Comic Book Bears Podcast

The Comic Book Bears are thrilled to welcome back to the show Steve Bryant! Steve, best known for Athena Voltaire and Ghoul Scouts (both of which who currently have a home at Action Lab Comics) is here to discuss his Kickstarter campaign for The Catch, a crime-superhero-caper-romance comic! Think Elmore Leonard meets Gotham Central and Powers! Written by Steve, with art by Ismael Canales and coloring by Roger Surroca, The Catch should appeal to fans of super-hero crime comics, like Gotham Central, Alias, or Powers, viewers who like heist or caper movies, or TV shows like Justified, Better Call Saul, or Sneaky Pete as well as indie comic collectors looking to get in on the ground floor of a new book, filled with action, clever dialogue, and great visuals. So, hit play and listen in as Bill Zanowitz and the other Steve (Mowry) talk to Steve about this new project, Athena Voltaire and much more!

  Late last year the DC Universe app launched. Steve and Bill have been using the streaming service for months and on this episode they talk about the exclusive shows (Titans, Young Justice: Invasion, DC Daily) and other things they enjoying about the streaming service. Then a trip to the spinner rack finds them chatting about the current X-Men books, Wrong Earth and the Ahoy Comics line, Peter Cannon: Thunderbolt, Heroes At Large, Hawkman, Umbrella Academy: Hotel Oblivion and much more! All this plus two great music documentary Woofs of the Week!

The horror rages on! Bill Zanowitz and Steve Mowry are back and this time around they discuss their favorite horror comic books of all time! EC Comics of the 1950's, Hellboy and the Mignolaverse, Sandman, Lucifer, Swamp Thing, The Sixth Gun, The Devilers, Hellblazer, Torso, Baltimore, Black Eyed Kids - all of these here and much more! (You might want to listen with the lights on!)  

The Comic Book Bears turn their cave into something dark and creepy for a change as they welcome writer/artist John Horsley to discuss the new comic project he is Kickstarting, The Eynes Anthology!! The book is about a family with a generation spanning connection to the supernatural! Listen in as John joins Steve and Billy Z in a discussion about the horror collection with numerous artists and writers from around the world joining John to tell us stories throughout time of this family and their demons! Check out eynesanthology.com for additional info about this crowdfunding campaign launching on February 1st!  

Our first episode of 2019 finds Billy Z and Steve discussing Aquaman, the most recent entry in the DC Extended Universe series of films starring Jason Momoa! Listen in as Steve and Billy weigh in on the James Wan directed movie. Beyond the film, the CBBears also talk about the history of Aquaman including reading recommendations from the 60's, 70's, 80's and today including the recent Drowned Earth crossover and the first issue of the new Kelly Sue DeConnick/Ronson Rocha run! We also discuss what comic book based films are coming in 2019, somehow Liza Minnelli works her way into the conversation and we say "Aquabro" a lot!

The Comic Book Bears are back with you for one more episode for 2018! And this time around Bill and Steve discuss Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse!! Listen in as Steve and Bill talk about what they thought of the new animated film featuring various Spideys and also provide some of their own reading histories with Spider-Man and their reading recommendations of Spider-Man stories past. (Don't worry - we'll be talking Aquaman next time!) And since it is the holiday season the CBBoys also talk about what they would love to see underneath their respective Christmas trees!

  We've been mum on the subject but we think it is high time that the Comic Book Bears addresses the Comicsgate controversy. With Bryan away in the land of the rising sun on the night we recorded, we are thrilled to bring back to the show our friend Caleb Alexander-McKinzie of the Southern Fried Geekery podcast for this episode! Seen by some as a consumer led revolt against forced diversity and liberalism in comics and by others as a harassment campaign targeting women, persons of color and the LGBTQ community, Comicsgate has birthed lawsuits, highly successful crowdfunding campaigns and comic cancellations among many other things. Join us for an hour and half as Steve, Billy Z and Caleb offer up their opinions regarding this hot button issue.

The 2018 editions of Baltimore Comic Con and New York Comic Con are in the history books and some of the CBB boys, past and present, were in attendance! Past and present ... what does that mean, you may ask? Well, for the first time in two years our former co-host and artist extraordinaire Matt Brossard joins us for an episode! Matt and Bill Z formed a dynamic duo while in Baltimore and they recount their exploits at the Charm City's long running con. Then Bill Z and Bryan talk about their NYCC experience. We didn't leave Steve on the sidelines for too long though and he joins in to talk about current comics including X-Men: Black - Mojo, Jook Joint, Cyko Ko! and Fantastic Four! One word - Slottwater!  

Join Steve, Bill (sorry ... William) and Bryan at the spinner rack once again as the CBBears offer up a nice dose of funnybook talk. Their selections this time around include Mister Miracle #11, Border Town #1, Captain America #s 1- 3, Red Hood and the Outlaws Annual #2, Royal City #14 and Batman #55. You'll also get a tangent about going digital and we do talk about Batman: Damned ... but not much.  

As Brother Bryan is off curling, Steve and Billy Z decide to do something a little different on this episode! The fates conspired against Billy's receipt of recent comics so our remaining bears decided to make this episode pretty much comic book free! Instead of chatting about their favorite four-color heroes and indie books the CBBears instead talk about other things they are enjoying during the summer months. Movie and TV news and shows are discussed along with toys, concerts and a recent BluRay/DVD buying binge on the part of one the co-hosts.  Within this episode's 90+ minutes The Toys That Made Us, The Pixies, great concerts, The Alienist, internet responses to casting, Mego toys, Smashing Pumpkins, I'm Dying Up Here, The Expanse, The Americans, terrible concerts, treasures found at Dollar Tree, They Might Be Giants and lots more make an appearance! And what show wouldn't be made better by a lifeguarding/acne tangent!?!?!

It is nuptial season in the comic book world and Bill, Bryan and Steve (along with unwanted wedding crasher in the form of Bill's head cold) are back with you for a new Comic Book Bears Podcast episode to talk about the recent Batman/Catwoman and Colossus/Kitty Pryde wedding issues! In addition to the aformentioned lovebirds, the CBB boys also talk about the first comic book wedding issues that they can remember as well as their favorite comic book wedding issues! All this plus Steve talks about the Black Hammer universe, Bryan talks about The Man of Steel and Bill fights a brave battle against the word "ambitious" within this hour+ of funnybook talk!

Grab some popcorn and get in your theatre seats as we have a movie triple bill to talk about. And to help out the CBB Boys this week we are thrilled to welcome to the show for the first time the amazing Caleb Alexander-McKinzie of the Southern Fried Geekery Podcast! Like everyone else in the CBB cave, listen in and you'll fall in love with him! (Sorry, boys - he's married!) Over the last few weeks we have seen the releases of Avengers: Infinity War, Deadpool 2 and Solo: A Star Wars Story and we needed to gather round the mic to talk about them. So join Caleb, Bryan, Bill and Steve to hear their opinions on these three films and we even sneak in a little bit of honest to gosh comic book talk toward the end!  

We are thrilled to welcome to the show for the first time queer comic book creator and educator Justin Hall! Justin is an Associate Professor of Comics at the California College of the Arts and a Fulbright Scholar. He's a pioneer historian of LGBTQ comics and in 2012 he curated the anthology No Straight Lines: Four Decades of Queer Comics, which featured milestone contributions by lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer comics creators. Now, Justin's Lambda Literary Award-winning and Eisner-nominated collection is the inspiration for a documentary film directed by Peabody Award-winning and national Emmy-nominated filmmaker Vivian Kleiman. This feature-length film will bring stories from the comics off the page and give you a personal introduction to the dynamic artists and writers who paved the way! Justin discusses the Kickstarter campaign for the film, which runs until May 23rd, as well as his own comic work and much, much more! Links are below! https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1077551457/no-str

Comic Books Bears Billy Z and Steve offer up a very special episode about a very special episode this time around! To talk about the recent "Carrie The Musical" episode of The CW's Riverdale the CBB boys are thrilled to bring back to the show geek culture writer and Archie Comics expert Chris Cummins! Not only is there a discussion regarding the episode, the history of Carrie The Musical itself (which was a legendary Broadway flop) is also covered in all its blood stained glory! DISCLAIMER 1: There were some recording glitches which Billy Z did his best to cure in the mixing process. DISCLAIMER 2: This is our gayest episode yet! Hands down!    

Bryan, Bill Z and Steve are back on the mic to offer up to you a solid hour and a half of comic book and comic related talk.  We cover recent comic culture news such as the concerns for Stan Lee after his appearance at the Silicon Valley Comic Con and the controversies over the recent 99 cents Marvel sales on Comixology.  We then turn on the tube and talk about what is happening with Legion, Legends of Tomorrow, SHIELD and Krypton. Finally we lope on over to the spinner rack and talk about Dark Knights: Metal, Brilliant Trash, Snagglepuss, The Terrifics, Lockjaw and more!

Though we were unhappy that Bryan could not join us for our latest episode due to his work travels, we are thrilled to bring back to the show special guest Wendi Freeman of the Double Page Spread Podcast! Instead of testing out Steve and Bill's chairs, beds and porridge Wendi joins the boys at the spinner rack as they discuss Milk Wars, Super Sons, Armstrong and The Vault of Spirits, Young Monsters in Love, the Black Hammer-verse and much, much more.  And in celebration of International Women's Month, we also spotlight women artists we really dig and our recommendations for kick ass female led comics. And we celebrate the face that we got through over an hour without going too far off on tangents ... by going off on tangents.  Listen in as and you will find out about the recent importance of bananas in Wendi's life, what Bill thinks of 1970's Hanna-Barbera cartoons and just why the cover girl for our episode is Stevie Nicks!  

The Comic Book Bears boys head to the movies this time around! Put those earbuds in and enjoy an hour of discussion about Black Panther! Based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name, it is the eighteenth film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and stars Chadwick Boseman as T'Challa, Michael B. Jordan, Lupita Nyong'o, Danai Gurira, Martin Freeman, Daniel Kaluuya, Letitia Wright, Winston Duke, Angela Bassett, Forest Whitaker, and Andy Serkis! Bill, Bryan and Steve offer up their (SPOILER FILLED) opinions about the film that is breaking box office records all over the place! And since it is a comic book based podcast, the CBBears have comic book runs starring Black Panther to recommend! In this episode you will also hear Bryan super excited about his favorite sport now that the Winter Olympics are happening, Bill revealing a film he thinks is better than Superman III, Batman and Robin, Catwoman AND Howard the Duck, and you won't believe the verbal mileage Steve gets out of a 10 page back up story from 198

We are finally back to having all of the CBBears on the mic with Steve, Bryan and Bill convening to talk about current comics! And what is on this episode's pull list? Mister Miracle #6! The Phoenix Resurrection #s 1-5, Superman #39, Dark Nights: Metal #5, The Silencer #1, Doomsday Clock #3, Detective Comics Annual #1, The Flash Annual #1, Sex Criminals #21, Ninjak vs. The Valiant Universe #1 and more! All that and naturally The Woofs of the Week!    

Bill and Steve offer up an hour plus of retro comics talk as they look back on the very early days of Image Comics. What Todd McFarlane, Jim Lee, Marc Silvestri, Erik Larsen, Jim Valentino and Rob Liefeld did in the early 90's was nothing short of revolutionary for the comic book industry.  Join us as the CBB spinner rack becomes a time machine and we discuss Spawn, Youngblood, WildC.A.T.S., Savage Dragon, Shadowhawk, Cyberforce and more. We also delve into titles that the big two released in the wake of the aforementioned that were very, very Image-y in certain ways.  

The Comic Book Bears are finally back!! After too long a wait Steve Mowry and Bill Zanowitz make their return to your earbuds and for the first episode of 2018 a bunch of fairly recent books are discussed! Doomsday Clock #s 1 & 2! Exit Stage Left: The Snagglepuss Chronicles #1! Batman Annual #2! Phoenix Resurrection: The Return Of Jean Grey! Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man! Plus The Woofs of the Week and more!