AAMP!itude

Secret Identities unveiled in Bawlmer

There was a lot going on last weekend in the city of Baltimore. Artscape, the annual arts festival, was happening around Mt. Royal and up Charles Street this year. At the Convention Center, Otakon was going on. Normally, the convention for fans of anime/manga/cinema/music (mostly of the Japanese variety) takes place later in the summer.

I've been to Otakon once before, a couple years ago. It was fine, but didn't always match my interests. So I decided to save my bucks by checking out the freebie, Artscape. My plans changed Friday morning, when I heard an announcement on the radio, as I was driving to work, that an Asian American event was happening at a bookstore on Saturday. I scribbled down the info. and later tried to google it.

It took some doing to get a hit. I wasn't sure what I'd heard and noted, so my search was failing, at first. After trying different key words, I eventually found a blog mentioning the activity. It turned out that there were to be booksignings and presentations at several places for Secret Identities; The Asian American Superhero Anthology.

I decided to go to the signing at Geppi's Entertainment Museum by Camden Yards baseball stadium on Saturday. It was my first time visiting the museum, and found it pretty interesting. The collection is not as well annotated or captioned as you'd find in a Smithsonian museum, for example, but since the objects represent American popular culture since the 1600's (especially comics), the displays are easily understood and often quite familiar to museumgoers.

(In fact, during my perusal of the comic book room, I watched part of a documentary on EC Comics, published by Wm. Gaines. (He's best known for publishing Mad Magazine.) One of the experts shown in the video was someone I recognized from my college days. He wasn't a student, but would come to our "Campus Comics and Science Fiction club" meetings. He'd regale us with tales of the cartoon and tv industry, as he worked as a writer for the Scooby Doo tv cartoon series.)

But back to the booksigning... it wasn't that well attended. I imagine that the purpose of holding it at Geppi's would be to try to take advantage of the hordes attending Otakon across the street. Unfortunately, few conventioneers came over (if any). That was a boon for me, as I got to spend some time getting to know some of the editors and contributors of Secret Identities.

The book is a contemporary take by various Asian Americans on Asian American comicbook superheroes. Secret Identities was several years in the making and came out in April of this year. I don't know if something like it has been published before. I would think so, but it's not an area that I've kept track of over the years. If not, then a book like this is long overdue (like several decades, overdue!).

The following are pictures from the Saturday event, unless otherwise noted:

From L to R: Jerry Ma (co-editor), museum/store clerk, Larry Hama (contributor), Keith Chow (co-editor), Alex Tarampi (contributor), and John Franzese (contributor).

Things worth noting: Keith Chow formerly worked for Diamond Comic Distributors in Timonium, the largest distributor of comic books in North America. Chow is the only one of the group who's local. The rest are from the NYC area... Larry Hama is the industry veteran and is probably best known for his writing of the GI Joe comics (1982-94).

Close-up of placard

Artwork for the book

The various characters, created by contributors for their comics, grouped together.

Larry Hama telling an anecdote to John Franzese, Alex Tarampi, and Blanca X.

GI Joe action figures, big and small.

Hama getting a good look at the GI Joe package he's just autographed. This particular product is new to him.

Hama talking with fellow comic book veteran Greg LaRocque at a signing, the next day, at the White Marsh Barnes & Noble bookstore. (You can see that they're talking behind Chow's back, although not about him.) LaRocque is a local guy (having been born, raised, and currently living in the Baltimore area). He's worked for major comic publishers Marvel and DC, and might be best known for his drawing of The Flash in the 90s.

Hama and Chow signing books. The ones Hama is signing are trade paperbacks of Marvel comic book reprints. There are different volumes, each centered around a major character in the original GI Joe series created by Hama.

For more information on Secret Identities and the folks involved in it, go to

http://www.secretidentities.org

things done and to do

I spent much of today finishing assembling an Ikea entertainment center. Had to do a little whittling and drilling to ensure the pieces fit together without gaps. I'd started putting it together last weekend.

Meanwhile, gotta bone up on VivoLogic and MATLAB software for work.