Women in Comics: Interview with the Creators of Bayou Arcana
With the fuss over the perceived lack of women guests at the Kapow! Comic Con this May, one group of creators ended up getting a little more exposure than they were bargaining for! Bayou Arcana, an upcoming comics anthology title, had already made a surprise splash in the UK headlines when featured in The Guardian, a national newspaper.
Described there as a "female-driven anthology", the book contains 11 stories, all written by men with the art by women. Several of the creators are heading down to Kapow! to feature on a panel, and I took the opportunity to ask the creators their thoughts on the book itself, on appearing at a large comics convention, and for the women, on their experiences within the comics industry as a whole.
Bayou Arcana is released in May and will be available through all good book shops.
Bayou Arcana: Promises, art by Sara Dunkerton
Before Watchmen, After Moore
DC's announcement that a slew of prequel Watchmen comics were in the pipeline caused quite the fuss in February. The latest issue of The Drink Tank, a Hugo award winning fanzine, has just gone live with a Before Watchmen special - you can read my contribution on page 17.
The "Watchmen moment", as my lecturer in Comic Studies describes it, is when we read a comic so great and revolutionary that we have to rush out and tell everyone we know to read it and share in the experience. In comics history, these moments are few and far between. What is perhaps more common is the "Before Watchmen moment", when we discover that our beloved medium has been pressed once more into chasing profitability through the ashes of past glory and ethical wrongs.
Glasgow Film Festival: Women in Comics Panel (Full and Uncut)
My recent friendly argument with Mark Millar on Twitter about women guests at the Kapow! Comic Con seems to have brought "women in comics" to the forefront of the comics headlines in the UK again, with Kapow!, Super London Comic Con, MCM Comic Con, and Thought Bubble all eager to announce that they do in fact have women guests, and in the case of the latter two, as a main part of their programme.
I was interested then to see what discussions would be present at the Women in Comics panel at the comics strand of the Glasgow Film Festival, also called Kapow, and with Mark Millar as patron. Chaired by Ariadne Cass-Maran of Graphic Scotland, the panel featured: Denise Mina, crime author and Vertigo writer; Kate Brown, comics writer/artist; Rhianna Pratchett, games and comic writer; Gillian Hatcher, editor of Team Girl Comic, an all woman anthology from a Glasgow collective; and Penny Sharp, an animator and contributor to Team Girl Comic. A very late addition to the panel was Charlie Adlard, artist of The Walking Dead.
This write up is an almost complete transcript of the proceedings given a full write up. Normally for interviews I produce (when allowed!) a full transcript but when covering a group discussion I felt that much of the tone would be lost without me properly contextualising what was going on.
Kate Brown at her earlier panel (write up coming soon!)
Women in Comics: Tokenism
In the aftermath of the discussion about women guests at Kapow! Comic Con, much has been made of the issue of "tokenism" when it comes to including women guests at these kind of events. A request for more women creators to come into the industry, for publishers to perhaps look harder for talented women, for events to have woman guests, or indeed for a comic to include a woman character, is often met with the brick wall of "well you wouldn't want tokenism would you?!" or perhaps "positive discrimination gone mad!".
Let's be clear, "tokenism" has a very specific meaning: the limited inclusion of a member of a minority that creates a false impression of inclusion. A false impression. It's a pretty easy pitfall to avoid, just make sure that the women you include are ones you truly want to be there. Like you do already with guys... it's very easy. "Tokenism" is an easy way of saying "can't be bothered looking". Because believe me, there are LOTS of women creators in the comic industry, at all levels, who are constantly trying to step forward and bumping into that brick wall. Saying their inclusion is "tokenism" is not far from saying those women don't deserve to be there, which is far from true!
Women in Comics: Women Guests at LSCC
The London Super Comic Convention is the new kid in town this year, opening its doors on the 25th-26th February. I've been in touch with them for a while now, organising the interviews with their star guest Stan Lee, and also about their quest to attract women guests.
The main line-up consists of 49 men and one woman - Emanuela Lupacchino (Marvel's X-Factor) - but the organisers are keen to stress that there are women guests in the small press section of the convention, and that women guests are an important part of their future.
The organisers of the LSCC have given me the following statement, and the list of women creators at the convention later this month, and it all sounds very positive indeed!
"London Super Comic Convention would love nothing more than to encourage diversity in the comic convention field, to that end we contacted quite a number of mainstream women creators to invite them to attend. Due to either work commitments or other reasons they were unable to do so, but we did manage to secure Emanuella Lupacchino and we have several women attending as part of our small press creators. [hit the jump for more!]
SciFi Now: Interview with Stan Lee
In addition to the interview I completed for The Independent on Sunday, I also interviewed Stan for the UK magazine, SciFi Now. While the other interview was aimed at a mainstream audience, the genre coverage of SciFi Now allowed for some geekier questions.
The focus of the interview was the Silver Age, when Stan and Marvel ruled the comics world. The interview is available in full in the current issue of the magazine and is 6 pages long, talking about everything from The Fantastic Four to Spider-Man, Kirby to Ditko, and a lovely little bit about Bill Everett and Daredevil.
You can download an excerpt at the website here!
About a Grrrl
Freelance writer. Comic geek, film addict, metal head, book worm, gamer. I sell books and write. I'd prefer to write books and sell.
This is a collection of my writing, thoughts and interesting links about my geeky interests.
Oh, and I'm not a guy. A woman reading comics still surprises some people...
Recent Tweets
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@tddfn He got a rubbish deal compared to Thor, I'd be angry too :P
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Re-watched Thor last night to get ready for Avengers... reminded myself I totally root for Loki.
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