The 2nd annual Metro Comic Con was held last weekend at the SM Megamall, and by most accounts it seems to have improved on its predecessor, the smaller venue leading to a better organized layout, with the komiks creators front and center, as they should be.
Flickr is giving me some issues trying to share individual images, so have a slideshow instead!
Here’s the Horror Panel (featuring Budjette Tan (Trese), David Hontiveros (Penumbra novellas, Pelicula), Bart (G. M.) Coronel (Tragic Theater)) from the “Literature From Shakespeare to Bob Ong: Bridging the Divide Between the Popular And the Canonical” conference, held at the UST on August 18, 2010. (The Q and A will be uploaded in another post)
The first question, which I didn’t capture on video, is “What are you most afraid of?”
Part 2 and 3 under the cut.
Yesterday, I trooped down to UST to attend the second day of the “Literature From Shakespeare to Bob Ong: Bridging the Divide Between the Popular And the Canonical” conference, by Visprint in collaboration with the UST Faculty of Arts and Letters: Dept. of Literature, Thomasian Writers Guild, The Literary Society and The Varsitarian. Many of the speakers were horror writers from Visprint’s stable, so it was a good opportunity to check the pulse of the genre here in the country, or at least to get the opinions of some of those at its vanguard. Komiks (in general, not horror komiks) were also represented, with Manix Abrera walking the audience through several of his strips.
I took a few videos of the talks and Question and Answer segments, and I’ll use this post as a hub as I slowly (yes I have slow a slow connection) upload the different videos. I’ll upload the talks first, and then lump the open forum segments in the last post. Siege Malvar, Alan Navarra, Nida Ramirez, and Eros Atalia were also on hand for some insightful talks, but my coverage here will focus on the komiks/spec fic content, although I’ll try to sneak in some videos of the others.
(Note that some of the links below are NSFW – many of these people specialize in horror, remember? ^_~)
Video 1: Horror Panel, featuring Budjette Tan (Trese), David Hontiveros (Penumbra novellas, Pelicula), Bart (G. M.) Coronel (Tragic Theater)
Video 2: Karl de Mesa (Damaged People, News of the Shaman)
Video 3: Manix Abrera (Kikomachine, 12) [not yet uploaded]
If there’s one theme that I’d say unites many of the stories in this year’s RP612fic, it’s this: a need for catharsis. We’re coming off a decade under an unpopular President, and while many are hopeful for the coming administration, there still remains a lot of unsettled issues, a lot of unpsent anger. Luckily, catharsis is one of the functions that fiction can undertake in the life of both writers and readers, and I hope that participating in this year’s Independence Day micro story tweet fest helped a few of us get ready for the new challenges that face us, while helping us remember what has come before.
I’d like to thank everyone who participated, especially Dominique Cimafranca who was impressively prolific during the RP612fic period. We generated over one hundred and fifteen stories over the Independence Day weekend–here are a few of my favorite stories:
I’d also be remiss if I didn’t point to Adam David’s essay on freedom, over at the Philippine Online Chronicles.
The rest of the stories run the gamut from science fiction, to horror, to fantasy (from the fantasy that means “magic” to the fantasy that means “how I wish this were true). Some are meant to be read alone, others in sequence (although there was a limit to how I could arrange them in anything but the reverse chronological order of a Twitter search.) Some aren’t stories in so much as hopes, dreams, or ideas and that’s fine too.The usual disclaimer applies: these stories are meant as fiction, and are not to be taken as allegations of actual facts, nor as statements of actual intent.
And now, beneath the cut, are the rest of the stories. (2009’s stories are here.) Enjoy, and see you all next year!
The Center for East Asian Languages is holding a seminar entitled “Komix101: Required Comic Book Reading for the Summer” that will tackle recommended comic books and graphic novels, for those looking for something to read this summer. Your guide on this little tour will be none other than Budjette Tan, co-creator of Trese and comics/komiks aficionado.
On May 15, a similar seminar will be held covering anime and manga, to be run by Raymond Sison, also from 2-4, at the same venue.
Back from Tokyo (more on that later) and there’s a lot to catch up on, so let’s get to it.
Now, here are a few new-ish SF fiction markets (via the specficmarkets lj community) and a contest (via email from chiles samaniego):
Finally, some events to mark on your calendars (Let me know if I’m missing anything):
I had no idea what on earth a Pecha Kucha was (but if I were forced to guess, I would have said “Tibetan curse word”), which means I can chalk up one more thing I’ve learned because of komiks. Pecha Kucha is a forum for presentations which are kept concise by adherence to the simple formula of 20 images x 20 seconds. (All in favor of a similar formula for mass homilies say aye!) Trese writer Budjette Tan gave a presentation at last year’s event, a a 6 minute 40 second Trese short story, which he recently uploaded for the reading pleasure of Trese fans everywhere. Thanks Budjette!
Writing (and Writer) News:
Events:
Reviews:
For all you Trese fans out there, a new novella entitled Masquerade (or Case File # 1031) has been uploaded to Rogue magazine, with a story by Trese scribe Budjette Tan and art by Mark Torres. It’s nice to see Trese stories appearing in different formats, and it does seem to allow for the possibility of more frequent releases of related content even when co-creator Kajo Baldisimo is busy/unavailable.
Budjette Tan has an interview up on FHM, which deals with his writing in general, as well as Underpass. You can find it here (somewhat NSFW of course, unless your boss will really believe you were at a Men’s mag site for the articles) or on Budjette’s blog here.
[Picture of Budjette sourced from the abovementioned FHM interview.]
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