“Comics in Focus: Chris Claremont’s X-Men will take an in-depth look at Claremont’s monumental run. It will explore the behind-the-scenes origins of notable characters like Wolverine, Storm, and Phoenix, as well as the challenges of creating art within a corporate system. The film will include new interviews with many of the biggest players involved, including Claremont, Louise Simonson, Ann Nocenti, Art Adams, and Jim Shooter. Particularly notable is a roundtable interview featuring Claremont, Simonson, and Nocenti, together for the first time in 10 years. The film will also include new interviews with contemporary artists inspired by Claremont’s work, including Matt Fraction, Jason Aaron, and Chris Bachalo.”

I think this would be a documentary a lot of comic readers would find fascinating, and I am also quite pleased to read that the team are hoping, if this proves successful, to launch a series of similar works, documentaries, approximately 45 minutes long for DVD and download, “offering in-depth looks at significant works that shaped comics history, using interviews with the people who helped shape it.” That’s a series I think a lot of us would enjoy seeing happen. Looks like they have secured a good chunk of their funding already but still have a way to go to the finish line – there’s over two weeks left so check out their full description and video on their Kickstarter page and give them some support if you can.

This coming weekend, it’s comic time at London’s MCM Expo. This massive celebrtion of sci-fi and fantasy media has been growing in popularity and praise for a few years now and this year sees the return of the MCM Expo Comic Anime Village.

Talking to several artists at BICS last weekend they talked of it being an enormous event, full of many, many people, most of whom have no interest in the comics section. But the benefit of having over 40,000 people in attendance means that even a small percentage of those passer-bys get converted into sales it’s good news for the comic exhibitors.

And this has led to a convention that is both huge and alternative, capable of pulling in the big names in the comic industry but also having a host of alternative/ small press artists at the show as well. Some of this may well be down to the London effect, but most of it has to be down to the determination of the organsiers of the Comic Village; Emma Vieceli, Anna Petterson and Matt Sheret to make it as good and as popular as it can possibly be.

Big names this year include Kieron Gillen, Jamie McKelvie, Andy Diggle, Paul Cornell, Jock, Bernard Chang and Sean Phillips. But the biggest name this year has to be the recently announced Chris Claremont – a genuine Marvel Comics legend and probably the definitive X-Men writer.

But a look at the writers/artsists list shows that there’s an awful lot of very familiar names at MCM for those of you reading the FPI blog: Marc Ellerby, Adam Cadwell, Lizz Lunney, Philippa Rice, David O’Connell, Luke Pearson, Gary Northfield, Sarah McIntyre, Garen Ewing, Faye Yong and many, many more.

MCM Expo is also the new home to the Eagle Awards, with the award ceremony taking place on the 29th October. After a troubled few years lets hope the Eagles can maintain some consistency and become an important part of the UK comics scene again. Good luck to anyone up for an award (fingers crossed).

And finally, this year sees the third titanic battle in the Artists Vs Writers Showdown. The teams this year are; Writers: David Hine, Simon Spurrier, Ian Sharman, Antony Johnston & Kieron Gillen. Artists: Bernard Chang, Sean Phillips, Lizz Lunney, Gary Erskine & Jamie McKelvie. With the scores currently 2-0 to the writers the artists are desperate to regain a little face. Battle commences on Sunday 31st at MCM Expo.

Oh yes, it is here. It may be a lot later than originally intended, but dammit, its worth the wait. Not to mention the weight – its a humungous tome, just remember when picking it up to lift from the legs and not your back. Alan Moore, Alan Davis, Captain Britain. Oh yes.