This piece is dedicated to the memory of artist Carolyn Kelly, daughter of POGO creator Walt Kelly, and guardian and custodian of his work and legacy. Carolyn Kelly had been spearheading the recent beautiful hardcover reprint collections of POGO from Fantagraphics, and even drew the strip herself during a brief revival. To learn more about […]
That’s what the San Diego Comic-Con can start to feel like in recent years: out-and-out war. It’s you against 124,999 other folks, all of whom are trying to get to the same places and buy the same things that you are, and you wish they’d just get out of your damn way. Stop. Take a […]
The Doctor Who fans out there can relate. Whenever The Doctor regenerates, usually the TARDIS will change too, but it always still looks and feels like the TARDIS. Oh, sure, the colors and details may change, but all the familiar facets remain: the curved walls, the central console. It still feels the same. You know […]
Every piece of official art that was ever used to promote BLASTOFF, everything from our logo and title font to over 70 theme banners, has all been the work of a single talent, our Artist-in-Residence Elena Casagrande. Elena was the first call Jud and I made when we started the business and needed a logo, […]
You’d think a great Spider-Man movie would have to take place mostly in New York. Au contraire. So many great Spidey stories have been travel stories, whether Spidey was in Florida confronting the Lizard, or the Savage Land working for JJJ, or off to London to try to win back Gwen Stacy. So even though […]
BLASTOFF WELCOMES COLLECTOR’S PARADISE TO NORTH HOLLYWOOD Award-winning SoCal retail chain to take over for departing vintage-comic boutique North Hollywood, CA, July 2019 – Blastoff Comics and Collector’s Paradise are pleased to announce that they have entered into an agreement that will allow Collector’s Paradise to take over Blastoff’s popular brick-and-mortar location at 5118 Lankershim […]
By 1941, public opinion on whether or not the U.S. should get involved in the fighting in Europe was decidedly mixed. One place that wasn’t quite so conflicted was the comic books, particularly the comics published by Timely. Having already had a taste of success with Carl Burgos’ Human Torch feature and Bill Everett’s Sub-Mariner […]
It was one year ago today that we lost the great Harlan Ellison. In a lot of ways, Harlan was kind of the patron saint of BLASTOFF, encouraging us and supporting us even before we had the store open, when Jud and I were just setting up the online business. And his trusting us to […]
So about six weeks before AVENGERS: ENDGAME came out, I began re-watching the entire Marvel Studios filmography and commenting about it on social media. Just because, I guess. (Although truth be told, I didn’t finish until much after ENDGAME’s debut, for reasons not worth getting into here.) With ENDGAME poised to return to theatres with […]
One of the things Jud and I are proudest of when it comes to Blastoff is our podcast, which ran throughout 2017. We wanted our podcast to be just how we had envisioned the store and the website: steeped in comic-book history and emotionally relevant. All of these podcasts are the work of many hands: […]
When Jud and I opened BLASTOFF seven years ago, it was important to us to be a different kind of comic-book store. And we’d often be complimented about our store’s appearance, which was certainly gratifying. But we wanted to be different not merely in appearance and practice, but in philosophy. In my many years of […]
I’ve been thinking a lot about Bill Mantlo in recent days, the amazing cinematic success being enjoyed by his creation Rocket Raccoon, and the tragedy of Mantlo’s own medical condition. Mostly, though, I’ve been thinking about what a great writer Bill Mantlo was. Which made me want to go back and re-present this look at […]
Last week, we were talking about the forgotten heroes of World War II comics, Hillman’s Airfighters, and their star attraction, Airboy, a kid pilot with an amazing robot plane named Birdie. Let us continue: In time, Airboy becomes an authorized if unofficial member of the Air Force, often going out on missions at the behest […]
