
for 150 issues. And the fact that the only acclaim is from diehard fans and she's still given sweet, sweet turtle stories after 100 issues is something to be applauded and recognized. And wherever she goes next or wherever they go next, I'm following because they've proven that they can maintain a story for 150 issues. I mean,

38:11
Kelly Thompson was on Captain Marvel for 50 issues, and that took four years. And that's the longest series that Captain Marvel's ever had. 50 issues, like that's another feat. Remember that legendary Jason Aaron Thoron you were talking about earlier? He was on that book for seven years and didn't even get to 60 issues. It is a spectacle. And all applaud goes to Campbell and the team over there at IDW. I salute you. You did a great job.

38:41
Just because I'm excited that Jason Aaron is hopping on does not diminish what you did. But I'm excited to see my hometown boy, my flavor, get on to TMNT. That's right. Drew was really into, he's always been into TMNT, but like a couple years ago, he really got into the comic books. And he read from issue one up to the current one. And some of the story arcs and character developments and the things that have transpired in that series, like just his description blew me away. I'm like,

39:10
What do you mean they did that to Donatello? You know, like, wait, what? Why would they do that? It sounds like she's just had like creative liberty to like take that, take the turtles in like places that, you know, that have never been, you know, like they probably wouldn't let them slide. That probably wouldn't slide on like Nickelodeon or an animated show or something. It sounds like she's had a lot of creative freedom to do some cool stuff in the comics. Yeah, and this is like what she was able to do on that book for as long as she had.

39:38
That's what comics used to be everybody back in the day when no one was paying attention. Chris Claremont could just write X-Men for 30 years. No big deal. Like no one said shit. Can we just do that again? Like let them do whatever. Like let these creators run free. Like we shouldn't kick an artist off a book after 16 issues or what have you, because it's not the top selling book and it's not beating Spider-Man and Batman. Like we should let them play in their own. You know, we can't get attached to these series unless we actually have time to get invested in them. Agreed.

40:07
I agree. That is one thing about current comics that is a little annoying is that a lot of them feel like they're written for six issue arcs trades and there's a reset or there might be a disconnect between certain arcs. But yeah, kudos to the IDW team. I want to transition and ask you guys because I showed preview images. Like I said, these different artists are going to be writing different one shots.

40:33
before the before Raphael Abercracke takes over art duties for the main series. And I just want to recap and say, and announce. So it's Joelle Jones writing the Raphael one shot that comes out July. You've got Jason. I'm sorry, Rafi. I'm actually wait that I fucked that up. Okay. Let me do that again. You got Joelle Jones drawing Raphael one shot in July. Then you've got Raphael. Am I saying this right? Why do I keep saying Raphael? Oh, cause I'm saying Raphael twice as Raphael. Yeah. Nevermind.

41:01
And then you got Ravio Albuquerque drawing the Michelangelo one shot in August. Then you've got Cliff Chang doing the art for the Leonardo one shot in September. And Donatello drawn by Chris Burnham in October. And then the, you know, the regular series starts of those four. If you only had to buy one, which one would you go for? Oh, it's rough for me. Easy. I mean, I was going to ask you guys before we got done with this topic, who's your favorite turtle?

41:29
For me, it's Raph because he's a maniac, but also Joel Jones, who is my favorite artist of that group. So it's an easy decision for me. You had me at Jason Aaron, and then you had said Joel Jones and Raph, okay, I'm in. Like, let's do this. Yeah. I think I'm at a tie. So my favorite turtle is Leonardo. You know, I've always loved like the leader, the pragmatic, you know, suck up. So Leonardo is my default and Cliff Chang is, you know, this preview image already looks pretty slick. But

41:59
Chris Burnham in this Donatello preview image they got, he is an artist that really gets into the weeds of like the minutia of art. Like every line, he just adds so much lines and texture and detail to his work. I'm like kind of curious to see like what his particular comic comes, looks like. And Donatello, from what I understand is like, gets a lot of love in this series. Like he's not just like your nerdy computer whiz guy. Like he...

42:27
I think he's been through some shit throughout the IDW series. So I'm kind of curious to check that out. Greg, what about you, man? Of those four, who peaks your interest the most? Oh, shit. If you can't tell me what turtle I am, we ain't friends. And straight up, Michelangelo, because he's the party dude. Choosing your turtle or identifying with whatever turtle is like figuring out your seven love languages. What Hogwarts house are you in? Yeah, exactly. It's just like, it's like, it's, it's, it's, um.

42:57
It's tarot and it's like astrology for like hyper nerds. It's just like, yeah, you may be like a Scorpio or like Mercury in retrograde, but like what fucking turtle are you? That's how I know if we're going to date or not. I'm a Leonardo rising. I'm a Mikey and a Donatello house. So it's like kind of complicated sometimes. Like I, I know that we've been trying to crack the secret to going viral online, but I think you might've figured it out if you can develop some sort of like.

43:26
TMNT astrology sign. What's your sign? You know, graphic man. What's your shell? Ooh, all right. Stop giving them all the good info. Yeah, we're workshopping. We're workshopping. Yeah, fuck, copyright, copyright. Stop the recording, botter. Yeah, all right, so safe to say we're all excited about the new TMNT series that'll be coming out. From my understanding, they are, it says here, IDW is kicking things off with a 10 page prelude.

43:52
story in the team and team, Alpha number one. Of course, every good relaunch has got to have Alpha number one. So Alpha number one, one shot on sale in June. And then the ongoing series with Jason Aaron and all these artists starts in July. So right around the corner, just in time for that. That's some Marvel shit, by the way. That's like, Jason's like, hey, coming from Marvel, we got to do a one shot. It's got to be Alpha. Can we put a decimal in there maybe? Is that OK? Yeah. I would like to go ahead and transition into.

44:19
You know, we'll make this our last segment of this show and that is talking about new comic books that our listeners should be aware of and that is where our good guy, Ben Kingsbury, comes into play. I asked him this morning to send in his three FOC picks of the week. So these are brand new comic books coming out in about a month that if you are interested in checking out, you're going to go to your local comic shop, ask them to order it for you or put it on your pull list. If you're...

44:48
Familiar with the show, you know Ben's got a very eclectic taste. He sometimes will make certain themes when it comes to his picks and I don't know if he's got a theme this week, but it's a stellar lineup of his books. So these are his top three new comic books that you as a listener, as a comic book fan should probably check out. Good morning, good afternoon or good evening short box nation. I'm Ben Kay.

45:12
Representing Gotham City Limit, Jacksonville, Florida. And I've got three comics you should add to your pull list right now. Let's jump off with a big major title for Marvel Comics. Symbiote Spider-Man 2099, number one. Peter David is penning this dystopian future piece, so that's worth giving it a shot right there. But let's dive deeper.

45:36
Marvel's been hinting at a major 2099 event happening this summer, and Miguel O'Hara getting his own symbiote separate from Venom 2099 would seem to be playing a major role. Plus, for those collectors out there, Marvel loves to throw first appearances in Spidey 2099 comics. Add this one today. All right, there goes your first pick of the week. That was Symbiote Spider-Man 2099. That comes out March 13th.

46:05
Alright, let's go into his second pick of the week. And this one comes from the Distinguished Competition. Alright, this one is a DC title for all you DC heads out there. Let's hear from Ben. Second on this week's list, DC Comics presents Suicide Squad Dream Team, number one of a four-part series. From all accounts, Amanda Waller is making her move to seize the ultimate power in the DCU.

46:35
The future, think Precog Minority Report. Plus, Suicide Squad's always best known for its cast of characters, so I'll introduce to you who's been announced. Join this ride with Harley Quinn, Bizarro, Clock King, Black Alice, and Dead Eye. This four-part series will be chaos, literally. All right, that was the second pick right there. That was Suicide Squad. Dream Team number one that comes out March 12th.

47:04
And last but not least, I'm really excited for this next pick. Listen from Ben. I'll let Ben tell you and then I'll follow up. And last but not least, let's hear one from the new publisher Distillery. White Boat number one of a three part series. Scott Snyder's Twisted Mind makes his debut for Distillery. And the one question White Boat promises to answer is this. Are you being shipped to paradise or sinking you to hell on earth?

47:33
For fans of Hereditary, The Host, Jurassic Park, The Island of Dr. Moreau, there have been secret cults that have existed for millennia. However, in this tale, they're working on something called The Human Project. Sounds like an X-Files episode to me, so I'm in. Plus, if you love your comic shop, letting us know that you want this oversized magazine comic really helps us in ordering. So get this one added to your pull list now. Well.

48:03
Another week is coming gone and I'm still Ben K representing Gotham City Limit, Jacksonville, Florida. Remember, with great power comes great responsibility and always take it to the limit. I could listen to Ben K read the previews magazine. That boy has a voice as smooth as Parquet. He's in the back of a shampoo bottle. He's good. Yeah, that was wonderful. Alright, once again, that last one was... White Boat.

48:29
White Boat, that one comes out March 27th. Just a quick recap of his top three. You got Symbiote, Spider-Man, 2099 number one. You got Suicide Squad, Dream Team number one, and White Boat number one. All of those will be linked in the show notes if you want to take a look at any of the previews, the covers, the creative teams, that will be in the show notes. So click on, or check that out if you are interested in previews. And just a reminder, even if you don't live in Jacks.

48:55
You can still take it to the limit by visiting gothamcitylimit.com where you can find exclusive comics and variant covers you won't find anywhere else. I also believe if you want to you know if you want to be a part of the Gotham City Limit family I believe they can also set you up with a poll list no matter where you're at. I know they do shipping. They've got certain customers in different states. So if you're interested in being a part of the Gotham City Limit family hit them up gothamcitylimit.com. All right. Greg, Chris, I'm going to look to you guys and ask of those three picks which one?

49:24
Peaks your interest the most, which one would you put on your pull list? I just want to point out really quick before we make our picks that the Symbiote Spider-Man 2099 has both a 1 in 100 Greg Land variant and a Salvador Larocca cover. So it's definitely not going to be Symbiote Spider-Man 2099. I wrote this series in the garbage off issue one. I'll kind of piggyback off you, Botter. Whiteboat number one, I mean, you have me at Scott Snyder. I'm in. Distillery doing a lot of cool work with a lot of their different...

49:53
titles. I'm specifically very excited for the James Tynan and Christian Ward spectrograph coming out in, I want to say March, but very excited for this white boat as well. Anything distillery does is looking to be pretty quality. So that'll be my pick.

50:10
Yeah, I'm also gonna choose White Boat Number One from Distillery. The description sounds a little bit like White Lotus Goes to Hell, and you know, I love the idea of that and what Distillery is doing and the prestige format that they got for us fans is cool, and you know, Ben was right, let your LCS know ahead of time on ordering these things, because the prestige books are a lot harder to order because they are.

50:38
a weird size and so, and they're a little more pricey. So it helps them ahead of time to kind of get their ducks in a row. So I know I'm like, I'll be calling my LCS tomorrow to make sure that they give me a copy of white boat. I piggyback off of all of that. I also pick white boat. I said that in the beginning, but I'm a sucker for, I've really started to grown to like the prestige format, you know, there's something about, you know, the artwork being larger, you know, just.

51:04
feeling like, you know, even though it comes with a little bit of a price tag, it's usually what like an eight 99 book. Um, I don't know. I think, I think it's a better pages though. 48 for usually it's like 48 to 52 pages in these prestige books. So it's got Snyder and Francesco. Frank Abella have been, you know, with them two together, they've been killing it. And with these books being the way they are easy to get 9.9 I've heard 9.8 are pretty much positive 9.9. If you're going to get a 9.9 in a comic book without pressing it, try out those prestige books, everybody.

51:33
Words of wisdom. There we go. All right, well gents, I think that kind of wraps us up for this episode. Our C2E2 panel tryout material. Can't wait to send this to them. But also. We're better in person. Yeah. And more handsome. But also, I wouldn't mind making this maybe a more regular thing. A meeting of the Comic Gents. That is the name of our text thread. I guess a little bit peeking behind the curtain for our listeners.

52:03
And that's kind of where I got the idea of having you guys on today. So I appreciate you guys jumping on with me, bearing with the technical difficulties. Do you guys have any closing remarks, any shameless plugs? Obviously I'm going to have links to both of your shows, your socials in the episode description, but do you want to say anything before we sign off? Chris? Uh, I love every time we can put this Voltron of a comic book podcasting beast together because.

52:28
I'll always love chatting with you guys. I talk to you guys in our Comic Gents thread more than I talk to my mom. So I, if I could just do that on a recording and then put it out into the world, Hey, more power to us. But, um, yeah, no, very much. I had a great time doing this. Hopefully we get to do that panel. Can't wait to hang out with you both in person. Uh, but we had a great time at New York Comic-Con last year and Greg, I know you and your tall ass have a just, just as much time, just as much of a good time as we had. So hopefully we can make it happen. And um,

52:58
Shameless plug, obli Subscribe wherever you listen to your favorite podcast. We'll be releasing a brand new segment next week. I think it's the week that this is coming out actually called Midnight Rewind, where we go back and look at our favorite anime classics of all time. Our first episode will be covering Princess Mononoke, and Bodder, you would appreciate this as a podcast head. My transcript is wild. It's like longer than the Bible. So it's going to be.

53:22
A very intricate and detailed episode. If you love anime, you've loved Princess Mononoke, Studio Ghibli. It's going to be one for the hardcore fans. So look out for that. Looking forward to it. Hell yeah, Chris. All right, Greg, what about you, man? Yeah, like Chris said, thank you again for having me on the short box. It's always a pleasure to meet up with you guys of like-minded nerds and comic book fans to talk about the things that I love the most. If you are

53:49
a part of the 80% of the audience that skipped ahead too far when we were talking football and you just got here. Let me give you the episode summation. Tom King is Chris Hacker's emergency contact. We know that for certain right now. To the creators of Omnibus, give Bada a sponsorship. He spent so much money on that app and said your name so many times this episode. The man deserves it. Yeah, let's get that email chain linked up. No.

54:19
I could do this every day with you guys. I love comic books so much. I love making sure people know how great comic books are. Shameless plug, firstissueclub.com. We cover the weekly issues of the, I'm all flustered. You guys got me flustered. I'm looking at you smiling. First Issue Club, we cover the first issues of the week. We've been doing it for, god, almost six, seven years now, and it's been just a fun ride.

54:47
I met you two gentlemen through that and we got no plans to stop it now. So come on by and maybe you'll find something you like and maybe you won't. Who knows? Greg, I am looking forward to texting you about my thoughts about your episode when it drops tomorrow. But with that being said, Short Box Nation, that is the end of our show. My pre-recorded outro will be playing here shortly, but I just wanted to say thank you for tuning in. Thank you for listening.

55:14
Hopefully you guys enjoyed something just a little more relaxed. You know, I love doing interviews. I love, you know, doing book reviews, but sometimes I don't want to write a Bible length, uh, transcription and outline. Sometimes I just want to catch up with the homies and talk comics. So if you guys enjoy this and if you did, let me know. All right, shoot me a message, email, let me know how you enjoyed this episode. And if you're the one person that is still listening, I appreciate you. Right. I love you the most. Be well, take care. And I'll catch you guys next week.

55:43
Christopher Priest!

55:51
There you have it short box nation, that's the end of the show. Thank you for hanging out, thanks for being here, and a special shout out if you made it this far. If you enjoyed this episode and you have some thoughts or comments that you want to share with us, write us at theshortboxjaxx at gmail.com. And if you really liked this episode, help us spread the word, share this episode with a friend or someone you know that loves comics as much as we do. And don't forget to leave us a 5 star rating and review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

56:19
or wherever you get your podcast. It takes two minutes tops and it would mean the world to us. So leave us a review. Now, if you want more content like bonus episodes or perks like early access and commercial free episodes, and in some cases, free comic books, consider joining our Patreon community at patreon.com slash The Short Box. It's an easy and very affordable way to support the show and get rewarded for being a fan. Once again, sign up at patreon.com slash The Short Box.

56:46
Speaking of our Patreon community, I want to give a big shout out to our current members, including Adam Chittani, Tony Aupi, RC Gamet, Blake Simone, Blythe Brumleaf, Bo Evers, Brian Brumleaf, Chad Landenberger, Chris Hacker, Chris Jinx, David Morales, Triple D Mystic, Dominique Jackson, Errol White, Edbot 5000, Generation Jaguar, Greg Hopkins, Greg Ligtite,

57:17
Rome Cabanatan, Joshua Miller, Justin McCoy, Kara Reichardt, Cassie Whitley, Corey Torgeson, Matt Godwin, Amanda Marin, Nick Wagner, Podcasters Assemble, Stephen Gamet, T-Mix, The Wait For It Podcast, Thomas Pandich, Thurian, Trey Namo, Walter Gantt, Warren Evans, and Zach Armour. Thanks again to everyone that listens and supports this show. Be sure to come back next week for a new episode. And most importantly, take care of yourselves. Read a good comic.

57:45
and continue to make mine and yours short box. I'll catch you soon. Peace.