Atomika Soviet Supermen & Sal Abbinanti

Download the MP3 here On this edition of Word Balloon, Sal Abbinanti creator of Atomika the alternate history of Russian superheroes and villains. Sal explores the iconic images of the former USSR, combined with Russian mythology, but is the first to say this isn't a pro-soviet polemic. "At least once a con a guy wants to argue with me about Communism...or say how are things in Russia and I say 'Guys, come on, Gene Simmons really wasn't a serpent. It's just an act.' " He gives tips to aspiring creators about marketing an independent comic in the current market. "You gotta hustle...I tried going to cons, all over the country like Loretta Lynn with the records and my husband (working) out of the car...doesn't work...I tell new creators, don't release the book until you have 5 issues in the can, you never realize how much time it takes to promote the thing... plus dealing by yourself with colorists,inkers and printers...you never realize how much time it will take." Sal also discusses future projects like The Hostage based on true crime Brazilian kidnappings and the sci-fi comedy Dagos On The Moon.

Jason Aaron Scares The Crap Out Of Me

Download The mp3 here We talk Scalped, Wolverine Weapon X, His wrap up on The Ghost Rider series, and his upcoming origin of one of the immortal weapons, Fat Cobra.

View From The Floor At The FX Con

Downlaod The Episode Here On this edition of Word Balloon, coverage of this year's FX International Con in Orlando, Fl. You'll hear floor chats with Jeremy Haun, who talks about drawing the Batman-Battle For The Cowl One-Shot Arkham Asylum, written by David Hine, and drawing the Top Cow series Berserker written by Rick Loverd . Haun calls the Arkham One-Shot "A great horror story. I got to draw some of my favorite villains...it does focus on the events after Arkham explodes in the first issue of Battle For the Cowl...with hints of what we'll see in the future (Bat books) ." Marvel writer Jonathon Hickman talks about Secret Warriors & his work on the Fantastic Four Dark Reign series and taking over the main FF book following Mark Millar and Brian Hitch "After the events of Civil War and Secret Invasion I thought there was a real opportunity to do a lot of FF closure in the Dark reign series . The first arc of the regular series will be called "solve everything", and Reed sets out to do so." Artist Ben Templesmith talks about his IDW work on Wormwood, Doctor Who, and Groom Lake, plus answers the perennial question will he and writer Warren Ellis be doing more issues of their Image series Fell? "There is more Fell(to come), whenever Warren wants to do it, I'm doing it." Writer Christos Gage discusses his IDW GI Joe work, his coming Avatar series Absolution, His WILDCATS work for Wildstorm, and Marvel books. On Avengers: The Initiative "Somehow a rumor got started that the Initiative was being cancelled, but that's not true, the only way it will be cancelled is if people think it's cancelled and stop buying it...We're actually starting an exciting period...the initiative is now run by Norman Osborn, so they're now training villains to be dark avengers and appear to be heroic while still being bad on the down low...Some former members are going underground to rebel against the new initiative directive. Tigra will be looking for some payback after her beating from The Hood." On the upcoming mini series House Of M:Masters Of Evil "What were the villains doing in the House Of M world. The Hood has assembled a gang of villains including Absorbing Man Titania, Crossbones The Sandman, Batroc The Leaper...they get together to steal, in a world where Magneto's army comes down on them hard...the non mutant world starts to mistake their rebellion as being heroic, so they start to plan the scam of a lifetime." Avatar comics publisher William Christensen talks about Warrens Eilis's Ignition City, Freak Angels, and how Avatar has changed their image from the "Bad Girl" books, to their current line of unfettered stories by today's top creators. Writer artist Mike Wolfer talks about his work with Eilis on the Avatar Series Gravel . And, Jim McCann checks in to discuss his New Avengers:The Reunion mini series for Marvel.

Viking Rituals With Ivan Brandon

Ivan Brandon and Nic Klien debut their Image series Vikings on April 22nd. The First Issue has already sold out with retailers, and Ivan Talks about the series particulars. We also look at his upcoming mini series for DC, featuring Nemesis, Final Crisis Aftermath : Escape, and his recent appearence on NBC's The Celebrity Apprentice download the mp3 here

Brian Reed Kills Ms Marvel

In this edition of the Word Balloon podcast, Marvel writer Brian Reed checks in to talk about all the big changes in Ms Marvel, and his two new projects, Timestorm 2099 and Dark Reign The Sinister Spider-Man. Some quotes from the audio interview… On Moonstone taking over the mantle as Ms Marvel I think this question of who am I comes from leading two lives…and now when you have bad guys playing good guys, it’s layers upon layers of itself. The first issue that focuses on her is the Government comes in and demands psych evaluations of the Dark Avengers to make sure they have the right people doing these jobs, so Norman wants to have a psychiatrist talk to a psychiatrist first.. The whole story arc revolves around what make Karla Sofer the person she is…while writing it I realized we’re going to have an interesting dark storyline for awhile.” “Timestorm 2099 is The present day Marvel slamming headlong into the future 2099 Marvel…these characters are still a lot of fun, but we’ve got to update it. All science fiction eventually shows its age. In the original run The Pixel company sounded really cool in 1993…that’s the danger of writing science fiction, unless your name is Douglas Adams …I wanted it to be loyal, but I also wanted it to be new…the facts behind the story are all entirely new, we see names and designs we recognize …as we were talking about characters we wanted to give a spit polish to, to a man, all of us said we’re not touching (the look of ) the 2099 Spider-Man. We’ll be following the present day Spider-Man and Wolverine, but most of the New Avengers will be making cameos , and some of the Dark Avengers.” On Sinister Spider-Man –“ This is a bad joke that I think has gone too far and someone approved it (laughs) . Someone said this needs to be a fractured fairy tale this is a Spider-Man book , but starring Mac (Venom) Gargan, and who would Peter be if he didn’t have all the responsibilities, with that power. Matt Fraction pointed out that I’m the wrist writer to have written the script line “Spider-Man is getting a lap dance.” (laughs) …When Norman first got them the job as avengers he said ‘none of you talk to the press, stick around the tower and behave .’ Well Mac said, “ It’s not like there’s a bunch of spider-men out there you can replace me with, so I’m going to do what I want..” So there’s a real animosity between him and Norman . Mac will be dealing with Norman, the City of New York , and something else he’ll have cooking..” download the show from here