Previously, Lisa Fary discussed with us her future project called “ScifiBabe”.

Yesterday, we got the following full retraction.

And here’s the press-release, in which she completely ignores the fact that’s she’s been defrauding her readers for months.

I demand Justice!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Contact:
Lisa Fary & John Dallaire
lisa@pinkraygun.com
john@pinkraygun.com
http://www.pinkraygun.com

Pink Raygun Blasts the Web on February 1st

TUCSON, AZ 2/1/07–

Pink Raygun, the new webzine featuring news, reviews and interviews for fangirls. . . and boys officially launched on February 1st at http://www.pinkraygun.com. Pink Raygun is dedicated to providing women a smart and savvy, yet girly, place to discuss and read about science fiction, fantasy and horror in all of their forms, be it television, movies, books or comics.

“Women need Pink Raygun,” says webzine editor Lisa Fary. “Nearly half of the Scifi Channel’s American viewership is comprised of women because the genre is changing, portraying more strong female characters in roles that have traditionally been played by men and featuring storylines that are more about people”. However, there have been few, if any, publications online or in print that address the growing female audience.

Pink Raygun features interviews with women working in all aspects of scifi, fantsy and horror. Within the first month, the webzine will run interviews with Noel Neill, known as the original Lois Lane, Christine Beiselin, who is the assistant costume designer for the film 300, and Amy Reeder Hadley, creator of Tokyopop’s American manga hit Fool’s Gold.

Other features of Pink Raygun include genre news, a message board forum, opinion pieces addressing issues within scifi, fantasy and horror and an extensive section dedicated to reviews of print and visual media, events, websites and music.

Pink Raygun’s management team is comprised of Lisa Fary as editor and John Dallaire as art director. Lisa Fary is a graduate of the creative writing program at Florida State University and holds an advanced degree in Special Education. Her early exposure to classic Battlestar Galactica in 1979 is largely responsible for her lifelong interest in science fiction and her childhood ambition of being an intergalactic space cowgirl. John Dallaire has over ten years of experience in commercial illustration and graphic design. He does art and illustration work for many of the casinos and resorts in Las Vegas. Together, Fary and Dallaire publish the webcomic, review and opinion site Intergalactic Law.

In case you missed the announcement the other day, Modern Tales has added five new comics this week:

• Alma Mater, about a prep school for girls
• Bellen, a relationship story about a couple named Ben and Ellen
• Minus World, about a video game studio; this one is co-created by the fantastically talented Bill Mudron, so skip it at your peril
• Nice Work, about Hollywood in 1960s; really interesting concept and some real visual flair on display here
• Steverino, inspired by the incredible true story of a nerdy guy

As usual, MT editor/webcomics dynamo Shaenon Garrity will greet her new chums with a series of interviews over at Talk About Comics, which starts today with Alma Mater’s Whitney June Robinson.

And, in a less happy vein, Fleen Fave Bernie Hou informs us today that he’s cutting back his schedule from Tuesdays & Fridays to when time permits. Tantalizingly, he hints about “new projects” being in the works; right thinking folk know that Hou’s work is worth waiting for, so subscribe to his newsletter or RSS feed to make sure you don’t miss any installments or announcements.

I ought to go back and retitle this thing, since I wouldn’t want to get any of another Episode I on what Scott Kurtz, Kris Straub, and Blind Ferrett have produced; this goes by the subtitle High School Daze, and is described thusly:

Francis worries about high school; Brent and Cole relive their glory days.

This episode starts off with the same 90 seconds or so (Office! Cubicle! Office! Cubicle! Fire!) that formed the series preview … certain things that were a bit awkward in the teaser trailer (like background noises at too high a level, which made the offices of PvP Magazine sound like a much busier place that it’s ever been shown) have been resolved. Brent’s voice (which to me was the strongest part of the trailer) sounds a bit more confident in the first installment, and the animation features a broader range of framings and motions than the preview. HSD proper starts immediately after the title logo and obligatory panda mauling.

There’s boobs, and barfing, and a bleeped naughty word, and you’ve got characters acting as you’d expect, but… It doesn’t entirely feel like PvP. This is probably because Skull doesn’t appear in the episode at all, which seems an odd choice given his key role in the strip. Sure, it’s just the first episode, and there’s nothing that says he has to appear in every one — but to not have Skull feels weird, like we’re watching a pilot for a new TV show that hasn’t found its groove yet.

The story itself plays like a PvP strip stretched out in time, and I don’t mean that in a bad way. Think about it this way: a three-panel comic strip is like a three-act story; there’s the setup in the first panel/act, the reaction in second, and resolution (usually with comuppance) in the third. In this respect, the shifting from three panels to three acts gives time to put more in than could possibly be accomodated in a regular strip offering, and allows for a smoother story than a comic strip arc could. When comic strip stories continue from day-to-day, you usually have to sacrifice at least part of panel #1 reminding people what they read yesterday; without that 24-hour-delay-and-reminder everything moves more smoothly, and the characters don’t have to act like they have low-level anterograde amnesia.

And yet, I’ve always thought that both Kurtz and Straub have done their best work when they set out to tackle longer story arcs; as their comics grew from daily gags to week-long themes to full-blown plotlines, they became much more interesting. I have a feeling that as they become more confident in their writing for this new medium, we’ll see stories structured less like a strip (in the sense of a single-day’s comic), and more like a strip (in the sense of an ongoing thing with character development and a sense of backstory). Given that Kurtz & Straub have spoken of the series as having “seasons”, I suspect that we may see an overall theme, like the year in PvP when Jade & Brent broke up, and many shorter story arcs were part of a buildup to their eventual reunion. I’d love to see a story that plays out in multiple installments (without the obvious crutches of cliffhangers) and becomes a coherent whole; that’s tough to do when you’ve only got 5 minute chunks to work with, but it can be done.

So bottom line — let’s say that the pilot’s been picked up, and we’ve got a 13-episode committment. And while Kurtz & Co. were kind enough to comp me a subscription, based on this first episode, it would have been a worthwhile risk to plunk down the cash myself. There’s potential, and Kurtz & Straub have the chops to build on it, and we just have to see if they can translate those chops to the world of sound & motion.

Okay, what with all the responses I got for what Chris Hastings (congrats on getting past those ‘bandwidth exceeded’ errors, Chris!) called the science fair project, 48 of you were willing to share data. Deadline was a touch over 10 hours ago, with only one contact since the 11th.

For statistical significance, I wanted a minimum of 100 respondents; since 48 < 100, my life just got easier in that I don't have to crunch numbers. If it turns out there really is a demand for this sort of analysis, I'd be willing to revisit the issue, but for now, we at Fleen will not be going ahead with the project. Many thanks to all who offered to share their data. Things were shaping up to be a nice cross-section of genre and audience size, and much as I hate calculating skews and kurtoses, getting the numbers would have been more than a little interesting.

You want new? We got new! First up, David Morgan Mar wants you to make a webcomic. You put your skills & preferences into a matrix, and when your name comes up in the queue, you contribute to an ongoing comic. This could be insanely, bizarrely awesome, or collapse like a game of “Telephone” with too many people whispering purple monkey dishwasher. I cannot wait to see what happens.

Also new, the long-running PC Weenies, which will cheerfully put you in the strip for a modest fee, is looking forward to strip #1000 in grand (ha, ha!) fashion. Wanna be in the landmark strip? It’s up for bid. Ironically, the 1000th strip extraganza is currently going for less than the usual guest-star fee; barring a last-minute bidding frenzy, this could turn out to be the bargain of the year

And, not strictly speaking new, but new for 2007, there’s a brand new set of 12 card for Valentine’s Day over at Scene Language, and more at The Devil’s Panties (featuring images from the deck of cards — hearts, naturally). Panties creator Jennie Breeden is also doing custom greeting cards — you pick the strip, pick the wording, and hey presto, it’s on the way to you. It’s like a completely-customized piece of merch for you and you alone. Neat.

Hey gang, it’s interview time again!

Today, I’m speaking with the creator of Goodbye Chains, Ms. Alice Hunt.
(more…)

So the new WCCA nominations have hit, and one may notice a few changes over years past:

1. Per Mark Mekkes’s report a month or so back, the genre categories remain, but fourth-tier categories for next year are up for nomination.
2. The voting round will continue until 11 February, with winners announced on 19 February; this is not only a compressed schedule compared to last year (with nine full weeks between preliminary nominations and final winners), it’s much earlier in the year. Recall that last year, the awards weren’t announced until more than halfway through the year, which probably lessened their impact a great deal.

All that being said, what’s an award without some Whaaa moments? I mean, seriously, Best Adapted Screenplay? Similarly, some headscratchers at the WCCAs:

• I thought it slightly odd that A Lesson Is Learned … is nominated for Outstanding Layout despite being officially on hiatus for fully a third of the year and having released a total of seven comics in 2006 (and none after May). But they are very good comics, it is a very nice layout, and the question of Should there be a minimum amount of work in the year to qualify for nomination? has been asked before.
• I like the redesign of PvP that Thin Slice did; since the site took a nomination for Outstanding Website Design, I hope that Scott Kurtz will share it with them if he wins.
• There’s always going to be differences of opinion; for example, I probably would have put Gunnerkrigg Court up for Outstanding Science Fiction Comic, instead of Outstanding Fantasy Comic as it was. Even Scott Kurtz seems to wonder if PvP is really a gaming comic (which would be a prerequisite to being Outstanding Gaming Comic). And in a crowded field of seven (!) entries, Outstanding Single Panel Comic inexplicably omits xkcd; if only for his tireless efforts to keep us warned as to the continuing threat of velociraptors, Randall Munroe deserved a nod.

But if these are the biggest things I can bitch about (and they are, pretty much), then the WCCA committee did a pretty good job. It’s especially gratifying to note that the nominees for Outstanding Comic represent a wide variety of artistic and storytelling styles. If you’re not familiar with Girl Genius, Gunnerkrigg Court, Narbonic, Perry Bible Fellowship, Scary Go Round, and Templar Arizona, now’s the time to get started.

Ugly Hill creator Paul Southworth in GENERIC SEX-LUBE shocker in the hallowed halls of Harvard Goddamn University! No news at this time as to the state of his pants.

Naturally, this means that I owe “Jonathan Gaudet and Allycia” a dollar. Email me, kiddies, and your American Cash Money will be on its way.

From David Malki !, an announcement:

The following announcement is only for people who write short stories and would like to get paid for it! Everyone else please close your eyes.

This is an open call for entries for a book that Ryan and Matt and I are publishing. It’s called Machine of Death and the premise is basically “What if everyone knew how they were going to die?”

Details on this coolness at machineofdeath.net!

Webcomickers will be found at opposite ends of Massachusetts starting today, what with Jephy McJacquespants, the Applegeeks crüe and Rob Balder holding forth at Genericon, on the campus of RPI, in Troy, NY (and rumor has it that at least one more long-time webcomic guy lives ’round those parts). Meanwhile, look for Paul Southworth, R Stevens 3, J-Ro, and Shaenon Garrity bringin’ the love and panel wisdom to Vericon, on the campus of Hahvahd in Cambridge, MA. If you bring Southworth some lube, I will give you a dollar. Update: And some Charmin! And yes, I know that Troy, NY is not technically in Massachusetts, but I did my graduate work at Rensselaer, and trust me, it’s bloody close enough. And, given the cold snap in the Northeast this weekend, coolness will be in extra-abundance.

I’ve felt like this on occasion. Don’t tell my wife, but it’s really cool.

Ever wonder what it’s like to be Liz Cusack Greenfield? She is very polite about penises, and exudes cool even in a steam room.

Update: What’s cooler than a new Winterview? How about one that a) takes place in Halifax; and b) features Bryan Lee O’Malley and Hope Larson? Five bucks says that somebody gets a powerup during the interview.

On the one hand, you have a McCloud tour stop interview in comic form — very cool. Good likenesses of Scott, Ivy, Sky & Winter, too.

On the other, Friend-o-Fleen/foe of syndication¹ Dave Kellett informs us in his blog (no direct link, sorry) that:

Looks like Sheldon started a bit of an trend over at comics.com! Fellow comics.com refugee Barkeater Lake has moved to an independent site … and it’s lookin’ good. Head on over!

We at Fleen will be keeping our eyes on comics.com, and we’ll be sure to tell you if any other comics follow the lead of Kellett and Barkeater creator Corey Pandolph.

Lastly, the guys at Unshelved, fresh off their ALA convention trip, took some time this morning to tell us that their Pimp My Bookcart contest has a winner. Check out the winner out (pictured up top) here, and the runners up here. Congratulations to Bill Barnes & Gene Ambaum for having such a tremendous response, and to Katie George and the teens of the Miller Branch Library in Ellicott City, MD for their win.

¹ It turns out that Kellett is actually the once-torrid-lover of syndication, bummed at the thought that the system doesn’t really offer the professional life it once did.