Friday 6 January 2017

Weekly Update #164: Rock Bottom Comics - An Appreciation


Rock Bottom Comics!
Reports that Dave's fame has spread as far as Fayetteville, Arkansas, 
have now been CONFIRMED, repeat: CONFIRMED.

22 comments:

Jeff Seiler said...

Well, first of all...I really sound like *that*!?! Secondly, I wasn't Going Home when I went to Fayetteville, I just went see my brother's house and, um, him. Third, very nice of you to call Alan and Josh, Dave, and even nicer of you to send them "gifties". And, since you mentioned that I visited more than one comics store on my trip, I should point out that the other one was Comics Empire, in Tulsa, where I purchased all of the monthly Cerebus issues I could while I was matriculating at Oral Roberts University, starting in 1982. I make a point of visiting there whenever I get to town. Mike, the owner, has also been a staunch supporter of Cerebus for a very long time. And he is very, very deserving of a "giftie".

Jeff Seiler said...

That's The Comic Empire, 3122 S. Mingo Road, Tulsa, OK, 918-664-5808. Mike McCormick owns and operates the store, daily, and has owned it for over 32 years. It has been in business for 40 years and had a good writeup in the Tulsa World newspaper (one of my past employers) seven months ago. In the article, it is noted that Mike first set foot in the store two days after it opened. Google the newspaper article--it's good.

The Comic Empire definitely deserves recognition.

Jeff Seiler said...

And while I'm at it, add Titan Comics, in Dallas, to the list. Jeremy Shorr, the owner and another guy who is there every day, almost always has all 16 volumes on the shelf. Heckuva nice guy, too.

Glen said...

I may need to head to "Mostly Comics" in St. Catharines, Ontario and remind them about the portfolios, Cerbeus in Hell, and the remastered TPBs. I did not see them on my last visit.


The owners of the store are incredibly nice.

Gary Boyarski said...

Aha! All these comic stores in the dark in regards to the remastered editions, only serve to strengthen my opinion that we need a remastered Cerebus #1, not only to satisfy the, ahem... ravenous hordes of fans that can't afford the real thing or the fake one, but to help get the word out about the remastering in an affordable format that also serves as a flagship 40th Anniversary item. I'm not sure how many regular readers AMOC has, but I'd wager that there are a lot of lapsed Cerebus fans who either aren't aware of the website, or any of the current goings on in the world of Cerebus in general. I can imagine a store owner being hesitant about stocking the trades, (current comic fandom being what it is, Dave, you'd probably make more money licensing Cerebus to Funko for those God-awful POP! Figures) but I can see them taking a chance on a reissue of THE comic that spearheaded a self publishing moment that lasted a decade.

"If you build it, they will come..." 😉

Anonymous said...

I'm with Gary. It's a good idea. The 22 remastered pages with a new cover and lots of advertising for the remastered trades and the FC packages/trade.

I'm currently watching Season 4 of "Ray Donovan", a very good show that airs on Showtime. In the first couple of episodes, they featured a sub-plot that centered around a prime time, pay-per-view boxing match on (you guessed it) Showtime. With lots of shots of the SHOWTIME logo over the squared circle.

Hey, if you own it, you can advertise anything you want in it, as you figured out from just about day one, Dave.

Jeff Seiler said...

Um, that was me, just above. Tapped the wrong button.

(That's what she said...)

Paul Slade said...

Just out of curiosity, I had a wander round London's four biggest comics shops this morning to see which (if any) Cerebus volumes I could find on their shelves.

I drew a blank at Forbidden Planet, Gosh! and Mega City, but had much better luck at Orbital. They had the remastered volumes of High Society (3 copies), Church & State I (1 copy) and Going Home (1 copy) all on display, plus single copies of Church & State II, Flight, Women, Guys and Jaka's Story. There was a copy of the IDW covers treasury on the next shelf up too.

I'm a bit disappointed that I couldn't find a single Cerebus volume on display at any of the other stores. Gosh! have been very helpful in reordering the remastered volumes for me when I ask, though.

CerebusTV said...

It had to happen. Jeff Seiler finally hit Rock Bottom.

Jeff Seiler said...

Actually, although I voted "None Of The Above" (really; you could look it up), I think Trump (Er... PRESIDENT-ELECT DONALD f×*%\$@TRUMP.. please, don't come after me, guys...) could actually build a YOOOUGE wall between us and Canada...

Thus, effectively, eliminating the last remaining aspect of Dave Sim's relativity in America.

Now, lest you're going "huh?!?", I personally, as a registered Republican, believe that we, The Grand Old Republic, have, truly...

hit Rock Bottom.

"Make America Great Again!"

Um, four years from now.

(Maybe. We'll see.)

How did we go from comic book stores to this?

See CNN.

Um, FOX would tend to disagree...

Jeff Seiler said...

And, I'm a Republican.



sigh...

Jake said...

It goes without saying Dave should do something like this.

https://www.bleedingcool.com/2017/01/08/terry-moores-brush-internet-insanity-new-collectible/

Travis Pelkie said...

I was going to post about that one myself, Jake!

Essentially, in case you don't want to go to the link, Terry Moore (of Strangers in Paradise, Echo, Rachel Rising, etc) has apparently only used 30 brushes to create the comics he's done, and he recently sold them on his website. Craziness ensued, because they got snapped up so quick, more than one person had them in their "cart", so they went to the first person to "check out".

If Dave were to do something like this, I'd say don't sell them all at once, necessarily. And maybe start with the one he was using when he was drawing the last piece he did, since it's cursed ;) Auctioning might work better too.

Gary Boyarski said...

That would be a neat and priceless collectable for any die hard Cerebus fan, but I think that would go against Dave's plans for the preservation of his house and all it's contents as a Cerebus museum.

Glen said...

@travispelkie


I'm thinking maybe Dave could auction off his game worn "Weekly Update" gray sweatshirts.


Signed of course.


Unknown said...

Gary - I can understand you thinking that it bolsters your opinion. That doesn't, however, mean that you're, necessarily, right. Stores that aren't buying CEREBUS except for "pull customers" aren't going to go "WOW! A FACSIMILE OF CEREBUS NO.1! I'VE GOT TO ORDER A DOZEN OF THESE!" They'll order one for every CEREBUS customer willing to pay for it in advance or add it to their subscription file.

At the moment, the intellectual property that's "in play" is CEREBUS IN HELL? With the fact that it isn't driving traffic (or, at least, not PAYING traffic) to cerebusdownloads.com means that it needs to be rethought.

So, we're still waiting to see what it will do over the course of the four issues and the trade paperback. Calum J. at STRANGE ADVENTURES in Halifax suggested CEREBUS IN HELL? #0 being re-solicited twice a year as a FREE CEREBUS kind of thing -- or the $1 comics that Image is doing right now. It's an interesting idea, but if it doesn't generate sales then it's, possibly, just good money after not-so-good money.

And I do have to point out that we are talking about actual money. Producing a "souvenir #1" is a different thing from getting acceptance for an intellectual property in the comic-store market. In any six-month period, AMOC is awash in ideas that, to be implemented, would cost 10's of thousands of dollars and the people making the suggestions have no stake in whether they work or not.

I'm fine with reading people's opinions on what they THINK will work. But, basically, the only thing that's worked so far is CEREBUS ARCHIVE Portfolios and Diamond buying complete print-runs of the trades. So, that's the island we're standing on and looking to build out from.

The orders on CIH? #2 are down to 4,400 on #2 from 5,500 on #1. I think that's a "survivable" drop, but I won't really know until I have the printing bill and the revenues and I can see what they look like with the latter subtracted from the former. Likewise between #2 and #3 and between #3 and #4. It's a drop, but is it a "survivable" drop? We won't have that information until April and it's now January.



Unknown said...

Hi Jeff - I really don't have time to Google articles unless they're research for SDOAR. I have taken a screen capture of the COMIC EMPIRE contact info and will contact Mike.

Paul Slade - Can you post the contact info for Orbital?

There's really no methodology to turn a non-CEREBUS store or a former-CEREBUS store into a current-CEREBUS store. I think it would be interesting to see how many current-CEREBUS stores there are and to get their contact info. Any help you or anyone else can give would be much appreciated. We'll try to make it "worth their while".

Glen - Same deal with MOSTLY COMICS. I realize that a number of you think that it's JUST a matter of letting a store know what's available and they'll get right on it. I think it's more a case of a store that WAS a CEREBUS store choosing consciously to NOT be a CEREBUS store. They'll be polite and enthusiastic while you're talking to them, but they won't actually change what they're doing. Because they're doing what THEY think will work. And CEREBUS, usually, isn't it.

Giving the benefit of the doubt: if you give them a printed-out list of what's available from Diamond and the order code numbers, I think that's as close as you can get to meeting them "halfway". But, that also gets into the area of "rude": "Don't come into my store and tell me I'm doing something wrong."

But, definitely, going into a store and ordering CEREBUS material is about the best that can be hoped for in a general sense. You ask them to order something for you, they order it, you pay them for it.

That's really what keeps us going and has kept us going for the last ten years.

Unknown said...

Paul Slade II - I think it's significant that you didn't know what you would find on your London travels and that what you found wasn't good news for CEREBUS.

"Hail Mary pass": Is it possible for CEREBUS fans to volunteer to maintain a CEREBUS section at their local store? i.e. Go in often enough to a store that does carry CEREBUS to say "You're missing HIGH SOCIETY and GUYS" and give them the order code for those books and then check to make sure that they're on the shelves a week or two later? I don't know. Most of you presuppose that people LIKE me and my work and I don't think that's the case, personally.

How would even an ostensible CEREBUS store react to having a "guest" police their inventory? No idea. If YOU'RE right, they would be fine with it. If I"M right, I think they would probably chuck the whole CEREBUS "thing" and tell you never to come back. All the CEREBUS trades are in print and available from Diamond. THEORETICALLY, that should be all it takes.

Only one way to find out. Any volunteers?

CerebusTV said...

Orbital in London is the favorite of CerebusTV and Glamourpuss Alumnus Robin Barnard. Orbital even carries Robin's own publications.

CerebusTV said...

"we, The Grand Old Republic, have, truly... hit Rock Bottom."

With the former Secretary, we already hit Foggy Bottom.

An empty pantsuit is no improvement over an empty suit!

Didja mean relativity or relevance?

Paul Slade said...

Orbital Comics are located at:

8 Great Newport Street,
London WC2H 7JA
UNITED KINGDOM

Telephone: (44) 207 240 0591
General enquiries: info@orbitalcomics.com.
Small Press enquiries: camila@orbitalcomics.com.

Jeff Seiler said...

Dave--When you contact Mike, remind him that I was there on December 27.

As to the notion of Cerebus volunteers "policing" stores, I'm not saying it won't work, but do you remember my similar experiment in Dallas back in the aughts? Remember Keith's Comics?

I would certainly be willing to reenlist here in the Twin Cities, though. Currently, with Big Brain Comics having shuttered some time last year, there are five stores in Minneapolis and two in outlying suburbs. The College of Comic Book Knowledge (best. comic. book. store. name. ever.) does not regularly stock the phonebooks but does carry CIH? and will order anything you ask for. I have not previously been to any of the others.

All said and done, though, I think you're right. Place an order and they'll get it for you.