The indictment. I read excerpts the last two days but I decided I oughta read the whole thing. I'm no expert on the drafting of legal papers but this seems clean, direct and filled with evidence — most of it from Trump's Republican colleagues — to convince almost anyone that it's a solid case. This is not to say someone couldn't construct a rebuttal case but they sure have a lot of damning points to address and counter.

But I'm not exactly open-minded on the subject of Donald Trump. I think he's a dishonest and dangerous man who cares about money and power but not about the people who give him the money and the power…and I felt that way about him when it was a far-fetched joke that he could ever win an election for anything.

So read it yourself and decide. It's only 45 pages and they're double-spaced. You've read longer blocks of text on this site about changes in the look and feel of Batman. Download the PDF here.

What kind of tree is this? Is there an expert on trees out there who can tell me what kind of tree this is? I would like to know what kind of tree this is. Thank you in advance if you know what kind of tree this is and you write and tell me what kind of tree this is.

One thing that fascinates me about the current Donald Trump indictments — and I'm not saying it fascinates me in a good or bad manner — is how many different ways this scenario can play out. Most of the possible ones look like Trump taking a very hard landing and he'll certainly be tied-up in court proceedings for an awful long time. (Everyone talking about how long seems to forget that when you lose, you appeal…so each trial can turn into several.) It kinda amazes me that at this stage of his life when he seems to have had to actually begun paying his lawyers — albeit with donors' money — he still can't seem to find any good ones.

People keep asking me for my predictions as to where this thing is going because, after all, who is more expert at this kind of thing than a guy who used to write Yogi Bear comic books? But if you insist, here's why I reply with such a resounding "I dunno." Think of all the things that could happen between now and when we get some sort of resolution in the courts and ballot boxes. There would be new scandals, new evidence, new indictments. None of us saw the stolen documents raid matter coming. Why couldn't other crimes outta nowhere be alleged?

Someone could die. I'm not wishing this for anyone but you have a lot of people involved as alleged conspirators, lawyers, witnesses, etc., some of them rather elderly and under massive stress. This whole story could take unexpected turns if someone dies, especially since almost no one will believe it wasn't murder. (A fellow I knew who was heavy into Kennedy Assassination Conspiracy theories refused to believe that the wife of Texas Governor John Connally wasn't killed as part of the cover-up even though she died 43 years after the assassination at the age of 87.)

Trump could do the unexpected…and don't ask me what that might be. But people do strange things when they're desperate and if the alternative is prison, something we'd think he'd never do might seem like it's worth a try.

Most of my friends insist his die-hard supporters will never desert him. That's probably true of some but the smarter ones — i.e., the ones wise enough to not be interviewed by Jordan Klepper — might leave him if they had a real alternative…

…which they don't right now. Trump is way out ahead of Ron DeSantis and all the other contenders are polling at numbers <5. Chris Christie and Vivek Ramaswamy are at 2% in surveys where the margin is plus or minus 3% — so one or both of them could be at a minus-one. But I think the reason a lot of Trump fans are still with him, indictments and all, is because they've become convinced that America as we know it is doomed if "one of them" (a Republican, preferably a rabid right-winger who is white and male and willing to toss Liberals in concentration camps) isn't elected.

Right now, Trump is the only candidate who seems to stand a chance of making that happen. They may love him but they love winning more and he's starting to look like kind of a loser. It's still not too late for a Donald surrogate — same positions, no indictments — to emerge. Okay, it's not likely. But not so long ago if I told you that a politician who was in Trump's position now — all those charges plus a jury found that he'd committed rape, even though it isn't called in the state where he was found liable — you'd never believe that guy could be in the presidential race at all, let alone with a wide lead in his party.

I'm not predicting any of this will happen; just noting that these twists and a lot of others that now seem unimaginable could. This is a volatile election in a volatile environment in a volatile country. With all that volatility, you can't rule out anything except that if Trump fails to reclaim the White House, he will never admit that he lost that election or any before it. My prediction, which is worth about two dollars with a margin of error of three dollars, is that Trump will never be President again but that a lot of crazy, unprecedented shit will happen before and even after the 2024 election.

From July 6, 1976: Rodney visits Johnny…

I want to thank Special Counsel Jack Smith for delaying the big indictment of Donald Trump until I was home and rested from Comic-Con.  And I look forward to at least one more, maybe several more.

Here's a link to Part 1.

Okay: The first thing you need to do is to decide what you want out of Comic-Con. It can be as simple as "I just want to see what it's like" or as (possibly) life-changing as "I want to get into comics." Both these things happen at Comic-Con, though the latter doesn't seem to occur anywhere near as often as the career-seekers wish. I've heard from a number of folks who have a very negative view of Comic-Con because they didn't find the job of their dreams there.

Once upon a time, that was a bit more likely than it is today. Major publishers like DC and Marvel once had active portfolio evaluations, making reps available to look at samples — mainly artwork — from potential talent. That doesn't happen much now. That's not the way they find new writers and artists these days…and DC and Marvel now use most of their convention presence to promote movies and TV shows. Presently, I think you can have a perfectly rotten experience at Comic-Con if you focus on getting work.

Then again, if you self-publish and hawk your own wares, I think you can have a perfectly wonderful experience doing that at Comic-Con. Just how wonderful will, of course, depend on how good and commercial your wares are. There's a lot of competition in that room.

Get in touch with what you want. And I think that line which I just went back and italicized for emphasis, is great advice not just for Comic-Con but for life. You don't have to set one goal forever but you need to have some direction for your personal compass. Over the years, I think I've benefited from asking myself the musical question, "What do I want?" And once I have some semblance of an answer, I follow it up with the question, "Do I really want that for myself? Or do I think I want it because I see others wanting it?"  If you can answer those questions honestly, it helps.  It truly helps.

Are their certain celebrities or creators who'll be there who you want to meet? That's not a bad reason to want to go to Comic-Con. Neither is to seek certain items you want for your collection. Excellent reason. Would you find it exciting to see previews of forthcoming movies or TV shows and to hear their stars and makers talk about the work? That's a fine reason, though maybe not so much for this past convention. How about the sheer entertainment of certain programs? Or to get a drawing from a favorite artist?

Or to learn from experts about some area that interests you? Study the schedule of panels and presentations. You can have a great time going from room to room, listening to panelists and authorities.

Or maybe you just want to see the cosplayers and maybe photograph them. Or maybe you're really into gaming and want to see what's new and grab up whatever freebees the companies are offering in their booths.

I have friends in or around my age bracket who go mainly for social reasons — to see friends they only see at conventions and to drink with them. I've heard them evaluate different conventions mainly for the bar scenes — which hotels had the best places to gather and imbibe. As a non-drinker, this is of zero interest to me but it might be the best reason for you to attend Comic-Con or any convention.

I could go on and on about this but the point is that you need to have some sense of why you want to be there, above and beyond the fact that lots of other people want to be there. And once you know, you can begin planning your convention around that goal. Remember how in Part 1, I told about how a friend of mine and I went to Disneyland with no real concept of what we wanted to experience there or where to find it? Don't make that boneheaded mistake with Comic-Con.

This, of course, comes after you arrange to be there.

If you've read this far thinking I'm going to reveal the secret of how to always get as many badges as you want, I'm sorry. I may have dragged you this far under false pretenses…but you should know that the San Diego Convention Center can only accommodate X number of people and the number who want to get in is more like 10X or 20X or maybe even higher. There are methods that involve being in tight with exhibitors or being program participants but I'm not the one to explain them. It may just be one of those Facts of Life you just have to accept the way you finally figured out there was no guaranteed way to win the California Mega Millions State Lottery.

There's also no way I was ever going to fit this topic into two installments on this blog so it's no longer a two-part series. Check back here in the next few days for Part 3 and the way I'm going, that may not ever be the end of it. We'll start by discussing things like travel and lodging.

That's roughly how Paul Reubens looked when I met him at The Groundlings some time in the early eighties. The Groundlings is a local (Los Angeles) improv troupe and school that at times has seemed like the farm team for Saturday Night Live. Paul is on a long list of folks whose names you'd know who got "discovered" (or at least honed their skills) with The Groundlings.

I picked a photo of Paul as Paul because Peewee Herman, as whom he became famous, was just one of the many characters I saw Paul do at The Groundlings. In a way, it's a shame Peewee caught on as big as he did because Paul had many other "people" inside him. He being himself may have been the most interesting.

I can't say I knew him that well and I suspect most people who knew him didn't know him that well even if they thought they did. He got in trouble from time to time. He got a reputation for being hard to work with from time to time…though to that last charge, I must say the two times I worked with him, he was only a small, acceptable pain-in-the-butt. I'm not denying the experiences of others; just reporting on mine.

In the last few years when I ran into him, always at the Magic Castle, he was pretty friendly. Hearing now that he'd been battling cancer for some time, I can only wonder if there was a connection. He was very excited one time when I introduced him to Sergio Aragonés.

Others who knew him better than I did will tell better stories than I can. I just wanted to say that the Paul Reubens I knew was a sweet and very creative man. He and some constituents were responsible for one of the most memorable evenings I have ever experienced in a theater. I tell that story here and it's one of the reasons I'm thinking good thoughts about the guy today.

Labor Law (relating to the current Hollywood strikes) meets Tree Law (about how and when you can trim trees). It's an irresistible intersection of legal issues for Devin Stone, the "Legal Eagle" of YouTube…

I'd forgotten, as I do every year, that the 4.5 days of Comic-Con come with several days of prep and several more of recovery…and time expands and compresses. Right this minute, I feel like Saturday of this past Comic-Con was months ago…but seven days ago as of this moment, I was scurrying to meet an editor for Breakfast at 8:30 to discuss a project I may or may not write.

That was followed by being on the Dungeons & Dragons panel at 10 AM, hosting Quick Draw! at 11:45 which led to the Cartoon Voices 1 panel at 1 PM, followed by being on Maggie Thompson's panel at 3:00, hosting the History of Cartoon Voices panel at 4:30, doing an interview at 6:30 and meeting friends for dinner at 8. Today, I just exhausted myself typing that last sentence.

Before I forget: Yes, I heard that several folks, including a few I was around at the con, came down with COVID. I tested. I'm fine. I wish them only the easiest of full recoveries.

And yes, I know that I can print out the convention souvenir book PDF myself but that does not result in a book that in any way resembles the book that would have resulted if they'd printed it out like the others on my shelf. That would just give me a lot of 8½ by 11 sheets that were not bound in book format. I'm not faulting the convention for saving money on this. I just would like the option of ordering a printed/bound version of the souvenir book.

Getting back to the hectic pace of the con: It's one of the things I like about it. I wouldn't/couldn't live that way all year but it's fun as an occasional change of scenery and schedule. It's fun to be around so many people having such a good time and some of those people are friends I don't get to see except at conventions. I especially enjoy living for a few days in an environment where it's utterly impossible to be bored; where everywhere you turn, there's someone interesting to talk to or something interesting to look at.

If you went and you didn't have the time of your life, I'd like to give you the following advice: You need to learn how to "do" Comic-Con.

In the summer of 1969 when I was 17 years old, I went to Disneyland for the first time. I'm not sure I can explain why a kid born and raised in Southern California hadn't made it there before then but I hadn't. That year, my pal Dwight Decker and I went for a day and we made just about every possible mistake starting with the erroneous assumption that you could experience Disneyland in one day. We took a bus there and back. I think we were on that bus (and some connecting buses we had to take to get to and from that bus) for more hours than all the collective time we spent on Disneyland rides.

We didn't know where to eat. We didn't know where to go. There were things we knew were somewhere in Disneyland that sounded like fun but we didn't know where they were and we certainly hadn't plotted out any sort of route that would take us from one to the other. I remember experiencing Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln, "It's a Small World," The Carousel of Progress, the monorail and not much else before we had to catch the bus home. We both slept most of the ride back.

Years later, I learned how to "do" Disneyland and had some much better times there.

In the Summer of 1970, one year after Dwight and I didn't "do" Disneyland the right way, my friend Steve Sherman and I didn't "do" New York the right way. We had some great experiences visiting the offices of DC Comics, Marvel and MAD magazine. We spent a day with Steve Ditko. We attended our first comic book convention. So much of it was wonderful and exciting…

…but we didn't know where to stay or where to eat or how to get around. We let the cab driver from the airport into Manhattan swindle us out of some cash. There were great shows playing on Broadway — shows I wish I'd seen — but we somehow didn't allow for that in our schedule. (The original production of Company was in its third month. Was I smart enough to go see it? No, I was not smart enough to go see it. I was also not smart enough to go see the original production of 1776 or several others then playing. James Coco in Last of the Red Hot Lovers or Maureen Stapleton in Plaza Suite might have been nice.)

Again: Years later, I learned how to "do" New York and had some much better times there.

And I had to learn to "do" Comic-Con. This is Part One of a two-part article. In a day or two, I'll tell you what I learned and how I learned it and why, though it might not apply at all to you, what I learned might help you figure out how you should "do" Comic-Con.

Disney historian and all-around great guy Jim Korkis…well, here. I'll let Mark Goldhaber, who had aided Jim and organized a GoFundMe campaign to help with Jim's medical bills give you the sad news…

Friends, I am heartbroken to have to inform you that our friend Jim Korkis passed away this morning. He was unresponsive this morning at the rehab center and was transported to the hospital. His brother Mike was able to arrive a few minutes before Jim passed. While Jim could not respond, Mike said that Jim appeared to be able to hear him, and he was able to talk to Jim for those last few minutes.

Jim had been feeling good this week, and there really was no indication that things would take a turn for the worse. He did not appear to be in pain, and went quickly and quietly as he had wished.

There will be a memorial for Jim at a date and time to be determined. It will be held via Zoom so that those elsewhere in the US or overseas can attend. We'll publicize the details once it's set, but for now Mike needs to focus on taking care of the necessary details.

I don't have much to add except that if you didn't know Jim, you missed knowing a really great human being. And if you're interested in animation history — especially Disney history — you owe this man for all he gave us. Very sad.

In The Nation, journalist Jeet Heer has written an article about Stan Lee taking credit for other folks' ideas at Marvel Comics. I tend not to get involved in these discussions because what I have to say about this can't be sufficiently communicated through a brief article or blog post. I get into it a lot in the book I'm writing about Jack Kirby at the moment which will be published one of these days but I also can't say when. For now, I'll just say I have a slightly different take on the situation than Mr. Heer…but only slightly.

Comic-Con has instituted a few belt-tightening measures to make up (a little) for the money they lost during the COVID shutdown (a lot) and one of those measures is to no longer print the souvenir book. It's now available only as a downloadable PDF. This is good because it means everyone can get a free copy merely by clicking on this link. It's bad because…well, some of us have a bookshelf of past souvenir books and you can't put a PDF next to all the others. I wonder if the con folks have investigated arranging for some print-on-demand company to satisfy those of us who are willing to order a copy printed on paper.

It's still a great book even if it isn't a tangible book. It has a great cover by Becky Cloonan and articles about Mort Walker, the 75th anniversary of Pogo, the 50th of The Human Target, Blade, Red Sonja, Shang-Chi, Howard the Duck and the Direct Sales Market and many more. There are also obits (a couple of which are by me) of great talents we've lost in the last twelve months. How can you not download such a book? Fine job, Jackie Estrada.

And I'll let you in on a little secret: It's not too late to download last year's souvenir book…also a fine, free publication. Don't say I never gave you anything.

This was Comic-Con #52 for me and one of the most enjoyable. A lot of folks felt that way and I see some online debates on whether that was because of the dearth of Big Stars or in spite of the dearth of Big Stars. Here's my take on it…

The Big Stars didn't matter. And to most of the 130,000+ attendees each year over the last decade or two, they never really have.

Here's an excerpt from Hollywood Reporter that, I think, gets it all wrong…

This was the year that San Diego Comic-Con was supposed to collapse. After all, with Hollywood studios pulling out and stars not able to promote their work, all due to the double whammy of the actors and writers strikes, why would people even bother to attend?

Well, about 150,000 attendees did, indeed, show up. There were no mass hotel cancellations nor mass refunds issued for badges, which were purchased months in advance. And an interesting thing happened on the way to the Comic-Con apocalypse. There was a renewed focus on comics and other graphic arts, even as Hollywood showed up in a diminished capacity.

Who said this was the year the con was supposed to collapse? Answer: The Hollywood Reporter and other outlets that don't seem to understand the event they cover every year. A more correct lede to the story would have acknowledged that all the talk about the con possibly being some kind of disaster was baseless and way off-target.

Comic-Con is one of the hottest tickets in this country. Each year when badges go on sale, they're snatched up faster than you can say "Clark Kent." People fight over them. There was never going to be a flood of mass refunds and if there had been, every one of those tickets would have been resold immediately.

Why do all these people want to be there? If you think it's just the previews of new movies, you don't "get" Comic-Con. It's that but it's also about comic books and comic strips and animation and gaming (video or otherwise) and fantasy art and cosplay and Star Trek and Star Wars and all kinds of collectibles and a dozen-or-so other things. Some don't interest me in the slightest just as some don't interest you in the slightest…and the beauty of Comic-Con is that they don't have to. You can just go for one or two of those interests and there's plenty about them there to keep you interested.

The strikes that kept the TV and movie promotions away were never going to doom Comic-Con. There are too many other things there for the absence of Hollywood to leave much of a void. The confusion is easily explainable: When the mainstream press covers Comic-Con, that's all they really care about. (Well, sometimes because the cosplayers make for good photo and video opportunities, the press cares a little about them. But that's about it.)

The "Comic-Con apocalypse" was, just like John F. Kennedy Jr. turning up alive to become Donald Trump's running mate, a wild fantasy. How ironic that it was about an institution than embraces and welcomes wild fantasies. But as far as I'm concerned, the lesson to be learned from the 2023 Comic-Con International is that the movie previews and TV personalities never mattered that much. Truth to tell, I'd be more worried for the future of Comic-Con if some year, there was no one in the building selling Funko Pop figurines.

With The Daily Show outta production because of strikes, someone at Comedy Central is trying to keep the brand alive by posting old clips. Here's a 21-minute sampler of things the program had to say about Tucker Carlson. Personally, I think they were too nice to him…

I'm fairly recovered from Comic-Con 2023 where, as I've mentioned, I had a helluva good time.  I ran myself ragged at times but it was a Good Tired.  Right after the Sunday Cartoon Voices panel, I left Room 6A at 12:55 and sprinted down a corridor with an escort of convention staffers to overrule any security guards who might tell me I had to go via a different route.  I stopped in a Men's Room but still started the Frank Miller panel at 1 PM sharp.  Pant, pant, pant.

A couple of security guards gave me some grief at the con, and I also had some friction with folks who were doing panels in rooms before I was scheduled to do one.  You're supposed to end the panel as per the schedule and I always do.  But a lot of them think their panel is so f'ing important that it's entitled to five or ten minutes of the next panel's time.  At times, I think they see more people coming in and they extend their panel a little bit.  They think those new arrivals are there to see their panel instead of entering to get good seats for mine…just as I could delude myself into thinking the late entrants into my panels aren't just arriving for the one after me.

But that's about the totality of the negatives and it ain't much.

People ask me, "How can you deal with the crowds?" and the answer is that I couldn't handle a steady diet of them but four or five days a year is tolerable.  It's especially tolerable when most of the folks who comprise that crowd are having such a good time.  It's fun to be around happy people.  They're also an indivisible part of something enjoyable enough to attract a crowd.  If I wanted to go to the World Series or the Super Bowl or the big Las Vegas Grand Prix this November or some sold-out concert by someone wonderful, I'd just accept that I'm not likely to have the place to myself.  If I want that, I need to go to lousier events.

The above photo is from The Groo Panel on Friday.  It's me and then our new colorist, Carrie Strachan, then Stan Sakai.

I didn't spend a whole lotta time in the main hall; didn't even set foot in there Saturday or Sunday.  It was easy to see on the other days that the sellers were doing brisk business and that most people were having a very good time.  I signed a couple of Groos for a fellow from Lisbon who said that he'd been saving for years and dreaming of finally, some day, making it to Comic-Con.  I asked him, "Worth it?" and he said, "When I get home, I start saving to come back some day."

No way can I pick one moment from the con as my favorite but this would be in the running: I had the pleasure — and it really was one — to interview Barbara Friedlander, who worked on DC's romance comics from around 1964 until 1970.  She was delightful and funny and genuinely pleased that people turned out to hear her.

Once upon a time, my Comic-Con experiences involved interviewing men (and the occasional woman) who'd worked in comics in the thirties, forties, fifties or sixties.  You name 'em, I got to interrogate 'em…but now they're either gone or too old to travel to the convention.  Even folks from the seventies are in scarcer supply then you might imagine.  I suspect that of the 130,000+ human beings who were in that convention hall a few days ago, Barbara had the oldest credits in mainstream comic books. If there was anyone else, I can't think of who it could have been.

And above now, we have the Quick Draw! panel from Saturday. The back row is me, Bill Morrison, Lalo Alcaraz and Lonnie Milsap. Front row is Tom Richmond, Scott Shaw! and Floyd Norman. I have no idea why we're making those strange gestures or why Scott has the expression he has. But the panel was a lot of fun and we did have Sergio Aragonés but only on the telephone. I started it by announcing, "We don't need movie and TV stars! We have CARTOONISTS!"

I'll probably write another post this week about the Cartoon Voices Panels. I'm getting a bit sleepy since I'm still on San Diego Time.