Greetings Loyal Airmen.  We’re sure all of you have heard the Beatles’ advice on how we all get by “with a little help from our friends.” Well that sage advice was never more apparent to the Air Chief than yesterdays first-Sat breakfast meeting of the Fort Collins Comics Coffee Clutch Crew. A monthly gathering of comic creators from all over Colorado we begun almost eight years ago when moving here from New England. As most writers and artists will tell you, creating is a lonely venture done in one’s office locked away from the rest of the world. Thus socializing of any kind with colleagues is always something to desire. Upon moving to Fort Collins, we were introduced to what we learned was a huge community of local comic people. Eventually, the Air Chief wondered if it might not be possible to arrange a monthly informal get together with those we’d had the pleasure of meeting. Thus eight years ago we began what we jokingly called The Fort Collins Comics Coffee Clutch Crew. At that very first meeting there were seven of us.

Yesterday twenty-four of us showed up at the local comic shop for this month’s meeting.  TWENTY-FOUR!!! Over the years we’ve watched the group grow bigger and bigger, with some members coming and going until our reminder’s list has over 30 names on it. These are writers, artists, young and old, amateurs and professionals, men and women. People from all walks of life and careers all bonding over one simple thing, their mutual love of comics. Now that’s pretty damn amazing. If you can spot the Air Chief in the pix above (taken at yesterday’s gathering by Rio Herrera) you’ll see me almost dead center wearing one of our Red Sox caps. We love hooking up with these great people and can only wonder at how much more the gang will continue to grow. We do indeed get by with a little help from our friends.

This week Warner’s Animation released its latest Batman animated movie based on a classic graphic novel; BATMAN – Gotham by Gaslight as written by Brian Augustn & illustrated by Mike Mignola. Since Bruce Timm convinced Warners to launch the animated Batman TV series, this studio has gone on to produced some truly amazing and wonderful projects, both as series and of course their DVD releases. The fun of this particular feature is that is based on one of the Elseworld line DC comics did years ago that re-imagined their classic characters in totally different settings and histories. With Gotham by Gaslight, we have a Victorian age Bruce Wayne trying to stop an American Jack the Ripper. We were always sad that for some reason, we never picked up the actual comics when they were released. Thus you can imagine our delight when we learned it would be adapted as a film. Now having watched it, we consider one of the finest Warner’s has done to date. Great story, great animation and wonderful characterizations from start to end. As always, whenever we enjoy one of these great Warner’s animated adventures, we’re left asking ourselves, why can’t they make their live action DC movies this good? Now that’s a mystery to ponder.

And finally we thought we’d leave you with a visual clue as to what new title will soon becoming your way from Airship 27 Productions. Thanks ever for stopping by and we’ll see you all here next week.

Ron – Over & Out!