Robserecaps Thirty Seven – Comic Book Feuds! Liefeld! Wizard! Marvel! Image!
After two months, we’re back! I have been grabbing episodes of Robservations to get to eventually, but when I see ‘the Wizard’ mentioned, (shout out to Positively Liefeldian) I’m there! Also, I’m just waiting for the Salty Keith-cast to drop!
- It’s the beefs the define us! The post image is the cover of Wizard with the Rob’s controversial (not in his opinion) interview
- The Rob gives us a recap of who he is and what he’s done, just in case this is your first episode. The Rob mentions his Snake Eyes series ‘blew the doors off the GI Joe franchise’
- I will not be buying Deadpool Badder Blood, but will be tracking it’s release schedule
- “Some creators value themselves above others, WAY above others and have no problem telling you. They cannot resist the opportunity to take shots at others.”
- “We’re gonna cover era and a feud to boost!” I think the Rob meant “to boot”?
- “To this day, no surprise, I am the youngest of the Image founders” I’m not sure the Rob knows how time works
- The Rob mentions his upcoming two part interview with Comics or Cartoonists Kayfabe (the Rob isn’t sure), naming members of the championship Lakers teams, and we are fourteen minutes in and the Rob is just filibustering
- To the Rob, putting Cable and Shaft on the cover Wizard was no different than when George Perez would draw Marvel and DC characters next to each other, which was never done at Wizard
- When Gareb Shamus called the Rob and said he was shocked Marvel had a problem with the cover. The Rob had a great relationship with Marvel at the time, even though, many times he never knew who he was talking to there. It was Jim Lee who called the Rob, not editorial, about the five trading cards for X-Force #1
- The Rob compares himself at this time to Kelly Clarkson and Taylor Swift, artists part of the zietgeist
- “The fans co-opted the Deadpool that I wrote and drew in New Mutants #98 and ran from there”
- The Rob takes umbrage with calling this interview ‘controversial’, at the time he was more successful than controversial. The only thing controversial about the Rob was that he was over achieving at such a young age.
- The Rob mentions him being offered (and turning down) writing and drawing Alpha Flight and Doctor Strange, he wanted an X-book and stood his ground
- 31 minutes in, the Rob does his super insulting impression of Todd McFarlane, telling the Rob he’d only sell one million copies of X-Force #1, which ended up selling over five million
- the Wizard interview was done by Patrick Daniel O’Neil, he was the editor and top dog at Wizard, very cynical, very sarcastic, struggling to take the Rob seriously
- The Rob skips over the part of the interview where O’Neil questions the Rob for lifting Feral (female, brown and orange) for Wildmane (male, white and blue) from a black and white ad for X-Cutioners
- The Rob cites how Marvel was getting away from their old house style and if you were to put characters drawn by Mark Bagley, Jim Lee, etc. they would look the same as well
- O’Neil cites an instance where the editor (Bob Harras) and the Rob changed one of Louise Simonson’s scripts for New Mutants without notifying her. Louise and the Rob had different opinions on how Cable should be written
- Every writer the Rob spoke with said scripting didn’t matter, it was just a way to make a quick buck while giving your story a polish
- O’Neil says it was not fair to Simonson for the Rob & Harras to change her story and not get a co-plotting credit, the Rob says it wasn’t fair when the Rob’s face was re-drawn by John Romita Sr on a Thor cover without being asked to change it or told
- The big change the Rob and Harras made to the plot in question was getting to the fight quicker
- the faster the Rob talks, the more sniffly the Rob gets, hope he’s feeling OK
- The Rob mentions (at the time) super hero stuff is what makes him money, all the secondary characters he created are getting spun off. The Rob has sci fi, horror, etc. stories he will get to eventually
- We now go to a 1993 Wizard interview with Louise Simonson where she mentions the new owners were more favorable to creators that can make short term, instant cash than tell long lasting stories
- In the interview, Louise say that the Rob was a freelancer, so he was greedy by nature, which gets a chuckle out of the Rob, citing Louise ‘crossing the street’ to jump on the cash cow of the Death of Superman
- Due to creator ownership, the Rob kept secrets about Cable and Domino close to his vest so his reveals would be unique
- We close with the Rob pointing out how in this issue of Wizard, Cable was on the top ten character list, New Mutants #87 was on the hot back issue list, X-Force #8 was on the hot coming soon book and he was on the hot artist list
- Since I haven’t listened in two months, has anyone tricked the Rob into saying something odd when he reads the reviews of his podcast?
- Lastly, the Rob mentions going to the ‘candy store’ and ‘cycles’ so who knows what’s up
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