Someone had actually started a thread about a movie being planned of Runaways. But I've never seen the comic myself.
Tom, I can't remember if you said you'd read it, but even at this cursory glance, I really think it would be something you'd be into. It's a romance of sorts, via a kind of sitcom set-up; the dialogue is very real and not trying to be smart. It just is!
Oh do excuse me. Do you have a minute? I'm not entirely sure, but I just thought just a couple of you might want to know that on August 16th 2010 there'll be a... Scott Pilgrim Signing At Page 45!!! "OMG! Scott Pilgrim is signing at Page 45?!?!?!" ... Ummm. Yes, exactly so! Scott Pilgrim will be here in person on Monday August 16th to sign pristine copies of BRYAN LEE O'MALLEY. "Oh My God. I'm hallucinating." Something like that. "Who wins? Do I win? I totally win, right?" Well, you do if you turn up to Page 45 on the appointed date, at the appointed time, with your appointed ex-girlfriend or boyfriend. No admission without an evil ex-boyfriend or girlfriend. "What?!?! -- Is Stephen kidding?!" I am indeed kidding. No exes allowed - we don't want any more fighting! The place: Page 45, 9 Market Street, Nottingham NG1 6HY (just follow the tram tracks - in the right direction, obviously)The date: Monday 16th August 2010The time: 5pm-7pm In all honesty I'd get there earlier in case a) we run out of stock, b) we get a chance to start early, and c) so many people turn up in the wake of the film that after a very short while it'll be signatures only rather than sketches. When Malley and Hope Larson signed together at Page 45 in 2006 it exceeded three hours, but this year Bryan is on a very tight schedule as dictated by his UK publishers and the film company, and we are very, very lucky to have him at all. Turn up early, buy stuff, buy more stuff, start the queue outside the door (the queue starts outside the door but not in the actual doorway, please), get someone to hold your place, buy even more stuff and then queue again. If you can't control yourself while Malley is signing your stuff (by which we mean books and prints not your, you know, stuff...) and want to buy even more books and posters then we really can't stop you. Just give us a shout: we'll be on the other side of the till with your credit card still in our hands. We Have: Scott Pilgrim / Page 45 Bryan Lee O'Malley & Hope Larson jam print @ £4-99 LINK WORLD EXCLUSIVE! You can't get it anywhere else in the whole wide wibbliverse!Scott Pilgrim Pre-Volume Six cast poster @ £4-99 LINK EUROPEAN EXCLUSIVE! You can't get this anywhere else outside of North America!Lost At Sea (£8-99) by Bryan Lee O'MalleyScott Pilgrim volume 1 (£8-99) by Bryan Lee O'MalleyScott Pilgrim volume 2 (£8-99) by Bryan Lee O'MalleyScott Pilgrim volume 3 (£8-99) by Bryan Lee O'MalleyScott Pilgrim volume 4 (£8-99) by Bryan Lee O'MalleyScott Pilgrim volume 5 (£8-99) by Bryan Lee O'MalleyScott Pilgrim volume 6 (£8-99) by Bryan Lee O'MalleyT-shirts and plushes imminent.Okay, volume six is imminent too.Suggested reading order: one, two then three followed by four, five and, ultimately, six!LOST AT SEA can be read at any time you choose. Now would be a good time, though.Hopeless Savages: Greatest Hits (£14-99) by Jen Van Meter & Christene Norrie with Bryan Lee O'Malley back in print in September. Order now! We Wrote: Scott Pilgrim vols 1-6 (£8-99) by Bryan Lee O'Malley.Scott is a clot. He really is. He's a total dumpling, and in terms of a Chinese take-away, dim doesn't even begin to sum the lad up.He is kinda cute, though, and as the series kicks off Scott is living with gay housemate Wallace for whom sly, dry mockery is a default setting. They're so poor they even share the same bed. But Scott sleeps soundly until this girl called Ramona comes skating through his dreams - she's a delivery girl and as you well know the quickest way from A to B is to skate through someone else's dreams, right? Then Scott meets Ramona in his waking life, falls head over heels in whatever the hell that thing is (he may figure it out eventually) but is casually informed that if he wants her as a girlfriend he'll have to defeat her seven evil exes in combat!Truly a unique series with a heart of gold, and a wit and a nintendo logic all of its own. There is not a single comic reader who could fail to fall in love with Scott, Wallace, Ramona or Bryan himself. O'Malley isn't even close to running out of innovative ideas: his visual gags keep tumbling onto the page, and so convinced are we that this book is for everyone that if you try the first and aren't immediately hooked, we'll give you your money back and even pay return postage.You will, on the other hand, have totally failed to earn The Power Of Love, so no power-up of a flaming sword for you guys! * * * Lost At Sea (£8-99) by Bryan Lee O'Malley -Raleigh doesn't have a soul. A cat stole it - or at least that's what she tells people - or at least that's what she would tell people if she told people anything. But that would mean talking to people, and the mere thought of social interaction is terrifying."Raleigh accidentally gets invited along on a road trip with a few of her year. Never the biggest socialite in her year she slowly realises, as do they, that it's an accident that she's there, in the car, watching the world speed by.It's such a beautiful summer, California doing what it does best, Ian, Dave and Steph turn out to be good travelling companions. The ghost of an old love pops into her head from time to time but journeys can do that to you. Even though you're getting away you're taking yourself with you.O'Malley's art meets at a perfect point in between Andi Watson and James Kochalka and his story is somewhere near those two as well. There's one great panel where Raleigh is in the back seat of the car and Bryan's got the light just right as it fall on her face, as she stares out. And he draws good cats. * * * Hopeless Savages: Greatest Hits (£14-99) by Jen Van Meter & Christine Norrie with Chynna Clugston-Major, Bryan Lee O'Malley, more.Everything to date in one massive volume! Here's my review of volume two from 3007 BC:The titular Hopeless-Savages are a family whose figureheads are two punk legends, each infamous in their own right before getting it on and really setting the world on fire. Now they've four children, the youngest of which is Zero, seventeen, with a fully formed band of her own. Rehearsing within earshot of her Grammy Award-winning parents proves a lot less daunting than falling in love with the only guy at college who doesn't want to get straight into her pants. Ginger's in love with her all right, and has been since early childhood, but he's reticent to the point where she has to do all the courting (indeed to begin with he's convinced that all she could want from him is a Platonic friendship which would cause him more pain than nothing at all), and Jen and Bryan both succeed in evoking all the awkwardness and frustration and desperation involved when confidence is low but there's so much to gain. Complicating things further, Zero gets grounded just as an intrusive television crew descends on the Hopeless-Savages for a Fame & Shame "Legends Of Rock" type affair, furiously blurts out a confession of love for the boy she supposes at that point to hate her, and faces the prospect of this being a prime piece of footage when the programme is aired.Van Meter's set-up is smart: each member of the family has a clearly defined personality of their own so that Jen has plenty to play with, yet she declines to force them all on us at once, introducing just enough history to illuminate the individual's perspective on any given situation, should they care to share it. This is where the flashbacks come in, and her choice of artists proves perfect for each.O'Malley renders particularly squidgy versions of the characters - superdeformed as the description goes for Japanese figures - and lends a real passion to the confrontations. But I also particularly enjoyed Chynna's tender sequence in which, when asked by Zero for advice, art-school brother Twitch reflects wistfully on his own prior love life, and feels (perhaps wrongly) that his succession of mistakes born of one big mistake make him wholly unqualified to comment.My only qualms are - once again - Zero's made-up language. I don't know if the device is for euphemistic purposes (i.e. to replace swearing) but it's less than convincing. However, coming back to Ginger's initial fears, this piece of dialogue really takes the biscuit, and if you've ever been there then you'll join me in wishing we all had a little of the young lad's self-knowledge:"I don't want to be the nice guy you hang out with while you repair the damage done to your self-image by egotistical thugs who wildly underestimate your worth. I don't want your head on my shoulder while you tell me what a great friend I am, so sensitive, just like a brother. I don't want to have to act happy for you when you go off with some charismatic idiot who - at best - thinks you're an ordinary girl... and not the treasure I know you to be. I don't want to look at you wistfully every so often, but never dare admit I've been wild about you since first grade because it would complicate your life and ruin the friendship. I've seen it. I don't want it. Sorry."Way to go, Jen. Can't Make That Date? You have one other chance: the glorious Gosh! in London. Accept no substitutes. The place: Gosh! in London opposite the British Museum.The date: Wednesday 18th August 2010The time: 4.30-6.30pm Please don't get the two dates mixed up! Ours is Monday August 16th!!!! Nota Bene: 1) Ramona Flowers sends her regrets, but unlike Scott she can't make a personal appearance this year. (That's what Gideon told us anyway.)2) Scott Pilgrim is not actually signing at Page 45. That's all in your heads. Bryan Lee O'Malley, however, will be here in person. Will that do?3) Normally we promise to get stuff signed even if you can't make it, so long as you pay for it in advance. This time, because of the logistics outside our control, that is merely an aspiration and on absolutely no account (sorry) will there be time for any sketches if you don't appear in person. Like I said, we are lucky that Bryan has been determined enough to sign here at all! Page 45 is a comic shop.We are:Scott Pilgrim UK Central. Always have been, always will be.Also:Stephen L. HollandTom Rosin Jonathan Rigbywith Dominique Kidd Page 45 was created in 1994 by Mark Simpson (1968-2005) and Stephen L. Holland (1659- ),then kick-started with more than a little help from the glorious Dominique Kidd. Roving ambassador: Emily Hubbard. Back-up brilliance: Jhelisa Taylor. Page 459 Market StreetNottingham NG1 6HYTel: (0115) 9508045 www.page45.compage45@page45.comwww.myspace.com/page_45 Open Monday 16th August until 7pm, but at 7pm we absolutely must wrap up, I'm afraid. It is the law! "SCOTT PILGRIM has been the coolest comic on Earth ever since the very first book, and if you've never tried it, you need Scott Pilgrim in your life. There are no exceptions, which means you're not one of them. They don't exist but you do, so that'll be eight pounds ninety-nine, please." - Stephen 'Soft-Sell' Holland Remember your friends! They too need SCOTT PILGRIM and they need it signed, even if they know neither of those things yet. They're still probably focussing on the L-word. Also: go viral! Spread this email, kitty-kins!