This year there was also the announcement that Phillip Kennedy Johnson would be in attendance. Johnson is a favorite of mine because of his stellar work on Superman. I met him at last year's Terrificon but a lot has happened since then! Johnson has been on Hulk, a horror book I have been reading. He has been doing a mind-bending run on Batman & Robin. He even did a fun mini-series called Hellhunters from Marvel. He is one of those creators now who I follow to whatever book he heads to because I know I will be getting quality work. When the show happened, Superman: The Book Of El had not been released.
So I knew I'd be heading there if I could. And lucky enough I had the day off.
The con itself is a perfect small con filled with a couple of big guests, some local artists, and some comic and toy dealers. It felt like there were fewer comic dealers than I remember the last time I went but I still got a couple of buys.
What I really liked about the con was it had a whole section just for kids. Comics needs a new generation. I was thrilled there was big area dedicated to that next group of comic readers.
Johnson has to be one of the nicest creators I have ever met. He let me pull up a seat and sit at his table so we could talk about his Superman run, the upcoming Book of El, and the other books of his I have read. Sitting there, it was great to see him interact with other fans, talking about Aliens, Superman, and all the other books.
For me, I picked his brain a bit about the upcoming Book of El. Yes, Kara has a role in it, but an interesting one. (He reiterated his thoughts that Kara is the historian of the family, the archivist so perhaps she is the Chronicler?) Kryl-Ux is the big bad but Superman is trying to help him, because that is what Superman does. And I was thrilled that the Super-Twins are in the book given they have been mostly ignored in the main books. I am hoping we get some sort of closure in their story. Johnson did say he was still writing the end of the series which ends a year from now.
Perhaps the most interesting 'peek behind the curtain' was that Ben Templesmith was a late addition to the Authority special above. So PKJ had to alter his script so that there were enough 'Earth Al Ghul' pages to have Templesmith do them, a perfect solution to keeping that particular style on appropriate pages. Genius!
And then I talked to him a lot about his Hulk run. I don't have many Hulk books in my collection so his run is the biggest swath for the character. He said when he was offered Hulk he wanted to go bigger and wilder than Al Ewing's Immortal Hulk and decided to go Gothic Horror. The book does remind me a bit of both the old Hulk TV show (Hulk wandering from town to town) and Alan Moore's American Gothic run in Swamp Thing.
He was kind enough to sign a few more issues of his Superman run and my Hulk #1.
We also talked a lot about his Batman & Robin run. One fan came up and echoed my feelings saying that they have never really cared for Damian as a character but this book has changed that. I talked about how I loved how the book straddled that fine line between grounded villain using hallucinogenic gas and demons and monsters.
The book is great and has been flying under the radar. People should seek out the back issues and trades. The Memento arc has been amazing.
Hoping PKJ heads up to the New England area again.
And people should attend Plastic City if they can, especially if there are young comic readers in the family.
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