Been a while since Gavin’s Underground has had a chance to go back to the geek with dozens of other tidbits happening in our local scene. But today he returns to BSR posting an interview with Greg Gage, owner of the Sugar House store Black Cat Comics.  The two chat about the shop as well as his thoughts on Utah and national comics.

Gavin’s Underground interview with Greg Gage

Gavin: Who are some local artists and writers should people check out?

Greg: Dave Chisholm’s Let’s Go To Utah is fantastic. Derek Hunter’s Pirate Club is a lot of fun. A new book that just came out, King Of Pain, by Nick West and Sam Rodriguez is great. Ryan Ottley’s artwork is astounding. He works on some big books, such as Haunt and Invincible from Image Comics. Banana Panic from Chris Hoffman is a ton of fun. A secret agent monkey. How can you lose? There’s just so much good stuff, and I’m sorry if I left anyone out. It’s just such a big comic community here. And in the interest of full disclosure, Sam and Nick are on the podcast that I do, but that doesn’t color my enjoyment whatsoever.

Gavin: Going national, what’s your take on the comic book industry as it stands right now?

Greg: Hollywood, for better or worse, has such an impact on comics. Iron Man and Batman sell incredibly well. Catwoman and Elektra got canceled. Any questions? The publishers have wisely decided to print to order now, which is to say if there are 200,000 orders for Green Lantern, that’s what they’ll print. This demonstrates a fiscal responsibility that wasn’t there in the 1990’s, which consequently saw Marvel Comics going bankrupt and more small press companies going out of business that ever before. I also think that with Disney’s recent purchase of Marvel, we’re on the precipice of something huge. American comics have never had global recognition. Merchandising, yes, recognition of the properties as comic books, no. Depending on how Disney handles things, we could see another huge boom. Right now things are pretty good, but they could always be better.