Don’t have your tickets yet for the 100 BULLETS wrap party scheduled for Saturday, July 11 at Meltdown Comics in L.A.?  Here’s what you’re gonna miss out on.

VIP tickets entitle you to:
• Programming with writer Brian Azzarello and cover artist Dave Johnson
• Access to the 100 Bullets art gallery
• Free food!
• Valet parking
• Open bar!
• Commemorative T-shirt
• Live music from the incomparable Nina Storey!
• A chance to hang-and-bang with the beautiful people from L.A.’s comics, artistic and literary communities.

And don’t forget the custom made shot glass seen above, featuring art by Dave Johnson. And of course the most important part is the chance to support our friends at the Hero Initiative.

Get your tickets today!

Brian Wood: LOCAL. The best thing I’ve done, and hopefully the first of many Ryan Kelly collabs. And the first NORTHLANDERS book, which not only got me out of my comfort zone but did the same for a lot of people who thought they knew what a comic book about Vikings was.

G. Willow Wilson: I’m proud to have written almost 500 pages in 2008. (AIR, VIXEN, and two drafts of The Butterfly Mosque)

David Lapham: YOUNG LIARS, definitely. Actually this was a huge year for me. Did a ton of work and finally feel like “I’m back” (even though I didn’t go anywhere) for the first time since STRAY BULLETS went on hiatus. YOUNG LIARS was something I had been working on for almost a year and a half before the first issue hit the stand. I felt it evolve from what I thought was going to be a Tomb Raider-esque chick action book to something that was completely twisted, dark, funny, tragic, real, fantasy, and just plain gonzo. It turned into everything I’d like to see in my comics all at once!

Jock: Comics wise I’ve not had much in print, apart from my SCALPED covers. Always proud to be part of that book. Outside of that I did a load of concept art for Pete Berg’s movie DUNE for Paramount, and I’m really proud of a lot of that. Very different to comics work, but very rewarding.

Cliff Chiang: GREEN ARROW & BLACK CANARY #4 came out in early January, and though it was a bear to get through (imagine drawing an issue about a hospital while a loved one is IN the hospital), I’m proud of how it turned out.

Will Dennis: I love all my children equally.

Brian Azzarello: 100 BULLETS lasting 100 issues with the same creative team. The impact JOKER had in not just the direct but the book market too ain’t so bad, neither.

Jason Aaron: The “Dead Mothers” arc of SCALPED. I think it’s the best thing I’ve done on the title, and I’m looking forward to the challenge of topping it in 2009. Also, the PUNISHER MAX CHRISTMAS SPECIAL and GHOST RIDER #26 (featuring the debut of the all-new Orb) were probably my favorite single issues to write.

WHAT WORK ARE YOU THE MOST EXCITED ABOUT FOR 2009?

Brian Wood: A few upcoming NORTHLANDERS one-shots should be excellent, if only for the artists we have lined up coughRissocough. Seeing how the new DEMO books come out, and writing issue #50 of DMZ. 50! Reaching fifty issues of a series is sort of like when I hit 30 years of age. I never thought I’d make it that long.

G. Willow Wilson: I hope not to have to work quite as hard in 2009. But I’m excited to keep writing AIR and branch out into new genres, to be disclosed forthwith.

David Lapham: Sales willing, hopefully a second year of YOUNG LIARS. I have another–still super secret–project coming up from Wildstorm. A big high concept idea I came up with (and I don’t get many of those). I enlisted a young artist to partner with, who I can’t wait for everyone to see his work because he’s going to be a great one. Every page looks better than the one before. As soon as I can I’ll post about it. Stay tuned…

Jock: Drawing SNAPSHOT, a mini series with Andy Diggle, but I’m also looking forward to working with some writer by the name of Jason. Jason Aarskrak or something? Aarnon?

Cliff Chiang: I’ll be finishing the Neil Young epic GREENDALE soon and it should be coming out later in the year. Hopefully, we’ve taken a cool concept album and made some good comics out of it. Also, excited to work with Azz again in 2009.

Will Dennis: I know I said I love all my children equally but that’s a bit of a fib. Cause this year I have two things that stand apart. First up in Feb(ish) is the final issue of 100 BULLETS. Hard to believe. A monumental achievement by any measure. And quite literally I would not have the career I’ve had without the generosity and blind faith shown to me by Brian, Eduardo, Trish, Dave and Clem all those years ago. I was a totally unknown assistant editor who inherited that amazing book. Azz had little to go on other than one night we spent drinking in some divey bars in nyc. It just goes to show that everything yer parents told u about drinking was dead wrong. One good night of boozing can change yer whole life forever. Now nearly 9 years later we have made it to the end. I think we told some pretty goddamn good stories (spent a lot of sleepless nights in that time too!) and I couldn’t be more proud of the work that everyone has done. It’s sad to see it go and I’m humbled by my association with this book

The other big event is the launch of the Vertigo crime line in September. A lot has already been said about this and more will be revealed at NYCC but the first two books are deadly. One is an occult thriller written by international best selling author Ian Rankin called DARK ENTRIES and the other is a nasty noir called FILTHY RICH from the man, Brian Azzarello. They’re about 200 pages each in glorious black & white digest size hardcovers! Hopefully folks will check ‘em out.

Beyond that I have a new monthly that we’re going announce at NYCC as we’ll as the usual goodness from Scalped, DMZ and Northlanders!

Brian Azzarello: I really don’t get excited unless I’m in a stadium. I’m looking forward to the debut of Vertigo Crime, and really proud to be part of it. Also some prose work will be published in the fall…

Jason Aaron: “The Gnawing” in SCALPED, Tony Moore drawing the mother of all trucker horror stories in GHOST RIDER, and the debut of my new WOLVERINE series, plus an as-yet-unannounced super-cool Marvel project.

WHAT’S YOUR NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTION?

Brian Wood: I don’t make them. Each year, each week, each day I just try to make forward momentum, and improve in everything if only a little bit.

G. Willow Wilson: My New Year’s Resolution is to play more. I’ve gotten too serious.

David Lapham: Kick heroin. After that everything else is easy street.

Jock: I never have them. I’m flawed, but I know it.

Cliff Chiang: 2008 kinda threw me for a loop, but 2009 is all about taking charge. We’ll see where that takes me.

Will Dennis: To never read blogs

Brian Azzarello: My New Years Resolution is to not be so invisible, and post regularly.

Jason Aaron: To make Brian Azzarello post regularly.

I hear it from a reliable source something big is happening Monday.

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we’re deep but inclusive. there’s really only one rule…don’t be ON all the time. 3 AM is not the time to be complaining about how someone screwed u over on a book or such and such writer sucks and your better than him/her or pitching that fantastic space opera that’s a cross between 2001 & Jules & Jim…save it. just hang loose, pick yer spots and have something else to talk about besides comics. i know that’s a bit controversial in this day and age but try it…feels good, right
anyway, you’re as liable as not to find us drinking luke warm beers behind the hyatt…join us if u want. last year we had a sintilating (spelling? who cares) conversation about “what doesn’t talk”…the consensus was that a peanut butter and jellly sandwich dosen’t talk. i wish somebody would go make me one…
every road trip needs a song…so on the eve of SDCC 2008 — a post dark knight bloodbath that starts tomorrow and end about 170 hours and 17000 beers from now — i’m calling CONSTRUCTIVE SUMMER by THE HOLD STEADY (ryan kelly…yer wrong about them – sorry!)  this years anthem.
an obvious pick? maybe to the ironic t-shirt crowd but i really don’t care. it’s a transcendent rock n roll song…remember those?…and it’s proof positive that there’s something special in the heartland water…u can draw a straight line to this record from bobbie zimmerman –> the stooges & MC5 –>the placemats & husker du –> the guided by voices boys — > ok…maybe the line takes a detour or two thru asbury park and the clash at the bond theater but “you follow me, right?”….(azz got that one)…it’s just a kick out the jams fuck around song that makes u wanna drink a beer and then toss the bottle out the car window (it’s like recycling…).
that’s all for now…reports as news happens. shocker fotos in homage to jock (like missing an arm!). see ya on the other side:
“We’re gonna lean this ladder up against the water tower
Climb up to the top, and drink and talk..this summer!

Me and my friends are like “Double-whiskey-coke-no-ice.”
We drink along in double time; might drink too much, but we feel fine…”

xoxo

~peter pan

The green represents all the money we make.

Test, originally uploaded by Jason Aaron.

yay?