Thursday, April 24, 2003

Air Fare

While you're over at Joe Sent Me, check out this interesting column on your better dining options in America's airports.

Reminds me of a time I was flying east with my mother. We had an hour stopover at the Cleveland airport and since Mom hadn't been able to eat the in-flight meal, I wanted to get her some food. I went up to a lady at our gate check-in podium and asked, "What's the best restaurant in the airport?"

She said, "Well, down by Gate 12, there's a Burger King."

I said, "No, we have some time here. What's the best restaurant in the airport?"

She said, "Down by Gate 12, there's a Burger King."

I said, "That's the best restaurant in the airport?"

She said, "That's the best restaurant in the city."

• Posted at 11:13 PM · LINK

Fly Joe

If you're interested in what's going on with the airlines and their various bankruptcies and financial shenanigans, my old pal Joe Brancatelli covers that beat better than anybody. He has a rundown of some of the current messes over in The Brancatelli File. It's part of the Joe Sent Me website, which covers the world of air travel in an independent, take-no-prisoners manner.

And yes, this is the same Joe Brancatelli who was once active in comics fandom and who had a column in Creepy and Eerie magazines. He used to report on the comic book business so he is not unfamiliar with greedy people in high places who don't know what the hell they're doing.

• Posted at 11:06 PM · LINK

Yo-ho-ho...

First, the Rio Hotel in Vegas decided that their thong-wearing cocktail waitresses weren't enticing enough and decided to replace them with ladies who'd also sing and dance as they served watery booze. Now, Treasure Island on the Strip is dumping the little pirate show out front and will be replacing it with a sexier version which includes, rumor has it, some scantily-clad women (details here.)

What's next? A sex-change for Siegfried or, more likely, Roy? Penn and Teller go topless? Elvis impersonators who do on-stage all the stuff Elvis did off-stage? I tell you: I worry for the values in that town.

• Posted at 5:25 PM · LINK

Hanna-Barbera Heritage

As noted here, a developer has proposed some plans for the old Hanna-Barbera building at 3400 Cahuenga, some of which involve tearing the thing down. Some groups are trying to drum up support to save the structure as a landmark and as a tribute to Bill Hanna and Joe Barbera.

I worked in that building for years, and still have a tremendous affection for the early cartoons that were produced there — though more so for the ones H-B did before that, out of a studio down on La Brea. Still, I find it hard to see how any of us will be that much worse off if there's a big Ross Dress-for-Less shop on the property instead. Yes, it might be nice if that bit of history is preserved but to the extent that's true then the folks at Time-Warner — which owns Hanna-Barbera and is phasing out that brand name in favor of that of Cartoon Network — ought to just come up with the bucks to do this. I've lost track of whether they still have custody of 3400 Cahuenga or if they sold it to Universal, which I believe was reported some time ago to be acquiring it. Curiously, the article I'm linking to doesn't tell who does currently hold the deed. But if Time-Warner doesn't own it, they could — and they could put an actual, working cartoon studio or other Hollywood-themed business in there. I don't see why it should be up to anyone else to save the place. And if they won't do it, it probably isn't worth saving.

• Posted at 2:43 PM · LINK

Metropolis As Videogame

This is kinda interesting. The 1927 classic movie, Metropolis, has been broken down into a "walkthrough" such as they do with branching role-playing and videogames. Click here to see it. And thank Buzz Dixon for the tip.

• Posted at 11:47 AM · LINK

Dell Comics Are Good Comics

Well, they were in the forties and fifties. And during most of that time, their publisher was a woman named Helen Meyer. She reportedly had very little to do with the content of the books, above and beyond saying things like, "Let's do more issues of that Uncle Scrooge comic," but that was important. And she and the other folks at Dell Publishing did a great job of marketing and distribution. Anyway, she has just passed away at age 95 and here's the New York Times obituary.

You are perhaps curious/baffled about the relationship between her company, Dell Publishing, and Western Printing and Lithography, which was the firm that created the contents of those comics and printed them. Here's an explanation.

• Posted at 10:00 AM · LINK

Credit Where Due

The other day, The Comics Journal daily weblog, ¡Journalista!, noted that a Reuters report on the current Marvel/Sony lawsuit had made reference to "artist Stan Lee." (Actually, it made reference to "San Lee," but that isn't the kind of mistake that gets anyone — not even Stan — upset...)

In this case, the "artist" reference is a bit unsettling since the artist who did co-create Spider-Man, Steve Ditko, has gone spectacularly unmentioned in all the publicity about the movies. So not only is he not getting credited (let alone, paid) but folks are acting like the non-drawing Mr. Lee created the much-merchandised visual and drew the early comics, as well. Reporters are enormously sloppy about things like this even though it's very easy to check.

This is more than a matter of folks being denied their due. Money — and therefore, financial security — are often linked not only to what you do but whether you get your name on it. Moreover, a lot of relationships between collaborators have been harmed and even terminated because one guy seemed to be getting more than his share of credit. It is important to note that, while sometimes one participant does things to screw the other(s) out of recognition, it also sometimes happens due to bad reporting.

Stan Lee, of course, is not an artist and has never claimed to be one. But I just did this Google search for "artist Stan Lee" and got 117 hits. A few are cases where the word "artist" just happened to come before his name and was not intended as a descriptor. Still, there are at least 100 instances where someone thought Stan was the artist, and some of them are from pretty important sources. This kind of mistake does more damage than you'd think.

• Posted at 12:53 AM · LINK