Associated Press:

The real life adventures of former al-Qaida-linked militant Nasir Abas have become a new comic book in Indonesia, chronicling his transformation from foe to invaluable ally in the fight against terrorism.

The story of the soft-spoken, seemingly mild-mannered 42-year-old — recognized by strangers on the streets and even asked for the occasional autograph — is well-known in the world’s most populous Muslim country.

He went from helping train Muslim extremists who carried out some of Southeast Asia’s deadliest attacks, including the 2002 Bali bombings, to informing police about the inner-workings of the Jemaah Islamiyah network.

He’s also joined a government program to convince convicted terrorists that killing unarmed civilians in the name of their faith is wrong.

“I want children to learn from my experience,” Abas said of the colorful 137-page comic “I Found the Meaning of Jihad,” which appears in bookstores Friday and will be handed out at some schools and libraries.

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What to make of this…? Something Alec Baldwin might enjoy…?

Via Comic Book Resources:

Rick Veitch wants you to think about things. Specifically, the writer/artist wants readers to think about the events of 9/11. Set to debut nearly 10 years after the tragic events of September 11th, 2001, “The Big Lie” from Image Comics features a physicist named Sandra who goes back in time to save her husband from perishing in the World Trade Center buildings. Veitch teamed with longtime collaborator Gary Erskine on inks as well as editors Thomas Yeates and Brian Romanoff who got the ball rolling on the project and saw it through to completion. CBR News spoke with Veitch about what he wants readers to come away thinking after reading the miniseries, how Uncle Sam comes into play and the problems Sandra encounters in her quest to save her husband. …

“If you are an American of my age, 9/11 was a major event; emotionally and politically” Veitch said. “How can an artist not want to explore it? ‘Can’t Get No’ was a flutterball about the emotional side of 9/11. ‘The Big Lie’ is a fastball aimed straight at the politics.”

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I recently read John Nolte’s piece on Sam Kinison, and it really struck a chord. He asks if a young comic today could get away with some of Sam’s material.

I was a young comic, barely breaking in my comedy teeth when I got to work with Sam. I was booked at Yuk-Yuks in Rochester NY, when Sam did a string of dates around the franchise, in early 1986. I was already booked at the Rochester Yuks all week, and Sam came in for two nights of that tour. I not only got to see his show twice, I was privileged to hang with him late in to the evening at the condo that first night.

—–

It was a week that changed my entire perspective on the art of comedy. I like most other beginners had a pretty simple act, just trying to get people to laugh. I was looking for the funny in pop culture references, maybe making fun of a television commercial, or the new practice of putting missing kids pictures on the sides of milk cartons. I was just another happy eighties comic with a skinny tie, open collar and my blazer sleeves pushed up to my elbows.

Sam did something I had never seen on a comedy stage before. He took real issues and dissected them with a comedy scalpel. On second thought, make that a chainsaw. He tore through the status quo with the subtly of a Pete Townsend power chord, wailing like a heavy metal priest. His act was an hour stream of consciousness, alternating between calm rationality and the battle of the id. He was Speed Metal to the Billy Joel pop that was passing for comedy in those days

Something few people know is that Sam never actually screamed while he was on stage. What he did was raise the pitch of his voice to sound like he was screaming, and turned the mike way up to compensate for the missing volume. It was an elocutionary device he learned from his days as an evangelist preacher. (more…)

Editor: This is the second part of a two-part series. You can read part one here.

The 1970s showed the once-invincible comic book super-heroes to be losers, in attitude and sales. Watergate had disillusioned the super-patriot Captain America with a storyline implying Nixon was the head of a terrorist group. The Captain trashes his outfit and becomes Nomad, The Man without a Country. My 11-year-old mind thought this was ridiculous, as Cap was originally a Depression-era 98-pound weakling until given a Super Soldier serum to bulk up and fight Nazis. It was unlikely that one of the “Greatest Generation” would bail on his country so readily. Even then I realized that this development merely mirrored a hippie writer’s attitude more than staying true to a character’s origins. 

Super-heroes became bleaker and even homicidal in the 1980s. The Punisher, a murderous vigilante, has become a top Marvel character. The Dark Knight Returns, a re-imagining of Batman, introduced an elderly caped crusader fighting the corrupt U.S. government represented by a stoogish Superman. Watchmen was set in a dystopic alternate reality where Nixon is still president and the super-group is made up of, among other miscreants, a rapist and mass murderer. It was a transmutation of established super-heroes from the 60s with Steve Ditko’s Objectivist hero The Question recast as the psychotic Rorschach.  (more…)