Dungeons & Dragons Art & Arcana: A Visual History

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borg’s Best of 2018–The Best in Print

Filed under: Backstage Pass, Comics & Books, Con Culture, Fantasy Realms, Movies, Retro Fix, Sci-Fi Café, Superheroes, TV — Leave a comment

December 29, 2018

Our borg Best of 2018 list continues today with the Best in Print. If you missed them, check out our review of the Best Movies of 2018 here, the Kick-Ass Heroines of 2018 here, and the Best in Television 2018 here.

So let’s get going. Here are our selections for this year’s Best in Print:

Best Read, Best Sci-fi Read – The Synapse Sequence by Daniel Godfrey (Titan Books). The Synapse Sequence is one of those standout reads that reflects why we all flock to the latest new book in the first place. The detective mystery, the future mind travel tech, the twists, and the successful use of multiple perspectives made this one of the most engaging sci-fi reads since Michael Crichton’s Jurassic Park. Honorable mention: Solo: A Star Wars Story novelization by Mur Lafferty (Del Rey).

Best Retro Read – Killing Town by Mickey Spillane and Max Allan Collins (Hard Case Crime). The lost, first Mike Hammer novel released for the 100th anniversary of Mickey Spillane’s birth was gold for noir crime fans. This first Hammer story introduced an origin for a character that had never been released, in fact never finished, but Spillane’s late career partner on his work made a seamless read. This was the event of the year for the genre, and a fun ride for his famous character. Honorable mention: Help, I Am Being Held Prisoner, by Donald E. Westlake.

Best Tie-In Book – Solo: A Star Wars Story–Expanded Edition novelization by Mur Lafferty (Del Rey). Not since Donald Glut’s novelization of The Empire Strikes Back had we encountered a Star Wars story as engaging as this one. Lafferty took the final film version and Lawrence and Jon Kasdan’s script to weave together something fuller than the film on-screen. Surprises and details moviegoers may have overlooked were revealed, and characters were introduced that didn’t make the final film cut. Better yet, the writing itself was exciting. We read more franchise tie-ins than ever before this year, and many were great reads, but this book had it all. Honorable Mention: Big Damn Hero by James Lovegrove (Titan).

Best Genre Non-fiction – Hitchcock’s Heroines by Caroline Young (Insight Editions). A compelling look at the director and his relationship with the leading women in his films, this new work on Hitchcock was filled with information diehard fans of Hitchcock will not have seen before. Young incorporated behind-the-scenes images, costume sketches, and a detailed history of the circumstances behind key films of the master of suspense and his work with some of Hollywood’s finest performers.

There’s much more of our selections for 2018’s Best in Print to go…

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Tags: Abrams Young Readers, Alan Gordon, Alex Ross, Andrew Hennessy, Aquaman and Jabberjaw, Art & Arcana: A Visual History, artist Hydro74, Batman Issue 50 variants, Caroline Young, Catwoman, Cavan Scott, Curt McAloney, Cynthia Von Buhler, Dan Abnett, Daniel Godfrey, David Tilotta, DC Comics, Del Rey, Doctor Who Who-ology: Regenerated Edition, Donald E. Westlake, Dungeons & Dragons Art & Arcana: A Visual History, Ed Piskor, Eduardo Lima, Firefly Encyclopedia, Firefly: Big Damn Hero, Frances Hodgson Burnett, Hanna Barbera, Hard Case Crime, Harper Design, Help I Am Being Held Prisoner, Hitchcock's Heroines, Insight Editions, James Lovegrove, Jon Peterson, Juann Cabal, Killing Town, Kyle Newman, Mariko Tamaki, Mark Salisbury, Mark Wright, Marvel Comics, Max Allan Collins, Michael Witwer, Mickey Spillane, Mickey Spillane Centenary 2018, MinaLima, Minky Woodcock, Minky Woodcock: The Girl Who Handcuffed Houdini, Miraphora Mina, Monica Valentinelli, Mur Lafferty, Nolan Woodard, Paul Pelletier, Rain Beredo, Sam Witwer, Signe Bergstrom, Solo: A Star Wars Story Expanded Edition, Solo: A Star Wars Story novelization, Star Trek: Lost Scenes, Stuart Craig, The Amazing Spider-man Issue 800, The Archive of Magic - The Film Wizardry of Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, The Art of Harry Potter, The Fantastic Four: Behold... Galactus!, The Moviemaking Magic of Star Wars: Creatures and Aliens, The Once and Future Tarzan, The Secret Garden, The Synapse Sequence, Thomas Yeates, Titan Books, Titan Comics, Wizards of the Coast, X-23, X-23 series, X-Men: Genesis, X-Men: Grand Design Second Genesis

Review–Find a treasure trove of Dungeons and Dragons’ past in new Art and Arcana visual guide

Filed under: Backstage Pass, Comics & Books, Con Culture, Fantasy Realms, Retro Fix — Leave a comment

November 2, 2018

Review by C.J. Bunce

If you’re not a player of Dungeons & Dragons, a new journey through the hills and valleys of the roleplay game that started it all will get you up to speed quickly. Dungeons & Dragons Art & Arcana: A Visual History is a comprehensive, authoritative, and licensed look back at nearly 50 years of gaming, storytelling, and artwork. If you grew up with the game you are certain to find both nostalgia and page-after-page of new information in its more than 700 color images from the past, images of heroes and villains, monsters and other creatures, that brought in some 40 million players over the years. Boasting some 10-15 million active players today, D&D now features the results of writers/D&D celebrity fans Michael Witwer (D&D historian), Kyle Newman (director of the movie Fanboys), Jon Peterson (game historian) and Sam Witwer (actor, Being Human, Smallville, Battlestar Galactica) pulling together published images and source art from each edition of D&D’s core books, supplements, and modules, magazines, advertisements, tie-in products, sketches, and draft rules. Their sources include the archives at Wizards of the Coast, private collectors, and more than 40 designers and artists from every era of the game’s history. Released in two editions, fans old and new can choose from the standard 448-page hardcover alone or a special edition Hydro74-designed boxed set with some intriguing extras. You’ll find a 14-page preview below courtesy of publisher Ten Speed Press.

This… treatise… this behemoth of a book is smartly designed so readers can approach it for a quick burst of throwback fun or a detailed dive behind the creation and many changes of the game and the companies behind it. You can find a side-by-side evolution and comparison of monsters and other characters, soak in old maps and character sheets, and compare the covers and key art across all editions. Possibly the best contribution is comparative images showing specific pop culture sources for many of the designs that made it into the early books and supplements, everything from Frank Frazetta Conan the Barbarian paintings to panels of comic book art from Marvel Comics’ Strange Tales.

From Guidon Games’ Chainmail to TSR to Wizards of the Coast and Hasbro and the latest 5th Edition rule books, the D&D story is one of corporate takeovers, failures, successes and strategies, all to survive and ultimately consolidate with games including Magic: The Gathering, Pokémon, World of Warcraft, and the entire Milton Bradley tabletop game catalog, all under one umbrella. It all started with creators Gary Gygax and David Arneson, and their efforts to build on miniature figure battle games from centuries past, and modern rules for gaming that had a historic source: sci-fi/fantasy author H.G. Wells first penned a gaming rulebook for miniatures titled Little Wars: a game for boys from twelve years of age to one hundred and fifty and for that more intelligent sort of girl who likes boys’ games and books, an influential book inspiring gaming to this day. The founders would pull in amateur artists and eventually professional artists, sprouting from a small headquarters in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, ultimately the source of Gen Con, the gaming convention that has been tied to D&D since the beginning.