It scares me how excited I am about this:
Kinley MacGregor to adapt the first five novels in her highly anticipated fantasy and romance series, LORDS OF AVALON....SWORD OF DARKNESS will be produced as a monthly 22-page comic starting this fall, with a script expertly penned by Roynne Gillespie (THE BURNING MAN) and illustrations by an artist soon to be announced. A graphic novel edition should be available in bookstores by Spring ’07.On the surface, it looks like it's just feeding into stereotypes - like the Harlequin series recently published by Dark Horse. The article's gives us an overly simplistic description of what "guys" and women want as the justification for the deal: women want romance and depth, and men want just the gore.
I think that Kinley MacGregor's books will translate very well into comic books - in part because they generally involve a decent amount of violence as well as romance. The mix of these two is what makes her books so popular, and I don't doubt that there is a huge potential audience for comic books like this. Really, I'm excited because I think it has the potential to be a fun read and because, more than anything I've seen so far, it has the potential to blast away some of the stereotypes that the article relies on - for both men and women. Which is needed if we are to continue the push for graphic novels to be defined as a medium that has a variety of genres within it, rather than a medium that is practically synonymous with one specific genre because it's (supposedly) dominated by a homogeneous audience. I like superhero stories, but I think all comic books will benefit from comics being seen as a medium rather than a genre.
My WOW craft playing, Romance junkie co-worker is going to flip when I tell her. And how did I miss that The Anita Blake series is coming out in comic book form as well? Talk about an idea that's long overdue. Although (snort) I do wonder how far they plan on going and what they plan on including. I'd love to see certain scenes rendered by a competent artist - but many of them would make the comic "adult only" at the very least. They'll make debates about what constitutes objectification in comics a hell of a lot more interesting, though.
(via When Fangirls Attack)
4 comments:
You've read these books? Great! I am a HUGE King Arthur fanatic, and I'd never seen them before! I asked for reviews on Whileaway but no bites os far.
Are they good? How's Gawain portrayed? Tell me Morgan and Morgause don't come off evil (or, in the case of being antagonists) too evil.
Oops, I haven't read these particular books of hers. Sorry : (
The only one out so far is Lord of Shadow. I do plan on picking it up in a few weeks and I'll let you know what I think when I do.
If they are anything like her other books, they are fairly typical of what is "hot" in romance at the moment, which is why I find it interesting, and - as a romance reader - exciting, that DB Pro is making a comic out of them. They are still very much romance novels, like Dark Horse Harlequin line. But unlike the Harlequin books, they have a a lot of action going on as well. It's just that, unlike non-romance books, the action and plot are still centered around the couple getting together. It's pretty much understood that relationships are the focus of the plot and the action scenes are the plot contrivances, not the other way around.
The reviews on Amazon are mostly positive, but well, they are Amazon reviews and they veer from lots of 5 stars from fans to a few 1 stars from former fans.
Hmm.. Might be interesting, I'll probably order the comic.
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