I went for the seminar instead of the workshops since I didn’t really need those. So yes, to sum it up, it was fun and super informative! This is also the first time the event is held and from what I heard from the organizer, she might be doing smaller versions, just some of the talks on its own in the future besides just the main event?

Alright, there are a variety of speakers. The first was William from Epsilon Mobile and he talked about applications and the business of how Apple and Amazon might work. So far no one does combo selling, like the digital and the hard copy version as a sale together. That’s where his company comes in. Reminds me of how Japanese visual novels are though! The method that is.

The second speaker was Joyce! She’s there doing her impression of being stuck in a box.

Ok no, she’s not.

She was sharing us the do-s and don’t-s in querying for publishers and whatnot!

It’s a stubborn process as always, meanwhile you can buy her book too or check out her other fiction here.

Hey it’s Michele of the National Arts Council! She gave a short talk about literary grants we could apply to them. For the really much dosh given out to write a story, you need to have a track record at least of being someone who really writes a lot and contributes to the society etc.

Interesting fact is that, digital ebooks are considered in the publishing grant so that’s good. It wasn’t before but now digital book stuff are considered under the literary side. If you have questions on the grant though, you can always email them!

Here’s one of the organizers of the event! Luthiea! That’s her online name anyway. Check her webby out for she has online fiction and has links to other writers etc.

Break time and I went to the bazaar.

When I looked up, I saw a big ass fan. It was really huge and I was wondering what brand it was. Anyway, the bazaar was cool since it had snacks, comics and even temporary sparkly tattoo booths.

Lunch was provided if you signed up for the seminar or workshops. Meanwhile, 24 Hours Comics Day was being held in some of the rooms at Goodman Arts Centre. Oh yes, the artists got to get the food too so they weren’t going to starve while they drew their stuff. LET US ENTER…

So, it was a quiet room while everyone drew on… COMPUTERS?! I know it’s usual for us to do Nanowrimo on ipads/phones/computers/etc but I was going ooh cause it seemed everyone brought their laptops and wacom tablets besides their pen and papers! Traditional artforms like watercolours/pencils are there but yeah, I forgot that going digital was available when there were powerpoints for everyone!

Not shown in the picture is a table full of biscuits, tea, coffee and candy.

Lunch time over and it’s time for the rest of the talks! Got to learn more about the comic scene and that really, it goes for everyone that you need to find your own voice in writing. The last panel had the speakers there for a question and answer session.

Alright, goodies! I got a goodie bag which you can see what stuff I had. Bag sponsored by Cold Wear, comics, 14:59 newspaper (this is a good paper for students who like to read/write since it has stories and poetry! It likes to encourage students to show their creativity), Coco magazine, a Green Lantern mini figurine and a brochure from iFly.

Yes, they were a sponsor and had a session where they informed how they got the iFly into Singapore because it really was interesting to know that it was freaking hard to get it done here due to it being the first in Asia and the rules here.

WELP! Let’s see if Luthiea organizes mini talks since those should be good for those who couldn’t attend this seminar!

Talk/Discussion on Writing Real Life Speculative Fiction

Admission: Free

Location: Central library, multipurpose room (basement)

When: 24 September, Saturday, 6pm

Come on down if you’re interested in learning how to write fiction and yes, finally we have this once more since it was postponed by the elections. Gee.

MEANWHILE…

The same weekend has a WaterFire® art installation by Barnaby Evans at Bedok Reservoir. Main programme starts at 6pm but the fires light up at 7.40pm for 24th and 25th September. I know I’ll be going to the one on Sunday. Would be lovely to check it out and get inspiration and whatnot.

Click the picture above to see the full programme!

Also, what’s this…?

Oooh a Comics Xchange?

Yes! They’ve got workshops for artists and writers. I’m going for the seminar though.

Location: Goodman Arts Centre (You might remember this is the GAC when the crew made a mug)

Time: 10am – 8pm

Date: 1 – 2 October

The seminar is $40 for one day or $60 for both while the workshop is $50 for both days since it’s a course. You choose either:

Character Design for Comics
For anyone age 12 or above (including mature adults!) who would like to know how to create original, convincing and varied characters, then the Actions Workshop is just the place to be. There are basic fundamentals for creating characters – whether or not your passion is Shojo, Fantasy, Superhero or Sci-Fi, and this two day workshop will both strongly enlighten plus entertain!

Plot & Script Writing for Comics
There are many forms of writing, and few are as unique as comics. The Captions Workshop will teach and demonstrate essential fundamentals of plot building, story structuring and development of narrative with character dialogue. How to format a professional script is vital knowledge for any writer, as editors and artists require them to relay clear and concise instructions. Suitable for age 12 and above (including mature adults!).

The programme for the seminar is a whole lot more so you’ll have to check on their website to see which day you’d like to attend… OR GO TO BOTH!

Meanwhile, there’s a FREE entry to the bazaar where you can go there and buy doujinshi, artwork and cosplay.

The grounds of GAC is pretty good for cosplay. Lots of different scenarios you can capture. Plus, I know 24 hour comics is going to be there too, the comics equivalent of Nanowrimo. Sorta.

Anyway, go look see what do you want to do.

They’ve a website and Facebook for you to ask questions if you have any!

The Singapore Toys, Games, Comics Convention 2010 starts tomorrow! Hurray! They’ve got the line up and “who’s who” up at their website now including the name of the shops. However, I’d like to focus on SOME people who aren’t “special guest stars” but who make the convention fun. They range from the various shops, to the organizations and even media people! I got to talk or rather email some of the people below so heh, you guys will get to know more on them!

The 501st

Singapore has one of the largest garrisons in Asia! They’re a group of Star Wars fans who make their own armour and costumes based on the bad guys in the movies. Everyone who is a Star Wars fan, owning a “bad guys’” costume and who likes to help out people are welcomed to join the 501st Legion!

Heh you see, even though they’re stormtroopers, imperial guards or even Darth Vader, the guys and ladies of the 501st are pretty sweet and nice. They do charity work and help out at some events!

At STGCC, they will be holding a droid hunt in which members of the public can join (note: This is VERY fun, my friends did this before). All you got to do is sign up at the 501st booth and you’ll be given a lanyard with a droid card. Then you’re free to roam around the convention hall doing your own things… AND THEN THE STORMTROOPERS WILL HUNT YOU DOWN!! They’ll be wandering around in little squadrons and will try to spot you. They will then capture you and issue you with a ticket to collect a prize at the booth. Heh.

More details at the 501st booth but one of my friends who did this… Well, here’s a hint. If you’re a Star Wars fan, you should know there’s one line about “droids” and if you use it, it might work. HUR HUR. To sign up, there should be a small fee to join but this will go to charity!

All the money collected will be donated to their said charity for the weekend (check out at the convention to know more). Besides the droid hunt, the 501st will be having a photobooth in which you can take a picture with them and there would be a R2D2 there too! Boop beep boop boop.

Check them out at their website if you want to join them or find them at their booth to check out their armour and find out more from them! They’ll be near the Starwars.sg people too! There’ll be a Hoth Battle Scene built entirely from Lego bricks so woaah.

If you’re spending mucho moolah to buy goodies at the convention, I don’t see why you can’t spare a fiver or ten (or more!) to help their cause.

G&B comics

If you like Western comics and are not a member of G&B, I tsk tsk at you. Members get special privileges like movie night and special sessions of signings with visiting artists and writers! Heck, they get discounts and other funky previews too. For STGCC, watch out their booth for the comic giveaways. Just check out what time they’ll be giving them out or heh, buy the comics since they’ll certainly stock up especially on the writers/artists who’ll be at the convention!

They’re the store in which you can pick up the special edition comics of V is for Vendetta, exclusive prints of Kickback  and other limited edition sketch books by Leinil Yu.

To be a member of the store you have to get to the actual store location itself at Rochor Centre since I would think they’ll be too busy selling the goods at the convention itself. Address and other info at their website here! Oh by the way, they SHOULD have their NETS machine marking at the booth at the convention… Bye, bye monies to you!

Here Be Geeks

They’re one of the supporting blogs of STGCC. Ha, ha I might be biased because I’m a guest writer for them but really, they’re cool. The articles and tweets they post are easily read and insanely fast. If you want to know any info or “inside” stuff of the convention, head on to their blog at Here Be Geeks or follow them on their twitter.

HBG is made up of a trio of geeks and site was created to fill up a niche that lacked in Singapore – comic books, television and gaming. They felt that the pop culture elements were seriously lacking in exposure here. (Yes, I totally agree.) They just started 11 months ago and booyah, now they’re even the supporting blog for STGCC!

The dudes will be walking around attending the panels, MODERATING some of them, providing live updates to the blog and tweeting at the event. If any of you readers want to know what’s happening at STGCC before you even hit the place, you should definitely read their posts since they’ve extensive maps of the location, event timings etc. Heck, it’s even in a more readable format that the STGCC website currently. The schedule for the events on all 3 days are out too and they’ve managed to find the pdf for it. So if you want in both pdf or excel, you can check out their blog post here, heh.

You might catch them in their official HBG t-shirts or on the last day, they’ll be going as the League of Evil Exes from Scott Pilgrim or Star Trek. Also, look out for contests and giveaways at their site! I can certainly say that their stuff is not sucky. BWUAHAHAHA! Very cool stuff if you like geeky things. Ok, uh. You don’t need to spend anything unlike the above two people, however please say hello to them! They’re nice. People going to some panels, you’ll see at least one of them and uh, me too on the various ones on the three days as moderators.

Movie Mania

They’re a movie fan group of costumers. Actually they don’t stop at just movies, they do costumes from games and comics too! They’ll be having a booth and Reno, the head of MM will be talking on Sunday at the 1pm panel at the 401-402 room. He’ll be talking about Cosplay 101 – How to make/source your costumes with Ellya Chao and Clive Lee. In my ahem, ahem sources I know there will be an ODST (from the Halo series) squad on Saturday. If you guys like the game, be sure to catch the whole squad there! Besides ODST, MM were the guys who usually can build their own armoured costumes. They have a Warmachine and Ironman too. Reno will also be one of the judges at the cosplay competition held there on stage.

Seriously, if you like costumes, weapons and all that cool stuff. Check out their booth or their website here.

Gone Case!

There’s a lot of cool independent artists and studios to be had at the convention at the Artist Alley. I managed to interview one of them who’s launching their book “Gone Case” there! Interestingly, they’re in the What’s New page of STGCC!

Gone Case is written by Dave Chua, a freelance writer, editor and a joint winner for the SPH-NAC Golden Point Award in 1995 amongst other awards. It’s illustrated by Koh Hong Teng who won the Digital Art Gold Award at Comgraph Asia Pacic Digital Art & Animation Competition in 2001 for his graphic novel “01321″ and his comics have been published in both Liquid City 1 &2.

The story was actually published in 1996! It’s a novel about a coming-of-age story about a year in the life of a 12-year old living in a Singaporean housing estate. However, in this comic adaptation, the duo took a year for it to come together, discussing on which points to focus on for it. The inspiration for the story was when Dave Chua wandered about the housing estate he stayed in, and felt there was a shortage of stories set in that milieu.

You readers can check out their sample pages or bits of their story at their website here. They will be at the Windmill Studios booth, Artist Alley J12. And just at STGCC, the comic book will be just $16! The price at major bookstores will be $18.90 so best you get it there. Plus, you can always get your book autographed by them! Besides Gone Case, they’ll be selling Hong Teng’s popular ‘BLKS&NOS’ Art Series Postcards and Cheah Sin Ann’s book – Billy and Saltie: Cool Croc.

IZReloaded/R3LOAD Network

If you’ve been to any event previously like AFA, various parties and whatnot, you might have seen IZReloaded before or at least his videos. Both IZ Reloaded and R3LOAD Network are official supporters of STGCC 2010 and he and his crew will be there!

IZ will be covering STGCC for R3LOAD Network, an entertainment and pop culture web TV network.  He’ll be doing a lot of filming, taking photos, interviewing, etc. And lots of tweeting. You readers can check out his twitter at @izreloaded. So if you want to be caught on camera, wave to him, smile and pose. Unlike the other blogs, IZ usually has video summaries of the events and they’re usually uploaded pretty fast.

Heh, if you miss the event, be sure to catch his videos. Or if you were there, check it out anyway to see if you were caught on camera!

AND THAT IS IT! Well, there’s more people who help out and make the convention fun but you guys have to BE there to check it out! If you wanna know where I’ll be? I’ll mostly be around the 501st, Movie Mania booth, artist alley checking out the goods or at the panels. I’ll definitely be on a panel as a moderator on Sunday for the 2.15pm-3pm, Traditional form of comic illustration panel at room 401-402.

Uh, so everywhere I guess?

SEE YOU GUYS THEN!

Guess which one I went to.

No, not the Borders one nor the one about some health thing. I think a lot of medical profession types were there that day. What I went to is of course the Anime Festival Asia X! Or AFA X cause you know, this year is 2010. I didn’t preorder tickets so I had to line up to get mine.

To see how long the line was, well just play the video. It was just around a twenty to thirty minutes wait though so it wasn’t TOO long.

I got my tickets eventually! $15 including the stage pass. $8 if I just wanted the main floor for one day. I didn’t go for the Anisong one and that one costs around $55 and upwards if I remember the base price right.

Then yesss, finally! Through the main doors!

And this is the programme for both of the days! Mind you, now I’m just gonna pic spam because there’s a lot to see and I’m sure you guys can tell what happens in the pictures.

Considering it’s the anime festival asia, you have tons more than just anime stuff. There’s travel agencies to get to Japan since the people who go to the fest are most likely to go on them especially when they have special packages to go around specific places for otakus. Heh even the travel agencies like the cosplayers to ask them for a picture with them.

Canon also sponsored photos for free! There were three dioramas which was really cool cause one of them was a Victorian setting. Good for cosplayers to pose in front and get their pictures taken! Even if you weren’t, you could still pose in front of them and get pics taken.

The Animax people got their usual voice over booth which is very fun. Looks like they’re really utilizing their sound booth for many anime or comic conventions because it must be really worth it for them to do so. A lot of people like trying it out cause you can pretend to be the voice over of some cartoon or anime characters!

Meanwhile, there was a Japanese Cool exhibition with various technology. They had a set done up so you could act in front of some 3d enabled video cameras! People got to see the effect on the tv screens by viewing through the special 3d glasses set up in front of them. Toyota had a lot of tech shown there including their latest line of Winglets. I don’t think it’s out in the market yet but it looks like a more portable version of the Segway!

Pretty fun, eh?

This was a Thailand cosplayer who came to AFA X, I think he was there to compete nonetheless, woaah look at the detail on his armour!

So anyway, lots of people bought toys, exclusive products and there were competitions there too besides the cosplay one. There were card game tournaments, a Street Fighter arcade game one amongst others.

Of course besides toys, there were props sold and nekomimi-s (cat ears usually on hairbands to wear) and other merchandise to wear like hats and masks!

There was also a charity auction for Gracehaven. That’s interesting since I haven’t seen this done in the previous conventions.

Meanwhile, there were also demos on new games like Project Diva by SEGA. The machines will probably be in the arcades sometime in the future here if they’re not already set up by now. The game stars Hatsune Miku and it’s one of those music and rhythm games.

This year besides the maid cafe (or rather this year’s theme for the maid cafe is School Days so they had a set up as if you were in a Japanese classroom), we had a butler cafe available! Lots of ladies of course queued up for this one so both cafes were pretty full with customers. No photos inside because it’s in the rules but you can check out Atelier Royale’s facebook page to see the butlers that served at the cafe. I like the cakes and the service was cute.

This was their first time serving lots of customers and I was a benevolent ojou-sama (lady). I had the urge to ring the bell to just drop a hanky or tissue and say that I had dropped it and would they pick it up for me? BUT NO, THAT WOULD BE EVIL. Hence, I was nice since they were doing their best anyway. Hahaha.

There was a Joy Sound machine too at the Brother booth! For those who don’t know, Joy Sound is like a karaoke game where you get scores for the songs you sing. However, it’s all in Japanese. This doesn’t stop it from being used at the convention cause it’s like one of the only conventions that there WILL be people around who are be able to sing in Japanese anyway. Oh yes, Brother is smart.

They have a booth there to show their sewing machines. Nowadays lots of cosplayers do buy sewing machines to do up their costumes. It’s like the number one big ticket item cosplayers will buy so heh, Brother, good show in making their brand known to people and especially to the younger set instead of the usual demographics who’d buy them! I wonder who in Brother’s marketing team thought of this.

Anyway, this one was fun. They’re singing Magnet, the NeruxGero version that is.

Besides the big name companies or shops like KKNM, Cospa etc, the artist alley was there for local and abroad artists to sell their artwork and doujins. Lots of Hetalia stuff this year. Heh, there’s the usual graffiti board too where you can draw on it. It’s fun to see the result of it at the end of the day because there are lots of good artists who contribute to it. Meanwhile, can you find the Bleach characters? Hahahaha.

Soon it was time for me to go. I didn’t stay around for the shows on the main stage though. Meanwhile, if you want to read more on the cosplay competition, read The Cosplay Chronicle‘s posts on it including the one with the performance videos!

Remember that picture from my episode on Free Comic Book Day? Yeah well, I did say that pic was a bit photoshoped to make it look better but it didn’t really need that much photoshop in the first place anyway.

So let’s show you how to be as faceless or how to make a faceless mask like how Renee Montoya is as The Question!

Here’s a reference of my outfit for that day anyway. The artwork’s by Philip Tan and it’s from the Book of Revelations/Blood. I kinda borrowed the compilation book so I managed to see it in there anywho. Considering it’s the most casual outfit I did ever, it freaked a lot of people out due to the facelessness.

FIRSTLY, a note! You can also check the tutorial on how to make a faceless mask here by Jessica Smith. Her post enabled me to make my own so yes, let’s start on how I did it. You can try find at your own craft places but I pretty got my stuff from Art Friend here.

Things to get:

• 18 gauge wire
• Cheese cloth (Art Friend had it out of stock so I bought mine online, now they stock tons of it! Sheesh.)
• Dylon’s fabric paint! Red, yellow, black, white. (Make sure it’s in a small glass bottle and the new formula, not the old. 1 bottle each should work)
• Brush/spoon/some stirrer
• Pail/bucket/large bowl
• Newspaper or whatever scrap material to dry your cheese cloth
• Muslin or whatever “flexible” soft cloth large enough to cover your face
• Marker
• Pins
• Super glue
• Scissors

Let’s begin!

As you can see, the wire part is the easiest thing to do for this whole mask. I didn’t use the 32 gauge wire as stated in Jessica’s tutorial since I just twirled the ends together. If you note the wire there, the top part of the head is separated from the jaw part. Use enough wire so you can have the ends meet together and twirl it together (with pliers if you don’t have strong fingers) till they’re together!

Pretty much you just smoosh/bend the wire to conform to your forehead and to the part where your jaw ends. With the extra bit there, you should be able to wear the wire like a pair of spectacles.

The next part, take your cheese cloth out from its package. Fold it a few times until you can’t see the “holes” in it and that the length of the cloth should be able to cover your face with some extra inches left over. You just need that amount so cut it from the rest. At the moment, I still have some cheese cloth left over to make another mask if I wanted to.

Ok, this is where the bucket or pail or whatever comes in. Make sure you have good lighting in your room or wherever you’re doing this. According to your skintone, mix the paint: red, yellow, black and white. Well, I’m Asian so that’s the colour I needed. Just add more red or less yellow if you’re not and increase the tone by using black or lighten it with white fabric paint.

Warning: Carefully add black paint by drops and stir the whole paint mixture in the bucket or pail before adding more.

Add water as needed, I managed to get to my skin tone after at least half an hour of mixing and checking. Dump your cut cheesecloth in the bucket and make sure the whole thing is covered with it. The new Dylon fabric paints does NOT harden your cloth when you dry it.

ALSO, make sure that when you add the cheese cloth, it looks correct to your skin tone for it depends on what colour your cheese cloth is. Adjust when necessary.

Then lay it out to dry! Or hang it to dry. I chose to just lay it down.

The next part is fitting it all in together. This picture is taken at night and kinda dark. You can note it looks like I’m already faceless! I didn’t photoshop this picture by the way so that’s the effect you’ll get and oh yes. You CAN see through it. The beauty of cheese cloth.

Right, remember the muslin or spare soft cloth? You might need help, just get someone to draw on your face WITH the spare cloth on it with a marker. It should outline your forehead towards your jaw. With that, cut out the piece with a few centimeters extra.

When your cheese cloth is dry, fold it up in the layers until you can’t see the holes from afar. You should be able to see through the cloth against your face though. With that folded, time to lay your spare piece on top and cut it out! Yes. Your cheesecloth might be in cut layers, that’s why you have pins, make sure they’re all together.

Alright, the difficult part. Don’t rush as you attach the cloth to the wire frame with the help of your pins and glue. You can pin the cloth to the wireframe, the extra bit from where you marked your face is to be folded down and super glued. Make sure you don’t stick your fingers together or something when you do this. trim when needed when all is done!

Also remember to do some test shots to just check!

Considering this was freaking daylight with immense sunlight, it still looked good from afar. It’s much better with less lighting up close. Oh yes, for this one I rushed so it looks a bit off in some pictures.

The hat and wig pretty much covered and also helped to keep the mask in place. I can talk easily and see things pretty clearly too. I might be making a better version with more adjustments to the colouring and size next time but still, for a first rushed faceless mask I did just for Free Comic Book Day, it was pretty fun!

Even though I’m not sponsored by G&B comics, it feels like this post is brought to you by them since it’s going to be full of comic-ky goodness! It’s because this episode features Free Comic Book Day! Yaaaay.

Actually, this was before Free Comic Book Day. The evening before, the shop had booked a theatre for the members of the shop. We bought our tickets so all we had to do was just redeem them at the counter that was set up near the entrance of the cinema. They also gave us a free Iron Man comic!

Before the movie started, there was a lucky draw on who would win the Iron Man statue action figure thing. It’s one of those detailed sculpted ones which is oh so expensive and gorgeous. That guy there won it. Meanwhile, if you watch the movie, stay after the credits for your usual extra clip and also, can you spot Stan Lee during the movie?

Fast forward to Free Comic Book Day which was pretty much the next day. It’s the first Saturday of every May held all around the world. The store said it was going to open at 12pm but woah, there was a queue by 11-ish. Raven Silvers, Avariel and Mintea was with me for this. Heh.

It was rather packed when all of us went in! Besides FCBD, the store was having a 1 USD = 1 SGD sale for the book compilations aka trade paperbacks.

And according to the email, those who were in costume would get a little free goodie too! Hahah, Captain America is one of the store staff/owner’s friend but then everyone who’s a member of the shop are kinda like friends in a way anyway. Anywho, I went as The Question in her more casual outfit from the book of Revelations/Crime Bible. I needed a new picture in a costume since my other friends had updated theirs from the other conventions in Australia.

Hahah, yes. I can see through it quite well. I probably need to adjust the colouring since this is for fluorescent while I was instead in daylight. The above pic over this video was with photoshop since I might as well make it look nice eh? I didn’t get to adjust the mask tighter in the vid. In photos, it still looks nice without photoshop since it’s supposed to be for dimly lit places. Without photo editing, it should look like this.

As we slowly got our turns to the table at the back with the free comics, (10 for members, 5 for non-members!) there were large frames of pictures to our right with the various events the store had been at. Fun fact! You can see some of the Adventure Crew and me in the Neil Gaiman event pictures if you can spot us in the audience and naturally you can see me in the Brian Bolland photos for when he was at the Singapore Toys, Games and Comics Convention.

Besides the free comics, Storm Lion was there in the store giving art demonstrations and to sign autographs on their first preview issue comic out.

The others bought the trade paperbacks but I couldn’t find the one that I wanted. Nonetheless, the Thursday before I saw some figurines I wanted and thought that I’d get it on Saturday. It was a Spike and Faith figurine! GASP! There was much shouting and gasping since Spike was easily found behind the counter (you can see Shazam etc in the background, the Buffy figurines are blocked by the guy in front of me in this picture) but Faith was hidden behind the other Buffys! And yes, on the left you can see bottles of True Blood.

Apparently they didn’t bring that much for Spike and Faith so AAAAAAH YESSS, I got them! HURRAH!

My haul from FCBD? 10 comics, the Spike and Faith figurines and a free Shazam figurine plus bag for dressing up! The War Machine Heroclix are for those members who wore the member t-shirt! It was pretty fun. Arrch messaged me though to say that he got a Lady Gaga comic book there in Australia. We didn’t have it here but we had tons of the others! (Different comic stores get different comics according to what was ordered in, I think.)

The only pissy thing was that while the whole bunch of us girls (it’s very obvious that we’re girls, in fact the majority of the girls who came for FCBD, I pretty much knew them and intro-ed them to each other via their Livejournal names) were standing in front of the shelves searching for some titles, one of the mothers of the children was telling her daughter that there weren’t any comics for girls.

You may not my faceless uh, face but you can be certain I gave a look along with everyone else of us giving an expression of horror. Really, irony to the max while we were talking about, “Should I get this? Oh-my-gaaah, yes I should get this!” in the way of how one would go “Should I get this shoes? It so totally matches my outfit” etc and there she was saying that to her kid. Though, they were there because their son was getting comics and we didn’t want to go !!!!!! aloud in case said mother would restrict said son from going to the shop or something.

Too bad though, it wasn’t a comics for girls issue there, it was more for the age range. I wouldn’t recommend X-men to her but there are books like Owly, DC Superhero Kids or others. Just DON’T go saying “There aren’t books for girls here” when girls are all up surrounding in your face or something.

If you want to not be addicted or jump in before they launch a major story line, this issue is the one to jump on. Out of the stack for this week’s shipment, this comic got the most reaction shot out of me.

• X-men Legacy #234

Let’s get on with the fangirling! For one thing, everyone should know I’m a total Rogue fan so this issue is very fun

How do I start this!? This issue is totally for Rogue fans and in a way it was not so serious drama drama like how the X-men can get because it’s a brief interlude after their fights with… ok a whole bunch of people and this is their “quiet” resting time for now. However, the cuckoos need Rogue’s help to take away their powers for just a bit so they can search for the Phoenix Force that disappeared and hid somewhere.

Brief summary, Rogue accepted a position where she could help the new students at this new “mansion” of sorts. I won’t call this a mansion since it feels much more but anyway, it’s their academy of sorts. So anywho, Rogue got to have psychic powers for this issue for a bit while the cuckoos work their thing. They’re the bitchy blonde ladies if you can’t tell.

So Rogue goes on her way after that until she’s called back later or whatever. Meanwhile, she hears something in French and we should know who that is. Remyyyyyyyy. Somehow she hears something else hidden in his mind in which he says “What, again?” since yeah, it’s not new to them. However, she’s not forcing him but just asking him to get someone to look at him since hey, it’s Remy and Rogue knows how stubborn he can be and it is not the first time anyway.

And then they get into the whole Rogue avoiding Remy thing because she needs to learn to control her powers once more after the Prof fixed her again.

As you can see, she doesn’t want to avoid Remy but she so totally associates him with the lack of control and goes on a total fantasy spree in her mind… BUT WOAH, wait a minute! She’s still got psychic powers from the cuckoos so WHOOPS? She just broadcasted the whole thing to everyone?!

I don’t know if this page wins over the Buffy issue where Buffy dreaming of Spike and Angel with the whole nurse get up and random cupids and all. This page is certainly a contender for one of the most embarrasing thoughts to be broadcasted though!

You had to see her reaction when Remy told her to stop, it was so freaking cute.

Anywho, off she goes to find Magneto since she needed to talk to him about him messing with Surge’s powers. Which he was anyway. And oh does Magneto always have to do the floaty crotch thrust thing or is it just to show off to Rogue huh? Probably he just likes to do it anyway. La la la, DARN YOU PSYCHIC POWERS! Rogue gets to feel how Magneto feels about her and it’s doing a looping feedback thing so she likes him when it’s actually him liking her and you know, loop.

Free kisses to Mags I guess. She got pissy about it nonetheless once she realized what happened and turned off the emphatic part and huffed away. This is soooo totally for the Rogue/Magneto fans. The one before that was so for Rogue/Remy which I totally approve!

Really, she’s like a guidance counselor.

Maybe if it were Jean or whoever, they might be too prissy and be all “Oh noes, I’m invading someone’s thoughts! I must angst now for I am invading their privacy!” but no, not Rogue. She’s just going all along fine since it’s not as if she can help it.

Not much of a difference from all the voices in her head long ago anywho. So taking advantage of her brief powers, she goes on and advises some students that seem to be having trouble and… Woah there, I think there might be a future appearance of some stalker in the future.

For a girl who couldn’t be touched, she certainly touched a lot of people’s hearts.

DUH, DUH, DUUUUUUUUH.

We don’t know who the mystery thought voice is so perhaps in future issues. For now, Rogue returns back to the cuckoos who failed in finding the Phoenix Force and they take their powers back and hurray, all is back to normal.

For now.

Kyaaaaaa~~ Blatant Rogue-ism for this issue! I like it!

Hellooo, it’s been a while since I did this. Nonetheless! I figured I’d just focus on the comics that I’d go gah over more out of the lot in every shipment. Less picture editing then. Major spoilers for BtVS because I am all grah over the plotline.

• Girl Comics No. 1 (1 of 3)
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer #33

Let’s start with Girl Comics No. 1! For those reading just the title, no it doesn’t mean that the comic features girl characters although they are inside the book. It means that these limited 3 issue series is done entirely by girls! Writers, pencillers, inkers etc. Actually, I’m not sure about the inker and colourist if they’re girls (whoops, if you are? Cause I can’t tell if it’s a gender neutral name). But anyway, the ladies of comics creation!

The intro to this anthology of stories by the ladies is pretty inspiring. Cause you know, it makes you feel that these girl heroines in stories do it because… Well, their speech sums it up! Try to name all of them if you can!

Anywho, lots of different art styles in this first issue. I quite like it since the storylines aren’t so typical and some characters make you go “OHHH” once you realize who they are. There’s about six different stories in here and in the first one (excluding the intro with the speech), Nightcrawler looks like Desire from Sandman, only you know, blue.

There’s also pages with info about some ladies of Marvel who worked there and they certainly created history! Overall, I liked this! I’d be getting the next two issues (hopefully, unless it sells out).

Firstly in Buffy the Vampire Slayer #33, Xander got to cheer up Buffy. No biggie, Buffy is Buffy. She’s got the whole “ARRGH, IT’S MY FAULT” thing going on and she’s currently getting all the powers from dead slayers and so yeah. Still, she’s being dramatic. It’s okay, Willow knows this too and got Xander to do the whole speech thing to B so up we go! B is happy, hurray or at least wanting revenge to stop all this Twilight nonsense and getting Giles, Faith and Andrew back.

Meanwhile, everyone from CSN and every other comic news website knows who the heck Twilight is.

THIS, this actually made me go, “What?” because he’s beating up Faith. Giles recognizes the voice but FAITH, she should have known too. If you follow the TV series or read fanfics or the wiki, Faith did save Angel (ha ha, spoiled you if you haven’t been spoiled yet) and GOT INTO HIS HEAD. This is so freaking weird for her not to know so.

And then Andrew helped to stop Angel smacking Faith by hitting him with a frisbee. This is pretty cool and Andrew-like. He may not have powers but he certainly would help his friends out. For Buffy/Faith fanficcers, there’s a point where B says that she can feel Faith hurting too, so haaaaaaa and off she goes to rescue them when waiting for Willow and Amy to finish a spell to find them.

Randomly, I did wonder how the heck did Andrew get all the gear and where from if he sneaked away?

Okay, the Buffy/Twilight fight. It’s… Oh man, ANGEL ACTUALLY READS TWILIGHT? He must have or he was being ironic! I would peg him as being ironic since I doubt he’d read it. Or so I hope.

Besides Xander, Willow actually has the best original lines in this issue.

ARRRRRRRRRRRRGH. This is so annoying. It’s all true lurve soul joining crap or something. It’s just so… AUGH.

Really.

Willow has the best lines in this issue. Also next issue is called “Them F#@%ing plus the true history of the universe”. There’s got to be explaining to do! For one thing, Buffy + any romancy love person = KABLOOEY. Now Angel is… GAAAAAAAAAAH. Well, there has to be a good reason or else I hope that Faith is gonna smack his face if Buffy doesn’t any more. I half expected that THIS Angel was a hoax but we don’t really know… ARGH, we’ll see.

Righto, for this week’s shipment, we have:

• Cinderella: From Fabletown with Love #2
• X-Babies #3
• Batman: The Cat and the Bat
• Empowered: The Wench with a Million Sighs

Onwards we go!

So last we saw Cindy in was that some guy was sneaking up behind her with a dagger. Surprise! It is actually Aladdin. Anyway, in Cinderella: From Fabletown with Love #2, apparently Aladdin also is trying to find out who’s doing the whole illegal magical item business. Thus, they decided to join forces since they were working on the same goal anyway.

In the meantime, while Cindy and Aladdin share intel and prepare to gather info and find the things, Cordwainer shows new designs to the shoe elves to make. The elves think it’s a bad idea and I am inclined to think so too. Whatever it is, magical shoes even for Fabletown folk don’t seem to be a good combination anyway.

Back to Cindy and Aladdin! Off they go to some soirée of sorts where dodgy business types are to be had with the mafia and all the such where supposedly a deal for magical items. Cindy is not impressed with Aladdin by the way, since he clearly is the suave handsome type which she totally doesn’t like.

Anyway once they arrive, the “boss” for the party is a lady in a red burqah and tells the guards to get rid of them! Apparently the guards are big ghols and the two super spies are getting in quite a fix since they can’t fight them while the drop from the roof of the building is really high. It just hit me, what if the boss was one of the sisters who went to the shoe shop in issue 1? It could be possible! Durrr, duurr, duuur. FORESHADOWING?

Okay, X-babies #3 actually gave an exciting turn instead of going down. This is good because things just got fun now! And no, there’s no zombies either but anyway the X-babies finally got themselves out of that world and into the “real” mojoworld! Also, Rogue totally is in it with Wolvie whenever it’s for fights since they’re both hardcore (for babies).

Okay, so Wolvie and Nightcrawler were on the rescue team. Apparently other characters were also stuck in their own VR world like the X-babies. They found the real Wally, Terry, Roy and Top Dog! With Top Dog’s intelligence, they disabled all the VR systems to free everyone else! Meanwhile, the attack team consisting of the other X-Babies were fighting the creepy imitations.

The only thing was that these imitations can’t feel pain and they were creepily bouncy and stuff! Really, really creepy.

And in the nick of time, Wolvie busts in with the other people they rescued! Also, Wally, Terry and Roy look kinda cute when they’re drawn like this and more dignified! Anyway, Wolvie can’t believe the rest of the X-Babies can’t defeat them and even though Rogue warns him about them not feeling pain, he demonstrates that yes, it can be done.

This is one of the scariest fight scenes I had ever seen especially in an X-Baby comic book since you can actually see him dicing them all up!

Creepier though that they thought they had won but NO. The pieces joined together since they were jellyish and reformed back into their imitations once more AND the programmer brought more backup. AUGH. Took this page with my camera but this is SO AWESOME IN A CREEPY WAY. Can you recognize all of them? Hahahahah. I am amused with Deadpool even being in there. DUR, DUR, DUUUUUR.

Batman: The Cat and the Bat, not so much screenshots because all of the pages are awesome! It’s a compilation of Batman Confidential issues where Barbara Gordon is Batgirl and meets Catwoman for the first time. The whole thing is sassy, fun and expressive. Yeah, expressive. The artwork on the characters shows their expressions and you won’t be able to not imagine how their lines are said. Besides, Babs and Selina? You know it’s an exciting cat fight when they both of them are combined. GET IT, GET IIIIT.

Yay! Empowered: Wench with a Million Sighs! Okay, for those who haven’t read the previous volumes of Empowered, don’t read this until you’ve read volume 5 at least. This would be a major spoiler once you know where she’s at.

And thus, in the Empowered style of story, we have the main action happening while having cuts to a conversation of the Caged Demonwolf with Thugboy and Ninjette.

Yeah, I can’t believe he talks to Emp’s mother either. Anyway, as they analyze each different sigh, the story moves on and compared to a regular Empowered volume, this isn’t too rated but it still is compared to other comics anyway. Caged Demonwolf is always amusing in his verbose narrations.

It’s amusing cause I like Adam Warren’s style of writing since you’d get little bits of pieces of Emp’s past and yes, it will show how it affected her when she grew up.

Meanwhile in “reality” or rather the past where it happened before Caged Demonwolf’s narration, Emp is fighting Irresistimmovable. All the other Superhomeys are down and it’s up to Emp to defeat him. Considering she’s at a superhero mausoleum, she gets advice from dead superheroes from their tombstones. It’s a prerecorded message thing, you see.

And of course she runs into someone familiar and asks for advice from her instead. Mindf**k, unlike the other heroes is a sensible one and her powers was of telepathy. Also, she gives really, really good advice. In the meantime, I kept trying to look for a certain hero’s tombstone because he was annoying like heck and I wanted him to be dead instead of being an obnoxious creep that would torment Emp in the next volume whenever it comes out.

Of course even in fighting, Emp has quite a lot of sighing when she does so. Each sigh is just so meaningful of each situation, heh.

Especially when the sighs increase and then she gets really frustrated. Heh, Emp can be so freaking awesome then. Needless to say, the day is saved and well, she still sighs at the end of the story. Hahahaha! Okay yeah, get it only if you read the other volumes. You can read it without reading the rest but, you’ll just get spoilered especially for volume 5 if you do so.

Till next shipment of comics then!

Alrighty! Spoilers included, also panels don’t look like how they are because I used a camera to take a pic since the scanner is kinda crappy here.

We’ve got:

• Queen Sonja #2
• Emily the Strange – The Thirteenth Hour #2
• Models Inc #4
• Gotham City Sirens #6
• Buffy and Angel figurine collection #2

Here we go! Also, at this rate, you can see how odd the genre mix I read.

Yes, she is Red freaking Sonja! No one else would wear a chainmaille bikini and ride around on a horse in that attire! Queen Sonja #2 continues to her “flashback” thingy where it started in issue 1. Yeah, it’s weird if you just got this issue without reading the first since all “this” has happened. It’s to show why she’s called Queen Sonja now.

Anyway, these bunch of bandits had made off with an old woman’s belongings. Normally, if Sonja learns that they are evil men or they had been banditing (WHAT IS A VERB FOR BANDIT?!) for ENJOYMENT, she’d cut their heads off straight away. Considering the ladies explained themselves what had happened, she is nice and merciful. Only that they had to return the goods pronto and that she will follow them to see what had happened to drive them to banditry (Obvious answer: Evil, evil men!)!

There’s story ‘recaps’ by the bandits and the pages are gorgeous in that classic way of story recaps. Ever seen Conan or well old barbarian movies before? You get pages of landscapes and such with just the right amount of text but the visuals tell the story more.

So soon her “band” was captured and they were taken near a site where they found out where all the people were taken as slaves to. Those that read this issue can pretty much tell who her “band” of ladies are and I do mean ladies in a title sense.

She’s got enough and actually pretty much pretended to be caught and went insane on the captors once they were at a nice strategic spot over seeing the land and yet still in the distance from the guards below. I got to say though, when she does flying kicks and all like that… DOES she wear anything underneath that?

If not, I guess that’s why the guys are dead. If you see her girly bits, it is a sign that you will die. For reals. So anyway, Red Sonja is pretty scary and slightly biased on ladies but she’s helpful. Onwards to issue #3 whenever it comes out then. There’s going to be much bloodshed as usual.

On to Emily the Strange – The Thirteenth Hour #2, I got startled by the sudden Emily BJD ad in the pages. There seems to be more ads for BJDs in comics nowadays. Hmm. You can get her at the official Emily the Strange website. If you haven’t read an Emily comic before, it’s black and white and sometimes on rare occasions, it can be bright red!

It’s pretty wordy for a comic and it will confuse you in her journey to strange places.

It’s her 13th birthday you see and she lost her watch, taken by an evil being!

I just like all the cats in it and it’s pretty deep and punny!

Heh a soft spot for fuzzy things. As I said, it can get literal and punny. I like those. In this end of this issue, she’s getting closer to the point of finding her watch, yay! It is like a journey of self discovery of a gothic Alice in wonderland.

Models Inc #4, the end of the little series. It feels like Marvel is redoing old classic characters and making them into new series for people to buy or something. That’s Sachet Nelson, the artist. Disapproving artist is disapproving.

It was certainly a soap opera kind of ending. Or a mixture of Nancy Drew and uh, models.

Okay, all the cool lines were actually in issue #3. This one is more like finishing things up to a conclusion. Chili is totally cool, she actually did learn stuff from Patsy aka Hellcat and instead of Patsy being watched, they should have been wary on ALL the models there.

What was pissy though that in the first issue there was some weird werewolf vibe going on. APPARENTLY, IT WAS A RED HERRING. Nothing to do with werewolves. Just dead artists and expensive paintings.

Set with models and characters from retro classic Marvel series. I’m liking Chili, she’s very lively compared to the rest besides Patsy and okay, it’s also pretty much because she is the sassy one. Chili, like her name is hot stuff. Sheesh.

Oh and hey there… Using a cast to hit a person and then whapping them in the face? Or to be more exact, whunktting them seems to be painful for all parties involved. Seriously, a fractured arm is in a cast for a reason. BECAUSE IT IS FRACTURED. Whatever, all was a happy day ending as the models strut their stuff.

The ending was kind of nice in a way that it’s predictable. It’s not the predictability that makes it nice, it’s the whole HEY, it’s MARVEL and they actually gave us a happy ending including a cast of females who are although models, aren’t that ditzy, peppering with quite witty lines at times and situations. You don’t get too many happy SPECIFIC endings in Marvel comics nowadays so this was cute too since they didn’t make the ladies too like bitchy skanky hos like Marvel Divas unbelievable.
Yay, yay so good bye limited Models Inc run, you didn’t blow it off too bad and you sure knew when to end before it got draggy.

Gotham City Sirens #6! Last we saw, Ivy and Catwoman were in their own specific traps. Well, they got out of it and were chasing after Gagsworth who pulled Harley along with him.

Ivy when combined with Catwoman can be funny in her serious droll way. Don’t worry about them, they know how to handle themselves out of this mess for Selina has… a handphone!

Meanwhile, Harley gets monologued by Gagsworth and is clearly unimpressed. He is such a delusional little troll.

He keeps on telling her how fun he had with Mister J… Right… Yes… That totally happened, Gagsworth.

Harley of course is still really, really unimpressed.

Anyway, Ivy and Catwoman finally managed to bust through the traps with the help of Jenna, their contractor and get through to Harley. This scene ironic yet poetic since you’ll recognize why if you’re really a Harley fan.

And off home they go in Jenna’s van where Harley asks them if she was too obsessed with Mister J since Gagsworth was too over delusional about Joker. Cute, real cute there. Also, I like this scene with all their expressions there of duhness.

And of course Harley vows not to get with Mister J again… But then he might have changed for the better and starts to ramble and as always… Heh, Ivy, I knooow, you’re just jealous. Yes. The ending’s cute in a not really cute way but it ends of with a good conclusion for this arc of the series. What made me go what the heck though was this:

This ad of Batman & Robin in there. What… What the heck is Robin wearing? I admit, I do not read Batman but I can’t remember when he ever wore something fruity like that?! I see the Batcycle looks different? But uh ROBIN WHAT ARE YOU WEARING? It confuses me because it can’t be a going back in time storyline because they have motorcycles yet Robin is wearing something like he’s going for a Romeo & Juliet audition (with Batsy as Juliet?!?) or something. SOMEONE TELL ME WHY? That IS Robin, right?

Okay the last one is the Buffy and Angel collector’s figurine #2, the comic shop owner guy told me that there were 3 and that the last one might be Willow.

And the cast pic for the back of it. Aww, no Lorne but there’s a Fred! So yay to that, it means it’s not the “earlier” seasons since she only appeared much later and Cordelia is blonde-ish here.

Like the first issue, it had facts from the series, the comics and other developments. Heh, I always found puppet Angel pretty funny. He has a removable nose, did you know? Right and like the first issue, it came with an Angel figurine. My comment on it is that it’s pretty dark. Cause duh, it’s Angel. He keeps wearing black and stuff so yes, the paint job for the figurine is pretty much dark colours.

Yep. Pretty dark. Anyway till next shipment! That’s it for reaction shots!

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