Strap yourselves in, readers, because this week’s Previously will take you on a journey. Happy Fall and for our Canadian readers, enjoy the long weekend for Thanksgiving.
Nachie Marsham, who was previously the publisher at IDW, has been hired by Skybound as senior editor. In his new role, Marsham will manage Skybound’s partnership with Lego and develop original comics for the multimedia company. Skybound is known for The Walking Dead and Invincible comic and TV series, as well as other licensed products, but I am excited to see what becomes of this plan for original comics led by Marsham. With the money generated from licensed products, I hope this means supporting creators with truly original ideas and voices!
Tiny Onion Studios, a small label led by James Tynion IV, announced its first artist-in-residence program which will feature Jordie Bellaire and Aditya Bidikar. On his Substack, Tynion had some good words I want to share:
Our goal for this initiative is to build a better version of the “exclusive” contract, and not only provide talent with stability and guaranteed work without all the usual red tape but to also celebrate them as multi-hyphenate creators and crucial members of the Tiny Onion ecosystem.
How nice to read business verbiage that doesn’t sound like gobbledygook marketing copy run through ChatGPT. This is what happens when creators run things. And in that vein, Tiffany Babb, a former writer for WWAC, has launched a Kickstarter for The Comics Courier, a biannual print newspaper featuring comics criticism, of the serious and silly kind.
Okay, now for some terrible news, but I promise to end things on a light-hearted note.
Bolhem Bouchiba, a long-term animator for Disney and Pixar, is awaiting trial in France on child sex abuse charges. Bouchiba worked on The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Hercules, Tarzan, Lilo & Stitch, The Incredibles, Ratatouille, Up, Soul, Incredibles 2, Luca, and Elemental. I won’t list the details of the charges here because they are fucking awful, but I do want to note that he was convicted in 2014 for sexually assaulting a child, but as you can see by the titles above that did not stop him from getting hired to work on children’s films. DO BETTER, ENTERTAINMENT INDUSTRY!
And now for something completely different.
If you happen to have $8.8 mil on hand, then you should throw your hat in the ring for Stan Lee’s Los Angeles home. With 3 beds and 7 baths (why do rich people homes always have so many bathrooms, can someone explain, please?), the house is currently occupied by Stan Lee’s daughter and features an iconic Spider-Man scene in the foyer.
That’s it for this week’s Previously. Support creators running their own shows and demand that these big media conglomerates do better.
