No Such Thing As A Comics Celebrity…

By Tony Lee

So. I’m writing this on a Wednesday morning, about twelve hours after the surprising news that Heath Ledger has passed away burst onto the interwub. And I’m a little sad, to be honest. I mean, I know that some people claim that he was a colossal dick, and he was a bit of a prima and all that, but I liked him. When he was cast as the Joker I was one of the few people who immediately said ‘come on! Give the guy a break! Perhaps he’s got what it takes.’

And now he’s dead, apparently found naked in Mary-Kate Olsen’s bedroom with a pharmacy of pills around him. It’s a damned shame.

But that’s not the point of this column – the point is what was said when I discovered this news. I was sitting around friends, watching wrestling on TV and I had an email informing me of it. I told my friends the news, and they were suitably shocked. One of them said to me ‘See? That’s what the pressures of fame get you. Are you sure you really want that?’ And as quick as a flash his girlfriend replied ‘yeah, but he’s a comics writer. They don’t become celebrities.’

And that made me think. Because actually, it’s incredibly true. In the mainstream, there is no such thing as a comic celebrity. If I was found naked in bed surrounded by pills, would I hit the news? Of course not. Even if someone like Joe Quesada was found this way, it still wouldn’t reach the BBC.

(And no, that’s not a veiled Brand New Day threat; I picked Joe because currently he’s one of the biggest names in comics.)

And yeah, I know that I’ll suddenly get emails galore saying that Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, Grant Morrison, Mark Millar, Brian Bendis et al all qualify for celebrity, but I said at the top that I’m talking about the mainstream. The world of comics is a niche market, a genre mentality. Alan Moore can walk around his stately home with a shotgun for days and not shoot random paparazzi. They just don’t care any more.

Sure, Frank Miller could be classed as a bona fide celebrity now, but that’s only because of Sin City and 300 hitting the box offices. He’s no longer a God dammed comics celebrity – he’s now a God dammed movie celebrity. Many of the people who loved his God dammed films don’t even realise that they were once a God dammed comic book or God dammed graphic novel.

It’s a sad fact but it’s true. You can be the biggest fish of a small pond, and yet the sea won’t have heard of you.

But in comics, in the land of the comic fan, we do have comics celebrities. We’re fascinated by the writers, the artists, the creators and we will queue up for hours just to catch a glimpse of them. Warren Ellis had a queue around the block at last year’s San Diego. At one point the queue for his signing found themselves facing the equally long queue for Stan Lee and the hall was almost broken in half by squeaky nerd-screams as they pulled out authentic lightsaber replicas and giveaway plastic Zelda swords and began to do battle. Only a sudden rumour of Bruce Campbell in the food court was able to calm the fight down enough for the security to get in there with the batons, taser guns and the tear gas.

And at the same San Diego, Neil Gaiman, there as a special guest presenting the Eisners had to be smuggled into the convention through a back door disguised as a large fluffy chipmunk for his panels rather than walk through the front of the convention centre.

For fans are insane. Let’s face it, its short for fanatic, and that’s what a lot of them are. Alan Moore doesn’t do conventions any more after one fan followed him into the bloody toilet and asked for an autograph while Alan was at the urinal. We might all like our adoration, but there are points where it becomes a little, well, creepy. I mean, even if Alan had turned and pissed on his shoes, the chances are they’d be up on Ebay the following day. ‘Alan Moore piss-stained trainers’. I can see it now.

But that said, when you’re an up-and-comer like me? You love to meet fans. Because a fan of your work? Well, that’s someone who’s actually read your work. And that’s one more person that you actually expected to. You find yourself split between nodding and going ‘thank you. Thank you for the kind words’ and grabbing them and going ‘are you retarded? Did you not consider picking up Diggle’s Hellblazer instead? It’s much better! You wasted money! Hahahaha! You wasted money! For me! Fuck you, fanboy! I win! Hahahahaha’ which is a little disturbing, when alls said and done.

Never let the headsquirrels out while talking to a fan. Or, more importantly, an editor.

So in our clique-y little world there are comics celebrities, although when you point this out to many of them (including people like Warren Ellis who base an entire internet persona on being a lord and master of all and Internet Jesus), they’ll shake their heads and vehemently deny it. And to me, that humility is what makes a true comics celebrity. People like Mike Carey, Geoff Johns, Howard Chaykin, Mike Oeming, David Hine – people who like a deer in the headlights whenever they’re told that someone loves their stuff. These are the people that I class as a celebrity.

Oh, and me of course. Because I’m totally awesome.

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And so in less than two weeks we have the annual Great San Diego Scrum, where countless hotels open up their special convention rate to a website that’s twitchier than an epileptic with tourettes and a phone line that’s held together by string and chewing gum. For an hour on February 6th, thousands of people will continually phone and email the hotels in a vain attempt to grab the hotel room of their dreams. Some will succeed – but to do so? They’ll be hitting the phones at 9.00 and one second and they’ll have the room by 9.01. Anything after that? You’re fucked.

I’m not going to tell you our devious plan this year, but we have the phone banks ready and entire internet cafes ready to ensure I have the penthouse suite that I require. Or at least a hotel room that’s not three miles away and across the bay.

To be honest it’s not too bad – last year we were at the Radisson, and it was about a mile walk which, to a Brit is laughable and actually quite pleasant. But say this to an American? They look at you like you hired a circus midget to fuck their poodle. I shared a two bed room with four others, bringing my own camp bed and sleeping bag. Every morning I put it down, every night I put it back up. I was fine. I actually enjoyed it; it was like a sleepover with some mates. And it’s this mentality that you need when booking a San Diego hotel room, because the chances are, you’ll fail. And you will end up on someone’s floor. That said, we have the Hard Rock Hotel added to the scrum this year, which should be interesting. It’s the Gaslamp end of the convention centre, the opposite end to the Hyatt and a good ten to fifteen minute walk away. Whether the Hyatt will manage to keep the end of evening drinking location crown is to be seen. This could start a new trend with the OMNI and the Hard Rock becoming the new places to hang out.

Of course, that’s even if you get a hotel room.

This year I have friends helping me get a hotel room – mainly because on the 6th of February, I’m giving a lecture in London at 8pm. And, with the hotel rush kicking off at 9am, that’s 5pm Greenwich Mean Time. So, I’ll manage about half an hour of stress and crying before I have to drive the two hours down to London.

For those of you in London, it’s called ‘The Bard: Creating Gods For Fun and Profit’ and is upstairs at the Deveraux Pub, Deveraux Street or something. It’ll be fun. I get to mock people, so I’ll be laughing at least.

I’ve not done this lecture for over two years now, and I’ll admit the nerves are there. This really is a hit and miss talk, because it’s technically not part of any organised spiritual tradition, pagan path or religion. It’s me talking about energy, archetypes, ‘God’ and what we make of it. But I do promise a free new God or Goddess for every attendee. Which is nice, isn’t it! You get your own brand new imaginary friend.

Come along. Bring popcorn.

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Other things. Many of you now know that the untitled Moonstone one shot I’ve been talking about for ages is called MILF Magnet. Yes, I shit you not. It’s some of the funniest shit I’ve ever written, all wrapped up in a nice deviant little bow. Hopefully it’ll be out in time for San Diego, but most likely August. More news as I can announce.

Basically it’s the story of Tazer, a young, late teens superhero in a League of Justice who, in a fight with the usual fodder of bad guy finds that he’s accidentally cursed himself with an irresistible attraction to any woman over the age of forty. And of course shenanigans entail as he finds his crime fighting compromised by a variety of different ways. And it does have the best line I’ve ever written in it –

“Now f*ck me hard and call me Granny.”

Utter genius, incredibly funny and brilliantly drawn. Moonstone came to me with this almost a year ago going ‘We’ve had an idea… your name came up… you might want to do it under a fake name’ and they’ve really let me take charge of it. If you liked The Pro, you’ll love MILF Magnet.

The Gloom is still running weekly at The Chemistry Set, so go and read. We’re into episode #2 now, and the action is starting to build.

Hope Falls #3 should also be hitting the shops in the next week or two in the US, and apparently is out already in the UK, so remember to go and pick it up. Or Daddy will have to show you on the teddy bear where he’s going to hurt you.

And so we bid farewell to January, officially the longest and most difficult month of the year. What exciting things will February bring? And how can I use it to my infernal advantage?

Well. Booking a fucking hotel room would be a start…

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Discuss this column at the Only A Forum forum.
© 2008, Tony Lee

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