Periscope: Portland's storyboard and comics studio.

He took the stuff he was comfortable with, the scientific process, and turned it like a firehose onto the subject of love. The results are fittingly powerful and contradictory -- a set of horrendously chilling experiments which incontrovertibly demonstrated one of the most tender principles of human life.

Tom Spurgeon talks with Jim Ottaviani, Dylan Meconis and Janine Johnston.

Free Comic Book Day was a blast. I wrote about it briefly at the CBIA forum:

From my limited vantage point behind the signing table, I can say that FCBD at Cosmic Monkey Comics' new location in Portland was a big success. Jeff Parker, David hahn, Colleen Coover and I were constantly busy talking about comics, signing and doing sketches. I couldn't see how the other guests were doing, as they were out of my eyeline, but the cash register was right in front of me, and there was always a big line of people there. On the sketch front, Hahn's Firestar and Spider-Man were in big demand, and everyone was shocked when Jeff Parker drew in their Agents of Atlas hardcovers. The guy was an artist for over ten years, people! Don't be shocked that he can still bust out a Gorilla Man.

There was a giant Star Wars crew out front taking pictures with kids, who seemed to be having a great time, though a couple clearly thought the wookie was sort of alarming.

This was the first time I ever had FCBD content to sign, and it was ridiculously enjoyable to watch that huge stack of Whiteouts dwindle down to one or two copies. It seemed like the only breaks in signing came when I had to explain to younger readers that they couldn't have a copy, but that I'd draw a picture of Batman for them. Lots of questions about the movie, most of which I could only answer second or third hand. I get to visit to the set in Montreal next week, so at least I'll have some answers at my next signing.

Biggest surprise: a car crash right outside the store. * BOOM! * No one was hurt, and some kids sitting in a stroller on the sidewalk were maybe ten feet away from the point of impact and they didn't even cry. Andy Johnson and some customers quickly organized a clean-up crew and they swept the glass out of the street. One shopper rolled up a poster she'd just bought and used it as a wand to direct traffic, waving cars into the next lane. It was really nice seeing actual community spirit in action.

As you'd expect, the big smash-up took some of the fun energy out of the room, but things quickly lightened up again and things went on as before. Soon everyone was talking comics and posing next to stormtroopers again. I'm glad to say that I had a great, great time.