Some notes from around the shop, including an extension on our Blackest Night promotion, Alec leaves the store, and a reminder that if you miss the DaveCon, you are most uncool.

Details on upcoming events in our store for the rest of August and September.  Mostly so I don’t have to do another one of these for a month!!

Those of you who have been around our store long enough, know that we really like to support our local artists.  And our artists are usually generous in return with us, with their time and other projects.  One of our good friends is Ryan Claytor, an independent self-publisher who moved here to the Lansing area a few years ago from California.  I know, I know, I’ve asked the same question:  Why??

So now we have posters for both Thor and Captain America.  So I’m just curious what our readers think… which movie looks or sounds better at this point?  Both comic titles have had nice runs in the last few years… Ed Brubaker, in particular, on Captain America, and J Michael Straczynski when he took over Thor.  But as to which movie is most appealing…?  Vote in our poll on the right side of the page!

If you’re like me, and are fascinated by the creative process that goes into the production of a comic book / graphic novel / Sunday morning funny paper, then this post is for you.

There was just so much cool stuff on the invoice this week that I felt a blog post might be appropriate.  Take a look at what you’ll be missing if you fail in your duty to make your weekly schlep to Clem’s, in beautiful downtown Lansing, this week:

Just wanted to post a couple more things about our local artists.  Don’t forget to circle Saturday, October 2nd on your calendar – that’s the date for 24 Hour Comics Day this year, when we’ll have quite a few of our favorite artists, both professional and amateur, in-store to take on the challenge of writing & drawing a complete 24-page comic book in 24 hours!  We’ll be running it from 10am Saturday to 10am on Sunday morning, and the event is sponsored by many of our nearby downtown businesses.  Clem’s …

Comic books tend to mirror pop culture quite well as an industry, and sometimes they even directly influence pop culture themselves.  This becomes quite apparent when one examines the recent rash of vampire affection in our entertainment.  Of course, vampires have always been a fun diversion for unique storytelling (Hey there, Tom Cruise!), but it seems lately they’ve really been hogging the spotlight. 

Here are 4 great reasons for you to pick up Superman #701 at Clem’s this week.  Or next week.  Maybe not the week after that, because we’ll probably sell out at some point, and then DC will do a second print, and you want the first printing, don’t cha?

I had a few things that I wanted to Tweet / Facebook, so I will instead just put them into one post.  And probably wind up Tweeting / Facebooking them anyway.  How many of you out there would like to ditch the social networking train and go back to direct-to-tape voice answering machines and listed numbers?