Behind the Scenes -- A BAB Editorial Meeting

Karen: We sometimes joke around about our BAB "editorial meetings" -- basically, the emails that fly back and forth between Doug and I where we plan the blog's content. After several years now of this dog and pony show, we seem to have our act together, although life does intrude from time to time. But we manage to agree pretty well on the overall content. It is getting a little harder to come up with new books to review, but that just gives us a reason to buy more trades and back issues. But we thought it might be fun, and possibly enlightening, to share a recent exchange we had with you all, to let you see how we decide what to run, and when, and how those conversations meander.

D: Since the end is in sight for Monsterpalooza, do you want to set the order for the Kirby month?  I can set the posts up if you tell me how you'd like to run them.  Thanks!

K: Geez, I was just thinking on the drive in this morning whether we were going to do Avengers Under Siege or our Return of the King series, yet forgot to bring it up with you! Getting senile...anyway, yes, let's get Kirby going. I was thinking chronologically might be cool -what do you think? I can figure out what that order might be as best as possible and we can do that if you like.

D: I'm open to the Avengers, too, if you feel more like a series after a bunch of one-shots.  Now that I think of it, we had discussed Kirby in December -- sort of a "Very Kirby Christmas" -- but since he was Jewish that's probably inappropriate!! 

I don't mind either direction -- you go with what feels like the most fun.  I haven't read any of those Kirby books (I always thought that I bought a lot of monthlies when I was a kid, but that simply cannot be true...), so I'm open for some learning.

I'll try to get to adding my comments to the Mummy post today or tomorrow.  Tigra is ready, and the Power Girl post is done (art has been added); again, get in on Power Girl only if you feel like you have time.  No worries!  But, really looking forward to your impression on the Tigra story (and art!).

K: Good point about Kirby and Christmas, we don't want to appear insensitive! So starting it in November seems the way to go. I went ahead and put them on the schedule. Cap came first, followed by the Eternals. Devil Dinosaur and Machine Man appeared to be published at the same time so I just went in alphabetical order. As I do have the original comics for Cap and the Eternals, I might try to dig those out and scan the covers, since everyone seemed to like seeing the real, beat-up comics.

I kind of wish we had access to his Black Panther stuff (do you?) but I've heard it's pretty awful...

D: I don't have any BP by Kirby.  I've picked up the tpbs to look at them a time or two and have always set them back down!

After our month of the King and his '70's writing, we will need to do a praise-worthy book -- would FF Annual #6 happen to be a favorite of yours?  It was reprinted in G-S FF #6 -- features Annihilus and the birth of Franklin.  We could do a partner review in between Kirby and the Avengers run if you would like.

K: We could review it...but we did already review it on the old Two Girls, etc. blog!

Don't feel bad, I can't remember what I had for lunch last week...

D: "FF Family Matters"!!  What a great idea!!

Jeez...

I'm not kidding -- I've had that G-S FF sitting out where I can see it for a couple of months now, thinking I'd review it as a "Favorite".  Never, ever occurred to me that we'd already done it.

That being said, have you ever thought of re-reviewing some of those great series, like "Celestial Madonna", again with our revised BAB-focused points of view?

K: Yeah, I have, particularly the Cap/"Secret Empire" stuff and the "Celestial Madonna" series. Maybe a little further down the road? Surely there must still be some Bronze Age classics we're over looking. We still have our X-Men continuing reviews to do.  Sadly, FF in the Bronze Age just wasn't very good, same for Thor. I really haven't gone back and looked at Hulk much, mostly due to the Trimpe art, but I may take a look. I keep adding things to my holidays to-do list, and  I know I will never get them all done.

D: For Bronze Age FF, about the only two longer arcs I'd like to do sometime are the Frightful Four farce when they held try-outs in the Baxter Building, and the Son of Doom arc shortly after the team had broken up in the #190s.

As to Thor...  I have some of the hardcovers, but haven't read any of those stories in ages.  I know people like the long tale with the camera crew in Asgard, and the mythical red-headed Thor.

We need to at some point get back to Amazing Spider-Man as well.

Hey, by the way -- I got out the Beast Masterworks a couple of days ago to leaf through the Rutland story.  Egad!!  I didn't mind Bob Brown much on DD, Batman, or even the Avengers -- he was tolerable.  But on this Beast story...  The Juggernaut looks like he needs to get himself to Jenny Craig!  He could have gone to the Rutland parade masquerading as a fishing bobber!  It's too bad for that series that the interiors were so badly drawn as compared to the covers, which I thought were overall excellent.

K: Those two FF arcs were actually pretty good, and I'd say the Galactus vs. High Evolutionary was fun as well. Also the earlier Roy Thomas stuff with Galactus and Gabriel and the Panther in South Africa (or its Marvel equivalent) were solid.

For Thor, I enjoyed the Celestials/Eternals story that Thomas started, but then he diverged into this re-telling of "The Ring of the Nibelung" that was just terrible. I mean, it was awful stuff with Thor standing in for Siegfried and Valkyrie for Brunhilde and it was plopped down right in the middle of this exciting story with the Celestials returning to make judgment on Earth. It seemed to go on forever and I gave up on it, and then at some point they got back to the Celestials, and suddenly all the Asgardians were dead, and it took me a few years to get issue 300 and find out what the heck had happened. The Celestial part was fantastic but the other stuff? Terrible. I can't say that word enough. I have the two trades it is collected in but I will only read the Celestial part. 

I have that Beast/X-Men Masterworks but only thumbed through it because the art was, indeed, wretched. Most of the artwork on the Beast series was by Tom Sutton I think and it made my eyes hurt. I'll have to look at this Bob Brown artwork. Most of the time I find him acceptable but no better than that. Fishing bobber! Lol.

Doug:  So there you have it -- a "day in the life", so to speak.  We hope you enjoyed your All Access pass to the BAB...  Shoot, we could have our own reality show!  Enjoy your weekend!