November 15th's Meanwhile, in Las Vegas...

This week’s Las Vegas Weekly comics column examines the first volume of Keiko Tobe’s With the Light: Raising an Autistic Child, which I guarantee will be the best family melodrama manga about autism you read all year.

While you’re there, you may also want to take a look at this piece by Steven Wells, which applauds Kyle Baker for stepping up and addressing the Iraq War in his new series Special Forces while “the creaking, wheezing geriatric dinosaur of the literary novel is still gathering its ponderous thoughts about the war on terror.”

Oddly enough, both books prominently feature autistic characters. Huh.




Attention Columbusites and/or any visitors who plan on being in town for next weekend’s Mid-Ohio-Con! You’re probably going to want to stop by the now annual pre-party hosted by local small press collective Panel. Here’s the relevant info fresh from my inbox:



Once again, Panel is hosting the pre-party for Mid-Ohio Con! It's all happening at 8 p.m. - midnight at Barley's in the Short North on Friday, Nov. 23.

There will be a DJ, cash bar and a Live Art Throwdown! Pros and con-goers mingle (but don't be *that guy* if you run into your favorite artist or somebody.)

Mid-Ohio starts the next day at the convention center, which is basically right across the street. Panel will debut its 10th anthology, Panel X. We always joked that our tenth anthology was going to be sex-themed. We never dreamed the joke would go so horribly, horribly wrong.

So that's the scoop:
UnMasked: The Pre-Mid-Ohio Con party
8 p.m. - midnight
Friday, Nov. 23
Barley's Brewing Co.
467 N. High St.



Click over to Panel’s online HQ Ferretpress.com for more info, including links to Barley’s home page and so forth. As a non-drinker, I can’t speak to Barley’s beer selection, although I understand it’s pretty damn good, but they do have the second best veggie burger in Columbus.

And hey, how about that Tom Williams, flier above, huh? To see more of his work—including a pretty sweet Rom image—check out his site.





This is the only image of Mark Bagley drawing DC characters I could find after a five-minute Internet search. Aquaman and Green Lantern might want to hurry up and change dance partners there. Anyway, Comic Book Resources’ gossip columnist Rich Johnston brings the first word of the next DC weekly series, the one that will follow Countdown:



Well, I'm told it's the DC weekly comic that will follow "Final Crisis," written by Kurt Busiek. Starring Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman, Mark Bagley will draw every issue himself. Well, 14-16 pages of it anyway, for a whole year, with Fabian Nicieza contributing to a weekly back up feature with rotating artists.



Is it true? Johnston thinks so, judging by the green light on his stoplight icon next to the piece. It sure sounds true, as the clues all match up just fine. Johnston previously reported Busiek as the writer of Final Crisis (which would make sense if he heard Busiek were writing the big series after Countdown), Busiek has mentioned online that he had an idea for the Superman books that DC decided was big enough to be made into a bigger event of some sort, and Mark Bagley is reportedly jumping ship from Marvel to DC. Also, Busiek and Bagley have worked together to pretty good effect before…on a DC comic.

I actually kinda hope this is true, because Busiek has yet to disappoint me on the Superman books, and he seems to have been turning ideas for stories around pretty quickly, judging how often he (and sometimes partner Nicieza) were able to provide fill-ins for slow artists and/or slow creative teams.

Between his Superman work, his one arc on JLA and JLA/Avengers, he’s written pretty much the whole DCU, and none of his portrayals really struck me as “off.”

If a single creative team can guide a weekly, I think that will iron out a lot of the glitches in Countdown, and if it’s a fan-favorite creative team telling a story they’re excited about (rather than working off memos full of plot-points handed down by editorial, as the Countdown staff seems to be doing), then I think a lot of the people turned off by the current weekly might give the third one a chance.

I know I would, anyway.