WONDERCON ANAHEIM 2018 PROGRAM BOOK Superman cover art collectible comic-con NEW

Description: Check out our other new & used items>>>>>HERE! (click me) FOR SALE:A great looking program from an awesome Southern California conventionOFFICIAL WONDERCON ANAHEIM 2018 PROGRAM BOOK & SCHEDULE DETAILS:Superman cover art celebrates Action Comics' 1000th issue and 80th birthday!"Pencils by Dan Jurgens, inks by Norm Rapmund, colors by Alex Sinclair, lettering by Todd Klein. The cover is illustrated by WonderCon Anaheim 2018 special guest Dan Jurgens, who has a long history with Superman. Jurgens was one of the creators behind the 'Death of Superman' storyline in the 1990s and has helped to redefine the character in the Rebirth era. Joining Dan are his long-time inker Norm Rapmund, plus color artist Alex Sinclair, and letterer Todd Klein, celebrating the Man of Steel on his groundbreaking anniversary, and the character’s continued quest for truth, justice, and the American way!" (firewireblog.com) 136 pages of WonderCon!Program includes WonderCon Anaheim 2018 convention schedules, short bios, articles, ads, maps, vendor info, merchandise and exclusives info, artist appearance list, and even a blank page for autographs and notes. CONDITION:New; not mint but close. Please see photos for condition.To ensure safe delivery all items will be carefully packaged before shipping out. THANK YOU FOR LOOKING. QUESTIONS? JUST ASK.*ALL PHOTOS AND TEXT ARE INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY OF SIDEWAYS STAIRS CO. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.* "Superman is a superhero who appears in American comic books published by DC Comics. The character was created by writer Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster, and debuted in the comic book Action Comics #1 (cover-dated June 1938 and published April 18, 1938).[1] Superman has been adapted to a number of other media, including radio serials, novels, films, television shows, theater productions, and video games. Superman was born on the fictional planet Krypton and was named Kal-El. When he was a baby, his parents sent him to Earth in a small spaceship moments before Krypton was destroyed in a natural cataclysm. His ship landed in the American countryside, near the fictional town of Smallville. He was found and adopted by farmers Jonathan and Martha Kent, who named him Clark Kent. Clark developed various superhuman abilities, such as incredible strength and impervious skin. His adoptive parents advised him to use his abilities for the benefit of humanity, and he decided to fight crime. To protect his personal life, he changes into a colorful costume and uses the alias "Superman" when fighting crime. Clark resides in the fictional American city of Metropolis, where he works as a journalist for the Daily Planet. Superman's supporting characters include his love interest and fellow journalist Lois Lane, Daily Planet photographer Jimmy Olsen and editor-in-chief Perry White, and enemies such as Brainiac, General Zod, and his archenemy Lex Luthor. Superman is the archetype of the superhero: he wears an outlandish costume, uses a codename, and fights evil with the aid of extraordinary abilities. Although there are earlier characters who arguably fit this definition, it was Superman who popularized the superhero genre and established its conventions. He was the best-selling superhero in American comic books until the 1980s.[2] Creation and conception Jerry Siegel, writer Joe Shuster, illustrator Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster met in 1932 while attending Glenville High School in Cleveland and bonded over their admiration of fiction. Siegel aspired to become a writer and Shuster aspired to become an illustrator. Siegel wrote amateur science fiction stories, which he self-published as a magazine called Science Fiction: The Advance Guard of Future Civilization. His friend Shuster often provided illustrations for his work.[3] In January 1933, Siegel published a short story in his magazine titled "The Reign of the Superman". The titular character is a homeless man named Bill Dunn who is tricked by an evil scientist into consuming an experimental drug. The drug gives Dunn the powers of mind-reading, mind-control, and clairvoyance. He uses these powers maliciously for profit and amusement, but then the drug wears off, leaving him a powerless vagrant again. Shuster provided illustrations, depicting Dunn as a bald man.[4] "The Reign of the Superman", a short story by Jerry Siegel (January 1933) Siegel and Shuster shifted to making comic strips, with a focus on adventure and comedy. They wanted to become syndicated newspaper strip authors, so they showed their ideas to various newspaper editors. However, the newspaper editors told them that their ideas were insufficiently sensational. If they wanted to make a successful comic strip, it had to be something more sensational than anything else on the market. This prompted Siegel to revisit Superman as a comic strip character.[5][6] Siegel modified Superman's powers to make him even more sensational: Like Bill Dunn, the second prototype of Superman is given powers against his will by an unscrupulous scientist, but instead of psychic abilities, he acquires superhuman strength and bullet-proof skin.[7][8] Additionally, this new Superman was a crime-fighting hero instead of a villain, because Siegel noted that comic strips with heroic protagonists tended to be more successful.[9] In later years, Siegel once recalled that this Superman wore a "bat-like" cape in some panels, but typically he and Shuster agreed there was no costume yet, and there is none apparent in the surviving artwork.[10][11] Siegel and Shuster showed this second concept of Superman to Consolidated Book Publishers, based in Chicago.[12][a] In May 1933, Consolidated had published a proto-comic book titled Detective Dan: Secret Operative 48.[13] It contained all-original stories as opposed to reprints of newspaper strips, which was a novelty at the time.[14] Siegel and Shuster put together a comic book in a similar format called The Superman. A delegation from Consolidated visited Cleveland that summer on a business trip and Siegel and Shuster took the opportunity to present their work in person.[15][16] Although Consolidated expressed interest, they later pulled out of the comics business without ever offering a book deal because the sales of Detective Dan were disappointing.[17][18] Cover of an unpublished comic book, 1933 Siegel believed publishers kept rejecting them because he and Shuster were young and unknown, so he looked for an established artist to replace Shuster.[19] When Siegel told Shuster what he was doing, Shuster reacted by burning their rejected Superman comic, sparing only the cover. They continued collaborating on other projects, but for the time being Shuster was through with Superman.[20] Siegel wrote to numerous artists.[19] The first response came in July 1933 from Leo O'Mealia, who drew the Fu Manchu strip for the Bell Syndicate.[21][22] In the script that Siegel sent to O'Mealia, Superman's origin story changes: He is a "scientist-adventurer" from the far future when humanity has naturally evolved "superpowers". Just before the Earth explodes, he escapes in a time-machine to the modern era, whereupon he immediately begins using his superpowers to fight crime.[23] O'Mealia produced a few strips and showed them to his newspaper syndicate, but they were rejected. O'Mealia did not send to Siegel any copies of his strips, and they have been lost.[24] In June 1934, Siegel found another partner: an artist in Chicago named Russell Keaton.[25][26] Keaton drew the Buck Rogers and Skyroads comic strips. In the script that Siegel sent Keaton in June, Superman's origin story further evolved: In the distant future, when Earth is on the verge of exploding due to "giant cataclysms", the last surviving man sends his three-year-old son back in time to the year 1935. The time-machine appears on awhere it is discovered by motorists Sam and Molly Kent. They leave the boy in an orphanage, but the staff struggle to control him because he has superhuman strength and impenetrable skin. The Kents adopt the boy and name him Clark, and teach him that he must use his fantastic natural gifts for the benefit of humanity. In November, Siegel sent Keaton an extension of his script: an adventure where Superman foils a conspiracy to kidnap a star football player. The extended script mentions that Clark puts on a special "uniform" when assuming the identity of Superman, but it is not described.[27] Keaton produced two weeks' worth of strips based on Siegel's script. In November, Keaton showed his strips to a newspaper syndicate, but they too were rejected, and he abandoned the project.[28][29] Siegel and Shuster reconciled and resumed developing Superman together. The character became an alien from the planet Krypton. Shuster designed the now-familiar costume: tights with an "S" on the chest, over-shorts, and a cape.[30][31][32] They made Clark Kent a journalist who pretends to be timid, and conceived his colleague Lois Lane, who is attracted to the bold and mighty Superman but does not realize that he and Kent are the same person.[33] Concept art c. 1934/1935. Note the laced sandals, based on those of strongmen and classical heroes.[34] In June 1935 Siegel and Shuster finally found work with National Allied Publications, a comic magazine publishing company in New York owned by Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson.[35] Wheeler-Nicholson published two of their strips in New Fun Comics #6 (1935): "Henri Duval" and "Doctor Occult".[36] Siegel and Shuster also showed him Superman and asked him to market Superman to the newspapers on their behalf.[37] In October, Wheeler-Nicholson offered to publish Superman in one of his own magazines.[38] Siegel and Shuster refused his offer because Wheeler-Nicholson had demonstrated himself to be an irresponsible businessman. He had been slow to respond to their letters and hadn't paid them for their work in New Fun Comics #6. They chose to keep marketing Superman to newspaper syndicates themselves.[39][40] Despite the erratic pay, Siegel and Shuster kept working for Wheeler-Nicholson because he was the only publisher who was buying their work, and over the years they produced other adventure strips for his magazines.[41] Wheeler-Nicholson's financial difficulties continued to mount. In 1936, he formed a joint corporation with Harry Donenfeld and Jack Liebowitz called Detective Comics, Inc. in order to release his third magazine, which was titled Detective Comics. Siegel and Shuster produced stories for Detective Comics too, such as "Slam Bradley". Wheeler-Nicholson fell into deep debt to Donenfeld and Liebowitz, and in early January 1938, Donenfeld and Liebowitz petitioned Wheeler-Nicholson's company into bankruptcy and seized it.[3][42] In early December 1937, Siegel visited Liebowitz in New York, and Liebowitz asked Siegel to produce some comics for an upcoming comic anthology magazine called Action Comics.[43][44] Siegel proposed some new stories, but not Superman. Siegel and Shuster were, at the time, negotiating a deal with the McClure Newspaper Syndicate for Superman. In early January 1938, Siegel had a three-way telephone conversation with Liebowitz and an employee of McClure named Max Gaines. Gaines informed Siegel that McClure had rejected Superman, and asked if he could forward their Superman strips to Liebowitz so that Liebowitz could consider them for Action Comics. Siegel agreed.[45] Liebowitz and his colleagues were impressed by the strips, and they asked Siegel and Shuster to develop the strips into 13 pages for Action Comics.[46] Having grown tired of rejections, Siegel and Shuster accepted the offer. At least now they would see Superman published.[47][48] Siegel and Shuster submitted their work in late February and were paid $130 (equivalent to $2,503 in 2021) for their work ($10 per page).[49] In early March they signed a contract (at Liebowitz's request) in which they gave away the copyright for Superman to Detective Comics, Inc. This was normal practice in the business, and Siegel and Shuster had given away the copyrights to their previous works as well[50] (see the Copyright issues section of this article for more details on this matter). The duo's revised version of Superman appeared in the first issue of Action Comics, which was published on April 18, 1938. The issue was a huge success thanks to Superman's feature.[1][51][52] Influences Siegel and Shuster read pulp science-fiction and adventure magazines, and many stories featured characters with fantastical abilities such as telepathy, clairvoyance, and superhuman strength. One character in particular was John Carter of Mars from the novels by Edgar Rice Burroughs. John Carter is a human who is transported to Mars, where the lower gravity makes him stronger than the natives and allows him to leap great distances.[53][54] Another influence was Philip Wylie's 1930 novel Gladiator, featuring a protagonist named Hugo Danner who had similar powers.[55][56] Superman's stance and devil-may-care attitude were influenced by the characters of Douglas Fairbanks, who starred in adventure films such as The Mark of Zorro and Robin Hood.[57] The name of Superman's home city, Metropolis, was taken from the 1927 film of the same name.[58] Popeye cartoons were also an influence.[58] The name "Clark Kent" was created by taking the first names of actors Clark Gable and Kent Taylor. "Clark" was also inspired by explorer William Clark especially when coming up with the names "Lois and Clark" a nod to Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, American explorers who discovered an overland route to the Pacific Ocean. Douglas Fairbanks (left) and Harold Lloyd (right) influenced the look of Superman and Clark Kent, respectively. Clark Kent's harmless facade and dual identity were inspired by the protagonists of such movies as Don Diego de la Vega in The Mark of Zorro and Sir Percy Blakeney in The Scarlet Pimpernel. Siegel thought this would make for interesting dramatic contrast and good humor.[59][60] Another inspiration was slapstick comedian Harold Lloyd. The archetypal Lloyd character was a mild-mannered man who finds himself abused by bullies but later in the story snaps and fights back furiously.[61] Kent is a journalist because Siegel often imagined himself becoming one after leaving school. The love triangle between Lois Lane, Clark, and Superman was inspired by Siegel's own awkwardness with girls.[62] The pair collected comic strips in their youth, with a favorite being Winsor McCay's fantastical Little Nemo.[58] Shuster remarked on the artists who played an important part in the development of his own style: "Alex Raymond and Burne Hogarth were my idols – also Milt Caniff, Hal Foster, and Roy Crane."[58] Shuster taught himself to draw by tracing over the art in the strips and magazines they collected.[3] As a boy, Shuster was interested in fitness culture[63] and a fan of strongmen such as Siegmund Breitbart and Joseph Greenstein. He collected fitness magazines and manuals and used their photographs as visual references for his art.[3] The visual design of Superman came from multiple influences. The tight-fitting suit and shorts were inspired by the costumes of wrestlers, boxers, and strongmen. In early concept art, Shuster gave Superman laced sandals like those of strongmen and classical heroes, but these were eventually changed to red boots.[34] The costumes of Douglas Fairbanks were also an influence.[64] The emblem on his chest was inspired by heraldic crests.[65] Many pulp action heroes such as swashbucklers wore capes. Superman's face was based on Johnny Weissmuller with touches derived from the comic-strip character Dick Tracy and from the work of cartoonist Roy Crane.[66] The word "superman" was commonly used in the 1920s and 1930s to describe men of great ability, most often athletes and politicians.[67] It occasionally appeared in pulp fiction stories as well, such as "The Superman of Dr. Jukes".[68] It is unclear whether Siegel and Shuster were influenced by Friedrich Nietzsche's concept of the Übermensch; they never acknowledged as much.[69] The immigration background of the two authors may also be a significant factor. As the children of Jewish immigrants, experiences of discrimination may well have influenced the imaginative creation of (anti)hero figures with superpowers.[70] Comics See also: Publication history of Superman and Superman (franchise) Comic books See also: List of Superman comics The cover of Superman #6 (Sept. 1940) by Joe Shuster, the original artist and co-creator Since 1938, Superman stories have been regularly published in periodical comic books published by DC Comics. The first and oldest of these is Action Comics, which began in April 1938.[1] Action Comics was initially an anthology magazine, but it eventually became dedicated to Superman stories. The second oldest periodical is Superman, which began in June 1939. Action Comics and Superman have been published without interruption (ignoring changes to the title and numbering scheme).[72][73] A number of other shorter-lived Superman periodicals have been published over the years.[74] Superman is part of the DC Universe, which is a shared setting of superhero characters owned by DC Comics, and consequently he frequently appears in stories alongside the likes of Batman, Wonder Woman, and others. Superman has sold more comic books over his publication history than any other American superhero character.[75] Exact sales figures for the early decades of Superman comic books are hard to find because, like most publishers at the time, DC Comics concealed this data from its competitors and thereby the general public as well, but given the general market trends at the time, sales of Action Comics and Superman probably peaked in the mid-1940s and thereafter steadily declined.[76] Sales data first became public in 1960, and showed that Superman was the best-selling comic book character of the 1960s and 1970s.[2][77][78] Sales rose again starting in 1987. Superman #75 (Nov 1992) sold over 23 million copies,[79] making it the best-selling issue of a comic book of all time, thanks to a media sensation over the supposedly permanent death of the character in that issue.[80] Sales declined from that point on. In March 2018, Action Comics sold just 51,534 copies, although such low figures are normal for superhero comic books in general (for comparison, Amazing Spider-Man #797 sold only 128,189 copies).[81] The comic books are today considered a niche aspect of the Superman franchise due to low readership,[82] though they remain influential as creative engines for the movies and television shows. Comic book stories can be produced quickly and cheaply, and are thus an ideal medium for experimentation.[83] Whereas comic books in the 1950s were read by children, since the 1990s the average reader has been an adult.[84] A major reason for this shift was DC Comics' decision in the 1970s to sell its comic books to specialty stores instead of traditional magazine retailers (supermarkets, newsstands, etc.) — a model called "direct distribution". This made comic books less accessible to children.[85] Newspaper strips See also: Superman (comic strip) Beginning in January 1939, a Superman daily comic strip appeared in newspapers, syndicated through the McClure Syndicate. A color Sunday version was added that November. Jerry Siegel wrote most of the strips until he was conscripted in 1943. The Sunday strips had a narrative continuity separate from the daily strips, possibly because Siegel had to delegate the Sunday strips to ghostwriters.[86] By 1941, the newspaper strips had an estimated readership of 20 million.[87] Joe Shuster drew the early strips, then passed the job to Wayne Boring.[88] From 1949 to 1956, the newspaper strips were drawn by Win Mortimer.[89] The strip ended in May 1966, but was revived from 1977 to 1983 to coincide with a series of movies released by Warner Bros.[90] Editors Initially, Siegel was allowed to write Superman more or less as he saw fit because nobody had anticipated the success and rapid expansion of the franchise.[91][92] But soon Siegel and Shuster's work was put under careful oversight for fear of trouble with censors.[93] Siegel was forced to tone down the violence and social crusading that characterized his early stories.[94] Editor Whitney Ellsworth, hired in 1940, dictated that Superman not kill.[95] Sexuality was banned, and colorfully outlandish villains such as Ultra-Humanite and Toyman were thought to be less nightmarish for young readers.[96] Mort Weisinger was the editor on Superman comics from 1941 to 1970, his tenure briefly interrupted by military service. Siegel and his fellow writers had developed the character with little thought of building a coherent mythology, but as the number of Superman titles and the pool of writers grew, Weisinger demanded a more disciplined approach.[97] Weisinger assigned story ideas, and the logic of Superman's powers, his origin, the locales, and his relationships with his growing cast of supporting characters were carefully planned. Elements such as Bizarro, his cousin Supergirl, the Phantom Zone, the Fortress of Solitude, alternate varieties of kryptonite, robot doppelgangers, and Krypto were introduced during this era. The complicated universe built under Weisinger was beguiling to devoted readers but alienating to casuals.[98] Weisinger favored lighthearted stories over serious drama, and avoided sensitive subjects such as the Vietnam War and the American civil rights movement because he feared his right-wing views would alienate his left-leaning writers and readers.[99] Weisinger also introduced letters columns in 1958 to encourage feedback and build intimacy with readers.[100] Weisinger retired in 1970 and Julius Schwartz took over. By his own admission, Weisinger had grown out of touch with newer readers.[101] Schwartz updated Superman by making Clark Kent a television anchor, and he retired overused plot elements such as kryptonite and robot doppelgangers.[102] Schwartz also scaled Superman's powers down to a level closer to Siegel's original. These changes would eventually be reversed by later writers. Schwartz allowed stories with serious drama such as "For the Man Who Has Everything" (Superman Annual #11), in which the villain Mongul torments Superman with an illusion of happy family life on a living Krypton. Schwartz retired from DC Comics in 1986 and was succeeded by Mike Carlin as an editor on Superman comics. His retirement coincided with DC Comics' decision to reboot the DC Universe with the companywide-crossover storyline "Crisis on Infinite Earths". Writer John Byrne rewrote the Superman mythos, again reducing Superman's powers, which writers had slowly re-strengthened, and revised many supporting characters, such as making Lex Luthor a billionaire industrialist rather than a mad scientist, and making Supergirl an artificial shapeshifting organism because DC wanted Superman to be the sole surviving Kryptonian. Carlin was promoted to Executive Editor for the DC Universe books in 1996, a position he held until 2002. K.C. Carlson took his place as editor of the Superman comics. Aesthetic style In the earlier decades of Superman comics, artists were expected to conform to a certain "house style".[103] Joe Shuster defined the aesthetic style of Superman in the 1940s. After Shuster left National, Wayne Boring succeeded him as the principal artist on Superman comic books.[104] He redrew Superman taller and more detailed.[105] Around 1955, Curt Swan in turn succeeded Boring.[106] The 1980s saw a boom in the diversity of comic book art and now there is no single "house style" in Superman comics.[citation needed] In other media Main article: Superman (franchise) Radio The first adaptation of Superman beyond comic books was a radio show, The Adventures of Superman, which ran from 1940 to 1951 for 2,088 episodes, most of which were aimed at children. The episodes were initially 15 minutes long, but after 1949 they were lengthened to 30 minutes. Most episodes were done live.[107] Bud Collyer was the voice actor for Superman in most episodes. The show was produced by Robert Maxwell and Allen Ducovny, who were employees of Superman, Inc. and Detective Comics, Inc. respectively.[108][109] Stage In 1966 Superman had a Tony-nominated musical play produced on Broadway. It's a Bird... It's a Plane... It's Superman featured music by Charles Strouse, lyrics by Lee Adams and book by David Newman and Robert Benton. Actor Bob Holiday performed as Clark Kent/Superman and actress Patricia Marand performed as Lois Lane. Film Paramount Pictures released a series of Superman theatrical animated shorts between 1941 and 1943. Seventeen episodes in total were made, each 8–10 minutes long. The first nine films were produced by Fleischer Studios and the next films were produced by Famous Studios. Bud Collyer provided the voice of Superman. The first episode had a production budget of $50,000 with the remaining episodes at $30,000 each[110] (equivalent to $553,000 in 2021), which was exceptionally lavish for the time; $9,000 – $15,000 was more typical for animated shorts.[111] Joe Shuster provided model sheets for the characters, so the visuals resembled the contemporary comic book aesthetic.[112] Kirk Alyn as Superman The first live-action adaptation of Superman was a movie serial released in 1948, targeted at children. Kirk Alyn became the first actor to portray the hero onscreen. The production cost up to $325,000[113] (equivalent to $3,665,000 in 2021). It was the most profitable movie serial in movie history.[114] A sequel serial, Atom Man vs. Superman, was released in 1950. For flying scenes, Superman was hand-drawn in animated form, composited onto live-action footage. The first feature film was Superman and the Mole Men, a 58-minute B-movie released in 1951, produced on an estimated budget of $30,000 (equivalent to $313,000 in 2021).[115] It starred George Reeves as Superman, and was intended to promote the subsequent television series.[116] The first big-budget movie was Superman in 1978, starring Christopher Reeve and produced by Alexander and Ilya Salkind. It was 143 minutes long and was made on a budget of $55 million (equivalent to $229,000,000 in 2021). It is the most successful Superman feature film to date in terms of box office revenue adjusted for inflation.[117] The soundtrack was composed by John Williams and was nominated for an Academy Award; the title theme has become iconic. Superman (1978) was the first big-budget superhero movie, and its success arguably paved the way for later superhero movies like Batman (1989) and Spider-Man (2002).[118][119][120] The 1978 film spawned three sequels: Superman II (1980), Superman III (1983), Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (1987). In 2006, Superman Returns was released, designed after the 1978–1987 film series. Superman was portrayed by Brandon Routh, who later reprised his role in the Arrowverse crossover Crisis on Infinite Earths (2019–2020). Superman has appeared in a series of direct-to-video animated films produced by Warner Bros. Animation called DC Universe Animated Original Movies, beginning with Superman: Doomsday in 2007. Many of these movies are adaptations of popular comic book stories. DC Extended Universe In 2013, Man of Steel was released by Warner Bros. as a reboot of the film series, starring Henry Cavill as Superman. A sequel, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016), featured Superman alongside Batman and Wonder Woman, making it the first theatrical film in which Superman appeared alongside other superheroes from the DC Universe. Cavill reprised his role in Justice League (2017) and its director's cut (2021). Superman also appears at the end of the film Shazam! (2019) very briefly, portrayed by stuntman Ryan Handley. Superman briefly appears in the first season finale of the TV series Peacemaker (2022), portrayed by a stand-in. Cavill makes an uncredited cameo appearance in the mid-credits scene of the film Black Adam (2022). DC Universe A new reboot of the film series, titled Superman: Legacy is in development, to be set in the DC Universe (DCU) franchise. The film will be written and directed by James Gunn and produced by DC Studios. It is set to release on July 11, 2025. Television Actor George Reeves portraying Superman in Stamp Day for Superman. After appearing in film, he would be the first actor to star as Superman in television. Adventures of Superman, which aired from 1952 to 1958, was the first television series based on a superhero. It starred George Reeves as Superman. Whereas the radio serial was aimed at children, this television show was aimed at a general audience,[121][122] although children made up the majority of viewers. Robert Maxwell, who produced the radio serial, was the producer for the first season. For the second season, Maxwell was replaced with Whitney Ellsworth. Ellsworth toned down the violence of the show to make it more suitable for children, though he still aimed for a general audience. This show was extremely popular in Japan, where it achieved an audience share rating of 74.2% in 1958.[123] His first animated television series was The New Adventures of Superman, which aired from 1966 to 1970. The show also feature a seven-minute part focused on Superboy named The Adventures of Superboy. Starting in 1974, Superman was one of the leading characters in the Hanna-Barbera-produced animated series Super Friends and all its sequels until 1986. To celebrate his 50th anniversary, Ruby Spears produced an animated series partially based on Superman (1978) and post-Crisis Superman comics created by John Byrne. The model sheets for Superman (1988) were drawn by legendary comics artist Gil Kane and most of the episodes were written by comics writer Marv Wolfman. Superboy aired from 1988 to 1992. It was produced by Alexander and Ilya Salkind, the same men who had produced the Superman films starring Christopher Reeve. Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman aired from 1993 to 1997. This show was aimed at adults and focused on the relationship between Clark Kent and Lois Lane as much as Superman's heroics.[116] Dean Cain played Superman, and Teri Hatcher played Lois. Smallville aired from 2001 to 2011. The show was targeted at young adults.[124][125] Played by Tom Welling, the series covered Clark Kent's life prior to becoming Superman, spanning ten years from his high school years in Smallville to his early life in Metropolis. Although Clark engages in heroics, he doesn't wear a costume, nor does he call himself Superboy. Rather, he relies on misdirection and his blinding speed to avoid being recognized. Later seasons find him becoming a public hero called the Red-Blue Blur, eventually shortened to the Blur, in a proto-Justice League before taking on the mantle of Superman. Superman: The Animated Series (with the voice of Tim Daly on the main character) aired from 1996 to 2000. After the show's conclusion, this version of Superman appeared in the sequel shows Batman Beyond (voiced by Christopher McDonald) aired from 1999 to 2001 and Justice League and Justice League Unlimited (voiced by George Newbern), which ran from 2001 to 2006. All of these shows were produced by Bruce Timm. This was the most successful and longest-running animated version of Superman.[116] In the Arrowverse, the main Superman (played by Tyler Hoechlin), appears as a guest star in several television series: Supergirl, The Flash, Arrow and Legends of Tomorrow. A Supergirl spin-off, Superman & Lois, premiered on February 23, 2021. Superman appears as an ensemble character in the animated shows Justice League, Justice League Unlimited, and Justice League Action. He appears as a guest character in other animated shows such as Batman: The Brave and the Bold and Harley Quinn. Video games Main article: List of video games featuring Superman The first electronic game was simply titled Superman, and released in 1979 for the Atari 2600. The last game fully centered on Superman was the adaptation of Superman Returns in 2006. From 2006 to present, Superman appeared in a co-starring role, such as the Injustice game series (2013–present). Merchandising DC Comics trademarked the Superman chest logo in August 1938.[126] Jack Liebowitz established Superman, Inc. in October 1939 to develop the franchise beyond the comic books.[51] Superman, Inc. merged with DC Comics in October 1946.[127] After DC Comics merged with Warner Communications in 1967, licensing for Superman was handled by the Licensing Corporation of America.[128] The Licensing Letter (an American market research firm) estimated that Superman licensed merchandise made $634 million in sales globally in 2018 (43.3% of this revenue came from the North American market). For comparison, in the same year, Spider-Man merchandise made $1.075 billion and Star Wars merchandise made $1.923 billion globally.[129] The earliest paraphernalia appeared in 1939: a button proclaiming membership in the Supermen of America club. The first toy was a wooden doll in 1939 made by the Ideal Novelty and Toy Company.[130] Superman #5 (May 1940) carried an advertisement for a "Krypto-Raygun", which was a gun-shaped device that could project images on a wall.[131] The majority of Superman merchandise is targeted at children, but since the 1970s, adults have been increasingly targeted because the comic book readership has gotten older.[132] During World War II, Superman was used to support the war effort. Action Comics and Superman carried messages urging readers to buy war bonds and participate in scrap drives.[133] Copyright issues Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster Main article: Copyright lawsuits by Superman's creators In a contract dated 1 March 1938, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster gave away the copyright to Superman to their employer, DC Comics (then known as Detective Comics, Inc.)[b] prior to Superman's first publication in April. Contrary to popular perception, the $130 that DC Comics paid them was for their first Superman story, not the copyright to the character — that, they gave away for free. This was normal practice in the comic magazine industry and they had done the same with their previous published works (Slam Bradley, Doctor Occult, etc.),[50] but Superman became far more popular and valuable than they anticipated and they much regretted giving him away.[134] DC Comics retained Siegel and Shuster, and they were paid well because they were popular with the readers.[135] Between 1938 and 1947, DC Comics paid them together at least $401,194.85 (equivalent to $6,510,000 in 2021).[136][137] Siegel wrote most of the magazine and daily newspaper stories until he was conscripted into the army in 1943, whereupon the task was passed to ghostwriters.[138][139] While Siegel was serving in Hawaii, DC Comics published a story featuring a child version of Superman called "Superboy", which was based on a script Siegel had submitted several years before. Siegel was furious because DC Comics did this without having bought the character.[140] After Siegel's discharge from the Army, he and Shuster sued DC Comics in 1947 for the rights to Superman and Superboy. The judge ruled that Superman belonged to DC Comics, but that Superboy was a separate entity that belonged to Siegel. Siegel and Shuster settled out-of-court with DC Comics, which paid the pair $94,013.16 (equivalent to $1,060,317 in 2021) in exchange for the full rights to both Superman and Superboy.[141] DC Comics then fired Siegel and Shuster.[142] DC Comics rehired Jerry Siegel as a writer in 1959. In 1965, Siegel and Shuster attempted to regain rights to Superman using the renewal option in the Copyright Act of 1909, but the court ruled Siegel and Shuster had transferred the renewal rights to DC Comics in 1938. Siegel and Shuster appealed, but the appeals court upheld this decision. DC Comics fired Siegel once again, when he filed this second lawsuit.[143] In 1975, Siegel and a number of other comic book writers and artists launched a public campaign for better compensation and treatment of comic creators. Warner Brothers agreed to give Siegel and Shuster a yearly stipend, full medical benefits, and credit their names in all future Superman productions in exchange for never contesting ownership of Superman. Siegel and Shuster upheld this bargain.[3] Shuster died in 1992. DC Comics offered Shuster's heirs a stipend in exchange for never challenging ownership of Superman, which they accepted for some years.[141] Siegel died in 1996. His heirs attempted to take the rights to Superman using the termination provision of the Copyright Act of 1976. DC Comics negotiated an agreement wherein it would pay the Siegel heirs several million dollars and a yearly stipend of $500,000 in exchange for permanently granting DC the rights to Superman. DC Comics also agreed to insert the line "By Special Arrangement with the Jerry Siegel Family" in all future Superman productions.[144] The Siegels accepted DC's offer in an October 2001 letter.[141] Copyright lawyer and movie producer Marc Toberoff then struck a deal with the heirs of both Siegel and Shuster to help them get the rights to Superman in exchange for signing the rights over to his production company, Pacific Pictures. Both groups accepted. The Siegel heirs called off their deal with DC Comics and in 2004 sued DC for the rights to Superman and Superboy. In 2008, the judge ruled in favor of the Siegels. DC Comics appealed the decision, and the appeals court ruled in favor of DC, arguing that the October 2001 letter was binding. In 2003, the Shuster heirs served a termination notice for Shuster's grant of his half of the copyright to Superman. DC Comics sued the Shuster heirs in 2010, and the court ruled in DC's favor on the grounds that the 1992 agreement with the Shuster heirs barred them from terminating the grant.[141] Under current US copyright law, Superman is due to enter the public domain in 2033.[145][c] However, this will only apply (at first) to the character as he is depicted in Action Comics #1, which was published in 1938. Versions of him with later developments, such as his power of "heat vision", may persist under copyright until the works they were introduced in enter the public domain themselves.[146] Lois Lane, who also debuted in Action Comics #1, is expected to enter public domain as well in 2033, but supporting characters introduced in later publications, such as Jimmy Olsen and Supergirl, will pass into the public domain at later dates. Captain Marvel See also: National Comics Publications v. Fawcett Publications Superman's success immediately begat a wave of imitations. The most successful of these at this early age was Captain Marvel, first published by Fawcett Comics in December 1939. Captain Marvel had many similarities to Superman: Herculean strength, invulnerability, the ability to fly, a cape, a secret identity, and a job as a journalist. DC Comics filed a lawsuit against Fawcett Comics for copyright infringement.[citation needed] The trial began in March 1948 after seven years of discovery. The judge ruled that Fawcett had indeed infringed on Superman. However, the judge also found that the copyright notices that appeared with the Superman newspaper strips did not meet the technical standards of the Copyright Act of 1909 and were therefore invalid. Furthermore, since the newspaper strips carried stories adapted from Action Comics, the judge ruled that DC Comics had effectively abandoned the copyright to the Action Comics stories and Superman, and therefore forfeited its right to sue Fawcett for copyright infringement.[141] DC Comics appealed this decision. The appeals court ruled that unintentional mistakes in the copyright notices of the newspaper strips did not invalidate the copyrights. Furthermore, Fawcett knew that DC Comics never intended to abandon the copyrights, and therefore Fawcett's infringement was not an innocent misunderstanding, and therefore Fawcett owed damages to DC Comics.[d] The appeals court remanded the case back to the lower court to determine how much Fawcett owed in damages.[141] At that point, Fawcett Comics decided to settle out of court with DC Comics. Fawcett paid DC Comics $400,000 (equivalent to $4,051,244 in 2021) and agreed to stop publishing Captain Marvel. The last Captain Marvel story from Fawcett Comics was published in September 1953.[147] DC Comics licensed Captain Marvel in 1972 and published crossover stories with Superman. By 1991, DC Comics had purchased Fawcett Comics and with it the full rights to Captain Marvel. DC eventually renamed the character "Shazam" to prevent disputes with Marvel Comics, who had created a character of their own named "Captain Marvel" back when the Fawcett character had lingered in limbo.[148] Character overview This section details the most consistent elements of the Superman narrative in the myriad stories published since 1938. Superman himself In Action Comics #1 (1938), Superman is born on an alien world to a technologically advanced species that resembles humans. Shortly after he is born, his planet is destroyed in a natural cataclysm, but Superman's scientist father foresaw the calamity and saves his baby son by sending him to Earth in a small spaceship. The ship is too small to carry anyone else, so Superman's parents stay behind and die. The earliest newspaper strips name the planet "Krypton", the baby "Kal-L", and his biological parents "Jor-L" and "Lora";[149] their names were changed to "Jor-el", and "Lara" in a 1942 spinoff novel by George Lowther.[150] The ship lands in the American countryside, where the baby is discovered by the Kents, a farming couple. The Kents name the boy Clark and raise him in a farming community. A 1947 episode of the radio serial places this unnamed community in Iowa.[151] It is named Smallville in Superboy #2 (June 1949). The 1978 Superman movie placed it in Kansas, as have most Superman stories since.[152] New Adventures of Superboy #22 (Oct. 1981) places it in Maryland. In Action Comics #1 and most stories published before 1986, Superman's powers begin developing in infancy. From 1944 to 1986, DC Comics regularly published stories of Superman's childhood and adolescent adventures, when he called himself "Superboy". From 1986 on (beginning with Man of Steel #1), Superman's powers emerged more slowly and he began his superhero career as an adult. The Kents teach Clark he must conceal his otherworldly origins and use his fantastic powers to do good. Clark creates the costumed identity of Superman so as to protect his personal privacy and the safety of his loved ones. As Clark Kent, he wears eyeglasses to disguise his face and wears his Superman costume underneath his clothes so that he can change at a moment's notice. To complete this disguise, Clark avoids violent confrontation, preferring to slip away and change into Superman when danger arises, and in older stories he would suffer occasional ridicule for his apparent cowardice. In Superboy #78 (1960), Superboy makes his costume out of the indestructible blankets found in the ship he came to Earth in. In Man of Steel #1 (1986), Martha Kent makes the costume from human-manufactured cloth, and it is rendered indestructible by an "aura" that Superman projects. The "S" on Superman's chest at first was simply an initial for "Superman". When writing the script for the 1978 movie, Tom Mankiewicz made it Superman's Kryptonian family crest.[153] This was carried over into some comic book stories and later movies, such as Man of Steel. In the comic story Superman: Birthright, the crest is described as an old Kryptonian symbol for hope. Clark works as a newspaper journalist. In the earliest stories, he worked for The Daily Star, but the second episode of the radio serial changed this to the Daily Planet. In comics from the early 1970s, Clark worked as a television journalist (an attempt to modernize the character). However, for the 1978 movie, the producers chose to make Clark a newspaper journalist again because that was how most of the public thought of him.[154] The first story in which Superman dies was published in Superman #149 (1961), in which he is murdered by Lex Luthor by means of kryptonite. This story was "imaginary" and thus was ignored in subsequent books. In Superman #188 (April 1966), Superman is killed by kryptonite radiation but is revived in the same issue by one of his android doppelgangers. In the 1990s The Death and Return of Superman story arc, after a deadly battle with Doomsday, Superman died in Superman #75 (Jan. 1993). He was later revived by the Eradicator using Kryptonian technology. In Superman #52 (May 2016) Superman is killed by kryptonite poisoning, and this time he is not resurrected, but replaced by the Superman of an alternate timeline. Superman maintains a secret hideout called the "Fortress of Solitude", which is located somewhere in the Arctic. Here, Superman keeps a collection of mementos and a laboratory for science experiments. In Action Comics #241, the Fortress of Solitude is a cave in a mountain, sealed with a very heavy door that is opened with a gigantic key too heavy for anyone but Superman to use. In the 1978 movie, the Fortress of Solitude is a structure made out of crystal. Clark Kent "Clark Kent" redirects here. For other uses, see Clark Kent (disambiguation). Superman's secret identity is Clark Joseph Kent, a reporter for the Daily Planet. Although his name and history originate from his early life with his adoptive Earth parents, everything about Clark was staged for the benefit of his alternate identity: as a reporter for the Daily Planet, he receives late-breaking news before the general public, always has a plausible reason to be present at crime scenes, and need not strictly account for his whereabouts as long as he makes his publication deadlines. He sees his job as a journalist as an extension of his Superman responsibilities—bringing truth to the forefront and fighting for the little guy. He believes that everybody has the right to know what is going on in the world, regardless of who is involved.[155] In the Bronze Age of Comic Books, Clark Kent was featured in a series that appeared primarily in The Superman Family, "The Private Life of Clark Kent" where Superman dealt with various situations subtly while remaining Clark. To deflect suspicion that he is Superman, Clark Kent adopted a mainly passive and introverted personality with conservative mannerisms, a higher-pitched voice, and a slight slouch. This personality is typically described as "mild-mannered", as in the opening narration of Max Fleischer's Superman animated theatrical shorts. These traits extended into Clark's wardrobe, which typically consists of a bland-colored business suit, a red necktie, black-rimmed glasses, combed-back hair, and occasionally a fedora. Clark wears his Superman costume underneath his street clothes, allowing easy changes between the two personae and the dramatic gesture of ripping open his shirt to reveal the familiar "S" emblem when called into action. His hair also changes with the clothing change, with Superman sporting a small curl or spit curl on his forehead. Superman usually stores his Clark Kent clothing compressed in a secret pouch within his cape,[156] though some stories have shown him leaving his clothes in some covert location (such as the Daily Planet storeroom)[157] for later retrieval. As Superman's alter ego, the personality, concept, and name of Clark Kent have become synonymous with secret identities and innocuous fronts for ulterior motives and activities. In 1992, Superman co-creator Joe Shuster told the Toronto Star that the name derived from 1930s cinematic leading men Clark Gable and Kent Taylor, but the persona from bespectacled silent film comic Harold Lloyd and himself.[158] Clark's middle name is given variously as either Joseph, Jerome, or Jonathan, all being allusions to creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. Personality In the original Siegel and Shuster stories, Superman's personality is rough and aggressive. He often uses excessive force and terror against criminals, on some occasions even killing them. This came to an end in late 1940 when new editor Whitney Ellsworth instituted a code of conduct for his characters to follow, banning Superman from ever killing.[159] The character was softened and given a sense of humanitarianism. Ellsworth's code, however, is not to be confused with "the Comics Code", which was created in 1954 by the Comics Code Authority and ultimately abandoned by every major comic book publisher by the early 21st century.[160] In his first appearances, Superman was considered a vigilante by the authorities, being fired upon by the National Guard as he razed a slum so that the government would create better housing conditions for the poor. By 1942, however, Superman was working side-by-side with the police.[161][162] Today, Superman is commonly seen as a brave and kind-hearted hero with a strong sense of justice, morality, and righteousness. He adheres to an unwavering moral code instilled in him by his adoptive parents.[163] His commitment to operating within the law has been an example to many citizens and other heroes, but has stirred resentment and criticism among others, who refer to him as the "big blue boy scout". Superman can be rather rigid in this trait, causing tensions in the superhero community.[164] This was most notable with Wonder Woman, one of his closest friends, after she killed Maxwell Lord.[164] Booster Gold initially had an icy relationship with the Man of Steel but grew to respect him.[165] Having lost his home world of Krypton, Superman is very protective of Earth,[166] and especially of Clark Kent's family and friends. This same loss, combined with the pressure of using his powers responsibly, has caused Superman to feel lonely on Earth, despite having his friends and parents. Previous encounters with people he thought to be fellow Kryptonians, Power Girl[167] and Mon-El,[168] have led to disappointment. The arrival of Supergirl, who has been confirmed to be his cousin from Krypton, relieved this loneliness somewhat.[169] Superman's Fortress of Solitude acts as a place of solace for him in times of loneliness and despair.[170] Powers, abilities, and weaknesses The catalog of Superman's abilities and his strength has varied considerably over the vast body of Superman fiction released since 1938. Since Action Comics #1 (1938), Superman has superhuman strength. The cover of Action Comics #1 shows him effortlessly lifting a car over his head. Another classic feat of strength on Superman's part is breaking steel chains. In some stories, he is strong enough to shift the orbits of planets[171] and crush coal into diamond with his hands. Since Action Comics #1 (1938), Superman has a highly durable body, invulnerable for most practical purposes. At the very least, bullets bounce harmlessly off his body. In some stories, such as Kingdom Come, not even a nuclear bomb can harm him. In the earliest stories, Superman's costume is made out of exotic materials that are as tough as he is, which is why it typically doesn't tear up when he performs superhuman feats. In later stories, beginning with Man of Steel #1 (1986), Superman's body is said to project an aura that renders invulnerable any tight-fitting clothes he wears, and hence his costume is as durable as he is even if made of common cloth. In Action Comics #1, Superman could not fly. He traveled by running and leaping, which he could do to a prodigious degree thanks to his strength. Superman gained the ability to fly in the second episode of the radio serial in 1940.[172] Superman can fly faster than sound and in some stories, he can even fly faster than the speed of light to travel to distant galaxies. Superman can project and perceive X-rays via his eyes, which allows him to see through objects. He first uses this power in Action Comics #11 (1939). Certain materials such as lead can block his X-ray vision. Superman can project beams of heat from his eyes which are hot enough to melt steel. He first used this power in Superman #59 (1949) by applying his X-ray vision at its highest intensity. In later stories, this ability is simply called "heat vision". Superman can hear sounds that are too faint for a human to hear, and at frequencies outside the human hearing range. This ability was introduced in Action Comics #11 (1939). Since Action Comics #20 (1940), Superman possesses superhuman breath, which enables him to inhale or blow huge amounts of air, as well as holding his breath indefinitely to remain underwater or space without adverse effects. He has a significant focus of his breath's intensity to the point of freezing targets by blowing on them. The "freeze breath" was first demonstrated in Superman #129 (1959). Action Comics #1 (1938) explained that Superman's strength was common to all Kryptonians because they were a species "millions of years advanced of our own". In the first newspaper strips, Jor-El is shown running and leaping like Superman, and his wife survives a building collapsing on her. Later stories explained they evolved superhuman strength simply because of Krypton's higher gravity. Superman #146 (1961) established that Superman's abilities other than strength (flight, durability, etc.) are activated by the light of Earth's yellow sun. In Action Comics #300 (1963), all of his powers including strength are activated by yellow sunlight and can be deactivated by red sunlight similar to that of Krypton's sun. Exposure to green kryptonite radiation nullifies Superman's powers and incapacitates him with pain and nausea; prolonged exposure will eventually kill him. Although green kryptonite is the most commonly seen form, writers have introduced other forms over the years: such as red, gold, blue, white, and black, each with peculiar effects.[173] Gold kryptonite, for instance, nullifies Superman's powers but otherwise does not harm him. Kryptonite first appeared in a 1943 episode of the radio serial.[174] It first appeared in comics in Superman #61 (Dec. 1949).[175] Superman is also vulnerable to magic. Enchanted weapons and magical spells affect Superman as easily as they would a normal human. This weakness was established in Superman #171 (1964). Like all Kryptonians, Kal-El is also highly susceptible to psychokinetic phenomena ranging along Telekinesis, Illusion casting, Mind control, etc., as shown in Wonder Woman Vol 2 # 219 (Sept. 2005). A powerful enough psionic can affect either the psyche or microbiology of Superman to induce strokes or mangle his internal organs, as well as disrupt his mind and perceptions of the world, something a young power-amped Gene-Bomb meta showcased in Superman #48 (Oct. 1990). Supporting characters See also: Superman character and cast and List of Superman supporting characters Superman's first and most famous supporting character is Lois Lane, introduced in Action Comics #1. She is a fellow journalist at the Daily Planet. As Jerry Siegel conceived her, Lois considers Clark Kent to be a wimp, but she is infatuated with the bold and mighty Superman, not knowing that Kent and Superman are the same person. Siegel objected to any proposal that Lois discover that Clark is Superman because he felt that, as implausible as Clark's disguise is, the love triangle was too important to the book's appeal.[176] However, Siegel wrote stories in which Lois suspects Clark is Superman and tries to prove it, with Superman always duping her in the end; the first such story was in Superman #17 (July–August 1942).[177][178] This was a common plot in comic book stories prior to the 1970s. In a story in Action Comics #484 (June 1978), Clark Kent admits to Lois that he is Superman, and they marry. This was the first story in which Superman and Lois marry that wasn't an "imaginary tale." Many Superman stories since then have depicted Superman and Lois as a married couple, but about as many depict them in the classic love triangle. In modern era comic books, Superman and Lois are a stable married couple, and the Superman supporting cast was further expanded with the introduction of their son, Jonathan Kent. Other supporting characters include Jimmy Olsen, a photographer at the Daily Planet, who is friends with both Superman and Clark Kent, though in most stories he doesn't know that Clark is Superman. Jimmy is frequently described as "Superman's pal", and was conceived to give young male readers a relatable character through which they could fantasize being friends with Superman. In the earliest comic book stories, Clark Kent's employer is George Taylor of The Daily Star, but the second episode of the radio serial changed this to Perry White of the Daily Planet.[179] Clark Kent's foster parents are Ma and Pa Kent. In many stories, one or both of them have died by the time Clark becomes Superman. Clark's parents taught him that he should use his abilities for altruistic means, but that he should also find some way to safeguard his private life. Antagonists Main article: List of Superman enemies The villains Superman faced in the earliest stories were ordinary humans, such as gangsters, corrupt politicians, and violent husbands; but they soon grew more colorful and outlandish so as to avoid offending censors or scaring children. The mad scientist Ultra-Humanite, introduced in Action Comics #13 (June 1939), was Superman's first recurring villain. Superman's best-known nemesis, Lex Luthor, was introduced in Action Comics #23 (April 1940) and has been depicted as either a mad scientist or a wealthy businessman (sometimes both).[180] In 1944, the magical imp Mister Mxyzptlk, Superman's first recurring super-powered adversary, was introduced.[181] Superman's first alien villain, Brainiac, debuted in Action Comics #242 (July 1958). The monstrous Doomsday, introduced in Superman: The Man of Steel #17–18 (Nov.-Dec. 1992), was the first villain to evidently kill Superman in physical combat without exploiting Superman's critical weaknesses such as kryptonite and magic. Alternative depictions Main article: Alternative versions of Superman See also: Superman (Earth-Two) and Superman (Earth-One) The details Superman's story and supporting cast vary across his large body of fiction released since 1938, but most versions conform to the basic template described above. A few stories feature radically altered versions of Superman. An example is the graphic novel Superman: Red Son, which depicts a communist Superman who rules the Soviet Union. DC Comics has on some occasions published crossover stories where different versions of Superman interact with each other using the plot device of parallel universes. For instance, in the 1960s, the Superman of "Earth-One" would occasionally feature in stories alongside the Superman of "Earth-Two", the latter of whom resembled Superman as he was portrayed in the 1940s. DC Comics has not developed a consistent and universal system to classify all versions of Superman. Cultural impact and legacy The superhero archetype Superman is often thought of as the first superhero. This point can be debated: Ogon Bat, the Phantom, Zorro, and Mandrake the Magician arguably[by whom?] fit the definition of the superhero yet predate Superman. Nevertheless, Superman popularized this kind of character and established the conventions: a costume, a codename, extraordinary abilities, and an altruistic mission. Superman's success in 1938 begat a wave of imitations, which include Batman, Captain America, and Captain Marvel. This flourishing is today referred to as America's Golden Age of Comic Books, which lasted from 1938 to about 1950. The Golden Age ended when American superhero book sales declined, leading to the cancellation of many characters; but Superman was one of the few superhero franchises that survived this decline, and his sustained popularity into the late 1950s led to a revival in the Silver Age of Comic Books, when characters such as Spider-Man, Iron Man, and The X-Men were created. After World War 2, American superhero fiction entered Japanese culture. Astro Boy, first published in 1952, was inspired by Mighty Mouse, which in turn was a parody of Superman.[182] The Superman animated shorts from the 1940s were first broadcast on Japanese television in 1955, and they were followed in 1956 by the TV show Adventures of Superman starring George Reeves. These shows were popular with the Japanese and inspired Japan's own prolific genre of superheroes. The first Japanese superhero movie, Super Giant, was released in 1957. The first Japanese superhero TV show was Moonlight Mask in 1958. Other notable Japanese superheroes include Ultraman, Kamen Rider, and Sailor Moon.[183][184][185] Fine art Starting with the Pop Art period and on a continuing basis, since the 1960s the character of Superman has been "appropriated" by multiple visual artists and incorporated into contemporary artwork,[186][187] most notably by Andy Warhol,[188][189] Roy Lichtenstein,[190] Mel Ramos,[191] Dulce Pinzon,[192] Mr. Brainwash,[193] Raymond Pettibon,[194] Peter Saul,[195] Giuseppe Veneziano,[196] F. Lennox Campello,[197] and others.[193][198][199] Literary analysis Superman has been interpreted and discussed in many forms in the years since his debut, with Umberto Eco noting that "he can be seen as the representative of all his similars".[200] Writing in Time in 1971, Gerald Clarke stated: "Superman's enormous popularity might be looked upon as signaling the beginning of the end for the Horatio Alger myth of the self-made man." Clarke viewed the comics characters as having to continuously update in order to maintain relevance and thus representing the mood of the nation. He regarded Superman's character in the early seventies as a comment on the modern world, which he saw as a place in which "only the man with superpowers can survive and prosper."[201] Andrew Arnold, writing in the early 21st century, has noted Superman's partial role in exploring assimilation, the character's alien status allowing the reader to explore attempts to fit in on a somewhat superficial level. A.C. Grayling, writing in The Spectator, traces Superman's stances through the decades, from his 1930s campaign against crime being relevant to a nation under the influence of Al Capone, through the 1940s and World War II, a period in which Superman helped sell war bonds,[202] and into the 1950s, where Superman explored the new technological threats. Grayling notes the period after the Cold War as being one where "matters become merely personal: the task of pitting his brawn against the brains of Lex Luthor and Brainiac appeared to be independent of bigger questions", and discusses events post 9/11, stating that as a nation "caught between the terrifying George W. Bush and the terrorist Osama bin Laden, America is in earnest need of a Saviour for everything from the minor inconveniences to the major horrors of world catastrophe. And here he is, the down-home clean-cut boy in the blue tights and red cape".[203] An influence on early Superman stories is the context of the Great Depression. Superman took on the role of social activist, fighting crooked businessmen and politicians and demolishing run-down tenements.[204] Comics scholar Roger Sabin sees this as a reflection of "the liberal idealism of Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal", with Shuster and Siegel initially portraying Superman as champion to a variety of social causes.[205][206] In later Superman radio programs the character continued to take on such issues, tackling a version of the Ku Klux Klan in a 1946 broadcast, as well as combating anti-semitism and veteran discrimination.[207][208][209] Scott Bukatman has discussed Superman, and the superhero in general, noting the ways in which they humanize large urban areas through their use of the space, especially in Superman's ability to soar over the large skyscrapers of Metropolis. He writes that the character "represented, in 1938, a kind of Corbusierian ideal. Superman has X-ray vision: walls become permeable, transparent. Through his benign, controlled authority, Superman renders the city open, modernist and democratic; he furthers a sense that Le Corbusier described in 1925, namely, that 'Everything is known to us'."[210] Three men seated onstage, flanked by Superman material The Library of Congress hosting a discussion with Dan Jurgens and Paul Levitz for Superman's 80th anniversary and the 1,000th issue of Action Comics Jules Feiffer has argued that Superman's real innovation lay in the creation of the Clark Kent persona, noting that what "made Superman extraordinary was his point of origin: Clark Kent." Feiffer develops the theme to establish Superman's popularity in simple wish fulfillment,[211] a point Siegel and Shuster themselves supported, Siegel commenting that "If you're interested in what made Superman what it is, here's one of the keys to what made it universally acceptable. Joe and I had certain inhibitions… which led to wish-fulfillment which we expressed through our interest in science fiction and our comic strip. That's where the dual-identity concept came from" and Shuster supporting that as being "why so many people could relate to it".[212] Ian Gordon suggests that the many incarnations of Superman across media use nostalgia to link the character to an ideology of the American Way. He defines this ideology as a means of associating individualism, consumerism, and democracy and as something that took shape around WWII and underpinned the war effort. Superman, he notes was very much part of that effort.[213] An allegory for immigrants Superman's immigrant status is a key aspect of his appeal.[214][215][216] Aldo Regalado saw the character as pushing the boundaries of acceptance in America. The extraterrestrial origin was seen by Regalado as challenging the notion that Anglo-Saxon ancestry was the source of all might.[217] Gary Engle saw the "myth of Superman [asserting] with total confidence and a childlike innocence the value of the immigrant in American culture". He argues that Superman allowed the superhero genre to take over from the Western as the expression of immigrant sensibilities. Through the use of a dual identity, Superman allowed immigrants to identify with both of their cultures. Clark Kent represents the assimilated individual, allowing Superman to express the immigrants' cultural heritage for the greater good.[215] David Jenemann has offered a contrasting view. He argues that Superman's early stories portray a threat: "the possibility that the exile would overwhelm the country".[218] David Rooney, a theater critic for The New York Times, in his evaluation of the play Year Zero considers Superman to be the "quintessential immigrant story [...] [b]orn on an alien planet, he grows stronger on Earth, but maintains a secret identity tied to a homeland that continues to exert a powerful hold on him even as his every with those origins does him harm".[219] Religious themes Some believe that Superman took inspiration from Judaic mythology. The British rabbi Simcha Weinstein notes that Superman's story has some parallels to that of Moses. For example, Moses as a baby was sent away by his parents in a reed basket to escape death and adopted by a foreign culture. Weinstein also posits that Superman's Kryptonian name, "Kal-El", resembles the Hebrew words קוֹל-אֵל (qōl ʾēl) which can be taken to mean "voice of God".[220] The historian Larry Tye suggests that this "Voice of God" is an allusion to Moses' role as a prophet.[221] The suffix "el", meaning "god", is also found in the name of angels (e.g. Gabriel, Ariel), who are airborne humanoid agents of good with superhuman powers. The Nazis also thought Superman was a Jew and in 1940 Joseph Goebbels publicly denounced Superman and his creator Jerry Siegel.[222] All that said, historians such as Martin Lund and Les Daniels argue that the evidence for Judaic influence in Siegel's stories is merely circumstantial. Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster were not practicing Jews and never acknowledged the influence of Judaism in any memoir or interview.[223][224] Superman stories have occasionally exhibited Christian themes as well. Screenwriter Tom Mankiewicz consciously made Superman an allegory for Jesus Christ in the 1978 movie starring Christopher Reeve: baby Kal-El's ship resembles the Star of Bethlehem, and Jor-El gives his son a messianic mission to lead humanity into a brighter future.[225] This messianic theme was revisited in the 2013 movie Man of Steel, wherein Jor-El asks Superman to redeem the Kryptonian race, which corrupted itself through eugenics, by guiding humanity down a wiser path." (wikipedia.org) "Career Image Comics and Marvel Rapmund's career began with Image Comics' Brigade #1 in 1992. He worked on the series concurrently with Image titles Bloodstrike and Team Youngblood until 1994, when he moved from Brigade to Supreme. Rapmund worked on several series under the Image banner (including the Extreme Studios and Maximum Press imprints), and in 1997 inked several issues of Alan Moore's Supreme: The New Adventures as well as issue #3 of Alan Moore's Judgment Day limited series. Work on a pair of 1997 Image/Marvel Comics crossover titles, Spider-Man/Badrock and Silver Surfer/Weapon Zero, led to more jobs with Marvel on Avengers, Iron Man, and Fantastic Four. DC Comics Rapmund began working primarily on DC Comics titles, starting in April 1998 with Teen Titans (vol. 2) #19; at the time the series was being written and pencilled by Dan Jurgens, who had written Spider-Man/Badrock. After the Titans series was canceled in September 1998 (issue #24), Rapmund inked various DC titles, including Superman, Superboy, Young Justice, and Action Comics. He worked on Aquaman vol. 5 from issue #50-75 (Dec. 1998 - Jan. 2001) Starting in September 2000, Rapmund also inked issues of Marvel's Wolverine vol. 2 and X-Men, staying with these series after Aquaman ended in 2001. His work on Wolverine ended with the issue #179 cover (September 2002), and Rapmund continued inking various Marvel and DC titles, as well as Image Comics' Masters of the Universe, a series which coincided with the 2002-2003 revival of the 1980s He-Man franchise. Transitioning primarily to Marvel's Black Panther and Fantastic Four in late 2003, Rapmund worked heavily on X-Treme X-Men in early 2004 as well as returning to the Teen Titans, whose latest series was being written by Geoff Johns. This was followed by a stint with Marvel's Rogue from 2004 to 2005 and various other Marvel and DC titles, culminating with DC's Supergirl and Infinite Crisis from 2005 to 2006. Among his next titles were the DC limited series 52 and Countdown to Final Crisis in 2007, with Rapmund then on contract with DC Comics.[citation needed] DC began a new Booster Gold series in October 2007, with art by Jurgens (who had created the character in 1986), Rapmund and (initial) co-writers Geoff Johns and Jeff Katz.[6][7] He and Jurgens briefly left the title to work on Time Masters: Vanishing Point. At the conclusion of that series, it was announced that he would return to Booster Gold, along with Dan Jurgens, in May 2011 with Issue #44. Rapmund also worked on various other DC titles concurrently and has worked on several Flash comic books. Awards Rapmund won the Inkwell Awards Favorite Inker Award in 2014.[1] In 2016, Rapmund was nominated for the Inkwell Awards Most Adaptable award.[8] In 2021, he won the Inkwell Awards Most Adaptable Inker.[2][3] In 2022, he was awarded the Inkwell Awards Most Adaptable Inker again." (wikipedia.org) " "San Diego Comic-Con International is a comic book convention and nonprofit[2] multi-genre entertainment event held annually in San Diego, California, since 1970. The name, as given on its website, is Comic-Con International: San Diego; but it is commonly known simply as Comic-Con or the San Diego Comic-Con or SDCC.[3][4] The convention was founded as the Golden State Comic Book Convention in 1970 by a group of San Diegans that included Shel Dorf, Richard Alf, Ken Krueger, Ron Graf, and Mike Towry;[5][6][7][8][9] later, it was called the "San Diego Comic Book Convention", Dorf said during an interview that he hoped the first Con would bring in 500 attendees.[10] It is a four-day event (Thursday–Sunday) held during the summer (in July since 2003) at the San Diego Convention Center in San Diego. On the Wednesday evening prior to the official opening, professionals, exhibitors, and pre-registered guests for all four days can attend a pre-event "Preview Night" to give attendees the opportunity to walk the exhibit hall and see what will be available during the convention. Comic-Con International also produces WonderCon, held in Anaheim, and SAM: Storytelling Across Media, a conference held in 2016 in San Francisco and beginning in 2018 annually at the Comic-Con Museum in San Diego. Since 1974, Comic-Con has bestowed its annual Inkpot Award on guests and persons of interest in the popular arts industries, as well as on members of Comic-Con's board of directors and the Convention committee. It is also the home of the Will Eisner Awards. Originally showcasing primarily comic books and science fiction/fantasy related film, television, and similar popular arts, the convention has since included a larger range of pop culture and entertainment elements across virtually all genres, including horror, Western animation, anime, comics, manga, toys, collectible card games, video games, webcomics, and fantasy novels. In 2010 and each year subsequently, it filled the San Diego Convention Center to capacity with more than 130,000 attendees.[11] In addition to drawing huge crowds, the event holds several Guinness World Records including the largest annual comic and pop culture festival in the world.[12] 2020 marked the first time that the event had been canceled since its establishment.[13][14] It was rescheduled for July 2021, however, this show was canceled soon after it had been announced. Comic-Con returned later that year with a scaled back version of itself in November 2021, marketed as "Comic-Con Special Edition". Comic-Con, as its former pre-pandemic self, returned to San Diego in July 2022 after a two-year hiatus. The next scheduled Comic-Con will begin on July 20, 2023. History and organization The convention was founded in 1970 by Shel Dorf, Richard Alf, Ken Krueger, Mike Towry, Ron Graf, Barry Alfonso, Bob Sourk, and Greg Bear.[5][6][15] Initial comic book and sci-fi club meetings would be held at Krueger's Alert Books in Ocean Beach, where much of the foundation of the early Cons coalesced.[16] In the mid-1960s, Dorf, a Detroit-born comics fan, had mounted the Detroit Triple-Fan Fairs, one of the first commercial comics-fan conventions. When he moved to San Diego, California, in 1970,[17] he organized a one-day convention (Golden State Comic-Minicon) on March 21, 1970, "as a kind of 'dry run' for the larger convention he hoped to stage." Dorf went on to be associated with the convention as president or manager, variously, for years until becoming estranged from the organization.[18] Alf co-chaired the first convention with Krueger and became chairman in 1971.[6] Convention crowd outside of Golden Hall in 1982 Following the initial gathering, Dorf's first three-day San Diego comics convention, the Golden State Comic-Con,[17] drew 300 people[19] and the venue was held in the basement of the U.S. Grant Hotel,[17] having been secured by Graf,[20] from August 1–3, 1970.[21] Other locations in the convention's early years included the El Cortez Hotel, the University of California, San Diego, and Golden Hall, before being moved to the San Diego Convention Center in 1991.[22] Richard Alf, chairman in 1971, has noted an early factor in the Con's growth was an effort "to expand the Comic-Con [organizing] committee base by networking with other fandoms such as the Society for Creative Anachronism and the Mythopoeic Society, among others. (We found a lot of talent and strength through diversity)."[23] In a Rolling Stone article about the origins of Comic-Con, it noted the work of Krueger, who handled early business matters, and worked to get the event to be organized by a non-profit organization.[24] By the late 1970s, the show had grown to such an extent that Bob Schreck recalled visiting with his then-boss Gary Berman of Creation Conventions and reflecting, "While [Berman] kept repeating (attempting to convince himself) 'This show's not any bigger than ours!' I was quietly walking the floor stunned and in awe of just how much bigger it really was. I was blown away."[25] From 1984 to c. 1994, a trade fair called the "San Diego Comic Book Expo" was held in association with the San Diego Comic-Con; David Scroggy was the organizer.[26] According to Forbes, the convention is the "largest convention of its kind in the world;"[27] Publishers Weekly wrote "Comic-Con International: San Diego is the largest show in North America;"[28] it is also the largest convention held in San Diego.[29] The convention has an estimated annual regional economic impact of more than $140 million.[30] Yet, in 2009, the estimated economic impact was criticized for allegedly negatively impacting seasonal businesses outside of Comic-Con, low individual spending estimates of attendees, that a large number of attendees live in San Diego, and that the impact of the convention was more cultural than financial.[31] The estimated economic impact of that year's convention was $180 million.[32] In 2014, the estimated impact of that year's convention was $177.8 million.[33] In 2016, the estimated impact of that year's convention was down to $150 million.[34] By 2018, San Diego Comic-Con saw increasing competition from other comic conventions in places such as New York City, and Washington, D.C., which caused it to compete for attendees and companies time and budget; yet San Diego Comic-Con was described by Publishers Weekly as "a must-do".[35] The convention is organized by a panel of 13 board members, 16 to 20 full-time and part-time workers, and 80 volunteers who assist via committees. Comic-Con International is a non-profit organization, and proceeds of the event go to funding it, as well as SAM: Storytelling Across Media and WonderCon.[22] The convention logo was designed by Richard Bruning and Josh Beatman in 1995. In 2015, working with Lionsgate, a video channel was created to host Comic-Con related content.[36] In 2015, through a limited liability company, Comic-Con International purchased three buildings in Barrio Logan.[37] In 2018 Comic-Con International purchased a 29,000-square-foot (2,700 m2) office in San Diego's Little Italy neighborhood.[38] In 2017, the organization acquired a lease to the Federal Building in Balboa Park, originally built for the California Pacific International Exposition and previously occupied by the San Diego Hall of Champions, with the intention of opening a Comic-Con Museum.[39] By October 2017, the organization began to hire staff for the museum.[40] Nearly a year after acquiring the lease, the museum was not yet open.[41] During the 2018 Comic-Con International, one reason stated for why the museum had not yet opened was the need for additional funds.[42] Organizers are hoping to raise $25 million with a target opening date of late 2020 or 2022.[38] On April 17, 2020, the 53rd convention was cancelled due to in California. It was originally scheduled to occur from July 23 to 26, 2020, to coincide with the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Japan, which was postponed to 2021 due to th.[13] An "SDCC at Home" digital streaming event was held during the same time period as a replacement for the 2020 event.[43] Although plans were made for the convention to possibly return in 2021 (with 2020 badge holders given the option to receive a full refund or to roll over their badge to 2021),[13] it was announced on March 1, 2021, that the convention would be cancelled once again. Despite availability of, the organizers assessed that it was still premature and unsafe to hold an in-person event at SDCC's full scale on the originally-scheduled dates, and that Comic-Con International was exploring the possibility of holding a smaller in-person spin-off event later in the year. SDCC at Home will again be held, but in a downsized form due to reduced financial resources.[14] Events The San Diego Convention Center during Comic-Con in 2013 Along with panels, seminars, and workshops with comic book professionals, there are previews of upcoming feature films and portfolio review sessions with top comic book and video game companies. The evenings include events such as awards ceremonies, the annual Masquerade costume contest, and the Comic-Con International Independent Film Festival, which showcases shorts and feature-length movies that do not have distribution or distribution deals. Traditional events include an eclectic film program, screening rooms devoted to Japanese animation, gaming, programs such as cartoonist Scott Shaw!'s "Oddball Comics" slide show, Quick Draw! hosted by Mark Evanier with Shaw!, Sergio Aragones and a guest cartoonist responding to improvisational prompts and games (a la Whose Line Is It Anyway?) and animation expert Jerry Beck's program featuring TV's "worst cartoons ever", as well as over 350 hours of other programming on all aspects of comic books and pop culture. Like most comic book conventions, Comic-Con features a large floorspace for exhibitors. These include media companies such as movie studios and TV networks, as well as comic-book dealers and collectibles merchants. And like most comics conventions, Comic-Con includes an autograph area, as well as the Artists' Alley where comics artists can sign autographs and sell or do free sketches. Despite the name, artists' alleys can include writers and even models. Academics and comic industry professionals annually hold the Comics Arts Conference at Comic-Con, presenting scholarly studies on comics as a medium. In recent years, the number of television shows that are promoted far outnumber films. During the 2011 convention, at least 80 TV shows were represented, compared to about 35 films.[44] The shows not only promote in the exhibit halls, but also use screenings and panels of various actors, writers, producers, and others from their shows. Premium cable channels HBO and Showtime have used the con to promote programs like Game of Thrones (HBO), Dexter (Showtime), Shameless (Showtime) and True Blood (HBO).[44][45][46] In 2013, there were 1075 total panels held during the convention, the plurality of which were anime-focused (29%), followed by comic-focused panels (26%). 1036 vendors participated in the convention in 2013.[47] There are at least 17 separate rooms in the convention center used for panels and screenings, ranging in size from 280 seats to 6,100 seats. The two biggest are Ballroom 20, which seats approximately 4,900;[48] and Hall H, which seats just over 6,100.[49] The neighboring Hilton Bayfront is also used, with its main ballroom (Indigo) seating up to 2,600.[50][51] The other neighboring hotel, the Marriott Marquis & Marina, also hosts a lot of Comic-Con activity. Among other things, the hotel serves as the anime headquarters and is where the nighttime films are shown.[50] Exclusive collectibles In the 21st century, the convention has drawn toy and collectibles designers who sell "Comic-Con Exclusive" products. Such companies have included Lego, Hasbro, Funko, Gentle Giant LTD, Mattel, NECA, ThinkGeek, Sideshow Collectibles, Entertainment Earth, Bif Bang Pow!, Mezco, Toynami, and Kotobukiya.[52][53] Most such exclusives are licensed properties of film, comic book and animation characters. In the media of comic con international Comic-Con International has served as the setting for Mark Hamill's Comic Book: The Movie, and for an episode of the HBO television series Entourage, the latter of which, while set at the event, was not filmed there. Comic-Con also served as an excuse for the fictional characters Seth Cohen and Ryan Atwood's trip to Tijuana, Mexico in episode 7 ("The Escape") of the first season of TV series The O.C. The convention also featured prominently as a setting for the Numb3rs episode "Graphic". In season 4 of Beauty and the Geek, an episode was featured where the contestants traveled to Comic-Con 07 and were given a challenge to create their own superheroes. In an episode of Punk'd, Hilary Swank gets Punk'd after an "attack from talking robot". In season 5, episode six, of the Showtime show Weeds, attendees from Comic-Con 2009 are seen in Silas and Doug's medicinal marijuana club. Comic-Con featured at some length in the 2011 movie Paul which stars Simon Pegg and Nick Frost.[54] Issue No. 72 of The Invincible Iron Man (January 1975) was set at the July–August 1974 Comic-Con at the El Cortez Hotel and featured cameos by a few of the special guests. The fifth Kelly Green graphic novel The Comic-Con Heist (1987) written by Leonard Starr and drawn by Stan Drake was set at the 1983 con and depicted such regulars as Will Eisner, Milton Caniff, Burne Hogarth and Jack Kirby along with Shel Dorf; it initially only appeared in French until Classic Comics Press issued a collection of all five volumes of the series in English in 2016.[55] Other comics set at the convention include Archie No. 538 (September 2003), Archie Giant Series No. 601 (October 1989) and No. 624 (October 1991), G.I. Joe No. 180 (July 2012), Dazzler No. 30 (January 1984), Lobo Convention Special ([September] 1993) and Fanboys Vs Zombies.[56] 1992-1995 the Con partnered with Dark Horse Comics for an annual San Diego Comic Con Comics giveaway to attendees spotlighting characters published by Dark Horse.[57] Comic-Con is mentioned in the long-running CBS geek-targeted sitcom The Big Bang Theory in several episodes, and in NBC's Chuck in the episode "Chuck Versus the Sandworm", as an event the characters enjoy attending.[58][59] On the Futurama episode "Lrrreconcilable Ndndifferences", the main characters attend the 3010 convention (with it being referred to as "Comic-Con Intergalactic" and the iconic eye logo now sporting multiple eyes), where Fry looks for approval for his own comic while Bender attends a panel from Matt Groening (creator of Futurama as well as The Simpsons) on his new show "Futurella" (a twist on the title of the show and a parody of its cancellation by Fox). In "It's My Party and I'll Bang If I Want To", an episode of the 2011 season of The Real World: San Diego, the cast attends Comic-Con made up as zombies in order to pass out promotional flyers for the House of Blues, where they worked as part of their season work assignment.[60][61] Filmmaker Morgan Spurlock released a 2011 documentary feature film set at the convention, Comic-Con Episode IV: A Fan's Hope. Writer Robert Salkowitz also used the 2011 Comic-Con as a backdrop for his book Comic-Con and the Business of Pop Culture, an analysis of the comics industry's 21st-century dilemmas and what the future may hold.[62] Since 2015, Conan O'Brien has recorded a week of live shows from Comic-Con at the nearby Spreckels Theatre.[63] In 2015, the Food Network series Cake Masters had an episode where Duff Goldman presented a cake at Comic-Con to the cast of Fantastic Four.[64] Comic-Con Begins Podcast In 2020, SiriusXM in association with Stitcher started production on COMIC-CON BEGINS: Origin Stories of the San Diego Comic-Con and the Rise of Modern Fandom . The podcast is a six-part mini-series chronicling the birth and evolution of the San Diego Comic-Con, and is told by over 50 of the original contributors. Among the founders there are also interviews with celebrities like Felicia Day, Ho Che Anderson, Jackie Estrada, Scott Aukerman, Trina Robbins, Kevin Smith, Neil Gaiman, and Bruce Campbell. Hosted by Brinke Stevens of Slumber Party Massacre.[65] The podcast was expanded into the book See You at San Diego: An Oral History of Comic-Con, Fandom, and the Triumph of Geek Culture by creator Mathew Klickstein and published by Fantagraphics on September 6, 2022.[66] The book includes forewords by cartoonists Stan Sakai and Jeff Smith, and an afterword by Wu-Tang Clan's RZA. The audiobook version was released on the same day by Blackstone Audio....Comic-Con Magazine Comic-Con Magazine, formerly known as Update, is the official magazine of San Diego Comic-Con International, WonderCon, and SAM: Storytelling Across Media, published free by San Diego Comic-Con International in the United States. The seed of the Comic-Con Magazine was a short one-shot issue of The Spirit, based on Comic-Con and sold exclusively in 1976 at the San Diego Comic-Con International. The Comic-Con Magazine debuted as Update in July 2005 and mainly focused on the winners of the Eisner Awards.[126] The last Update issue appeared in July 2008;[127] then it went on hiatus. When it came back, it was as Comic-Con Magazine, which not only covered San Diego Comic-Con International, but also WonderCon and the Alternative Press Expo, more commonly known as APE (which the con owned through 2014). The new Comic-Con Magazine features interviews with Comic-Con attendees and complete coverage of the Comic-Con events.[128][129] The fourth issue of Comic-Con Magazine was a hybrid with Comic-Con's Souvenir Book with cover art by Alex Ross, in full color and exclusive to Comic-Con attendees.[128][130] Exhibitors [icon] This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (December 2017) A large number of exhibitors from art, comics, games, film, TV, and publishing are at Comic-Con. There are three types of exhibitors at San Diego Comic Con. Inside the convention center, which requires a badge to visit during the convention, includes artists alley and the main exhibitor hall. Artist Alley is for up and coming artists who are new to the pop culture world by selling their new books, comics, toys, and or services. They range from local companies and businesses in Southern California to international ones, but are mainly private endeavors. Artist Alley is usually located in Hall G of the convention center. Spaces for these exhibitors are highly sought after and are on a lottery and need-based system.[131] The main exhibit hall, which includes larger well-recognized companies, takes up halls F through A. These companies sell or promote new and upcoming movies, television shows, and video games as well as featuring toys and exclusives with many selling for hundreds or even thousands on the secondary markets outside the convention. Some notable recurring companies include Lego, Hasbro, Funko, Hallmark Cards, Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, The Walt Disney Company, and Blizzard Entertainment. Off site The other type of exhibitors include offsite exhibitors, booths and events which are located outside the convention center. These locations are usually within walking distance of the convention center but have been moving into nearby parks in recent years. Some notable examples include Gaslamp Quarter, San Diego, Petco Park, and Children's Park (San Diego).[132] In recent years, these offsite events have no connection to SDCC.[133] In the past, most sites have not required a Comic-Con badge.[134] In 2017, one example was a virtual reality and immersive set based on the movie Blade Runner 2049.[135] In 2018, these examples included a Taco Bell Demolition Man themed pop-up restaurant in the Gaslamp;[136] and a Shake Shack Bob's Burgers themed pop-up restaurant in Mission Valley.[137] However, there are some official offsite events that require a badge.[138] In 2018, it was estimated that nearly 200,000 people will be in Downtown San Diego due to Comic-Con related exhibits and events." (wikipedia.org) "Science fiction (sometimes shortened to sf or sci-fi) is a genre of speculative fiction, which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel universes, and extraterrestrial life. Science fiction can trace its roots to ancient mythology.[1] It is related to fantasy, horror, and superhero fiction and contains many subgenres. Its exact definition has long been disputed among authors, critics, scholars, and readers. Science fiction, in literature, film, television, and other media, has become popular and influential over much of the world. It has been called the "literature of ideas," and often explores the potential consequences of scientific, social, and technological innovations.[2][3] It sometimes serves as an outlet to facilitate future scientific and technological innovations.[4] Besides providing entertainment, it can also criticize present-day society and explore alternatives. It is also often said to inspire a "sense of wonder."[5] Definitions Main article: Definitions of science fiction American science fiction author and editor Lester del Rey wrote, "Even the devoted aficionado or fan—has a hard time trying to explain what science fiction is," and the lack of a "full satisfactory definition" is because "there are no easily delineated limits to science fiction."[6] According to Isaac Asimov, "Science fiction can be defined as that branch of literature which deals with the reaction of human beings to changes in science and technology."[7] Robert A. Heinlein wrote that "A handy short definition of almost all science fiction might read: realistic speculation about possible future events, based solidly on adequate knowledge of the real world, past and present, and on a thorough understanding of the nature and significance of the scientific method."[8] Part of the reason that it is so difficult to pin down an agreed definition of science fiction is because there is a tendency among science fiction enthusiasts to act as their own arbiter in deciding what exactly constitutes science fiction.[9] Damon Knight summed up the difficulty, saying "science fiction is what we point to when we say it."[10] David Seed says it may be more useful to talk about science fiction as the intersection of other, more concrete, genres and subgenres.[11] Alternative terms Further information: Skiffy Forrest J Ackerman has been credited with first using the term "sci-fi" (analogous to the then-trendy "hi-fi") in about 1954;[12] the first known use in print was a description of Donovan's Brain by movie critic Jesse Zunser in January 1954.[13] As science fiction entered popular culture, writers and fans active in the field came to associate the term with low-budget, low-tech "B-movies" and with low-quality pulp science fiction.[14][15][16] By the 1970s, critics within the field, such as Damon Knight and Terry Carr, were using "sci fi" to distinguish hack-work from serious science fiction.[17] Peter Nicholls writes that "SF" (or "sf") is "the preferred abbreviation within the community of sf writers and readers."[18] Robert Heinlein found even "science fiction" insufficient for certain types of works in this genre, and suggested the term speculative fiction to be used instead for those that are more "serious" or "thoughtful."[19] History Main articles: History of science fiction and Timeline of science fiction H. G. Wells Some scholars assert that science fiction had its beginnings in ancient times, when the line between myth and fact was blurred.[20] Written in the 2nd century CE by the satirist Lucian, A True Story contains many themes and tropes characteristic of modern science fiction, including travel to other worlds, extraterrestrial lifeforms, interplanetary warfare, and artificial life. Some consider it the first science-fiction novel.[21] Some of the stories from The Arabian Nights,[22][23] along with the 10th-century The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter[23] and Ibn al-Nafis's 13th-century Theologus Autodidactus,[24] also contain elements of science fiction. Written during the Scientific Revolution and the Age of Enlightenment, Johannes Kepler's Somnium (1634), Francis Bacon's New Atlantis (1627),[25] Athanasius Kircher's Itinerarium extaticum (1656),[26] Cyrano de Bergerac's Comical History of the States and Empires of the Moon (1657) and The States and Empires of the Sun (1662), Margaret Cavendish's "The Blazing World" (1666),[27][28][29][30] Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels (1726), Ludvig Holberg's Nicolai Klimii Iter Subterraneum (1741) and Voltaire's Micromégas (1752) are sometimes regarded as some of the first true science-fantasy works.[31] Isaac Asimov and Carl Sagan considered Somnium the first science-fiction story; it depicts a journey to the Moon and how the Earth's motion is seen from there.[32][33] Following the 17th-century development of the novel as a literary form, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (1818) and The Last Man (1826) helped define the form of the science-fiction novel. Brian Aldiss has argued that Frankenstein was the first work of science fiction.[34][35] Edgar Allan Poe wrote several stories considered to be science fiction, including "The Unparalleled Adventure of One Hans Pfaall" (1835), which featured a trip to the Moon.[36][37] Jules Verne was noted for his attention to detail and scientific accuracy, especially in Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea (1870).[38][39][40][41] In 1887, the novel El anacronópete by Spanish author Enrique Gaspar y Rimbau introduced the first time machine.[42][43] An early French/Belgian science fiction writer was J.-H. Rosny aîné (1856–1940). Rosny's masterpiece is Les Navigateurs de l'Infini (The Navigators of Infinity) (1925) in which the word astronaut, "astronautique", was used for the first time.[44][45] Many critics consider H. G. Wells one of science fiction's most important authors,[38][46] or even "the Shakespeare of science fiction."[47] His notable science-fiction works include The Time Machine (1895), The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), The Invisible Man (1897), and The War of the Worlds (1898). His science fiction imagined alien invasion, biological engineering, invisibility, and time travel. In his non-fiction futurologist works he predicted the advent of airplanes, military tanks, nuclear weapons, satellite television, space travel, and something resembling the World Wide Web.[48] Edgar Rice Burroughs' A Princess of Mars, published in 1912, was the first of his three-decade-long planetary romance series of Barsoom novels, which were set on Mars and featured John Carter as the hero.[49] These novels were predecessors to YA novels, and drew inspiration from European science fiction and American Western novels.[50] In 1924, We by Russian writer Yevgeny Zamyatin, one of the first dystopian novels, was published.[51] It describes a world of harmony and conformity within a united totalitarian state. It influenced the emergence of dystopia as a literary genre.[52] In 1926, Hugo Gernsback published the first American science-fiction magazine, Amazing Stories. In its first issue he wrote: By 'scientifiction' I mean the Jules Verne, H. G. Wells and Edgar Allan Poe type of story—a charming romance intermingled with scientific fact and prophetic vision... Not only do these amazing tales make tremendously interesting reading—they are always instructive. They supply knowledge... in a very palatable form... New adventures pictured for us in the scientifiction of today are not at all impossible of realization tomorrow... Many great science stories destined to be of historical interest are still to be written... Posterity will point to them as having blazed a new trail, not only in literature and fiction, but progress as well.[53][54][55] In 1928, E. E. "Doc" Smith's first published work, The Skylark of Space, written in collaboration with Lee Hawkins Garby, appeared in Amazing Stories. It is often called the first great space opera.[56] The same year, Philip Francis Nowlan's original Buck Rogers story, Armageddon 2419, also appeared in Amazing Stories. This was followed by a Buck Rogers comic strip, the first serious science-fiction comic.[57] In 1937, John W. Campbell became editor of Astounding Science Fiction, an event that is sometimes considered the beginning of the Golden Age of Science Fiction, which was characterized by stories celebrating scientific achievement and progress.[58][59] In 1942, Isaac Asimov started his Foundation series, which chronicles the rise and fall of galactic empires and introduced psychohistory.[60][61] The series was later awarded a one-time Hugo Award for "Best All-Time Series."[62][63] The "Golden Age" is often said to have ended in 1946, but sometimes the late 1940s and the 1950s are included.[64] Theodore Sturgeon's More Than Human (1953) explored possible future human evolution.[65][66][67] In 1957, Andromeda: A Space-Age Tale by the Russian writer and paleontologist Ivan Yefremov presented a view of a future interstellar communist civilization and is considered one of the most important Soviet science fiction novels.[68][69] In 1959, Robert A. Heinlein's Starship Troopers marked a departure from his earlier juvenile stories and novels.[70] It is one of the first and most influential examples of military science fiction,[71][72] and introduced the concept of powered armor exoskeletons.[73][74][75] The German space opera series Perry Rhodan, written by various authors, started in 1961 with an account of the first Moon landing[76] and has since expanded in space to multiple universes, and in time by billions of years.[77] It has become the most popular science fiction book series of all time.[78] In the 1960s and 1970s, New Wave science fiction was known for its embrace of a high degree of experimentation, both in form and in content, and a highbrow and self-consciously "literary" or "artistic" sensibility.[79][80] In 1961, Solaris by Stanisław Lem was published in Poland.[81] The novel dealt with the theme of human limitations as its characters attempted to study a seemingly intelligent ocean on a newly discovered planet.[82][83] 1965's Dune by Frank Herbert featured a much more complex and detailed imagined future society than had previous science fiction.[84] In 1967 Anne McCaffrey began her Dragonriders of Pern science fantasy series.[85] Two of the novellas included in the first novel, Dragonflight, made McCaffrey the first woman to win a Hugo or Nebula Award.[86] In 1968, Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, was published. It is the literary source of the Blade Runner movie franchise.[87][88] 1969's The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin was set on a planet in which the inhabitants have no fixed gender. It is one of the most influential examples of social science fiction, feminist science fiction, and anthropological science fiction.[89][90][91] In 1979, Science Fiction World began publication in the People's Republic of China.[92] It dominates the Chinese science fiction magazine market, at one time claiming a circulation of 300,000 copies per issue and an estimated 3–5 readers per copy (giving it a total estimated readership of at least 1 million), making it the world's most popular science fiction periodical.[93] In 1984, William Gibson's first novel, Neuromancer, helped popularize cyberpunk and the word "cyberspace," a term he originally coined in his 1982 short story Burning Chrome.[94][95][96] In 1986, Shards of Honor by Lois McMaster Bujold began her Vorkosigan Saga.[97][98] 1992's Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson predicted immense social upheaval due to the information revolution.[99] In 2007, Liu Cixin's novel, The Three-Body Problem, was published in China. It was translated into English by Ken Liu and published by Tor Books in 2014,[100] and won the 2015 Hugo Award for Best Novel,[101] making Liu the first Asian writer to win the award.[102] Emerging themes in late 20th and early 21st century science fiction include environmental issues, the implications of the Internet and the expanding information universe, questions about biotechnology, nanotechnology, and post-scarcity societies.[103][104] Recent trends and subgenres include steampunk,[105] biopunk,[106][107] and mundane science fiction.[108][109] Film Main articles: Science fiction film and Lists of science fiction films The Maschinenmensch from Metropolis The first, or at least one of the first, recorded science fiction film is 1902's A Trip to the Moon, directed by French filmmaker Georges Méliès.[110] It was profoundly influential on later filmmakers, bringing a different kind of creativity and fantasy to the cinematic medium.[111][112] In addition, Méliès's innovative editing and special effects techniques were widely imitated and became important elements of the medium.[113][114] 1927's Metropolis, directed by Fritz Lang, is the first feature-length science fiction film.[115] Though not well received in its time,[116] it is now considered a great and influential film.[117][118][119] In 1954, Godzilla, directed by Ishirō Honda, began the kaiju subgenre of science fiction film, which feature large creatures of any form, usually attacking a major city or engaging other monsters in battle.[120][121] 1968's 2001: A Space Odyssey, directed by Stanley Kubrick and based on the work of Arthur C. Clarke, rose above the mostly B-movie offerings up to that time both in scope and quality, and greatly influenced later science fiction films.[122][123][124][125] That same year, Planet of the Apes (the original), directed by Franklin J. Schaffner and based on the 1963 French novel La Planète des Singes by Pierre Boulle, was released to popular and critical acclaim, due in large part to its vivid depiction of a post-apocalyptic world in which intelligent apes dominate humans.[126] In 1977, George Lucas began the Star Wars film series with the film now identified as "Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope."[127] The series, often called a space opera,[128] went on to become a worldwide popular culture phenomenon,[129][130] and the second-highest-grossing film series of all time.[131] Since the 1980s, science fiction films, along with fantasy, horror, and superhero films, have dominated Hollywood's big-budget productions.[132][131] Science fiction films often "cross-over" with other genres, including animation (WALL-E – 2008, Big Hero 6 – 2014), gangster (Sky Racket – 1937), Western (Serenity – 2005), comedy (Spaceballs −1987, Galaxy Quest – 1999), war (Enemy Mine – 1985), action (Edge of Tomorrow – 2014, The Matrix – 1999), adventure (Jupiter Ascending – 2015, Interstellar – 2014), sports (Rollerball – 1975), mystery (Minority Report – 2002), thriller (Ex Machina – 2014), horror (Alien – 1979), film noir (Blade Runner – 1982), superhero (Marvel Cinematic Universe – 2008–), drama (Melancholia – 2011, Predestination – 2014), and romance (Her – 2013).[133] Television Main articles: Science fiction on television and List of science fiction television programs Don Hastings (left) and Al Hodge in Captain Video and His Video Rangers Science fiction and television have consistently been in a close relationship. Television or television-like technologies frequently appeared in science fiction long before television itself became widely available in the late 1940s and early 1950s.[134] The first known science fiction television program was a thirty-five-minute adapted excerpt of the play RUR, written by the Czech playwright Karel Čapek, broadcast live from the BBC's Alexandra Palace studios on 11 February 1938.[135] The first popular science fiction program on American television was the children's adventure serial Captain Video and His Video Rangers, which ran from June 1949 to April 1955.[136] The Twilight Zone (the original series), produced and narrated by Rod Serling, who also wrote or co-wrote most of the episodes, ran from 1959 to 1964. It featured fantasy, suspense, and horror as well as science fiction, with each episode being a complete story.[137][138] Critics have ranked it as one of the best TV programs of any genre.[139][140] The animated series The Jetsons, while intended as comedy and only running for one season (1962–1963), predicted many inventions now in common use: flat-screen televisions, newspapers on a computer-like screen, computer viruses, video chat, tanning beds, home treadmills, and more.[141] In 1963, the time travel-themed Doctor Who premiered on BBC Television.[142] The original series ran until 1989 and was revived in 2005.[143] It has been extremely popular worldwide and has greatly influenced later TV science fiction.[144][145][146] Other programs in the 1960s included The Outer Limits (1963–1965),[147] Lost in Space (1965–1968), and The Prisoner (1967).[148][149][150] Star Trek (the original series), created by Gene Roddenberry, premiered in 1966 on NBC Television and ran for three seasons.[151] It combined elements of space opera and Space Western.[152] Only mildly successful at first, the series gained popularity through syndication and extraordinary fan interest. It became a very popular and influential franchise with many films, television shows, novels, and other works and products.[153][154][155][156] Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987–1994) led to six additional live action Star Trek shows (Deep Space 9 (1993–1999), Voyager (1995–2001), Enterprise (2001–2005), Discovery (2017–present), Picard (2020–2023), and Strange New Worlds (2022–present), with more in some form of development.[157][158][159][160] The miniseries V premiered in 1983 on NBC.[161] It depicted an attempted takeover of Earth by reptilian aliens.[162] Red Dwarf, a comic science fiction series aired on BBC Two between 1988 and 1999, and on Dave since 2009.[163] The X-Files, which featured UFOs and conspiracy theories, was created by Chris Carter and broadcast by Fox Broadcasting Company from 1993 to 2002,[164][165] and again from 2016 to 2018.[166][167] Stargate, a film about ancient astronauts and interstellar teleportation, was released in 1994. Stargate SG-1 premiered in 1997 and ran for 10 seasons (1997–2007). Spin-off series included Stargate Infinity (2002–2003), Stargate Atlantis (2004–2009), and Stargate Universe (2009–2011).[168] Other 1990s series included Quantum Leap (1989–1993) and Babylon 5 (1994–1999).[169] SyFy, launched in 1992 as The Sci-Fi Channel,[170] specializes in science fiction, supernatural horror, and fantasy.[171][172] The space-Western series Firefly premiered in 2002 on Fox. It is set in the year 2517, after the arrival of humans in a new star system, and follows the adventures of the renegade crew of Serenity, a "Firefly-class" spaceship.[173] Orphan Black began its five-season run in 2013, about a woman who assumes the identity of one of her several genetically identical human clones. In late 2015 SyFy premiered The Expanse to great critical acclaim, an American TV series about humanity's colonization of the Solar System. Its later seasons would then be aired through Amazon Prime Video. Social influence Science fiction's rapid rise in popularity during the first half of the 20th century was closely tied to the popular respect paid to science at that time, as well as the rapid pace of technological innovation and new inventions.[174] Science fiction has often predicted scientific and technological progress.[175][176] Some works predict that new inventions and progress will tend to improve life and society, for instance the stories of Arthur C. Clarke and Star Trek.[177] Others, such as H.G. Wells's The Time Machine and Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, warn about possible negative consequences.[178][179] In 2001 the National Science Foundation conducted a survey on "Public Attitudes and Public Understanding: Science Fiction and Pseudoscience."[180] It found that people who read or prefer science fiction may think about or relate to science differently than other people. They also tend to support the space program and the idea of contacting extraterrestrial civilizations.[180][181] Carl Sagan wrote: "Many scientists deeply involved in the exploration of the solar system (myself among them) were first turned in that direction by science fiction."[182] Science fiction tries to blend fiction and reality seamlessly so that the viewer can be immersed in the imaginative world. This includes characters, settings, and tools and perhaps most critically, the scientific plausibility and accuracy of technology and technological concepts. Sometimes, science fiction forecasts real life innovations and discoveries. Science fiction has predicted several existing inventions, such as the atomic bomb,[183] robots,[184] and borazon.[185] In the 2020 series Away astronauts use a real-life Mars rover called InSight to listen intently for a landing on Mars. Two years later in 2022 scientists used InSight to listen for the landing of a real spacecraft.[186] In the Jurassic Park franchise, dinosaurs are created from ancient DNA and 18 years later, real life scientists found dinosaur DNA in ancient fossils. Brian Aldiss described science fiction as "cultural wallpaper."[187] Evidence for this widespread influence can be found in trends for writers to employ science fiction as a tool for advocacy and generating cultural insights, as well as for educators when teaching across a range of academic disciplines not limited to the natural sciences.[188] Scholar and science fiction critic George Edgar Slusser said that science fiction "is the one real international literary form we have today, and as such has branched out to visual media, interactive media and on to whatever new media the world will invent in the 21st century. Crossover issues between the sciences and the humanities are crucial for the century to come."[189] As protest literature Further information: Political ideas in science fiction and Social novel "Happy 1984" in Spanish or Portuguese, referencing George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, on a standing piece of the Berlin Wall (sometime after 1998) Science fiction has sometimes been used as a means of social protest. George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949) is an important work of dystopian science fiction.[190][191] It is often invoked in protests against governments and leaders who are seen as totalitarian.[192][193] James Cameron's 2009 film Avatar was intended as a protest against imperialism, and specifically the European colonization of the Americas.[194] Robots, artificial humans, human clones, intelligent computers, and their possible conflicts with human society have all been major themes of science fiction since, at least, the publication of Shelly's Frankenstein. Some critics have seen this as reflecting authors' concerns over the social alienation seen in modern society.[195] Feminist science fiction poses questions about social issues such as how society constructs gender roles, the role reproduction plays in defining gender, and the inequitable political or personal power of one gender over others. Some works have illustrated these themes using utopias to explore a society in which gender differences or gender power imbalances do not exist, or dystopias to explore worlds in which gender inequalities are intensified, thus asserting a need for feminist work to continue.[196][197] Climate fiction, or "cli-fi," deals with issues concerning climate change and global warming.[198][199] University courses on literature and environmental issues may include climate change fiction in their syllabi,[200] and it is often discussed by other media outside of science fiction fandom.[201] Libertarian science fiction focuses on the politics and social order implied by right libertarian philosophies with an emphasis on individualism and private property, and in some cases anti-statism.[202] Science fiction comedy often satirizes and criticizes present-day society, and sometimes makes fun of the conventions and clichés of more serious science fiction.[203][204] The potential for Science Fiction as a genre is not just limited to being a literary sandbox for exploring otherworldly narratives but can act as a vehicle to analyze and recognize a society's past, present, and potential future social relationships with the Other. More specifically, Science Fiction offers a medium and representation of Alterity and differences in social identity.[205] Sense of wonder Main article: Sense of wonder Further information: Wonder (emotion) Illustration by Aubrey Beardsley for Lucian's A True Story Science fiction is often said to inspire a "sense of wonder." Science fiction editor and critic David Hartwell wrote: "Science fiction's appeal lies in combination of the rational, the believable, with the miraculous. It is an appeal to the sense of wonder."[206] Carl Sagan said: "One of the great benefits of science fiction is that it can convey bits and pieces, hints, and phrases, of knowledge unknown or inaccessible to the reader . . . works you ponder over as the water is running out of the bathtub or as you walk through the woods in an early winter snowfall."[182] In 1967, Isaac Asimov commented on the changes then occurring in the science fiction community: "And because today's real life so resembles day-before-yesterday's fantasy, the old-time fans are restless. Deep within, whether they admit it or not, is a feeling of disappointment and even outrage that the outer world has invaded their private domain. They feel the loss of a 'sense of wonder' because what was once truly confined to 'wonder' has now become prosaic and mundane."[207] Science fiction studies Main article: Science fiction studies The study of science fiction, or science fiction studies, is the critical assessment, interpretation, and discussion of science fiction literature, film, TV shows, new media, fandom, and fan fiction.[208] Science fiction scholars study science fiction to better understand it and its relationship to science, technology, politics, other genres, and culture-at-large.[209] Science fiction studies began around the turn of the 20th century, but it was not until later that science fiction studies solidified as a discipline with the publication of the academic journals Extrapolation (1959), Foundation: The International Review of Science Fiction (1972), and Science Fiction Studies (1973),[210][211] and the establishment of the oldest organizations devoted to the study of science fiction in 1970, the Science Fiction Research Association and the Science Fiction Foundation.[212][213] The field has grown considerably since the 1970s with the establishment of more journals, organizations, and conferences, as well as science fiction degree-granting programs such as those offered by the University of Liverpool.[214] Classification Further information: Hard science fiction and Soft science fiction Science fiction has historically been sub-divided between hard science fiction and soft science fiction, with the division centering on the feasibility of the science central to the story.[215] However, this distinction has come under increasing scrutiny in the 21st century. Some authors, such as Tade Thompson and Jeff VanderMeer, have pointed out that stories that focus explicitly on physics, astronomy, mathematics, and engineering tend to be considered "hard" science fiction, while stories that focus on botany, mycology, zoology, and the social sciences tend to be categorized as "soft," regardless of the relative rigor of the science.[216] Max Gladstone defined "hard" science fiction as stories "where the math works," but pointed out that this ends up with stories that often seem "weirdly dated," as scientific paradigms shift over time.[217] Michael Swanwick dismissed the traditional definition of "hard" SF altogether, instead saying that it was defined by characters striving to solve problems "in the right way–with determination, a touch of stoicism, and the consciousness that the universe is not on his or her side."[216] Ursula K. Le Guin also criticized the more traditional view on the difference between "hard" and "soft" SF: "The 'hard' science fiction writers dismiss everything except, well, physics, astronomy, and maybe chemistry. Biology, sociology, anthropology—that's not science to them, that's soft stuff. They're not that interested in what human beings do, really. But I am. I draw on the social sciences a great deal."[218] As serious literature Further information: Literature and Literary fiction Engraving showing a naked man awaking on the floor and another man fleeing in horror. A skull and a book are next to the naked man and a window, with the moon shining through it, is in the background Illustration by Theodor von Holst for 1831 edition of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein[219] Respected authors have written science fiction. Mary Shelley wrote a number of science fiction novels including Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus (1818), and is considered a major writer of the Romantic Age.[220] Aldous Huxley's Brave New World (1932) is often listed as one of England's most important novels, both for its criticism of modern culture and its prediction of future trends including reproductive technology and social engineering.[221][222][223][224] Kurt Vonnegut was a highly respected American author whose works contain science fiction premises or themes.[225][226][227] Other science fiction authors whose works are widely considered to be "serious" literature include Ray Bradbury (including, especially, Fahrenheit 451 (1953) and The Martian Chronicles (1951)),[228] Arthur C. Clarke (especially for Childhood's End),[229][230] and Paul Myron Anthony Linebarger, writing under the name Cordwainer Smith.[231] In his book "The Western Canon", literary critic Harold Bloom includes Brave New World, Solaris, Cat's Cradle (1963) by Vonnegut, and The Left Hand of Darkness as culturally and aesthetically significant works of western literature. David Barnett has pointed out that there are books such as The Road (2006) by Cormac McCarthy, Cloud Atlas (2004) by David Mitchell, The Gone-Away World (2008) by Nick Harkaway, The Stone Gods (2007) by Jeanette Winterson, and Oryx and Crake (2003) by Margaret Atwood, which use recognizable science fiction tropes, but whose authors and publishers do not market them as science fiction.[232] Doris Lessing, who was later awarded the Nobel Prize in literature, wrote a series of five SF novels, Canopus in Argos: Archives (1979–1983), which depict the efforts of more advanced species and civilizations to influence those less advanced, including humans on Earth.[233][234][235][236] In her much reprinted 1976 essay "Science Fiction and Mrs Brown," Ursula K. Le Guin was asked: "Can a science fiction writer write a novel?" She answered: "I believe that all novels ... deal with character, and that it is to express character–not to preach doctrines [or] sing songs... that the form of the novel, so clumsy, verbose, and undramatic, so rich, elastic, and alive, has been evolved. ... The great novelists have brought us to see whatever they wish us to see through some character. Otherwise, they would not be novelists, but poets, historians, or pamphleteers."[237] Orson Scott Card, best known for his 1985 science fiction novel Ender's Game, has postulated that in science fiction the message and intellectual significance of the work are contained within the story itself and, therefore, does not need stylistic gimmicks or literary games.[238][239] Jonathan Lethem, in a 1998 essay in the Village Voice entitled "Close Encounters: The Squandered Promise of Science Fiction," suggested that the point in 1973 when Thomas Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow was nominated for the Nebula Award and was passed over in favor of Clarke's Rendezvous with Rama, stands as "a hidden tombstone marking the death of the hope that SF was about to merge with the mainstream."[240] In the same year science fiction author and physicist Gregory Benford wrote: "SF is perhaps the defining genre of the twentieth century, although its conquering armies are still camped outside the Rome of the literary citadels"....onventions Main article: Science fiction convention Writer Pamela Dean reading at the Minneapolis convention known as Minicon in 2006 Conventions (in fandom, often shortened as "cons," such as "comic-con") are held in cities around the world, catering to a local, regional, national, or international membership.[254][50][255] General-interest conventions cover all aspects of science fiction, while others focus on a particular interest like media fandom, filking, and so on.[256][257] Most science fiction conventions are organized by volunteers in non-profit groups, though most media-oriented events are organized by commercial promoters.[258] Fandom and fanzines Main articles: Science fiction fandom and Science-fiction fanzine Science fiction fandom emerged from the letters column in Amazing Stories magazine. Soon fans began writing letters to each other, and then grouping their comments together in informal publications that became known as fanzines.[259] The earliest organized online fandom was the SF Lovers Community, originally a mailing list in the late 1970s with a text archive file that was updated regularly.[261] In the 1980s, Usenet groups greatly expanded the circle of fans online.[262] In the 1990s, the development of the World-Wide Web exploded the community of online fandom by orders of magnitude, with thousands and then millions of websites devoted to science fiction and related genres for all media.[263] The first science fiction fanzine, The Comet, was published in 1930 by the Science Correspondence Club in Chicago, Illinois.[264][265] One of the best known fanzines today is Ansible, edited by David Langford, winner of numerous Hugo awards.[266][267] Other notable fanzines to win one or more Hugo awards include File 770, Mimosa, and Plokta.[268] Artists working for fanzines have frequently risen to prominence in the field, including Brad W. Foster, Teddy Harvia, and Joe Mayhew; the Hugos include a category for Best Fan Artists.[268] Elements Plaque at Riverside, Iowa, to honor the "future birth" of Star Trek's James T. Kirk Science fiction elements can include, among others: Temporal settings in the future, or in alternative histories.[269] Space travel, settings in outer space, on other worlds, in subterranean earth, or in parallel universes.[270] Aspects of biology in fiction such as aliens, mutants, and enhanced humans.[271][272] Predicted or speculative technology such as brain-computer interface, bio-engineering, superintelligent computers, robots, and ray guns and other advanced weapons.[271][273] Undiscovered scientific possibilities such as teleportation, time travel, and faster-than-light travel or communication.[274] New and different political and social systems and situations, including Utopian, dystopian, post-apocalyptic, or post-scarcity.[275] Future history and evolution of humans on Earth or on other planets.[276] Paranormal abilities such as mind control, telepathy, and telekinesis." (wikipedia.org) "The Anaheim Convention Center is a major convention center in Anaheim, California and is the largest exhibition facility on the West Coast of the United States. It is located across from the Disneyland Resort on Katella Avenue. The original components, designed by Adrian Wilson & Associates and built by Del E. Webb Corporation,[2] opened in July 1967—including a basketball arena followed shortly by the convention hall. It holds many events, like Star Wars Celebration, VidCon, BlizzCon, Anime Expo, D23 Expo, WonderCon, NAMM Show, competitions, and more. In addition to hosting various types of conventions, the Anaheim Convention Center was used to host the wrestling during the 1984 Summer Olympics.[3] The center has subsequently undergone six major expansions (1974, 1982, 1990, 1993, 1999–2000, 2016–2017). It is the largest exhibit facility on the West Coast.[4] Hostings The Arena at the Anaheim Convention Center in 2007. 2004 Anime Expo Originally, the arena was home to the Anaheim Amigos of the American Basketball Association during the first ABA season, 1967–68. The franchise relocated to the Los Angeles Sports Arena and became the Los Angeles Stars immediately thereafter; the team eventually moved to Salt Lake City and became the Utah Stars, capturing the 1970–71 ABA Championship. The Stars' subsequent fan support in Utah set the foundation for the NBA's Utah Jazz.[5][6] The San Diego Friars of WTT played some of their home matches in the arena between 1975 and 1977.[7] In 1978, the Anaheim Oranges of WTT used the arena as their primary home venue. The arena was also home to the California Surf of the NASL for one indoor season (1979–80).[8] According to frequent news reports, the largest exposition held at the Convention Center in recent years has been the Winter NAMM Show. This music-equipment convention (trade only, not open to the general public) had over 2,000 exhibitors and a record-breaking 115,888 attendees during the 2020 show.[9] The NAMM Show has been running at the Anaheim Center since 1977, except for a three-year break in 1998–2000 while the Convention Center underwent major renovations, and in 2021 due to the. In 2008, news reports indicated that NAMM's long-term lease with the Anaheim Convention Center authority would end in 2010, and NAMM was applying pressure to the City of Anaheim to further expand and improve the convention center.[10] The NAMM Show did ultimately occur in the convention center in 2011 and the subsequent years. The Anime Expo was hosted at the Anaheim Convention Center in 1996 and again from 2003 through 2006[11] and was one of the convention center's biggest public events. Blizzard Entertainment holds BlizzCon at the venue. In 2005, BlizzCon used the northern two conference halls, (and the arena for a concert one evening). In 2007 and 2008, it used three conference halls. In 2009, it used four conference halls. While tickets to the 2007 event sold out in 3 days, tickets to the October 2008 event sold out "within minutes,"[12] and tickets to the August 2009 event sold out in "56 seconds". Tickets to the 2010 Blizzcon reportedly sold out within 30 seconds. Another large convention held at the center is the Medical Design and Manufacturing Show, held shortly after Winter NAMM.[13] The venue served as the site for wrestling at the 1984 Summer Olympics.[3] The venue hosted the Big West Conference's men's and women's college basketball tournaments from 2001 to 2010 and the 76 Classic college basketball tournament from 2007 to 2012. The Wooden Legacy college basketball tournament has been hosted at the convention center since 2021 (the 2020 edition of the tournament was scheduled to be hosted at the venue prior to being cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic). It was briefly home to the Anaheim Arsenal basketball team in the NBA Development League from 2006 to 2009 before it relocated to Springfield, Massachusetts, for the 2009–10 season. During the 1992 Los Angeles riots, the Los Angeles Clippers were forced to move Game 4 of their NBA playoff series versus the Utah Jazz to the Convention Center.[14] VidCon has been held at the Anaheim Convention Center since its third annual event in 2012.[15] The new venue offered a much larger capacity than the previously used Hyatt Regency Century Plaza hotel in Los Angeles.[16] WonderCon is hosted annually at the convention center since 2012, with the exception of 2016 when it was held at the Los Angeles Convention Center.[17] The 2012 VEX Robotics World Championship was also held in the convention center. Almost 600 teams were present at the competition which utilized two of the convention center's exhibit halls, as well as the convention centers Arena. In 2013 the VEX Robotics World Championship returned to the Anaheim Convention Center, occupying 3 exhibit halls as well as the arena. There were over 700 teams present, representing 24 nations. Each competed to be crowned the World Championship within their respective divisions.[18] Disney's inaugural D23 Expo, a biennial convention for Disney fans, was held at the Anaheim Convention Center in 2009. The convention center has hosted all subsequent D23 Expos.[19] Lucasfilm's Star Wars Celebration fan gathering was held at the convention center in 2015.[20] Minecon was held at the venue in September 2016.[21] It hosted the 2017 World Weightlifting Championships.[22] The Collegiate Challenge gymnastics meet was held in the arena in 2019.[23] The convention center hosted the 2017 FBLA-PBL National Leadership Conference.[24] The convention center hosted the 2019 Business Professionals of America National Leadership Conference.[25] The convention center and arena is currently hosting the California State Future Farmers of America leadership conference, which started in 2018, the largest youth convention in the State of California. As of 2019, 9,000 students from across the state of California have attended the event, with more expecting to show up in the future. The convention center was a filming location for Star Trek: Picard and will make an appearance in the show as a part of Starfleet Headquarters." (wikipedia.org) "Dan Jurgens (/ˈdʒɜːrɡənz/;[1] born June 27, 1959)[2] is an American comic book writer and artist. He is known for his work on the DC comic book storyline "The Death of Superman" and for creating characters such as Doomsday, Hank Henshaw and Booster Gold. Jurgens had a lengthy run on the Superman comic books including The Adventures of Superman, Superman vol. 2 and Action Comics. At Marvel, Jurgens worked on series such as Captain America, The Sensational Spider-Man and was the writer on Thor for six years. He also had a brief run as writer and artist on Solar for Valiant Comics in 1995. Career 1980s After graduating from Minneapolis College of Art and Design in 1981, Jurgens' first professional comic work was for DC Comics on The Warlord #63 (Nov. 1982).[3] He was hired due to a recommendation of Warlord creator Mike Grell who was deeply impressed by Jurgens' work after being shown his private portfolio at a convention.[4] In 1984, Jurgens was the artist for the Sun Devils limited series (July 1984 – June 1985), with writers Gerry Conway and Roy Thomas. Jurgens would make his debut as a comic book writer with Sun Devils. He began scripting from Conway's plots with #8 (Feb. 1985) and fully took over the writing duties on the title with #10 (April 1985).[5] In 1985, Jurgens created the character Booster Gold,[6] who became a member of the Justice League. Jurgens was one of the contributors to the DC Challenge limited series in 1986.[7] His first work on Superman was as penciller for The Adventures of Superman Annual #1 (1987).[3] In 1988, Jurgens provided pencil art for the Deadman short stories which were written by Mike Baron in the short-lived anthology Action Comics Weekly from issues #601–612.[8] He then had a run as artist of Green Arrow with writer Mike Grell from 1988 to 1990. In 1989, Jurgens began working full-time on the Superman character when he took over the writing/pencilling of the monthly The Adventures of Superman.[3] 1990s Jurgens was the penciller of the 1991 limited series Armageddon 2001 and co-created the hero Waverider with Archie Goodwin.[9] Jurgens helped writer Louise Simonson and artist Jon Bogdanove launch a new Superman title, Superman: The Man of Steel in July 1991[10] and assumed the writing/pencilling of the main Superman comic book with issue No. 57 (July 1991).[3] He created a supporting hero named Agent Liberty[11] in issue No. 60 (Oct. 1991) and then worked on the "Panic in the Sky" crossover in 1992.[12] During his run on Superman, Jurgens created two major villains, Doomsday and the Cyborg Superman. Doomsday was the main antagonist in "The Death of Superman" storyline which saw the iconic hero killed in an issue consisting entirely of splash pages.[13] The Cyborg Superman was an existing character which Jurgens reintroduced in The Adventures of Superman #500[14] for the "Reign of the Supermen" storyline. Jurgens wrote and drew Justice League America (#61–77 April 1992 – July 1993)[15] and in 1993 pencilled the Metal Men four-issue miniseries,[3] which was a retcon of their origin story. Jurgens wrote and pencilled the crossover series Zero Hour[16] and the Superman/Doomsday: Hunter/Prey miniseries, both in 1994.[17] Jurgens scripted and provided layout art for the Superman vs. Aliens miniseries. The story featured a battle between Superman and the aliens created by H. R. Giger (a.k.a. the Xenomorphs), from the titular film series. It was co-published by Dark Horse Comics and DC in 1995. In the same year, he gave up the pencilling duties on Superman. Also in 1995 he was writer/penciller on Solar with issue #46 from Valiant Comics wherein he worked with inker Dick Giordano and with penciller Tom Grindberg joining in with issues #51–54 after Jurgens relinquished penciller duties with issue #50. In 1996 Jurgens and Italian artist Claudio Castellini worked on the highly publicized crossover Marvel vs DC.[18] Jurgens was one of the many creators who worked on the Superman: The Wedding Album one-shot in 1996 which featured the title character's marriage to Lois Lane.[19] Jurgens developed the Tangent Comics imprint for DC the following year.[20] In January 1996, Jurgens was writer and penciller of the new Spider-Man series, The Sensational Spider-Man, at Marvel Comics.[3][21] The title was initially conceived to be the flagship showcase for the new Ben Reilly Spider-Man. The initial seven issues (#0–6, January–July 1996) were written and pencilled by Jurgens. Jurgens pushed strongly for the restoration of Peter Parker as the true Spider-Man and plans were made to enact this soon, but Bob Harras, the new Editor-in-chief, demanded the story be deferred until after the "Onslaught" storyline. Jurgens had by this stage become disillusioned with the immense amount of group planning and constant changes of ideas and directions and took this as the last straw, resigning from the title. In a past interview several years after his Spider-Man run, Jurgens stated that he would like to have another chance on the character, since his run was with the Ben Reilly character during the Spider-Man Clone Saga, and not Peter Parker. Jurgens wrote and pencilled Teen Titans (vol. 2) for its entire two-year, 24-issue run (October 1996 – September 1998). George Pérez, the co-creator of The New Teen Titans served as inker for the series' first 15 issues. After 10 years working on the Superman character, Jurgens ended his run as writer with Superman vol. 2 #150 (Nov. 1999). Also in 1999, Jurgens was writer and layout artist for the tabloid-sized graphic novel Superman/Fantastic Four, with finished art by his former The Adventures of Superman inker Art Thibert.[22] Jurgens worked with Marvel Comics as writer on Thor vol. 2 with pencilling by John Romita Jr.[23] and as writer/artist on Captain America vol. 3. Jurgens was the debut writer of the Tomb Raider: The Series comic book series licensed to Top Cow Productions and Image Comics, which in 1999. The debut issue of Tomb Raider was the number one selling comic book of that year. Jurgens was writer of the series until issue #21.[3] 2000s In 2000, Jurgens was the writer and provided layouts for the four issue prestige miniseries Titans/Legion of Super-Heroes: Universe Ablaze, with finishes provided by Phil Jimenez. Jurgens wrote Aquaman vol. 3 from issue #63 (Jan. 2000) until its cancellation with issue #75 (Jan. 2001). In November 2002, he wrote and pencilled the four-issue weekly miniseries Superman: Day of Doom (Jan. 2003),[3] which marked the 10 year anniversary of "The Death of Superman" storyline from 1992. After a hiatus from comics, he returned to DC Comics, providing layouts for the lead story in the Infinite Crisis Secret Files 2006 special (April 2006) and provided art for the weekly series 52 and to the six-issue limited series Crisis Aftermath: The Battle For Blüdhaven written by Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Grey.[24] Jurgens collaborated with writer/creator Marv Wolfman on the Nightwing series for issues #125–128. On Metamorpho: Year One, Jurgens was writer and penciller for the first two issues with Mike Norton drawing issues #3–6. Jurgens was writer and artist of the "History of the Multiverse" back-up stories in the weekly Countdown which appeared in issues #49–38. At the Los Angeles Comic Con in March 2007, DC announced a new, ongoing Booster Gold series written by Geoff Johns, pencilled by Jurgens, and inked by Norm Rapmund to begin shortly after the end of 52.[25] He was the writer of Tangent: Superman's Reign limited series in 2008, revisiting the Tangent Comics characters and wrote and illustrated an issue of The Brave and the Bold vol. 2 No. 23 (July 2009), which featured Booster Gold and Magog.[3] 2010s Three men seated onstage, flanked by Superman material The Library of Congress hosting a discussion with Dan Jurgens and Paul Levitz for Superman's 80th anniversary and the 1,000th issue of Action Comics. Jurgens was amongst the creative talent of DC Comics' The New 52 relaunch in 2011, becoming the writer of the new Justice League International series with artist Aaron Lopresti[26] and the artist of the new Green Arrow series with writer J. T. Krul and inker George Pérez. He became co-writer of Green Arrow with Keith Giffen on issues #3–6. DC announced in October 2011 that Jurgens would return to Superman, co-writing and drawing, the self-titled Superman series with Giffen. Their first issue was #7 (cover dated May 2012).[27] During 2012–2013, Jurgens was writer and artist of Fury of the Firestorms: The Nuclear Men from issues #13–20, where the series was canceled.[3] In 2014, he and Giffen together with Jeff Lemire and Brian Azzarello co-wrote The New 52: Futures End.[28] In 2015, Jurgens became the writer for Batman Beyond, starting with issue #1 in June 2015.[29] He was writer of the two-issue miniseries Convergence: Superman in 2015, and was the writer for Superman: Lois and Clark from 2015 to 2016. As part of the DC Rebirth relaunch of 2016, Jurgens wrote Action Comics, with the series returning to the previous numbering, beginning with issue #957.[30] He contributed to Action Comics #1000 (June 2018)[31] and then became the writer of the Green Lanterns series.[32] Personal life Jurgens is married and has two children, Quinn Jurgens and Seth Jurgens.[33] Awards Jurgens was awarded the 1994 National Cartoonists Society Award for Best Comic Book." (wikipedia.org) "Action Comics is an American comic book/magazine series that introduced Superman, one of the first major superhero characters. The publisher was originally known as National Allied Publications, and later as National Comics Publications and as National Periodical Publications, before taking on its current name of DC Comics. Its original incarnation ran from 1938 to 2011 and stands as one of the longest-running comic books with consecutively numbered issues. The second volume of Action Comics beginning with issue #1 ran from 2011 to 2016. Action Comics returned to its original numbering beginning with issue #957 (Aug. 2016). Publication history The Golden Age Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster saw their creation, Superman (also known as Kal-El, originally Kal-L), launched in Action Comics #1 on April 18, 1938 (cover dated June),[3] an event which began the Golden Age of Comic Books.[4][5] Siegel and Shuster had tried for years to find a publisher for their Superman character—conceived initially as a newspaper strip. Superman was originally a bald madman created by Siegel and Shuster who used his telepathic abilities to wreak havoc on humanity. He appeared in Siegel and Shuster's fanzine Science Fiction.[6] Siegel then commented, "What if this Superman was a force for good instead of evil?" The writer and artist had worked on several features for National Allied Publications' other titles such as Slam Bradley in Detective Comics.[7] They were asked to contribute a feature for National's newest publication. They submitted Superman for consideration. After re-pasting the sample newspaper strips they had prepared into comic book page format, National decided to make Superman the cover feature of their new magazine.[8] After seeing the published first issue, publisher Harry Donenfeld dismissed the featured strip as ridiculous. He ordered it never to be on the cover of the series. Subsequent reports of the first issue's strong sales and follow up investigations revealed that Superman was the reason. Thus, the character returned to the covers, becoming a permanent presence in issue 19 onward.[9] Initially, Action Comics was an anthology title featuring several other stories in addition to the Superman story. Zatara, a magician, was one of the other characters who had his own stories in early issues. There was the hero Tex Thompson, who eventually became Mr. America and later the Americommando. Vigilante enjoyed a lengthy run in this series. Sometimes stories of a more humorous nature were included, such as those of Hayfoot Henry, a policeman who talked in rhyme. The series saw the introduction of several characters and themes that would become longstanding elements of the Superman mythos. Lois Lane made her debut in the first issue with Superman.[10] An unnamed "office boy" with a bow tie makes a brief appearance in the story "Superman's Phony Manager" published in Action Comics #6 (November 1938), which is claimed to be Jimmy Olsen's first appearance by several reference sources.[11][12][13] New superpowers depicted for the first time for the character included X-ray vision and super-hearing in issue #11 (April 1939)[citation needed] and telescopic vision and super-breath in issue #20 (January 1940).[14] Luthor, a villain who would later become Superman's archenemy, was introduced in issue #23 (April 1940).[15] The original Toyman was created by writer Don Cameron and artist Ed Dobrotka in issue #64 (September 1943).[16] By 1942, artist Wayne Boring, who had previously been one of Shuster's assistants, had become a major artist on Superman.[17] The Silver Age Under editor Mort Weisinger,[18] the Action Comics title saw a further expansion of the Superman mythology. Writer Jerry Coleman and Wayne Boring created the Fortress of Solitude in issue #241 (June 1958)[19] and Otto Binder and Al Plastino debuted the villain Brainiac and the Bottle City of Kandor in the next issue the following month.[20] Gradually, the size of the issues was decreased. The publisher was reluctant to raise the cover price from the original 10 cents and reduced the number of stories. For a while, Congo Bill and Tommy Tomorrow were the two features in addition to Superman. Writer Robert Bernstein and artist Howard Sherman revamped the "Congo Bill" backup feature in issue #248 (January 1959) in a story wherein the character gained the ability to swap bodies with a gorilla and his strip was renamed Congorilla.[21] The introduction of Supergirl by Otto Binder and Al Plastino occurred in issue #252 (May 1959).[22] Following this debut appearance, Supergirl adopted the secret identity of an orphan "Linda Lee" and made Midvale Orphanage her base of operations. In Action Comics #261 (February 1960), her pet cat Streaky was introduced[23] by Jerry Siegel and Jim Mooney.[24] Supergirl joined the Legion of Super-Heroes in issue #276.[25] She acted for three years as Superman's "secret weapon," until her existence was revealed in Action Comics #285 (January 1962).[26] In the view of comics historian Les Daniels, artist Curt Swan became the definitive artist of Superman in the early 1960s with a "new look" to the character that replaced Wayne Boring's version.[27] Bizarro World first appeared in the story "The World of Bizarros!" in issue #262 (April 1960).[28] Writer Jim Shooter created the villain the Parasite in Action Comics #340 (Aug. 1966).[29] The Bronze Age Mort Weisinger retired from DC in 1970 and his final issue of Action Comics was issue #392 (September 1970).[18] Murray Boltinoff became the title's editor until issue #418. Metamorpho was the backup feature in issues #413–418 after which the character had a brief run as the backup in World's Finest Comics.[30] Julius Schwartz became the editor of the series with issue #419 (December 1972)[31] which also introduced the Human Target by Len Wein and Carmine Infantino in the backup feature.[32] The Green Arrow and the Black Canary became a backup feature in #421 and ran through #458, initially rotating with the Human Target and the Atom.[33] Between issues #423 (April 1973) and #424 (June 1973), the series jumped ahead by one month due to DC's decision to change the cover dates of its publishing line.[34] A new version of the Toyman was created by Cary Bates and Curt Swan in issue #432 (February 1974).[35] Issues #437 (July 1974) and #443 (Jan. 1975) of the series were in the 100 Page Super Spectacular format.[36] Martin Pasko wrote issue #500 (October 1979) which featured a history of the Superman canon as it existed at the time[37] and was published in the Dollar Comics format.[38] The superheroine Vixen made her first appearance in Action Comics #521 (July 1981).[39] To mark the 45th anniversary of the series, Lex Luthor and Brainiac were both given an updated appearance in issue #544 (June 1983). Lex Luthor dons his war suit for the first time in the story "Luthor Unleashed!"[40] and Brainiac's appearance changes from the familiar green-skinned android to the metal skeletal-like robot in the story "Rebirth!".[41] Keith Giffen's Ambush Bug character made appearances in issues #560,[42] #563,[43] and #565.[44] Action Comics #579, written by Jean-Marc Lofficier and drawn by Giffen, featured an homage to Asterix where Superman and Jimmy Olsen are drawn back in time to a small village of indomitable Gauls.[45] Schwartz ended his run as editor of the series with issue #583 (September 1986) which featured the second part of the "Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?" story by Alan Moore and Curt Swan.[46] The Modern Age Following the events of Crisis on Infinite Earths, writer/artist John Byrne relaunched the Superman franchise in The Man of Steel limited series in 1986.[47] Action Comics became a team-up title with issue #584 (January 1987) featuring Superman and the New Teen Titans.[48] Other costars during this period included the Phantom Stranger,[49] the New Gods,[50] the Demon,[51] Hawkman and Hawkwoman,[52] the Green Lantern Corps,[53] the Metal Men,[54] Superboy,[55] Big Barda,[56] Mister Miracle,[57] Booster Gold,[58] the Martian Manhunter,[59] the Spectre,[60] Lois Lane and Lana Lang,[61] Checkmate,[62] Wonder Woman,[63] and the Man-Bat.[64] The first Action Comics Annual was published in 1987 and featured Superman teaming with Batman in a story written by Byrne and drawn by Arthur Adams.[65] A DC Comics Bonus Book was included in issue #599 (April 1988).[66] From May 24, 1988 – March 14, 1989,[67] the publication frequency was changed to weekly, the title changed to Action Comics Weekly, and the series became an anthology.[68] Prior to its launch, DC cancelled its ongoing Green Lantern Corps title and made Green Lantern and his adventures exclusive to Action Comics Weekly. The rest of these issues featured rotating serialized stories of other DC heroes, sometimes as try-outs that led to their own limited or ongoing series. Characters with featured stories in the run included the Black Canary, Blackhawk, Captain Marvel, Catwoman, Deadman, Nightwing, the Phantom Lady, the Phantom Stranger, the Secret Six, Speedy, and Wild Dog. Titles spun off from Action Comics at this time included a Catwoman miniseries and a Blackhawk ongoing, in both cases by the same creative teams that worked on the weekly serials. During and after Action Comics Weekly's run, two Green Lantern Specials were published in late 1988 and the second in spring 1989, the latter special wrapping up the storylines from the Green Lantern serials in Action Comics Weekly. Each issue featured a two-page Superman serial, a feature that, according to an editorial in the first weekly issue, was intended as a homage to the Superman newspaper strips of the past. The final issue of the weekly was originally intended to feature a book-length encounter between Clark Kent and Hal Jordan by writer Neil Gaiman.[69] While Gaiman's story primarily teamed up Green Lantern and Superman, it also featured other characters from Action Comics Weekly, including the Blackhawks (in flashback), Deadman, and the Phantom Stranger. The story ran counter to DC editorial policy at the time as it portrayed Hal Jordan and Clark Kent as old friends who knew each other's secret identities. This was not considered canon in 1989 and Gaiman was unwilling to change this aspect of the story (as each serial in ACW was edited by different editors, continuity was not being maintained by DC editorial).[69] The story was pulled and a different story, written by Elliot S. Maggin, was run. Gaiman's story was finally published as a one-shot in Green Lantern/Superman: Legend of the Green Flame in November 2000. The Action Comics Weekly experiment lasted only until the beginning of March 1989 and after a short break, issue #643 (July 1989) brought the title back onto a monthly schedule.[68] Writer/artist George Pérez took over the title[70] and was joined by scripter Roger Stern the following month.[71] As writer of the series, Stern contributed to such storylines as "Panic in the Sky"[72] and "The Death of Superman". He created the Eradicator in Action Comics Annual #2[73][74] and later incorporated the character into the "Reign of the Supermen" story arc beginning in The Adventures of Superman #500.[75] The Eradicator then took over Action Comics as "the Last Son of Krypton" in issue #687 (June 1993).[76] Stern wrote the 1991 story wherein Clark Kent finally revealed his identity as Superman to Lois Lane.[77][78] Cover of Action Comics #800 (April 2003), a modern take on the cover of Action Comics #1, art by Drew Struzan Several major Superman storylines crossed over with Action Comics including "Emperor Joker" in 2000[79] and "Our Worlds at War" in 2001.[80] John Byrne returned to Action Comics for issues #827–835 working with writer Gail Simone in 2005–2006. After the "One Year Later" company-wide storyline, Action Comics had a crossover arc with the Superman series, entitled "Up, Up and Away!" which told of Clark Kent attempting to protect Metropolis without his powers until eventually regaining them. The "Last Son" storyline was written by Geoff Johns and Richard Donner, the director of the 1978 film Superman: The Movie, and was pencilled by Adam Kubert. This story introduces the original character, Christopher Kent, and adapts the classic Superman film villains, General Zod, Ursa and Non into the regular DC Universe continuity.[81] Issue #851 (August 2007) was presented in 3-D.[82] Starting with issue #875 (May 2009), written by Greg Rucka and drawn by Eddy Barrows,[83] Thara Ak-Var and Chris Kent, took Superman's place as the main protagonists of the comic, while Superman left Earth to live on New Krypton. A Captain Atom backup feature began in issue #879 (September 2009). On February 22, 2010, a copy of Action Comics #1 (June 1938) sold at auction for $3 million, besting the $317,000 record for a comic book set by a different copy, in lesser condition, the previous year. The sale, by an anonymous seller to an anonymous buyer, was through the Manhattan-based auction company ComicConnect.com.[84] Although DC had initially announced Marc Guggenheim as writer of the title following the War of the Supermen limited series,[85] he was replaced by Paul Cornell.[86] Cornell featured Lex Luthor as the main character in Action Comics from issues #890–900[87] and Death appeared in issue #894, with the agreement of the character's creator, Neil Gaiman.[88] In April 2011, the 900th issue of Action Comics was released. It served as a conclusion for Luthor's "Black Ring" storyline and a continuation for the "Reign of Doomsday" storyline. The final issue of the original series was Action Comics #904. The New 52 The title was relaunched from issue #1, as part of 2011's The New 52 by the creative team of writer Grant Morrison and artist Rags Morales.[89][90] As with all of the books associated with the relaunch, Clark Kent appears younger than the previous incarnation of the character. Action Comics focus on the early days of Superman's career, while the Superman series focus on Superman's present. Superheroes at large have appeared only in the past five years, and are viewed with at best, suspicion, and at worst, outright hostility. The storyline in Action Comics takes place about a year before the events of Justice League #1, and was referred to by DC Co-Publisher Dan DiDio as "DC Universe Year Zero" while JL operates as "Year One."[91] The Man of Steel is not yet trusted by Metropolis citizens and wears a basic costume consisting of a caped T-shirt, jeans and work boots. The first issue has had five printings as of March 2012.[92] The first story arc of the relaunched series, entitled Superman and the Men of Steel for the collected edition, begins very early in Superman's career as he starts making a name for himself as a champion of the oppressed in Metropolis. He captures the attention of the military and scientist Lex Luthor, who are both interested in testing his capabilities as well as discovering what kind of threat he represents. Following the completion of Morrison's storyline, writer Andy Diggle and artist Tony Daniel became the new creative team on the title with issue #19. Unlike the previous issues, the setting for the Action Comics series would now take place in the present. Diggle announced his resignation as the writer of the series shortly before his first issue went on sale.[93] Diggle left the title with only one issue completed (he would be co-writer for #20 and co-plot issue #21), with Daniel taking on full scripting and art duties for the two following issues completing the three-part story arc "Hybrid". Scott Lobdell wrote the series after Diggle and Daniel's departure.[94] Writer Greg Pak and artist Aaron Kuder became the new creative team on the series with issue #25 (Jan. 2014).[95] This series concluded with issue #52 (July 2016), which was part of the "Final Days of Superman" storyline which depicted the death of the "New 52" version of Superman.[96] DC Rebirth As part of DC Comics' DC Rebirth relaunch in June 2016, Action Comics reverted to its original numbering beginning with Action Comics #957. Written by Dan Jurgens, the series ships twice-monthly[97] and serves as a continuation of the comic book series, Superman: Lois and Clark, which featured the pre-Flashpoint Superman alongside his wife, Lois Lane, and their son, Jon Kent.[98][99] Three men seated onstage, flanked by Superman material The Library of Congress hosting a discussion with Dan Jurgens and Paul Levitz for Superman's 80th anniversary and the 1,000th issue of Action Comics For the series' 1000th issue—released on April 18, 2018, the 80th anniversary of the premiere issue—DC returned Superman to his traditional costume with the red trunks and yellow belt.[100] Action Comics #1000 collects the regular cover, blank variant cover, eight covers spanning eight decades from the 1930s-2000s, nineteen other variant covers from variant artists, and a hardcover Action Comics: 80 Years of Superman Deluxe Edition. Brian Michael Bendis became the new writer for the Action Comics series starting with issue #1001.[101][102] Infinite Frontier Starting with issue #1029, the title became a part of the Infinite Frontier relaunch in March 2021. Phillip Kennedy Johnson became the lead writer on the series, as well as its companion series Superman.[103][104] Publication changes and special numbering Action Comics is the longest-running DC Comics series by number of issues, followed by Detective Comics. A departure from a strict monthly schedule was four giant-size Supergirl reprint issues published as a 13th issue annually: issues #334 (March 1966), #347 (March–April 1967), #360 (March–April 1968), and #373 (March–April 1969). Action Comics has not had an uninterrupted run, having been on a three-month hiatus on two separate occasions. The first of these occurred during the summer of 1986, with issue #583 bearing a cover date of September, and issue #584 listing January 1987. The regular Superman titles were suspended during this period to allow for the publication of John Byrne's six-issue The Man of Steel limited series.[68] Publication was again suspended between issues #686 and #687 (February and June 1993) following the "Death of Superman" and "Funeral for a Friend" storylines, before Action Comics returned in June 1993 with the "Reign of the Supermen" arc.[68] The series was published weekly from May 24, 1988, to March 14, 1989.[67] (See detail in The Modern Age section above.) The temporarily increased frequency of issues allowed Action Comics to further surpass the older Detective Comics in the number of individual issues published. It surpassed Detective Comics in the 1970s when that series was bimonthly for a number of years. This change lasted from issue #601 to issue #642. During this time, Superman appeared only in a two-page story per issue; he was still the only character to appear in every issue of the series. An issue #0 (October 1994) was published between issues #703 and #704 as part of the Zero Month after the "Zero Hour: Crisis in Time" crossover event. There was an issue #1,000,000 (November 1998) during the "DC One Million" crossover event in October 1998 between issues #748 and #749. On June 1, 2011, it was announced that all series taking place within the shared DC Universe would be either canceled or relaunched with new #1 issues, after a new continuity was created in the wake of the Flashpoint event. Although being DC's longest running series, having reached issue #904 at the end of its initial run, Action Comics was no exception, and the first issue of the new series was released on September 7, 2011.[2] In February 2016, it was announced that as part of the DC Rebirth relaunch, Action Comics would resume its original numbering system, starting with issue #957 (Aug. 2016) and ship on a twice-monthly schedule....Awards Action Comics #684 was part of "The Death of Superman" storyline which won the Comics Buyer's Guide Fan Award for "Favorite Comic Book Story" for 1992. Action Comics #687–691 were part of "The Reign of the Supermen" storyline, which won the same award for 1993.[113] In other media The 2006 film Superman Returns features a scene in which Superman holds a car over his head in the same pose. In Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice from 2016 Lex Luthor's inmate number is AC-23-19-40, a reference to Luthor's first appearance in Action Comics as well as a small newspaper clipping of Superman holding a car over his head in the same pose. In the 1999 animated film The Iron Giant, Hogarth shows the titular robot a collection of comic books, including an issue of Action Comics featuring Superman, and notes the Giant's comparison between him. In The Simpsons episode Homer's Barbershop Quartet, Homer scavenges through a box of priceless artifacts, one of the items being the very first copy of Action Comics, which he dismisses all as junk and worthless. Sales Action Comics sales Year(s) Sales (est.) Revenue (est.) 1960–1989 170,851,312[114] $34,752,239[114] 1993 2,203,000[115] $4,103,250[115] 1996–2001 3,055,766[116] $5,958,744[116] 2002–2006 2,400,000[116] $5,400,000[116] 2007–2008 1,200,000[116] $3,588,000[116] 2009 192,400[117] $575,276[116] 2010 439,000[118] $1,778,610[118] 2011 950,600[119] $3,677,494[119] 2012 1,035,600[120] $4,326,044[120] 2013 777,500[121] $3,528,125[121] 2014 583,704[122] $2,507,133[122] 2015 440,757[123] $1,784,243[123] 2016 1,080,297[124] $3,440,779[124] 2017 1,179,798[125] $4,118,675[125] 2018 1,119,097[126] $6,995,333[126] Total 187,508,831 $86,533,945" (wikipedia.org) "Action Comics #1000 (cover dated Early June 2018) is the 1,007th issue of the original run of the comic book/magazine series Action Comics (after special #0 and #1,000,000 tie-ins to Zero Hour: Crisis in Time! and DC One Million respectively;[1] a second #0 in 2012; and #23.1, #23.2, #23.3, #23.4 in 2013[2]). It features several Superman stories from a variety of creators, including previously unpublished artwork by Curt Swan, who drew Superman for nearly four decades. It was a commercial and critical success, being the most-ordered comic of the month. Contents The panel seated in director's chairs IGN's Laura Prudom (far left) hosts a panel at 2018's South by Southwest convention discussing Superman's 80th anniversary and the release of Action Comics #1000, with (left to right): Dan Jurgens, Jim Lee, Frank Miller, and Brian Michael Bendis. Action Comics #1000 is an anthology, and contains several Superman stories, mostly around five to 10 pages, showcasing different eras of Superman's publication history and fictional life: "From the City Who Has Everything" (Dan Jurgens, writer and penciller; Norm Rapmund, inker; Hi Fi Design, colorist; Rob Leigh, letterer) is a celebration of Superman hosted by his home city of Metropolis, modeled after Jurgens' previous work on "The Death of Superman", the Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman episode "I'm Seeing Through You", and Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' "For the Man Who Has Everything".[3] "Never-Ending Battle" (Peter J. Tomasi, writer; Patrick Gleason, penciller and inker; Alejandro Sanchez, colorist; and Tom Napolitano, letterer) has splash pages of Superman from various fictional universes and media (such as the 1940s cartoons, the film Superman and the Mole Men, the DC animated universe and the comic Kingdom Come set in an alternate future timeline) making his way home to his family: Lois Lane, Jon Kent, and Krypto. "An Enemy Within" (Marv Wolfman, writer; Curt Swan, penciller; Butch Guice and Kurt Schaffenberger, inkers; Hi-Fi, colorist; and Rob Leigh, letterer) repurposes unpublished art by Swan with the Metropolis Police Department talking down a hostage taker. "The Game" (Paul Levitz, writer; Neal Adams, penciller and inker; Hi-Fi Design, colorist; and Dave Sharpe, letterer) is a digital-only story that was published in the hardcover Action Comics: 80 Years of Superman and has a chess match between Superman and Lex Luthor. "The Car" (Geoff Johns and Richard Donner, writers; Olivier Coipel, penciller and inker; Alejandro Sanchez, colorist; and Nick Napolitano, letterer) follows from the story and cover of Action Comics #1 as Superman follows gangster Butch Mason to get his car repaired. "The Fifth Season" (Scott Snyder, writer; Rafael Albuquerque, penciller and inker; Dave McCaig, colorist; and Tom Napolitano, letterer), has Superman and Luthor meeting at a planetarium. "Of Tomorrow" (Tom King, writer; Clay Mann, penciller and inker; Jordan Bellaire, colorist; and John Workman, letterer) features Superman five billion years in the future, as Earth's sun cools and expands from a yellow star into a red giant, thus robbing him of his power source. He takes the opportunity to say goodbye to Ma and Pa Kent and thank them for raising him. This is one of two stories DC published digitally prior to the comics' release. "Five Minutes" (Louise Simonson, writer; Jerry Ordway, penciller and inker; Dave McCaig, colorist; and Carlos M. Mangual, letterer) has Clark Kent in the Daily Planet office with his boss Perry White and ducking out to save some innocents as Superman while also trying to meet his deadlines. This story was also previewed by DC online. "Actionland!" (Paul Dini, writer; José Luis García-López, penciller; Kevin Nowlan, inker; Trish Mulvihill, colorist; and Josh Reed, letterer) Mister Mxyzptlk and his lover Miss Gsptlsnz design a dangerous amusement park featuring Superman's exploits. "Faster Than a Speeding Bullet" (Brad Meltzer, writer; John Cassaday, penciller and inker; Laura Martin, colorist; and Chris Eliopolous, letterer) has Superman intercepting a bullet at the last second and talking to a woman who was brave in the face of danger. "The Truth" (Brian Michael Bendis, writer; Jim Lee, penciller; Scott Williams, inker; Alex Sinclair, colorist; and Cory Petit, letterer) has Supergirl and Superman face off against Rogol Zaar, a new villain who claims to be responsible for the destruction of Krypton. Publication and promotion Three men seated onstage, flanked by Superman material The Library of Congress hosting a discussion with Dan Jurgens and Paul Levitz for Superman's 80th anniversary and the issue Action Comics #1000 involved several creative teams working independently for multiple stories. This anthology approach was common in comics' early history but is more rare today. The lead story ends a commercially and critically successful run by Jurgens, who has a long history working on Superman, including "The Death of Superman" storyline from 1992 and hands over the book to new regular writer Bendis who is also responsible for writing the miniseries Man of Steel (volume 2), following from his short story in this issue. García-López came out of retirement for this issue.[4] DC initially solicited the title featuring several creators who did not appear in the final version, including Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely (who had previously partnered on All-Star Superman), long-time Superman artist Doug Mahnke, and Tim Sale.[5] The comic was paired with a hardcover retrospective released one week prior, Action Comics: 80 Years of Superman (ISBN 978-1401278878). This book features essays, reprints of previous stories and covers, the print debut of "The Game", and a newly published story made by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster that a young Marv Wolfman was given when he toured DC's headquarters as a child. The two publications' similar names and release dates caused confusion among consumers; this was compounded by the fact that the original title of the hardcover explicitly mentioned Action Comics #1000.[6] Additionally, the book was originally solicited with a poster but that was removed prior to publication and made a separate item for purchase.[7] DC also had the issue tie in to an episode of The Big Bang Theory where the character of Sheldon Cooper attempts to buy the comic, but is interrupted by Neil Gaiman (playing himself). The issue sells out due to the author mentioning the store that he is in on social media, causing a flood of comic fans to visit.[7] Reception Critical reception For The A.V. Club, Oliver Sava called the issue "an emotional, exciting celebration of Superman’s evolution and the core tenets that have stayed constant through these changes" giving it a B+.[8] At Bleeding Cool, Joshua Davison gave the issue a 9.5 out of 10, saying, "In the litany of 'landmark' issues released of late—almost entirely of which came from Marvel and have been largely quite enjoyable—Action Comics #1000 manages to stand apart on a mixture of charm, endless sincerity, and an optimistic tone to brighten up even these dark times." He praised the issue for having several unique takes on Superman mythos.[9] Eric Francisco of Inverse agreed that the comic was a superlative tribute to Superman, writing, "the comic itself will go down as one of the best Superman stories of all time. Very sentimental, maybe to a fault, Action #1000 is less about celebrating Superman, the Intellectual Property and more about examining why people believe in characters like Superman in the first place."[10] GameStop's Comicbook.com featured a review from Russ Burlingame, giving the issue four out of five, writing, "there is a lot to love in this volume".[11] IGN's Jesse Schedeen gave the release an 8 out of 10, summing up, "there's a lot of heart in these pages, and no shortage of gorgeous artwork. It's impossible not to be moved by the many loving Superman tributes these creative teams have put together."[12] In PopMatters' review by Jack Fisher, the issue got nine out of ten with the finale reading, "Like the Man of Steel himself, Action Comics #1000 does plenty to raise the bar and bring hope to generations past and present. What started Siegel and Shuster nearly a century ago is still going strong today. It seems impossible that any character could endure for so long, but that's exactly what makes him Superman."[13] Assessing the importance of the comic, Polygon writer Susana Paolo pointed out that the issue was only the second piece of writing that Brian Michael Bendis had ever done for DC Comics, after having spent the previous two decades being associated with his work on various Marvel Comics characters. Paolo summarized her review by saying, "If you’ve low-key detested every Superman story you’ve read or if you’ve given the character a good shake and still just don’t see his appeal, skip this one. But if, instead, you have an ounce of romance in your soul, pick it up."[14] Similarly, Comic Book Resources caps the review from Jim Johnson by pointing out how, "[f]ans of Bendis have a lot to look forward to, but those enamored with the now-concluded Jurgens/Tomasi/Gleason era might take some time to win over" but praising the issue overall.[15] The importance of Bendis' transition to DC was noted by Newsarama's David Reposte: "Of course, the question on everyone's mind is likely what will be in the Man of Steel's future, as we get our first taste of Brian Michael Bendis at DC Comics. Teaming up with Jim Lee, Bendis certainly starts his tenure off with a bang... and while the cliffhanger of the story can't help but feel a little cheap, you can only hope that Bendis brings this tighter, more focused writing to his new company". He concludes the review, "[i]n a lot of ways, Action Comics #1000 feels like a bulletproof comic book, one whose strengths outweigh its flaws, and one whose structure seems impervious to diminished momentum" and gave the book eight out of 10.[16] The issue was notable not only for the quality of the stories and one of comics' most famous creators joining a new company, but also for Superman's costume reverting to its classic style with red trunks and yellow belt.[17] As part of The New 52 line-wide relaunch, DC substantially changed the history and appearance of many of their heroes, including Superman. After the DC Rebirth relaunch merged elements of the old and new continuities, his appearance stayed mostly the same, but this issue reintroduced the classic look that the character has had basically for the entirety of his print history. NPR's Glen Weldon praised the move from an aesthetic perspective, saying that it "satisfies" and breaks up the blue and red color nicely. For io9, Rob Bricken summed up the controversy over the costume writing, "Superman is an icon, and so is his outfit", urging DC to revert to the classic costume years prior;[18] the publication touted the return of the traditional suit in the run-up to the release.[19] Prior to the issue's release, DC promoted the comic by handing out red trunks at SXSW.[20] Commercial reception Despite retailing for $7.99, this issue was the best-selling comic of April 2018. Its variant covers were also very popular: a few weeks before the issue's release in a breakdown from Diamond Comic Distributors of additional orders of comics which had 10 of Action Comics' covers in the top 15 of re-orders for that week. The standard cover was first, with the 1960s homage by Mike Allred being third, a blank white cover was fourth, a 2000s cover by Lee Bermejo was fifth, the 1930s cover by Steve Rude was sixth, the 1990s cover from Dan Jurgens was eighth, Jim Steranko's 1970s cover was ninth, the 1940s variant by Michael Cho was tenth, Joshua Middleton's 1980s cover was eleventh, and the 1950s variant by Dave Gibbons was twelfth.[21] Two weeks before it was released, DC Comics' co-publisher Dan DiDio announced retailers had purchased more than half a million copies.[22] The issue ended up being both the comic that sold the most issues as well as the one that made the most money in the North American market in April 2018, according to Diamond Comic Distributors;[23] the final tally for April was 449,787 units.[24][25] In contrast, The Amazing Spider-Man #800—another heavily promoted milestone issue released in the following month of May—sold 411,480 copies to retailers. Action Comics #1000 also charted in May, as the 23rd most-ordered comic with another 52,129 units sold." (wikipedia.org) "A comic book convention (one day event) or comic-con is a fan convention with a primary focus on comic books and comic book culture, in which comic book fans gather to meet creators, experts, and each other. Commonly, comic conventions are multi-day events hosted at convention centers, hotels, or college campuses. They feature a wide variety of activities and panels, with a larger number of attendees participating in cosplay than most other types of fan conventions. Comic book conventions are also used as a vehicle for industry, in which publishers, distributors, and retailers represent their comic-related releases. Comic book conventions may be considered derivatives of science-fiction conventions, which began in the late 1930s. Comic-cons were traditionally organized by fans on a not-for-profit basis,[1] though nowadays most events catering to fans are run by commercial interests for profit. Many conventions have award presentations relating to comics (such as the Eisner Awards, which have been presented at San Diego Comic-Con International since 1988; or the Harvey Awards, which have been presented at a variety of venues also since 1988). At commercial events, comic book creators often give out autographs to the fans, sometimes in exchange for a flat appearance fee, and sometimes may draw illustrations for a per-item fee. Commercial conventions are usually quite expensive and are hosted in hotels. This represents a change in comic book conventions, which traditionally were more oriented toward comic books as a mode of literature, and maintained a less caste-like differentiation between professional and fan. The first official comic book convention was held in 1964 in New York City and was called New York Comicon.[2][3] Early conventions were small affairs, usually organized by local enthusiasts (such as Jerry Bails, later known as the "Father of Comic Fandom", and Dave Kaler of the Academy of Comic-Book Fans and Collectors), and featuring a handful of industry guests. The first recurring conventions were the Detroit Triple Fan Fair, which ran from 1965–1978, and Academy Con, which ran from 1965–1967. Many recurring conventions begin as single-day events in small venues, which as they grow more popular expand to two days, or even three or more every year. Many comic-cons which had their start in church basements or union halls now fill convention centers in major cities.[4] Nowadays, comic conventions are big business, with recurring shows in every major American city. Comic book conventions in name only, the biggest shows include a large range of pop culture and entertainment elements across virtually all genres, including horror, animation, anime, manga, toys, collectible card games, video games, webcomics, and fantasy novels. San Diego Comic-Con International, a multigenre entertainment and comic convention held annually in San Diego since 1970, is the standard bearer for U.S. comic-cons. According to Forbes, the convention is the "largest convention of its kind in the world;"[5] and is also the largest convention held in San Diego.[6] According to the San Diego Convention and Visitor's Bureau, the convention has an annual regional economic impact of $162.8 million,[7][8] with a $180 million economic impact in 2011.[9] However, in 2017, SDCC lost its record of the largest annual multigenre convention to São Paulo's Comic Con Experience (first held in 2014).[10] Internationally, the world's largest comic book convention, in terms of attendees, is Japan's Comiket (first held in 1975), which boasts annual attendance of over half a million people.[11] Italy's Lucca Comics & Games (first held in 1965) and France's Angoulême International Comics Festival (first staged in 1974) are the world's second and third largest comic festivals, respectively. History Origins In 1961 or 1962, Jerry Bails was vital in the formation of the Academy of Comic-Book Fans and Collectors (ACBFC), the first official organization of comic book enthusiasts and historians. The ACBFC brought fans of the medium together, administered the first industry awards, and assisted in the establishment of the first comic book conventions. The Academy's first order of business was to administer the Alley Awards, which traced their origin to "a letter to Jerry dated October 25, 1961," by fellow enthusiast (and future comics professional) Roy Thomas, in which he suggested to Bails that his fanzine Alter-Ego create its own awards to reward fandom's "favorite comic books in a number of categories" in a manner similar to the Oscars.[12] The first Alley Awards, given for the calendar year 1961, were reported in Alter Ego No. 4 (Oct. 1962). Alley Talley and other gatherings of 1964 On March 21–22, 1964, the first annual "Alley Tally" by ACBFC members was organized by Bails at his house in Detroit, with the purpose of counting "the Alley Award ballots for 1963."[12] This became notable in retrospect as the first major gathering of comics fans, predating the earliest comic book conventions, which were held later in the year.[13] Attendees included Ronn Foss, Don Glut, Don and Maggie Thompson, Mike Vosburg, and Grass Green. Comics historian Bill Schelly notes that the Alley Tally and "even larger fan meetings in Chicago . . . helped build momentum" for these earliest conventions.[12] (The Chicago gathering occurred May 9–10, 1964; it featured "several dozen" attendees, a dealer room, and film showings.)[14] In addition, an unnamed convention held May 24, 1964, in the Hotel Tuller, Detroit, Michigan, was organized by teenagers Robert Brusch and Dave Szurek,[13][15] with assistance from Bails[12] and members of the Michigan Science Fiction Society.[16] This gathering featured about 80 fans of the comic book medium.[17] New York Comicon The first recorded "official" comic book convention took place in 1964 in New York City. Known as the "New York Comicon",[2][3][18][19] it was held July 24, 1964,[14] at the Workman's Circle Building.[15] A one-day convention organized by 16-year-old Bernie Bubnis[20] and fellow enthusiast Ron Fradkin,[15] official guests of the Tri-State Con included Steve Ditko,[14] Flo Steinberg,[20] and Tom Gill.[15][21] Reports were of over 100 attendees.[21] 1965: The first recurring conventions Continuing the momentum from the previous year, Bails, Shel Dorf, and the members of the Michigan Science Fiction Society formed the "organizing committee" of the ground-breaking multigenre convention Detroit Triple Fan Fair (DTFF),[22] which was held July 24–25, 1965 at the Embassy Hotel, in Detroit, Michigan.[12] The DTTF was held annually in Detroit until 1978. Meanwhile, in New York City, teacher/comics enthusiast Dave Kaler[23] had taken over as ACBFC Executive Secretary; the organization produced Academy Con I (officially known as "Comi Con: Second Annual Convention of Academy of Comic-Book Fans and Collectors"),[24] held July 31 – August 1, 1965, at the Broadway Central Hotel.[25] Under Kaler's leadership, the Academy produced three successful "Academy Con" shows in New York during the summers of 1965–1967,[20][26][27] attracting industry professionals such as Otto Binder, Bill Finger, Gardner Fox, Mort Weisinger, James Warren, Roy Thomas, Gil Kane,[20] Stan Lee, Bill Everett, Carmine Infantino, and Julius Schwartz.[26] As befitting a convention run by the Academy of Comic-Book Fans and Collectors, the Alley Awards were presented at all three Academy Cons.[28] The 1965 Academy Con also featured one of the first recorded "superhero masquerades," or costume contests. 1965 also saw the genesis of what became the annual Italian comic book convention Lucca Comics & Games. Rinaldo Traini and Romano Calisi (forming the International Congress of Cartoonists and Animators) held the Salone Internazionale del Comics ("International Congress of Comics") in Bordighera.[29] In 1966, it moved to a small piazza in the center of Lucca, and has grown in size and importance over the years. Expansion and growth In 1966, comic book conventions continued to evolve and expand, The July 23–24 New York Comicon (not to be confused with the later New York Comic Con) was held at the Park Sheraton Hotel, in New York. Produced by John Benson,[26] guests included Jack Kirby, Jim Steranko, Otto Binder, Len Brown, Larry Ivie, Jack Binder, Roy Thomas, Gil Kane, Archie Goodwin, bhob Stewart, Klaus Nordling, Sal Trapani, Rocke Mastroserio, and Ted White. Featured events included a keynote speech by Kirby, a discussion about censorship between Don Thompson and Comics Code Authority acting administrator Leonard Darvin, a panel about the Golden Age of Comics, and one on the "so-called 'Forgotten '50s,' particularly EC Comics. Bhob Stewart, on a panel with Archie Goodwin and Ted White, predicted that there would soon be "underground comics" just as there were already "underground films."[30] Meanwhile, also in 1966, the first Southwesterncon was held in Dallas, Texas. Organized by Larry Herndon (of the fanzine Star Studded Comics), the official guest was Dave Kaler;[31] about 70 attendees took part. Later Southwesterncons rotated between Houston ("Houstoncon")[32] and Dallas ("D-Con"), adding Oklahoma City ("Multicon") to the mix in 1970.[33] The Southwesterncon partnership lasted roughly until 1971, with Houstoncon, D-Con, and Multicon continuing separately until 1982. In 1967, a new convention was inaugurated in St. Louis. In 1968, two important conventions had their start. Taking over for the Academy Con, Brooklyn native and school teacher Phil Seuling hosted the International Convention of Comic Book Art at the Statler Hilton Hotel in New York City on July 4–7. The guests of honor were Stan Lee and Burne Hogarth.[34] This annual convention, which later became known as the Comic Art Convention (CAC), hosted the presentation of the Alley Awards from 1968–1970.[28] CAC ran annually (occasionally in Philadelphia) over Independence Day weekend, until 1983. In England, Phil Clarke produced Comicon '68 (British Comic Art Convention) at the Midland Hotel, Birmingham, from August 30 to September 2, 1968. "Member"-guests include Alan Moore, Paul Neary, Jim Baikie, Steve Moore, and Nick Landau; there were 70 attendees.[13] The British Comicon ran annually, variously in Birmingham, London, and Sheffield, until 1981. The 1970s and explosive growth Comic book conventions increased dramatically in the 1970s, with many of the largest conventions of the modern era being established during the decade. In the early 1970s, conventions sprang up in almost every major American city (and some minor ones), as well as in London, with Comic Mart, a bimonthly trade show which ran regularly until the mid-1980s. Comic book creators, editors, and publishers began to make it part of their routine to attend conventions as official guests. Major comics-related news events were often broken at annual conventions: examples include the news that Jack Kirby was defecting from Marvel to DC, and DC's announcement that it was reviving Captain Marvel.[35] On August 1–3, 1970, Shel Dorf produced the Golden State Comic-Con, held at the U.S. Grant Hotel, in San Diego. Official guests were Forrest J. Ackerman, Ray Bradbury, Jack Kirby, Bob Stevens, and A. E. van Vogt, and it drew 300 people.[36] The three-day show evolved into San Diego Comic-Con International, and now attracts 130,000 or more attendees.[37] The Creation Convention debuted in 1971, organized by 14-year-old Queens schoolboys Adam Malin and Gary Berman,[38] and held over Thanksgiving weekend at the New Yorker Hotel, in New York City.[39][40] The guest of honor was Jim Steranko.[41] From that point until the late 1980s, Creation Entertainment continued producing large annual conventions in New York City, usually taking place over the weekend following Thanksgiving.[42] A popular venue for the Thanksgiving cons was the Statler Hilton Hotel.[43] In the mid-1970s, attendance at the New York Creation conventions averaged around 5,000 fans; the admission was around $5/day.[44] The 1971 Comic Art Convention (held July 2–4 at the Statler Hilton Hotel, New York City) was notable for being the convention credited by Will Eisner for his return to comics: I came back into the field because of [convention organizer Phil Seuling]. I remember [him] calling me in New London, [Connecticut], where I was sitting there as chairman of the board of Croft Publishing Co. My secretary said, 'There's a Mr. Seuling on the phone and he's talking about a comics convention. What is that?' She said, 'I didn't know you were a cartoonist, Mr. Eisner.' 'Oh, yes,' I said, 'secretly; I'm a closet cartoonist.' I came down and was stunned at the existence of the whole world. ... That was a world that I had left, and I found it very exciting, very stimulating".[45] Nostalgia '72, held July 22–23, 1972, at the Pick-Congress Hotel, was the first Chicago-area comics and collectibles convention.[40] Produced by Nancy Warner, the show had about 2,000 attendees.[46] That show evolved into the Chicago Comicon (now known as Wizard World Chicago), and attracts more than 70,000 attendees annually.[47] The Angoulême International Comics Festival debuted in Angoulême, France, in January 1974. 10,000 attendees[48] made it the most successful inaugural comic book festival to that date.[citation needed] 1974 also saw the first OrlandoCon, organized by regional chairman of the National Cartoonists Society Jim Ivey; guests included C. C. Beck, Roy Crane, Hal Foster, Ron Goulart, and Les Turner. OrlandoCon ran annually for 20+ years until 1994. In 1976, there were 20 comic book conventions held throughout the United States; many of them attracted thousands of attendees. Around this time specialized shows began popping up, focusing on such topics as underground comics,[13] EC Comics,[49] women in comics, and individual creators like Frank Frazetta. In August 1979, FantaCo Enterprises publisher Thomas Skulan produced FantaCon '80 at The Egg convention center, Empire State Plaza, in Albany, New York. The first annual Albany-area horror and comic book convention,[50] FantaCon ran annually until 1990. Creation Entertainment spreads its wings Beginning around 1980, Creation Entertainment expanded its conventions beyond New York, producing cons in San Francisco[51] and Washington, D.C.[52] By 1983, the company was the leading producer of comic book conventions nationwide.[53] For instance, in 1986, Creation produced large-scale comics conventions in at least six cities, including Philadelphia, Los Angeles, New York City, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., and New Brunswick, New Jersey. (The New York show featured a special tribute to Marvel Comics' 25th anniversary; guests included Stan Lee and Jim Shooter.)[54] During this time, Creation branched out from comics and began producing conventions in the horror and science fiction genres; it was particularly known for its Doctor Who conventions. After 1988, the company stopped producing comic book conventions to focus on its other, more profitable, fan conventions. The 1980s Both the Heroes Convention and the multigenre Dallas Fantasy Fair debuted in 1982. HeroesCon is one of the largest independent comic book conventions still operating; during the heyday of the Dallas Fantasy Fair, it was one of the largest comics conventions in the country, third in attendance behind the San Diego Comic-Con and the Chicago Comicon.[citation needed] (The Dallas Fantasy Fair went defunct in 1995.) Comic book conventions spread to Canada and Switzerland in 1985; also debuting that year was the United Kingdom Comic Art Convention (UKCAC), first held September 21–22, 1985, at the University of London Union. Guests included such U.K. stars as Steve Bissette, Bill Sienkiewicz, Dave Sim, Marv Wolfman, Brian Bolland, John Bolton, Eddie Campbell, Alan Davis, Hunt Emerson, Brett Ewins, Dave Gibbons, Ian Gibson, Denis Gifford, Alan Grant, Garry Leach, David Lloyd, Mike McMahon, Alan Moore, Steve Moore, Paul Neary, Kevin O'Neill, Ron Smith, Dez Skinn, Bryan Talbot, and John Wagner. Admission was £7.50 for both days. UKCAC ran annually until 1998. A number of still-extant conventions debuted in 1987, beginning with the Wonderful World of Comics Convention, held at the Oakland Convention Center, in Oakland, California. Later to be known as WonderCon, the convention was founded by San Jose native John Barrett, co-owner of the retail chain Comics and Comix. The multigenre Dragon*Con also debuted that year, hosted by the Pierremont Plaza Hotel, in Atlanta, Georgia. Official guests were Michael Moorcock (his first convention appearance in twelve years), Robert Asprin, Lynn Abbey, Robert Adams, Richard "Lord British" Garriott, Gary Gygax, and Toastmaster Brad Strickland; and there were 1,400 attendees. In 1988, in commemoration of Superman's 50th anniversary, the Cleveland Convention Center hosted the International Superman Expo. Held June 16–19, official guests include Curt Swan, Jerry Ordway, George Pérez, Marv Wolfman, and Julius Schwartz.[55][56] By the end of the 1980s, comic book conventions were evolving into sprawling affairs that promoted films, television shows, celebrity performers, video games, toys, and cosplay as much as (if not more than) comic books. Many historians date this shift to the release of Tim Burton's Batman film in 1989, which sparked the convention circuit's newfound embrace of Hollywood.[4] Great Eastern fills a gap Great Eastern Conventions produced comic book conventions for nearly 20 years, but most actively during the years 1987–1996. In New York City, the Great Eastern shows filled the gap after the mid-1980s demise of the annual Comic Art Convention and Creation Conventions. From 1993–1995, Great Eastern hosted two New York City shows annually at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center. (The 1995 show was the last comic book convention held at the Javits Center until the New York Comic Con in 2006.)[citation needed] Great Eastern also ran shows in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts,[57] Oregon, Minnesota, Texas, and South Florida. Despite their large fan attendance and expansive venues, however, Great Eastern's large shows were criticized by many within the industry for pandering to dealers and spectacle. As frequent participant Evan Dorkin stated, "The New York shows are extremely unfriendly to both creators and fans. . . . There is limited programming, limited professional appearances at these shows."[58] In March 1996, Great Eastern, at a very late point, cancelled what had been advertised as a larger-than-usual New York show, scheduled to be held at the New York Coliseum on 59th St. & Columbus Circle.[58] As a substitute event, comic book retailer Michael Carbonaro and others on the spur of the moment mounted the first Big Apple Comic Con,[58] now a long-running show. Greenberg and Great Eastern Conventions disappeared from the fan convention circuit from that moment forward Small press conventions and comic book "festivals" In response to the big conventions' shifting focus away from comic books themselves, a number of small conventions sprang up in the mid-1990s that turned the focus back onto comics, particularly those not published by the big mainstream companies DC Comics and Marvel Comics. Many of these "indy cons" were inspired by Cerebus creator Dave Sim. In 1992, Sim partnered with Great Eastern Conventions in promoting small conventions in over 20 U.S. locations,[59] including Indiana, Oregon, Texas, as well as in South Florida. And in 1995, Sim toured the country in a self-styled nine-stop "Spirits of Independence" tour.[60] The antecedent to these new "comic festivals" may have been Berkeleycon 73, held April 20–22, 1973, at the Pauley Ballroom, ASUC Building, University of California, Berkeley. Berkeleycon was the first convention devoted to underground comix[40] (which had their unofficial mecca in the San Francisco Bay Area). The first exclusively small press conventions were CAPTION, which debuted in Oxford, England in 1992; the Alternative Press Expo (APE), which debuted in San Jose, California in 1994; and the Small Press Expo (SPX), which premiered in Bethesda, Maryland in 1994. Wizard takes over Wizard Entertainment purchased the Chicago Comicon in 1997 to expand from its core publishing business into trade/consumer conventions.[61] In just a few years, the now renamed "Wizard World Chicago" event boasted a weekend attendance of over 58,000 people.[62] Wizard World Chicago was the template for a new kind of convention that shifted its focus from actual comic books to ancillary elements of pop culture fandom: celebrity performers, films, television, video games, and toys — "comic conventions" almost in name only.[4] In 2002, Wizard produced "Wizard World East" in Philadelphia, a still-ongoing show (now known as "Wizard World Philadelphia").[63] They added ongoing shows in Texas in 2003, Los Angeles in 2004,[64] and Boston in 2005. Beginning in 2009, Wizard made a concerted push to dominate the North American convention circuit, as it began acquiring existing conventions and starting new ones in various cities. To begin, Wizard's CEO Gareb Shamus acquired the Paradise Comics Toronto Comicon.[65][66][67] Soon afterward, Shamus acquired the Big Apple Convention, New York City's longest-running multigenre popular culture convention,[68] with the intention of directly competing with the New York Comic Con (produced by ReedPOP beginning in 2006).[69] In fact, Wizard initially scheduled the 2010 Big Apple Comic Con for October 7–10, the exact same dates as the previously scheduled 2010 New York Comic Con.[70][69] Wizard later moved the dates of its 2010 New York convention to October 1–3;[71] the company gave up the New York market after 2013. Beginning in 2010, Wizard Entertainment produced a "North American Comic Con" tour. City stops included Toronto, Anaheim,[72] Philadelphia,[73] Chicago, New York City, Austin, and Boston.[citation needed] By 2013, Wizard conventions included Portland Comic Con, St. Louis Comic Con, Philadelphia Comic Con, NYC Experience, Chicago Comic Con, Ohio Comic Con, Nashville Comic Con, Austin Comic Con, and New Orleans Comic Con.[74] And in September 2013, Wizard World announced seven new stops for the 2014 tour: Sacramento, Louisville, Minneapolis, Atlanta, San Antonio, Richmond (Virginia), and Tulsa.[75] This explosion in Wizard-produced conventions brought accusations that the entertainment behemoth was deliberately trying to push its competitors out of business.[76][77] On the other hand, many praised Wizard's professional and standardized approach to producing conventions.[4] Conventions as big business Starting in the mid-2000s, ongoing comic book conventions sprung up in most major U.S. cities, most of which are still ongoing. [See List of comic book conventions] These pop-cultural gatherings attract tens of thousands of fans and generate millions of dollars in revenue every year.[4] In addition to the Wizard-run conventions, Comic-Con International runs the San Diego Comic-Con International, WonderCon, and formerly ran the Alternative Press Expo; while Reed Exhibitions runs the New York Comic Con and the Chicago Comic & Entertainment Expo. Types Since the first conventions in the mid-1960s, hundreds of local and regional comic book conventions have sprung up around the world either as one-time or annual events. At these conventions, fans of comic books come together with the professional writers, artists, editors, and publishers of the field to discuss its many aspects. Increasingly, comic conventions have expanded in scope to encompass the gamut of pop culture phenomena relating to comics, from film, television, and animation to gaming and collectibles. Some cities have a number of comic-cons. Nearly every weekend of the year now has at least one convention somewhere, and some conventions are held on holiday weekends where four or more days can be devoted to events. Commercial shows vs. volunteer conventions An important distinction can be made between commercial events (often called "shows") – those run by dedicated companies who specialize in con organization, or by local for-profit firms – and volunteer-run cons. Usually run for profit, commercial events tend to charge for "tickets" or "admission" rather than having "memberships". A primary focus of commercial events is meeting celebrities, such as stars of TV shows and movies, professional wrestlers, glamour models, etc. There are frequently very long lines of people waiting for autographs at commercial events. While famous actors like William Shatner of Star Trek are paid tens of thousands of dollars per convention, minor and obscure bit players pay to set up booths to sell autographs and memorabilia.[78] Commercial events also tend to have less small-scale programming; panels will more often be composed of famous actors, directors, etc. on press junkets, where the panels are held in very large rooms with very high attendance. The largest conventions (in terms of attendance) tend to be commercial ones. Commercial events tend to be more likely to be about popular visual media than volunteer cons, and they also tend to attract the younger generation, but this is not absolute by any means. Some commercial conventions have been known to aggressively go after fan-run conventions via their legal teams.[77] Volunteer conventions, on the other hand, tend to be smaller in scope and more intimate in character. Although there are frequent autograph sessions, they tend to be less of an attraction for volunteer cons. Admission to volunteer cons is usually called "membership," thus emphasizing that the fans themselves are the ones who make up the con, rather than the staff who run commercial cons. A community of fans who run such conventions has developed, and many of them share their best practices and keep convention-running traditions alive.[35] Comics festivals and "indy shows" So-called "comics festivals" are based on a European model started by such long-running conventions as Lucca Comics & Games and the Angoulême International Comics Festival. Festivals are much more focused on the art and literature of the comics form, and only minimally on related pop culture expression and merchandising. In the U.S., comics festival and "indy shows" tend to highlight the "alternative comics" genre, not the work of "mainstream" publishers like DC Comics and Marvel Comics. Cosplaying is rarely if ever a feature of these conventions. Some notable North American small press conventions include: Alternative Press Expo (APE), San Jose, California (1994–2017) – produced in San Francisco for 15 years Cartoon Crossroads Columbus (CXC), Columbus, Ohio (2015–present) Chicago Alternative Comics Expo (CAKE), Chicago, Illinois (2012–present) Comic Arts Brooklyn (CAB) (formerly known as Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Fest [BCGF]), Brooklyn, New York (2009–present) – produced by the retailer Desert Island Comics Comic Expo (Bristol International Comic & Small Press Expo), Bristol, England (2004–2014) – produced by retailer Mike Allwood East Coast Black Age of Comics Convention (ECBACC), Philadelphia (2002–present) – focuses on black creators and characters Massachusetts Independent Comics Expo (MICE), Boston, Massachusetts (2010–present) MoCCA Festival, New York City (2002–present) – originally produced by the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art; now produced by the Society of Illustrators Small Press and Alternative Comics Expo (SPACE), Columbus, Ohio (2000–present) – Produced by small-press publisher Back Porch Comics Small Press Expo (SPX), Bethesda, Maryland (1994–present) STAPLE!, Austin, Texas (2005–present) Stumptown Comics Fest, Portland, Oregon (2004–2013) Toronto Comic Arts Festival (TCAF), Toronto (2003–present) – produced by the retailer The Beguiling Legion Comic Book, Toy and Art Convention Smyrna, Georgia (2019-present) produced by Urbnpop Productions "Comics-only" shows Comics-only conventions emerged in response to the sprawling pop culture-focused conventions epitomized by Wizard Entertainment, San Diego Comic Con International, and the New York Comic Con. "Comics-only" shows tend to hearken back to the comic book conventions of the 1970s and 1980s: still focused on the genres of superhero, fantasy, horror, and crime; as well as dealers selling back issues and other collectibles, but without the domineering presence of the mainstream publishers, or film and television producers. Notable "comics-only" conventions include: Baltimore Comic-Con (est. 2000 in Baltimore, MD) Big Apple Comic Con (est. 1996 in New York City) Heroes Convention (est. 1982 in Charlotte, NC) Organization and staffing Comic book conventions were traditionally run and staffed by volunteers,[79] though venues may require certain activities to be contracted out. Event funding typically relies on convention registrations.[80] Nowadays, many of the larger conventions are incorporated as non-profit organizations, usually to achieve tax-exempt status and safeguard the organizers' personal assets – in the US, some are 501(c)(3) charities, while others are registered as recreational clubs. The largest events may require up to a hundred volunteers.[citation needed] Volunteers often receive T-shirts or other benefits. Timing and duration Most comic book conventions take place over a weekend, with events scheduled between Friday evening and Sunday afternoon. Saturday is typically the busiest day, as most fans must return home on Sunday. One-day passes are sometimes sold at a reduced price. Reasons for this include: Most fans would have to take a vacation from work or study to attend an event held during the workweek. Transportation costs are often lower for weekend travelers. Hotels have few business travelers during the weekend, making it much easier to reserve a block of rooms and secure space for programming at a reduced price. Many fans are students and have little discretionary income, so hotel and convention fees are important factors....Attendees Attendees include artists and dealers offering products and services for sale to fans, and those wish to buy them. Others come for the programming, or to meet friends or other comic book fans in general. Many attend for all of these reasons. Some later publish a "con report" detailing their experiences. Attendees of major conventions receive a bag with the convention program, a lavishly illustrated volume featuring themed artwork, articles submitted by members and the official guests, along with a description of the event's programming, staff, rules, guests, and any charity being supported by the convention.[84][85] Local restaurant information and a combination pocket schedule and map may also be included. Sponsors often receive additional items such as T-shirts, pins, or ribbons, as well as faster registration badge pick-up and on-site meals.[86] They may also be displayed prominently in convention publications. Official guests Comic book conventions typically feature official guests or guests of honor. These guests are to some extent the headliners of the convention. A convention may have as many guests of honor as the convention committee wishes. A guest can be an industry figure – some notable and frequently appearing examples of industry guests include Stan Lee, George Pérez, and John Byrne. More and more, guests also can include film and television directors and actors, as more of these cultural products are based on comic books. Examples of this sort of guest, frequently seen on the convention circuit, include William Shatner, Bruce Campbell, and Norman Reedus. Comic conventions represent an opportunity for fans to interact with such individuals that may not be possible outside the event.[4] Professionals at conventions Conventions provide a forum for fans to see first-hand and meet their favorite authors and artists. They also serve the interests of authors, editors, and other publishing professionals, providing opportunities for networking, promotion, and a convenient location for contract negotiations and other business meetings. A number of cons include a category for "Attending Professionals": professionals who pay a (possibly reduced) price to enter but also get a special name badge that proclaims them to be professionals in the field.[citation needed] In the early days of comic book conventions, there was little or no distinction made between the "pros" and the "fans." (After all, many professionals in the field began as fans, and may still consider themselves fans; and more than a few fans have also worked professionally or semi-professionally in the field.) Nowadays, other than in the so-called "Artist Alleys," there is more of a caste system among professionals and enthusiasts. Artist Alley Artist Alley is a fixture at most comic conventions. It is an area where creators display and sell their work (including original art), take commissions, sign autographs, and interact with fans. These areas may also include crafts, drawn art, self-published books or video, fanzines, and more. Con suite At North American conventions, a hospitality suite is often provided as a room reserved for light refreshments, a quiet conversation, and a place to briefly rest. The refreshments typically include coffee, tea, juice or soda, and light meals appropriate for the time of day. Depending on local liquor distribution and liability laws, the suite may serve alcohol. At conventions in the rest of the world, the hotel or convention center bar typically offers the same social function. At conventions in the United Kingdom, the provision of cask ale is generally considered essential. Cosplay Traditionally, conventions held a costume contest called a masquerade, where persons go on stage and compete for nominal prizes based on their skill in assembling and presenting genre-inspired outfits. This, however, would be more accurately labelled a "talent show" rather than the "fancy dress ball" that the term suggests (although British fandom sometimes uses the term "fancy dress"). From press coverage of comic book and anime conventions has arisen the widespread tendency of fans in general attendance at the con to dress up as their favorite characters in elaborate costumes (known as cosplay) that are time-consuming and/or expensive to assemble....Programming During panels at comic book conventions, the audience is sometimes invited to line up and ask questions using a dedicated microphone. Panel-led discussions, or Panels, usually fill up the daytime hours of most conventions with typically one-hour discussions involving some pre-determined topic, usually related in at least some way to comics. Panels usually come in two segments: the host puts on a presentation or does an interview with a guest, and then the fans are asked to give questions. The topic scope for panels is varied and can include things from new releases to author spotlights. There are also workshops, that are like panels but are more geared towards instructions through a major or specific task such as how to draw comics, or use industry-specific software. Another event at most comic book conventions include screenings of films and TV shows that can last through the day. Panel members (even professionals) are not customarily paid for their appearance, although many North-American conventions waive membership fees for program participants or rebate them after the convention. Special events Some conventions feature award ceremonies, in which the best works and most notable individuals are recognized for their contributions to the field. [See Awards, below] A convention may have one or more auctions. The Art Auction is an event where the most popular items from the art show are sold to the most interested buyers at the convention. Many conventions also have auctions for charities. Evening entertainment often includes a combination of official and unofficial events, including formal invitational dinners, and fandom-themed room parties. A few conventions and festivals have a closing ceremony to formally mark the end of the convention. Depending on the convention, this can be a major gathering of most of the membership, or it may be lightly attended or dispensed with entirely as members are occupied with packing up and checking out of the hotel. Exhibits and fixed functions An exhibit hall or dealers' room is a popular feature at comic book conventions. Publishing companies, distributors, and other proprietors often arrive to exhibit and/or sell their newest products to fans. Wares can include back issues of comic books, graphic novels & trade paperbacks, manga and anime media, action figures, apparel or pre-made costumes, music CDs, software, decorations, toys, art books, specialty foods, and many more. Many conventions have video rooms in which genre-related audiovisual presentations take place, typically commercial Hollywood movies, genre television show episodes, and anime. If there are multiple media rooms, each one may have themed content. Larger conventions may also have a genuine film room, for presentation of actual movies on film instead of video. Game rooms are also available at some conventions for attendees to play a variety of genre games, including collectible card games, role-playing games board games, and video games. Thematic Areas A Fallout Cosplayer photographed at a Comic Con in a Fallout Themed area. Thematic areas are set up in the comics fairs where cosplayers and visitors can take photos in an environment that follows that of a specific comic, anime or video game or participate in various themed activities. These areas are set up by not for profit associations or sometimes by video game developers or Anime producers. Some examples of these areas are those dedicated to Star Wars, Fallout or to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Idiosyncrasy Many con-goers take pride in being interesting and unusual, and naturally many cons are highly idiosyncratic. Cons often have activities, running jokes, organizational methods, and other features that not only differentiate them from other cons but are often a point of pride. Most cons vary from the above outline in one or more important ways, and many have their own unique cultural characteristics. Most cons will tend to evolve many of their own idiosyncrasies along these lines. To fans, these are often part of the charm each convention offers.[citation needed] Awards Main article: List of comics awards Almost since their inception, comic book conventions have hosted comic awards. Two of the longest-running and most prestigious awards are the Eisner Award and the Harvey Award, both of which began in 1988 after the dissolution of the Kirby Awards. The Eisner Award has been presented at San Diego Comic-Con International since 1988; while the Harvey Awards, also inaugurated in 1988 and after being presented at many different venues for much of their life, have been presented at the Baltimore Comic-Con since 2006. The following is a list of conventions and the award presentations they host (or formerly hosted): Angoulême International Comics Festival (France) Grand Prix de la ville d'Angoulême (1974–present) – formerly known as the "Alfreds" (1974–1988) and "Alph-Art Awards" (Prix Alph-Art) (1989–2003). In addition, the Angoulême festival presents a number of other awards called "The Official Awards of the International Comics Festival" (le Palmarès Officiel du Festival international de la bande dessinée). from a pool of 40–60 albums, called "official selections." From these are awarded the "Best Album" prize, five "Angoulême Essentials," one "Revelation Essential" (given to new talent), and one Essential chosen by the public. The Heritage Essential (for reprinted material) and Youth Essential are selected from separate nominee pools. Baltimore Comic-Con (U.S.) Harvey Award (2006–2016) Ringo Award (2017–present) Barcelona International Comics Convention (Spain) – Gran Premi del Saló (1988–present) Chicago Comicon (U.S.) – Harvey Award (1988) Comics Fest India (India) – Kalpana Lok Awards (2010–present) Dallas Fantasy Fair (U.S.) – Harvey Award (1989–1995) East Coast Black Age of Comics Convention (U.S.) – Glyph Comics Awards (2006–present) Festival de la BD francophone de Québec (Canada) – Prix Bédéis Causa (1988–present) Forest City Comic Con (Canada) – Joe Shuster Awards (2015) Heroes Convention (U.S.) – Inkwell Awards (2011–present) International Comics Show of Erlangen (Germany) – Max & Moritz Prize (1984–present) Lucca Comics & Games (Italy) – Gran Guinigi Award (1967–present) MoCCA Festival (U.S.) Harvey Award (2004–2005) MoCCA Arts Festival Awards of Excellence (2012–present) Pittsburgh Comicon (U.S.) – Harvey Award (2000–2002) Salón Internacional del Cómic del Principado de Asturias (Spain) – Haxtur Award (1985–present) San Diego Comic-Con International (U.S.) Inkpot Award (1974–present) Russ Manning Award (1982–present) Kirby Award (1985–1987) Eisner Award (1988, 1991–present) Bill Finger Award (2005–present) Small Press and Alternative Comics Expo (U.S.) – Day Prize/SPACE Prize (2001–present) Small Press Expo (U.S.) – Ignatz Award (1997–present) Strip Turnhout (Belgium) – Bronzen Adhemar (1972–present) Supanova Pop Culture Expo (Australia) – Ledger Award (2005–present) Toronto Comic Arts Festival (Canada) – Doug Wright Award (2005–present) Toronto Comic Con (Canada) – Joe Shuster Awards (2005) WonderCon (U.S.) – Harvey Award (1997–1999) Defunct awards United States Alley Award – presented at Academy Con (1965–1967)[28] and Comic Art Convention (1968–1970)[28] Comics Buyer's Guide Fan Awards – presented at Chicago Comicon (1983–1996)[88] Don Thompson Award – presented at Motor City Comic Con (1992–1998) Goethe Awards/Comic Fan Art Awards – presented at Comic Art Convention (1971–1974) Howard E. Day Prize – presented at Small Press and Alternative Comics Expo (S.P.A.C.E.) (2001–2007) Ignatz Award (not the same Ignatz Award presented at the Small Press Expo) – presented at OrlandoCon (1975–1994) Klein Award – presented at MoCCA Festival (2002–2012) Lulu Award – presented at San Diego Comic-Con International (1997–2009) Wizard Fan Awards – presented at Dragon Con (1993), Philadelphia Comic Book Spectacular (1994),[89] and Chicago Comicon (1995–2006) United Kingdom Ally Sloper Award – presented at Comics 101 (1976) Eagle Awards – presented at British Comic Art Convention (1977–1979), London Comic Mart (1983), Birmingham Comic Art Show (1984, 1986), United Kingdom Comic Art Convention (UKCAC) (1987–1990), Comic Festival (2000, 2002), Comic Expo (2004, 2006–2008), London MCM Expo (2010–2012), and London Film and Comic Con (Eagles rebranded as "True Believer Comic Awards") (2014) National Comics Awards – presented at United Kingdom Comic Art Convention (UKCAC) (1997–1998) and Comic Festival (1999, 2001–2003) British Comic Awards — presented at the Thought Bubble Festival (2012–2016) Italy Lucca Comics & Games – Yellow Kid Awards (1970–2005)" (wikipedia.org) "WonderCon is an annual comic book, science fiction, and film convention held in the San Francisco Bay Area (1987–2011), then—under the name WonderCon Anaheim—in Anaheim, California (2012–2015, 2017–present), and WonderCon Los Angeles in 2016.[2] The convention returned to the Anaheim Convention Center in 2017 after a one-year stint in Los Angeles due to construction at the Anaheim Convention Center. The convention was conceived by retailer John Barrett (a founder of the retail chain Comics and Comix) and originally held in the Oakland Convention Center. In 2003, it moved to San Francisco's Moscone Center.[3][failed verification] The show's original name was the Wonderful World of Comics Convention. History Retailer Joe Field (of Flying Colors Comics and Other Cool Stuff) and his partner Mike Friedrich owned and operated the convention for fifteen years. In 2001, they brokered a deal with the management team that runs the San Diego Comic-Con International to make it part of the Comic-Con International convention family.[4] This gave the San Francisco show a wider audience and has made it a venue for previews and early screenings of major motion pictures, in particular ones based on comic books. These have included Spider-Man 2 in 2004, Batman Begins and Fantastic Four in 2005, Superman Returns in 2006, 300 in 2007, Watchmen in 2009, and Kick-Ass in 2010. All of these events featured the stars of the films fielding questions from the audience. WonderCon had 34,000 attendees in 2009,[5] 39,000 in 2010, and 49,500 in 2011.[6] The show left the Bay Area after the 2011 con, because San Francisco's Moscone Center was being remodeled. The convention moved to Anaheim in 2012, and was rebranded WonderCon Anaheim.[2] When the move to Anaheim was first announced, Comic-Con International said they would be returning to San Francisco after the Moscone Center renovations were complete; however, the convention ultimately stayed in Southern California. In 2016, a new convention started in the Bay Area, called the Silicon Valley Comic Con.[7] WonderCon relocated from Anaheim to Los Angeles in 2016, and is now called WonderCon Los Angeles and was held March 25–27, 2016 at the Los Angeles Convention Center.[8] The 2017 edition of the convention returned to Anaheim and was held March 31 – April 2, 2017.[9] The WonderCon logo was designed by Richard Bruning and Tim Zach. Logo for WonderCon at Home. The 2020 edition of the show, scheduled for April 10–12, was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[10] The 2021 edition of the show, scheduled for March 26–27, was cancelled again due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Event history Dates Location Guests May 2–3, 1987 Oakland Convention Center Oakland, Calif. [11] April 23–24, 1988 Oakland Convention Center Oakland, Calif. [12] April 28–30, 1989 Oakland Convention Center Oakland, Calif. [13] May 11–13, 1990 Oakland Convention Center Oakland, Calif. Dan Brereton, Erik Larsen, Jim Lee, Rob Liefeld, Ron Lim, Ken Macklin, Chris Marrinan, Trina Robbins, Jim Valentino, Tim Vigil, Marv Wolfman[14] April 24–26, 1992 Oakland Convention Center Oakland, Calif. [15] April 22–24, 1994 Oakland Convention Center Oakland, Calif. [16] April 26–28, 1996 Oakland Convention Center Oakland, Calif. [17] April 1–3, 2001 Oakland Convention Center Oakland, Calif. [18] April 19–21, 2002 Oakland Convention Center Oakland, Calif. [19] April 25–27, 2003 Moscone Center San Francisco, Calif. [20] April 30 – May 2, 2004 Moscone Center San Francisco, Calif. [21] February 18–20, 2005 Moscone Center North San Francisco, Calif. [22] February 10–12, 2006 Moscone Center West San Francisco, Calif. [23] March 2–4, 2007 Moscone Center South San Francisco, Calif. [24] February 22–24, 2008 Moscone Center South San Francisco, Calif. [25] February 27 – March 1, 2009 Moscone Center South San Francisco, Calif. [26] April 2–4, 2010 Moscone Center South San Francisco, Calif. Peter S. Beagle, Geoff Johns, Adam Kubert, Jimmy Palmiotti, Tim Powers, Kevin Smith, Judd Winick[27] April 1–3, 2011 Moscone Center South San Francisco, Calif. Sergio Aragonés, Robert Kirkman, Francis Manapul, Joe Quesada, Frank Quitely, Amy Reeder, Bill Sienkiewicz, Judd Winick, Marv Wolfman[28] March 16–18, 2012 Anaheim Convention Center Anaheim, Calif. [29] March 29–31, 2013 Anaheim Convention Center Anaheim, Calif. [30] April 18–20, 2014 Anaheim Convention Center Anaheim, Calif. Tony Daniel, Jim Lee, Mark Waid[31] April 3–5, 2015 Anaheim Convention Center Anaheim, Calif. Neal Adams, Becky Cloonan, Sam de la Rosa, Steve Epting, Greg Horn, Phil Noto, Greg Weisman[32] March 25–27, 2016 Los Angeles Convention Center Los Angeles, Calif. Brian Michael Bendis, Amber Benson, Jason Faunt, Lou Ferrigno, Christopher Khayman Lee, Jim Lee, Humberto Ramos, John Romita, Jr., Bill Sienkiewicz, David Sobolov[33] March 31 – April 2, 2017 Anaheim Convention Center Anaheim, Calif. Sergio Aragonés, Kevin Eastman, Chad Hardin, Phil Jimenez, Jim Lee, Mark Waid[34] March 23–25, 2018 Anaheim Convention Center Anaheim, Calif. Sergio Aragonés, Larry Hama, Faith Erin Hicks, Jim Lee, Patrick Rothfuss, Gail Simone, Mark Waid[35] March 29–31, 2019 Anaheim Convention Center Anaheim, Calif. [36] April 10–12, 2020 Anaheim Convention Center Anaheim, Calif. Cancelled due to COVID-19 pandemic March 26–27, 2021 Anaheim Convention Center Anaheim, Calif. Cancelled again due to COVID-19 pandemic April 1–3, 2022 Anaheim Convention Center Anaheim, Calif. Rico E. Anderson, Michael Cho, Bobby Clark, Becky Cloonan, Tracee Lee Cocco, Michael W. Conrad, David Dastmalchian, Kevin Eastman, Ashley Eckstein, Mary Gibbs, Shannon Hale, Herbert Jefferson Jr., Neil Kaplan, Sarah Kuhn, Lex Lang, Cherami Leigh, Elliot S! Maggin, Deneen Melody, Amanda C. MIller, Trung Le Nguyen, David A. Robertson, Kevin Smith, Michael A. Stackpole, Babs Tarr, Larry Thomas, David F. Walker, Tula Lotay/Lisa Wood, Gene Luen Yang, Skottie Young March 24–26, 2023 Anaheim Convention Center Anaheim, Calif. Jason Aaron, Alane Adams, Beau Billingslea, Steve Blum, Griffin Burns, Mingjue Helen Chen, Tom Cook, Ian James Corlett, Mark Evanier, Jenny Frison, Mitch Gerads, Kyle Herbert, Adam Hughes, Brian Hull, Phil Jimenez, Daniel Warren Johnson, Tom King, Jae Lee, Steve Leialoha, Mary Elizabeth McGlynn, Cynthia McWilliams, Annalee Newitz, Joe Ochman, Gary Phillips, Joe Quinones, Trina Robbins, Kaitlyn Robrock, James Rollins, Neil Ross, Tom Ruegger, Paul Rugg, Mark Russell, Evan “Doc” Shaner, Kaiji Tang, Greg van Eekhout, Marv Wolfman, Gene Luen Yang Features and events The exterior of WonderCon at the Anaheim Convention Center While the main attraction of WonderCon has always been various retailers selling back issues of comic books and action figures, the exhibitor list has grown to include retailers of specialty DVDs. There is also an "Artists Alley" featuring mainly comic book artists selling artwork, signing books, and doing sketches; and mainstream celebrities signing autographed pictures. WonderCon hosted the Harvey Award ceremonies from 1997 to 1999.[37] Since 2007, academicians and comic industry professionals have held the Comics Arts Conference in conjunction with WonderCon. In addition, WonderCon features an event called "Trailer Park," where trailers for upcoming films are shown. The WonderCon masquerade competition usually takes place on Saturday after the convention closes. Awards are given to those with the most creative performances, though anyone can participate." (wikipedia.org)

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Publication Month: March

Publication Year: 2018

Series: WonderCon Anaheim

Language: English

Publication Frequency: Annual

Publication Name: Comic-Con International

Distribution: Controlled Circulation

Publisher: Comic-Con International

Genre: Action & Adventure, Activity, Art & Photography, Classics, Comics, Fantasy, Fashion, Illustration, Manga & Anime, Movies & TV, Science Fiction

Country/Region of Manufacture: United States

Topic: Art, Comic Books, Country, Fantasy, Fiction, Photography, Pop, Superhero