ABCP BEST OF 2010 COMING IN 2011!!

Because what if we did the show this week, but something AMAZING came out this week, and was the best of 2010, but we couldn't include it in our best of 2010 show because we recorded our best of 2010 show before 2010 was actually really over and then we would all be sad but then we couldn't include it in our best of 2011 show either because it would have come out in 2010 not 2011 and the best of 2011 show we do next year will only include books that were released in 2011 not 2010 which is when books that came out this week are coming out because right now it is technically still 2010 also...



...WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

ABC Podcast Episode #119 and Spaghetti Bonus, For 'Tis The Season!!

This later-than-usual episode of the Awesomed By Comics Podcast is brought to you by The Sanctuary at Rutgers University, which has an amazing comics collection for an ice cream parlor. Try the ABCP Double-Pie, which is not called that and they will look at you funny if you ask for it, but is a scoop of pumpkin pie and a scoop of apple pie. Big wins for Chaos War, Birds of Prey, and X-Factor. Some interesting stuff going on in The Occultist. Aaron flips through Superman: Earth One and spots a painfully stupid mistake. And, surprise surprise, we gush about The Unwritten. Taking a bit of a break from the regular show for a couple of weeks, but our annual year-end spectacular will be here soon to more than tide you over.

Download/subscribe to the show here or in the right sidebar, and leave an iTunes review! Tell us what you think in the comments, and feel free to suggest your own winners for our categories.

WHOA BUT HEY WHAT IS THIS?






A spaghetti a day keeps the scurvy away.
Three spaghettis a week makes your underarms reek.
Twelve spaghettis a month ah fuck I have painted myself into a corner.

Evie's cover of the week is this:




And then Aaron's cover of the week is this:



And that GODDAMNIT, REALLY? Superman panel is this:



And the actual definition of active voice is this.

And we'll be back next week sometime with our year-end wrapup!

New Episode Tonight AT LONG LAST

ABCP Episode #118 plus Colleen Coover and visual aids!!

This episode of Awesomed By Comics is brought to you by misinformation about the website of our very special guest, artist and writer extraordinaire Colleen Coover! Colleen delivers delightful rants and raves about her comics picks, pans, and personal projects, and even recommends a book that is made up almost entirely of words!? We have hundreds of love-units for Fables #100, mighty affection for Thor: The Mighty Avenger, fresh giggles for "New Avengers," and three cubes for new series 27. Evie also reports on Black Swan, which is awesomely bonkers, and you should all go see it even if Aaron would hate it.

Download/subscribe to the show here or in the right sidebar, and leave an iTunes review! Tell us what you think in the comments, and feel free to suggest your own winners for our categories.

*UPDATED WITH COLLEEN'S LINKS AND VISUAL AIDS*

Colleen's Surprise of the Week: Miss Don't Touch Me

Colleen's Crap of the Week: Steve Bunche's review of Spider-Man Turn Off The Dark

Colleen's Comic-Related Non-Comic Item of the Week: Mass Effect 3 cinematic trailer

Collen's Cover of the Week: Iron Man Legacy #9, cover by Juan Doe:


Colleen's Panel of the Week, from I Am an Avenger #4, story by Colleen Coover!

ABC Podcast Episode #117 and Visual Aids

This episode of the Awesomed By Comics Podcast is brought to you by Sue from DC Women Kicking Ass, who turns our show into ABCP Women (and technically also a guy, but whatever) Kicking Ass! Huge wins for some of our favorite creators, as Gail Simone's Secret Six, Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning's Heroes for Hire, and Fred Van Lente's Taskmaster take home the big prizes, and most of the little ones too. Also, Crap of the Week has never been so literal. Plus, a dog!!!

Download/subscribe to the show here or in the right sidebar, and leave an iTunes review! Tell us what you think in the comments, and feel free to suggest your own winners for our categories.

Cover(s) of the Week:

Sue's pick, from Batman 80-Page Giant, cover by Dustin Nguyen



Aaron's cover, from The Boys #49, covery by Darrick Robertson



Evie's cover, from Sweet Tooth #16, cover by Jeff Lemire



Panels come from She Hulks #2, Generation Hope #2, and three from Secret Six #28, if I remember correctly, which I may not, but it doesn't really matter at this point because I need to get up early tomorrow and therefore no panels now. But I did better than last week at least!! HUZZAH!

ABC Podcast, Episode #116, plus maybe some visual aids later?

This episode of the Awesomed By Comics Podcast is brought to you by Lastic Man, who probably should have either an E or a P in front of his name, but don't tell the lawyers. Big wins for Incorruptible, Ultimate Spider-Man, Thor: The Mighty Avenger and Taskmaster. Also winning big was the common cold, which soundly defeated Evie - and listener Jen, who soundly defeated Aaron. (post-credits, Aaron narrates his half of a couple of yugioh battles, which did not end well for him.) We bid a fond farewell to Leslie Nielsen, talk a lot about The Boys even though it didn't come out this week, and Aaron invents shoes.

Download/subscribe to the show here or in the right sidebar, and leave an iTunes review! Tell us what you think in the comments, and feel free to suggest your own winners for our categories.

Other stuff to come possibly later, when I'm not as tired.

ABC Podcast, Episode #115 plus visual aids

This long-awaited episode of Awesomed By Comics is brought to you by oh hey hello, how have you been in the three weeks since we've done a show? Any graduations, engagements, birth announcements? Really??? That's awesome!!! Yes we are back, after some work travel and music travel and some that was both at once. We unsurprisingly heap unending praise on Spider-Girl, Thunderbolts (except for ONE BAD THING) and Morning Glories, and perhaps somewhat surprisingly enjoy us a lot of Batmans. We also give mad ups to Superman-Batman, which is neither surprising nor unsurprising unless you also read it and know us at all, in which case, duh. There's a discussion about the new Harry Potter movie, and Aaron needs video game recommendations!

Download/subscribe to the show here or in the right sidebar, and leave an iTunes review! Tell us what you think in the comments, and feel free to suggest your own winners for our categories.

Cover(s) of the Week

Aaron's pick, from Honey West #2, cover by Malcolm McClinton:


Evie's pick, from Morning Glories #4, cover by Rodin Esquejo:


Panel(s) of the Week

Evie's pick, from Thunderbolts #150 by Jeff Parker and Kev Walker:


Aaron's pick, from Superman-Batman #78 by Joe Kelly, Jack Kelly and Ed Benes:

ABCP Returns This Weekend

Also Christmas is only six weeks away, but do not get your chicken a gun.

ABC Podcast, Episode #114.5 plus super secret clapping instructions

If you think ABCP only stands for Awesomed By Comics Podcast, you are barking up the wrong tootin' tree! On this week's show, ABCP stand for "Awesomed by Clapping and Pokemon." Aaron is away working on The Ampersands' next album, but is giving all of you the chance to appear on it, by participating in a slightly advanced 3rd grade music lesson. Ta (rest) Ta (rest) Ti Ti Ta (rest). After that, Aaron and Evie and then Aaron again match poke-wits against friend of the show and now FOUR-time guest, Chris Sims from War Rocket Ajax and Comics Alliance. Listen in, as Chris is given the greatest gift of all.

...

No, not friendship. An Omastar.

Download/subscribe to the show here or in the right sidebar, and leave an iTunes review! Tell us what you think in the comments, and feel free to suggest your own winners for our categories.And if by some bizarre chance this happens to be your first episode, then please listen to the previous one (or really, any other at random) to get a better sense of what this here thing is usually like.

NOW.

If you chose to participate in our Awesomed By Clapping game, here's the instructions again:

You will need:

1 computer with recording software and a microphone. Most PCs have something called "Sound Recorder" or "Windows Sound Recorder" in the Accessories folder of the start menu, most Macs (or all?) come with Garage Band - and most laptops have built-in condenser mics, so if you've got a laptop, you're probably already there.

1 device other than that computer, on which you can listen to this episode in your headphones. Can be an mp3 player, or another computer.

STEP 1: Test out the sound recorder to make sure it works.
STEP 2: Once you know it works, start recording.
STEP 3: Press Play on your headphone device and listen to this episode.
STEP 4: Clap when I tell you to clap. It's basic 4/4 time, counting the 1/8th notes, you're on the 7 and 8 in the verse, and the 2, 4, 6 and 8 in the middle section. You might want to practice a couple of times.
STEP 5: When you're done, save your file.
STEP 6: email it to me at ampsrecord (at) gmail.com
STEP 7: wait patiently until the next Ampersands album comes out, which (if all goes well) will have YOU on it!

ABC Podcast, Episode #114 plus visual aids

This Halloween episode of Awesomed By Comics is brought to you by the combined forces of Lord Byron, John Stamos and the undead. Major awards this week go to the adorable Ultimate Spider-Man, the super duper adorable Hellboy/Beasts of Burden one-shot, the fierce and surprising Amazing Spiderman, and Tom Fowler's portrayal of Chris and Euge in Deadpool Team-Up. We talk about "Red," the movie that has about as much to do with the comic it was based on as this one does, and alert you that at least one of us will be out of town for the next two weeks, but we'll have at least one special thing with which to hold you over in the mean time.

Download/subscribe to the show here or in the right sidebar, and leave an iTunes review! Tell us what you think in the comments, and feel free to suggest your own winners for our categories.

Cover of the Week

Evie and Aaron's pick, from Hellboy/Beasts of Burden one-shot, cover by Jill Thompson:


Panel of the Week

Evie and Aaron's pick, from Deadpool Team-Up #888 by Cullen Bunn and Tom Fowler (panel starring Chris Sims and Eugene Ahn of War Rocket Ajax and some other things):

Some of Aaron's Favorite Webcomics and the Pokemon With Which He Feels They Correspond: Part Two, Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal

Here's one of my favorites from SMBC:

And the Pokemon with which I feels it corresponds is:

 

Ninjask.

Quick and Nimble. Get in, attack, get out. Nothing fancy, but it delivers punchlines as though it were a bug that is also a ninja, with a ghost cousin that inhabits the discarded shell of its former self.

Plus with Speed Boost, Ninjask gets a speed upgrade every single turn. SMBC updates every single day. This is the same.

Some of Aaron's Favorite Webcomics and the Pokemon With Which He Feels They Correspond: Part One, Dinosaur Comics

I'm starting with the first webcomic I ever read.  (Not this one in particular, but Dinosaur Comics in general. This is just an example of one I like.)

And the Pokemon with which I feels it corresponds is: 

Pikachu. 

Ubiquitous but undeniably cute. Brilliant in its simplicity. You would have a hard time finding someone on the internet who did not at last have a basic knowledge of who Pikachu is, just as you would have a hard time finding someone on the internet who had not at least heard of Dinosaur Comics.

ABC Podcast Episode #113 plus visual aids

This episode of Awesomed By Comics is brought to you by Andy Partridge of XTC and the band's seminal 1980 album "Black Sea" produced by Steve Lillywhite, because we're testing a theory. Major awards this week to X-Factor #210, Morning Glories #3, Hulk #26, Loki #1, creative business models, and one of Aaron's asinine conspiracy theories. Warmest welcomes to anyone listening for the first time thanks to Evie's appearance on iFanboy this week; please feel free to go back and listen to as many archived episodes as you'd like, regardless of whether Aaron thinks that's "weird".

Download/subscribe to the show here or in the right sidebar, and leave an iTunes review! Tell us what you think in the comments, and feel free to suggest your own winners for our categories.

Cover(s) of the Week

Evie's pick, from Batman Beyond #5, cover by Dustin Nguyen (UPDATE: During the show we weren't convinced this cover was by Dustin, but I found it on his Deviant Art page, so it is confirmed. Sorry for any confusion or stupidness!):


Aaron's pick, from Deadpool #28, cover by David Johnson:


Panel(s) of the Week

Aaron's pick was from Power Girl #17 by Judd Winick and Sami Basri: but instead here's Mockingnerd's awesome Fin Fang Foom:

(Seriously, one of you pros who listens to the show, put this gal on a two-pager in something.)


Evie's pick, from Hulk #26 by Jeff Parker and Gabriel Hardman:




Bonus Blastoise Freak-Out:



Oh, and also you guys should probably see this too.

GVSB

We'll be posting the next episode of ABC later tonight, but to hold you over, please download the latest episode of iFanboy's Pick of the Week Podcast, where I sat in with Ron and Josh while Conor is away (also, happy birthday Conor!). We talked about Hulk #26, Fables #99 and a bunch of other stuff, including Batman & Robin, which got me into hot water with iFanboy listeners the last time I was on the show because, well, if you listen to Awesomed By Comics, you can probably figure it out. This time, however, I believe I was less polarizing. We'll see. I'm not a good judge of these things. Enjoy!

It's like punching a hole in the fabric of time

This week is the CMJ Music Marathon, meaning hundreds of rock shows all over New York that need to be seen and written about and hyped and/or dismissed as overhyped. So I've been out late more or less doing these things, cramming comics in when I can. I didn't even get to the store until today, so I had them all in my bag, grabbing a few pages here and there.

Tonight I saw an amazing earlyish set by the Extra Lens, a collaboration between John Darnielle of the Mountain Goats and Franklin Bruno of the Human Hearts, and I highly recommend you do this thing should it come up in your general vicinity. Anyway, I have a brief bus ride from the subway to my house, so I plunked down in the virtually empty bus and pulled out this week's Hulk #26 by Jeff Parker and Gabriel Hardman. I'm pretty behind on the whole Hulk thing right now, but I'm taking third chair on iFanboy tomorrow night, and it will be discussed, plus I feel like I should get off my ass in re: anything those guys are putting out.

A stop after the one I get on, three dudes got on, probably early to mid-20s. They took a few steps in and then kind of froze in a line, like they'd accidentally walked in on a knifing. Then without warning, they were sitting two in the seats behind me, one in the seat in front of me. Dude behind me clears his throat and is all "Excuse me, I'm sorry to bother you, but what exactly are you reading?" I flipped the cover closed, and they all looked at each other like I'd shown them a baby dinosaur in my purse. "Oh WOW," says the talker. "I was just wondering because, see, I very rarely see any women reading graphic novels or anything of that nature."

So first of all: I'm reading Hulk #26. You don't need to pull out the "graphic novel" talk, you and I both know I'm reading a comic book.

Second, and I feel this is important: You really jumped the gun in immediately launching into a loud, practiced discussion amongst yourselves about your respective statuses in World of Warcraft. I realize that maybe a grown woman reading that week's Hulk book on her commute is sort of unusual, but it really didn't constitute a challenge to the order of the universe. I don't know the first thing about WoW and/or its classes of dragon, and while I could flatter myself that you assumed this alternate topic was something we could share, I'm inclined to think it was something else. Maybe if you'd asked me what else I'd read this week, or who some of my favorite writers are, or something like that, we could have been friends for that five minute bus ride. As it is, looking over my shoulder and whispering "Iron Man" didn't really seal any bonds.

I know you were in shock, and I apologize for forcing you to improvise under stress. But hopefully this experience will prepare you for future double rainbows, or urban tornadoes, or girls reading comic books in public.

ABC Podcast Episode #112 and Visual Aids AND Last Week's NYCC Pictures

This episode of the Awesomed By Comics Podcast is brought to you by Evie's Birthday, with a special message from her mom! As usual, big wins for The Unwritten and Echo, Bruce Wayne's back before he's gotten back, Aaron can't understand why he doesn't hate Walkin' Supes as much as he probably should, and the new Knight and Squire knocks Evie base over apex and makes her want to shove madam palm and 'er five sisters in the map of tassie, innit? But the book's banging on about faff gives Aaron the habadabs.

Download/subscribe to the show here or in the right sidebar, and leave an iTunes review! Tell us what you think in the comments, and feel free to suggest your own winners for our categories.

Cover(s) of the Week: 

Evie's Pick, from Amazing Spider Man Presents: Black Cat #4, cover by Amanda Conner and Christina Strain

Aaron's Pick, from Justice League: Generation Lost #11, Cover by Cliff Chiang:

 Panel(s) of the Week: 

 Evie's Pick, from New Avengers #5 by Brian Michael Bendis and Stuart Immonen:

 Aaron's Pick, from Strange Tales 2 #1, by Nick Gurewitch

 NYCC leftovers are down here, under this thing.

ABC Podcast #111 NYCC EDITION and (pending) visual aids

This episode of the Awesomed By Comics Podcast is brought to you almost entirely by the contents of New York Comic Con. (Comicon? Comic-Con? Spiderman? Spider-Man? Spader-James?) We take a break from our usual format of handing out awards to the week's books, and instead hand out awards to the weekend's events, with a smattering of books sprinkled in.

Whoa damn, lightning storm here is NUTS.

Download/subscribe to the show here or in the right sidebar, and leave an iTunes review! Tell us what you think in the comments, and feel free to suggest your own winners for our categories.

Many photos coming tomorrow, but it's late, so check back for more. Also, I hear u liek Mudkipz.

New show con-ing soon! Oh no I didn't.

So we had a whiz bang 3+ days at New York Comic Con, and met a lot of people and took a lot of pictures and read almost no comic books this week. As a result, we will of course have a show, but will probably record it tonight, and talk about things that aren't strictly straight from the page. I was going to post a teaser picture here from our trip to Mars 2112 last night with a whole mess of great people that many of you will recognize, but then realized they're all at home. The pictures, not the people. Or the people may be at home, but not my home. Anyway. Stay tuned.

SICK DAY

Sorry no show this week everyone, I had about 18 good hours between bouts of this cold, and I spent 10 of them in the car. But rest assured that while I'm resting...

1 billion hugzzzzzzz, back next week with goodies from nycc

Aaron