Episode 773: Tom Scioli's TRANSFORMERS VS GI JOE

Having just talked about the early days of 2000AD, we thought it would be fun to chat with someone with a strip running in the Progs right now. Starting with Prog 2367 was Book Two of the strip “Full Tilt Boogie”, the continuing adventures of teen bounty hunter Tee, her grandmother, and their cat as they criss-cross the galaxy. Drawn by Eduardo Ocana, colored by Eva de la Cruz, lettered by Annie Parkhouse, and written by today’s guest.

She is a multi-hyphenate creator whose CV would take the entire show to lay out in detail, so with her indulgence I will paraphrase. A writer of prose, comics, poetry, film and television, she is also a director and collaborator and obviously a multi-tasker of the highest order. She has mashed up the Archie gang with the Predator, worked with Duncan Jones, and edited an anthology of soldiers autobiographical stories about their deployments. While not afraid to roll up her sleeves and do all manner of creative jobs herself, her eye for collaboration has led her to working with such talents as Carla Speed McNeil (on No Mercy) and Erica Henderson (on the pulp horror Dracula Motherf**ker and the more recent Parasocial), as well as the aforementioned Ocana even prior to “Full Tilt Boogie”.

Greg tried to keep this episode’s conversation coherent but because today’s guest is Alex de Campi, with so many avenues for questions and straight-shooting answers, it was no mean feat. Find out how he did and more on today’s chat!

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Robots From Tomorrow is a comix podcast recorded deep beneath the Earth’s surface. You can subscribe to it via iTunes or through the RSS feed at RobotsFromTomorrow.com. You can also subscribe to our YouTube channel at this link. Follow Greg and the show on Bluesky. Stay safe and enjoy your funny books.

Today’s episode is the second of three looking at the best Superman stories of the Seventies to the mid-Eighties with the DC3Cast’s very own Vince Ostrowski! Vince & Greg dive into what makes the Superman of this era different than his more modern incarnation and start giving you gem after gem of Super-Tales of the post-Silver Age / pre-Crisis Man of Steel. Intercompany crossovers! Intracompany crossovers! History lessons! Horror on a superhero scale! All that plus a REALLY big missile and more on today’s episode!
  

SUPPLEMENTAL MATERIAL 

Comics referred to in this episode are:

• Superman vs The Amazing Spider-Man
• Superman and Spider-Man
• World of Krypton #1-3 (of 3)
• DC Comics Presents #1-4, 26-29, 36
• DC Comics Presents Annual #1
• Superman Annual #9
• The Phantom Zone #1-4 (of 4)

The Phantom Zone and World of Krypton minis, as well as the DC Comics Presents issues, are available as individual issues on DC Universe Infinite.

Superman Annual #9 is not available digitally or collected in any English-language reprint.

The two DC/Marvel crossovers are also unavailable digitally, though they were reprinted at standard comic book size in both the Crossover Classics vol. 1 collection from 1992 and as individual reprints in 1996. They will both be included in the upcoming DC Versus Marvel Omnibus, and presumably available digitally at some point afterwards. 

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Robots From Tomorrow is a comix podcast recorded deep beneath the Earth’s surface. You can subscribe to it via iTunes or through the RSS feed at RobotsFromTomorrow.com. You can also subscribe to our YouTube channel at this link. Follow Greg and the show on Bluesky. Stay safe and enjoy your funny books.

As part of his Someday Reading Project, Greg takes a look at the first dozen programmes of The Galaxy’s Greatest Comic: 2000AD! Do those early installments still hold up? Was Dredd the leader of the pack… or the runt of the litter? What controversial boys’ adventure comic paved the way for Tharg and all that Thrill-Power? All that and more on today’s bite-sized episode! 

 
SUPPLEMENTAL MATERIAL 

Rebellion/2000AD’s First Stories Digital Bundle

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Robots From Tomorrow is a comix podcast recorded deep beneath the Earth’s surface. You can subscribe to it via iTunes or through the RSS feed at RobotsFromTomorrow.com. You can also subscribe to our YouTube channel at this link. Follow Greg and the show on Bluesky. Stay safe and enjoy your funny books.

Today’s episode is the first of three looking at the best Superman stories of the Seventies to the mid-Eighties with the DC3Cast’s very own Vince Ostrowski! Vince & Greg dive into what makes the Superman of this era different than his more modern incarnation and start giving you gem after gem of Super-Tales of the post-Silver Age / pre-Crisis Man of Steel.

Kryptonite No More! Must There Be A Superman! The Great One and the Greatest of All Time! Whiz Wagons! Clones! The Sweet Science! The Wedding of the Century! Hippie Bikers! More quotemarks than you can shake a stick at! All that and more on today’s episode!  

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SUPPLEMENTAL MATERIAL 

Comics referred to in this episode are:

• Superman #232
• Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen #133-141
• Forever People #1
• Superman #233-242
• Superman #247
• Action Comics #404
• Superman vs Muhammad Ali

Superman #232, 247, and Action Comics #484 are not available digitally as individual issues. Action Comics #484 is available digitally in the Lois Lane: A Celebration of 75 Years and Action Comics: 80 Years of Superman: The Deluxe Edition collections. Superman #247 and the main story from #232 (originally from Superman #141) are available digitally in the Superman: A Celebration of 75 Years collection.

Superman vs Muhammad Ali is available digitally but not through DC Universe Infinite.

The rest of the comics are available as individual issues or in the Kryptonite No More, Jack Kirby’s Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen, or Jack Kirby’s The Forever People collections on DC Universe Infinite.

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Robots From Tomorrow is a comix podcast recorded deep beneath the Earth’s surface. You can subscribe to it via iTunes or through the RSS feed at RobotsFromTomorrow.com. You can also subscribe to our YouTube channel at this link. Follow Greg and the show on Bluesky. Stay safe and enjoy your funny books.

Greg kicks off The Someday Project looking at one of his early comics influences: a magazine-sized mind-bender (at least for someone of his age to read it) unlike anything else on the stands. HEAVY METAL? Nope. 2000 AD? Negative. Those are coming soon enough, but today Greg talks about the impact of David A. Trampier's "Wormy" from DRAGON magazine. Does it still hold up? How can you get a hold of it today? All that and more in today's episode!

SUPPLEMENTAL MATERIAL 

The start of "WORMY" on the Internet Archive

"Wormy" ran in DRAGON issues:

• 9-20
• 29-34
• 36, 39, 42-44
• 47-52
• 54-58
• 60-128
• 130-132

Wormy: The Dragon's Dragon

Correspondence with Dave Trampier and A History of His 1985 Attempt to Crowdfund a "Wormy" Anthology

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Robots From Tomorrow is a comix podcast recorded deep beneath the Earth’s surface. You can subscribe to it via iTunes or through the RSS feed at RobotsFromTomorrow.com. You can also subscribe to our YouTube channel at this link. Follow Greg and the show on Bluesky. Stay safe and enjoy your funny books.

The winter break is over, and Greg returns to give listeners a peek behind the curtain in this quick preview of what 2024 has in store for the show, including and most importantly, the lowdown on what has been referred to in hushed whispers around the office as... THE SOMEDAY PROJECT! What new devilry is this? All is revealed in today's episode!

Robots From Tomorrow is a comix podcast recorded deep beneath the Earth’s surface. You can subscribe to it via iTunes or through the RSS feed at RobotsFromTomorrow.com. You can also subscribe to our YouTube channel at this link. Follow Greg and the show on Bluesky. Stay safe and enjoy your funny books. 

Today's guest is someone listeners of this show will be familiar with, as he name is mentioned often and in tones of reverence. For almost 30 years he has worked with such artists as Jae Lee, Jeff Lemire, Bill Sienkiewicz, JH Williams III, and BERNIE WRIGHTSON to bring color into their art in a way that always enhances, never detracts - no mean feat there.  He's also been a teacher/presenter/lecturer of art and illustration at such institutions as Towson University, Johns Hopkins University, the Institute for Contemporary Art in London, and MICA the Maryland Institute College of Art, where he currently a professor. Two of his most recent projects are his recoloring of the Bernie Wrightson's Swamp Thing run for the recent Absolute Edition, and the second volume of Dark Horse Comics' "Richard Corben Library", which collects Den: Neverwhere with his gorgeous restoration work giving it new life. He's Jose Villarrubia, and Greg is thrilled to have him on the show to talk about all of that and more.

Robots From Tomorrow is a twice-monthly comics podcast recorded deep beneath the Earth’s surface. You can subscribe to it via iTunes or through the RSS feed at RobotsFromTomorrow.com. You can also follow Mike and Greg on Twitter. Stay safe and enjoy your funny books.

Today's guest needs no introduction, but we have episode post space to fill so we're doing one anyway.  He's a creator whose balance of romanticism and pragmatism has kept him in the business and thrall of comics for almost 50 years. As an artist, a writer, and a cartoonist, he has almost certainly forgotten more about comics, history and storytelling than most of us will ever know. But thankfully, two of his latest projects are about giving that knowledge back to the comics community. The first is Hey Kids! Comics!, a roman a clef work from Image about the history of mainstream comics whose final issue just came out last month and whose trade collection is due next month. The other is COMIC BOOK U, a series of in-person seminars with writer/editor Mark Waid kicking off next Saturday, November 18th at UCLA that looks to give attendees "an immersive tutorial into the process and craft of creating comic books" . In addition to all of that, he is reviving John Benteen's early 20th Century soldier-of-fortune creation Fargo with an upcoming 96-page adaptation through the crowdfunding platform ZOOP. We are, of course, talking about Howard Chaykin, and Greg got a chance to chat with him about comic book know-how, the collision of past & future, musical theater as comic book inspiration, just how neat Jason Bernard was, and a lot more on today's episode!

Robots From Tomorrow is a twice-monthly comics podcast recorded deep beneath the Earth’s surface. You can subscribe to it via iTunes or through the RSS feed at RobotsFromTomorrow.com. You can also follow Mike and Greg on Twitter. Stay safe and enjoy your funny books.

The last time today's guest was here for his own episode, it was July 2014, during the final days of the Kickstarter campaign for Little Nemo: Dream Another Dream, the Eisner-winning anthology title assembling a truly dream-worthy roster of creators to pay tribute to Windsor McCay's seminal comic strip. In the nearly ten years since then, he has gone on to found Beehive Books, where he and creative partner Maielle Doliveux continue to put out book after book, work after work that seem like artifacts from some other, better timeline. 

From Illuminated Editions pairing such literary classics as Crime and Punishment, Peter Pan, and The Kwaidan Collection with artists like Dave McKean, Brecht Evans, and Kent Williams, to documenting the continuing works of cartoonist Ronald Wemberly, to blanket tapestries from the likes of Michael DeForge, Jim Woodring, Yuko Shimizu, to a literal suitcase of period-accurate text & ephemera for the epistolarian horror classic Dracula, and so much more, my guest apparently hears the word NO as an invitation, not an obstacle. He is Josh O'Neill, and Greg is thrilled to have him back on the show after much too long an absence to talk about all things Beehive Books.

Robots From Tomorrow is a twice-monthly comics podcast recorded deep beneath the Earth’s surface. You can subscribe to it via iTunes or through the RSS feed at RobotsFromTomorrow.com. You can also follow Mike and Greg on Twitter. Stay safe and enjoy your funny books.

There are many days working in the show that Greg is grateful to be an observer of comix rather than a creator of them, because the level of craft and skill his hypothetical output would have to measure up against already gives him the willies. That being said, today’s guest has already put together such a formidable resume and body of work (all before the age of 30) it makes even this comix-adjacent host wonder what the hell he's been doing with his life. 

With nearly 10 published works to her credit, Tillie Walden has already won 2 Eisner Awards, 2 Ignatz Awards, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, AND a Hugo Award nomination. She remains a faculty member at her alma mater, the Center for Cartoon Studies, and is currently in her first of three years as Vermont's Cartoonist Laureate. This episode has Greg peppering the cartoonist with a myriad of questions about her new book, the second volume in her Walking Dead trilogy about fan-favorite queer teen survivor Clementine, the boundaries of YA horror, how nothing brings out generation gaps like an apocalypse, just what it is in Vermont's water that makes it a cartoonist mecca, and much more!

Robots From Tomorrow is a twice-monthly comics podcast recorded deep beneath the Earth’s surface. You can subscribe to it via iTunes or through the RSS feed at RobotsFromTomorrow.com. You can also follow Mike and Greg on Twitter. Stay safe and enjoy your funny books.