NERDS AROUND TOWN

Nerds Around Town: X-Men, Gary Glitter and Batman: Hush

Cory De La Guardia
Oct 11, 2019, 4:38 am
ART BY JESUS RODRIGUEZ

Born with a comic book in one hand and a remote control in the other, Cory DLG is the talent of Conroe's very own Nerd Thug Radio and Sports. Check out the podcast replay of the FM radio show at www.nerdthugradio.com!

GOOD DEED OF THE DAY

This week I've been focusing on Extra Life which will be November 2nd. Donations will be going towards the Children's Miracle Network of Hospitals as they have every year. Extra Life is this great charity that we've worked with for the last few years at Nerd Thug Radio and I love it. We game for twenty four hours and we literally just have fun and raise money for a great cause benefiting the local branch of the Children's Miracle Network of Hospitals. Check it out.

THE X-MEN ARE COMING

Next Wednesday marks the debut of X-Men #1. Hickman has done an amazing job changing everything but keeping it familiar and this is a great time to be a fan of Marvel's mighty mutants. Like in sports, the NBA is better when the Lakers and the Celtics are good, Marvel is better when the X-Men are good. They've struggled in the last few years to find a nice rhythm and this is such a great moment for this stable of characters. Here's hoping this leads to a many great things as this initial line up is incredibly intriguing.

NEW ANIMATED FILMS

Batman and Wonder Woman both recently had animated releases. Batman: Hush, the storyline made famous for Jim Lee's return to monthly art and to mainstream comics after being in an executive role for the past few years and Wonder Woman: Bloodlines based on a storyline from the comics written by Gail Simone. Gail was a blogger made good, who after a few years of writing a popular pop culture blog (*ahem*) was hired to try her hand at comic books, she is now one of the most prolific writers in modern books and is getting a lot of credit for the plot of the upcoming Birds of Prey movie. Hush was a big deal at its time and is getting strong reviews but as comic fans watch it they are commenting on the lack of solid storytelling, but what's funny to me is that I'm not sure that isn't all that different from the pretty comics with a lack of storytelling. Wonder Woman has lower reviews but is from a much better story, interesting to me.

MR. GLITTER

So there's a guy named Gary Glitter, from the 80s obviously, he was a UK based pop star. His music is everywhere here in the United States and he makes over $250k a year in royalties from his tunes, including the one that plays in every sporting event that goes "nah nah nah nah HEY!" (Actually called "Rock and Roll Part 2"). So far this isn't a big deal, except the song, like every other Gary Glitter song, is blacklisted in the UK because Gary is a repeat offender pedophile. He famously got caught after bringing his computer tower to a computer fix it guy who went through it and found all the horrible stuff and turned him in. He then made the world tour of suspicious countries with sex tours and laid low until eventually getting arrested in Vietnam and deported back to the UK. So in the UK, everyone knows these songs are by this terrible guy and for years they've totally ignored them but here in the States, we gleefully play his music and continue to fund his sad, pathetic living. Most recently using Gary's music in the dark hit Joker. It's time we had a talk about Mr. Glitter.

NOT THAT YOU ASKED

So earlier I wrote I was in the running for a new secret gig. I got it. It's weird and unconventional but it's an opening for a reoccurring project with these guys if it works and I'm excited. Everyone stay tuned, just saw the cover for the second issue of Another Day at the Office and it's great.

Feel free to check out my brand new comic book Another Day at the Office or buy a shirt from Side Hustle Ts where some proceeds help people struggling with cancer or listen to Nerd Thug Radio. Thoughts, complaints, events and comments can be sent to corydlg@gmail.com.

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NERDS AROUND TOWN

Nerds Around Town: Nerd Holiday shopping guide, piracy and libraries

ART BY JESUS RODRIGUEZ

Born with a comic book in one hand and a remote control in the other, Cory DLG is the talent of Conroe's very own Nerd Thug Radio and Sports. Check out the podcast replay of the FM radio show at www.nerdthugradio.com!

GOOD DEED OF THE DAY

For the next two weeks I'm going to be pointing to the charity called "Let's Bring 'Em Home." They buy plane tickets for active duty enlisted guys and fly them home for the holidays. On December 13th, Nerd Thug Radio and The Adventure Begins will be teaming up and holding the Nerd Thug Takeover to benefit this wonderful organization. Starting at 6pm, proceeds from sales will be going to this 501c registered charity and will be helping to try and bring some enlisted people home for the holidays so they can see their families.

GREAT NERD GIFTS

So I hate that this is a thing but it's a real thing so it bears doing. This week has also become Christmas shopping kick off weekend, with all kinds of crazy Black Friday deals and a lot of people buy most of their gifts during this weekend so I suppose I owe it to the nerds around town to make some suggestions for people. So here are my five nerd gifts suggestions: 5. Watchmen Deluxe Edition 4. We're not always grim and gritty, maybe a little light hearted Superman and Batman statue 3. Black Science Premiere Hardcover, it's not just superheroes anymore 2. Bloodshot Deluxe Edition, in anticipation of this movie coming out next year and 1. Either "DCeased" or "Batman Who Laughs" they're both equally worthy of the top spot.

PIRATING COMICS

The hot topic of pirating broke out this week on Comic's twitter as the creator of Image comic "Crowded" got irritated when he saw roughly 90k reads of his 10 issue book but he as a starving artist is worried about his book being cancelled. I remember being a kid who illegally swapped music files when that stuff first came out and Lars of Metallica fame came out and went after Napster for stealing from artists. At the time, as a kid not understanding how stuff works I thought he was such a chump for that. Now as a creator who pays his own bills, I recognize the courage and the strength he had to come out and say, "if you're a fan of my music, then you need to buy it." The reality is that paying creatives for their work is the right thing to do. My grandmother passed away early this year and she had asked specific people to speak at her funeral service and after the fact there were conversations amongst the family members that they were surprised some of them took money for coming to speak. I know there are specifics that make this hard to explain well, and it wasn't that my family didn't want her to have a nice service, there was just surprise about the business of it. What wound up coming out of the conversation though is that this is their living, this is how they pay their bills and are able to continue their good works, by asking for and receiving money for their work. IF you like something, pay for it, I'm not saying pay everything for it, I make comics and I literally let people pay me personally whatever they want for a PDF of my comic. I'm not expecting to get rich doing this, but I have to receive value for my work or I can't keep doing it, the same is true for everyone else in this industry.

LIBRARIES BAD?

During the conversation about piracy, a village idiot from the "wise minds" of the Comicsgate community suggested Libraries and piracy are the same thing. This is vastly incorrect and an idiots take on a big idea. Yes libraries only may buy one copy of your work and then let tons of other people read it at no added benefit directly to you. But first of all, they bought A COPY, secondly libraries are the poor person's option to enrich their lives through the arts. You don't get mad that people use libraries, you get thrilled. Reading is the backbone of all modern societies through all of human history that mattered. Passing knowledge freely from person to person in a way that is respectful to the process is exactly what we should want everyone around the world to be doing. We certainly don't get mad at libraries loaning books out for free, that is just stupid. Also from a capitalism standpoint, if you sell your books to the estimated 100k libraries across America, you made a lot more sales than the estimated 2k comic shops across America, just a math thought.

NOT THAT YOU ASKED

Work is progressing on issue #2 of Another Day at the Office and I'm super excited but the real question is, what's the best way to market it? How exactly should I handle the release of issue #2? These are the big things I'm pondering this holiday.

Feel free to check out my brand-new comic book Another Day at the Office or buy a shirt from Side Hustle Ts where some proceeds help people struggling with cancer or listen to Nerd Thug Radio. Thoughts, complaints, events and comments can be sent to corydlg@gmail.com.

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