After bouncing around at a few local colleges in upstate New York, Randy Gentile made the decision to move to New York City where he attended Pratt Institute. He landed an internship in the famous Marvel Bullpen and was able to turn that into a full-time gig in the now defunct Marvel in-house lettering department. He later transitioned to Chris Eliopoulos’ Virtual Calligraphy lettering studio.
With VC he lettered damn near every Marvel book at one time or another including Amazing Spider-Man, Fantastic Four, Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, Uncanny X-Men, Punisher, and Marville… wait, Marville?
Anyway, after 7 years of lettering Randy decided to make a go of it on his own without the aid of Chris “Obi-Wan” Eliopoulos. Since then he’s begun lettering for DC Comics where his work can be seen in funny books like Batman, Detective Comics, Gotham Underground, Teen Titans and Booster Gold.
Outside of his lettering work he self-publishes an autobiographical comic called NYComix and an uber-fast paced superhero strip called Randall. Both comics have been featured on Comic Geek Speak and Fanboy Radio.
When he’s not wallowing in lettering self-pity he spends his time in Brooklyn along with his lovely wife, Ereisa and their three cats Finnian, Don Fanucci and Olive.
Are Floppies Dead?
Last week I expressed my distaste for Ed Brubaker's decision to not include any extras in his Criminal Trade paperbacks. A few folks were kind enough to reply to this on my Font of Wisdom Message board and they respectfully disagreed with me. 
If you missed last week's column, then what the hell were you doing? Just kiddin', basically I picked up the latest issue of Criminal and really enjoyed it. The comic was a good read and I really loved the extras in the back.
Look, I grew up on Bronze Era Marvel books that were chocked full of letters pages and the Bullpen Bulletins were in their prime. Hell, the Bullpen Bulletins were what made me want to work there one day. I LOVE comic book extras.
The Criminal extras included a really nice essay by crime author Duane Swierczynski that was as fun to read as the comic itself. I admire Brubaker's desire to give his readers more bang for their buck and I feel that the extra bang should carry over to the trade as well. Sure, there's no rule stating that this has to happen, but to me, a trade paperback should have those little extra bells and whistles. And knowing that the floppies have these amazing bells and whistles, it's a shame I can't get them all in one nice package suitable for my bookshelf.
Honestly, I think it might be time to start moving away from floppies. I'm sure there are folks out there reading this thinking I'm insane (it won't be the first time) but really why are we sticking with these things? It's nostalgia at this point. I loved Brian Vaughan and Edwardo Risso's Logan but that book was 4 bucks. 4 bucks for a pamphlet of stapled together glossy paper. I'm to the point now where if I love the first issue of a book I stop buying it and I wait for the trade. When the trade hits I've got a nice square bound book with Edwardo Risso sketches in the back, maybe a few pages of BKV's amazingly fun to read scripts, a cover gallery... a complete comic book experience all in one nifty piece.
Comic fans and creators all wish comics were more "accepted" by the mainstream. Is a floppy pamphlet the route to go when you're looking for mainstream respect?
Hand someone a floppy issue of Watchmen and hand someone else Absolute Watchmen. Sure they might flip through each one but at the end of the day one guy is holding one twelfth of the story and the other guy has a tome containing an epic story the best our medium has to offer.
Floppies do benefit from the monthly format...the cliffhanger, the Wednesday trip to the LCS, etc. But the thing is, so many books today are written for the trade and just frankly read better in that format.
The Millar/Hitch Ultimates reads way better as a trade than it did in the "monthly." Which, with Hitch, was damn near yearly. I still haven't read volume 2 of that series. I completely lost interest with all those delays. How about getting a friend to read comics? Are you going to hand them an issue of Powers or are you going to hand them the "Who Killed Retro Girl" trade?
Bendis, by the way, does a great job of packing his trades with fun stuff. Powers has one of the best letters pages in comics and he even reprints them in the insanely well-done Powers hardcovers. You're getting the full Powers experience with that hardcover and it's worth every penny. Take out those extras and you're missing out on some really fun stuff.
Powers is another book that reads much better in trade format. I was loving the current story arc in Powers but it's been so damn long since the last issue I can't remember what I loved about it. So, again, I'm off to trade waiting. At least that wait will pay-off with a complete storyline.
One argument I heard about the no extras in the Criminal trade is because the Icon imprint doesn't market the book for the writers so they have to do everything they can to get folks to buy the monthlies. Look, I sympathize with their plight but honestly... you're getting your creator-owned book distributed by Marvel Comics. These aren't grass roots mini comics they're hand stapling on the kitchen table. One email and they've got a preview on Newsarama. They've got prime space in Previews every month. Go talk to creators doing real independent comics and see how fast they'll switch marketing strategies. It could be worse, guys.
Anyway, getting back to the no-extras in Criminal trade paperbacks, basically what I'm trying to say is why not give people everything today's comic has to offer? Criminal is going to sit on the shelves of dozens of Barnes and Noble and Borders bookstores across the country. Every day people who haven't read a comic in ages and who haven't read a comic ever will pass by the book and while they'll get a really well done comic, they'll be missing out on all the extra stuff they can find in a comic shop. Throw new readers all you've got. Show them the essays, the letters pages covered with fan devotion, show them the sketching process by the artist, and show them the scripts that the artists transformed into amazing art. Show new readers soup to nuts what goes into today's comic book. Even long time fans will love to see it.
When I tell people I'm a comic book letterer, you'd be amazed how many people say: "There are people who draw the balloons?" Seriously. They must think the balloons form out of thin air. Maybe there are little elves making them. Either way they are always surprised to hear all the hard work that the writer, penciler, inker, colorist and letterer put into a comic book. Trade paperbacks are a way to show people this and I guarantee they'll be astounded.
So that was my round about way of telling Brubaker to throw some extras in the trade.
I'll see ya'll next week. Thanks for reading.
Font You!
-Randy
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