Due to a large explosion at the factory, the 2009 Registered Weapon Advent Calendars have been destroyed. But that unfortunate accident will not stop us from counting down to the upcoming RW/slightly-related-to-RW events in December.

1. XXXMas – Dec. 19th @ Caledonia in Athens, Ga.

For 2009, Excalibrah and Swamp Thang will be headlining this Athens annual XXXmas tradition. Have they developed Candy Cane glowstick technology? Is Santa real inside The Matrix? I don’t know but come to the show to find out. Also, Triple Velcro, a comedy duo similar to Rodney Dangerfield if he was a convicted sex offender, will be reuniting to warm-up the crowd with some seasonal jokes. Finally, while unconfirmed, a major West Coast fantasy rap star is rumored to be on the VIP list. If you’ve heard the album, you KNOW Flip and Brah best be careful. He might ruin their holiday season like cheap lights draped around an under-watered Christmas tree.

And speaking of mysterious guests…

2. Starting on December 21, Race Baño returns in an all-new holiday adventure, which is on par with Rudolph, Frosty, TNBC and Nestor (who remembers the long-eared donkey?). For two weeks, Frank and FELIX will be on vacation while Race…well…races to solve a heinous crime before the clock strikes midnight on Christmas Eve. Maybe Rob will allow us to drop some preview art soon.

As you can see, Weaponeers, there is plenty to look forward to in the coming weeks.

The RW Team

P.S. Only a few copies left of Registered Weapon Volume 1. Stuff some stockings here!

According to Wesley, I don’t get comics.

He’s right.

First, do I think Kyle is permanently six feet under? No. Probably not. But Ted Kord is still worm food. So you never know when DC decides to re-establish the meaning of death in comics. Right now, I’d say there is a 90 percent chance Kyle is back by the end of Blackest Night. Maybe next issue. I thought so when I wrote my rant, which may get lost in the bombastic and fist-shaking-angry language. And I understand the absurdity of getting pissed over the death of a fictional character because we all have bigger problems in the real world…but what can I say…that’s why we read comics and we obviously have a sense of humor about the entire situation.

While his death was the catalyst for the post, the crux of my dissatisfaction is the recent lower-tier status of Kyle. Since Rebirth, DC’s approach to the character has been to blend him in to the background of the larger universe. To be fair, the company did use him in a starring role in Countdown and he is/was a featured cast member of GLC so he’s not absent. If the numbers say otherwise, I’ll rescind parts of my next point, but, Kyle has lucrative value. Readers will buy Kyle comics. Although the Ion sales may not be the best indicator as the series probably strayed too close to Guy Gardner: Warrior territory in removing the character from his natural state. The overall reaction to Kyle’s death seems to indicate that dollars are out there waiting to be spent on the character.

So Wesley is right. I don’t get comics. I don’t get why DC doesn’t increase the prominence and sales options for the GL that carried that title for more than 10 years.

That’s my real problem. Other people seem to share it too.

Thanks to Robot 6 for the link.

Poor, poor Kyle Rayner. All he ever wanted to do was hang out with the Flash and stare at that faux-Wyeth painting and maybe make out with Soranik Natu a little. And now he’s dead and nobody cares because he died in the middle of a superhero crossover about dead superheroes coming back to life. There is no justice in this world.

BUT! Maybe there can be, if people like you and me and also you and then you over there as well stand together and say “We want our Green Lantern back! No, not that one, the one with the black hair! Yeah, that’s the one. Cool.” We must make our voices heard! To that end, we have formed KOLD, Kyle’s Order of Lime Defenders, to represent our demands and let the Guardians of the Universe know that this affront shall not stand. To join our fight, all you have to do is go and buy yourself a T-shirt, and everyone you meet will know that you stand for what is right and true in this world.

CRAB MASK 4 LIFE

UPDATE 11/15/09

I haven’t eaten breakfast yet and I’m already supremely pissed off. SPOILER WARNING: Those of you that haven’t read the latest issue of Green Lantern, my suggestion is to enjoy today’s Registered Weapon, ignore this post and have a great Friday because I’m about to discuss why DC decided to anger a paying portion of it’s fanbase (assuming there is no resurrection, which in a story about the dead rising is entirely possible) and refuses to learn from its own mistakes.

Sucks.

At the end of GLC 42, Kyle Rayner apparently sacrifices his life to save OA or something. The details are fuzzy because my monthly shipment from the excellent Discount Comic Book Service will arrive the first week of December. The infuriating events are well recapped on various message boards though.

The Beginning…

The death of Kyle is the culmination of DC’s marginalization and disinterest in the character since the return of Hal Jordan (for the uniformed, check out the wiki history). The move reeks of spite and contempt for fans for preferring any Green Lantern over Hal Jordan and the Silver Age. Kyle has had target on his back for that reason for awhile. He’s the brightest light of an era that DC is hellbent on rewriting out of current continuity: the 90s (I could even argue the post-Crisis era too). One of the prevalent plot devices in that decade was the emergence of replacement/legacy heroes such as Jean Paul Valley, four Supermen, Wally West, Connor Hawke, Ben Reilly, Jack Knight, Artemis, young Tony Stark, The Ray and plenty of other minor heroes. Some of the heroes were editorially designed to be temporary, others were reinventions of characters not printed in decades. Despite being part of a stunt, whether or not the character WAS a stunt depended on the writer. While Emerald Twilight meets the criteria of an ultimate comics money grab with a legendary hero turning villain, killing his brothers-in-arms and destroying the decades old foundations of the intellectual property, the result was far from it.

Whether it be zeitgeist or luck, Ron Marz created a character that spoke directly to a teenage boy at the time. In the early 90s, comic creators were becoming rock stars in the industry. Flashy names like Jim Lee, Todd McFarlane, Rob “Button Your Fly” Liefeld, Erik Larsen were breaking away from Marvel and DC to create a hipper company (think like a teenage kid…Bloodstrike was cool). Classic comic moments were happening every Wednesday (or Thursday at my shop in Greenville, SC). Superman was dying. Batman was broken. Spider-man was the other Spider-Man. Wolverine was de-adamantiumed. Apocalypse ruled. And Green Lantern was insane. The magic was palpable. I looked forward to every single Thursday afternoon trip to the LCS. The resonant enthusiasm seeped into so many of us that we wanted to be comic creators when we grew up. The then hive-mind of kids spending wadded-up dollars on comics are now the same 30-year-olds writing an internet’s worth of web comics and repetitiously asking the same question at comic conventions: how do we break in?

Which is why Kyle is such a powerful character. Kyle Rayner is us. No, he’s not a comic creator. But he is a creator. An artist with a pop-culture influenced imagination. He struggles with women, holding down jobs and everyday issues like finding an apartment. And, yes, none of those characteristics is dynamic or unique. Except…Kyle made it. The big break literally landed right in his lap. Instead of becoming a comic creator, he became a superhero.

To be fair, the metaphor was not obvious to me when I collected Kyle’s GL run as kid. I started seeing the connection when Hal returned as I asked myself why I loved Kyle over other Green Lanterns. Guy was an engaging rogue that was willing to punch authority in the face and pay the consequences, which is the opposite of me.  John carried too much guilt and Hal’s arrogance always left me cold. But Kyle isn’t a sum of what the other are not. As I tried to define him, the similarities emerged.

As the populist groundswell echoed throughout the internet, certain comic fans hyped Green Lantern Rebirth as a reparations for Emerald Twilight. I understand that sentiment because of their own disenfranchisement with the treatment of Hal, a character they connected with deeply. The controversial passing of the ring hindered Kyle for the start as he never caught on with much of the old guard. When Rebirth was a foregone conclusion, the dialogue between Green Lantern fans grew more toxic. Much like the American political scene, you were either for or against someone. If you loved Hal, you hated Kyle. And vice versa. I hated that period in GL comics because I felt there was room for both. Not to mention John Stewart, Guy Gardner, Mogo, G’Nort and an entire freakin’ corps of ringslingers. The divide still continues today.

Rebirth arrived, Hal returned and sales rose. The event was a mega hit which returned Green Lantern to the top of the charts. Hal fans used the success as vindication of that character’s superiority. I’d argue the success was a potent mixture of Hal’s return, Didio’s hype , Van Sciver’s gorgeous, innovative GL art but, mostly, John’s masterful storytelling. The comic was well-written, well-conceived and hit all the hot buttons for nerds. I loved every second of it. And Kyle was treated with respect as Hal returned. There’s a line somewhere in the series when Hal tells Kyle that the corps wouldn’t exist without him. He’s right.

…Of the End.

The first few years after Hal’s rebirth, DC still featured Kyle prominently. But the company rescinded his A-list status as he did not fit Didio’s “iconic status” of Green Lantern but he still appeared on a monthly basis. His role as Torchbearer was explored in the Ion maxi-series and he used his considerable influence in The Rann-Thanagar War series and during Infinite Crisis. Curiously, Kyle was omitted as a cast member from the Green Lantern Corps monthly until after the Sinestro Corps War, which was an odd decision. For points during the mid-2000s, Kyle lacked a monthly home. The character is arguably DC’s second most lucrative Green Lantern but I don’t know that for a fact. John Stewart’s high profile throughout the last decade may have changed that.

Still, the internal attitude towards Kyle was apparent. DC let the character drift further from the mainstream action to solidify Hal’s identity as Green Lantern again (I fear a similar pattern of events coming with Wally West after Barry’s recent rebirth). Since the Sinetro Corps War, Kyle has shared the spotlight in Green Lantern Corps with a crowded cast in stories serving a larger purpose of the GL corner of the DC Universe, which is not a criticism of Tomasi’s fantastic run at all. The reality, though, is that Kyle is not a priority to DC as they made that obviously clear this week:

Kyle is a Marvel Zombie

Removing the Emerald Twilight controversy from the equation, what does the current editorial direction of DC have against Kyle (maybe nothing but recent actions suggest otherwise)? My guess is that at his core, Kyle is closer to a Marvel hero than a DC god.

His origin is exactly like Peter Parker’s fateful day but instead of a radioactive spider, Kyle encountered a radioactive blue dude. Characters like Peter, Matt Murdock, Ben Grimm, the X-Men are normal people thrust into a miraculous life through no actions of their own. The universe pushed them down and they stood right back up. Super soldiers, homesick aliens, spoiled rich kids, petulant gods, pretentious scientists, fearless fighter pilots are amazing too. But watching the guy from your neighborhood succeed…well…there’s something uniquely special about that.

Like I said earlier, Kyle is THE comic book fan. He’s us. Not the grotesque, rotund Cheeseburger-breath, Newsarama-forum troll that lives in a basement. No, Kyle is like the rest of us: normal, simultaneously awkward and brilliant with relationships, he’s holding down a career, he’s trying not to dwell on but still remember lost loved ones, he’s having drinks with friends and, everyday, he’s moving through life with one eye cast towards the fantastic. Difference is…Kyle actually has the chance to wear the fantastic on his finger.

RIP Kyle Rayner.

You were our kind of dude and one hell of a Green Lantern. Here’s hoping you’re back next issue.

Kyle's best look.

Next week, I’ll try to do a Top 10 Greatest Kyle moments post.

–The Pixies brought their 20th anniversary Doolittle tour to the Hollywood Palladium last night, and it was incredible. I know there are plenty of arguments to be made against this sort of thing, and against this thing in general (i.e., playing one album in its entirety): it’s obviously a cynical cash-grab, they’re not writing anything new, they’re not even altering the songs in performance, they’re just mechanically running through 20-year-old songs for an audience of aging hipsters, etc. All of that is true. BUT: this show was practically a religious experience, and I mean that in a very specific way. It was a heavily codified ritual designed to bring the faithful to a state of ecstasy (and boy, did it ever). The Lord’s Prayer and the Doxology don’t change from Sunday to Sunday, do they? No they don’t, and neither do “Debaser” or “I Bleed.” The spontaneity you might normally expect from a rock show was replaced by a sense of history and inevitablity that was just as powerful, if not more so. What once might have seemed disturbing or abrasive–Black Francis’s murderous shrieks or Joey Santiago’s drill-press guitar lines–is now a source of joy, and what was always comforting (the distinctive warm, bouncy sound of Kim Deal’s bass) is now even moreso. (It also helps that the band was in really excellent form; Black Francis hasn’t screamed this well in years, and drummer David Lovering convincingly made the case that he was always the band’s greatest strength.) Chide the audience for wallowing in nostalgia if you must, but what I felt last night was not a desperate clinging to past glories but a communal celebration of songs that sound as exciting now as they did 20 years ago, even though you know every word, every beat and every note. Sometimes getting exactly what you want is as good as you think it will be. (Also Black Francis now looks like Vic Mackey after spending a few years behind a desk. He’s got some extra pounds but he’ll still beat your ass.)

Go here to download a free EP of live tracks from the tour.

–If you’ve been staring at that “The Boy in the Tunnel” ad to the left and wondering what the hell that is, now is the time to find out. Four years ago I began writing a novel about an underground war between secret societies at a fictional Southern university whose students are issued Student Handbooks that can tell the future; since that initial burst it’s been kind of slow going, but now I’m determined to finish the rough (very rough) first draft. Yes, I’m doing it as part of NaNoWriMo, and yes, I’m aware that there is a certain lameness associated with that endeavor, but mostly I don’t care. I work best with deadlines, and here’s a big fat one. Done and done.

As I’ve done since the beginning, I will post new chapters to the GLFC every weekday starting on Monday. So check that out. I recommend you spend the weekend getting caught up to speed. I also recommend you please keep in mind that this is an extremely rough draft and will be rewritten, and that there are certain plot inconsistencies and just plain bad writing. I also also recommend that you ignore chapters i, iii and 2, which have nothing to do with anything.

–If you care, I may be Twittering under the name @lilgardner in the near future. Novel updates will probably be posted there, since the GLFC is running on donkey-powered old-school Blogger whatnot and doesn’t seem to have an RSS feed.

–Gardner

Voting in the 2009 Webcomic Readers Choice Awards is now open, and Registered Weapon is nominated for Best Art (congrats, Dave & Rob) and Best New Comic. So if you feel that RW is the best in those categories (and we encourage you to check out the competition, as there is some great stuff in there–for instance and also and this too) head on over there and vote! You have to be a member of Webcomic Planet to vote, but why aren’t you already? Go! Now!

VOTE!

Everybody has to have a hobby. Chris likes to make busts of South Carolina’s governors out of butter. Dave and Rob have their backyard-wrestling tag-team career. Me, when I’m not working on RW or making the reality TV or writing scripts or this thing, I spend my free time making rap songs about my kickball team. Two years ago, inspired by Excalibrah and The Flip Scoldjah (oh wait, I meant my hated rivals Excalibrah and The Flip Scoldjah), I made a small collection of not-very-good songs about my kickball team, The Grassy Best, under the moniker The Grassy Beast. Since then I have been sporadically working on a follow-up, and though the Best folded nearly a year ago, the Beast kept going and finally got together enough tracks for another album. And now we present that album for your amusement.

The very loose concept of the Beast’s work is that Los Angeles (and possibly the world) has been overrun by zombies, and the surviving members of The Grassy Best are now grizzled zombie fighters. Granted, much of the lyrical content of this album concerns Hollywood Division kickball in-jokes, but the other topics covered may be of more interest to you: zombies, Batman, Lost, 90s alt-rock, the comics of Grant Morrison, The Simpsons, eschatology, and hyperbolic braggadocio that makes Kanye West seem humble. On the production side, DJ Two-Handed Engine samples everybody from XTC to Carl Sandburg to Joe “Bean” Esposito, and even brings in a real guitarist for one track.

So click the cover art (by my brother, master carpenter and noted zombie artist Will Linn) to download the album, and perhaps for 51 minutes it will transport you to a world where everything is simple, where a well-timed kick and a big rubber ball can defeat the worst evils in existence. Enjoy?

Track listing:
1. Get Ready (The Sound of the Beast)
2. Fight ‘Em Off
3. Keep Off the Grass
4. In the Swan
5. The Best
6. Mexican Coke
7. Release the Hounds
8. Alec Guinness
9. Black Glove
10. Where Is Your Brain?
11. Let Me Work
12. Five Innings
13. Sixth World Bitches

More at thegrassybeast.com.

–Gardner

UPDATE 10/20: Apparently I’m an idiot who can’t type in a basic URL. The link is now fixed.

Here’s Dave and Rob this past weekend, running Bmore like Stringer Bell:

Salesman of the Year Dave Lentz even managed to sell a pair of books to a couple by spinning out a doomsday scenario in which they break up and have to fight over custody of their sole copy of Registered Weapon Case 001. Look for the RW team, possibly coming soon to a con near you!

…or at least it would be, if we were to get nominated. Nominations for the 2009 Webcomics Readers Choice Awards are now open at Webcomic Planet, and we would like to encourage you to nominate Registered Weapon if you feel such action is warranted, particularly in the categories of Art (for messrs. Dave Lentz and Rob Simmons), Protagonist (for Farthing Electronics Model 59, aka FELIX), and New Comic. Or whatever category you feel like! We’ll take any recognition anybody wants to give us! So head on over to nominate away, and be sure to follow the rules so the nom isn’t rejected. (I think you have to be a registered Webcomic Planet user to nominate, but you don’t have to sign away too much to register. You can’t take my first-born if I never have a first-born, Webcomic Planet! Loophole!)

Attention East Coasters: Dave and Rob will be hitting the Baltimore Comic-Con this Saturday and Sunday, October 10-11. They’ll be doing sketches and selling copies of Registered Weapon Case 001, as well as our BRAND-NEW BUTTONS:

You know you want ‘em. The boys will be at Table 5 on the back wall alongside Mumblepuss creator Jamie Fickes. Look for the sweet Brady Seitz-designed banner above, or use this handy map (click to embiggen):

See you there!