...and we've got the BEST FRIENDS in the whole wide world!
On Saturday, July 18th, we celebrated our one year anniversary in STYLE!
To honor the occasion, we brought out some pretty heavy hitters to celebrate along with us!
Archie artist extraordinaire, Fernando Ruiz was here to wow the crowd with his stellar drawing skills for Archie fans and comic fans alike! As the artist on various Archie titles including the new Archie vs Predator series, it was a complete honor hosting him for a second time. A nicer guy there never was, Fernando came here right after teaching his class at the amazing Kubert School to "wow" our customers with his talent! Here is an example - a sketch cover he did for us on our Spider-Gwen #1 blank cover.
New to the scene, Isaac Goodhart was on-board as well. He draws a new comic called "Postal" for Top Cow and currently resides in Astoria. He and his lovely girlfriend were nice enough to come check out our little slice of heaven here in Montclair, sign copies of the first trade paperback for Postal that just came out and sketch for our customers! Here's a little something he whipped up for us.
Joe Caramagna, the AMAZING Marvel writer, joined in the party too! He signed copies of his work that include Avengers Vs, Marvel Universe Avengers Assemble, Ultimate Spider-Man Web Warriors and SO MUCH MORE! Joe is a Jersey-guy unlike any other and, although he doesn't draw much anymore, even he got in the action by sketching us this amazing piece:
Last but NEVER least, our good friend and neighbor Brian Smith - artist and writer for books such as Spongebob Squarepants, Stuff of Legend, Voltron Force, the Intrepid EscapeGoat and MORE - came by his LCS (local comic shop for those wondering) and hung out with fans, customers and friends while sketching, signing and even ran home to grab some original art he'd been working on in his free time to show some fans including US!
NOTE: Special shout-out to Greg Schigiel (artist/writer for Pix) and Stephen Coughlin (artist/writer for Sanctuary) for stopping by and hanging out with us! We really do have the best friends!
If you thought all that wasn't amazing enough, we held an all day raffle called PACK WARS. See - you buy a pack of baseball cards and when raffle time came, we would see who had the best stat for the prize - most home runs, fewest strike outs, most innings pitched, best on base percentage, etc. Check out some photos below of all our amazing winners!
The day ended with a STELLAR, AMAZING, OUT-OF-THIS-WORLD performance by a local band comprised of some of Montclair's most talented high-schoolers - Tula Vera! They performed in the store and ROCKED IT! You can check out the videos but it doesn't do them justice. They are destined for greatness and it was an honor having them in the store. The future of rock looks bright indeed!!!
To top it all off, in style, we received this from Mr. Stan Lee himself! BIG THANK YOU to Chuck Robertson for making the connection and being an all-around awesome guy with great sons!
Needless to say, we had a blast! We have met some amazing people who work in comics and some even more amazing customers who truly love comics, art, stories, reading and fun over the last year and it looks like we'll be here for a long time to come! We swell with great anticipation about who we'll meet in the next year and the years to come!
Thank you so much to all the artists, writers and - most of all - the customers and fans of comics for keeping the medium (and us) alive and thriving! We couldn't have done this without all of you and your support and our greatest pleasure is paying that back to you by hosting fun, exciting and entertaining events for you to attend and enjoy!
Keep it coming cuz we're not done yet...
Much love,
Everyone involved at East Side Mags