Yes, it's exciting enough to make you forget all about those people losing their jobs, isn't it?
^^^ (Potential sarcasm alert)^^^

There's no question that Adam Hughes isn't going to be lacking for work opportunities in the comics industry. He'll have no problems paying his bills. Unfortunately, what it amounts to is he (and all the reboot artists) are taking work away from Fernando Ruiz, the Kennedy brothers, Jeff Shultz, Bill Galvan, and all the other artists who spent decades specializing in drawing ACP's characters in the traditional style. I'm not going to support a policy by the company that replaces the opportunity for those artists to get work, with the company's decision to reward its faithful work-for-hire freelancers by kicking them to the curb in favor of giving the work to artists from outside the company who can easily live without it.

Another interesting prototype, "The POW Trio" appears on this LAUGH #189 cover, dated Dec. 1966. The Archies didn't make their first official appearance until LIFE WITH ARCHIE #60, Apr. 1967.

Another Jughead relative.

I was struck, when browsing through some old cover images from issues of LAUGH, to see these covers featuring shaggy white dogs bearing an amazing resemblance to Hot Dog. The actual Hog Dog (as named) didn't appear until plans got underway for Filmation's The Archie Show,  which first aired in 1968. These covers from LAUGH are dated May and July of 1964, respectively.

Quote from: The Bee on April 14, 2016, 01:48:26 PM
I will eventually read it on digital, but I won't purchase a copy of any of them.

Just as I did with the rebooted ARCHIE and JUGHEAD, I will borrow a copy just to satisfy my curiosity. If that were not an option for me, I would just pass on it entirely, without a bit of remorse. I don't feel like the reboot is something I can cast a financial vote for, in principle. I expect it to fail, if not immediately, then eventually. I want it to fail, and as quickly as possible. If the reboot merely represented an attempt to diversify Archie as a product, I'd feel differently, but since it seems absolutely clear that it's not meant as a mere additional option, but as an intended replacement for traditional-style Archie, I'm forced to view this as an "us vs. them" situation. If the inevitable end result of that is no new stories, then I guess I'll have to settle for reprints (or possibly... back issues). On the other hand, any new material they're going to produce in the traditional style is something I will support and cast my financial vote for. I am putting my money where my mouth is, and sending ACP a clear message in the only way that's going to count, in the pocketbook.

Brutal honesty is my policy. The rebooted titles are not an acceptable substitute for the product that I REALLY want to buy from ACP; not even "better than nothing".

These are some of the rare examples of pages that show Trula not in control of her emotions. Usually, the shoe's on the other foot, with Jughead, the normally cool and collected one, being frazzled and frustrated. That story, the last 3 images you showed here, where Jughead, in an act of desperation, decided to follow Archie's advice that moving in with Trula (with her psychological expertise) might actually help him work out some of his issues with his dad, so he was willing to submit to being a bug under her microscope, as he imagined it. Jughead had always thought of Trula as a Machiavellian schemer, a mad scientist who treated him like a lab rat or a puppetmaster that pulled his strings. Yet in the story where he moves in with her and her mother, she does nothing of the kind. She treats him cordially as she would any house guest, and in sympathy towards his problems with his dad, does nothing to interfere. In that particular instance, it turned out that NOT being studied like a lab rat (contrary to his expectations) is what drives Jughead bonkers. He's waiting and waiting for it to happen, but it never does. Trula really does treat him like a friend in need, until he snaps from the pressure he imagines he's under. That finally causes Trula to break her calm demeanor as a gracious host and go ballistic. The ultimate cause was Jughead's annoying habit of constantly leaving the cap off his toothpaste tube, getting toothpaste all over the sink countertop. Ironically though, Trula would have been glad to help him understand his problems if he'd only ASKED her for help. She doesn't volunteer that help, unasked, because she doesn't want to be a busybody, and wants to respect him as a guest in her home. Only afterward does she question her mother as to why she allowed Jughead to stay with them as a houseguest. Krysta wanted to study Trula's reactions as research for a new book she's writing. She really isn't being mean, but it seems like Trula studying other people to understand them is her way of feeling like she's in control, not only of any situation involving human interaction, but in control of herself and her life. She actually likes Jughead, but she's afraid of not being in control around other people.

Quote from: Fernando Ruiz on April 15, 2016, 12:23:00 AM
Solid reliable workhorses like Jim Aparo, Herb Trimpe and Nick Cardy are revered now after their deaths, but at the end of their lives, these guys couldn't get any work outside of commissions and convention sketches. It's only after these guys dies that all of a sudden their fans seen to roll out and sing their due praises.

Or, not to put too fine a point on it... Dan DeCarlo. The way the comic book industry had been set up from its earliest days made it difficult to succeed on mere talent, hard work, and the number of pages produced over a long career. The comics industry was not kind to Kirby and DeCarlo in their later years. Others with lesser talents, like Bob Kane or Todd McFarlane, made out a better career by business-savvy, or the good fortune to be in the right place at the right time, and being careful when things like contracts were signed.

Can you remember back when DeCarlo was having his legal battles with ACP?  Were these things discussed among the younger generation of artists & writers, or was there ever any sense of foreboding about the 'handwriting on the wall', etc?  After all, this was even after such well-publicized battles of 'creator vs. company' as Siegel & Shuster vs DC and Kirby vs Marvel. Surely at ACP this must have seemed like a large and scary prospect.

Quote from: invisifan on April 13, 2016, 01:30:19 PM

Quote from: 60sBettyandReggie on April 13, 2016, 01:20:48 PM
There's a story I have in BVDD #82 called Ride Like the Wind. Veronica is visiting her cousin Tate and his wife Julie who live on a farm in Kansas. I don't know if that cousin ever appeared in other stories.

Thanks, I'll try to get that; of course aside from being from Mr. Lodge's side of the family we also don't know where or how harper fits in either ...

If any one else knows any appearance for lesser known relative of character — mention them here and I'll compile a list ...

Eventually you'd wind up with a list of dozens of aunts, uncles, and cousins - meaning that all the parents came from huge families. For example, in JUGHEAD AND ARCHIE COMICS DIGEST #2 which I just read, there's a story ("Post Haste") where Archie gets a notice of a package in the mail from Veronica's Uncle Cedric, and is very excited to get to the post office to pick it up and find out what's in it. Uncle Cedric isn't in the actual story, and neither is Veronica. In this same digest, there's also a story ("You Ought NOT To Be In Pictures") where Jughead decides to enter Jellybean in the 'Li'l Miss Riverdale Cutie Pie' contest. There's a single panel where he mentions "Cousin Horace at Kresskell's Dept. Store told me about it." There's two relatives right there, and they never even appeared in the stories. That same digest has a story, "Buzzin' Cousin", that features Veronica's cousin Alice. There's one random digest issue with 3 different relatives!

In the more extended family area, you've got "Grandpa" Jones, who isn't actually Jughead's grandfather, but his elderly clone. (You can't get more closely related than that!) After he retired from the Time Police, Jughead had this clone created with all of his memories, and the clone was put into hibernation to be woken up in the case of any Time Police emergencies (he winds up traveling back to Civil War times to rescue the original Jughead, and becomes the Colonel Pickens whose statue now sits in Riverdale's Pickens Park). Also seen in TIME POLICE was Merlin Jones, another relative of Jughead's, this one his elderly descendant (and founder of the Time Police) who decides to spend his retirement in medieval Camelot, thus inspiring the stories of Merlin the magician.

ARCHIE GIANT SERIES #602 also has a 2-page feature on "Jughead's Family Tree". (Possibly a feature that had other installments? Who knows?) It spotlights four relatives of Jughead's: Bixx "Spit-Valve" Jones, big band songwriter and trumpet player; Ipswitch Jones, space explorer and all around nice guy; Biff "Spillman" Jones (also known as "Wrong Way" Jones), a naval captain of the early decades of the 20th Century; and Lujak Jones, a popular club boxer of the 1930s who became a celebrity and whose later career had his picture plastered on billboards and in magazines, and whose gravel voice graced many adventure radio programs - after being involved in a scandal, he became a gym teacher and taught at Riverdale High until 1958.

Today I read ARCHIE GIANT SERIES #590 and 602, and JUGHEAD'S TIME POLICE #1-6; plus about halfway through JUGHEAD AND ARCHIE COMICS DIGEST #2.

^^^ THIS, is the unfortunate bane of the entertainment industry. Whether it's pop music, the motion picture industry, or comics. The venerated and respected elder statesmen whose career stretches back decades are the 1%ers. In other careers, it's those with the most experience that get the top jobs with the top salaries, and no shortage of work offered. In the entertainment business, it's the newer, younger "next big thing", the fresh faces, the new names. It's a sad thing, but what can you expect... the entertainment industry's bread and butter audience has always been youth culture. Sometimes by the time the respect due actually comes, it's too late to make a difference. Sadly, I can remember back in the mid-1970s when the prevailing wisdom among comic book consumers had it that Jack Kirby was a hack, a has-been, washed-up.

You can't LIKE anything in the galleries. If you try clicking on "Like this?", you get a bar that pops up that says "LOADING ... " but otherwise does nothing and goes nowhere.

Quote from: invisifan on April 13, 2016, 07:06:08 PM

QuoteWow, I read a few pages into SPIDEY #4 and then just gave up. What a difference the art of Nick Bradshaw made on the first 3 issues of that book (which are slated to be reprinted in a one-shot deluxe Marvel Treasury Edition). Unless Bradshaw's just skipping an issue or two before coming back, I guess I'm done with it.

I wouldn't say the art made a real difference to me, but I don't blame you for giving up — I thought the first issue showed a lot of potential, but with #2 it just seemed ...  aimless?  pointless?  I'll probably keep watching where it goes a while longer, but ... 

I took 'the point' such as it is, to be approximately the same as that of Ultimate Spider-Man when that title started out, i.e. "What If Peter Parker, the Amazing Spider-Man were just beginning his career today?" Come to think of it, that's pretty much what Kurt Busiek & Pat Oliffe's Untold Tales of Spider-Man was as well, except that they weren't concentrating so much on making a point of modernizing things, just telling modern-style stories "interstitially" dispersed between those classic adventures. SPIDEY wasn't doing a straight retelling of the original Lee/Ditko stories so much as a reinterpretation of Peter's first encounters with various foes in a modern context, which I think is perfectly valid. If you're going to sweat how it fits into "Spider-Man continuity", it's probably just going to be a burr in your saddle.

Is there a place in modern comics for a stripped-down, back-to-basics Spider-Man? I think there is; but then again, the execution is everything (Bradshaw's art made those stories dynamic and fun, whereas the art in #4 made it all look rather dull and pedestrian). I pretty much have zero interest in the continuity-heavy, complexly-interwoven adventures of the current Spider-Man. Marvel Universe Spider-Man fans obviously disagree vehemently with my opinion.

Quote from: invisifan on April 13, 2016, 07:49:28 PM

Quote from: irishmoxie on April 13, 2016, 07:23:11 PM

Quote from: invisifan on April 13, 2016, 06:54:05 PM

Quote from: irishmoxie on April 13, 2016, 02:37:24 PM
How's gwenpool?

that's a hard question — it's definitely a strange book, self-referential mocking of the superhero genre; and that was the stated intent (more or less — do you know anything about it already?) ... I'd like it to succeed actually, but not sure if they're going to pull it off ...

Don't know anything about it or Marvel but the art looked cool.

Gwen Poole is a comic fan who got "displaced" during a multi-universe event ... her version of Earth is essentially ours, and she's read all sorts of Marvel comics so when she ends up on that earth she decides she's dreaming or part of a book/narrative and must be the hero — so she will win in the end and nothing horribly bad can happen ... and if she is the hero in a superhero world then she gets to be a superhero ... and starts living out her fantasies ... and things get ... weird ...

Pretty much seems like Marvel's answer to Harley Quinn to me... the adventures of a dangerously loopy chick.

Quote from: irishmoxie on April 13, 2016, 07:24:12 PM

Quote from: invisifan on April 13, 2016, 07:06:08 PM

Quote from: DeCarlo Rules on April 13, 2016, 03:47:04 PM

QuoteHENCHGIRL #6 (Things take an interesting turn in this issue.)

Definitely — may you live in interesting times.

Just as I gave up on the series. Boo. Maybe I'll have to pick it up again. Too bad they don't do digital issues. I guess I'll slog through the web comic.

Webcomics are annoying to you to the point where you'd rather pay for a PDF (or whatever digital format it is you're used to reading) than to "slog" through it for FREE? Or you know, save a bunch of the webcomics as JPGs and put them in a file folder on your tablet where your comic reader app can access them? This I don't get. The fact that they're free is what keeps me reading webcomics. Other digital comics that are available in print, it's just easier to get the print copy. When they're not available (or hard to find) in print, then it's just annoying. Unless they're free webcomics.

The other thing I realized the other day when thinking about this is that I have absolutely NO sense of urgency about getting digital comics. They're not going to NOT be available next week, next month, or next year, or harder to find, or more expensive. (In fact, they occasionally are later on sale cheaper, for 99 cents or something, on ComiXology, or other places that have sales on digital comics.) That makes them a lot lower priority for me, because I need to find the stuff that won't be easy to find next week, next month, next year FIRST. So that stuff goes to the top of my list, while digital comics go to the bottom. A lot of the stuff I read and/or collect isn't available digitally anyway.