FLAMING RIVER CON 2024

 

FLAMING RIVER CON 2024 is a special nerd and pop culture event, celebrating LGBTQIA+ geek culture and featuring queer vendors, art, comics, books, zines, podcasts, panels and workshops. It’s at the Cleveland Heights Community Center, 1 Monticello Blvd., Cleveland, Ohio 44118. This will be my third year attending as a guest. I’m thrilled beyond words to be returning to one of my favorite conventions of them all.

I’ll be appearing on the Social Justice and Comics panel, 10:30 am to 11:15 am. I’ll also be at the VIP Party, 3:30 pm to 4:15 pm where I’ll be happy to answer questions, sign any Isabella comics you have (for free) and talk comics in general.

The vendors room will have 40 tables filled with cool stuff from all over the community. Last year, I bought a bunch of books and comics. There will also be several non-profits exhibiting at the event and sharing solid information about rights and available services. At this time in our troubled history, we need to know all we can to protect ourselves and those we love.

Other panels and programming will include “First Steps to Self-Sufficiency,” “Cartoons 4 Change,” Sci-Fi Queer Erotica,” “Queerness Mental Health and Pop Culture Representation,” “Intersections and Sci-Fi,” “To Boldly Go: One Small Step for Trans Woman in STEM,” “Finding Your People” and more. There will be cosplay and a writing workshop for kids, an intro to table top gaming, gaming and Pokemon Parties.

The Flaming River Con is a family-friendly event. Entry is free, but a $5 donation at the door is suggested. Take it from me, my friends, it’ll be about the best $5 you have ever spent.

© 2024 Tony Isabella

WHERE IN THE WORLD IS TONY ISABELLA?

 

When not practicing scaring small children for Halloween (see above photo), I spend most of my time at my home in Medina, Ohio. Where I write stuff and work on my eBay and garage sales. I’m currently in the middle of a very busy September.

Once I hit October, my plans include writing and then sending out pitches for comic-book series, graphic novels, novels, short stories, TV series and movies. The way this will work is, when a pitch or script is ready to go, I’ll make announcements here and on my social medium. I won’t be going into detail on my pitches, but there will be enough information to hopefully entice s smart publisher or producer to ask for more.

Though my final Vast Accumulation of Stuff garage sales will be Friday and Saturday, September 27 and 28, I’ll bring some stuff to conventions I’ll be attending through the end of the year.

My eBay store, which is run by my dear friend Rob Petersen, is a year-round venture. I’ll continue going through my VAOS throughout the fall, winter and spring to add great new items to the store.

In addition to my writing and that other stuff, I’m available to appear at conventions and movies, TV shows and what have you. I enjoyed my brief role in that episode of Black Lightning and in a small local production. I would like to do more, enough so I can become a full member of SAG/AFTRA. I can play male, female and inhuman roles.

Here’s a schedule of where you can see me the rest of 2024. I’ve got gigs lined up for 2025, but I’ll share those with you later in the year.

Saturday, September 21: I’ll be a guest at The Flaming River Con in Cleveland Heights, Ohio. This is a wonderful LGBTQ+ event for fans of comics, science fiction and more. I’ll be doing a panel in the morning and a meet-and-greet in the afternoon. I’ll also be at one of the after parties.

Friday and Saturday, September 27 and 28. I’m already restocking for this sale and adding some amazing items. There’ll be a table of cool Godzilla stuff and much more.

Saturday, November 2: I will be a guest at the Lawrence County Collectors Convention in New Castle, Pennsylvania.

Saturday and Sunday, November 9 and 10: I’ll be returning to one of my favorite events, the Akron Comicon.

Friday thru Sunday, December 6-8: I’ll also be a returning guest at GalaxyCon Columbus. I had a blast there last year and expect to do the same this year.

As we get closer to each of these events, I’ll write about them here and elsewhere. But I wanted to give you as much advance notice as I could.

I’ll be back soon with more bloggy stuff!

© 2024 Tony Isabella

BATMAN: THE SILVER AGE CLASSICS PART SIX

 

It’s been almost five months since I last wrote about the fun stories reprinted in Batman: The Silver Age Omnibus Volume One. It’s a massive tome that collects Batman #101-116 and Detective Comics #233-257, spanning mid-1956 through mid-1958. In an effort to cover more vintage comics faster, I’m going lighter on the story summaries. Let us begin with a new masked hero who has joined the Dynamic Duo and seems to be running the show.

Detective Comics #245 [July 1957] features Edmond Hamilton’s “The Dynamic Trio,” drawn by Sheldon Moldoff and Charles Paris. Moldoff also drew the cover as well. The Grand Comics Database aka the GCD summarizes the story:

Batman declares he needs help to crack a smuggling ring and brings in a new hero called Mysteryman. {Reporter/photographer] Vicki Vale spends the whole story trying to figure out who Mysteryman is.

This is the Batman I loved as a kid. He fights against crime without being driven by rage. He’s respectful of allies. He does the right thing. I like to think there is a still a readership out there who would love this Batman as much as I do.

 

Mysteries abound in Batman #109 [August 1957]. Behind the cover by Moldoff and Paris, we have three short Batman stories. The writers of the first two are unknown.

In “Three Crimes Against Batman,” drawn by Moldoff and Paris, a crook steals fairly worthless Batman-related objects as part of a plot to unmask our hero. It’s a too convoluted plot, both the crook’s plan and the story itself, that relies on the crook and the hero thinking alike. An inferior story.

“Follow the Batman” is another convoluted plot. A gang of crooks impersonate Batman to steal radium. A headmaster and students of a school for amateur detectives stumbles onto the plot and seeks to track the criminals. It’s slightly better than the first tale. Moldoff and Paris are the artists.

“The 1001 Inventions of Batman” is the gem of the issue. Written by Hamilton and drawn by Dick Sprang and Paris, it delighted me as a kid. A criminal scientist duplicates one of Batman’s crime-fighting devices and uses it to his own larcenous ends. The good guys know he’s duplicated a device, but don’t know which one. In figuring this out, our heroes recall several inventions. Young Tony would have loved to have had them all. I have no memory of the other stories in this issue, but this one has stayed with me since I first read it over six decades ago.

                                                                              

Detective Comics #246 [August 1957] presented ‘Murder at Mystery Castle” by Bill Finger with art by Moldoff and Paris. The cover was by Moldoff. The synopsis: The murder of John Barham in his own castle that he had disassembled in Europe and rebuilt in America draws the Caped Crusaders into a murder mystery that nearly costs them their lives.

As is to be expected from a tale by Batman’s co-creator, this is a classic. Barham’s castle with its ancient and still working weapons is fascinating. Each suspect has a possible motive. The clue to how Barham was killed is a good one as is Batman’s logic in figuring out the killer’s identity. It’s a mystery that plays fair with the readers.

                                                                           

Batman #110 [September 1957] was a pause in the run of covers by Moldoff. It was one of two covers this month drawn by Curt Swan and inked by Stan Kaye. Inside were the usual three short Batman stories.

“Crime of the Month Club” was written by Dave Wood with art by Sprang and Paris. Criminals committing heists of various kinds are using plans clearly devised by a mastermind. The opening splash reveals that mastermind is the Joker, selling crimes to the members of his crime-of-the-month club, but the story itself treats his identity as a mystery. Batman figures out the pattern to the crimes and foils the Joker who, for some reason, decides to carry out a crime in person. Not a particularly strong story.

“The Secret of Batman’s Butler” is by Finger, Moldoff and Kaye. It retells how Alfred came to work for Bruce Wayne, differing from his first appearance in several ways. In the story, Alfred thinks he’s accidentally exposed Batman’s secret identity to a criminal and decides to quit. Things are not what they appeared to Alfred, but the revelation of the truth makes perfect sense and is heartwarming.

“The Phantom Batman” is by Hamilton, Sprang and Paris. An explosion in an experimental electronics laboratory makes Batman a literal phantom who can neither be touched or touch anything. He has to overcome this ability/disability to bring a criminal gang to justice.

                                                                         

Detective Comics #247 [September 1957] with “The Man Who Ended Batman’s Career” has the second Swan/Kaye cover. The story is by Finger, Moldoff and Paris. It’s a favorite of mine.

Professor Milo, who will show up in a few more tales throughout the decade has a plan to destroy Batman. Using his psychological knowledge, the mad scientist installs an extreme fear of bats in our hero. Batman adopts the alternate identity of Starman, but his bat phobia continues to cripple his crime-fighting. I loved this story as a kid and still love it. There’s a reason Finger is my favorite Batman writer.

Moldoff is back on cover duty for Batman #111 [October 1957), which features two stories by Finger and one by Hamilton. All are penciled by Moldoff with inks by Paris on the first two and Kaye on the third.

In “The Gotham City Safari,” Batman and Robin become members of the Safari Club for their work hunting down the most dangerous game: criminals! The setting is a large estate which has been divided into parcels resembling and stocked with animals from Africa, India and Mexico. The non-violent hunt turns deadly when a member is murdered.

From writer Finger, young Tony learned “a sharp, violent blow on the tip of a rhino’s horn will knock him out temporarily.” I never got the chance to test this out back then or later.

“The Other Bruce Wayne” is also by Finger. Our hero was named for a cousin who is a great detective. The cousin is appalled by Bruce’s social butterfly lifestyle and vows to train him to be a detective. Hilarity ensues.

Hamilton’s “The Armored Batman” is the cover story. Threatened by the mysterious Blair Graeme, Batman and Robin don medieval armor to protect themselves. All Gotham is baffled, but there is a method to this madness.

That’s all for today. Watch for another look at Silver Age Batman in the near-future.

© 2024 Tony Isabella

THINGS THAT MADE ME HAPPY IN AUGUST

 

My penultimate Vast Accumulation of Stuff garage sales of the year were big fun and very profitable. Fans came from literally all over the country with one of my Facebook friends coming from Texas on his way to visit his family in Michigan. There were familiar faces and new ones. Including one fan who had last seen me thirty years ago at a Mid-Ohio-Con where Bob Ingersoll and I had signed his copy of Captain America: Liberty’s Torch. He said we had treated him with great kindness and made him feel like a part of the family. Ripples, my friends, ripples. You never know when a simple act of kindness will remain with someone all their lives and, hopefully, inspire them to treat others in kind.

Sales-wise, I reached 113% of my goal for the weekend. That money will go towards a much-needed renovation of my bathroom and save Saintly Wife Barb from the horror of my using hers. This is how you stay married for forty years.

My final VAOS garage sales of 2024 will be Friday and Saturday, September 27 and 28, 9 am to noon at 840 Damon Drive, Medina, Ohio. I’ve already started restocking for that event.

Moving on, here are things that brought me joy in August.

August 1: Monster Bash #53. I came for the amazing cover feature on one of my favorite movies of all time, but I’m staying because the entire magazine is fun. I also enjoyed the recollections from the readers and the “My Favorite Things” parody.

August 2: Batman: Caped Crusader. Batman is back on Amazon Prime! I love the animation style. I love the new take on the Penguin. I love the sense of retro dread in every shot. The writing and acting are excellent. Highly recommended.

August 3: The Complete Web of Horror. This book reprints the short-lived but pivotal magazine of the 1960s and adds stories originally created for subsequent issues. Wrightson. Kaluta. Reese. Brunner. It’s a solid contender for an Eisner Award. 

                                                                     

 

August 4: Vivien Chien’s Peking Duck and Cover is her new “Noodle Shop Mystery.” Once again, Lana Lee finds herself in the middle of a murder at Cleveland’s Asia Village. Why hasn’t Hollywood turned these great books into a TV series?

August 5: A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder (Netflix). Pip is looking into the murder of a girl five years earlier. The girl’s boyfriend confessed and committed suicide. Pip doesn’t think that’s the real story. One episode in and I’m hooked.

August 6: Tracker. It was fun seeing Jensen Ackles playing Justin Hartley’s brother. I’m glad he’ll be back next season to continue the Shaw family drama. It’s one of the few ongoing TV subplots that has been able to hold my interest.

August 7: Sarge Steel. I’ve been thinking of this 1960s character of late, triggered by the absolute vile way DC Comics portrays him in its brutal fare. He deserves much better. For now, I’ll have to be content with a collection of his original tales.

August 8: Wonder Woman Vol. 1: Outlaw by Tom King, Daniel Sampere and Tomeu Morey. Despite its vile characterization of Sarge Steel, this is an intense and well-written book with breathtaking art by Sampere and Morey.

                                                                       

August 9: Mega Crocodile 2. I was looking for some goofy fun and, yowza, did this cheesy Chinese monster movie do the job! Possibly the most manic crocodiles I’ve seen, victims flung all over, a good human story. You can see it on YouTube.

August 10: Mad Scientist #31. When you’re as disorganized as I am, you sometimes find hidden unread gems like this 2016 issue. A fine issue, especially editor/publisher Martin Arlt’s amazing article on The Thing from Another World.

August 11: Action Comics #1067 features Jefferson Pierce before he became Black Lightning. Written by Gail Simone and drawn by Eddy Barrows, it’s authentic Black Lightning. Something we need to see more of in DC comic books.

August 12: Bad Monkey. Vince Vaughn is a suspended police detective who gets drawn into a case involving a severed arm and many levels of corruption. This terrific new Apple+ TV is based on the novel by Carl Hiaasen. I’m enjoying the heck out of it.

August 13: Washington’s Gay General: The Legends and Loves of Baron von Steuben by Josh Trujillo and Levi Hastings. The Baron shaped U.S. military training. Members of the LGBTQ+ community have been contributing to our nation from the start.

August 14: Done-in-one stories. I recently read two terrific ones: Batman/Superman: World’s Finest #12 and Doctor Strange #18, both by Mark Waid. These are welcome relief from the overblown story arcs and crossover events we see too many of.

                                                                              

August 15: Jackpot! starring Awkwafina and John Cena, and streaming on Amazon Prime, this is a goofy movie set in a near-future L.A. where if you kill a big lottery winner, you get their money. It’s big dumb fun and just what I needed.

August 16: Once again, manga exhibits its amazing range. My Brain is Different: Stories of ADHD and Other Developmental Disorders by Monzusu presents nine true tales that offer some basic information for readers. I recommend it to librarians.

August 17: Gender Studies: The Confessions of an Accidental Outlaw by Ajuan Mance is a neat little graphic album of autobiographical stories. Race, gender and geekiness mix in a work that is funny and insightful. I liked it a lot.

August 18: Batman/Superman: World’s Finest by Mark Waid and Dan Mora. After reading the first three trades, I realized this is my favorite current DC Comics title. So I added it to my pull list at my friendly not-in-my-neighborhood comics shop.

August 19: Anyone Comics. Located at 831 Nostrand Avenue in my once-home of Brooklyn, New York, Anyone has been my friendly not in my neighborhood comics shop for several months. They’re great and I hope to visit them in person some day. 8-19-24.

August 20: Valentine Bluffs Massacre by S.A. Check, James Kukoric and Andrea Arcari, this entertaining sequel to My Bloody Valentine movies is published by American Mythology Productions. Not the stuff of awards, but fun nonetheless.

August 21: My friend Mark Dooley has recently published a slew of comic books, including the moving The Actual, Semi-True Adventures of Mark and Dee Holiday Special. Different and worthwhile, his comics are worth checking out.

                                                                         

August 22: Lula Dean’s Little Library of Banned Books. A book banner sets up a mini-library of “decent” books in her yard. A prankster puts the book covers on banned books. The ripples from this go far. Entertaining and suspenseful.

August 23: RizTech. Located at 215 S. Court Street on Medina’s City Square, this fine establishment recovered my data from when my old computer and set me up with a new computer. I recommend them highly.

August 24: Census by Marc Bernadin, Adam Freeman and Sebastian Priz. Liam Malone gets a job with the Census Bureau registering all manner of supernatural beings. It’s clever, dire and funny. I’m looking forward to the second volume.

August 25: “Legendary.” In its April 28 episode, The Equalizer took on anti-LGBTQ bigotry and conversion camps. Sadly, over two dozen states still allow these evil institutions.

                                                                       

August 26: Huda F Are You? By Huda Fahmy is the first of three semi-autobiographical graphic novels in which the author both celebrates and explores her American-Muslim identity. Hilarious, yet also serious in portraying anti-Muslim bigotry.

August 27: The Killer. Streaming on Peacock, this is director’s John Woo’s remake of his 1989 film. Nathalie Emmanuel plays hit woman Zee. I make no excuses for loving solid action movies with lethal ladies. I just do.

August 28: John Wick 4. Oh, my dear Keanu, your unkempt mass slaughtering never fails to entertain me, though I’m at a loss to figure out why. And Bill Skarsgard was wonderfully nasty as the villain. Will there really be a John Wick 5?

August 29: The Continental. This three-part series takes us back to the hotel-for-assassins (seen in John Wick) in the 1970s and the battle between a young Winston Scott and the thoroughly vile Mel Gibson. More high body count fun.

                                                                            

August 30: Only Murders in the Building is back with its fourth season murder mystery stretching from New York to Hollywood. Steve, Martin, Selena, I love you all madly. You’re must-watch TV for Saintly Wife Barb and me.

August 31: Animals #1 by Keith Foster and Ed Condon. I picked up this creepy “what the frack is happening with nature” comic book at G-Fest. It was suspenseful enough that I have ordered the next issue.

Here are my “Best of the Month” picks.

BEST COMIC BOOK OR GRAPHIC NOVEL: Batman/Superman: World’s Finest by Mark Waid and Dan Mora

BEST BOOK: Lula Dean’s Little Library of Banned Books

BEST MOVIE OR TV SHOW: Only Murders in the Building

BEST PERSON(S): The staff at Anyone Comics.

BEST OTHER THING: Mega Crocodile 2

Keep watching this space for much more bloggy fun, including a list of my upcoming appearances. Love you all madly.

© 2024 Tony Isabella

SEPTEMBER GARAGE SALES ARE GO, GO, GO!

 

My Vast Accumulation of Stuff garage sales have been lots of fun thIs summer, but they are drawing to a close. My next-to-last garage sales of 2024 will be Friday and Saturday, September 6-7, from 9 am to noon each day at 840 Damon Drive, Medina, Ohio. I’ve been stocking and restocking at a furious pace and I think you’ll be impressed by how much great stuff is available at bargain prices.

My vintage comic books boxes are so full I’m not sure I could get any more issues in them. My hardcover/trade paperbacks boxes are nearly full and will be full by the end of the day.

There are over a dozen way cool trading cards sets priced to sell. These include Famous Comic-Book Creators, Batman, MAD, Superman, Star Trek, Disney, Archie and more. Some other sets will be showing up in my eBay store.

My dollar comic book boxes are full. My magazine boxes are close to full. I have an incredible selection of over-sized hardcovers and trades.

I have eleven $10 mystery boxes available at the present time. I think these might well be the last mystery boxes of the year. They are limited to one per customer per day.

As always, you can bring your Isabella-written comics and stuff to the garage sales and get them signed for free. I charge $10 per signature at conventions.

I’m also happy to answer questions about my career and comics in general. It’s like a mini-convention in a garage.

Come for the wonderful bargains. Stay for the fun!

© 2024 Tony Isabella