Grassroots Support for Criminal

Hey, big thanks to Ash and Sean for an impresive bit of Criminal activism.

Sean's post also contained the Warren Ellis quote that now adorns the top of this blog. Thanks, guys.

Brubaker Talks Criminal at The Comics Reporter

Head on over to Tom Spurgeon's site for the Comics Reporter interview with Ed Brubaker, in which Brubaker discusses the inspirations and marketing efforts of the new series and much more. Thanks, Tom, for the link to A Criminal Blog, too.

Phillips on UK Tour for Criminal

An excellent chance to meet one of the best and hardest-working artists in comics. Details at Sean Phillips's blog.

Brubaker Talks Criminal on Around Comics Podcast

Ed Brubaker is interviewed in a new Around Comics Podcast. The site says "Around Comics welcomes writer Ed Brubaker for an extended interview to talk about his exciting new project with former partner-in-crime, Sean Phillips. Brubaker and Phillips reunite on the noir project Criminal..."

More in the link.

Christopher Allen's Advance Review of Criminal #1

Comic Book Galaxy's Christopher Allen has posted his advance review of Criminal #1 at his blog. Have a look!

Phillips Posts Criminal #2 Thumbnail Tease

Nobody gives better art-tease than Sean Phillips. Check out the newly-posted thumbnail art from Criminal #2.

Criminal Preview in Stores Today!

Remember to pick up Walking Dead #30 today in comic shops, the first, full-colour printed opportunity to read the five-page preview trailer. I predict that years from now this issue will be hard to find and Criminal readers are going to view it as the Holy Grail of their favourite crime comic. Act now and save yourself the trouble later on, pick up Walking Dead #30 today at your local comics shop.

Ed Brubaker MP3 Interview at Word Balloon

I haven't had a chance to listen to this yet, but here's a link to a Word Balloon MP3 interview with Ed Brubaker.

Criminal #2 Solicitation Released

Marvel/Icon has released its solicitation for Criminal #2, and it's been posted at Comic Book Resources.


Detail from cover to Criminal #2

CRIMINAL #2
Written by ED BRUBAKER
Art and Cover by SEAN PHILLIPS

Top Ten writer Ed Brubaker (Daredevil, Cap, Uncanny X-Men) and best-selling Marvel Zombies artist Sean Phillips's CRIMINAL is shooting your way, and all smart comic readers may as well have a bullseye on their foreheads!

Leo has reluctantly joined on for the heist to end all heists, but nothing is what it seems, and when this job falls apart, it's in a hail of bullets and double-crosses that leave him shattered. What will he do next? Run for his freaking life!

But will anywhere be safe, when the cops and the bad-guys are all after him?

Advance buzz is already spreading about CRIMINAL, and critics are predicting it'll be Brubaker and Phillips best work yet. And as a bonus, each issue of Criminal is packed from cover to cover with content, featuring a full length continuing story, as well as back-up stories and articles and DVD-style behind the scenes extras.

32 PGS. NO ADS!/Mature …$2.99

Remember to tell your comics retailer that you want to pre-order Criminal #2!

Augie Reviews Marvel Zombies

Over at Comic Book Resources, Augie De Blieck look at the new Marvel Zombies hardcover, illustrated by Criminal's Sean Phillips:

There are some isolated sequences in which Phillips returns to his more formalized narrative techniques for the sake of moving the story along, but for the most part, this book is an exercise in drawing zombies doing horrific things, and Phillips' art fits the bill. The blocky shadowy areas give the book the right mood, while the disgusting bits are, at times, covered by them.

"Disgustingly fun," Augie goes on to say, and I couldn't agree more. Marvel Zombies was one of my favourite comics of the past year, and the new hardcover collection gets it right with its lush, oversized format and a full cover gallery (including the covers that graced second, third and fourth printings).

While waiting for Criminal, you could do far worse than picking up this new collection and immersing yourself in some unusual but brilliant art by Sean Phillips -- and Robert Kirkman's dark, witty script is great fun as well. The guy knows zombies, and he knows Marvel history, and he and Phillips mix the two to horrifically hilarious results.

Walking Dead #30 with Criminal Preview in Stores 8/23

Your first opportunity to see Criminal in print is tomorrow, as Walking Dead #30 arrives in comic shops. Get details at Freak Comics and don't miss this full-colour Criminal preview.

Keeping Current on Criminal

Thanks for checking out A Criminal Blog, your support of Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips's new comic is most appreciated. If you're anywhere near as excited about its release as I am, you'll want to know everything you can about it as we count down to Wednesday, October 4th. So, what I'm asking is that if you spot any Criminal-related news, on a blog, message board, comics news site or anywhere, please e-mail me the info so I can share it with A Criminal Blog readers.

Any and all help is appreciated, and if you have suggestions for improvements to this blog, those are welcome as well.

Criminal #1 Review

The 24 issues of Sleeper by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips were, in their time, the best monthly comic book being published. The series was about fear and paranoia, loyalty and betrayal, alliances and conflicts, but at its heart it was about Holden Carver, one of the most vivid and interesting characters to emerge in comics in my lifetime. Over the course of the series, Brubaker and Phillips earned my trust as two of the most gifted and skillful creators in comics, and their creative partnership, as far as I am concerned, is the modern day equivalent of, if not Lee and Kirby, at least Thomas and Windsor-Smith, who also created about 24 issues of wonderous comics not quite like anything else on the stands at the time. And like the original Conan the Barbarian, I believe Sleeper will still be read, collected, respected, and most importantly enjoyed decades from now.

I'm going to try to not reference Sleeper too much from here on out, because, as they said in that movie, "It's over Johnny!" It's time to look ahead, and what makes it easiest to move on from my favourite monthly title of the past couple of decades is...Criminal is better.

Holden Carver was a great character, but he was essentially alone amid a sea of people he couldn't trust, a sole protagonist in a very dangerous world. Criminal posits a dangerous world as well, a similar world of tension and scheming and alliances and heists -- but in the first issue, Brubaker and Phillips establish an entire cast of criminals that, in the context of the book, can all more or less be looked on as lead characters. If Sleeper was The Rockford Files of crime comics -- and it wasn't, really, but stay with me here -- Criminal is Hill Street Blues, a brilliant ensemble piece with a fascinating cast of memorable characters that instantly and organically define themselves and welcome you into their sordid world.


Published art will be full-colour. Copyright (C) Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips
The first issue, the beginning of a five-part arc called "Coward," does focus attention on a particular character -- in a harrowing and brilliantly effective opening scene, we meet Leo, and through narration he tells us about the set of rules that has kept him alive and free in a criminal world that leaves most people neither in the long term. Phillips depicts Leo as seedy but sympathetic, and the sense of his sharp, canny instincts comes through in both the words and the pictures. He's someone we want to know more about, after a lean and powerful four-page opening sequence that Scorcese or Tarantino would be proud to open a movie with. It's a heist-gone-wrong moment that sees Leo make a practical decision followed by a clever escape, and it's four pages of crime comics gold.

From there we meet the other key characters in the story, and the sense of already-established relationships in a real world we can explore as readers is intoxicating.

Phillips's art has improved even from the glory days of Sleeper, and the way he stages a key conversation between Leo and two cops is a visual delight. It's just three guys talking, but Phillips's bold use of shadows and his confident ink line -- he can draw the hell out of anything by now -- make even a simple three-way chat a confluence of suspicions and hidden motives. How lucky Brubaker is, to have so simpatico a collaborator with which to create this world and these people.

Phillips, too, is a lucky artist -- because Brubaker comes to Criminal having thought up a complete cast of characters and the complex weaving in and out of each other's lives that will be the apparent key to the series. Whether it's an angry reunion with the wife of an old colleague, or the bartender at a seedy, underworld dive, there's a strong sense that these people all know each other, and each other's secrets, and who knows who will ultimately be loyal, and who will not?

As a reader, where comics often let me down is in creating a convincing world filled with people I want to learn more about. It's why superhero comics don't often meet my needs, and it's why I look to artcomix and autobiographical comics to satisfy my cravings for complete new worlds. A complete new world is what Brubaker and Phillips deliver in Criminal #1. It's without question the best new comic to debut this year, and the most promising and rewarding first issue since Sleeper. This is a new world, though, and it's a dangerous place. I hope you're ready for it. I know I am.

Criminal #1 is published by Marvel/Icon Comics and arrives in comic shops Wednesday, October 4th.

Criminal on YouTube

Here are a couple of Criminal-related videos on YouTube:

"Comic Laundry" on Criminal
Criminal Trailer

Enjoy!

Brubaker on Alter Ego Podcast

Ed discusses Criminal and more at the Alter Ego Podcast at MySpace.

I'd give you a more direct link if I could...but it's show #21, shouldn't be too hard to access.

Download Criminal's PDF Trailer

If you haven't had a look yet at the terrific "trailer" for Criminal that Ed and Sean have created, you must see it. Download the Criminal PDF trailer.

More than anything, it reminds me of Orson Welles's trailer for Citizen Kane. It takes snippets from the work it promotes and adds a throughline unique to the trailer, to make it an entertaining standalone ad for the series, a clever promotional effort I've never seen anything quite like, to dangle a participle or whatnot.

Give it a look, you won't be disappointed.

Five Questions for Ed Brubaker

Over at The ADD Blog, I've posted my Five Questions for Ed Brubaker. Check it out!