Mike Wieringo

I just got online a little while ago and one of my usual stops is a comics news site. One of the headlines was something about a tribute to Mike Wieringo. If you're unfamiliar with Mike, he's a great, great comic book artist. Anyway, I was confused by this. Why is there a story called A Tribute to Mike Wieringo? Then I saw the next story. He passed away yesterday. I have to tell you, I'm in complete shock. He was only 44. That's so young.

I didn't know Mike personally. I did meet him once at a New York City convention. He was working on one of the Spider-Man books at the time. When I saw him at the convention, my first question to him was "Is Todd here?" Todd, being Todd Dezago, one of my best friends in the world and Mike's collaborator on the book. (fyi, Todd was there the day before. I had missed him.)

So I just read the news and tried to call Todd, but his voice mail picked right up, no rings. He's probably got the phone shut off, and I can't say that I blame him. He and Mike were as close as two friends could get. I feel just awful for Todd. I know I'll talk to him shortly, but I hate having this helpless feeling. He's my friend and he's in pain right now and I just want to be there for him.

Besides Spider-Man, Todd and Mike did a book called Tellos. A great fantasy book that you should pick up if you haven't already.

I don't know what else to say. I'm always terrible in situations like this. Here's a link to the news story on Mike: http://www.newsarama.com/Chicago_07/Ringo.html