Awesomeversary Special: The Recap Contest Revealed!

This, my friends, marks not only the first ISB post of 2007, but also the first post of the ISB's third year. I intend to hold off on the actual reminiscing until tomorrow, but I've got to say: There's just something magical about being able to cajole a small army of adults into drawing pictures of super-heroes with crayons.

Seriously, you guys are awesome. As for the contest itself, I think I can go ahead and call it a success, although there seemed to be a bit of confusion on the rules. This probably comes from the fact that I called it the 2007 recap contest, but apparently a lot of people thought that meant that the object was to do a story from the past year, which it wasn't. Pretty much anything except for what was still going on was fair game, and while I probably should've mentioned that a few days ago, it didn't seem to stop anyone from having a good time with it.

Now, the entrants!

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SECTION 1: POSTED ON THE WEB

Canton brings us the Ultimate Fantastic Four in Frightful (from UFF #30-32), and while I'd normally disqualify it for using a slightly-photoshopped version of my own drawings, that's a pretty good way to sum up a story drawn by Greg Land.

Jon offers up a monocrhomatic summary of Ultimate Extinction, wherein the heroes of the Ultimate Universe shoot Galactus with beams of happy thoughts, which was a lot less silly before I had to type it out.

Loren wins the unofficial "Most Adorable" prize for his take on The All-New Atom #1-6.

Mightygodking apparently did not care for BEYOND! as much as I did. Oh well!

Ragtime didn't really have a choice but to include Jericho in the abridged version of Teen Titans: One Year Later.

Mark Engblom includes both a kick to the face and bold new concepts like "perspective" and "backgrounds" in a surprisingly well-drawn recap of The Death of Gwen Stacy.

Googum may have actually been the only person in the country who actually read the relaunch of Warlord, and thanks to him, you don't have to.

Diamondrock undoubtedly got some pointers from his pal Azrael when he took on one of my favorites, Robin: Boy Wanted.

The Hipster Doofus reveals the tortured mind of Marc Spector in a recap of the Moon Knight relaunch that's actually much easier to get through than the original.

Jeff Rients didn't bother with a story, but that's pretty well in the spirit of Nextwave: Agents of HATE!

McGone has a few words for those of you who just started reading Nextwave.

Chris Heimpel's cheery, one-page version of Desolation Jones includes my single favorite line of the entire contest: "You don't win fights by being a better boxer, you win 'em by being a Warren Ellis avatar."

Jeff clearly felt that Seven Soldiers left something to be desired.

Sleestak (of Lady, That's My Skull) abbreviates Garth Ennis's Marvel MAX Fury mini-series to within an inch of its miserable life!

Sean Kleefeld leaves out the awesome fight with Arcade's Hulk Robots, but presents an otherwise accurate summary of The Thing.

Jake is a slacker. For shame, Jake. For shame.

"Starman" Matt Morrison, whose place in the Knight Family Legacy is yet to be revealed, greatly improves on the workds of Judd Winick with a new version of Green Arrow: One Year Later. Like that's hard.

Charlie Anders thinks her entry's crappy, despite being the only version of Knightfall to include the word "recidivism."

Matt Brady offers up Nextwave #1-2, complete with matching jackets!

Richelle Mead and Caitlin Kitteredge show off their skills as professional writer-types with the Death and Resurrection of Collossus (also featuring Batman)!

Kalinara, unlike her slacker partner, finished an entry: Revenge of the Green Lanterns!

SECTION 2: MAILED TO THE ISB! (Click for larger images, of course)

Notintheface dares the impossible: Improving on Bruce Jones:



Wake reveals something we should all know about Batman:



Keenan Funk and I are on a mission to ensure that nobody ever draws a stick-figure of Tony Stark without a martini in hand:

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Honorable Mentions:

David Thiel goes back to 1974 for Marvel Team-Up #20, wherein Dinosaurs led by Stegron invade New York and are subsequently punched in the face by Spider-Man. That, my friends, is a beautiful thing.

Brandon Bragg of the inimitable Random Panels brings us Fatal Attractions, and his stick figures put mine to shame, especially in the last panel. If Charles Schultz had gotten around to introducing bone-claws into Peanuts, it would look like this.

Captain Supercool certainly lived up to his name with a recap of Batman & Son, which almost took the top prize solely for the use of Marvel's old "Pop Art" logo in Panel 2, let alone the kick to the face and the joyous reappearance of Shirtless Batman. It's excellent.

Tom Foss of the Fortress of Soliloquy included the phrase "It's clobberin' time, Senate Subcommittee Chairman!" in his recap of the utterly rad Acts of Vengeance. Further explanation should not be necessary.

Brian Smith has an intriguing fixation on the Enchantress, which is what happens when you read The Marvel Super-Heroes Secret Wars as a kid.

And finally, the first runner-up: TheDeadPenguin recaps Mike Oeming and Travel Foreman's Ares (which I've joined up into one image for convenience here), and it is awesome. The use of "APARO!" as a sound effect of the God of War punching someone sells the whole thing, but even the style itself is exaclty the kind of "just-enough-detail" that I like, and actually reminded me a lot of classic internet flash movie "Dad's Home," which was a lot of fun.

But sadly, there can be only one winner, and that is...

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Timothy Curtin's "PLANETARY IN 30 SECONDS!"



(Click the image for the full, super-sized saga in an eight-panel, 1 MB image!)

This was one of the ones that was sent to me via email pretty early in the contest, and the fact that you're all going to see it now for the first time is one of my favorite things about the whole shebang. It was obvious from the start that Timothy put a lot of work into the panels to make up for the blank ones in the middle, which is probably why the original files were so freaking ginormous, but it was all worth it when I hit that sixth panel and started cracking up.

Great Job, Tiomothy! You've won yourself a signed copy of CRACKED Magazine #3, some guaranteed-awesome back issues, and an increasingly irrelevant crayon drawing by me.

And that's the contest, but before I wrap it up, I'd like to sincerely thank everybody who participated this time around. It was a pretty goofy idea, and you guys did a great job with it. As for me, I'll be back tomorrow for the start of a bold new era as the ISB enters Year 3! BE THERE!

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BONUS FEATURE: The ISB In 30?!

Realizing that my ego knows no bounds, Mallet (of The Zombie Mallet entered the contest with a summary of this very blog over the year 2006, and while I couldn't in good conscience call it the winner--the ISB's not a comic, after all--I was very tempted. Check it out:



But there's no reason I can't give it an honorary award for excellence in the field of making me look totally awesome. Congratulations, Mallet: You just got yourself a drawing of Namor.