 |
| Above, DC Comics will be located near Warner Bros. Studios in Burbank. Photo by Armand Vaquer. |
DC is officially closing it's New York offices today, climaxing the progressive move to Burbank over the last few years. They've been kind enough to invite me to a final lunch at the office with so many old friends to commemorate the occasion.
Rather than write about what the DC office in NY has meant to me personally, let me take today to write about what it's meant to NY, and vice versa.
The various DC offices over the past 80 years have been a gateway for New York's young people, originally mostly from immigrant or disadvantaged backgrounds, to bring their gifts to entertain the world. Kids like Shelly Mayer, Joe Kubert, Carmine Infantino, Alex Toth, Bob Kane, Bill Finger, Jerry Robinson, Irwin Hasen--and in a later generation, Neal Adams, Len Wein, Marv Wolfman, Howard Chaykin, George Perez, Denys Cowan--and so many, many more, came knocking on the doors and found an outlet for their talents. Based in a city that long opened its doors to the world, DC opened up to people with passion for creating stories and artwork, and to a generation or two of people who came to New York "to get into comics." It wasn't the only comics company that did this, but it was the most consistent presence--the only leader in the field to have stayed in the front of the pack for over 75 years, creating opportunities in the greatest city on our continent.
It's not only writers and artists who came through the DC offices and prospered. A tally of the young New Yorkers who spent an early part of their careers at DC and went on to interesting lives would include publishing pioneer Byron Priess, a host of editors, leading licensing executives, and graphic desgners.
The offices have also been a magnet for business change in the comics field. The idea that comics could be original periodicals was first made real and practical in a DC office, as was the first truly successful graphic novel publishing program in America. And would comics have been that same if NY English teacher Phil Seuling hadn't had easy access to offices to pitch his direct sales idea? The comic shop may have been born in California, but the systems that fed it started here.
Has all this connecting been made obsolete in the era of the Internet and global interdependency? Maybe. There's certainly an argument that today you can run anything, anywhere.
But New York won't be quite the same without a DC Comics, and as a New Yorker whose life was shaped by his city and by the DC offices, I can be sad about that.During my days as a regular reader of DC's line-up of comics back in the 1960s, the address their editorial offices were located was 575 Lexington Ave., New York, New York. For some reason, that address always stayed with me.
 |
| Above, DC's characters are prominent on a sound stage at Warner Bros. Studios in Burbank. Photo by Armand Vaquer. |
In 2015, DC Comics will leave its base of operations for more than three quarters of a century when the publishing arm of DC Entertainment moves across the country from New York to join its digital and administrative divisions in Burbank, Calif.
The move, initially reported as rumor this morning, was confirmed in an email sent by DC Entertainment president Diane Nelson to staff this afternoon. "The move is not imminent and we will have more than a year to work with the entire company on a smooth transition for all of us, personally and professionally," she wrote.
DC Entertainment initially moved its multimedia-related offices to Burbank in 2010, a year after the formation of DCE as an entity within the larger Warner Bros. corporation.Ever since I can remember, DC Comics has always been based in New York, with some operations in Sparta, Illinois. I still remember when DC was still National Periodical Publications back in the 1960s. I also remember their New York address back then: 575 Lexington Avenue, New York, New York. Some things just get tattooed in one's gray matter.
The landmark 1974 animated series Space Battleship Yamato finally gets
a live-action treatment from director Takashi Yamazaki! In the year 2199, earth
has become a wasteland after five years of radiation attacks from an unseen
alien enemy called the Gamilons. One of the survivors is Kodai Susumu (Kimura
Takuya), who picks up a mysterious device one day while hunting for scrap metal.
After discovering a map to a planet inside the device, the military sends out
its last battleship--the Yamato-- in the hopes that it'll be the key to
save humanity. Kodai joins the Yamato crew and quickly proves to be a worthy
team member. With only a year left before the end of earth, what will the Yamato
crew find at the end of their long and perilous journey? One of the
highest-grossing Japanese films of all time, Space Battleship Yamato is
a sci-fi spectacular for audiences of all ages.
Japan. 2010. 137 min., 35mm, in Japanese with English subtitles. Directed by Takashi Yamazaki. With Takuya Kimura, Meisa Kuroki, Toshiro Yanagiba.For ticket information, go here.
Written By: Ken Hulsey
Written By: Ken Hulsey
It's good to see Elvira doing a 'horror hosted' program again, well, I won't see it, it's on in New York.
Written By: Ken Hulsey
ALSO, come out and meet-&-greet and take a photo with LATIN HORROR's sexy Ambassadors of Fear: Yenny Love, Ellie Diez, Aisha Koswara, Traci Islands (Photo Above) and Tatiana Dellepiane. And welcome the hostess of our forthcoming online macabre lifestyle program MEIDO Teve, Giselle Rodriguez. All photos will be uploaded to latinhorror.com for retrieval after the event (must be a member of LATIN HORROR's Facebook group page, or registered with latinhorror.com to receive access link to stills).
Source: Warner Bros
Source: MediaLab
Written By: Ken Hulsey
(2)
See Also: Russian Soldiers Discover A Harry Monster On The Beach / A Mysterious Creature Washes Ashore In New London Connecticut 
Source: Randy (Kaiju Big Battel)
"LONE" Trailer from Imagine Science Films on Vimeo.
Written By: Ken Hulsey
Source: Quiet Earth / Avery Guerra
Rookie director, Andrew Nowrojee, has just completed his first short film entitled "Lone." The film follows the survivor of a global holocost in his persuit to find fellow survivors and ultimately after not finding any, build himself a robot companion. Oddly enough the new robot "buddy" that he builds looks a lot like "Wall-E" or "Johnny 5", but then again all robots these days kinda look like those two "droids", so maybe we shouldn't come down on Nowrojee for not coming up with a different looking design.
Now let's be perfectly honest....if I was the last surviving male on planet Earth, I would be looking for one of those "real-looking" love dolls. You know those expensive ones in the backs of magazines....in fact maybe two or three different.....wait, wait....uhum. I got off track.
Then after...er that....I would build me some kind of "droid." C'mon having your own robot would be cool!
Look for "Lone" to screen at the Imagine Festival in New York City.
Source: Electric Artists
Source: Viz Pictures
