This is going to be a bit nomadic and aimless, with some thoughts and things I want to remember. On with the show and don’t munch on your popcorn too loudly; please be considerate to other patrons.

Anyone else getting lots of Russian spam? I get an inbox full of subject headings containing Cyrillic letters, which is rather cool. A new source of revenue for the Russian mafia?

Over at the Pulse, Ellis talks about NextWave. Now, I’ll admit that I’m a fan of Ellis, but this does sound kind of interesting. Immonen’s art has an animated series quality to it that is very pleasing to the eye and Warren seems to be going in to this project with his tongue so far in his cheek he’s going to require extensive oral surgery to remove it, so it could be something to watch.

In other comics news, Wizard World Chicago happened this weekend; lots of news, where some people go exclusive for other people, yet more comics are announced, and stuff happened, mostly to the reaction of ‘Meh’. I’ll look forward to Ed Brubaker and Michael Lark on Daredevil, but I might wait for the trade, despite knowing in advance that I will enjoy it. However, via Jog, the bit of bad news out of WWC is that The Intimates is cancelled as of #12. I feel bad now for my comments about The Intimates in my last post. More grist for the mill concerning why I pick up certain comics.

Which brings me to some of my rambly shit. Jog writes (and writes and writes – the individual posts tend towards the long) good posts; they are intelligent and make me feel inadequate and make me wonder why I do this blogging thing.

Now, I’ll try not to get all whiny, so bear with me. There are some excellent comic blogs around that provide different coverage of the wide world of comics: Mike’s experience of working in a comic shop (and his encyclopaedic knowledge of comics); Dave’s Long Box for humour; the sharp writing style of Johnny Bacardi; the cynical and witty approach of another comic shop worker at postmodernbarney, to name a few off the top of my head.

So why do I write this blog?

I don’t have an encyclopaedic knowledge of the form, I don’t experiment in the more artistic avenues that the medium embraces, and I don’t have the critical powers of some (despite the title of my blog).

I think the main reason, apart from the enjoyment of writing, was to talk about comics (and film and television and whatever) in a forum where like-minded individuals could possibly engage in discussion, as I am particularly shy when it comes to even commenting on people’s posts in Haloscan, which is pretty pathetic, I know.

This is complicated by the Delay Factor – the majority of the comic bloggers are American and get their comics (and film and television) earlier than us Brits, so I miss out on some discussion due to the fast pace of the web and the nature of blogs themselves. When I lived and worked in the USA, I felt delighted to be on even footing when it came to comics and films and (some) television programmes – when I returned to the UK, I had to take myself off my film buff mailing list because it was depressing seeing them talk about films I wouldn’t be seeing for some time.

Anyway, I was going to ask why other people blog, but I don’t think there are sufficient readers to initiate a discussion (which isn’t a desperate plea for comments, rather an honest assessment of a blog which lost a lot of momentum when it went on hiatus for several months) and is a feeble excuse for not discussing it further myself. I just wanted to see if the act of writing about the concept behind it would crystallize my thoughts. I’m not sure it worked but it was enjoyable doing it nonetheless. For me, it’s not about getting my blog on the links section of other bloggers (although I am happy and proud when I do see it – I’d be talking shit if I didn’t) or getting lots of hits on the site meter, although it’s nice to know that people are reading this blog. I want to write because I love comics and film and television and comedy and want to see those thoughts published and hopefully get better about writing about them. We’ll take it from there after that.

That’s the rambly shit finished, btw. I have some ideas for specific topics that I will blog about, so look forward to genuine, possibly original, content in the next few days.