2008 Friends of Lulu Board Announced

The reading advocacy group Friends of Lulu has announced their 2008 Board of Directors after a long process that involved several posts asking people to go vote and my no joining them. The officers are:

* President: Valerie D'Orazio
* Membership Secretary: Nicole Boose
* Recording Secretary: Alison Bailey
* Treasurer: Marion Vitus
* Vice President, Public Communications: Leigh Dragoon
* Vice President, Public Relations: Adalisa Zarate

Congratulations to the new Board.
 
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CR Review: Daybreak, Vol. 2



Creator: Brian Ralph
Publishing Information: Bodega Distribution, soft cover, 48 pages, 2007, $10
Ordering Numbers: 0977767246 (ISBN)

Brian Ralph's zombie story, currently being serialized on-line, moves into its second published chapter with a subtle shift downward from the first chapter's frequently bewildering intensity. Ralph even toys with what had seemed like a purposeful decision to not show the creatures with several glimpses in this book, in a variety of forms, often that of victim status. What settles upon the proceedings is a more subtle sense of discomfort that only comes with relief, in this case the feeling that a life lived hand to mouth, running so as not to be murdered and devoured, isn't exactly the way anyone would choose to live. By easing off the throttle, Ralph gives us a world where dying might not be that awful an option given the state of what passes for living. An upgrade in dread isn't a negligible thing for a middle chapter in any kind of horror-related art to be able to claim.

In that vein, the figure in front of us that was so welcome in the previous chapter starts to become a symbol of our growing disenchantment. He's not great company, for one, and it's easy to see his future feelings for our presence in the disdain he feels for a dog that keeps showing up. Still, with Ralph's choice to make each panel a tightly focused representation of what we can see, inserting us into the story, we have to confront our inability to turn away from him. That's a fascinating effect, unique to this project's story and presentation, particularly as it comes in the course of what's a standard narrative. It's one that Ralph then turns on its head in the final sequence when he affords the reader a final, perhaps decisive move. There's definitely an intelligence animating what might seem to some like a limited story. Beyond that are the usual pleasures of taking in Ralph's visuals, the sense of humor not far away even during the worst circumstance, the way that he draws confined places with such attentiveness that they really feel like worlds unto themselves. These little chapterbooks feel like the lead-up to a larger, more considered work, but as with the minis that Ralph used to hand out in anticipation of future trades they're so fun and visually appealing you don't mind as much owning the same work twice, or even just in this rougher form.


 
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Go, Read: Jeff Parker and Colleen Coover’s X-Men Halloween Short Story


 
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This Isn’t A Library: New and Notable Releases to the Comics Direct Market



*****

Here are those books that jump out at me from this week's probably mostly accurate list of books shipping from Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc. to comic book and hobby shops across North America.

I might not buy all of the following -- I might not buy any -- but were I in a comic book shop I would likely pick up the following and look them over, potentially resulting in mean words and hurt feelings when my retailer objected.

*****

SEP070032 APOCALYPSE NERD #6 (OF 6) $2.99
Another Peter Bagge comic book series ends. You know, he's done a ton of work since Hate.

JUL073277 MOUSE GUARD WINTER 1152 #2 (OF 6) $3.50
I'm glad this is serialized rather than simply coming out in trade form; I think there are a lot of younger readers who would enjoy this comic who might better be able to get on board if they're only asking $4 instead of $29.95.

AUG072311 IMMORTAL IRON FIST VOL 1 TP $14.99
The best modern superhero trade out this week, from the Ole and Arn Anderson of new superhero comic writers, Ed Brubaker and Matt Fraction. They basically slam an eternal warrior/legacy hero template on top of one of the goofier 1970s kung fu heroes, and make it entertaining.

MAY070028 PERRY BIBLE FELLOWSHIP TRIAL OF COLONEL SWEETO HC $14.95
The much-awaited print debut for on-line comics oddball king, an effective mix of cruel humor and surprise twists that's distinguished by a really effective and fevered art style.

JUL070270 GON VOL 2 $5.99
Remember when everyone was flipping out over the awesomeness of Gon? Is it just quieter flipping out now?

AUG072286 MMW ATLAS ERA STRANGE TALES VOL 1 NEW ED HC $54.99
AUG072284 MMW FANTASTIC FOUR VOL 6 NEW ED HC $54.99
I'm not a huge fan of this expensive hardcover reprint series, but I like both selections of comics. The Fantastic Fours being reprinted are among the best comics ever.

APR073332 BIFF BAM POW #1 (RES) $2.95
Holy crud, it's a new Evan Dorkin/Sarah Dyer comic book, and an old-fashioned humor comic to boot. I sort of miss the days when we'd see a lot more one-offs from higher profile creators in comic book form.

AUG073640 BLAB VOL 18 $22.95
Alway, always, always worth your consideration.

AUG073907 COMPLETE PERSEPOLIS TP $24.95
I had no idea they were doing a trade collecting the two Persepolis volumes, but with the movie coming out it makes total sense. My mom loved this book, and yours will, too.

SEP073672 DEOGRATIAS TALE OF RWANDA GN NEW PTG $17.95
This heartbreaking look at the dehumanizing effect of war was under-appreciated but I guess not under-sold.

SEP073862 DUNGEON VOL 1 TP NEW PTG $14.95
SEP073863 GLACIAL PERIOD GN (O/A) (MR) $14.95
Two great book from NBM's recent releases, a broad and satisfying comedy and a offbeat, witty futuristic fantasy.

AUG073600 MOOMIN COMPLETE TOVE JANNSON COMIC STRIP VOL 2 HC $19.95
Hello, I am an awesome book that for some reason is flying below the comics chat radar, mostly because comics is totally ridiculously great right now. How are you? Please buy me.

AUG073918 MAGGOTS GN (MR) $21.95
AUG07391 NEW ENGINEERING GN $19.95
AUG073920 POWR MASTRS GN VOL 1 (MR) $18.00
AUG073921 STOREYVILLE GN $24.95
PictureBox, Inc. launches a nearly $90 attack on the wallets of well-meaning alt-comics fans everywhere with four book of the year candidates. If comics shops stocked these kinds of trades the way they stock superhero comics, every retailer in the US would be having a heart attack for all this stuff coming out the same week. The new edition of Storeyville is worth it even if you have the newsprint version; the add-ins, like a Chris Ware introduction, are high quality.

JUL073895 TEZUKAS MW GN (MR) $24.95
Yet another must-have book from the rich August of the great cartoonist's life, in what is turning out to be a ridiculous week.

AUG073645 ZIPPY 2007 WALK A MILE IN MY MUU MUU $18.95
I am so thankful for these collections. Hopefully it's not lost on a week like this one.

*****

The full list of this week's releases, including some titles with multiple cover variations and a long, impressive list of toys and other stuff that isn't comics, can be found here. Despite this official list there's no guarantee a comic will show up in the stores as promised, or in all of the stores as opposed to just a few. Also, stores choose what they carry and don't carry.

To find your local comic book store, check this list; and for one I can personally recommend because I've shopped there, try this.

The above titles are listed with their Diamond order code in the first field, which may assist you in finding comics at your shop or having them order something for you they don't have in-stock.

If I didn't list your new comic, you're welcome to assume the worst of me, but it's likely I just missed it. I am not a good person.
 
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If I Were In Toronto, I’d Go To This


 
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Gordon Lee Trial Set for Next Week

Almost exactly three years after the initial incident that led to criminal charges, the case against Georgia retailer Gordon Lee will go to trial Monday on two misdemeanor charges, that if he loses, could result in fines and jail time. The case stems from a Halloween 2004 incident where Lee allowed a copy of Alternative Comics #2 to get into the hands of a pair of minors during a holiday giveaway sponsored by local merchants in Rome, Georgia. That book contained incidental male nudity. The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund took the case on in early 2005, and since then there's been legal wrangling resulting in several dropped or reduced charges and other more inexplicable delays including a sick judge. The Fund has spent around $80,000 in their handling of the case.
 
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Go, Bookmark: We The Robots




This is Chris Harding's new irregularly-updated web strip, and was suggested to this site by Wes Hargis. Thanks, Wes.
 
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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* this New York Times report about the Supreme Court hearing arguments about pandering-class pornography, basically pornography that doesn't involve real-life people in its making, makes me think that didn't go well for the Free Speech absolutist element of the argument.

* book and comics industry blogger Ron Hogan goes to Manhattan's new Kinokuniya branch and likes what he sees; at the same time, he's grateful for the greater depth and breadth of selection available at other places in New York.

* Charlos Gary asks whether or not newspapers are ready for a cartoon revolving around a bi-racial character, characters or couple -- I don't see why they wouldn't be.

* the good folks at Editor & Publisher note that the airing of an American Masters focusing on Charles Schulz nudged the new biography Schulz and Peanuts up the Amazon.com sales charts. This well-traveled blog link takes to you a long post Schulz's 12 vital devices as selected by Schulz, basically recurring gags with a physical component or rigid set of expectations. When you think of all the devices that don't fit on this list -- Re-Run on the back of his mom's bicycle, the mind-blowing Charlie Brown in bed wondering about the nature of life and death strips, the Charlie Brown/Peppermint Patty tree cartoons, Sally talking to buildings, the scout cartoons, Snoopy writing, Snoopy's puppet shows, waiting in line for movie tickets, Joe Cool, and the summer camp storylines, off the top of my head -- it's easy to see what a rich strip Peanuts was.

* Johanna Draper Carlson writes a short post recasting recent arguments about serial comics versus trades purely in terms of the audience being served. In other words, if people prefer trades, shouldn't publishers consider giving them what they want rather than foster a system of artificial scarcity to maximize sales? It's a point of view to keep in mind.

* a representative of the Silver Bullet Comics shop in North Carolina surfaces to take issue with some of the news coverage regarding the shop. Basically, he feels the selling off of assets was just something that came from the normal course of doing business given the company's shift in priorities, not a seizure, and that orders made through the on-line services offered are still being filled. I imagine there will be some people in the comments giving those quotes the finger.

* this is just wrong.

* we clearly need another industry-wide superhero comics universe reboot, but this time only in superhero titles. 52 Aftermath: The Crime Bible: The Five Books of Blood is just ridiculous-sounding. There should be no superhero comic title that a child cannot ask their parent to pick up without having to introduce a mnemonic device.

* some new work from the very grateful Darryl Cunningham, at Forbidden Planet.

* as part of their plan to keep folks from buying them, PictureBox Inc. slipped a couple of worth volumes onto their site: Cold Heat Special Edition and Galactikrap #2.

* Robert Crumb, Matt Groening and Stan Lee all make a genius list; this guy remains unimpressed.
 
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Happy 70th Birthday, Yoshiharu Tsuge!


 
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Jerry Warshaw: 1928/29-2007

Mark Brown of the Chicago Sun-Times has written a nice obituary for the Chicago-area cartoonist Jerry Warshaw, who passed away on Sunday in Evanston. Warshaw's clients included Playboy and Rotarian, and a look at the on-line archives for books indicates he provided art for a number of books about cartooning, including one Brown mentions, A Funny Drawing Lesson. He is survived by a daughter.
 
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Happy 65th Birthday, Michael Fleisher!



there is some confusion over whether Mr. Fleisher was born October 31 or November 1
 
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Missed It: Jimbo’s Inferno by Gary Panter Wins 2007 American Book Award

I pulled this out for a news write-up yesterday and then somehow forgot about it in the crush of late-yesterday news, but the great Gary Panter, one of a half-dozen people working who can seriously vie for world's greatest living cartoonist honors, was a recipient of a 2007 American Book Award for his book Jimbo's Inferno. Publisher Fantagraphics notes that it's the first graphic novel from their company to take home one of these awards, given in general recognition of a work's literary value, since Joe Sacco's Palestine did so 11 years ago. It's also noted that the mid-'90s win did a lot for raising the profile of Sacco's work. Like much of what Panter has done, Jimbo's Inferno is a vastly under-appreciated work that would reward a second or third or fifth look, so let's hope that's in the cards.
 
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Happy 70th Birthday, Frank Stack!


 
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Your Danish Cartoons Hangover Update

* here's an article that touches on one of the more horrible outcomes from the 2006 Danish Cartoons Controversy: killings of Christians in Nigeria, and subsequent reprisal killings.

* there was a point when I expected a ton of articles about what Muslims actually find funny; it didn't happen, but here's one now. I like all feature articles where someone's clothes are described in attentive detail.

* this article takes a municipality by municipality look at right-wing fundamentalism vs. Islamic fundamentalism. It sounds promising, but I soon got lost in all of the hedging about what was actually being described.
 
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Vertical Inc.‘s Black Jack Due Fall 2008



In addition to being a fine addition to Vertical's library of Osamu Tezuka works for adults, this is another example of a major publishing initiative that focuses not on a new-to-North-America property but a series that's been done here but maybe not to maximum sales effect.
 
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Quick hits
Craft
Khoi Vinh Sketches
Mike Manley Draws
Kevin Huizenga Draws
Kevin Huizenga Draws
Sean Phillips Oil Paints
Homemade Bone Costumes
Craig Thompson, Jen Wang Duel
Superest: Superhero Design Game

Exhibits/Events
Yaoi Con Report
Mike Rhode on OSU
Go See Team Baldo
Andertoons on OSU 01
Andertoons on OSU 02
Andertoons on OSU 03
Andertoons on OSU Pics
Shaenon Garrity on Recent CAM Exhibits

History
Columnist Muses on Pogo
Manga Horror Advice Column
Student: Charles Schulz's Cartoons Are What Matters

Industry
PWCW: State of the CBLDF
New Comics Store in Starkville
uClick Comics Coming to Internet

Interviews/Profiles
CBR: Alex Sheikman
PWCW: Jamie McKelvie
Panoptikon Matt Madden
Cartoonist Delights Kiwis
AM New York: Roz Chast
Mundo Fantasma: Sara Varon
THOnline.com: Arthur Geisert
ComicBookMovie.com: DJ Coffman
Massive Interview With Greg Rucka
Mundo Fantasma: Sammy Harkham
Mundo Fantasma: Paul Hornschemeier

Not Comics
Mark Trail Adapted For Stage
Junot Diaz Wins First Novel Prize
Review of Schulz on American Masters

Publishing
Robot to Continue
Amulet Softcover Cover
Lew Stringer on Beano Changes
What Peter David Is Working On
Marvel and Military Do Fifth Book
Cleanliness Is Next To Gorgomaximus
Kodansha & Yahoo Japan Ready Free Comics
The Best Comics are Comics From TV and Books

Reviews
Jog: Mineshaft #20
This Guy is Mad at PvP
Graeme McMillan: Various
Chris Mautner: Horror Manga
Noah Berlatsky: America Gone Wild
Brian Heater: Good-Bye San Francisco
Dustin Harbin: The Mourning Star Vol. 1
Rob Vollmar: Bride of the Water God Vol. 1
Leroy Douresseaux: Yakitate!!: Japan Vol. 8
Michael May: End Times: Bloody Demon Guts
NeilAlien's Dr. Strange Appearance Round-Up
Matthew Brady: Eduardo Risso's Tales of Terror
 

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CR Review: The Spirit, Vol. 1



Creators: Darwyn Cooke, J. Bone, Dave Stewart, Jared K. Fletcher
Publishing Information: DC Comics, hard cover, 192 pages, October 2007, $24.99
Ordering Numbers: 1401214614 (ISBN10), 9781401214616 (ISBN13)

The first volume collecting issues of DC's new The Spirit is, as expected, an extraordinarily good-looking book, clean and lean, with a clever and sharp-looking die-cut cover and impressive-as-you'd expect insides. You could spend hours looking at the damn thing, and I think I have. There are arresting instances on just about every page, the kind where you find yourself constantly clucking your tongue in appreciation. It's like watching a beautifully shot film. Your eyes might be seduced by the symmetry in a face or the perspective selected for a long shot of a living room. Cooke's comfortable partnership with Bone and Stewart results in handsome, pleasurable art, art worth going back to and looking at again. The two-page spreads have the requisite pop, a reminder of the Jack Kirby DC days of 35 years ago where a piece of visual candy lay waiting on pages 2-3 as a kind of stutter-step into the story proper. Cooke's women are beautiful, his bad guys grotesque, and there's only a tiny bit of struggle with the outsized, cartoonier figures like Commissioner Dolan (who retains a level of absurdity, at least in his design, that suggests his being a larger than life boss more seen that way than is that way) and Ebony (mercifully revamped and updated). The stories are ripped out of the 1940s in which Will Eisner's stories are set and take place in one of those mid-20th Century cities with modern elements that Cooke as much as anyone has popularized. Like I said, I've been looking at the thing for hours now. I like it.

Reading it is a different experience. While a book combining Will Eisner's signature character and a talent high-profile mainstream cartoonist like Cooke seems like it'd be a natural, there are a few pre-existing strikes against the project. One, some might be uncomfortable by anyone other than Will Eisner doing these characters. Two, it's been my suspicion since it was announced that the title would work better as a series of comic books despite the fact we're in a world now where the trade makes or breaks a project's reputation and drives much of the smaller print run decisions. Three, Eisner and Cooke have greater differences as artists than many might realize. The first trouble spot is either a part of a reader's makeup or it isn't; if you're disqualified from enjoying a second take on the character and his world, that's cool, I can't really talk you back into a place where you might change your mind. The second I'll talk about a few graphs down the page.

The third proves to be a compelling way to look at the entire project, the wisdom of taking a second shot at a great piece of comics making. Cooke loves an arresting image as much as any creator on the planet seems to. He has a good eye; his pictures are tasteful and sumptuous. This is a big part of why he's been so successful I think in a part of the art form that in many other ways doesn't share his values. Mainstream comics has been reduced, mostly by Mark Waid and Grant Morrison, into a string of story moments. Cooke's skill and taste make him an extremely effective facilitator of story through a single image. In contrast, a lot of what Eisner did counted on setting a consistent tone and then riffing off of it, sometimes bringing in a set of artistic effects and seeing what would happen when he would throw one at the other, an ongoing study in medium cool.

Darwyn Cooke's run on The Spirit will likely end with a reputation as a quality work that's much more constrained than what Eisner accomplished. It's hard to work at the edge of your talent with someone else's characters, and I don't think these comics ever transcend the esteem with which Eisner's work is held in our collective memory. And yet I think it's worth noting that it may be seen in much the same way by people looking at it in the context of Cooke's career. Its contribution there may be in helping instill within Cooke a greater sense of discipline when it comes to creating a visual through-line scene to scene. There are fewer confusing jumps from one part of a scene to another than in some earlier Cooke works, when an item switches hands in a scene between P'Gell and The Spirit between where you might think it would end up, it jars because Cooke has left behind the series of still shots from past works and moved into sustained scenes. The degree of control applied to the last two Spirit stories in this volume and the collection-concluding reprint of the Batman/Spirit team-up comic is quite severe. I think the comics are tighter and more entertaining as they move along, and reflect a more seamless integration of Eisner's basic methodology. It should be interesting to see what Cooke makes of some of these techniques in his promised, stand-alone graphic novels.

Okay, as for the second point from the earlier graph: I really do think that The Spirit may be a better comic series than a collection. The mostly stand-alone stories here are dense, making the series one of the more satisfying purchases on an individual issue basis. Cooke integrates different, tried and true storytelling techniques like flashbacks or shifts in time, but he lets them breathe through limited use rather than pushing them by making that the central focus of any one story, a strategy that give the comics a greater texture than most books on the stand and in some cases an unexpected rhythm to the stories themselves. There are even small shifts in presentational style that take the comic out of full film-comics mode and make for a richer reading experience. It's the kind of comic book where you can buy only that comic and have a little comics reading session at your house with your feet up rather than seeking satisfaction by devouring all those tiny snippets of story in pamphlet form. If I were a habitual comics shop devotee, I would be a little bit happier every time this book looked out at me from the new funnybook wall. It seems perfect for that experience.

The one improvement with the collection is that reading all the stories together one gets the sense that the creators may be poking a bit at their lead character. I can't tell if it's on purpose or not, but seen as a continuity, decisions upon coming back to life like pursuing a heightened, crazier version of one's professional life or putting one's greatly satisfying romantic life into a holding pattern, these may remind one of the kind of classic identity crisis a person might enter into in their late twenties, the panic and shuffle that comes upon a first severe setback, although perhaps one that doesn't involve briefly dying. A series of romantic entanglements that don't go much deeper than assurances of mutual attraction, ramping up the elements you favor best at your place of employment to re-imagine it as more of a cause, an overall refusal to sit still: most of us have seen these things in a friend or two whom we patiently wait out and hope that the damage to the progress of their life isn't too severe. Cooke's The Spirit suggests an everyman who through fisticuffs and heroic action works his way through one of the great, universal questions: what the hell am I doing with myself? I'll be interested to see if the next set of issues suggest an answer. I'm already terrified that less gentle hands may take up the same exploration after Cooke's gone.


 
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Not Comics: 2007-2008 NBA Preview



Every year I participate in an NBA preview hosted by Virtual Memories, which I use as an excuse to make a bunch of dumb cracks about sports. Since this year I've included comics-related facts in relation to every city featured, I thought it would be okay if I mentioned it here.
 
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Your Fall 2007 Xeric Grant Recipients

According to the press release, $26,548 in grants was given five creators in order to facilitate their self-publishing efforts.

* Colleen Frakes -- Tragic Relief
* Geoff Grogan -- Look Out! Monsters
* Corinne Mucha -- My Alaskan Summer
* Lars Martinson -- Tonoharu: Part One
* Jaime Portillo -- Gabriel

The Xeric Foundation, celebrating its 15th anniversary this year, was established by Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles co-creator Peter Laird. Past winners include Adrian Tomine and Jason Lutes. The next deadline is March 31.
 
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2008 MoCCA Art Festival Exhibitor Applications Now Ready For Download


 
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Castree DNA Match One in One Billion

The trial of Ronald Castree for the 1975 murder of 11-year-old Lesley Molseed moved into the prosecutor's compelling DNA evidence, by which sperm found in Molseed's underwear provided a DNA match with the one-time comics dealer. The sample was obtained from material used for analysis of fiber, the original garments having been destroy in the mid-1980s.

The Molseed murder is news for both the seriousness of the crime and its notoriety deriving from the fact that a previous suspected was convicted and served time for several years before being cleared of the crime, dying a few months later.
 
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Go, Look: Nicolas Cinquegrani


 
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Michael George Pleads Not Guilty

The Pennsylvania retailer and convention organizer Michael George, facing charges for murdering his then-wife in Michigan in 1990, entered a plea of not guilty during a hearing Monday in front of Judge James Biernat. Barbara George was shot in the head in the early evening on July 13 of that year. She was 32 years old.

George's attorney Carl Marlinga also filed a motion to release George to his mother's house, which I think is something that had also previously been floated.

This article has a nice run-down of the latest information, including the defense attorney's take on the case as circumstantial and dependent on a timeline, and the prosecutor's rebuttal regarding motive and the suspect's behavior.
 
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Happy 56th Birthday, P. Craig Russell!


 
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When Internet Comics Models Collide

* Josh Roberts of ComicSpace and OnlineComics.net and Joey Manley of the WebComicsNation family of comics sites have announced a merger and an infusion of capital from an investment company called E-Line Ventures. This involves merging some of the sites from both companies under the ComicSpace name and re-energizing some of the more strongly branded Manley company initiatives. I think this is a smart move and fairly interesting one in terms of it providing both companies with access to skills and resources and a stabilizing influence that could be hugely beneficial; my initial hunch is that this falls short of making likely a revolutionary change in terms of things like growth and the passion held for these efforts. I'll try to find out more. For one thing, this seems to be the only time "E-Line Ventures" has ever been mentioned on the Internet.

* Unless I misunderstood, today is the day that Zuda Comics goes live. That's DC Comics' web initiative, which basically seems like a lot of other webcomics efforts (lots of fantasy features with enough sprinkles from other genres to portray itself as diverse; a vast range of skill involved, a crowd-pleasing element in a lot of what's on the docket) except they're going to be driven by a wide call for creative contributions, they'll be paying people at a certain level of publication, they can offer the promise of eventually getting down on one knee and offering the cartoonist a ring that means a media property-gigundo corporation development marriage, and there are massive questions regarding the terms of that money and partnership in terms of how much control it gives DC over the creation -- with the consensus on that last point being "quite enough it should give someone pause." However, like most things in comics there's a calculated resignation combined with a careerist impulse that makes short work of those concerns, at least enough that the more difficult fight is against other willing participants. It's also probably worth noting that while the history of comics right up through modern times demands we cut the analysis of such deals absolutely no slack when it comes to catch the tiniest whiff of exploitation, there are severe deals that have worked and do work to the satisfaction of many cartoonists. What I'm interested in is that if this deal works in terms of delivering readers and development resources to such projects in a fashion that justifies the expense of investment and the cost of playing ball.

* Graeme McMillan catches word I missed that comics property development company Platinum, of "all the licensing and movie deals of a comics publishing, little actual publishing" fame has ended its relationship with the comics information site Broken Frontier. Apparently, this took placed back in July. I'm not sure what you can say about either the development or how BF benefited from the partnership in any way -- I'm not casting aspersions; I really don't know.
 
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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* the Supreme Court will hear arguments in US v. Williams this morning. At issue is an element of anti-pornography law that not only goes after child pornography but goes after any and all depictions of the same, which I believe means any sort of representation of such an act, even for literary or satirical purpose, could be prosecuted on the same level as someone having a empty warehouse filled with cameras where they keep children in a cage and ritually abuse them, primarily through a gateway argument, the use of which in itself has troubling implications. Here's an analysis being sent around by the American Constitution Society that appeared on their blog. I don't envy anyone having to safeguard First Amendment rights through such an unpleasant, but I think on balance it's an admirable and necessary task.

* I enjoyed the American Masters television program on Charles Schulz that ran on PBS last night -- and may have yet to run in your area -- if only for the wonderful archival footage unearthed that I'd never experienced, including a lot of footage of the Schulz Family at home, several moments of Schulz drawing, and a really late television interview (with Al Roker -- who talked about the experience here) where Schulz broke down. Some of the comics analysis was pretty good, too, such as Jules Feiffer recalling how refreshing it was to see actual little kid behavior on the page, the notion that the strip captured the separate world that kids live in, and something I hadn't thought of before but that seems really obvious now in that the strip played as a quiet counterpoint to a lot of busier, more aggressively illustrated features on the same page.

I imagine there will be a lot of people that will point to this as another example of a treatment of Schulz that concentrates far too much on the melancholy aspects of Peanuts and his personal character at the expense of the sunnier qualities in the comic strip and in its creator. I sympathize, especially with the family, who must carry a level of insight, expectation and disappointment that the rest of us can never truly understand. At the same time, I think that the sadness in Peanuts has been correctly identified as a lot of what made it great -- perhaps the single thing that most distinguished it from every strip before or since -- despite the elements of universal craft that Schulz showed as a gagmaker and an evocative cartoon artist. It might be one thing if this poignant element were somehow masked in the strip, or such a complete 360 from what we know of the cartoonist's personal life, but it's right out there in the open for both and supported by statements from those who knew them best. I hope that there is a deeper appreciation at some point that more closely looks at how the humor worked in relation to those elements, and I'm all for a continuing element of high regard for Schulz's chops, but I don't blame anyone for exploring a general subject that seems glaringly obvious in the strip and from the man's own testimony.

* speaking of Schulz, he continues to be one of the most effective money-makers among dead celebrities.

* the retailer advocacy organization ComicsPro has sent out a press release declaring its devotion to high standards when it comes to anti-collusive practices, including incorporating "an antitrust compliance policy into its by-laws outlining the parameters within which independent retailers can confidently deal with each other." This is important because the potential membership base for a group like ComicsPro has real trust factors involved with things like sharing information because of the possibility that by fostering an atmosphere of support they are planting the seeds for nearby competition to spring up.
 
posted 10:10 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Ali Dilem Joins Daryl Cagle’s Line-Up



The Algerian cartoonist Ali Dilem has joined Daryl Cagle's high-profile on-line showcase (October 27 entry) for editorial cartoonists in the United States and abroad. Dilem is better known for the legal battles he's faced in his country for his cartoons and the eloquence and passion with which he's spoken publicly about these struggles than he is for his cartoons as expression and commentary, although this is an imbalance that may be addressed through this new exposure.
 
posted 10:08 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Crankshaft Given Timeout In Oshkosh

According to this column in the Oshkosh Northwestern, an odd cartoon October 24 run in the Tom Batiuk/Chuck Ayers feature Crankshaft (available for view through these archives) was enough to earn the feature a brief suspension from the pages of that paper. At issue was a joke the editors of that paper believe trivialized rape, a joke others have described as playing into a myth that rape is solely about sexual attraction and therefore not a concern for older women.

You can get an idea of how the cartoon played with comics fans by checking out Alan Gardner's comments threads. As for my view, I think it was a crappy joke. The Crankshaft character is bound to say stupid, hurtful things -- that's his modus operandi, along the line of an Archie Bunker or Gregory House. But this joke was presented in a way where it seems 99 percent likely the reader is supposed to find sympathy with Crankshaft's position in a way that we then afford him the virtue of puncturing the other women's vanity in that Dr. House way that's not very tactful. Without that, it's not really a joke at all, except in a very satirical way where we show a character saying something so asinine in a certain context the shock of it is humorous.

However, until there's a pattern of these things, I don't see this is as grounds for a significant indictment of the cartoonists, and I hope this doesn't turn into one of those Internet gotchas followed in a few days by a vigorous defense of the strip and its creators as if they were discovered transporting a body. It's just a joke that didn't work. You write 700 gags a year, for as many years as Batiuk has in a very successful career, you're going to have one or two where you don't see the other side of how it's going to be read (just as you're likely to subconsciously repeat someone else's joke a few times over the years, another classic gotcha-defense instigator). This is doubly true of a strip where one of the characters is supposed to act in cantankerous fashion or otherwise pushes the boundaries of acceptable behavior. The only thing that's slightly baffling is that even broaching the outer gates of a joke touching in any way on the subject of rape didn't set off the alarms of one of the production people that usually catch these things so that every possible reading of the strip was ascertained and a phone call was made to the syndicate editor.

I'm also impressed that the editors in Oshkosh are that on top of their comics page.
 
posted 10:06 pm PST | Permalink
 

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IDW to Publish Scorchy Smith Book




One of the greatly influential strip accomplishments, Noel Sickles' groundbreaking Scorchy Smith, will get the deluxe treatment next summer. Important words and phrases from the announcement include hardcover, oversized, complete, "magazine and other illustrations" and Dale Crain.
 
posted 10:04 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Quick hits
Craft
Paul Pope Curves Space

Exhibits/Events
Go See Gene Yang

History
I'm Not Sure I Understand This

Industry
Michael Atchison Honored
Ambrosia Adopts Pay-What-You-Want Model

Interviews/Profiles
Newsarama: Junot Diaz
Cincinnati.com: Tony and Mary Branch
Eddie Campbell Muses on Lat and His Recent Visit

Not Comics
Great Frank Springer Book Cover
Comic Strip Diet Maybe Not A Great Diet

Publishing
Zuda Profiled

Reviews
Paul O'Brien: Various
Frank Santoro: Panray
Paul O'Brien: X-Men #204
Paul O'Brien: Foolkiller #1
Jamie Lovett: Shortcomings
Cary Fagan: Long Tack Sam
Kevin Church: Heroes For Hire
Paul O'Brien: X-Men: First Class #5
Paul O'Brien: Cable & Deadpool #46
 

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CR Review: On The Road of Knives…



Creators: Shawn Cheng, Zak Smith, Nicholas Di Genova
Publishing Information: Self-Published, Ongoing, dedicated web site, 33 panels, 2006-present
Ordering Numbers:

I think part of the charm with the on-line comic On the Road of Knives... is the clash between its super-intense drawing and the casual way in which it's being produced (it's been months since an update). Reading it is sort of like sitting between the artists at some kind of diner and peering over their shoulders to take in their "exquisite corpse"-like game. Monsters and things that fight monsters are introduced, killed, reborn and so on. The appeal here is the design work, the way that many of the monsters resemble blobs of flesh wrapped up in a cloth sheet or snake-like coils bearing teeth, and the herky-jerky humor of the combat, often seen through a very depiction of any one panel's attending menagerie. It's not a very deep story -- it's barely a story yet, and I'm not holding out for some great flowering here, if the artists ever return to it -- and both the shifts in tone and dominant style might be unpleasant to the eye before the intricacies sink in and start to communicate on their own. If nothing else, it's a nice springboard for discussion on how single panels can build a narrative and how much style and flow can be altered without losing a narrative thrust. I want more loosely conceived projects on the Internet like this one, not fewer.


 
posted 1:00 pm PST | Permalink
 

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If I Owned a Television, I’d Watch This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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Racial Tensions Still Heated at CCSU

It's hard at times not to kid academic institutions for taking weeks to smooth over something as seemingly obvious and disposable as a cartoon with unfortunate overtones penned by some student who should have known better. Of course, if things don't get worked out to everyone's satisfaction you may end up with what sounds like a potentially difficult situation at Central Connecticut State University, where a cartoon is one of several factors leading to campus-wide calls for attention to issues of race.
 
posted 10:30 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 69th Birthday, Ralph Bakshi!


 
posted 10:12 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* the esteemed comics creator, creators rights advocate and historian Jerry Robinson joins DC Comics as a consultant; hopefully his consulting will have some of the flavor of the on-stage broadsides during his last couple of Bill Finger speeches in San Diego.

* a big chunk of Paul Gravett's TCJ cover-featured discussion with Posy Simmonds appears here.

* if I understand the standards provided in this article correctly, I can only speak on women's issues in comics 1/3 of the time.

* as in America, cartoonists in Brunei aren't always respected; not so much like America, they're supposedly well-paid.

* the Schulz and Peanuts PR juggernaut continues its way across the print and on-line media landscape: here's probably the best feature article from the weekend just past: 12 Things You Didn't Know About Charles Schulz. The real action is in the comments thread of this posting at Cartoon Brew, with family members and friends piping in. Schulz received additional attention over the weekend in anticipation of his American Masters profile, which begins running on various PBS stations tonight.

* it's not exactly comics, but I can't imagine any comics reader not being interested in at least taking a look at Jack Davis' Don Quixote children's book project when it's completed. Fifty-five drawings!

* this is the coolest fan art you're likely to see all year, Kevin Huizenga doing two portraits of characters from CF's Powr Mastrs.

* E&P picks up on the odd Crankshaft joke from last Friday. I'll go into what I find interesting about such strips at a later date, it's not what's been suggested for me, but the tenor of such debates is so awful on both sides that I hesitate to do so while some people out there are still working over a specific example.

* do syndicates usually re-package material for presidential elections? I find the thought kind of interesting. Creators has a fine line-up of solid editorial cartoonists, including maybe the biggest figure in that field the last three years, Mike Luckovich.

* a fine article in Epoch Times remembers the Inuit illustrator and cartoonist Alootook Ipellie.

* this post about Barney Google and Rice-A-Roni would have been my Dad's favorite thing to read on the Internet ever.

* if there's any stranger way to start out a week than with the words Massive Scott Nybakken Interview, I don't know what it is. The interview's good, just unexpected, in an unexpected place.
 
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Happy 63rd Birthday, Nic Cuti!


 
posted 10:08 pm PST | Permalink
 

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How Did I Miss This Amazing Story?

From an examination of recent elections in Poland.

"When his twin brother Lech, who remains the nation's president, boycotted a vital meeting in Germany because a Berlin cartoonist had compared him to a potato, the same Poles didn't know whether to laugh or cry."

Not only is this the greatest reason for a leader to blow off a meeting in the history of mankind, and an event on which I would have posted about fifty times if I'd been aware of it when it happened, it always kills me whenever anyone is compared to a potato.
 
posted 10:06 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 54th Birthday, Batton Lash!


 
posted 10:04 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Quick hits
Exhibits/Events
Komikazen Report
Big Cartoon Auction
Report From Caniff Festival
Report From Ed Koren Event Friday
Preview of Brampton Manga Exhibit

History
This Made Me Laugh
Trick or Treat With Luckovich
Wizard: Best Modern Cowboy Comics
CBR: Best Newspapers As Portrayed In Funnybooks

Industry
I Hate Your Cartoon
I Hate Your Cartoon
New Kinokuniya Store Profiled
Opinion Re: Manga and Tougher Porn Laws
Is People Being Mad at Ted Rall Even News?

Interviews/Profiles
NPR: Ed Koren
CBR: Scott Kurtz
Newsarama: Gary Frank
NewsOK.com: Sterling Gates
The Muppet Newsflash: Tim Beedle
Northampton Chronicle: Frank Jeffs
Your Mom's Basement: Larry Young
I Only Just Learned To Spell Sienkiewicz
Darnell Terrell Loves The Superhero Comics
Your Mom's Basement Readers: Larry Young

Not Comics
Hollywood [Hearts] Manga
IDW Happy About Film Success
Ted Benoit Involved In Ad Campaign

Publishing
Original Manga Guide Proposal
Preview of Classics Illustrated Line
Seattle P-I Previews New Palestine Edition

Reviews
AV Club: Various
Brian Heater: Blue Pills
Richard Krauss: Strip Down
Gabe Bullard: Micrographica
Zack Shlachter: Shortcomings
Dick Hyacinth: Powr Mastrs Vol. 1
Richard Krauss: Thrills and Chills #4
Abhay Khosla: Vinyl Underground #1
Shaenon Garrity: Comics Underground Japan
Matthew Brady: Sock Monkey: The Inches Incident
Craig Taylor: Aya, Exit Wounds, The Three Paradoxes
Brendan Wright: Screw Heaven, When I Die I'm Going To Mars
 

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Five Positive Stories About Comics



Past the occasional message board reply, it's been difficult for me to participate in the latest swirl of hot topics and heated debate and wave of hand declarations that seems to fuel the comics corner of Internet these days. Frankly, I'm at a loss as to what most people are talking about most of the time, although I'm impressed by the confidence with which they speak.

I don't know what this industry needs. I don't care where comics is trending in terms of story or craft or mark-making or autobiography. I don't have anything to say about comics industry journalism except that I'm trying my hardest with the resources I have to do it. I have ethical questions about a lot of industry practices but I'm not totally convinced one way or the other about the majority of them, certainly not enough to stop asking. I don't know which comics are a dead end. I don't have a preference as to how comics are read, who's doing the reading, or where they are when they do it. I don't know why one kind of comics would ever cost another kind of comics their readers. I don't have a specific vision as to where comics should be. I can't tell you comics' future.

What I do know is that this is an extraordinary time to be a comics reader. The most extraordinary time. And sometimes I think we forget about that. I spent much of my adult life in comics shops every Wednesday looking for something -- anything -- to purchase. Today I have a 40-item wish list devoted solely to black and white reprints of Marvel and DC comic books. It's been ten years since I bought art from a cartoonist so they could eat, a dozen since I bought comics at a going out of business sale for a store I loved, and five since anyone's told me that the latest CBLDF beneficiary should go straight to the circle of hell where pornographers go. (To my face, anyway.) While I appreciate a continuing skepticism and an always replenishing desire to make things as ethical and excellent as possible, I remain convinced that things are better than they used to be, and there's no reason to lose sight of that, either.

Here are five stories that make me happy. Maybe they'll make you happy, too.



We Know What To Do With Joe Sacco Now
I worked for Joe Sacco's publisher when he was still in the process of making his incredible comic book Palestine in the mid-1990s. As much as everyone in that publishing house wanted that comic to succeed, it sold poorly, barely enough for Joe to scrape by. Although the work itself was stunning in so many ways, Palestine failed to offer readers superheroes, indy-comics style fantasy, humorous satire, relationship drama or any of the grounds for sales through which the hit comic books at that time had planted their respective flags.

It was only through the publication of a volume in book form that Palestine began to find its audience. It went on to become a perennial solid seller as a trade publication. This Fall, Joe Sacco gives us a special edition of Palestine decked out with as good an author's section on making a great comics work as has ever been published and still anchored by those great, heartbreaking, insightful, lushly drawn and chaotically depicted comics pages, a barely contained howl at the way the world works for millions of people fueled by the passion of a cartoonist working at the outer edge of his talent.

I imagine Joe Sacco will see a much larger check for this new edition than he did when it was a low-selling comic book. He has in one weekend seen more significant press attention. There are more readers who will know how to appreciate the book when they pick it up. There are more stores that will carry it for a longer period of time. All of that makes me happy. Joe Sacco is the kind of cartoonist that deserves Special Editions more than he deserves a low-selling series no one knows quite what to do with. Joe Sacco now has a place in comics, and comics is better for it.



Craft and Story Are Valued as Never Before
I welcome all kinds of comics stories into the marketplace and into the consciousness of critics and editors. A diverse medium is a stronger, richer medium and every incremental broadening of expression is a chance for another kind of reader to engage with the world's greatest art form. At the same time, I can detect no paucity of craft, and certainly no devaluation of story, and I'm confounded by anyone who would argue differently.

The continued ghettoizing of the view that comics hold collectible value independent of content, the commercial rise of art comics, the aging of mainstream comics readers, the bounce-back effect from cross-media interest and the manga invasion all seem to me the kind of things that contribute to a higher baseline for craft considerations among much of the comics audience. If widespread crabbiness is an indication of anything, it's that fans are more demanding than ever, not less. While in the American mainstream the top-selling titles may not always come from the best writers and artists all the time, there's a significant place for people who wear working hard on their chops on their sleeves like Sean Phillips, Stuart Immonen, Matt Fraction, Ed Brubaker, Gail Simone and Alex Maleev. Tons more. Robert Kirkman. Ben Templesmith. Further, the discussion of craft now includes a much wider swath of cartoonists. Twenty years ago a discussion of great craftspeople in comics would have centered around, say, Steve Rude, Dave Stevens and Mark Schultz. Now you are much more likely to hear craft arguments on the behalf of artists as disparate as Charles Schulz, Darwyn Cooke and Lynda Barry. The great vanguard of alternative cartoonists from Jim Woodring to John Porcellino are marvelous craftsmen. Craft is king.

The land it rules is Story. Young people in every medium have always been fascinated with telling their own tales before most of them turn their voices elsewhere. New playwrights so frequently chronicle what happened to their circle of friends while growing up that there are jokes about it. Screenwriters write screenplays about screenwriters writing screenplays. Songwriters put into song and verse every relationship they had between the ages of 19 and 22. That was bound to happen in comics, too, as greater avenues for expression opened up that weren't bound up in a cape and tights or required to push it away. While there are people that respond to that kind of raw expression, it's rarely the work that drives an art form. It certainly doesn't with comics.

There are so many emerging cartoonists interested in making comics outside of the bounds of autobiography and reportage. The best thus far of his generation, Kevin Huizenga, makes amazing comics using a classic everyman, Glenn Ganges. Zack Soto has introduced us to Dr. Galapagos, the astonishing Eleanor Davis seems equally comfortable with monsters and lonely people and Zak Sally has started his readers on a journey with Sammy the Mouse. Sammy Harkham came to our attention by looking at the world through the eyes of a sailor and continues to hold our interest by depicting its reflection in the eyes of a golem. Ben Catmull gave us an entire town in the first issue of his Monster Parade. Mat Brinkman, Chris Forgues and Brian Chippendale walked us through richly detailed entire worlds in Teratoid Heights, Powr Mastrs and Maggots. Frank Santoro and Ben Jones centered their recent serial Cold Heat not around a around a depressed twenty-something but a "tri-racial, bi-sexual woman ninja named Castle." Top Shelf is building a significant portion of their line around genre stories with foxes, owls and super spies as leads. First Second has a hit with Sardine, put comics' greatest autobiographer in touch with a turn of the century detective agency and took their greatest leap of faith with a Lost Colony.

We continue to value the stories the more established cartoonists provide. There's still a Palomar and a Hoppers and an Ylum, (not to mention a Metropolis and a Latveria). Usagi Yojimbo and Groo are still being published (David Chelsea in Love and Real Stuff are not). Last year we met Edison Steelhead (The Ticking, Renee French) and this year got to spend time in the company of Percy Gloom (in Cathy Malkasian's Percy Gloom). The vast majority of manga published in the US to highest-profile success has been long form serial narrative, from Dragon Head to Dr. Slump to Naruto to Bleach to Fruits Basket to The Drifting Classroom to Anne Freaks. I was in the grocery store the other day and while I was in line I read a part of a story about a boy possessed by a ghost that plays Go, which I pray to God isn't autobiographical. Comics has a million stories, some of which have only just begun.

I honestly couldn't tell you if there's enough story, or if it's bad if some people don't value story as much as I do. Maybe I'm not looking close enough to see incremental differences of degree, maybe I'm not as taken with certain, classic modes of delivery, I don't know. I do know comics remains stuffed with stories, stories that I'll be reading and telling people about until the day I die, stories that thrill the vast majority of readers who come to the medium, and take up a huge portion of the collective creative class's attention. Story has nothing to worry about. Story rules.



IDW is Going to Publish Little Orphan Annie
No one believes me when I tell them just how much I enjoy Harold Gray's long-running newspaper strip Little Orphan Annie at the height of its powers. There's nothing like it in all of comics, in all the artistic world. On a technical level, Gray used white space and spare design in a way that equaled George Herriman when it came to showing the awesomeness of nature. Gray could also use those same elements to suggest how empty a single room apartment could be, or the loneliness of a mansion's Great Hall when people weren't around to fill it.

As much as it's been reduced in the public mind to an unctuous song or two squeaked out by one of Mommy's special darlings curling up her fists to look cute, Little Orphan Annie's moral character on its best, rightful stage is an astounding thing to behold. My Mom and a million other little girls wanted to be like Annie when they were kids, and reading Gray's strip I soon found out that Mom had chosen far better than I had (either Hardy Boy). The closest modern analog to Annie in pop entertainment is Chihiro in Miyazaki's Spirited Away, although Annie's coarser in both character and presentation. Each child works through their problems, finding strength through that hard work. They're both empathic, look out for other people, and remain true to themselves. All the time. You might laugh, but if you take into account the era in which the best Annie adventures took place, there must have been something almost spiritual in its message. Stay honest. Stay true. Keep working. You'll get home.

I don't know where IDW is beginning its project, but hopefully they'll be committed until the best work begins, the late '20s and into the 1930s and even the '40s. I never get sick of reading how Annie and her Daddy Warbucks find each other and their fortune, lost more times than I can count. I never get tired of looking at the way Harold Gray carved space from the abyss with only a few lines of ink. I never get tired of these comics. Welcome back, Annie.



The Editorial Cartoonist Field Bleeding Has Subsided (At Least For Now)
It seems to me that the tenor of talk about the notion of the editorial cartoonist profession going away has changed over the last several months. I suspect that a lot of that change comes from outside events. The sudden passing of Doug Marlette made a lot of people realize just how loud a noise a successful cartoonist makes within the sound of his voice, whether it's a series of local stages or a national one. The emergence of new-generation stars like Mike Luckovich and Nick Anderson are noteworthy in that they both are solid craftspeople who excel within the regional culture in which they're placed, and have obvious value to their publishers. Tom Toles has by now undeniably become the cartoonist at the Washington Post everyone hoped he'd be when he stepped in for Herblock. Giants of the field Paul Conrad and Pat Oliphant refuse to fade. The list goes on.

One important development may have been convention-related. The push by several at this year's AAEC meeting to downplay news of the loss of cartoonists paper to paper and replace it by extolling the positive effects editorial cartoonists have on their publications is not only smart in itself but suggests considered opposition to decay and progressive remedies will come. That has to be an encouragement. For the first time in a while, the last few months paint a picture of editorial cartooning as a field in an adjustment period rather than simply a profession in decline. At some point it was inevitable that the bleeding would stop, that the talent remaining would be so considerable as a group that things would settle into place and would be of such obvious value to their newspapers that no matter how they transform themselves in the next several years it would be clear that cartoonists must be a part of it. I didn't expect the bounce so soon, but if the rally takes place now, that's great news.



Cromartie High School is Two-Thirds of the Way To Full English Publication
Sometimes I find myself wishing I got to experience the last ten years of translated manga at an age and with a taste for material where more of it might be closer to my heart, the way it must have been great to be an 11-year-old with a sizable allowance in 1962 and the way it was an additionally fun experience to be 14 and ready for indy comics right when indy comics was ready to entertain me. I'm old like that. There's still a ton of manga of which I'm fond, both out of my natural age range and interests (Dr. Slump) and square within them (Ode to Kirhito). I can't complain. If I occasionally wish for a certain set of eyes that used to be mine, it's out of greed.

Cromartie High School is one of those rare comics that works for me just like the significant works being translated, but it also has enough appeal for it not to feel totally out of place in the broader range of books finding translation in the US. Unlike some of the other books I find myself more easily enjoying, Cromartie High School with its large band of satirical idiots I get to experience because of its pop effectiveness more than its literary value. It's funny, it's weird, and I find its press against the normative standards of where funny comes from endlessly entertaining and fairly admirable. It's a minor miracle that it's being published here. I have no idea who's joined me in reading the 12 volumes to date, out of a potential 16 or 17 (depending who you talk to), but I'm grateful for whatever demented publishing strategy that has kept it coming out. All of this translated manga is in a way a wonderful bonus in terms of what I ever imagined would be the comics landscape in America, even ten years ago. I can't help but smile a bit at the good fortune.

*****

That's enough for now. I know it's kind of ridiculous to bemoan the state of on-line windbaggery with a post as long as that one. There's just so much to be positive about, and I'm not sure any of it is being emphasized as much as it should be.

Heck, it would be easy to do five more. I'm heartened by the fact that web cartoonists like Scott Kurtz, Chris Onstad, R Stevens and Nicholas Gurewitch have reached the audiences they have in the way that they have, the true inheritors of the comics self-publishing crown. I'm tickled that Jeff Smith's Bone seems to have captured that rarest of all creatures: a second audience. I'm glad to read so many people are interested in Schulz and Peanuts and Jonathan Ross' televised love letter to Steve Ditko. I'm amazed by the relationship that Garry Trudeau has managed to forge with military personnel while remaining critical of the current war. I'm impressed by the emergence of next generation of industry icons like Eric Reynolds, Joe McCulloch, Brendan Burford and Dan Nadel. I root for Sophie Crumb and Frank Thorne and Mark Tonra to continue making comics despite reasons that might make other people stop. I want to live in a town that has one of these new breed comic stores, and its own editorial cartoonist. I've had at least one dream about White River Junction, Vermont. And the comics. So many comics.

I no longer care as much as I used to if you agree with me about all that's wrong with comics. The greater hope is that you have some interaction with everything that's right.
 
posted 10:30 pm PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In Portland, I’d Go To This


 
posted 10:25 pm PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In Jersey, I’d Go To This


 
posted 10:25 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Five Link A Go Go

* go, look: stupidity poster mocking use of Danish cartoons imagery in election

* go, look: new Al Columbia project

* go, look: more on Steve Canyon show

* go, bookmark: Gianfranco Goria photo blog

* go, bookmark: killer Disney History blog
 
posted 10:20 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Fff Results Post #97—Nightstand

Five For Friday #97 Results

On Friday afternoon, participating CR readers were asked to "Name the Last Five Comics You Read, Good or Bad, of Any Kind, Shape or Form, from Fifth to First Position." Here are the results.

*****



Tom Spurgeon

5. The Spirit Vol. 1, Darwyn Cooke
4. Maggots, Brian Chippendale
3. All The Rage, Aaron McGruder
2. Only Skin #2, Sean Ford
1. The Manga Bible, Siku

*****



Devlin Thompson

5. My Dear 500 Friends, by George Price (Simon & Schuster, 1963)
4. Working Together For a Livable Land (Soil Conservation Society of America, Ankeny, Ohio, 1978)
3. Devil Kids #51 (Harvey, Sept. 1971)
2. Bart Simpson Comics #38 (Bongo, 2007)
1. Dennis the Menace #118 (Fawcett, Jan. 1972)

*****



Chris Cilla

5. Tom Lechner Tales of Inertia #1
4. Jaime Hernandez Penny Century #7
3. the sunday comics section of The Oregonian, 10/21/07
2. Adrian Tomine Shortcomings
1. Basil Wolverton Intense #3

*****



Roger Langridge

5. Doctor Who Magazine #388, Daniel McDaid, Martin Geraghty and David A. Roach
4. Awesome: The Indie Spiner Rack Anthology, Various
3. Tank Girl; The Gifting #4, Alan Martin, Rufus Dayglo & Ashley Wood
2. Wander #1, Rich Tingley
1. Gasoline Alley Complete Dailies Vol. 3, Frank King

All but the last one involve people I know, which says something about my comic reading habits these days.

*****



Marc Sobel

5. Walking Dead #43
4. Mome #9
3. Corny's Fetish
2. Love & Rockets #26
1. Sandman Mystery Theatre #48

*****



Jim Rugg

5. Miss Fury
4. Where Creatures Roam 8
3. Skyscrapers of the Midwest 4
2. Machine Man 9
1. Speak of the Devil 2

*****



Dan Morris

5. Cyborg 009 by Shotaro Ishinomori
4. Maggots by Brian Chippendale
3. New Tales of Old Palomar 1-3 by Gilbert Hernandez
2. Storeyville by Frank Santoro
1. Cold Heat 1-4 by BJ and Frank Santoro

*****



J. Caleb Mozzocco

5. Blue Beetle #20 by John Rogers and Rafael Albuquerque
4. Ultimate Spider-Man #115, by Brian Michael Bendis and Stuart Immonen
3. Showcase Presents: Batgirl Vol. 1, by Gil Kane and Various
2. With the Light: Raising an Autistic Child, by Keiko Tobe
1. The Mourning Star, by Kazimir Strzepek

*****



Booksteve

5. Kabuki #1 -- David Mack
4. Cutey Bunny #2 -- Joshua Quagmire
3. Doc Savage #1 -- Gold Key 1966
2. All Star Batman #6 -- Miller/Lee
1. Walt Disney Christmas Parade 1952

*****



Sean T. Collins

5. Daredevil #101
4. Exterminators #22
3. All Star Batman & Robin, the Boy Wonder #7
2. Green Lantern #24
1. Action Comics #856

*****



Jason Michelitch

This list looked a lot different before I remembered to include webcomics.

5. the latest Penny Arcade (Jerry Holkins and Mike Krahulik)
4. the latest Overcompensating (Jeffrey Rowland)
3. the latest Achewood (Chris Onstad)
2. Doktor Sleepless #3 (Warren Ellis and Ivan Rodriguez)
1. Casanova #10 (Matt Fraction and Fabio Moon)

*****



Scott Cederlund

5) The Spirit HC
4) Tales of the Sinestro Corps Superman-Prime #1
3) Absolute Sandman V2
2) Chris Staros Yearbook Stories 1976-1978
1) Casanova #10

*****



Ray Cornwall

5. Brubaker's Rise and Fall of the Shi'ar Empire Uncanny X-Men hardcover
4. Eagle -- manga about a mythical run for the President by an Asian-American Vietnam war vet
3. GTO -- Great Teacher Onizuka -- fantastic sex comedy from Japan
2. Lone Wolf and Cub (though, technically, I'm on book 16 of 28 -- but 16 books count, right?)
1. Concrete -- The Human Dilemma (just read it tonight on the train)

*****



Daniel Mata

5. Green Lantern Corps #17 by Dave Gibbons, Patrick Gleason, and various
4. Uncle Sam & the Freedom Fighters by Jimmy Palmiotti, Justin Gray, and Renato Arlem
3. Dr. 13: Architecture & Mortality by Brian Azzarello & Cliff Chiang
2. 2000 AD: Extreme Edition 3 #25 by John Wagner, Alan Grant, Alan Hebden, and Massimo Belardinelli
1. The Hollow Grounds by Luc & Francois Schuiten

*****



Dave Knott

5. For Better or For Worse
4. Doonesbury
3. Penny Arcade
2. Achewood
1. Diesel Sweeties

*****



Dick Hyacinth

5. Dungeon Parade vol. 2
4. Powr Mastrs
3. Town Boy
2. Achewood
1. Marmaduke

*****

Thanks to all that participated!
 
posted 10:10 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 82nd Birthday, Leonard Starr!


 
posted 10:08 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 62nd Birthday, Gary Hallgren!


 
posted 10:06 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 55th Birthday, Jim Valentino!


 
posted 10:04 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 38th Birthday, Andi Watson!


 
posted 10:01 pm PST | Permalink
 

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First Thought of the Day

Every time I see that commercial, I'm frightened I'll never find that one person who I'm compatible with because I'm holding out for that one person with whom I'm compatible.
 
posted 10:00 pm PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In Toronto, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In Denver, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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CR Week In Review



The top comics-related news stories from October 20 to October 26, 2007:

1. Ronald Castree goes to trial.

2. ComicsPro announces a deal changing semi-insane trade practices on certain books coming from Wizard

3. Fires in southern California makes local industry members keep one eye out this week.

Winner Of The Week
Darryl Cunningham

Loser Of The Week
Silver Bullet Comics

Quote Of The Week
"Call me a snob if you will, but I'm not too fond of draft dodging warmongers." -- Peter Bagge

this week's imagery comes from pioneering comic book house Centaur Publications
 
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Happy 77th Birthday, Leo Baxendale!


 
posted 11:00 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 59th Birthday, Bernie Wrightson!


 
posted 10:30 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Five For Friday #97—Nightstand

Five For Friday #97 -- Name the Last Five Comics You Read, Good or Bad, of Any Kind, Shape or Form, from Fifth to First Position



5. The Spirit Vol. 1, Darwyn Cooke
4. Maggots, Brian Chippendale
3. All The Rage, Aaron McGruder
2. Only Skin #2, Sean Ford
1. The Manga Bible, Siku

*****

This Subject is Now Closed

*****
Five For Friday is a reader response feature. To play, send a response while it's still Friday. Play fair. Responses up Sunday morning.
 
posted 1:00 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Friday Distraction: Find-A-Grave



Search using the keyword cartoonist and enjoy the photos.
 
posted 9:00 am PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In Chicago, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In Seattle, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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Your Danish Cartoons Hangover Update

* the Guardian follows up on a story to which Matthias Wivel brought our attention yesterday, some limited political fall-out from a campaign poster that references the 2005 publication of Muhammed caricatures in a Denmark newspaper and the riots, boycotts and political protests that followed in 2006.

* the high profile Danish Muslim candidate Asmaa Abdol-Hamid answered the poster ("Freedom of expression is Danish, censorship is not") with one of her own ("Freedom of expression is Danish, stupidity is not"), and declared that no one feels these cartoons are an issue any longer.

* Erik Melander was nice enough to send in these notes on a mention in a wire story that I mentioned here about Lars Vilks cartoons:

Hello, while the fact that galleries refused to exhibit Lars Vilks drawings of Muhammed as a dog, it is rarely said what kind of galleries they were. Being a swede, that information is readily available through swedish media.

The first gallery was the Tallerud Art appreciation society. Tallerud being the name of the community house of Alster parish (and can be seen on the second picture on this web site. Alster Parish consists of a village surrounded by farmland and is located some kilometers north of the city Karlstad. The only figure I could find of the number of inhabitants in the parish is from 1973 and claims a population of 1404. It was the society that asked Vilks to contribute to an exhibition with the theme dogs in art and to which he sent the ink drawings of Muhammed as a dog.

The second gallery was an exhibit at a small Art college in Bohuslan named Gerleborgsskolan. It has, according to its webpage, 620 students.

The third gallery did not receive a submission from Vilks before the news of the drawings had reached the media (but before the editorial at Narikes Allehanda was published). This "gallery" was the National Museum of Modern Art in Stockholm.

Vilks has been criticized in Sweden for what some say were the calculating way that he submitted the drawings to the first two exhibitions, that were almost certain to reject them, and then use this to build publicity. Especially as he is the author of the book Hur man blir en samtidskonstnar pa tre dagar (translated loosely as "How to become a contemporary artist in three days"), which was written in 2005 and is a book about art and how to market it.

Thank you, Erik.
 
posted 10:18 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Look: Roy Doty Cartoons


 
posted 10:16 pm PST | Permalink
 

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DNA Questions in Ronald Castree Case

Today's articles tracking former comics dealer Ronald Castree's trial for the 1975 murder of the child Lesley Molseed provide a glimpse at a potential defense: not being able to prove that the semen that led to the DNA link to Castree 30-plus years later was spent in the course of a killing. Also, I hadn't seen the photo that's available through the link, nor had I actually read that Castree denied having committed the murder until today's articles -- although that certainly would have been understood given the trial, one supposes.
 
posted 10:14 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Look: Matt Madden’s Sketch Comic


 
posted 10:12 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* Ralph Steadman is among those cartoonists having work auctioned for the benefit of food-related charities.

* free manga is being supplied to some of the families dislocated by Southern California wildfires.

* this image looks like an honest-to-god William Messner-Loebs comic, but I can't get the reader on ComicMix to work this morning. I'm sure they'll send me a "it's working now" or "you're an idiot" note after I've shut down the computer for the day. Anyway, if I had a bigger image to spotlight new work from a significant creator who's been in troubled circumstances for years now, I would make this its own post, but since I don't, I'm putting it over in the hopes that you'll try the link until it works.

* Steven Grant kind of loses me when he declares

"Ultimately there's no publisher in America today predicated on the idea of letting talented creators go their own way, because no publisher has a coherent plan for capitalizing on that, and that goes for both indie and mainstream."

I'd have to see a stronger argument than he makes that companies like Drawn and Quarterly and PictureBox aren't doing exactly that, letting talented creators go their own way. Even if the alt-companies can be portrayed as too rigid in their preferred aesthetics to qualify as allowing creators to go their own way, Fantagraphics has one that at least encompasses Castle Waiting and Barry Windsor-Smith all the way to Kim Deitch and a forthcoming anthology of abstract comics. I guess you could say that still doesn't qualify, but I think the differences are way more important than the similarities. And what about Image? I can't imagine that Steven Grant's anonymous creator with superheroes in their heart couldn't find an amenable avenue towards doing superheroes there. It's all very confusing.

* Jeremy Love does a victory lap after being the first Zudacomics.com instant winner, which means his Bayou gets a contract without having to be voted on by the masses. Apparently, he was one of the cartoonists contacted and encouraged to pitch when DC's webcomics initiative was still in development.

* this sounds pretty cool were it to happen.

* Darryl Cunningham is thrilled, shocked and embarrassed by the donations that have come in to help alleviate a life-crippling situation. He also got gigs out of it. I hope that he continues to get better.

* Alan Gardner notes that Editor & Publisher's Dave Astor has weighed in on the controversy surrounding Schulz and Peanuts. Astor's one of the more astute reporters and editors out there paying attention, so he might bring a perspective into the affair we haven't heard yet.
 
posted 10:10 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 76th Birthday, Larry Lieber!


 
posted 10:08 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Collective Memory: 24HCD 2007

Links to stories, eyewitness accounts and resources concerning 24 Hour Comics Day 2007, held over a few days with October 20th as the anchor date in various locations around the world.

I will slide new links into this post or its archived equivalent available in the links to the right for as long as they're .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). I'd love more actual comics from the event, if you've done one and have it posted somewhere.

*****

Institutional
Web Site
Blog

Blog Entries
(please note that the institutional blog has tons of posts on events as they unfolded)
24HCDB: I'd Rather Not Run It Next Year
aikido al
Artsomofo
Beat Preview
Blog@Newsarama
BT Livermore
Collin Cannaday
Collin Cannaday 02
Dandy Raffe
huah
irish tomboy
kyrallina
masked retriever
Minneapolis 24-Hour Comic Day Blog
Nevik Moore
oilyrags
oscarthemonk
rosalio
Ryan Estrada
sleepymonk
Sweet 7000's Baaadassss Comics
the absurd fellow
The Masked Retriever
the-s-guy
The Secret Life of Mr. Nihil and Mrs. Rat
Toren Atkinson
Tyler Stafford
Vrempire Lair

Message Boards
Comicworld.gr

Miscellaneous
Nat Gertler's Post-Event Press Release

News Stories and Columns
Pikiran Rakyat
Savannah Morning-News: SCAD Students

Art/Photos
Chapel Hill Comics
Jason Turner
laurasmoncur
nickracecar

Video
Belmont High School
Hellas
Hellas 02
Hellas 03
Jim Hanley's Universe
Jim Hanley's Universe 02
Jim Hanley's Universe 03
Malaysia
Night Flight
Portugal
Salvador
Vastagamma
Vastagamma 02
Vermont

Some Results
Chapel Hill Comics Practitioners
Dan Goldman
Jason Turner
Jim Chadwick
Ken Avidor
Kevin Cannon
Maxeem Konrardy
Oliver East
Paul Maybury
Ryan Estrada
stereotypist
Tom Humberstone

*****
.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
*****
 
posted 10:06 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 58th Birthday, Glynis Oliver!


 
posted 10:04 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Quick hits
Craft
Breathe In, Breathe Out
RSS Feeds Are Necessary

Exhibits/Events
Comics-Focused Quills Report

History
On Dave Stevens
All Hail Nell Brinkley
Well-Traveled Watterson College Art

Industry
On New Comics Day as Ritual
Hooray! Comics Finally Saved!
Tom Tomorrow on Nate Fisher Incident

Interviews/Profiles
WFIE: Josh Elder
WIBW: Alex Grecian
Newsarama: Steve Mumford
Daily Cross Hatch: John Porcellino
Broken Frontier: Adam Hughes 01
Broken Frontier: Adam Hughes 02
Broken Frontier: Adam Hughes 03

Not Comics
Lio Movie
Boy Stupidity Crisis
That Is One Cute Dog
Why Not Give Comics For Halloween?

Publishing
Grim World May Not Welcome Grim Comics

Reviews
Jog: Foolkiller #1
Dan Rafter: City of Glass
Noah Berlatsky: Black Hole
Eddie Campbell: True Love
Ted Cox: Schulz and Peanuts
Andrew Austin: The Nightly News
 

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CR Review: The Death of the New Gods #1



Creators: Jim Starlin, Matt Banning
Publishing Information: DC Comics, comic book, 40 pages, October 2007, $3.50
Ordering Numbers:

There's a certain pleasure to reading The Death of the New Gods #1 for those of us who grew up as kids during the 1970s when creator Jim Starlin was operating at the height of his commercial and creative powers. The comic eases into its story in assured fashion, with a lot of narrative grind to its pages that the Image Revolution taught most of comics to race past, and Starlin's always been pretty adept at portraying old-school hammy superhero acting with enough of a sophisticated core that any modern ugliness they act upon seems as natural as the pages they stand around speechifying or playing cute. After reading a lot of today's breathless junk, reading this comic is sort of like watching an old hand play a part on a television show where all the younger actors kind of defer to that actor's charm and skill.

Starlin also brings with him a lot of his narrative and artistic peccadilloes. Starlin's speeches always seem to get stuck on a pieces of modern vernacular that jar the readers right out of the story, and I'm not certain how he does this but his scene work feel less like moments taking place amid in a reality teeming with individuals than something acted in a studio, or people playing with toys against the backdrop of a diorama (this was the singular difference from his superhero work to his Metamorphosis Odyssey serial in Epic a quarter century ago; a lot of those felt like worlds and not stage sets and I'm not sure why). The various Star Trek television shows had the same problem, but they rarely strove for epic, galactic consequence based on 18 dudes in a room somewhere. Jack Kirby's characters were so grand and powerful that you had no problem believing they'd fill up a world; here not so much. Also, about once a page, a figure will deliver his line over his shoulder as if he going to receive a $50 bonus for finding the room's surveillance camera. Starlin additionally shares with same-generation artistic star Paul Gulacy a difficulty in keeping track of the length of limbs, which extend about a foot too far in some scenes and in others make a character look suddenly far shorter in a close-up than he was when seen from far away. In fact, I never noticed this before but almost everyone is over-lean and sinewy-muscled: worlds populated by dozens upon dozens of lost Carradine brothers, with Big Barda more of a volleyball player than bodybuilder, and a few tubs of goo and hulk-like widebodies thrown in for variety's sake. It's almost comforting to see these tics, but that doesn't make them any less distracting.

So, the plot: something is killing the Jack Kirby created New Gods, and something is wrong with the universe, and we assume the problems are related. It's my understanding this extends a plot from one of those DC mini-series between the maxi-series, I'm not sure which one or ones. The fact that an action scene is a throw-in of the kind you might get in a filler issue of a superhero book circa 1978 indicates that book's driving force, like many of those recent mini-series, will be a changing status quo through character positioning rather than hammering out something new through a thrilling story. Does that make sense? Having the deaths take place off panel as they do here reinforces this feeling that all of these characters are being forced to deal with editorial edict more than having to suffer the results of a story whose conflicts are played out on the page. Nothing in The Death of the New Gods #1 feels bigger than the title or suggests a world greater than its role in DC world-positioning; in some scenes it feels like the characters are contracted players showing up to play their best-known roles before retreating back to a show on ABC Family. Even a story about gods should have some sense that the ending hasn't already been decided upon, and I don't get any of that feeling here.

In the end, the art here is almost in how one processes comic book maxi-events than in how the story takes over. The plot lines are introduced in this issues with a certain amount of classic superhero seriousness, and there's even a reference to the Forever People's involvement that might pique the interest of those who know their Fourth World comics. Still my gut feeling was to not take the whole affair seriously. The fact that the New Gods at 35 years of age feel like relatively fresh creative turf compared to all of the heroes that have in some form or another punched a Nazi makes me suspect that they won't die because there's still stuff to do with them, even if it's in New New Gods form or Post New Gods form or whatever. On the other side of it, the impression I get that this is merely one of a dozen company mandated status quo shake-ups makes it feel less serious than it should -- they wouldn't really kill off a bunch of Jack Kirby creations in service to the sixth- or seventh-place event of this half-decade, would they? It's an event comic both too big and too small to do what it promises.


 
posted 1:00 pm PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In LA, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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Your Danish Cartoons Hangover Update


 
posted 11:30 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Last Call for Johnny Bacardi Site

If I'm reading this correctly, David Jones, better known as Johnny Bacardi, is calling it a day after five years of comics and music related commentary and reviews. Bacardi's site is one of the last remaining new voice sites that sprung up in 2002-2003 with the explosion of popularity in easy-to-use interfaces for web publishing, a year or two ahead of the assumption of the same kinds of platforms by more established comic industry folks and vehicles. I liked his comics reviews and never linked to them as much as I should have. I hope he finds a future home for his writing about comics and a thirst for returning to that work, because I'm selfish, but mostly I hope he enjoys himself in future endeavors and feels appreciated by the many people who enjoyed reading his work.
 
posted 10:45 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Ronald Castree Goes To Trial

The trial has begun in West Yorkshire's Bradford Crown Court for UK comic book dealer Ronald Castree, indicted in the murder 32 years ago of an 11-year-old girl named Lesley Molseed. The opening statement by the prosecution included the cause of death, the description of a similar incident said to have been instigated by the now 54-year-old against a then nine-year-old, the mother's testimony about her child, some sketching out of supporting facts like where Castree lived at the time of the murder and where his wife was, and an explanation of why the trial is taking place now: a 2005 DNA swab taken on a completely unrelated matter became a one in a billion match. Coverage can be found in most major publications across the pond.

Kenny Penman of Forbidden Planet notes that unlike the Times article, television coverage he's seen has thus far not played up Castree's comics past.

The case gained much of its notoriety because another man named Stefan Kiszko was found guilty for the murder in 1976, and was in jail serving the terms of a life sentence until the early 1990s before DNA evidence freed him. He died just over one year later from a massive heart attack, and his devoted mother died soon after. Speculation about the identity of the real murderer had been rampant until Castree's arrest, and for some that arrest wasn't enough to divert them from other theories.
 
posted 10:20 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 40th Birthday, Taiyo Matsumoto!


 
posted 10:16 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Comics-Stuffed SoCal Still Suffers Fires

It's all about turning tides and homecoming stories on major news sites at 7 AM this morning regarding the week's biggest national story: wildfires near Malibu and especially San Diego. Mark Evanier mentions in passing that he understand someone involved with Comic-Con International lost their home, but none of the blogging professionals in the area seem to have updated yesterday, which when combined with more benevolent contextual news usually ends up being a sign of relief after more intense reasons to update rather than a dire turn. Chris Marshall wrote in to say that IDW's Chris Ryall canceled an interview yesterday because he was going to leave the offices after a short time, although the regional event has "done wonders for freeway driving".
 
posted 10:14 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Look: Josh Cochran’s New(ish) Site


 
posted 10:12 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* the first alt-comic gigantic release of the Fall/Christmas season, Adrian Tomine's Shortcomings, will go to a second printing and was well-represented at Frankfurt with several foreign edition deals. (October 24 post)

* The DC Comics webcomics initiative known as Zudacomics.com has named its initial line-up of features, what looks to be a heady mix of known-but-not-famous and genuinely unknown creators. While the press release boasts that the strips offer a wide array of genres, I'm basically seeing nine fantasy comics (some with cross-genre chaser) and one diary comic which based on the work available by the creator on the web may have fantasy elements. Like most great artistic enterprises in our modern age, the ten strips will be nurtured by immediately becoming subject to a vote upon by Zuda readers, with the winning strip will receive a year-long contract. We wish all the participants good luck, in all phases of their participation.

* that site launches on the 30th.

* Jack Elrod of Mark Trail will receive the Outstanding Forestry Journalism Award from the Society of American Foresters, to be given out during the national convention in Portland, Oregon.

* that's one cool Jaime Hernandez poster for Bob Dylan's radio show.

* it's awesome that NBM is bringing the blog and book version of Lewis Trondheim's Les Petits Riens to English-language audience. It's been on a couple of my best of lists. Still, I have to admit, the language that keeps showing up in announcements that suggests the blog and book are being created from whole cloth rather than being translated from the French-language version kind of bugs the crap out of me. It's so parochial, as if a comics work doesn't exist until we can read it. Translating work and re-presenting it for a new audience is a great achievement all in itself, or I hope it can be seen that way; it shouldn't need finessing.

* I take it from this post on grumbling fans that Marvel is delaying publication on an issue or two of its "One More Day" Spider-Man plot-line, which is expected to have some significance in terms of that character's status quo.

* the saga of one-time Danish Cartoons protest leader Said Jaziri continues.

* I wasn't aware that Lars Vilks's work including Muhammed imagery that led to a death thread was rejected three times by Swedish gallery owners.

* Fantagraphics has published its first prose novel, Laura Warholic, which is worth noting for a ton of what should be obvious reasons.

* not comics: Johnny Ryan is one of four artists providing cover art to the magazine Vice that can be converted to paper Halloween masks. When I worked for The Comics Journal a hundred years ago, I always wanted to do a section of paper masks with various comics figure caricatures, like Bill Willingham's killer Jim Shooter portrait.
 
posted 10:10 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Look: Ant Sang


 
posted 10:08 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Blogger: Crankshaft Strip is “Heinous”



A Wednesday afternoon post at the blog Feministing notes a joke in that day's Crankshaft it terms "pretty fucking heinous." I'm unable to come up with a reading of the joke that doesn't have it hinge on the woman no longer needing to protect herself from assault because she's older and not as good looking anymore, although if someone has one, .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). Unless Crankshaft has an untypical creation path, the above gag has to have been funny to the creators in question and to at least one person at the editorial service bureau that pushed the strip into production, or at least not raised any red flags.

Barely related, but this comment from Shaenon Garrity on Funky Winkerbean made me laugh.
 
posted 10:06 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Not Comics: Money Bin Model



via Gianfranco Goria
 
posted 10:04 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Quick hits
Craft
Go See Tak Toyoshima on Tour
Warren Ellis on Magazine Design

Exhibits/Events
Boston Con Wrap-Up

History
Punch 05
Punch 06
Milton Caniff Set The Standard

Industry
What the Heck?
Decision on Teacher Just
NYT Inordinately Impressed With Webcartoonist

Interviews/Profiles
SBC: Gregg Hurwitz
TalkAboutComics.com: Kevin Moore
ReportOnBusiness.com: Mark Mobius

Not Comics
Jim Borgman Helped Shape Cincinnati

Publishing
MW Previewed

Reviews
Tucker Stone: Various
Don MacPherson: Various
James Lovegrove: Various
Andrew Wickliffe: Superspy
Brian Heater: I Killed Adolf Hitler
This Guy Really Likes Death Note
Andy Shaw: Maggie The Mechanic
Don MacPherson: Ex Machina #31
Chris Mautner: Schulz and Peanuts
Andrew Wickliffe: Daredevil #95-99
Andrew Wickliffe: The Savage Brothers
Andrew Wickliffe: Marvel Movie Premiere #1
Matthew Brady: Shojo Beat (November 2007)
Charles Mudede: Palestine: The Special Edition
Andrew Wickliffe: Batman and the Outsiders #3

 

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CR Review: Maggots



Creator: Brian Chippendale
Publishing Information: PictureBox Inc., softcover, 344 pages, Fall 2007, $21.95
Ordering Numbers: 9780978972260 (ISBN13), 0978972260 (ISBN10)

I'm more than a little in love with my copy of Maggots right now. I've been taking it to the gym and reading it on the machines and I sneak furtive glances at a page or two when I'm stuck at a traffic light. It's a book that's been collected from material that was done in 1996 and 1997 and promised to us through mini-comic snippets or by prospective publishers almost since that time, but I don't think it's merely factor of satisfying that great, simmering sense of anticipation that's been built. I like reading Maggots as much as I do in the way that I have been because it reminds me of my own early- and mid-20s and that's not a state of mind with which I'm comfortable spending more than a few minutes at a time.

Much has been made about the origin of Chippendale's project, the way that Maggots is drawn on top of -- or into, if you prefer -- a Japanese book catalog, elements of which can be seen softly impressing themselves into white space or even incorporated into the narrative at certain points. The critic Jog looks at some of those elements and decides they make Maggots "perhaps the perfect embodiment of a major aspect of the Fort Thunder aesthetic (if you will): using the consumer society's debris as elements of creativity, transforming one lifestyle's garbage into another's art via accumulation or defacement," something he later slightly rephrases in wonderful fashion as "seizing an instrument of capital and making it radiate with personal, spiritual vision by beating the shit out of it with drawings."

I think that's true, and cleverly said, but what's really striking about this complete PictureBox edition is how you can see the effect these elements have on the reading of Maggots. Most people agree that with its looping panel arrangements, chaotic plot-lines and reduction of movement into beats, Maggots can be seen as a book about movement and motion. This printing, however, makes me reconsider its power as a textured work, something that blends a variety of layers and visual clues that work in cohesion and opposition depending on Chippendale's intent. The suggested looped reading, a kind of snakes and ladders movement back and forth down one page that's opened and then snaking back up the opposite, does keep the eye bouncing frenetically. But some of the choices made in terms of inserting entire tiers thwart that easy flow (Chippendale even apologizes for this) while the layered nature of the artwork over other graphic elements provides each page with a resistant force against which the motion works. It's not that the figures move as much as they push through their heavily inked surroundings; it's not just about movement and the energy that builds as it the figure whips from one place to another as much as the teeming energy that keeps the figures active, the sense of pullulative effort that puts things into motion. I don't know about you, but a conception of life as a series of adventures and experiences from which I moved one after the other after the other, covering someone else's tracks with my own, certain I was a part of something shared, encountering elements of violence and sex both implied and real, leading to the occasional epiphany that assaults the senses and impresses forever, that wasn't just an experience that these artists had in Fort Thunder, let alone only something little Hot Potato goes through by himself. That was at its essence a way of moving through the world with which a lot of us were stuck, a way of reducing the world to what's in front of you that I never thought I'd see on the page in quite this way. It has undeniable power.

Finally more than scattered glimpses united by promise, Maggots rewards a full reading or, if you prefer, a series of occasional dip-intos, even if its way of looking at the world remains forever foreign. It's funny on almost every page, the marks are frequently beautiful to the eye (particularly when the action expands to cover one or two pages) and in clever hands it might act as a resource for some storytelling approaches in the way that Master Race provided clues as to how one might depict time visually and compress information. You should buy one, or if you see me, ask to borrow mine.


 
posted 1:00 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Please Think About Maybe Helping Out The Cartoonist Darryl Cunningham



I don't know the cartoonist Darryl Cunningham, and I'm only barely aware of his work. I also don't know anyone close enough to Cunningham to personally vouch for the desperateness of his situation the way that local media played this role with the Tom Artis family. But when someone's down enough on his luck to ask for assistance, I'm inclined to give them a soapbox, and send along a little help myself. I'm afraid it will be a much more common thing over than the next 10-20 years.



Darryl Cunningham is asking for help. Go here to read more and follow the links to a proper pay pal account. Go here to read Cunningham's post on the matter, here to see various images up on his flickr account and here to see his illustration blog. The cartoonist has promised art when he gets back up on his feet, but that's not something I'd feel comfortable taking -- on principle, but also because of how much I'm able to give would probably be swallowed whole by the postage.



Additionally, I just sort of found his art to be appealing. Maybe some of the editors out there could use one of those cityscapes as a one-pager in their anthology or something like that, or might be otherwise interested in contacting Mr. Cunningham. Maybe someone out there could arrange to purchase an original. Whatever you can do, whatever you choose to do, thanks, even if it's just for reading this post.



 
posted 9:00 am PST | Permalink
 

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This Isn’t A Library: New and Notable Releases to the Comics Direct Market



*****

Here are those books that jump out at me from this week's probably mostly accurate list of books shipping from Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc. to comic book and hobby shops across North America.

I might not buy all of the following -- I might not buy any -- but were I in a comic book shop I would likely pick up the following and look them over, potentially resulting in mean words and hurt feelings when my retailer objected.

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JUN073373 DREAM OF THE RAREBIT FIEND THE SATURDAYS SC $19.95
JUN073372 GROWING OLD WITH BC A CELEBRATION OF JOHNNY HART GN $19.95
AUG074292 MUTTS BEST OF MUTTS HC $24.95
I want to see both of these book. The first is part of Checker's ongoing exploration of the strange nooks and crannies of comic strips past, the second looks more or less like an official treatment of the late Johnny Hart's contributions to the form, and the third is more Mutts and I like Mutts. You know what would be cool? It would be a cool if a publisher devoted itself to making small paperbacks of the kind that used to be made from comic strips.

JUL072152 DAREDEVIL #101 $2.99
AUG072268 X-MEN FIRST CLASS VOL 2 #5 $2.99
Two Marvel comic books I might be enticed into picking up, one for the late twenty-something too early forty-something that watches series on FX demographic that Marvel and DC seems to spend a lot of time pursuing, and the other Jeff Parker's super-retro, kid-friendly take on the original X-Men characters. So I have a Werner Roth fixation: sue me.

JUN070218 SPIRIT VOL 1 HC $24.99
AUG072003 CASANOVA #10 (MR) $1.99
AUG072013 GLISTER #2 $5.99
JUL071966 WALKING DEAD #43 (MR) $2.99
JUL073562 USAGI YOJIMBO VOL 3 SC (NEW PTG) $15.95
A big week for narrative-driven character-focused comics of the kind that some people suggest don't exist anymore: a noir proto-superhero, a super-spy, a girl who cleverly finds a way to extract herself from weird circumstances, a zombie-survivor saga and a new edition of an early volume from the great Stan Sakai. Of all of these I think the Darwyn Cooke/J. Bone Spirit material might be just a tiny bit better served by reading it in comics form, but they're all potentially transporting reads in a big, comfy chair on a Saturday afternoon.

JUN073804 BASIL WOLVERTON AGONY AND ECSTASY TP $25.00
I'm only familiar with Basil Wolverton's late-period bible comics and illustration by reputation, so I'm dying to see this.

AUG073296 CROMARTIE HIGH SCHOOL VOL 12 #12 $10.95
My favorite ongoing manga series; it's hard to believe there are going to be 17 volumes of this. Maybe. If things go well. Knock on wood.

AUG074327 DOONESBURY.COM THE SANDBOX SC $16.95
JUL074081 SCHULTZ AND PEANUTS HC $34.95
The two books most likely to receive a -"title" designation in my morning google searches these days; the latter book I would imagine is a must-read for everyone out there. Unless maybe it's a John Banner biography because surely no one in the business of comics at a place like Diamond would misspell the name of one of the greatest cartoonists ever.

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The full list of this week's releases, including some titles with multiple cover variations and a long, impressive list of toys and other stuff that isn't comics, can be found here. Despite this official list there's no guarantee a comic will show up in the stores as promised, or in all of the stores as opposed to just a few. Also, stores choose what they carry and don't carry.

To find your local comic book store, check this list; and for one I can personally recommend because I've shopped there, try this.

The above titles are listed with their Diamond order code in the first field, which may assist you in finding comics at your shop or having them order something for you they don't have in-stock.

If I didn't list your new comic, you're welcome to assume the worst of me, but it's likely I just missed it. I am not a good person.
 
posted 9:00 am PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Read: Status of Mid-Day Case From Media Source, Irfaan Khan’s Web Site

The top half of this article provides a fairly concise rundown on how the Mid-Day case, where four journalists including the cartoonist Irfaan Khan are facing legal turmoil based on articles and cartooning about the actions of a former Indian court justice. The four were allowed by another court to post bail, and the cases should proceed in early 2008. At issue I think is the lingering specter in many countries that officials should not be subject to criticism, even accurate criticism, based on their position, of which this case is a particularly egregious example because at its heart is a former rather than sitting justice. It's also heartening to read about such vociferous support by the journalistic community and others, to the point where simply running the same stories and cartoons in as many papers as possible has been considered.

Irfaan Khan wrote into CR this morning to note that his own web site has been updated to reflect the impending case. There are a lot of cartoons to look over, too, if you have no interest in freedom of speech issues.
 
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Happy 82nd Birthday, Al Feldstein!


 
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SoCal Comics Folk Still Watching Fires

According to the 7 AM PT update on CNN, the number of people asked to leave their homes due to fires in Southern California is four times what it was this time yesterday, with the number moving over one million. Comic Book Resources had a really nice write-up on what businesses and cartoonists in the area are up to, with several affected (the CCI offices are closed for the time being; some IDW employees have been displaced) but no one as yet directly endangered; and I'd direct anyone in that area to keep them updated. I would also suggest blogs from industry or industry-related people in the area like Chris Allen, Mike Sterling (rather far away; but his orange sky pictures are creepy), Scott Dunbier, Mark Evanier (miles away, but extremely well-connected to folks in the region) and Larry Marder.
 
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Happy 54th Birthday, Mindy Newell!


 
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Missed It: Shop Assets Sold at Auction

I was completely and totally unaware of this story blogged and linked out with fury at Blog@Newsarama regarding what looks like the final fate of the Winston-Salem retailer Silver Bullet Comics. The store had physically closed down after an announcement July 30, and had apparently made a brief go of it as an on-line retailer, to the also now apparent dissatisfaction of some of those customers. The end game came with either a seizure or a settlement or some sort of agreement between the store and the state's department of revenue regarding unpaid taxes and either stock or no-longer-needed store material, which was used as the basis of an October 8 auction. I want to dig into this a bit before I comment -- I don't really understand why the site is being updated, for one -- but the first thing that pops into mind is that this was a fairly aggressive retailer in terms of at least its on-line presence and plans to expand, which makes it a bit different than the whinny and sneeze kind of deaths we've become accustomed to seeing with retailers in recent years.
 
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Happy 45th Birthday, Mark Campos!


 
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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* there have been a few stories and blog mentions about the great cartoonist Lat's recent trip to the United States, all of which have been fairly adorable. I'd never heard the story in this one that he was once paid for art in tickets to Shaw Brothers movie. The more newsworthy element is that more European-language editions of his books are in the works.

* it's probably just me, but I never know what to think about feature stories like this one.

* it looks like the writer Peter David will be attending the convention that had told him they didn't have the money to bring him there after using his name in early advertisements. Looks like they found more money, and David heard from enough fans who had bought non-refundable tickets that were looking forward to meeting him that he'll attend. The original communication from the convention to David threw a spotlight over the problems that comics professionals have in dealing with conventions, particularly smaller ones.

* there is no one cooler than Creig Flessel, a cartoonist of a generation far enough in our nation's past that as a child he worked with his father who was a blacksmith, and so I'm glad to see him honored by the Cartoon Art Museum.

* if you haven't been paying attention, Marvel's really ramped up portions of its on-line presence in the last six months, to I believe good result. This ad partnership should provide more opportunities, and is yet another example of how Marvel has pressed its movie and publishing successes into what seem like beneficial partnerships other than past business arrangements many of which seemed second-rate.

* this is barely comics, but a nice story nonetheless; could comics at some point do something targeted to urban school libraries?

* the comics business news and analysis site ICv2.com notes that Tokyopop will early next year raise the prices on its Blu imprint to $12.99 a copy, confirms this is where other companies are with their yaoi titles, and asserts that this reflects their relative scarcity in the marketplace. I would also guess this suggests these book are aimed at people willing to pay the extra money and feel they're still getting good value in doing so. Pricing is a big deal with manga; like the landscaped comic strip successes of the late 1970s, manga has as part of its success portfolio a format/price component in addition to markers regarding content.

* a copy of Amazing Fantasy #15 was sold at auction for $227,000 late last week. According to one of those plastic-sealer companies, the comic book featuring the first appearance of Spider-Man was well-preserved. I have no idea what spending that much money on a comic book means, although it can't be good. I'm mostly relieved that comics has progressed as a medium to read and enjoy to the point where this isn't the #1 news story of the month.
 
posted 10:02 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Quick hits
Exhibits/Events
Photos From ICAF Event

History
Meet Mary Blair
Byrne Sees Lee/Kirby FF Clear #1

Industry
TV Comics
DrMaster Profiled
What Teens Read
Terry Bave Not Dead
What Role Does Diversity Really Have?

Interviews/Profiles
PWCW: Mort Gerberg
Playback: Shon C. Bury
PWCW: Danny Fingeroth
Panels and Pixels: Chris Mautner
Keith Giffen: Various Comics Critics

Publishing
Zuda Launches October 30

Reviews
Jog: New Engineering
Andrew Wheeler: Postcards
Leroy Douresseaux: Nexus #99
Zak Edwards: Ultimate X-Men #87
Leroy Douresseaux: D.Gray-Man Vol. 7
Jeet Heer: Untitled Shuiho Tagawa Comic
Koppy McFad: Green Arrow/Black Canary #1
Chris Allen: Showcase Presents: Batman and the Outsiders Vol. 1
Johanna Draper Carlson: In His Likeness: Meph and the Foxy Lady
 

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CR Review: Sin Titulo



Creator: Cameron Stewart
Publishing Information: Transmission-X, web comic, landscape format, ongoing
Ordering Numbers: Free

There's a lot to admire in what's been seen to date in Cameron Stewart's Transmission-X effort Sin Titulo but if you're like me you won't be able to get over how damn slick it is. If you've been tracking on-line discussion about comics for the last 10 years -- and I'm sorry for that, first and foremost -- you'll probably recall chats whereby people have argued that the future of the industry depends on accessible entertainments recognizable to non-comics fans who enjoy a wide array of genres and approaches in their television watching and book reading. I don't know if that's true, but it was for a very long time an argument with a lot of adherents and I imagine it still is. Well: here's the kind of comic those people have been talking about. An attractively drawn, easy to understand, slightly Lynchian mystery, Sin Titulo is the kind of thing that could be optioned for a film and ably serve as a potential vehicle for just about any level of star and size of production you'd care to name. Young man discovers mysterious elements to his grandfather's death that includes an intriguing woman: that works for just about any actor aged 18-42 you'd care to name. Except for a false element that creeps into one scene regarding an overly blunt depiction of corruption and abuse at the nursing home, Stewart sets an admirable tone.

The downside is that the story thus far feels a bit like eating dinner in your slippers and bathrobe: maybe a bit too comfortable. There's a fine line between communicating motivation by presenting a believable character, revealing a belief system, and then setting that character in motion, and having the fact that we're submerged into this comfortable fictional construct kind of do that for the reader. We may better be able to impress ourselves onto the character for his cipher-like personality, but because the world presented proves comfortable and bland, even with the hints of majorly weird goings-on, one never stops hoping that the character will emerge and direct our interest somehow. We need to root for him, too, and he doesn't feel real enough for that to be worth our time. A lot of what will become valuable or will fail to reach that summit with this project is going to depend on how things develop from here on out. The floor could drop from the whole affair at any time; the story could change on a dime. And yes, that makes it a fun serial reading experience, too. But twenty pages in, I'm beginning to have my doubts this will transcend its accomplished execution to date, and I'm not certain I'd be on it becoming the kind of a longer work that not only demands our attention but rewards it.


 
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Missed It: Ben Schwartz on Cartoonist Biographies of Schulz, Caniff and Kirby

One of the best writers about comics going, Ben Schwartz, had a nice article in the LA Times over the weekend that's kind of half-survey, half-analysis. The best thing about it is that it looks into why these books are being published and provides the best answer through its compelling description of the cartoonists profiled: these are interesting, popular and skilled creators through which we can better understand their artistic contributions and certain generations of Americans.

Speaking of cartoonist biographies, for those of you following the back and forth between Schulz and Peanuts and the Schulz family, this seems to me the best of the recent articles I've read.

* Ben wrote in to apologize for the assertion in his article that Jack Kirby created rather than co-created Captain America
 
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Go, Look: Jim Blanchard Gallery


 
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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* this kind of thing sometimes rubs me the wrong way, but I rather liked the unabashed "hooray for our guy" nature of this cartoonist profile.

* news reports from Garry Trudeau's appearance last night in White River Junction, Vermont on behalf of the Center for Cartoon Studies can be found here, here and here.

* Tom Batiuk's press and publicity tour continues. Man, that site's photographer is tall.

* NBM has put up what I'm guessing will be an American-language version of Lewis Trondheim's Les Petits Riens blog, in anticipation of their publication of work from same. The French-language version has been around for a while now and is one of the best comics out there, period, I think. I wish NBM had more closely mirrored the immaculate look of the French version.

* Chip Kidd, deejay.

* the relationship between government officials and journalists in South Africa recently became a lot uglier; whether this eventually has an impact on the cartoonist Zapiro, who up to now has only been sued by an ex-government official, remains to be seen.

* "This book is a complete honeybee package..." I've already forgotten what that article is about, but I sure hope that someday I make something that can be described as "a completely honeybee package."

* I'd seen this mentioned before, but I can't remember that I'd heard Carol Burnett talk about her desire as a child to become a cartoonist. I'm not sure why it intrigues me, either, except that maybe as a performer she's on the popular edge of a kind of humor that didn't really get over in newspaper strips in the 1950s and 1960s, except arguably through Parker and Hart.
 
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Go, Look: D&Q Store Opening Pix



Brad Mackay took the photos during last Friday's official opening of the Drawn and Quarterly store; his blog post on the event can be found here.
 
posted 10:20 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Another Festival Award For Ali Dilem

An award for a curiously unnamed French caricature festival goes to Algerian Ali Dilem, one of the world's most important cartoonists in terms of the consistent quality of his work and the firm stances he's always taken against government interference into his work. If you're not familiar with Dilem, you might try this interview or this profile. On the positive side, the festival also invited Dilem's editor; on the negative side, there seems to be something about riding a cow through town as part of the prize package.
 
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Johnny Ryan’s Marvel Comics Page


 
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Not Comics: SoCal Fires and Comics Folk

As most of you are no doubt aware, a series of wildfires in southern California has had a troubling effect on thousands of people in that part of the country, burning homes and forcing evacuations. Here's a CNN.com index from 8 AM PT this morning. Not only does this directly effect a ton of folks, a lot of people not in Southern California can usually find a tangential relationship to such a story. For instance, one of my fraternity brothers from 20 years ago and his family were in a forced evacuation area, and a bunch of people from that portion of my life are shooting e-mails around this morning keeping apprised of their status, albeit in between missives making fun of the guys living in recently-proclaimed ugliest city Philadelphia. You know how it is.

Anyhow, three comics-related folk that I can think of that have broached the subject in their blogs you might want to track if you're interested in comics as some sort of odd entry point into the affair are Larry Marder, Scott Dunbier and Chris Allen.
 
posted 10:14 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Look: SPX 2007 Fumetti



I think we all know deep in our hearts that the fumetti is by far the natural form for convention reports; accept no substitutes
 
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What We Talk About When We Talk About Superheroes and the Sales Charts

The writer and sometimes comics critic Tim O'Neil has a fun review of recent Marvel comics up, which includes some notions about the general shape of sales in the comic book Direct Market of hobby shops and comic book stores, which is driven by sales of superhero funnybooks from Marvel and competitor DC Comics.

O'Neil's rough theory is that Marvel is more dynamic within the marketplace than DC is right now, that either more than or in addition to the relative quality of their books, they are perceived as having the more exciting general stories and specific titles right now. I think there's something to that, and I don't want to hold O'Neil to a super-rigorous standard for simply floating an explanation about current market climes. I do it every month when ICv2.com releases their sales figure. However, I was intrigued by this analysis.

"Has anyone noticed that Marvel seems to be going through a rather ruthless process of culling their mid-list? Underperforming peripheral Spider-Man and X-Men titles are being dropped left and right. The X-Men are heading into a big crossover cycle which will, Marvel is hoping, reinvigorate the franchise in much the same was that Avengers: Disassembled and New Avengers invigorated the moribund Avengers books. Potentially more interesting, Marvel is making Amazing Spider-Man their test-case for a new almost-weekly format (thrice monthly), with thanks to DC for that unpaid market research, I'm sure.

What does this market consolidation mean? It means, partly, that Marvel smells blood in the water. The direct market is a zero-sum game, and DC is suffering badly in both actual sales and customer perception. The more dynamic Marvel appears to be, and the more they can turn this perception of dynamism into sales, the smaller DC's piece of the pie becomes."

Now on this stuff, I'm not sure what to think. For one thing, no mainstream comics source that I can find seems to be running analysis of a basic sort like what titles are coming out and are being canceled, so I can't check on O'Neil's assertion. That's weird, isn't it? That no one keeps track of this basic market function with a dedicated "what is being published and canceled" look at things?

However, from a rough look at the charts, it seems like there are plenty of moderate-selling books from Marvel that are currently in the low series numbers. I count 15 with sales between 25,000 and 50,000 and issue number less than #50. Additionally, judging by the lack of comics being published in a certain issue range beyond that (#50-200), it seems like the moderate-selling books have long been volatile. If Marvel is goosing the orientation of their X-Men titles to match the sales of their Avengers titles, that sort of makes sense to me. The former group is outperformed by the latter in terms of top-of-market presence. I don't see a divergent course that indicates a vote against the DM as directly constituted, not yet.

What I'm more interested in is the floated notion that "The direct market is a zero-sum game...". I understand the idea, but is it true? Haven't DM sales gone up since 2002? Aren't more shops opening? Aren't more shops opening aimed at the reader rather than at the collector being added to the overall mix based on the "can't compete with that durn Ebay" kinds of shops we seem to see closing? While there are more comics performing at certain levels at the tops of the charts and mounting evidence that DC and Marvel have a greater interest in sustaining top of charts numbers through things like sales gimmicks and the emphasis of their PR than they are supporting their mid-list with such things, the numbers for the #50 and the #100 have also gone up, haven't they? This probably shouldn't be ignored.

That doesn't mean there aren't criticisms that you can lay on the Direct Market and the kinds of books that sell there. Take your pick! You can point to unethical and outdated industry structures and practices that limit competition and hamper analysis (exclusive perks, non-reportage of sales figures, the persistence of pay for play programs at Diamond), mounting anecdotal evidence that suggests problems with long-term health in terms of genre exhaustion (the drop in non-event sales, the chaotic pattern of sales success for DM-type books away from the beneficial structure provided by the DM) or what seems like a persistent lack of regional coverage, or point out how the market has largely calcified in terms of rigid expectations for certain kinds of sales successes for certain kinds of books (although even you'd have to float an argument that explains performers like the Whedon Buffy series), or point out how the expectation for any sales on some types of books have been bled out of the bottom end of the DM altogether (hello, indy genre titles now serializing on-line), or the perceived ceiling for kid-friendly and humor work that seems much more severe than it was for Bone and Hate a half-generation earlier, or you can argue that DC and Marvel seem more interested in seizing market share than overall growth and react with the former in mind more than the latter (DC shifting Countdown so that it drives attention to the next maxi-series as opposed to the regular-title emphasis of 52; the emphasis given stunt creative teams at both companies even when the result stands against time-honored sales virtues like publishing regularity), and that despite gains that companies may be leaving sales on the table now or down the road and perhaps making more severe any eventual down cycle.

And yet, if just to be fair, this sort of analysis should probably take some of the bottom-line numbers into account, at least every once in a while. Mainstream comics companies and fans have long been hilariously dismissive of numbers outside the Direct Market, a kind of vocational values hangover from the generation that didn't see indy/alt guys as actually working in the comic book industry until they pulled a gig on Green Lantern. That doesn't mean those of us who are cognizant of such successes should be dismissive of where the DM might work just because it better suits our pet Armageddon scenario. There's plenty out there to criticize without having to load our arguments through too-casual assertion.
 
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My Brother Says No One Feels Any Safer



tiny superheroes patrolling North Halsted, from a recent Chicago Tribune
 
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Go, Read: Japan, Ink in Wired

I don't like to quote huge blocks of text as a matter of course, but sometimes the article says it way better than I could. Also, I haven't read it yet:

"Now think back to our American lawyer -- the one lying on the cement floor. After the smelling salts arrived, he no doubt would have picked himself off the ground, thumbed a cease-and-desist letter on his BlackBerry, and phoned in a temporary injunction to close down the joint. Imagine Disney's response if some huge comics convention in St. Louis or Houston were selling exquisitely rendered, easily identifiable comic book versions of Mickey Mouse and Goofy falling in love. Picture the legal department at United Feature Syndicate hearing about someone selling $6 books that show a buxom teenage Sally and a husky teenage Linus canoodling on a beach. The violations at Super Comic City were so brazen and the scale so huge -- by day's end, some 300,000 books sold in cash transactions totaling more than $1 million -- that just about any US media company would have launched a full-metal lawsuit to shut the market for good.

Go here for Daniel H. Pink's article that will likely have people talking, at least for a few days.

Gene Kannenberg points out that anyone talking manga in Wired will have way more talking points than Pink's article. For the full suite of subjects and links to them, go to Kannenberg's launching-point post.
 
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Happy 44th Birthday, Eric Shanower!


 
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Quick hits
Marie Severin Update
Much-Liked Industry Veteran Into Rehabilitation Center

Craft
Derik A Badman on Color

Exhibits/Events
Comics Shine at Frankfurt
Preview of American Masters on Schulz

History
Graphic Novels As Relevant Illustration

Industry
New Fans Are A Myth
This Headline Kills Me
Iranians Always Win Festivals
Demeaning Awards Celebrate Comics
Canadian Retailers Ignore Archaic Price Suggestions

Interviews/Profiles
CBR: Eric Thornton
Xaviar Xerexes: Spike
Philly.com: Al Wiesner
The Oregonian: Bruce Campbell, Mike Richardson
Boston.com: Randall Munroe and His 350K Daily Hits

Not Comics
Seeking Spidey In NYC
Review of Will Eisner Movie

Publishing
Weekly Crisis Is New To Me
Studio Tavicat Re-Launches Web Site
Jenny Everywhere: Open Source Character

Reviews
Paul O'Brien: Various
RC Harvey: Army@Love
Chris Mautner: SPX Haul
Don MacPherson: Brawl #1
Mark Athitakis: Shortcomings
Paul O'Brien: New Excalibur #24
Paul O'Brien: Suburban Glamour #1
M. Thomas Inge: Schulz and Peanuts
Chris Allen: Avengers-Defenders War
Graeme McMillan: The Brave and the Bold #7
Leroy Douresseaux: The Complete Peanuts Vol. 8
 

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CR Review: Powr Mastrs Vol. 1



Creator: Chris Forgues
Publishing Information: PictureBox Inc., soft cover, 120 pages, October 2007, $18
Ordering Numbers: 9780978972288 (ISBN13), 0978972287 (ISBN10)

The first 120 pages that make up the first volume in the unknown-number-of-volumes series by Chris Forgues (CF) called Powr Mastrs do what all sprawling story-driven comics do: ease us into the narrative, introduce a bunch of characters, and most importantly give us an idea of how those characters function in the world in which they're placed. Whereas many fantasies communicate freedom at first touch, a child's notion of being able to arrange life and career and family in a way that suits your granted-by-God, reinforced by prophecy ability to select a course of self-determination that is muddied by none of those hindrances, the Known New China depicted here seems dominated by vaguely dissatisfying rules and rigid expectations in terms of give-and-take within relationships. People snipe at each other, they may not give as good as they get, they may find themselves dressed down when someone reminds them of this imbalance, some of the characters are outright broken. Even a forthcoming celebration called transmutation night functions in the story as basically an indication that its pleasures are not to replicated until then. I loved it; my heart immediately went out to all of the characters a bit broken and out of step; theses are feelings that the English schoolmaster type of fantasy never manages to stir.

I've read this book only once since receiving it, and want to read it at least one or two more times through. I'd be lying to you if I said I thought this a totally accessible comic book story, although I can see where people might decide that for themselves. For me, there's something about the consistency of the visual presentation that discombobulated me. I'm guessing that this is scanned pencil work, slightly altered, although I could see one or both of those things not being true. Some pictures are hazier than others, less detailed or even less sharply realized. It's unsettling, and while it throws the reader's attention more deeply into some scenes that might have been pushed past simply because the drawing is so sharp and lovely, at times I had a hard time making sure I paid close attention to certain scenes for the lack of refinement in some art. It could be that CF is subverting the effect of a kind of baroque presentation that such work routinely provides, what can become a crutch to the imagination for its limited palette, or it could be psychological reinforcement for the shifts in powers that came as each relationship become delineated. Or it could just be an uneven approach to art. I'm not certain, but the possibility speaks well that there is a world here worth discovering, and that there's more than a first impression to be had.

As for now, you can enjoy that initial meeting: Forgue's costume designs, for one, or the humor that drives several scenes, or even the way characters charm or work in non-primary emotional colors. (There's a chapter called "Pico's Cabinet" that consists of little more than a conversation between a character and the book's readers, that proves utterly disarming). I'm not certain how many people will be able to find an immersion experience waiting for them as the story continues, or that for most people this won't qualify under charming and even stiff rather than affecting and moving art. I don't even know that you can yet tell this is a story of quality and worth waiting for. Still, Power Mastrs's first volume creeps close enough to the sensation of fantasies from moments of half-remembered sleep, a kind of pageant with madness as its backdrop, that I can hardly wait for the next one.


 
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If I Were In Vermont, I’d Go To This


 
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ComicsPro Reaches Accord With Wizard

The direct market retailer organization ComicsPro issued a release over the weekend trumpeting its accord with Wizard Entertainment about a couple of that company's magazines. You can read the whole thing here, and I encourage you to do so.

What I find worth noting about it is that 1) sounds good, 2) by making it a point of emphasis, ComicsPro seems to want the notion out there that it works on behalf of all retailers and not just members of the advocacy group, and 3) that retailers are still living in a world with the high-level goofiness described in the issue involved. If I'm getting it right, Wizard was until this agreement allowed to ship some of its material based on one or two related factors as opposed to actual orders, which sounds positively insane. This is like finding out there's a longstanding rule whereby owners of Diamond exclusive companies are allowed to punch retailers in the stomach whenever they feel like it.
 
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Go, Read: Gary Tyrrell on Jeff Rowland’s Use of John White’s Owl Imagery

Gary Tyrrell takes a walk through a new, baby-steps cease-and-desist action apparently taken by the photographer John White against the cartoonist Jeff Rowland concerning Rowland's use of a popular, widely-disseminated image of White's on a piece of merchandise. Tyrrell makes all the smart disclaimers, for one thing, on things like timing and easement, and I think his general perspective on the issue comes pretty close to matching my own. For one, I think we would find common ground in his notion that the transformation the imagery undergoes is probably a key factor here, or at least should be.

I might break with Tyrrell a bit in that I believe there's some room to explore the notion of differences between expression through a product and expression through what we more commonly see as a work of art. If Jeff Rowland used the image in a story, I can't imagine anyone thinking that the use of the imagery were endorsed (just as its re-publication here wouldn't suggest I have a contract with White, I don't think). However, used on a product, I can see how someone might think this constitutes an implicit endorsement. Mostly, though, this is one of those nest of hornets, and I find it unfortunate when people in comments sections or on related sites suggest these kinds of stories are simple and can be summed up through a strident, summary declaration of values.
 
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Go, Read: Peter Bagge in LA Times


 
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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* it's a not-comics story to note that the movie version of 30 Days of Night won its opening weekend box-office wise; it becomes much, much more of a comics story when we recall that moving material from comics to screen plays a big role in how the comic book publisher IDW presents itself to the world and to the industry, and how freelancers approach that company and those few others that may be able to offer the same opportunity to their creators.

* add one more thing to the list of things I need to see before I die.

* Greg Topalian receives a promotion at Reed Exhibition but will still work on the New York Comic-Con and the brand-spanking new New York Anime Fest. Apparently, Lance Fensterman will be brought over from the BEA crew to do some work on NYCC.

* we should all go back and add a line to our obituaries for James Babcock, the longtime Sacramento Bee sports cartoonist that died over the summer: he was a primary inspiration for Thomas Kinkade. Whether that line has the word "evil, unfortunate outcome" in it is up to you.

* the publicity for a cartoonist exhibit can sometimes give you fresh insight on their legacy, because it's basically someone invested in that cartoonist presenting to the public the reason they're important enough to go see. In William Steig's case, it's fascinating to see this article focus on a sometimes little-appreciated aspect of his career: the fact that he was the first self-directed creator to work in that very important and influential corner of cartooning.

* this reads like a fairly standard "here's how the comics page has changed" announcement, with the potential sole difference that until this piece I can't remember a newspaper coming right out and saying they're likely to dump a strip that goes from creator-controlled to legacy strip.

* with the specter of prosecution no longer haunting him, Nate Fisher makes a long post at Heidi MacDonald's blog, The Beat.

* comics pundit and critic Chris Mautner expresses frustration with the amorphous, definitely-not-ever-in-detail thrust of recent comics-related dialog; Eddie Campbell seems more genuinely baffled than directly antagonized, at least for today, over why so much time is wasted on certain points; if I'm understanding Dirk Deppey correctly, he believes that the way Newsarama framed a discussion of a recent superhero comic female hero beat down by Brian Bendis in an interview with Bendis is more revealing than anything said about the defensibility of that scene. Do a find on "your tongue" to get to the story.
 
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Go, Look: Kevin Cannon’s Sloths



I always seem to enjoy cartoonist Kevin Cannon's 24-Hour comics. He was nice enough to personally send me a heads-up about his contribution to the event this year. "Tom, I hope you LO-O-O-O-O-OVE sloths, because my 24-hour comic this year is decidedly sloth-centric!"
 
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Your Danish Cartoons Hangover Update

* here's a panel report from I believe George Washington University about a panel organized by Marc Singer that included KAL and Mohammed Nor Khalid. I like the quote from Kallaugher about how imagery is a challenge to the vanity of the person depicted.

* this article is about the author's take on German reluctance to confront Iran on nuclear issues, but the compelling idea for readers of this blog may be that there were limits to the boycotts that absolved certain countries not based on their support or lack of support for insulting Muhammed, but how deep and full the business connections are between those countries. This is the first article I've seen that suggested something like that, although God knows I looked.

* this may only be fascinating to me, but one outcome of the Danish Cartoons Controversy was that it caused business leaders in certain Muslim-dominated countries to note industries in which they were dependent on the West and decide to foster homegrown versions of those industries. One such: insulin production.
 
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Missed It: Mitch O’Connell: Tattoos



This came out about a half year ago, and is comics only in the "shapes the way some folks think about cartoon imagery" sense, but I always liked Mitch O'Connell's work, and it's nice to see there's a book to buy. Thanks to Eric Reynolds.
 
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CR Commentary: Do Cartoonists Have Too Much Power?

This piece by a writer named Iain McWhirter in the Sunday Herald asks one of those questions which if you're like me might make you spend the time you're reading it thinking it's totally ridiculous and also wondering if it might not be absolute truth. Looking at the party resignation of Liberal Democrat Menzies Campbell, McWhirter suggests that despite the obvious free speech imperative that must allow them to do so, cartoonists have way too much power when it comes to setting the terms of broad political debate. This is because they can craft the kind of basic public image that defines a politician from the beginning of their career all the way through to its end. McWhirter further suggests that this phenomenon makes it hard for any politician with an obvious eccentricity to have the same chances at a fruitful career.

While I'm not sure the premise holds (the history of various cartoon versions of Tony Blair, for instance, showed a lot of image development that mirrored public opinion more than a take that was certain from the start) and I'm not sure that it's specific to cartooning (US politicians gain positive qualities in defeat they simply aren't allowed to have while running for high office, a parsimony that cuts across media) I have a lot of sympathy for the position. My gut says this is because how political culture has changed around the cartoonists rather than something new that cartoonists do. There's a court jester element to political cartooning that used to serve as a counter-measure to more serious inquiry and discourse and measure-taking, a kind of reminder that at heart this politician was this kind of clown, and so on. I'm not sure you can say there's anything out there in significant fashion that's halfway serious or measured in the way that makes cartooning's summary statements a counter-idea as opposed to a main idea, the same way that you have to look at something like The Daily Show differently when it's clear that's not where people are getting a different take on the news but where a significant number gets their news.
 
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Go, Look: Panayiotis Terzis


 
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Go, Read: Posy Simmonds Profile

The Telegraph has a very long, genial profile of the cartoonist Posy Simmonds on the eve of publication of her anticipated collection Tamara Drewe. If all the other news stories out there get you down, spend a few minutes in Simmonds' company and you'll likely feel better about the entire medium and everything related to it. One good piece of sort-of news is that she has another longer work planned. Tamara Drewe, which was serialized on-line, is out in Great Britain probably as we speak (official drop date November 1) and will be out sometime in November (official drop date November 27) here in the United States.
 
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Go, Look: Ken Dahl


 
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Happy 54th Birthday, Steven Grant!


 
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Go, Read: Early Spider-Man Debate

Matthias Wivel pulls a short series of posts from a longer series of posts at the Comics Journal message board about the potential contributions of Jack Kirby to early Spider-Man issues. Participants include Blake Bell and Mark Evanier. I enjoyed the back and forth because it was based just as much on looking at the actual pages as it was on rumors and the tortured testimony of the three major creators that came years and years after the fact. The reason I like arguments about the pages involved is that it moves away from the notion of the character -- which is important in a legal sense with the movies and whatnot -- and onto the work, and is therefore a bit more about the real achievement of Marvel during that period: a sustained run of excellent, enjoyable comic books.

Truth be told, I always thought Steve Ditko seemed perfectly rational and clear on this subject, especially if you seize on what he's saying that historically relevant and separate it from the stuff that's more philosophical in nature.
 
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Quick hits
Craft
Sean Phillips Inks
Mike Manley Paints
John Ostrander on Writing

Exhibits/Events
Steranko at Boston Con
Brian Reed Was In Tacoma
Comic Abstraction at MOMA
Peter Cuneo Speech Report
Cartoons Are Forever, Says Lat at ICAF

History
Punch 04
Clarence Friend Reflects

Industry
Updated Romics Winners
This Has to Be the First Year in Review Article
Background on DC Character Coming Out Worries

Interviews/Profiles
CBR: Bill Barnes
Newsarama: Brian Wood
Newsarama: Ty Templeton
New York Times: Gerald Way
Newsarama: Steven T. Seagle
New York Times: Marjane Satrapi
Columbus Dispatch: Donald Dewey
WSJ Has a Video of Roz Chast Up You Can Track Down

Not Comics
Befriending Fantagraphics
Albus [Hearted] Magic Hitler
This Guy Was Charlie Brown
Paul Hornschemeier Band on Tour

Publishing
Midnight Fiction Turns 1
He Will One Day Soon Be Legend
Help Jacob Covey Find Some Artists
R Crumb Taschen Sex Book Previewed
Dixon Replaces Bedard on Batman Book

Reviews
Shaenon Garrity: Aria
Mike Everleth: The Ticking
Frank Santoro: Nexus #99
Richard Krauss: Big Plans #2
Carlo Wolff: Schulz and Peanuts
Richard Krauss: Ka-Whump! #3
Ken Tucker: Schulz and Peanuts
Brigid Alverson: Within the Light
Scott McLemee: Schulz and Peanuts
Arthur Spiegelman: Schulz and Peanuts
Ken Chen: Reading Comics, An Anthology of Graphic Fiction, Cartoons, and True Stories
 

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CR Sunday Interview: Charles Brownstein



*****

I've known Comic Book Legal Defense Fund Executive Director Charles Brownstein for a dozen years now. So when he announced some changes on the Fund's board of directors and I wrote a reaction piece about an aspect of the board's current overall make-up, the resulting back-and-forth pretty quickly became a short interview. I like how it turned out, so I moved it here from its original Friday afternoon berth in the hope that more people will get a a chance to read it. We touch on several different issues in a short time, including the board, the Gordon Lee case, and the Fund's move to New York a couple of years back.

I appreciate Charles doing this, particularly in that he spent the first part of the week coming back from the Small Press Expo (SPX), one of the year's many important fund-raising stops for the organization, and that his time in the days to come is going to be dominated by the trial facing Georgia retailer Gordon Lee. It should go without saying that the CBLDF is a vitally important industry organization for its advocacy on the behalf of free speech issues affecting the comics medium. Please consider visiting their site and please consider donating to their cause.

*****

TOM SPURGEON: I wrote a post on Monday noting that the CBLDF board now includes people with links to what many believe were the not-exactly-CBLDF side on some comics issues with free speech elements. Is the fact that we have people like this serving on the board a sign of how comics has changed or how the Fund has changed? Do you feel it's fair to make note of this?

CHARLES BROWNSTEIN: It's always fair to comment on the governance of a public trust. And I think that the changes to the make up of the CBLDF board in recent years are an indication of both the Fund and the industry changing.

In the Fund's early days, I think it's fair to say that there were more pronounced and heated divisions in the field over matters of content diversity that no longer exist today. On Monday, referring to Chris Powell's Lone Star connection, and to Paul Levitz and Steve Geppi's positions on our board, you said, "But if you had told me in 1991 that 16 years later the CBLDF Board would count 1/3 of its members among people linked in some fashion to such contentious positions, and not on the side you'd think, I would never have believed you." Well, what if in that same hypothetical 1991 exchange you were told that today DC would be publishing American Splendor and the New York Times would be publishing Megan Kelso and Dan Clowes? The sort of material that was edgy and underground 16 years ago is mainstream today. Consequently, people who may have held opinions about those types of comics being problematic 16 years ago now earn a substantial portion of their revenue from those same sorts of comics.

The industry has changed to embrace a much broader diversity of content and audiences, and is reaching those audiences. I think the changes in the Fund's board reflect that. There's a larger vested interest for the business at large in protecting the First Amendment rights of the edgier frontiers of our content.

I also think that 16 years ago the Fund was a very young organization whose work tended to be regarded as controversial. But as the content we defend has become more mainstream, so has the organization's perception. Today I think most members of the field recognize that it's not just philosophically important to protect the First Amendment rights of the medium, it's also a necessity for doing business. I think that the inclusion of the captains of our industry on our board reflects the Fund's importance to this industry, and a maturation of the organization from being an earnest grassroots task force to being a serious, long-running institution.

SPURGEON: Can you talk about the new board members and what they bring to the CBLDF?

BROWNSTEIN: Well, Joe Ferrara isn't new to the Board, he joined in 2005, but I'm very pleased at his appointment to the role of Vice President.

SPURGEON: Sorry; of course he has been. What does Joe bring to that position?

BROWNSTEIN: Joe is one of the most experienced retailers in the country. His store, Atlantis Fantasyworld, is a Northern California institution, with over 30 years in business. His passion for the industry and its continued growth is evidenced by his work administrating the Will Eisner Spirit of Comics Retailing award, and in the countless hours he's spent sharing his knowledge at formal and informal industry functions. It's his presence on the board that brought us to create a membership program exclusively for retailers, and to establish our information publication The Best Defense: The CBLDF Retailer Resource Guide. I think he is a strong representative for sole-proprietor retailers and an asset to the Fund.

Likewise, I'm very excited to be working with Chris Powell, who has proved himself to be one of the smartest and most charismatic advocates for doing better business in the Direct Market. As President Pro Tem of ComicsPro, he's proved himself as a great organizational mind who can mobilize and motivate the retail community to put aside their differences and work towards common goals. I think he will be able to help us improve our communications to the retail community and motivate that community to become more involved in the Fund.

SPURGEON: What are a board member's responsibilities? Do they all vote on dispersal of funds and what cases the organization supports? Are they expected to contribute in other ways, say by fund-raising, in the manner of a board for an arts organization? How much of what you do and what Chris does is working with these board members to best make use of their skills?

BROWNSTEIN: The Board of Directors governs the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund. They vote on all cases the Fund supports -- both the ones that require direct monetary support, such as the Gordon Lee case, and the advocacy cases we sign onto under the umbrella of our Media Coalition membership.

The Board also supervises the management of the CBLDF. They work with the office to set the strategic agenda of the organization, and contribute time and expertise to our fund-raising and education programs. To that end, a good deal of what the office does involves interfacing with individual board members and board committees to execute the work that emerges from the very good ideas that they bring to the table.



SPURGEON: Can you talk a bit about what you like about the current make up of the Fund's board? I know we've spoken before in terms of balance in terms of industry representation, and also of the range of skills you have on hand.

BROWNSTEIN: The Fund has always strived to have a Board of Directors that reflects the makeup of the business at large, and I think the current Board accomplishes that goal very well. I think more than any other board in the organization's history, this one does a great job of representing the full scope of the industry's many facets. The interests of both the large and small publisher communities are well represented by Paul Levitz and Fund President Chris Staros, respectively. Joe Ferrara represents the perspective of sole proprietor retailers, while Chris Powell represents the perspective of a chain. Neil Gaiman and Peter David represent a wide range of creator concerns. Steve Geppi brings the perspective of the industry's most substantial distributor as well as an understanding of the workings of the political process that informs so many of our cases. Treasurer Milton Griepp brings a wealth of experience and an understanding of a broad range of business issues to the Board, and a knowledgeable, detail-oriented financial expertise to the position. Levitz, Geppi, and Griepp are also very active corporate citizens, and bring that perspective to the work that we do. Secretary Louise Nemschoff brings knowledge of intellectual property issues to the Board, and as an IP lawyer, does a lot of work to help artists who come to us seeking legal referrals and advice.

I also like that our board carries a wide range of geographical perspectives. Staros is in the South, Ferrara Northern California, Griepp and Gaiman the Midwest, Nemschoff L.A., David and Levitz New York, Geppi Baltimore, and Powell Texas. Each of them carry the pulse of their regions into the Fund and help us decide upon our work with an understanding of a wide range of local issues, rather than operating from within a Blue State bubble mentality, which I think is a strength.

Overall, I think the current board does a good job covering the range of stations that the CBLDF represents as the industry's longest running non-profit organization, and helps us achieve the goal of performing our work under a big umbrella that covers a full range of the American comics industry.

SPURGEON: I understand what you're saying, but let me play small press Devil's Advocate. For instance, what is it about Peter David and Neil Gaiman, two writers who have done the bulk of their work for big publishing companies during the course of their careers, that allows them insight into what a Gilbert Hernandez does or, say, what a Mike Diana does, people who have done a lot more work for smaller publishers or for themselves? Should anyone be concerned that 90 percent of your cases arise from a portion of comics whose sole representative on the Board is Chris Staros?

BROWNSTEIN: I don't think it's the case that 90 percent of our case load comes from the part of comics that you say is solely represented by Chris Staros.

The current case in Georgia involves content from a book published by St. Martins Press, which, economically speaking, is a lot closer to DC Vertigo than it is to Top Shelf. And speaking from a content level, well, there's not much difference between the subject matters of graphic novels published by DC Vertigo, St. Martins, or Top Shelf. They all cater to similar audiences.

Demon Beast Invasion, the comic at issue in the Jesus Castillo case, was published by CPM, which, at the time, was a large-ish manga/anime house that was closer to DC's CMX than it was to Top Shelf. The material at issue in the Mike Diana case was mini-comics, so for all practical business purposes, it had little in common with any of the publishers on our board. But I can't imagine any right thinking person not seeing the precedent dangers posed a case of that nature, were it to happen again today.

The material at issue in Planet Comics was pretty clear-cut adult horror, the likes of which no one on our Board publishes, but which I think everyone on the Board would agree retailers have a right to responsibly sell.

It's true that Staros has the most "street cred" as regards art comics, but I think the business and constitutional issues are such that they affect everyone on the board in a way that is pretty clearly understood.

As to what allows Peter David and Neil Gaiman insight into what a Gilbert Hernandez or a Mike Diana do, it's the fact that they're all professional authors who depend on the First Amendment to make a living. Peter and Neil have worked for a variety of publishers large and small, as has Gilbert, and to a lesser degree, Mike. While their subject matter may be in some respects more commercial than the authors you mention, I don't think that their understandings of and sympathies towards the professional and constitutional issues the Fund manages are any more or less valid than the authors you cite.

SPURGEON: Has adding retailers been important to you? Because to be honest, the retailer support in the Gordon Lee case seems to have been pretty weak. What can you and your retailer Board members do to better win over retailer support and confidence?

BROWNSTEIN: I agree that the initial reaction to the Gordon Lee case was less than sympathetic from the retailer community. Although now, as the case has developed, I think most people see that the case carries severe precedent dangers, and that the prosecution has deliberately run up charges in a way that would sink any small retailer, demonstrating, in part, why the Fund matters.

I think that the Fund needs to do a better job interacting with the retailer community and demonstrating how the work we do, we do on their behalf. We've taken steps to start that, notably publishing our Retailer Resource Guide. But it's something we need to expand, and these are issues that Joe and Chris have already begun working on. With their expertise going into the matter, we anticipate rolling out some new programs in this area early next year.

SPURGEON: Can you give me an example of this coming around by retailers in the Gordon Lee case? Can you provide the name of a retailer whose come over to your side, or cite an instance of support that backs your notion that general support has increased?

BROWNSTEIN: I'm not going to single anyone who switched sides out by name, no. But I have seen the overall level of message board invective against Gordon that was present at the case's start, and which you responded to in the "Why We Must Support Gordon Lee" essay, radically decline. Once retailers understood the details of the case, and how easily something like that could happen to them, they started to support the case in increasing numbers. For instance, I've seen grass roots support for the case increase, such as an unsolicited drive to spur donations for the case on the CBIA started by David Wheeler of Dragon's Lair Comics in Texas and spurred on by retailers around the last time the case was on the docket for trial. Likewise, our retailer membership ranks continue to grow, which I think reflects an overall approval for our work in general, and on this case in particular.

SPURGEON: As retailers diversify, does your decision not to financially support Fantagraphics in their dispute with Harlan Ellison preclude your support of a retailer under fire for an item not actually comics?

BROWNSTEIN: We haven't faced that situation, but, yes, I expect that is correct. The Fund has never paid for case[s] without relation to defending works within the comics medium, and I don't expect that to change.

SPURGEON: Do you have a relationship to the manga companies and manga-interested businesses like the bookstores?

BROWNSTEIN: That's something we're working on growing going into 2007.

SPURGEON: I think what may worry some folks is that at least on the surface the board's make-up might lack the kind of fevered free speech advocates it may have boasted in the past. Let me put it to you like this -- when the board discusses things, are there members that tend more towards free speech absolutism than others? Who has free speech's back, Charles? Is there any worry that the board might become too conservative?

BROWNSTEIN: I'm not worried about the Board becoming too conservative, because I don't think we've ever been too liberal. Defending the First Amendment isn't the province of a liberal ideology, it's the province of a patriotic one.

Although we regard them as allies, we're not the ACLU. We operate within a very narrow mandate to defend the First Amendment rights of work within the comics medium, and we do it because the industry depends upon those rights to do business. Naturally, the politics of some Board Members may be more left leaning and others more right leaning, but each member has a commitment to the First Amendment and a belief that Free Speech is the lifeblood of our business and our society. When it comes to deciding about taking a case, personal politics are put aside in favor of doing what is right for the First Amendment within the comics medium. I think our case history bears that out.

SPURGEON: I'm not sure I follow... Are you saying that there hasn't been a more conservative ideology at work in many of the cases the Fund has faced throughout its history? No one should be worried by the political make-up of the Board no matter what that political make-up might be? When an issue faces the board are the people that vote against an issue less patriotic than those who vote for it?

BROWNSTEIN: I'm saying that the Fund isn't conservative or liberal, and that defending the First Amendment isn't something that either side can claim exclusively as their own. If one must assign a political value to defending the First Amendment, I think the only one that's valid is patriotism -- specifically by upholding the spirit and practical applications of that law to provide for robust civic and intellectual discourse.

Sure, much of the Fund's casework has emerged in more socially conservative communities, but social conservatives aren't the only people engaged in instigating censorship. One needn't look much further than the calls for content restrictive legislation directed at the video game industry spurred on by the likes of Joe Lieberman and Hillary Clinton to see that the urge to censor is just as healthy on the left as it is on the right. There are advocates and opponents of the First Amendment on both sides of the political divide, and neither side can claim the First Amendment as their own.

The CBLDF works to achieve its narrow mandate of providing legal counsel, advocacy and education pursuant to protecting the First Amendment rights of the comics medium. Doing that work isn't about whether you wear an elephant or a donkey pin on your lapel. It's about valuing the First Amendment and recognizing its central importance to the continued health and vitality of our profession. It's about assuming the responsibility of protecting the First Amendment rights of the comics medium by looking at the big picture and doing what's best to ensure those freedoms stay intact for this and future generations. That is something that each member of this and the previous Boards I've served under have done in the time that I've been privileged to work at the CBLDF.




SPURGEON: Just to take things into a more informational area -- what's the status of cases currently under CBLDF purview?

BROWNSTEIN: We await a firm court date in the Gordon Lee case. It will either be on the docket for November 5 or November 12, and we should know in a matter of days.

On the advocacy front, our challenge to Utah's unconstitutional Internet law is still in the pre-trial stage. This is a challenge to House Bill 260, passed by the Utah legislature, that: 1) Apparently expands existing Utah law with respect to distribution to minors of harmful to minors material and pornographic material to include Internet content and Internet service providers ("ISPs"). 2) Requires the Attorney General to create a public registry of websites that he has unilaterally declared to include constitutionally-protected harmful to minors material, without any judicial review. 3) Requires ISPs either to block access to websites included in the registry and other constitutionally-protected content or to provide filtering software to users. 4) Requires Utah-connected content providers to self-evaluate and label the content of their speech, at the risk of criminal punishment.

The complaint was filed on June 9th 2005. We join The King's English, Inc.; Sam Weller's Zion Bookstore; Nathan Florence; W. Andrew McCullough; Computer Solutions International, Inc.; Mountain Wireless Utah, LLC; the Sexual Health Network, Inc., Utah Progressive Network Education Fund, Inc.; the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression; the American Civil Liberties Union of Utah; the Association of American Publishers; the Freedom to Read Foundation; and the Publishers Marketing Association in the suit.

We also just signed onto an amicus brief in the case of USA v. Williams, which goes before the U.S. Supreme Court this term. This brief supports the 11th Circuit's finding that the "pandering" provision of the PROTECT Act is unconstitutionally overbroad and vague.

In a nutshell, the "pandering" provision treats any material that "leads the viewer to believe" that material contains child pornography can be prosecuted as actual child pornography. The problem with this is that the pandering doctrine can be expanded so that marketing can be found illegal even if the product is not illegal, but solely because the marketing may suggest to some that the product is illegal. So consider the marketing for a hypothetical collection of underground comics that includes R. Crumb's controversial classic "Joe Blow." The story itself is protected by the First Amendment, but if the book's dust jacket describes the story as "R. Crumb's controversial incest satire," the book can be treated as pandering child pornography. The brief also argues that the law only applies to material with sexual content and therefore this is a restriction based on content.

While the defendant in this case was found guilty of one count of possessing child pornography and one count of pandering, the child pornography conviction is not being appealed. If the perspective advocated in our brief prevails, he will still spend his full prison term, but retailers and manufacturers of content needn't worry that the marketing of a work will have a lower degree of First Amendment protection than the work itself.

There are other advocacy cases currently developing, but that's the docket at the moment. Right now our energies are dedicated to finally going to trial in the Gordon Lee case. I know that Gordon is ready to get on with his life without having this case hanging over him, and we're more than ready to take this case to the jury.



SPURGEON: Charles, we talked a long time ago about what the Fund could be expected to achieve in New York, with the idea that some feel the added cost of being in New York might not be worth any advantages you see from it. Now that you've been there for a long while, can you point to ways the New York office has made it better for what the Board does?

BROWNSTEIN: New York was definitely the right move for the organization.

On a mission level, in the time that we've been here, we've been able to increase our involvement in the Free Speech community through our proximity to the activities of Media Coalition and Free Expression Network here and in Washington, DC.

On a personnel level, it's a lot easier to find and retain good paid and volunteer staff in New York than it was in Northampton, through the virtues of increased general population, a larger number of educational and legal institutions present in the city, and a larger number per capita of comics and Free Speech enthusiasts.

On a local fund-raising level, we've been able to establish an event program by taking advantage of supportive venues and the content community. We're able to interface more frequently and directly with the creative and publisher communities in New York, which has led to increased support, both in terms of financial and in-kind donations. We're able to better interface with the retailer community, and enjoy particularly strong support from Jim Hanley's Universe and Midtown Comics in fulfilling our fund-raising goals.

On a national fund-raising level, everyone comes to New York. So, we're able to have access to a wide range of creators and professionals who come to town and assist us in our fund-raising work, whether its signing premiums that we offer at conventions, or participating in our events. Likewise, going out into the country to do convention and event fund-raising is cheaper to do out of New York's airports than it is out of New England's.

New York is still at the center of the publishing, legal, and business universes. The CBLDF's presence here allows us better access to those spheres in a way that has helped us grow our work, and that will help us continue to grow as we move ahead.

SPURGEON: What was the last good comic you read?

BROWNSTEIN: Lord, Tom, no one ever asks me that question, so I'm gonna have to abuse it.

The very last comic I read was the current draft of the next Beanworld graphic novel, which I got to read after SPX last Monday. It's quite something. If you like Beanworld, I can assure you that [Larry] Marder hasn't lost it in the 15 or so years since he last published. I really wish I could say more, but I don't want to spoil it for anyone. But, it's awesome, and I really enjoyed it.

Other than that, the series I'm following religiously right now is Rick Veitch's Army@Love. I read the collection of the first six issues on the train down to SPX, and enjoyed it even more as a collection than I did in the single issues. Army really reads like a 21st Century update on Dr. Strangelove, except as an acidly funny, cutting satire of the current war and the information consumption that characterizes American culture. That's one I can't wait for between issues, and when I get them, that I can't even wait to get home to read. I've gotten lots of odd looks on the subway for laughing aloud at this comic.

At SPX I was able to pick up a couple of great new things. The first, which is the closest thing to an actual comic book that I picked up, was Kripa Joshi's Miss Moti comics. I really enjoyed Miss Moti and Cotton Candy, which is a terrific blend of charming color illustrations, formally inventive page design, and whimsical storytelling that uses comics to illuminate the inner life of its title character. I also picked up the last good mini-comic I read, which is Matt Wiegle's Ayaje's Wives. I've always really liked Wiegle's art and storytelling, but this one feels like a real cut above for its ability to interpret what feels like an authentic folk tale, but infused with an eeriness and illustrative sophistication that gives it a mark of genuine authorship.

I really wish I had the time and money to follow everything that's going on creatively in comics right now. The fact that I don't, however, is comforting, because it tells me that there's so much good work out there that the field is creatively quite healthy. When I started working for the Fund, I said that comics, as a medium, displays the purest range of free expression of any medium out there, and I think that's truer now than it was when I started five and a half years ago. It's the fact that comics keeps growing, and doing interesting new things in a way that nothing else does, that keeps me getting on the subway every morning and going into the office. It's a really fantastic field that we have here, and it's better than ever. And that makes it worth fighting for.


*****

* CBLDF logo
* photo of Charles Brownstein by Whit Spurgeon
* photo of birthday boy and still sort of newer-ish board member Paul Levitz by Whit Spurgeon
* cbldf-related art by James Kochalka
* art by Mike Diana
* cbldf-related art by George Perez
* cbldf-related art by Will Eisner
* four panels from The Salon, work at the heart of the Gordon Lee case
* cbldf-related art by Frank Miller
* Gary Erskine cover art to Army@Love #3
* cbldf-related art by Mark Schultz (below)

*****

editor's notes: (1) I know that Gilbert Hernandez is about the world's stupidest example up there. Gilbert's roughly a same-age peer of Peter's and Neil's, is friendly with Neil, and is someone who's worked at a multitude of publishers just like they have. I was casting about for an artist who works with imagery I could see coming under fire, but it would have been nice if I could have thought of someone who worked solely for small publishers, and was maybe younger. Josh Simmons would have been perfect. Also, in case there's any question, I in no way intended that question as anything even resembling a shot at Mssrs. David or Gaiman; I simply wanted to present a point of view where someone who works in a certain kind of comics might look at those writers and not necessarily feel as if they were on the same page. (2) Disclosure: books written by me were at issue in the Harlan Ellison/Fantagraphics dispute referenced.

*****


 
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If I Were I Gatineau, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In NYC, I’d Go To This


 
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Five Link A Go Go

* go, look: Owen Harris has a web site

* go, read: funny Gil Kane story

* go, consider: now that I'm old enough (just) not to trick and treat, I have no rooting interest in this movement about giving kids comics for Halloween

* go, bid: silent art auction for charity

* go, look: Mark Ryden
 
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Fff Results Post #96—Sort Of, Kind Of

Five For Friday #96 Results

On Friday afternoon, participating CR readers were asked to "Name Five Near-Versions of a Character You Like, At Least a Little Bit." Here are the results.

*****



Tom Spurgeon

1. Wonder Tot
2. Bizarro
3. Calvin's Clones
4. Sand Superman
5. Fat Marvel, Tall Marvel, and Hill Marvel

*****



Sean T. Collins

1. Chief Man-of-Bats
2. The Sinestro Corps
3. Pushpaw
4. Zibarro
5. This new red Hulk thing they're doing, simply because a red-colored Hulk is awesome.

*****

Austin Mayor



1. U.S. Agent aka Captain America VI
2. Flexo - the non-evil version of Futurama's Bender
3. Kon-El - He's not Superboy... or is he?!?
4. Overman - Grant Morrison's syphilitic Superman of Earth-17
5. Hex - Jonah Hex of the 21st Century

*****



Tom Bondurant

1. The John Henry Irons Superman
2. The Donna Troy Wonder Woman
3. Owlwoman of Justice Legion A, who in origin is almost Owlman of the Crime Syndicate, and in costume is almost Nite Owl from Watchmen
4. Jill St. John in the Robin costume, from the first episode of the '60s "Batman" TV show
5. Supreme (Alan Moore edition)

Honorable mention to Dr. Kate Pulaski (almost Dr. Leonard McCoy).

*****



Dave Knott

* Beta Ray Bill (Thor)
* G'Nort (Green Lantern)
* Spike (Snoopy)
* Death (Dream from The Sandman)
* Mini-Duke (Duke from Doonesbury)

*****



Jason Michelitch

1. Lil' Hellboy -- I like the Bill Wray grossout-in-hell stories, but Mignola's "Pancakes" is really what I'm thinking of here.
2. Sexually Uninhibited Nudist Tom Strong from The Many Worlds of Tesla Strong.
3. for that matter, the funny-animal fox version of Paul Saveen from the same book.
4. The modified resurrection of The Corinthian in Sandman.
5. The Maestro version of the Hulk from Peter David's run.

*****



Alan David Doane

1. Ben Reilly -- Under all the truly lousy comics the Spider-Man Clone Saga produced was a fascinating nugget of a good idea -- what if the "evil twin" of genre fiction got to stick around and grow into his own character? I still find Dan Jurgens's Sensational Spider-Man to be seven issues of the most readable and fun Spider-Man comics since Gil Kane stopped drawing the title, no small accomplishment given they mostly intersect with crossovers with other Spider-titles. Klaus Janson's crunchy, noirish inking was a huge boon to the title, too. I'm looking forward to seeing how Andrew Goletz and Glenn Greenberg's upcoming Life of Reilly book does, because I know a lot of people still remember Ben with fondness.
2. Beta Ray Thor -- This variant came along at just the right time for me, as I was old enough to appreciate Walter Simonson's vital, energetic cartooning but young enough to wonder if Thor had really been succeeded permanently by an equine-looking alien with a goofy but somehow perfect name.
3. Mike Murdock -- I read the MM saga, such as it was, in '70s Marvel reprints. It was silly but somehow really grabbed my young mind, the idea of Matt Murdock introducing a third secret identity into his very, very complicated relationship with his supporting cast.
4. Supreme -- Alan Moore's run on this Superman variant remains the most interesting and entertaining comment ever made on Siegel and Shuster's creation.
5. John Stewart -- The animated Green Lantern of the Justice League cartoon by Dini, Timm, McDuffie et al is the best iteration of the idea ever seen, and certainly the best-defined. I wish the series had never ended, but I wish that about all the DC animated series from Batman through Teen Titans.

*****



Joe Schwind

* Popeye and his Robot Twin
* Frankenstein and Frankenstein
* Tomahawk and the Man Who Posed as Tomahawk
* Tarzan and the Lion Man\
* Classics Illustrated 6: A Tale of Two Cities -- Sydney Carton and Charles Darnay

*****

Thanks to all that participated!
 
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Happy 52nd Birthday, Geof Darrow!


 
posted 10:04 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 51st Birthday, Paul Levitz!


 
posted 10:02 pm PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In Gatineau, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In Portland, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In Toronto, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In DC, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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CR Week In Review



The top comics-related news stories from October 13 to October 19, 2007:

1. Former teacher Nate Fisher will not be charged by Guilford police for giving one of his students Eightball #22 as a make-up assignment.

2. Decision of lower court to remove Hillary Clinton from lawsuit by former Stan Lee Media major player Peter Paul upheld; Paul still plans to pursue the presidential candidate as a material witness in civil case against former President Bill Clinton.

3. Small Press Expo (SPX) marks transitional year as younger cartoonists begin to dominate.

Winner Of The Week
Drawn and Quarterly, beginning the week with four Ignatz awards and ending it with the official opening of their store front.

Loser Of The Week
Michael George

Quote Of The Week
"I don't know how else to put this -- whatever your preference, there was some grade-A tail on display, in extremely close proximity to social lubricants and hotel rooms, and you crazy kids should be out there ticklin' and slappin' and makin' it happen." -- Sean T. Collins, in his SPX report for this site, causing several people who didn't catch his credit line up on top of his article to think I'd completely lost my mind.

this week's imagery comes from pioneering comic book house Centaur Publications
 
posted 12:00 am PST | Permalink
 

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Five For Friday #96—Sort Of, Kind Of

Five For Friday #96 -- Name Five Near-Versions of a Character You Like, At Least a Little Bit


1. Wonder Tot


2. Bizarro



3. Calvin's Clones


4. Gaard, Cosmic Hockey-Playing Version of Johnny Storm


5. Fat Marvel, Tall Marvel, and Hill Marvel

I think we all know my list could have been 1-5: Wonder Tot

*****

This category is now closed. Thanks to all that participated.

*****
Five For Friday is a reader response feature. To play, send a response while it's still Friday. Play fair. Responses up Sunday morning.
 
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Friday Distraction: Comic World


 
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If I Were In Gatineau, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Brooklyn, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Portland, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In DC, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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Your Danish Cartoons Hangover Update

* Reason has a video interview up featuring editor Flemming Rose.

* editor Flemming Rose talks about a recent public debate with Tariq Ramadan.

* more hackerwar stuff, although it's behind a wall. Essentially, there's a thread of this ongoing story where hackers in the countries at the heart of the story supposedly hack into each other's stuff and mess with the other guy as a form of protest.

* Anders Fogh Rasmussen supports the criticism of religion more now that he ever did.
 
posted 3:45 am PST | Permalink
 

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24 Hour Comics Day Already Underway



The 24 Hour Comics Day that for many will begin tomorrow is already well underway, explains Nat Gertler. Here's the site that explains the whole affair. Here's the blog that services the site that explains the whole affair.

I plan on celebrating in the usual fashion: taking 24 naps between now and Monday, and anticipating the pleasure of reading whatever Kevin Cannon ends up doing.
 
posted 3:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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Not Comics: Office Exhausted, Too?

Someone a lot savvier than I am could probably articulate a direct link between this Slate article about someone trying to figure out what's wrong with the television show The Office and the notion floated here yesterday that certain superhero concepts might be suffering from long-term exhaustion. All I can say is that it sort of seems like a similar outlook is in play.

I'm not a fan of that show, but I watched the last three episodes of the Canadian television series Slings and Arrows last night and thought about how satisfying a package that was at 18 episodes over three seasons, and how any more of them would have been really pushing it.
 
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Happy 60th Birthday, Giorgio Cavazzano!


 
posted 3:12 am PST | Permalink
 

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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* to my memory, Chris Ware doesn't do a lot of comics industry-related publicity, and likely turns down tons of tons of press opportunities in general, which is why word of an Inkstuds interview with Jeet Heer and Chris Ware on Frank King raised an eyebrow.

* Garry Trudeau is offering an original strip for sale in order to support the Center for Cartoon Studies. Doonesbury originals are pretty darn rare, as I recall.

* on any day, at any hour, you can jump on the Internet and find someone prescribing vast, wide-ranging solutions for all that ails the funnybook world. Brian Hibbs brings an always welcome retailer's perspective to more specific problems, although some of the pontificating might remind you of those "What this industry needs" message board jeremiads. In this latest installment, Hibbs wants you to believe that Vertigo periodicals don't sell because everyone is waiting for the trade but that the trades don't sell because the lack of a periodical push guts the consumer's passion for the trade -- sort of an industry constructed around an unfortunate magic Monkey's Paw wish. He also fairly pooh poohs the appeal of serials in trade form without noting that's the way US readers consume most manga, although he manages to mention manga when it suits his point about amortizing costs. I do agree with him that publishers crowd their serials through overeager early scheduling of trade collections, although I wonder if we're talking a significant number in terms of those waiting three months but not willing to wait six.

* speaking of which, no one should have to apologize to DC for mis-characterizing their sales figures until DC stops acting like it's 1952 and starts releasing them. Until then: shut up, DC.

* ComicsPro has hired one of its own, Amanda Fisher, to be that retailer group's communications coordinator. Who doesn't like Amanda Fisher?

* even though I'm practically too stupid to breathe when my intelligence is measured in manga-knowledge, I couldn't find anything new in this article that notes a slump in manga sales in Japan and suggests reasons for this, including how the cell phone has both supplanted the manga anthology and served as a huge, emerging market for comics. I suppose it's nice to have a bunch of that information in one place.

* the writer Brian Brendis does an interview with Newsarama about potential misogyny in a scene of the superhero Tigra getting beat around in an issue of his New Avengers. I haven't seen the work, so I can't comment directly. Usually these discussions get stuck on insinuating motive, motives which are almost never present, instead of talking about the effect of certain creative choices given the potent imagery of certain comics. I have no doubt that no one involved in this meant consciously or subconsciously to send a certain message. I guess it's sort of puzzling that it never occurred to anyone that this becomes more potent imagery because it's a woman in her apartment being assaulted. Although as it was one of the company's few noteworthy African-American heroes that topped the obituaries in Civil War and their leading gay superhero character was the one that bought it (temporarily, I think) when Wolverine was open for killing just about anybody out there in a high-profile serial adventure a few years back, one has to guess "What does this look like from the outside?" isn't a question Marvel asks itself all that frequently. Anyway, I would like to think there's room for a criticism over certain creative choices that doesn't have to paint anyone involved, supporting, or just not criticizing loud enough as misogynous scumbags. Maybe the flow of discussion has progressed this way; I haven't been reading.

* here's a friendly little piece on Drawn and Quarterly officially opening their retail space tonight. It looks nice.

* if you see Lynn Johnston's strip on Sunday and think it cuts a bit close to home given the fact that her husband left her, know that she realized the irony of the strip being up for re-publication, too.
 
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Go, Look: Ray Frenden


 
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Collective Memory: SPX 2007

Links to stories, eyewitness accounts and resources concerning the 2007 Small Press Expo, held October 12 and 13 with an October 14 Small Press Summit at the Marriott Bethesda North Hotel & Conference Center in Bethesda, Maryland.

+ = latest round of entries

*****

Institutional
City
Location of Show
Web Site

Blog Entries
A Bundle of Friends
AdHouse Books
Alec Longstreth
Atomic Books

Ben Towle 01
Ben Towle 02
Ben Towle 03
Bramble Vine Comics
Bramble Vine Comics 02
+ Brett Warnock (10-19 Entry)

Comics Alliance

Daily Cross Hatch
+ Dan Nadel
D Morris

Everything Ecstatic

Frank Santoro

Gary Tyrrell

Heroes Online

+ Jeff Smith
Jen Sorensen
Jog
Josh Fruhlinger

Kate Harmon

Liz Baillie

macarthur soup
mardouville
Matt Silady
Matt Wiegle
Mike Dawson

Otis Frampton

+ Patrick Dean

Rachel Nabors
Raina Telgemeier
Richard Marcej
Richard Marcej 02
Richard Marcej 03
+ Rich Watson
+ Robot Martini

Satisfactory Comics
Satisfactory Comics 02
Studio ID
SubmarineSubmarine

theBarnstorming
The Beat
The Three Cent Pup

Message Boards
DC Conspiracy
The Comics Journal
The Comics Journal 02

News Stories and Columns
ComixTalk
ComixTalk on Ignatz Ape
PWCW
Sean T. Collins on the Comics Criticism Panel
Sean T. Collins on the Show Generally
The Beat
The Beat 02

Photos
AdHouse Books
Blog@Newsarama
Bruce Guthrie
Bruce Guthrie 02
ComicsDC
CrowChick
dryponder
Greg McElhatton
heroesonline
Isotope Comics
Larry Marder
Liz Baillie
miscellaneous insanity
natebramble
Parkas4Kids
+ Patrick Dean
plasticintheafterlife
Richard Marcej
+ Robot Martini
+ Roger Langridge
Sarah Glidden
secondperiod
sheldoncomics
sugarfreak
The Beat 01
The Beat 02
Toby Craig

Video
Express Series

*****
.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
*****
 
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OTBP: King-Cat Comics #68



 
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Quick hits
Video
Express: Matt Kindt
Express: Nick Abadzis
Express: James Vining
Express: Jeffrey Brown

Craft
In Praise of Oliphant
Paul Pope Jumps In The Water
Craig Thompson Sits In The Kitchen

Exhibits/Events
Looking Forward to 24HCD
Birmingham Comics Show Report

History
Uncle Sam Iconography History
Muhammed Drawings Another Free Speech Assault
Wonder Woman Non-Panties-As-Outerwear Peariod

Industry
Don't Blame Cartoons
Don't Blame Cartoons 02
Grenuord Wins Romics Prize
The Kids, They Love the Manga
How Is Dead Man Producing Strip?
Chattanooga Will Hire (10-10 Entry)
Katherine Keller on Industry Journalism

Interviews/Profiles
Marvel Blog: Jeff Parker
Comic Dish: Nat Gertler
Newsarama: John Romita Sr.
Sequential Tart: Thom Zahler
Cut Out and Keep: Serena Valentino

Not Comics
Earl And Mooch Go To Races
McGruder Happy Out of Comics
Chris Butcher Loves Aphorisms
Rugby Fans Miss Their Cartoonist
Where the Osborn Hair Came From
Family Trying to Restore Steve Canyon TV Show

Publishing
CNN on Schulz Book
Eddie Campbell on French Editions
Daniel Pink Writes Business Manga
Haney/Stephens/Allred Teen Titans Due
Grant Morrison Working on Seaguy Sequel
Mike Ploog Artist on Aragones/Evanier Spirit
eCourant To Re-Publish Comics From Comics Page

Reviews
Jog: Various
Steve Duin: Talisman
Chris Mautner: Various
Jog: Powr Mastrs Vol. 1
Sarah Morean: Estrus #5
Don MacPherson: Various
William P. Secrist: Fun Home
Cris Skokna: ComicMix Offerings
Abhay Khosla: Cry Yourself to Sleep
Hervé St-Louis: Uncanny X-Men #489
Johanna Draper Carlson: Mangaka America
 

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CR Review: John Howe Fantasy Art Workshop



Creators: John Howe, Terry Gilliam, Alan Lee
Publishing Information: Impact, soft cover, 124 pages, 2007, $24.99
Ordering Numbers: 9781600610103 (ISBN13), 1600610102 (ISBN10)

CR occasionally gets put on a list for review works that aren't in any way, shape or form comics themselves or directly about comics. Many of these books have some sort of general fantasy element that people assume would be of automatic interest to comics fans. This may be the best book I ever received that way. John Howe Fantasy Art Workshop bills itself as a "practical art book" by a fantasy illustrator named John Howe, who I take it is an admired person in that field. He was also one of the conceptual designers that worked on the Peter Jackson Lord of the Rings films. His work seems to be very meat and potatoes fantasy, high-end gigs that are closer to source material for and prominent works within that genre, as opposed to the bulk of one's assignments coming from fifth generation copies of the more vital material or from obscurities. The art in the book comes from places like Tolkien, Beowulf, and Lovecraft, and modern practitioners like George RR Martin, Ursula Leguin and Robin Hobb.

I initially kept Fantasy Art Workshop rather than walking it over to the library figuring that at some point I'd read the text pieces contributed by Alan Lee and Terry Gilliam. Those essays were fine, but in having it around at arm's length I ended up reading much of the rest of the book and liking it enough to keep it. I think Lee put it well in his short piece when he talks about how some of us look at art books the way other folks might look at books of recipes; we may have no intention of ever cooking any of those things, but there's a pleasure to be had spending time with someone who does. So it is with listening to Howe talk about his life's work. At the same time, I don't think this is a great book; I bet there are sharper reproductions to be had, and it lacks the kind of jaw-dropping, heart-stopping insight of the kind that transcends its subject matter. It's more a solid and articulate book, accessible and friendly, wholly pleasant like a long Thanksgiving holiday afternoon spent in the study of a smart person who really enjoys what they do and has the ability to communicate why. The pictures are pretty, most of the art tips stay on character and approach in a manner that benefits those of us just looking at them, and there's some great shelf porn where we get to see Howe's storage facilities and workspace. All in all, a nice package.

For cartoonists I imagine there might be an opportunity to learn how to get more power out of a single image, which is a perfectly respectable thing to emphasize in comics no matter the reputation it may have in some circles as being less essential than pushing the eye from panel to panel and across the page. I would also imagine that Howe's notes on character design and the emphasis on incidental but crucial details like the evocative elements of where someone portrayed is looking might prove to be interesting notions for artists working at a certain skill level. Mostly, I think this book works far better on its own terms than it serves some utilitarian purpose: a glimpse into someone's life whose job it is to work in the world of image-making. If this were published back in 1983 and sat on my high school's library shelves, I would have checked it out at least a half dozen times.


 
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If I Were In Gatineau, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In DC, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In NYC, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In Lawrence, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In SF, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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Police Won’t Act Against Nate Fisher

Authorities in Guilford, Connecticut have concluded their investigation and have decided that no criminal charges are necessary against former teacher Nate Fisher, who resigned his position after parental and administrative negative reaction to his assigning a student Eightball #22 as a make-up assignment. That award-winning comic, which was later re-purposed into a book from Pantheon called Ice Haven, contains partial nudity and bad language. According to this article, a must-read because it contains the first words from Fisher himself about the ordeal, state authorities have also declined to press charges. Apparently, the charges being investigated were "breach of peace" and "impairing the morals of a minor." Fisher remains hopeful that this will not eliminate every possibility that he will teach again.
 
posted 11:00 pm PST | Permalink
 

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CR Commentary: Are Superhero Comics Near-Exhausted?

Although you can create a straight line connecting two dots it may not be fair to extend them horizon to horizon until you get several that lie along the same plane. However, I wanted to draw folks' attention to two places considering the state of the superhero comic right now: Sean Kleefeld's mini-essay on a blogger dropping his superhero comics for a year, and this thread at Mark Millar's on-line home where a lot of devoted fans are taking a look and thinking, "I'm not buying as many of these comics as I used to."

When I read articles like this, it always puts me in the mind of one of several theories about where superhero comics are heading, namely that these kinds of stories, based on characters that are almost all 30 to 60-plus years old, may be suffering less from a lack of super hot and exciting titles and takes at this very moment, but more from a long term bleed and exhaustion of stories regarding these characters that makes energizing them anew more difficult as the years go on.

Without as many kids or adults entering into the market to replace any readers that might bleed off -- or eventually die -- superhero comics have to sustain their audiences for a much longer time. At some point in all the relaunches and re-calibrations and re-packagings it seems logical that you really do start to run out of fresh, original stories to tell. This would also likely be the case for similarly archetypal, popular characters like Sherlock Holmes and Tarzan if they had less of a canon supplemented by a bunch of satellite works, and instead had as their core identity a giant, ongoing and relentless canon of hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of stories. Even Charles Schulz, whose 50-year core artistic effort lies at the heart of an even more widely cast popular experience with multiple entry points, shifted perspectives and emphases within Peanuts and had the luxury of only incremental narrative progression on a day to day, year-to-year basis.

In addition, it seems like many of these companies' characters aren't exactly world-beating icons. Do they really demand and merit such close attention and numerous opportunities to connect with an audience? I don't know, it's just a thought, and something on which to keep an eye. I know that I don't feel any great need to read another Hulk story in my lifetime, and I suspect there's an element of that that might creep into the reading habits of other, more passionate readers.
 
posted 10:50 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Humanoides Associes Reducing ‘08 Line

Ammar Abboud points to a couple of updates on the cash-flow problems suffered by the Humanoides Associes line. They've brought Fabrice Giger back as a consultant, and on Giger's blog it's indicated that the company will reduce their 2008 list by selling book contracts to other publishers, with the consent of the cartoonists.
 
posted 10:40 pm PST | Permalink
 

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ICv2.com: DHC’s Blade of the Immortal #131 Last In Comic Book Format

The comics business and news analysis site ICv2.com has an interview up with Dark Horse Comics' Philip Simon about that company's last traditional comic book formatted manga series publication, Blade of the Immortal #131, and what it means for the company in terms of production and the like to keep the trade series going without these comics books coming first.

All that stuff might be compelling in a wonky way, but it's probably just worth noting that DHC is leaving behind the comic book format for these works. That has to mean something, although deciding actually what it means is a scary proposition given comics' recent tendency to wheeze and make proclamations at the drop of a hat. It's not the end of an era, really. The sales superiority of the trade format became unquestioned years ago, but this does put some notions into my head about at least the conventional wisdoms that used to surround comic book formatted manga translations: that comics fans appreciated the lower point of entry represented by a cheaper, smaller unit for sale, and that there was an audience that might not take to specifics in trade format. It also makes me wonder if this isn't an early granite marker on what may in the next several years become an expansive graveyard for that general, classic mode of presentation.
 
posted 10:35 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* a comics shop in Michigan was apparently robbed by two armed suspects; I can't imagine how much it would suck to be the person behind the counter when that happened.

* Monte Schulz continues to make the family case against Schulz and Peanuts. NPR's coverage of the book is here.

* here's a sort-of follow-up to last year's Kuang Biao story, where a newspaper cartoonist was suspended for drawing President Ju Hintao weeping in sympathetic fashion, something that alarmed a lot of folks because of the benign nature of the drawing: two artists make less than benign art about their country's leadership. And while their studio was closed and they're under guard, they seem happy to note that they haven't been shot.

* one opinion-offerer offers an opinion of Lars Vilks.

* with a second-week surge for two-thirds of barrage #2 (volumes 19-21) in Viz's Naruto push this Fall, and all three books placing well on the USA Today Top 150 bookstore list, I'd say it's going better than the cynical takes on it had suggested it might. The key is how this plays out when the push stops in the new year, but so far, so good.

* this good-sized profile of Albert Uderzo puts album sales for the Asterix series at 325 million.
 
posted 10:30 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 107th Birthday, Boris Efimov!



For comparison's sake, Mr. Efimov was born three years before the late Al Hirschfeld, and the same year as Anne Frank's mom.
 
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A Closer Look at Marie Severin’s Career

As news comes that Marie Severin is in the first steps of recovering from a serious stroke with sense of humor intact, two articles call for a reappraisal of her contributions to comics books: Clifford Meth's reminiscence-driven look through the eyes of her peers, and Sean Kleefeld's analysis. You should read both. Severin's a really interesting figure and I do think the breadth of her career contributions -- the coloring, the design work at late-period resurgent '60s Marvel, and her own too infrequent contributions including the humor comics -- are under-appreciated.
 
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Go, Look: Rina’s Doodle Bug


 
posted 10:08 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Quick hits
Videos
DHC: Eric Powell
Express: James Vining
Express: Nick Abadzis
Express: Jim Ottaviani

Exhibits/Events
Go See Charles Barsotti

Industry
Visiting Un Regard Moderne
Thai Cartoonists Lack Worldwide Icon
Breaking News: Comic Shop Had Money
Why There Isn't Any Journalism In Comics

Interviews/Profiles
Why He Loves Paul Pope
Smith: Ann Marie Fleming
Comic Bloc: Joshua Dysart
IFanboy Podcast: Jim McCann
Arflovers.com/Blog: Jon Anderson
PWCW: Mark Evanier, Sergio Aragones

Publishing
The Gloom Joins Chemistry Set

Reviews
Jog: Punisher MAX #51
Matt Brady: Exit Wounds
Jason Michelitch: Awesome
Mike Everleth: Micrographica
Tim O'Neil: Regards From Serbia
Rob Clough: Best American Comics 2007
Brian Cronin: Skyscrapers of the Midwest #4
 

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CR Review: Thingpart




Creator: Joe Sayers
Publishing Information: Self-published, web comic, strip format
Ordering Information: Site

Thingpart is one of those pure gag strips where instead of following a cast of characters from situation to situation, the general approach and recurring themes act as the attachment stand-in. The most famous recent example on the comics page was Gary Larson's panel The Far Side, whose readers grew used to Larson's targets and the way in which he drew and made use of cows. A prominent example on-line is Nicholas Gurewitch's due to break out even bigger any microsecond Perry Bible Fellowship. I assume Thingpart is compared to PBF: they both use advanced stick figures that look 90 percent Dennis Worden/10 percent Carol Swain, and they seem to find humor in many of the same contrasts and constructions, such as a pointing out the gossamer thin wall between certain social constructs and the outright cruelties of the natural world.

A lengthy comparison between Sayers and Gurewitch would be unfortunate in that it could make Thingpart sound derivative when its virtues aren't borrowed ones. It's worth noting, however, that a great difference between the two features is that Sayers' work is much more visually cool. There are no sudden bursts of color or intrusions of different art styles, and the work within each panel fairly sits there. Figures and backgrounds share a lot of the same line weight, providing much greater resonance to the strips on off-hand office or at-home stupidities that put glitter and glue on the banality of everyday life. It also puts a lot of pressure on Sayers' gags. Taking into account Charles Schulz's statement that he might draw funnier on a day the gag wasn't quite there, it might be harder for a cartoonist working with Sayers' visual iconography to provide a drawing that might divert attention in that way. Since he updates irregularly, this isn't a problem the way it might be for a daily cartoonist who like it or lump it must step up to the plate every day. But it does suggest that this is a strip unlikely to be remember by its fans for visual high moments. It rises or falls with the general look and the specific gag.

Luckily, Sayers' gag work proves to be solid. In fact, most of the gags are what I would call old fashioned, at least in tone and temperature. Many of the gags are silly, cute. They generally lack the heat of jokes told by Ivan Brunetti or Evan Dorkin or Johnny Ryan, the flashes of anger that peek out that we get used to and even depend on seeing. One doesn't get the sense that anything in Thingpart really constitutes a criticism of something, the classic comedian's method of redressing imbalance. Ironically, Sayers seems more comfortable with jokes that rely on people laughing out loud after being exposed to blunt reversals rather than those that make someone's head nod as a greater context is revealed. He's like a boxer with a good jab wearing extremely poofy gloves, or a firework that emphasizes light over force. Maybe the most interesting thing about Thingpart if you read a bunch in a row is that there's little in the way of thematic progression or even noticeable craft development within the strip so far. Except for a shift in the interface, I wasn't able to identify a single visual or verbal touchstone that would allow me to know which strips were done a year ago and which were done last week. That's kind of a rarity when it comes to reading someone working in the strip form over time, and I'm not certain what it means -- that Sayers was a fully-formed voice before starting his strip? The strip isn't posted enough to force improvement? It's hard to know for sure. One can't help but hope for further refinement in all aspects of the strip's making; its promising newcomer vibe will start to grate after a while. Thingpart's a solid performer, and as long as he wants to keep making them, I'll be looking back in. A lot of what you get out of it depends on how much its modest virtues mean to you.

I apologize for stacking the strips to make them readable on this page



 
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This Isn’t A Library: New and Notable Releases to the Comics Direct Market



*****

Here are those books that jump out at me from this week's probably mostly accurate list of books shipping from Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc. to comic book and hobby shops across North America.

I might not buy all of the following -- I might not buy any -- but were I in a comic book shop I would likely pick up the following and look them over, potentially resulting in mean words and hurt feelings when my retailer objected.

*****

AUG070329 ARMY @ LOVE #8 (MR) $2.99
JUL070293 ARMY @ LOVE VOL 1 THE HOT ZONE CLUB TP (MR) $9.99
Rick Veitch has a regular series going, and it's so different from everything else DC publishes you might develop whatever the equivalent to whiplash is for reading comics. Plus, this week you can catch up via trade.

AUG073629 AWESOME INDIE SPINNER RACK ANTHOLOGY VOL 1 TP $14.95
Interesting contributor list; the very definition of a book I'd want to pick up and look over.

AUG073288 SKYSCRAPERS OF THE MIDWEST #4 (MR) $5.00
One of the best alt-comix debut series of this decade comes to an end. If you haven't been reading, it's a look back at growing up in a rural community that uses comics' ability with casual fantasy as a visual inducement that leaves you exposed to its stifling terrors.

JUN070213 SHAZAM MONSTER SOCIETY OF EVIL DELUXE HC $29.99
This is an extremely attractive version of Jeff Smith's series, maybe not really suited to toss to the young reader that might find Smith's treatment enjoyable, but totally appropriate for the upscale collector. For instance, the sleeve is a wrap-around poster, and underneath the sleeve is an attractive cover if you want to make use of the poster. If only all mainstream projects were as smart and classy as this one, there'd be a real backbone of perennials within a few years.

AUG073967 BOOKHUNTER GN (MR) $15.00
I think this is the much praised new Jason Shiga book from Sparkplug. I'm dying to see it.

JUL073958 DRIFTING CLASSROOM VOL 8 TP (MR) $9.99
JUL073961 NAOKI URASAWAS MONSTER VOL 11 TP $9.99
The two best manga series with volumes out this week, unless I'm missing something. Or have crappy taste.

AUG073930 STEVE DITKO READER VOL 3 TP (O/A) $25.00
AUG073929 THE JACK KIRBY READER VOL 2 TP (O/A) $25.00
JUN074028 JACK KIRBY COLLECTOR #49 $9.95
AUG074226 TINTIN & SECRET OF LITERATURE HC $29.95
You can take your history/theory classy, like the Tintin book sounds, or you can take it with the usual face-melting awesomeness as represented by more publications on the comics commentary gifts that keep on giving: Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko.

*****

The full list of this week's releases, including some titles with multiple cover variations and a long, impressive list of toys and other stuff that isn't comics, can be found here. Despite this official list there's no guarantee a comic will show up in the stores as promised, or in all of the stores as opposed to just a few. Also, stores choose what they carry and don't carry.

To find your local comic book store, check this list; and for one I can personally recommend because I've shopped there, try this.

The above titles are listed with their Diamond order code in the first field, which may assist you in finding comics at your shop or having them order something for you they don't have in-stock.

If I didn't list your new comic, you're welcome to assume the worst of me, but it's likely I just missed it. I am not a good person.
 
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If I Were In St. Louis, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In NYC, I’d Go To This


 
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Not Comics: Hillary Clinton’s Removal From SLM-Related Case Upheld

An article in the San Diego Union-Tribune brings word that an appellate court upheld a lower court's decision removing presidential candidate Hillary Clinton as the defendant in a lawsuit brought by former Stan Lee Media principal figure Peter Paul. Paul claims that he financed a now notorious 2000 fundraiser for Clinton in California hosted by Stan Lee because Paul had been promised that then President Bill Clinton would join the board of Stan Lee Media after leaving office. At issue is a discrepancy in the cost of the fundraiser and how that was reported on election records, which I believe was also what was at issue in the David Rosen criminal trial they describe.

Paul told the paper he will consider appealing to California's Supreme Court and that he doesn't care if the current New York senator is the defendant, he just wants Mrs. Clinton to appear as a material witness. Against whom I'm not entirely certain.

As you may recall, this is not the only ongoing legal matter concerning Stan Lee's storied, failed media company.

Related: a profile of Paul that looks like it was filed just before the court's decision.
 
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Inside Garry Trudeau’s New Sandbox

The Washington Post has a long-ish article on Garry Trudeau meeting some of the soldiers who contributed to the military blog he offered up through his Doonesbury strip's on-line presence, the best of which are now available in the book pictured at left. The relationship between Trudeau and the soldiers fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan has been one of the more fascinating cartoonist-related stories over the last few years, in that the cartoonist has remained popular with a lot of fighting men and women despite his generally critical stance against the current administration and some of their decisions regarding putting those men and women into the places they've been put. Trudeau has also confronted the war through his strip, notably in the saga of his quarterback-turned-reservist B.D., who lost a leg during a storyline in 2004 and has since gone through a number of post-injury story lines throwing a spotlight on the experience of injured veterans.
 
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Toronto: A Cock and Boob Story

A display featuring cartoon art standees and crocheted set of boobs and a penis was removed from a York University bookstore after a professor complained to University higher-ups. The display by stef lenk and Shannon Gerard was called Playing Doctor and engaged the subjects of breast and testicular cancer and self-testing for same. Chris Butcher has more, including Gerard's comics credentials.
 
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Go, Look: Sara Edward-Corbett


 
posted 10:12 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* here's a fine, short interview in support of independent UK publisher Canongate moving into comics with The Complete Peanuts.

* now that's a bad review.

* this CNN profile of Lars Vilks, whose portrait of Muhammed's head on the body of a dog alarmed the post-Danish Cartoons Controversy world, includes the notions that those who e-mail and text message death threats seem to do so in economical fashion.

* I keep forgetting to put this notice in the craft section of the quick hits entries, so I'll put it here: Marvel Editor Tom Brevoort is doing a series on comic book covers.

* Matthias Wivel gets into a discussion of value in art and contrary stances and backlashes that is well worth your time if you like to ponder these things.

* the University of Kentucky's Board of Trustees makes certain that it gets on the record condemning the content of a recent independent newspaper's cartoon featuring slave imagery.

* this article made me wonder if someone's official line on Paul Pope is that the pre-THB graphic novels no longer exist, although it was probably just a quickly-written press-driven story. Actors, writers and playwrights shift their resumes forward all the time, but the completion impulse in comics buying usually keeps it from happening there. Also, those prints sound cool.
 
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Go, Look: Danijel Zezelj’s Rex



I don't do a whole lot of web launch notices, because that way lies madness, but I thought the model made this worth noting: web publication of a previously not-translated comic in advance of small press publishing of a print version. Feels like the future.
 
posted 10:08 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 49th Birthday, Bill Holbrook!


 
posted 10:04 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Quick hits
Video
Express: Gary Groth
Express: Chris Staros
Express: Randal Jarrell

Exhibits/Events
Fallcon Report
Mauldin/Feiffer Preview
Toles Hits 25 Years of Syndication
Groo Hits 25 Years Of Lopping Heads Off
Missed It: Bump in the Night Exhibit Opens

History
A Collier's Collection
Fans Remember Schulz
Canon For Comparison to Manga

Industry
Pundit Criticizes Diamond's Success at Fulfillment

Interviews/Profiles
PWCW: Rain
CBR: David Hine
PWCW: Naomi Nowak
PWCW: Ralph Macchio
CBR: Jonathan Hickman
Zero Gravity: Nick Abadzis
TalkAboutComics.com: Tara Tallon
comiXology podcast: Richard Starkings

Not Comics
Pullman Influenced By Comics

Publishing
Gross
Comics For Christ
Comic Books: Influential
DHC's Conan Stewardship
Scott Pilgrim Site Re-Launches
Captain America Returns From Dead, Sort Of

Reviews
Julia Keller: Exit Wounds
Erik Pederson: Shortcomings
David L. Beck: Schulz and Peanuts
Michael Taube: Schulz and Peanuts
Johanna Draper Carlson: Hope Falls #1
Johanna Draper Carlson: Fox Bunny Funny
Graeme McMillan: Army@Love: The Hot Zone
 

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CR Review: Simon Dark #1



Creators: Steve Niles, Scott Hampton, Todd Klein, Chris Chuckry
Publishing Information: DC Comics, comic book, 32 pages, October 2007, $2.99
Ordering Numbers:

I'm half-way convinced that DC Comics' new title Simon Dark is some sort of art school project about the modern comic book marketplace, because more than any reaction to the work itself I spent the entire time trying to figure it out as an end result publishing strategy. Do people want an even darker vigilante sharing the same imaginary space as Batman? Really? Are they calling for vaguely Vertigo-y superhero comics where the first action our ostensible takes is a grisly murder? Still? Are they genuinely intrigued by a tougher-than-she-looks medical examiner whose first scenes practically shows her with "I will have a special relationship with Simon Dark" stamped on her forehead? Does Gotham City even have enough rich people at this point to staff yet another secret society? Is the room in the mansion where they talk entirely in plot points called the Exposition Room? Seeing as it's only soaked with radiation instead of stuffed to the gills with crazy-ass murderers and super-terrorists, do lots of people in the DC Universe still live in Prypiat? Hasn't the well for lonely, poorly dressed protagonists reading Edgar Allen Poe and being sad been poisoned by now? Have I lived long enough where 1990s mope has become a presentational style? All in all, the mind kind of boggles. To each his own and everything, but we're not talking about a market where you can put a bunch of new titles out there and this kind of thing can maybe find a small but passionate audience. To survive, a book has to really hit with a lot of people. If there's a place for this kind of project to makes a sales go of it when practically nothing else is working, it might be better to blow up the Direct Market and start over.

It's not that Simon Dark is a bad comic. The art by Scott Hampton has a melancholy, muscular feel to it. Writer Steve Niles has supplied a plot rather than plot points scattered at the feet of a bunch of superheroes standing around calling each other by their first names. The characters are reasonably appealing in a stock sort of way, like the kind you find on one of the Law & Order television series. And yet there are still too many formal hiccups for it to have that feeling of solid craftsmanship that distinguished the early issues of Gotham Central or Sandman Mystery Theatre. For one thing, pacing-wise it lurches forward and whips around awkwardly like a mad, crumping zombie. Some actions break down into multiple panels -- even whole pages -- when a single image or a pair of pictures would seemingly do. Other moments rip past the reader like the side of the road viewed from a moving car. This can be doubly aggravating in that the unevenness sends a message to the reader's subconscious: while the character and his circumstances may be a mystery, it's one we're intentionally not exploring while we spend a lot of time over here on this other stuff. It's the adventure comics fan service equivalent to Snoopy reading War and Peace one word at a time. In the end, there's nothing original in the conception that would keep my interest except perhaps with outstanding execution. While it's certainly possible for creators Niles and Hampton to deliver on that level, this debut issue shows them to be miles away from doing so.


 
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CR First Person: Sean T. Collins’ General Impressions of Small Press Expo 2007



18 Thoughts on the Small Press Expo 2007
By Sean T. Collins

1. I'd been to SPX only once before, in 2003, back when it was at its old "indie comics sleepaway camp" location in the Holiday Inn in Bethesda proper. At the time I was not super-crazy about the experience. This, on the other hand, was one of the best cons I've ever been to.

There are many reasons for that (you may have already seen one of them) but I have to think that the venue change played a big part. Now every single table and booth is all in one giant high-ceilinged room, which makes the convention floor feel more like an energetic marketplace of art and ideas and less like an estate sale, as one SPX staffer described the vibe at the old venue. There was also convenient access to a patio on which to sit and chill and smoke and talk on your cell and read, and a pretty terrific bar/restaurant. And to the extent that anything is convenient via the Metro, with its insanely vertiginous escalators and absurdly arcane payment system that I'm pretty sure involves the use of an abacus, the old downtown Bethesda restaurant area is still within easy reach.

2. I see that one of my complaints about SPX 2003 was a lack of compelling debuts. Boy, was that ever not the case here. I feel that there have been years within even my comparatively brief comics-reading memory where we'd have been lucky to see as many world-class comics appear within 12 months as went on sale for the first time at this one show, even with Sammy Harkham's new Crickets issue not actually making it in time. The full list (scroll down to the nominees for Outstanding Debut) isn't even a full list when you factor in mini-comics and the like.

3. And holy moley, the mini-comics! In terms of their craft as objects, Jeffrey Brown observed that the number of minis with color, silk-screened, die-cut, or hand-sewn covers actually appeared to be greater than the black-and-white jobs. There certainly were some gorgeous and compelling comics available; it would have been quite easy to wipe out your spending budget at Shawn Cheng, Sara Edward-Corbett and Matt Wiegle's Partyka and Eleanor Davis and Drew Weing's Little House tables alone. Trust me on that one.

4. Related: Most times I've been to a small-press convention, I've been excited to pick up new work from familiar artists but wary of diving into uncharted waters, and rarely have I seen previously unknown work capable of beguiling me into doing so. But there was an embarrassment of riches at SPX from artists I'd never heard of--and I like to think I'm a pretty savvy guy when it comes to these things. My poison included Matt Furie's hilarious Boy's Club from Buenaventura Press; Andres Vera Martinez's Tejano Ghost Stories, drawn and designed in beautiful black and white; and the minicomics anthologies of the Closed Caption Comics collective, a group clearly influenced by that notorious cultural dead end Fort Thunder that had nearly everyone I talked to saying "Whoa, did you see those kids next to the Bodega table?" There were at least that many over again on which I could gladly have splurged.

5. Speaking of Bodega and Buenaventura, along with PictureBox Inc. they formed a new trifecta of alternative comics publishing to sit alongside Fantagraphics, Drawn & Quarterly, and Top Shelf. Watching not one, not two, but three companies produce and sell high-quality avant garde work centered on alumni of the Fort Thunder, Paper Rodeo, and Highwater scenes is astonishing and invigorating.

6. Top Shelf has an exceptionally solid crop of new-ish releases and creators right now, with strong and interesting titles from Matt Kindt, Jeff Lemire, and Andy Hartzell, all of whom were on hand.

7. Oni was a visible and ebullient presence at the show as well, the most notable comparatively mainstream outlet there. They seem to have really internalized what made Scott Pilgrim connect and are continuing to deliver what may be the first organic wave of manga-influenced but not manga-derivative work we've seen, from their comfy digest formats on down: Wet Moon, Last Call, Black Metal and so on.

8. Where were NBM and SLG? I didn't just miss them, did I?

9. AdHouse could have gotten away with charging $50 for their latest James Jean Process Recess art collection at this show, which you could also have said for PulpHope at MoCCA. They're mightily impressive books. And if they subsidize Skyscrapers of the Midwest, even better.

10. Fantagraphics sold out of Paul Karasik's I Shall Destroy All the Civilized Planets Fletcher Hanks book again. Everyone loves this thing, from Comics Comics editor Dan Nadel to former Wizard Editor in Chief Pat McCallum. (You see what I mean? Everyone!)

11. The roster of creators on hand was extremely impressive, even just within the official guests of honor and panelist slots. As Heidi MacDonald pointed out to me, the line-up ran the gamut from Jeff Smith and Matt Wagner to Kim Dietch and Bill Griffith to Gilbert Hernandez to Nicholas Gurewitch to C.F., an accomplishment in itself. Moreover, the people responsible for fully six of my top 10 releases of the year -- Anders Nilsen, Kevin Huizenga, John Hankiewicz, Josh Cotter, Tom Neely, Gilbert Hernandez -- were all present at the show. Had Nick Bertozzi made it (did he?), it would have been seven. Brian Ralph, Paul Karasik, Jeffrey Brown, and Nick Gurewitch would probably be in the top 15, too.

12. Speaking of Gurewitch, his tiny table could easily have been replaced by a giant throne made of candy and gold, such is his draw. I expect that whole webcomics corner of the floor to metastasize into a presence to rival any of the big altcomix publishers, and I'm a little surprised that hadn't happened already.

13. In terms of the lines for their signings, Bone's Jeff Smith and Exit Wounds' Rutu Modan were the belles of the ball. This would seem to give lie to Heidi's notion that storytelling isn't valued by the snobs anymore.

14. The lines appeared to be shorter for the veterans like Beto and Deitch, but I'd guess that's because they each signed for herculean stretches of time between the two days of the show. Please think about how awesome it is that you enjoy an art form where that happens. You can't exactly count on having four hours to walk up and chat with, say, Bernard Sumner and Grace Slick at the same table in this world.

15. Speaking of the two days of the show, why are they Friday and Saturday? I asked around and found out that Sunday used to be a big hang-out day for the whole indie comics community (somewhere Gary Groth just spit on the floor and made the sign of the evil eye) involving a pig roast and a softball game against Diamond or something, but neither of these things happens anymore. Having 50% of your two-day show on a workday prevents people who would come from coming, period. This happened to my wife, and it cost all my former co-workers a day of show-going. I also heard complaints from creators that Friday's late hours really screwed them up in terms of meals and sleep. Do a proper Saturday/Sunday show, for pete's sake.

16. There was a panel on the State of Comics Criticism and I wrote about it here.

17. Much of crowd at this show was very attractive, a point that should be made often and loudly. This extends to many of the creators as well, both male and female, and not just in comparison to what most people in comics look like either. I don't know how else to put this -- whatever your preference, there was some grade-A tail on display, in extremely close proximity to social lubricants and hotel rooms, and you crazy kids should be out there ticklin' and slappin' and makin' it happen.

18. I even enjoyed the five or so hours it took me to drive down from Long Island and back, despite the lack of vegetarian meal options at rest stops. I timed my departure and arrival to avoid the New York and Beltway rush hours and listened to a half dozen albums I haven't had a chance to really dig into since I stopped commuting and lost my dedicated music-listening time. The new Radiohead's pretty good, huh? Best since Kid A. "All I Need" -- holy moses.

*****

* poster art by Bill Griffith; design by Jacob Covey
* David Bowie sketch by Andy Hartzell
* Eleanor Davis
* Brian Chippendale's Maggots
* Wet Moon from Oni
* Skyscrapers of the Midwest
* Nicholas Gurewitch
* Rutu Modan
* about 1/2 the comics brought home by Chris Pitzer, assembled from his show photos; I hope he's not mad

*****

Sean T. Collins writes about comics for a range of publications, and is an ex-employee of the Wizard Empire.
 
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If I Were In Iowa City, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Chicago, I’d Go To This


 
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Michael George Will Stand Trial

I'm a little lost when it comes to procedure, but this article seems to indicate that the recent preliminary exam resulted in the case against convention organizer and retailer Michael George regarding the 1990 violent death of his then-wife in his Michigan comic book store, has been given to the appropriate court and now a murder trial will take place. The link in question contains a much dryer summary of the hearing than what appeared in other sources, and also some posturing from both sides about how awesome their prospects are.
 
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Go, Bid: Chester Brown Original Art Auction To Benefit The Wright Awards


 
posted 10:20 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Burmese Caricaturist Faces Censorship

The cartoonist and caricaturist Awpikye has become accustomed to having his work held up by Burma's scary-sounding Press Scrutiny and Registration Board, although this time around it seems that the ban comes from his having brought food to protesting monks rather than the usual objections to content. Others assisting in that effort were arrested. The story was mirrored by a International Freedom of Expression eXchange bulletin. This is apparently the only mention of the veteran caricaturist on the Internet, at least in that English spelling, although it seems as if he uses several pen names.
 
posted 10:18 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 81st Birthday, Joe Sinnott!


 
posted 10:16 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* Hacker Wars: Revenge of the Swedes

* Thank you to Chris Scales for catching this Art Spiegelman comment in an on-line forum about the Nate Fisher case.

* Express took a high-end video camera to the Small Press Expo, and is posting the interview results in a series. Now up are Paul Karasik of "My book about Fletcher Hanks keeps selling out at every show" fame, SPX coordinator Karon Flage and Jeffrey Everett of El Jefe Design.

* Maybe the biggest single venue for print cartoons in North America, Parade has apparently been adding cartoonists to supplement its traditional Bunny Hoest empire.

* here's a not-really-comics-but-still story that interests me in that way of not knowing that it went on, it making sense when you do find out about it, and the whole thing being rather slimy in a way that can't be justified by an explanation. If I'm getting it right, the writer Peter David accepted an invitation to a smaller convention, his name was used in advertising the show and I would imagine that logic dictates it was a hook for attracting other guests, and then he was dis-invited when money got tight. The explanation is some sort of "good of the show" nonsense. Some of the related issues fascinate, too, like the suggestion that some convention guests might be seen as more desirable than others because a) they might come bundled in a group, and b) they share money they charge for autographs and the like with the show, which is another two things I didn't know about. Anyway: compelling. Plus, it totally sucks.

* One of Canada's more prominent protest leaders during the Danish Cartoons controversy is suffering threat of deportation. If nothing else, the description of the life as led is one of those things where most of us will go, "Well, that's certainly outside of my experience."

* A short preview of The Black Dossier, the next installment in The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen series, is now on-line.
 
posted 10:14 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 63rd Birthday, Bob Hall!


 
posted 10:12 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Get Well Soon, Marie Severin

Word has rippled through the comics industry that the extremely well-liked and admired veteran comic book colorist, artist and designer Marie Severin has been hospitalized following a stroke suffered last Thursday. Get well cards can be sent to:

Marie Severin, patient
c/o Huntington Hospital
270 Park Avenue
Huntington, NY 11743

No additional details are known.
 
posted 10:10 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 49th Birthday, Mark Badger!


 
posted 10:08 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 44th Birthday, Larry Young!



go see Larry and Carlton Fisk
 
posted 10:04 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Quick hits
History
Murray Ball Looks Back

Industry
I Hate Your Book
I Hate Your Book
Why He's Pro-Zuda
Herald Describes Contest
Tigra Beating Disturbs Critic
Grist Shenanigans Disturb Critic

Interviews/Profiles
Mondo: J. Bone
Wizard: Kazu Kibuishi
Sequential Tart: Will Pfeifer
Potomac News: Luna Brothers
Burlington Free Press: Ed Koren
Capital News 9: Aquilonia Comics
San Luis Obispo County: Jerry Scott

Not Comics
Not This Again

Publishing
Spooner Going E-Book
Comics Should Be Funny
Indy Comics Explored by Student Newspaper

Reviews
Paul O'Brien: Various
Jeff Chon: The Architect
Paul O'Brien: X-Factor #24
Doug Wolk: Simon Dark #1
Graeme McMillan: Brawl #1
Paul O'Brien: Simon Dark #1
Leroy Douresseaux: Gyo Vol. 1
Paul O'Brien: X-Men: Die By The Sword #1
Brendan Wright: Sergio Aragones' Groo: 25th Anniversary Special
 

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CR Review: Estrus Comics #5



Creator: Mari Naomi
Publishing Information: Self-Published, mini-comic, 48 pages, 2007, $5
Ordering Numbers:

I wasn't all that familiar with Mari Naomi's work before sitting down with this mini-comics, although I'm certain I've seen it out there somewhere before. I wish I had paid closer attention, because this is as strong an out-of-left-field book as I've read all year. In Estrus #5, the San Francsico-based artist and cartoonist allows her feature "Ex-Factor: A Romantic Resume" to take over from cover to cover. These are short stories based on the author's romantic interests from kindergarten until now, distillations of longer experiences into one or two scenes that she hopes may one day be collected into a single volume. I guess you could sort of see it as a companion piece to David Heatley's "My Sexual History," only with greater attention paid to tracking the individual emotional contexts through which she found attachment with whomever and less attention trying to build some meaning out of a catalog of sexual desires.

Although more casually than perfectly crafted, the comics in Estrus #5 prove compulsively readable. They're funny and sometimes affecting, making it easy to see oneself in the details, such as the way the young Mari bails on a boy because of a peer's harsh appraisal or noticing the place where she and a boy had sex outside was easily seen from a nearby road. At the same time, there's always that sneaking suspicion when it comes to such personal work that the portrayals may not be fair, or that we're simply peeping at the instances described, or that the experiences are forced to conform to Naomi's treatments of them as a sprightly anecdotes when they could or maybe even should mean something entirely. By that I don't mean to suggest anything having to do with a factor some people are likely to hit on right away, that most of the book is given over to anecdotes stemming from a minor. I actually like the matter-of-factness that Naomi brings to that element of her story. It's more a sense that I always wonder if the cartoonist has a story that doesn't make for an entertaining comic book short.

Still, any cartoonist who enters the art form inspired by Scott Russo's Jizz -- which is beginning to look like the one book of that moment in comics which was hugely influential without having a presence for itself before or after that time -- gets a bit of leeway from me. I would imagine anyone drawn to the freedom with which Russo made his pages isn't going to waste it putting together an elaborate construct. I think there's something there. No matter how you end up looking at Mari Naomi's comics, if you have the opportunity I'd definitely suggest you take that look.


 
posted 1:00 pm PST | Permalink
 

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APE Moves to November 2008



The Comics Reporter has confirmed with Comic-Con International that the Alternative Press Expo (APE) will move to November 1-2 2008 as indicated by the above banner appearing on their web site. APE has recently been held in the Spring after a run near the end of winter for the bulk of its decade-plus run as a small-press focused show based on the old convention model rather than a comics festival set-up. This alters the Spring convention landscape, puts more weight at the end of the major convention season and potentially crowds some of the traditional Fall shows.

We were able to speak briefly to the organization's David Glanzer about the move.

*****

TOM SPURGEON: Why?

DAVID GLANZER: The quick answer was we couldn't get dates for that location in April. As you know we rely upon the convention facility (whether it be in San Francisco or San Diego) to give us dates that work within our timeframe. We have a long history in San Diego, with a huge amount of hotel rooms and a general impact on the city that is well known.

The Alternative Press Expo, while big for its type, is a smaller event and securing dates, even one year out, has been difficult to say the least. I should point out that we actually have a similar problem with WonderCon. Typically we try to have contracts set up for at least a couple of years. This makes sense when you try to encourage exhibitors, attendees and the like to attend any event.

Unfortunately in San Francisco we can't book out as far out as we would like. We have been working diligently on trying to secure dates in April for this show, but it just wasn't possible. The thought of even moving the show to another city to try and keep those dates was floated around, but ultimately it was something that wasn't possible for a variety of reasons.

SPURGEON: When did you make the decision and was there a triggering factor?

GLANZER: The contract was signed last week. If there was any triggering factor it was that it's already near the end of the year and time wasn't on our side. Typically we like to announce the following years dates during the run of a show. APE 2007 was held in April of this year so we're already, arguably, six month late.

SPURGEON: Was there something structural that makes this easier, like the availability or space or the schedule of other cons?

GLANZER: No one ever wants to go up against another show. It's counter productive for all involved. But if the choice is whether or not to have an event, I think we try to factor all variables, and in this case, we decided to have a show. Ideally, we would love a multiyear contract, but that just isn't possible with our current location.

SPURGEON: Are there any plans to change emphasis as well as the date?

GLANZER: No change in emphasis at all. APE is an important show for the Independent and Self Published industry, there are no plans or even talk of changing its focus. And honestly, I think we're actually at a disadvantage to a degree.

We are now tasked with getting the word out that our show is going to be seven months later than it normally is. Change is rarely welcomed. So I think we have our work cut out for us.

SPURGEON: Are you worried at all about crowding the Small Press Expo (SPX)?

GLANZER: Of course. I'm hoping with SPX, which is a fantastic show by the way, being on one side of the country, and APE being on the other, any issues with the time frame will be small. Granted I'm sure this will have more of an impact on exhibitors than attendees since I don't know if there is really much crossover in that area.

SPURGEON: Are you worried at all about extending the convention season past people's ability to want to continue hitting conventions?

GLANZER: While APE is certainly part of the convention circuit, it's a very unique and independent portion of it. While bigger shows like Comic-Con, Wizard Chicago or WonderCon may see large numbers of attendees, and general craziness during their weekends, shows like APE and SPX cater to a potentially different crowd I think.

I'm hoping that since APE won't be held in April of this year, that those who plan to attend will be able to alter their schedule so that they can make the show in November. I have my fingers crossed on this.

SPURGEON: Was it easy to do this? Did you lose any money down? Did you have earlier dates announced and do you foresee anyone having to changes dates on their part now?

GLANZER: No, it was anything but simple. We really, honestly, do try to take a great many factors into consideration for all of our events. Primary among them is how to promote comics to a wider audience. It doesn't serve our mission if we do something that will be counter productive.

There was a great many long hours spent on the solution to this problem and we looked at it from a myriad of angles. Luckily, in a way, we didn't announce dates for another time, because we really didn't have dates. So that worked for us and against us. As for any economic impact, I guess we really won't know the answer to that question until after the show next year.

Even this year, WonderCon dates were announced later than we probably would have liked. Again, it would have been nice to announce next year's WonderCon dates at this year's show, but we couldn't book the facility so we had to wait to secure a contract and dates. It's really not an optimal way to plan an event but it's what we're faced with.

I honestly don't know if others will change dates, again, I'm hoping that with Indy shows being on two different coasts, this may mitigate some of those issues.

*****

Our thanks to Mr. Glanzer for making himself available.

photo swiped from Fantagraphics
 
posted 10:00 am PST | Permalink
 

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CR First Person: Sean T. Collins on the Criticism Panel at Small Press Expo

Ten Thoughts on the "State of Comics Criticism" Panel at SPX
By Sean T. Collins

1) I was glad for the presence of Douglas Wolk. His experience with non-aficionado periodicals was useful in highlighting practical considerations regarding the dearth of considered long-form criticism in the mass media that Gary Groth, Dan Nadel and Tim Hodler, and Bill Kartalopoulos (the editors of The Comics Journal, Comics Comics, and Indy Magazine and Egon Labs respectively) never really have to deal with: three-month lead times, the current mania for "fewer words, more bullets, more lists, more entry points," tying reviews into the PR cycle for new releases to the exclusion of works that aren't new or upcoming, tight word counts, limited space for comics coverage, how hard it is for professional critics to make a living writing about comics, etc.

2) Also, at one point Doug threw things to me and the other Wizard staffers (them current, me not so much) in the audience so that we could defend ourselves if we wanted in light of a few minutes' worth of Wizard-mocking by the panel, centered on a Top 100 trade paperbacks of all time list that the magazine put together a few years before any of us started working there. I'm proud of the coverage of alternative comics that I managed to provide during my time at the magazine -- I regularly reviewed Cold Heat on the website and named Mome Best Indie Anthology of 2006, just to name a pair of examples pertinent to the publishers on the panel -- but of course I agree that any list with 99 superhero books and a curve breaker like Maus at the top is a pretty terrible one.

The point that Doug enabled me to make is that most comics and graphic-novel coverage in mainstream-media publications, as well as most alternative/indie-comics coverage in Wizard and other superhero-centric print and web publications, is written from an advocacy position. I've written about comics for a half-dozen or so general-interest magazines, and usually the way it works is an editor at, say, Stuff will ask you in September about what good comics are coming out in December. You send them a list and they pick one and say "great, write about that one." Even at the old iteration of Giant, where I had 2-4 review slots each issue to work with, it was still a matter of pre-selecting comics that were worth making room in the magazine for, which meant comics that were good. When you have an editor who is usually fighting to carve out a spot for these things because she feels that comics is an art form worth talking about, and you as a writer tend to feel the same way, they're not going to use that space to have you explain why Will Eisner's later work is overrated.

3) I only ever hear complaints that the web has diffused informed opinion and is therefore inferior to the supposed centralization of print publications from people who work for print publications. In this panel the loudest voice on this point was Gary's, who first said that it's even hard to find good film criticism online. At first he said that this is because there wasn't any, but then when called on it by Tim, he admitted that he just didn't have the time to find it. Not to be all roll-over-Beethoven about it, but I can't imagine it's really any more difficult or time-consuming for me to have found Matt Zoller Seitz's blog, or Joe McCulloch's for that matter, than it was in Gary's much-vaunted mid-century golden age of arts criticism for people to have first discovered Andrew Sarris or Pauline Kael, much less Cahiers du Cinema. What's more, most of the people with whom I discuss criticism (the availability of discussion being quite important to Gary and the other participants) are just as aware of these online sources as I am. In other words, I think the "problem" likely lies less with the medium than the user, but also really isn't a problem at all.

4) I obviously wasn't alive during the '50s-'60s-'70s era Gary champions, but I'm not 100% convinced that this Golden Age of Criticism really existed. I mean, it existed in the sense that there were great critics writing about various art forms, sure (though not comics, not really). But Gary seemed to be arguing that the likes of Pauline Kael were the Gene Shalits of their day. I think it's a safe bet that if the average reader of this blog asked her mom and dad who Pauline Kael was, they'd have no idea. As an audience member pointed out, criticism isn't consumed by large numbers of people because most art isn't consumed by large numbers of people in ways that would make them receptive to criticism. As she said, this is doubly true of comics, where large numbers of people aren't consuming that art form at all, so yearning for a more vibrant critical milieu for comics is in some ways a fool's errand. But while I could be wrong, I think it's unlikely that this mass audience for criticism ever existed even for more popular art forms. If we instead mean a large audience of well-educated, well-informed cognoscenti, we should say so.

5) Doug advocated for the value of "bomb-throwing" -- divisive pieces intended to provoke debate. I'm not crazy about this at all. For every act of bomb-throwing into which went a considerable amount of thought, like the Journal's Top 100 Comics of the 20th Century list or Understanding Comics, there are probably three times as many straw-men massacres. Chris Ware sucks, most alternative comics are autobiographical and therefore boring, the only comics worth a damn are "New Mainstream" genre titles, no one tells stories anymore, the Internet is the future of comics, superhero stories are inherently worthless and no one in the real world likes them, manga is all the same, super-popular webcomics > pretentious art comics that nobody reads, etc. Yes, they frequently provoke intelligent responses, but more accurately way they necessitate intelligent responses lest the white noise they generate drown out actual argument and criticism.

6) "There are no schools of comics criticism." I think it was Doug who put it in this way, though maybe it was Dan who brought it up? And obviously this is true -- you don't really have all-encompassing, rigorously articulated points of view on comics a la, I dunno, [Sergei] Eisenstein or [Andre] Bazin. As I tried to point out, I think the emergence of Comics Comics as an antipode to The Comics Journal -- a voice seemingly less interested in combative "this is bullshit and this is emphatically not bullshit" throw-downs, seemingly more open to evaluating corporate genre work, seemingly more attuned to non-narrative sensibilities versus literary ones -- is important, but as that diverse collection of attributes would suggest, this isn't exactly a coherent philosophy. I tend to think coherent philosophies are wildly overrated at best and stultifying and poisonous at best, though, so maybe that's not such a bad thing.

7) Tim pointed out that the Journal's combative posture is understandable given the climate in which it started, one in which Maus had to be defended versus The Death of Captain Marvel. That work has been done, so now publications like Comics Comics can publish lengthy examinations of Steve Gerber's oeuvre without worrying that this will be taken to mean the work is on the same level as Gary Panter's.

8) I wish it were pointed out more often that there's really no such thing as "the Journal." There's Gary, and there's whoever's the editor, and then there's a bunch of writers who submit reviews and essays with no editorial guidelines and no back-end content editing either. (At least in my experience.) I know what "the Journal" is supposed to mean, but in reality it means the opinions of R.C. Harvey, Noah Berlatsky, Joe McCulloch, Tim O'Neil, me, Chris Mautner, Michael Dean, Kristy Valenti, and a couple dozen more all at once.

9) I wish the phrase "the dumbing down of American culture" were removed from this discussion. A look at the top-grossing films and best-selling books during the so-called Golden Age of Criticism indicates that America has always been pretty dumb, a state of affairs not at all unique to America, hey by the way.

10) Tim Hodler looks like Walter Becker from Steely Dan.

Sean T. Collins writes about comics for his blog and for the general magazine market. He is a former employee of Wizard
 
posted 9:00 am PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In NYC, I’d Go To This



The image provided that you can't read says something like "PictureBox and D.A.P. Present / A mega book signing featuring: / Frank Santoro : Storeyville / Brian Chippendale : Maggots / C.F. : Powr Mastrs Vol. 1 / 7:00 - 9:00 pm / Monday, October 15, 2007 / Spoonbill & Sugartown / 218 Bedford Avenue / Brooklyn, NY 11211 / www.PictureBoxinc.com"
 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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Missed It: CBLDF Board Changes

I almost missed it, which is why this is going all the way near the top of the day's blogging rather than the bottom, but the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund (CBLDF) recently announced two new moves regarding its board of directors. Retailer Joe Ferrara of Atlantis Fantasyworld has been named to the office of Vice President, and retailer Chris Powell of Lone Star Comics & MyComicShop.com has been named to the board. They join a current line-up of President Chris Staros, Treasurer Milton Griepp, Secretary Louise Nemschoff, Peter David, Neil Gaiman, Paul Levitz, and Steve Geppi. Heavy hitters all (okay, save one), and a group designed to fulfill the kind of obligations that one imagines are demanded of such a board in this day and age: rallying retailer support, helping to raise money, working behind the scenes to foster positive opinion towards Fund aims, and to represent the Fund in various public circumstances.

However, since we're up top, does anyone else out there think IT'S TOTALLY WEIRD AS CRAP that three of the CBLDF board members are Paul Levitz, Steve Geppi and a prominent person from Lone Star Comics? Steve Geppi and Diamond's history as a company that wasn't always friendly to the kind of art that tends to run afoul of local prosecutors was documented when he was named to the board, as was Levitz's more recent tendency to pulp comics runs based on content that might have stood a chance of being protected speech were they backed and fought for.

As for Powell, last I knew Lone Star Comics & MyComicShop.com was still owned primarily or solely by Buddy Saunders, a noted advocate for comic book ratings labels, both in the past and fairly recently. It's not an issue that's come up recently, but that was once an insanely hot point of contention. Buddy Saunders also wrote a lengthy essay in The Comics Journal in 1990 (the one with the boss Alan Moore cover, #138) decrying comic book violence from mostly a market view point but that also included a suggestion that art translated into societal ills so Werthamian that Bob Levin wrote an entire essay ripping into it and its implications ("Attack of the Salmon-Heads," TCJ #141).

I don't know Powell, and I realize there are fairness issues linking him to Saunders' views. (For that matter, I should say Saunders and Levitz have always been more than cordial and friendly to me; this isn't a personal thing.) But if you had told me in 1991 that 16 years later the CBLDF Board would count 1/3 of its members among people linked in some fashion to such contentious positions, and not on the side you'd think, I would never have believed you.
 
posted 4:00 am PST | Permalink
 

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More on the Ernesto Priego Affair

Marc Singer, the 2007 Chair of the International Comic Arts Forum, asked for a chance to present a response to my article that scholar Ernesto Priego claims he was not denied entry into the USA to present at ICAF. His response in full:

I'd like to offer a few clarifications in response to your latest article about Ernesto Priego. First of all, the person "claiming to be comics scholar Ernesto Priego" is indeed Ernesto Priego; no need to cast doubts about his identity.

Second, I have to disagree with Ernesto's distinction (repeated in Chris Mautner's article and yours) between being denied entry and not having his
visa renewed; they're one and the same. Whether he's turned back at the airport or his visa application is rejected, he's still not allowed to come into the
country and present his scholarship.

A September 23, 2007 broadcast of the program Global Journalist might provide some useful context. The moderator and guests, including an international affairs reporter for the Chronicle of Higher Education, make no distinctions between scholars who are turned away at the airport and scholars who are told ahead of time (usually just days ahead of the conference, as was the case with Ernesto) that they will be denied visas. That broadcast also inventories the factors that complicate attempts to challenge refusals of entry, including the lack of transparency behind these decisions and scholars' reluctance to speak out when it happens to them.

In your latest article, you write, "I find a lot of things confusing here, actually, including the chasm between the ICAF's take and Priego's, the seeming disconnect between the two just in terms of being in contact, that Priego waited two days to reply to anyone's questions and that now he doesn't want to make comments on a story he says doesn't exist. Although for all I know there's layers and layers of story here yet to be uncovered."

There are plenty of reasons for anybody to find this story confusing. One way to account for the discrepancies between the different public
interpretations of events is to remember that Ernesto Priego is counting on getting visas approved for future conference visits to the United States, whereas I don't have to worry about that. I stand behind every statement I have made on this story.

First of all, of course I stand behind my take on it, too. In the first article I reported Singer and ICAF's claims. In the second I reported Priego's claim that this was not true. I only expressed regret that I did not wait to run the story, which I had done because I had assumed that Singer and ICAF and Priego were in agreement on the version of the story that they were going to take public, not that I had run either story. Both stories were true. Singer and ICAF claimed the one thing; Priego claimed the other. I simply would have liked to have run both concepts in the original piece.

As for where I might come down in all this, well, that's more difficult.

This is going to be a long sentence, but here goes: I'm not convinced enough by my personal e-mail conversations with Singer and Priego, or by the article to which we've been directed here, which seem to me to be cases of a wholly different level of severity and do not include a different version by the actual person involved which must be negotiated around by implying the person might be protecting their professional self-interest, to endorse Singer's take on things as such obvious truth I don't regret not having Priego's take in the original story, too.

I don't doubt that these things happen, and I believe they're shameful. At the same time, it's awful enough that if someone close to the event denies that's what happened, we can't automatically dismiss that and mix them in with reportage on such events where no such denial has apparently been made. I also don't doubt that situations where the direct result is the same as the result of stupid, non-directed instances of policy are also unfortunate, but I believe the distinction is important and you have to make them clear.

ICAF's take could be true -- indeed, the truth could be far worse than we imagine! -- but I don't think there's enough there for me to endorse it over Priego's now repeated insistence to the contrary based solely on the suggestion that Priego might be understandably less than truthful. I'm happy to give Marc Singer a chance to stand behind his version of events, and I don't have any problems with his advocacy for a take on events he obviously believes in, but my interest here is not whether Singer can make a case for Singer as much as the best and most responsible way to present the story given all the contributing elements, and what we know up to this time.
 
posted 10:30 pm PST | Permalink
 

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ICv2.com: September ‘07 DM Estimates

The comics business news and analysis site ICv2.com offers their usual array of lists, estimates and analysis regarding the performance of comic books and graphic novels in the Direct Market of comic and hobby shops, this time for September 2007.

* Overview
* Analysis
* Top 300 Comic Books
* Top 100 Graphic Novels

The thing that strikes me about this group of sales estimates is that Marvel had a significant title in the top ten helped into that position by a sales gimmick or overt sales mechanism in addition to its content. This is the kind of thing that happens all the time, but really indicates the shape of the market and what these numbers mean to these companies when you stop and think about it. These companies feel a need to boost top-selling comics with at least as much aggression (if not more) than more standard selling comics or even poor-selling ones in their lines. I'm guessing that means securing your comics' place at the top of the charts is more important in some ways than selling more of a lower-selling title, and that these moves are more successful at that tier of sales.

You have to remember that more than any other comics market, the Direct Market for comics shops and hobby shops is shaped by the way that its sales leaders push material through that system. Historical events and structural realities have conspired to put that power into those players' hands. The market conforms around those moves. This means that any deviation or suggestion of a deviation away from general health across the board as the sole market goal suggests motives other than long-term growth in play -- say market share as a way of presenting oneself to corporate or stockholders, or the PR benefits of hit books as a reflection across the entire line -- motives that could potentially shape the market in a way that works against the most beneficial market outcome. It would be the greatest and saddest irony in comics industry history if the big companies were to shift their investment into the book market because they didn't have the discipline to make the best choices on their own behalf in a market where they have so much more control.
 
posted 10:24 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Missed It: Michael George’s Hearing

Michael George, the convention organizer and comic shop owner accused of killing his then-wife Barbara George in Michigan in 1990, had a preliminary exam last week where several details and takes on the events of 17 years ago, some salacious enough to drive news coverage, emerged. This includes a potential gambling problem feeding motive, the reaction of the family to George's behavior at the funeral, women coming forward to say that George pursued them to some extent, why police dismissed a robbery motive, confirmation of insurance monies received, George claiming that he believed the killer might be pursuing him, and forensic details about the shooting.
 
posted 10:18 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Look: Sketching Davie Bowie Part II


 
posted 10:16 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Random Comics New Story Round-Up

* Didier Pasamonik has a report on comics at the Frankfurt Book Fair, with photos.

* there's a bunch of not-really-comics news out there about audiences' embrace of the Persepolis film, which could further cement Marjane Satrapi's status as a world-class cartoonist: why France submitted it for the Best Foreign Film Oscar over La Vie En Rose, further confirmation it's been well-received by those who have seen it in conjunction with its closing-festival status in New York, and it won an award in Vancouver. A short interview here. When is Oprah going to make my 2003 prediction come true?

* Marcel Gotlib taking the Grand prix Saint-Michel 2007 leads a list of winners at the Festival BD de la Region de Bruxelles Capitale.

* a conservative blogger is claiming CNN ran footage depicting and even roughly identifying the safe house of Swedish artist Lars Vilks, in such a house because of threats to his life by people angered about a drawing he made with Muhammed's head on the body of a dog.

* speaking of which, I totally missed one of those Internet hackers target country of Muhammed cartoon origin articles.

* big turn-out for Tom Batiuk's first book signing.

* no reason to stop reading Dan Clowes' Mr. Wonderful.
 
posted 10:15 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Your 2007 Ignatz Award Winners



The winners of the 2007 Ignatz Awards were named Saturday evening in a ceremony held in conjunction with the Small Press Expo, in Bethesda, Maryland. Winners in bold.

*****

OUTSTANDING ARTIST
* Vanessa Davis, Papercutter #4 (Tugboat Press), Kramers Ergot #6 (Buenaventura Press)
* John Hankiewicz, Asthma (Sparkplug Comic Books)
* Jaime Hernandez, Love & Rockets (Fantagraphics Books)
* Rutu Modan, Exit Wounds (Drawn & Quarterly)
* Ted Stearn, Fuzz & Pluck in Splitsville #4 (Fantagraphics Books)

OUTSTANDING ANTHOLOGY OR COLLECTION
* Curses by Kevin Huizenga (Drawn & Quarterly)
* Drawn & Quarterly Showcase Vol. 4 by Gabrielle Bell, Martin Cendrera, and Dan Zettwoch (Drawn & Quarterly)
* King-Cat Classix by John Porcellino (Drawn & Quarterly)
* Misery Loves Comedy by Ivan Brunetti (Fantagraphics Books)
* Moomin Book One by Tove Jansson (Drawn & Quarterly)

OUTSTANDING GRAPHIC NOVEL
* Aya by Marguerite Abouet and Clement Oubrerie (Drawn & Quarterly)
* Bookhunter by Jason Shiga (Sparkplug Comic Books)
* Don't Go Where I Can't Follow by Anders Nilsen (Drawn & Quarterly)
* Exit Wounds by Rutu Modan (Drawn & Quarterly)
* House by Josh Simmons (Fantagraphics Books)

OUTSTANDING STORY
* Delphine #1-2 by Richard Sala (Fantagraphics Books/Coconino Press)
* Don't Go Where I Can't Follow by Anders Nilsen (Drawn & Quarterly)
* The End #1 by Anders Nilsen (Fantagraphics Books/Coconino Press)
* Martha Gregory by John Hankiewicz, Asthma (Sparkplug Comic Books)
* Felix by Gabrielle Bell, Drawn & Quarterly Showcase Vol. 4 (Drawn & Quarterly)

PROMISING NEW TALENT
* Gabrielle Bell, Lucky, Drawn & Quarterly Showcase Vol. 4 (Drawn & Quarterly)
* Scott Campbell, Flight Vol. 4 (Ballantine Books), Hickee vol. 3 #3 (Alternative Comics)
* Lilli Carre, You Ain't No Dancer Vol. 2 (New Reliable Press)
* Brandon Graham, King City (TokyoPop)
* Tom Neely, The Blot (I Will Destroy You)

OUTSTANDING SERIES
* Atlas by Dylan Horrocks (Drawn & Quarterly)
* Delphine by Richard Sala (Fantagraphics Books/Coconino Press)
* Dungeon by Lewis Trondheim, Joann Sfar, and various (NBM)
* Love & Rockets by Los Bros Hernandez (Fantagraphics Books)
* Mourning Star by Kazimir Strzepek (Bodega Distribution)

OUTSTANDING COMIC
* Doctor Id by Adam McGovern and Paolo Leandri (Indie Ink Studios)
* Fuzz & Pluck in Splitsville #4 by Ted Stearn (Fantagraphics Books)
* Love & Rockets vol. 2 #18 by Los Bros Hernandez (Fantagraphics Books)
* Monster Parade #1 by Ben Catmull (Fantagraphics Books)
* Optic Nerve #11 by Adrian Tomine (Drawn & Quarterly)

OUTSTANDING MINI-COMIC
* Burning Building Comix by Jeff Zwirek
* The Monkey and the Crab by Shawn Cheng and Sara Edward-Corbett
* Noose by Mark Burrier
* P.S. Comics #3 by Minty Lewis
* Seven More Days of Not Getting Eaten by Matt Wiegle

OUTSTANDING ONLINE COMIC
* Achewood by Chris Onstad
* Grace by Kris Dresen
* Persimmon Cup by Nick Bertozzi
* Thingpart by Joe Sayers
* Wondermark by David Malki

OUTSTANDING DEBUT COMIC
* Papercutter #6, Edited by Alec Longstreth

*****

The jury this year was Sara Edward-Corbett, Paul Hornschemeier, Steve MacIsaac, Jesse Reklaw and Zack Soto.

Congratulations to all the winners.
 
posted 10:14 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Fred Hembeck Omnibus From Image



hey, I'm there
 
posted 10:12 pm PST | Permalink
 

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OTBP: Papercutter #6


 
posted 10:08 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Next Up: JD Salinger Reviews Zippy

Bill Watterson on David Michaelis' Schulz and Peanuts.

Of all the headlines out there, I like this one the best.

This is the longest piece by a major name, and has the best photo.

I will organize these into a Collective Memory sometime this week.

 
posted 10:06 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 63rd Birthday, Cam Kennedy!


 
posted 10:04 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Quick hits
Exhibits/Events
FallCon Report
Frankfurt Book Fair Report
Go See KAL and SCTV Team Up
24-Hour Comics Day Coming Up
24-Hour Comics Day Coming Up 02
Report From Bellingham Convention
Superhero Exhibit to Florida Jewish Museum

History
On Violence
Best Blurb Ever?
Martin Rowson Reflects
NYT on Charles Schulz Image
Making the Case for '90s Good
I Am Dead And My Costume Is Shiny

Industry
Stop Hating
I Hate Your Cartoon
UK President Didn't Like Cartoon
Your Ding Cartoon Winners 2007
How Manga is Conquering Britain
Clarification on Hug Time Proceeds
Comic Book Idol Finalists Announced
Apparently Comics Are For Adults Now

Interviews/Profiles
The State: Joshua Dyson
Kansas City Star: Pat Oliphant
The Sun Chronicle: Norm Feuti
Edmonton Journal: Adrian Tomine

Not Comics
Chris Butcher in Japan 07
In Praise of Danger: Diabolik
On Graphic Novels Being Made Into Movies
Teachers Asked to Keep Eye on Death Note Readers

Publishing
Pearls Before Swine Adds Paper
All-Ages Comics Making Comeback?
Long-Time Reader's Reaction to Lisa Moore Passing

Reviews
John Burns: Various
Sam Leith: Shortcomings
Katie McNeill: Dark Hunger
RJ Carter: Booster Gold #3
Alex Good: Graphic Witness
Sam Leith: The Poor Bastard
Michal Goldstein: Exit Wounds
Richard Krauss: Mondo Flod #3
Richard Krauss: Reynard City #1
Richard Krauss: Mr. Emergency #1
Richard Krauss: Mr. Emergency #2
Tony Allen Mills: Schulz and Peanuts
Leroy Douresseaux: Korgi Book One
James F. Sweeney: Schulz and Peanuts
RJ Carter: Captain Carrot and the Final Ark #1
 

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Review Party: Emptying The Big Basket

CR receives about two to three comics a day. That doesn't sound like much, but it sure adds up. We run about 200-250 formal reviews in a calendar year, which means the vast majority of comics received don't get reviewed.

It's not about quality; it's about my ability to engage the work in question. Some of the comics we get are so instantly compelling from my viewpoint that they trigger an idea of how to approach them and move straight into the small pile of soon-to-review books. With another large group of books it's immediately obvious they're not going to be reviewed because I have no reaction to them. This includes most stand-alone series installments, or books that have a direct relation to another book recently reviewed. Those go directly into the library after being read.

The rest of the books, for which there's a glimmer of interest, go into a large basket under my desk. This basket is pulled out once a week and rooted through looking for items that spark the more direct kind of regard and focus that makes writing about them possible. When the basket is full, its contents are dispersed into the shelves and I feel sad all day.

The basket is full this morning, and since I'm feeling extra guilty about not getting to so many of its denizens this time around, I thought I'd spend an extra work day writing as many short reviews as I can. It may be in fits and starts, and it may flow, but at least the effort will be made.

I greatly appreciate everyone who sends work in; it all gets read, and it's all useful to me in covering and understanding the field and your place in it. I hope that the following is more useful to you than no response at all.

This post will be refreshed five reviews at a time, and I will end the day with the book depicted above, The Astounding Wolf-Man #3.

*****



Title: Pretending You Care: The Retail Employee Handbook
Creator: Norm Feuti
Publishing Information: Hyperion, soft cover, 300 pages, 2007, $16.95
Ordering Numbers: 9781401308902 (ISBN13), 1401308902 (ISBN10)

I was surprised by how much I liked this prose/comics hybrid, basically a disquisition on the backstage world of retail illustrated with a ton of comics from author Norm Feuti's strip Retail. It's a gimmick book, the kind of thing that fills up the humor section of a store, and while I don't think it's a transcendent one that demands reading and rewards those who aren't interested in a standard American humor book on retail, it's also not tossed off in any way most of these things are -- it's stuffed with gag material and comics to an almost surprising degree. Another way to look at the book would as an exploration of a cartoonist and his subject matter. I wasn't familiar with the strip. It's smartly drawn, and Feuti has carved out some really interesting territory in terms of providing conflict and funny within the strip and depicting characters that those of who are shoppers hate because they're not helpful. The typographic lettering is a really distracting element, though; every time I read one of the strips I think I'm reading someone's mash-up rather than Feuti's intended dialog.

*****



Title: Brawl #1
Creators: Dean Haspiel, Michel Fiffe
Publishing Information: Image Comics, comic book, 32 pages, October 2007, $2.99
Ordering Numbers:

Sometimes I think Dean Haspiel suffers more than most cartoonists by the loss of the one-cartoonist "solo anthology" that dominated the stands in the early '90s. It might be easier if exposed to his work on a regular basis to pick out a progression in cartooning skill, or subtle differences between stories. As it is, this shared book covering what I think is previously on-line material reads as a summary statement or even another shot at certain themes and story ideas more than it does the latest statement in an ongoing dialog between cartoonist and reader. The second feature, by Michel Fiffe, wasn't as memorable, and my initial impression is that the cartoonist may be several dozen pages from the kind of craft development necessary to achieve the visual effects he's going for rather than suggesting them.

*****



Title: Michael Allred's Madman Volume 1
Creators: Michael Allred
Publishing Information: Image Comics, soft cover, 294 pages, October 2007, $24.99
Ordering Numbers: 9781582408101 (ISBN13)

Michale Allred's Madman never really worked for me, never really cohered, which makes me more suspicious than usual that I react more to this early material than the later stuff. It's a pet peeve of mine. In most cases, I think people react to early material because like kids picking at their food they don't care about anything but a sweet, juicy new take on things; the execution not only doesn't matter; it doesn't register. But here the basic concept of the series was thin enough and the act of world-building that followed so sparsely done that it seems to function more effectively in its initial, limited scope than it did in any of the permutations that followed. Plus I liked the not full-color art. In other words, I'm saying you might not want to trust me on this one.

*****



Title: Nick Mag Presents Avatar The Last Airbender Enter: The Fire Nation
Creators: Various
Publishing Information: Nickelodeon, magazine, 52 pages, 2007, $4.99
Ordering Numbers:

I would have been all over something like this as a kid, although I grew up in a moment when they not only didn't have slick magazines devoted to comics and features about adventure cartoons, they didn't really have current adventure cartoons. As a supplement to some fan's experience, I would imagine this is necessary; as a stand-alone reading experience for a newbie it's more like walking through a birthday party where the only person you know is a friend of a friend. For most of us, that would be the Brian Ralph two-pager, a glorious single-tone romp in side-character nonsense that retains much of the cartoonist's personality. I wonder if the kids hated that one.

*****



Title: Killing Girl #2
Creators: Glen Brunswick, Frank Espinoza
Publishing Information: Image Comics, comic book, 32 pages, October 2007, $2.99
Ordering Numbers:

I have no idea if artist Frank Espinoza's art is suited to anything resembling a straight-ahead genre piece of the guns and plots variety, or really any genres that's popular in comics right now, although I'm sure there's someone out there that's noodled on the idea of sending him after DC's Thriller property. This trapped in amber early-'80s crime soap opera ended up a rough fit his talents, particularly the level of exposition in which this installment trades. Espinoza is good enough and different enough right now that I'm sure many people will buy this comic just to have another Frank Espinoza comic, and there are scenes that will reward them, like a flashback kidnapping where some of the figures are barely hinted at while others shove themselves forward and leer like outsider art. It's also possible that he could further develop into one of those cartoonists that sends even more people scrambling into the past for various oddball roads barely taken, like this one.

*****



Title: Brit #2
Creators: Bruce Brown, Cliff Rathburn, Andy Kuhn, Rus Wooton, Robert Kirkman
Publishing Information: Image Comics, comic book, 24 pages, September 2007, $2.99
Ordering Numbers:

I am almost certain without asking that this comic book adventure series exists largely because it's a character created by Image Comics anchor Robert Kirkman. Unfortunately, while it share an amusing concept with Kirkman's other works, the setting and milieu and characters are so much thinner and less rewarding what's found in books like Walking Dead and universe-sharer Invincible. I think it's mostly tone, in that Brit parodies tough guy comics of the wisecracking angry accented various, as well as the range of sources for that kind of book, by making its character cartoon invincible and his life kind of puffed up with cockeyed amusement. It kind of reminds me of the TV legend that they wanted to do a pilot with the Colonel Flagg character from MASH. It would have been so hard to ground that character into a series of his own. From this issue, and the introduction of a sister character when there's so much work to be done at home and on the job, I think it's turning out that way for Brit.

*****



Title: Nog A Dod
Creators: Various
Publishing Information: Conundrum Press, soft cover, 224 pages, 2006, $25
Ordering Numbers: 1894994167 (ISBN10)

I can't believe I never got to this one. This is a terrific art book, a selection of material edited by Marc Bell that originally found purchase in various Canadian mini-comics for a ten-year period beginning in the mid-'90s. It's what my college professor would call outsider art: mad doodles and complex drawings and melting, crazy portraits and tableaux. Bell kind of weaves back and forth through several pieces, but as less a unifying force than a sanity throughline, a familiar element to keep you from falling off the deep end. It's also well-produced, a very sturdy, smaller and effectively printed book. A lot of fun, and limited only by the scope of the project's defining characteristics. If you know what you're in for, it shouldn't disappoint.

*****



Title: My Life In A Jugular Vein
Creator: Ben Snakepit
Publishing Information: Microcosm Publishing, soft cover, 288 pages with CD, 2007, $15
Ordering Numbers: 097886655X

A collection of diary comics from an Austin-based musician-cartoonist, this worked better for me as a peek into the ebb and flow of a young artist's life, and what the author thought was important to report, than it did as comics on really any level. Unlike the work of, say, James Kochalka, the individual strips don't have the skewed viewpoint that fends off the specter of banality. I also had a hard time tracking relationships and even, a few times, figuring out where the hell the author was and exactly what it was they were doing. In that sense, it really is like reading someone's diary. Unless you were one of the people involved, or your lifestyle is really close to this, I'm not sure it yields enough insight or enough reading pleasure to want to stay the course through the book's entire run of work. I really wanted to like this book more than I did. To its credit, with a CD glued to the inside back cover and literally stuffed with comics, it's a nice package and price point.

*****



Title: Alter Ego #28
Creators: Joe Maneely, Lee Ames, Michael J. Vassallo, Roy Thomas, Nancy Maneely, Stan Lee, Jim Amash, Bill Schelly, Michael T. Gilbert
Publishing Information: TwoMorrows, magazine, 104 pages, September 2004, $5.95
Ordering Numbers:

I thought I'd reviewed this somewhere, but since it's in the basket let me say a few words. I enjoy and appreciate the wave of historical industry magazines that's developed over the last few years, of which Jack Kirby Collector is probably the father and Alter Ego is the cool uncle returned into the family's sphere. This issue examines the great Timely/Marvel/Atlas artist Joe Maneely, the great collaborator of Stan Lee whose passing at a young age makes a lot of historians wonder what might have been had he been around when Martin Goodman began pushing for that 1960s reinvigoration of his comics line, with Fawcett artist Lee Ames as a back-up. While the approach and viewpoint to and regarding the older comic book material may differ from my own in significant ways, and sometimes such magazines feel like a cold meats tray of assembled foodstuffs rather than a hearty meal, and there's always a risk of the joy the writer has for the material pushing itself onto stage to the detriment of the various pieces, but having this material collected is a huge boon. This issue has most of my favorite writers about this kind of comics, too: Thomas, Amash, Schelly and Vassallo -- the Joe Maneely of comics historians.

*****



Title: Incredible Comics With Tom Nguyen
Creators: Tom Nguyen
Publishing Information: Impact, soft cover, 128 pages, 2007, $19.99.
Ordering Numbers: 9781581809466 (ISBN13), 1581809468 (ISBN10)

Other than the fact that from the photos included it's clear that author-artist Tom Nguyen could put his brushes down and beat the crap out of me if he wanted to, I'm not quite sure why this book was singled out for potential review. There's a line of thinking I have about art instruction books -- their sole standard is pretty much how they help out aspiring artists, and no matter how much you may think it's not possible, every art instruction book likely helps someone out there with their art, frequently people you'd never suspect. The only angle you can really take is to look at the vision of comics suggested by the book, which if it's a limited one could not only restrict its appeal but project an image of comics that isn't accurate through omission. In that I think the book suffers a bit. I probably don't need to tell you this based on the above cover imagery, but this is clearly a book rooted in the ethos of mainstream comics, moreover the values of mainstream comics as slightly wacky, energetic showcases for mostly-idealized figure drawing: lots of references to babes, lots of super-muscular dudes. Take that for what you will.

*****



Title: Random Journeys #3
Creator: Rob Jackson
Publishing Information: self-published, mini-comic, 20 pages, no date of creation given, no price given
Ordering Numbers:

This is way too poorly drawn for most people to stomach reading it as anything more than a novelty; there's no ameliorative quality to the art that gets you a reasonable distance from that first take, either. Still, there's a nice, idiosyncratic bounce to the story and Jackson purses a humor based as much on character as it on situation that's all too rare in any medium these days. I also admire an artist whose limitations don't stop him from drawing as if he had major chops -- the story isn't reduced or stylized to protect the artist, as is the case with a lot of comics of this type. I'm not sure I want to read another panel, but I'll remember the name.

*****



Title: Project: Romantic
Creators: Various
Publishing Information: AdHouse Books, softcover, 256 pages, October 2006, $19.95
Ordering Numbers: 0977030423 (ISBN10)

My copy's cover cracked into something that looks like infection working its way up pale, pink skin towards an imaginary heart, and I tend to get tired reading so many comics stuff into an anthology formatted like this one. I also think that books that engage a single them from a variety of cartoonist viewpoints -- Dirty Stories springs to mind -- suffer greatly because of too much leeway given the artist in interpreting the basic take towards the idea. Still, there's a lot of good work in here, including comics from Robert Goodin, Joel Priddy, and Hope Larson, and some artists we don't get to see too frequently, like Kelly Alder and Michael Cho. So while I'm not sure it works so well as a themed whole, it's a nice showcase for a lot of artists. How much published full-color Tom Hart comics are there? Not enough.

*****



Title: Discovered: Sequential Art Anthology 2007
Creators: Various
Publishing Information: The Savannah College of Art and Design, soft cover, 224 pages, 2007, none given
Ordering Numbers:

A showcase for students at one of the few art schools in North America with an established, recognized and functioning comics track, it's probably due to my own dim reading abilities that the major insight I got from the book was on the cover. A lovely piece of art somewhere between Craig Thompson and Joann Sfar in terms of sensibility, it reminds that the next generation of cartoonists may not be defined by manga as much as an easy, catholic appreciation for any visual school on which they can lay their hands, including outsider art of all varieties and children's storybooks. The insides were kind of a disappointment. Usually it's difficult to project the artist a cartoonist will become, but a lot of this work seems more fully realized and stunted than it does in development and falling short. A couple of artists such as Kevin Burkhalter, have easy storytelling chops that should serve them well, while two or three others like Megan Gullatto, have developed their craft chops in a way that could mean work from the expanded New York book and book series publishing scene. Let me put it this way, I might want to look at the work being made by a half-dozen of these cartoonists a half-dozen years from now, but I'll probably be opening this book fewer than six times over the course of my life.

*****



Title: Monster Spotter's Guide to North America
Creators: Scott Francis, Ben Patrick
Publishing Information: FW, soft cover, 256 pages, 2007, $14.99
Ordering Numbers: 9781581809299 (ISBN13)

What John Cafferty and the Beaver Brown Band are to Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, so is Monster Spotter's Guide to North America to Jacob Covey's similarly-focused Beasts!. This is essentially a novelty book, shaped like a tourism guide, that instead of letting you know where to find a good hot dog in Seattle tells you that Ohio's Bigfootish "Orange Eyes" stands 11 feet tall. The drawings are serviceable rather than inspiring, while the text is dry enough to crumble as you move your eyes across the page.

*****



Title: Wonderfool World
Creators: David Sandlin
Publishing Information: Butler Gallery, soft cover, 158 pages, 2006, $24.95
Ordering Numbers: 0954863526 (ISBN10), 9780954863524 (ISBN13)

This is a beautiful art book done in conjunction with a Fall 2006 art show by David Sandlin, a Blab! veteran and painter receiving renewed attention of comics fans through his recent publishing ventures such as The Avengelist and An Alphabetical Ballad of Carnality. This is a gorgeous-looking that's hard to maneuver into because of the fold-outs and sturdy paper. Sandlin provides some sort of mad cross between Michael Dougan's early work and the Joe Coleman/Robert Williams/Tony Fitzpatrick thing of heightened, scary reality and luminous visuals. This book not only showcases that approach but provides better than usual context through an interview with Dan Nadel. If this kind of art interests you at all, you need this book.

*****

Brunch Break!

*****



Title: Ed's Terrestrials
Creators: Scott Christian Sava, Diego Jourdan
Publishing Information: Alias, hardcover, 88 pages, 2006, $19.99
Ordering Numbers: 9780978916817 (ISBN13), 0978916816 (ISBN10)

This is a pretty straight-forward kids' story in comics form presented in kids' book format. The book's details fairly flutter away the moment I shut the book, so I'm not sure how much help I can be there. It's basically one of those normal kids meets wacky aliens shorts. For instance, the aliens are fugitives on earth, but fugitives from an intergalactic mall rather than being something scary. It's not original enough for me to think this would be a lot of kids' favorite books, but I doubt anyone of them would rip it in half for extra art paper. The level of execution outstrips some of the blander choices in terms of stylization and characters, but I really can't recommend this.

*****



Title: Monster Island Three
Creators: Various
Publishing Information: Conundrum Press, soft cover, 144 pages, 2007, $15
Ordering Numbers: 9781894994279 (ISBN13)

Billy Mavreas' transmogrified 'zine about the junkier edges of mostly comics culture feels like a perfect book except that it lacks the kind of undeniably great feature that might anchor the whole affair. My favorites were comics by Rick Trembles and Bernie Mireault, and a decent generalist history of Captain Victory, but I imagine most people will focus on a strong illustration suite. I've had fun reading through the book, but I was never in a hurry to do so.

*****



Title: Fade From Grace
Creators: Gabriel Benson, Jeff Amano
Publishing Information: Image Comics, soft cover, 135 pages, 2005, $14.99
Ordering Numbers: 1582405271 (ISBN10)

This book certainly looks different than 99 percent of what's on the stands, but its combination of romance and superhero story tropes ends up being less than the sum of its parts. My hunch is that's because that story doesn't really match the strengths of the genres as much it counts on one story type accommodating the other, and vice versa. It's an almost perfect example of the kind of comic that might blow someone away who's immersed in one or the other to the extent that those values become their own, and clunks around wildly for the rest of us. As a superhero comic book, it doesn't veer enough widely from conventional approaches to sustain interest; as a romance, it doesn't bring any new ideas to the table. Dressing an idea up in a superhero outfit doesn't make it new.

*****



Title: Flytrap, Episode 2
Creators: Sara Ryan, Ron Chan
Publishing Information: Cold Water Press, mini-comic, 12 pages, 2007, $2
Ordering Numbers:

Sara Ryan's comics are always clever, and this one is smartly and attractively drawn, but her high concepts as executed tend to strike me more as artificial than lively. Such is the case with this installment in a series about the fantasy of running away to join the circus, although it's fairly adorable.

*****



Title: Dorothy #7
Creators: Catie Fisher, Mark Masterson, Ray Boersig, Greg Mannino
Publishing Information: Illusive Arts, comic book, 28 pages, February 2007, $5
Ordering Numbers:

This is a mix of full-color photo-comics and illustration in service of a modern re-telling of L. Frank Baum's The Wizard of Oz. Many people will find the Dorothy attractive and the designs effective; I was too distracted trying not to keep my eyeballs from ripping out of my head due to the garish class of sensibilities on display. And yet despite lines like "Toto, you bastard" it doesn't quite careen over into the fun kind of bad, either. I imagine there are people for whom this is the coolest thing, but to me it's way too much of aesthetic affront for me to keep my eyes on it long enough to make a judicious appraisal.

*****

Chicago Bears making rare New Mexico television appearance break

*****



Title: Savage Dragon #132
Creators: Erick Larsen, John Workman, Frank Fosco
Publishing Information: Image Comics, comic book, 80 pages, October 2007, $6.99
Ordering Numbers:

Erik Larsen makes strange comic books where the design elements for The Thing became just as important to superhero stories as his basic character type and where the success of the 1990s was enjoyed by the comics of 1974, locking their matter-of-fact, serious take on shared universes into place with all the rigor of today's crossovers and weirdly sexualized, shiny costumes. They're sort of fun to read, as is this book's middle section about the activities in and around a super-person stuff diner, but it never coalesces into an effect beyond a kind of loving tributes to comics that once were and what they never became.

*****



Title: The Vagabonds #2
Creators: Josh Neufeld, The Beatles, Joyce Brabner, The Civilians, Gerry Conway, Nick Flynn, David Greenberger, Eileen Myles, Harvey Pekar, Andrew Rashkow, Martha Rosler, Peter Ross, R. Walker
Publishing Information: Alternative Comics, comic book, 32 pages,
Ordering Numbers: 9781891867170 (ISBN13), 1891867172 (ISBN10)

I was glad to hear that Josh Neufeld was working on a story about New Orleans before and after Hurricane Katrina because it occurred to me that it might just take that big an event to take him all the way outside his natural self-awareness. Neufeld's a super-bright, super-nice cartoonist with all of the skills necessary to make regularly compelling comics. And yet the vast majority of his work has a strange, stifled element to it, like the pages or the approach were either just over thought (as in this comic's "Father Outside") or under thought (as in an extremely pedestrian adaptation of Typhoid Mary's story, with writer Joyce Brabner). You always get the sense that Neufeld's in control of the story, even if he were to say, "I'm not in control of this story." The Vagabonds #2 has that feeling maybe more than any comics I've read in five years.

*****



Title: The Art Of Luca Tieri
Creator: Luca Tieri
Publishing Information: The Department of Art and Power, soft cover, 48 pages, December 2006, $10.99
Ordering Numbers:

I love the idea of someone doing full-color sketchbooks of artists in a series. I was a little underwhelmed by this book of mostly music-related illustrations. It's well-drawn, it's lively, and the colors are a lot of fun, but the work itself doesn't feel like anything one hasn't seen a hundred times before. This is also more of an art book with sketch elements, which doesn't come together as well as you might think. For the price point involved, I can't imagine casual fans picking this up, and at 48 pages of mostly high-profile material I can't imagine devoted fans not waiting for larger reproductions somewhere. A permanent place stuck between the idea for disposable art and permanent art of high regard doesn't really do anyone any favors.

*****



Title: Put The Book Back On The Shelf: A Belle and Sebastian Anthology
Creators: Various
Publishing Information: Image Comics, soft cover, 192 pages, 2006, $19.99
Ordering Numbers: 1582406006 (ISBN10)

I think I'd have to be a pretty dedicated fan of Belle and Sebastian to truly figure out if this book works for its intended audience, and even then I could be wrong. I know that it didn't work for me, as the lack of any shaping of the book beyond its announced subject really keeps this volume from being something more than a collection of short stories of varying skill, for most of us, anyway. That said, I like several of the individual short stories just fine, particularly the narrative daring shown in Steven Griffin's "If You Find Yourself Caught In Love" and in Jacob Magraw's "Fox in the Snow."

*****



Title: A Last Cry For Help
Creator: Dave Kiersh
Publishing Information: Bodega,
Ordering Numbers: 0977767906 (ISBN10)

Dave K's pretty, half-way earnest and slightly filthy treatments of classic teen-aged stories of longing and woe have become pretty conceptually perfect at this point. They're really pleasing to the eye, they're funny, and Kiersh knows how to play off the super-serious aspects of the emotional turmoil in which his characters traffic with the eye-rolling headaches and stifled laughter they cause looking from the outside in. It's also a pretty damn thin layer of soil for an artist of his obvious skill to plant his flag.

*****



Title: Herman Belquest
Creator: Robert H. Stevenson
Publishing Information: Shortpants Press, mini-comics, 40 pages, 2007, no price provided
Ordering Numbers:

This is the weakest offering I've yet read from the Midwestern comics collective-plus Shortpants Press. A mostly wordless, panel-less everyman fable, Herman Belquest embraces all the cliches of its sub-genre, with frequent side trips into almost incoherent symbolism. I don't even like the formatting, which tends to work against what might be a slow, narrative build if the constructions of the pages went differently, or the character design, which are inelegant and just not very interesting. What's odd is that I like a couple of the pages, like one where our lead, now in a sort of strait-jacket, dreams of birds and dark clouds. I don't think this stands alone very well at all; at best it seems like a two- or three-page story. If it leads to stories that build on the kind of art in its best three or four pages, I'm happy to forget about it.

*****




Title: Tony Loco #1-2
Creators: Mark Teague, Derek McCaw, Mitchell L. Peterson
Publishing Information: Illusive Arts, 28 pages, December 2006 & February 2007, $3.50
Ordering Numbers:

This work has a few qualities that distinguish it from a lot of smaller press comics working some corner of the heroic fantasy-adventure genre. The mental patient protagonist's filter of reality as a series of mostly frightening, South American symbol-laden figure has a nice, jarring effect. I like the slow build, the fact that we don't really leave the mental institution for at least these first 40-plus pages, and the idea of a hero that has to solve his own problems before taking care of others seems like a fruitful twist on the Marvel formula. That being said, these are unique frills on a pretty well-traveled vehicle, and both the drawing (in terms of backgrounds being dropped and exaggerated character design) and the writing proved to be really broadly aimed. There's not a lot of detail, not much in the way of a twist or idiosyncratic moment to keep the reader's interest if the main, fable-like story fades away.

*****



Title: Hairbutt the Hippo Funnies
Creators: Jason Paulos, Bodine Amerikah
Publishing Information: Rat Race Comics, soft cover, 100 pages,
Ordering Numbers:

This is old-fashioned humor magazine humor, so I wasn't surprised to read that some of what's in Hairbutt the Hippon Funnies made an appearance in Australia's MAD. Basically how these stories work is by marching the anthropomorphic lead through various scenarios, it kicks it enough out of reality to function as a funhouse mirror to certain foibles and practices, but also exaggerates the whole thing so that there's a kind of zaniness to the proceedings. Hairbutt doesn't really stay tethered long enough for it to really function as satire except in the broadest sense, and the authors have a nice sense of balance when it comes to extending their stories -- they don't crash and burn, and pretty much retain their level of humor throughout. Solid, workmanlike stuff, which is ironic in that it's the kind of material that you never think of anyone collecting.

*****



Title: Feeble Attempts
Creator: Jeffrey Brown
Publishing Information: Top Shelf, comic book, 48 pages, Spring 2007, $5
Ordering Numbers:

This is one of my favorite Jeffrey Brown efforts in that it's kind of a Jeffrey Brown sampler: it contains within its brief page count some of the relationship-obsessive comics for which Brown became well known, it has some of the straighter autobiographical works, some of the funnier takes on personal-story driven comics, some of the broader fantasy stuff, and a range of the humor material. It's basically a compendium of magazine work. The strongest stuff here is the humor ("My Jesus is an Awesome Jesus"), and the straight-ahead autobio. I'm particularly fond of a story called "Little Events" and the effect Brown gets through the way he presents events both ordinary and extraordinary in the the comics equivalent of a quiet monotone, leaving the reader scrambling to determine what he means and indicating some disdain towards what for many other might be overwhelmingly important circumstances. You don't see that effect very often.

*****



Title: Connect the Polka Dots
Creator: Bill Griffith
Publishing Information: Fantagraphics, soft cover, 144 pages, November 2006, $18.95
Ordering Numbers: 978156097663 (ISBN13), 1560977779 (ISBN10)

Every so often you'll hear someone say out loud that Fantagraphics' dedication to preserving large swathes of comics work and keep it in print, but it's usually in terms of their comic book cadre, or Robert Crumb, or even Charles Schulz. The work they've done with Bill Griffith, however, is probably the kind of thing that only that publisher could do. Zippy the Pinhead has to be the oddest strip to see publication in the last 35 years, even if you don't appreciate the consistently high level of the art or the tone Griffith goes for in his unrelenting kidney punching of America's decades-long dedication to making itself less beautiful, extraordinary, interesting and relevant. The title comes from the best section, "Dinerama," which features a series of one of a kind discussions or even declarative mini-monologues, all within the fading structure of a architectural element no one want to see go.

*****



Title: Nicknames
Creators: Steven Stwalley
Publishing Information: Self-Published, mini-comic, 20 pages, 2004
Ordering Numbers:

Nicknames is comprised a modest series of head shot drawings, the figures in which tend to be making some sort of summary statement, while text at the bottom of each portrait reveals their nicknames. Stwalley works in a lot of humor both in those depictions and builds towards more complicated relationships between visual and nickname, like the sour-faced girl proclaiming "Everyone looks at my tits" whose nickname we find out is Cindi "Big Ass" Le Grass. Is it supposed to be funny because she's clueless as to what part of her body is an item of mockery, or is it pointing out that "Big Ass Le Grass" is the kind of nickname you get when the rhyme is funny no matter what else might be notable about you. I prefer which answer is sillier. A nice, modest, tiny book, the kind of throwaway project that makes sense that way.

*****



Title: The Three Bad Ones
Creators: Eleanor Davis
Publishing Information: Self-Published, mini-comic, one page, 2004
Ordering Numbers:

This is a micro-mini three years old now which is sold in a bundle with another mini-comic, Drew Weing's The Vault. This mini, which is scrolled out onto a single piece of paper, describes three trollish brother who seek the perfect woman. Like man of Davis' drawing, there's a great deal of humor, including the design of the brothers, the horrible things they do to failed candidates, their idea of a perfect woman, and their wailing when they think themselves in something akin to the same position as they were in before. Davis ends on an unexpected, subtle grace note, the kind of pitch-perfect creative choice we've come to expect from Davis as she becomes one of the more interesting emerging cartoonists of this decade.

*****



Title: Wide Awake 666
Creators: Various
Publishing Information: 3 Boys Production/Wide Awake Press, soft cover, 112 pages, 2006, 9.95
Ordering Numbers:

This is an odd anthology in that it's one of the rare forms of the newer breed that I think works better as a summary statement on its intended subject more than it does as a collection of good comics. That doesn't mean there isn't quality comics work in here. I really liked a J. Chris Campbell piece called "Uncle Jabby," and the look of illustrations by Josh Cotter and Eleanor Davis. But a lot of the other pieces are kind of brusque; while they might not stand alone, if you mix in generally strong text work with a couple of novelties like a comic where the visuals are photos of monster-head keychains, and you have a nice little book about the continuing fascination many have with classic horror elements and creepy things in general.

*****



Title: Seafood
Creator: Josh Frankel
Publishing Information: Self-Published, mini-comic, 44 pages, 2004, $4
Ordering Numbers:

Another one of Josh Frankel's nature narratives, Seafood follows a Yellowfin Tuna through several instances of feeding until the point it's hooked, bonked on the head, and begins its journey into being stuffed into a can so someone can make a casserole out of it. Frankel's comics are entertaining in that they capture a kind of natural movement in terms of its story elements without seeming to place some sort of template on top of actions in a way they don't deserve. This story in particular has an obvious theme of this fish as a predator near the top of one food chain and on the near-bottom of another. The comic event ends with notes and a couple of pages where Frankel explains himself, and spotlights some related issues he'd like you to know about. They should hire him to do all the pro-animal materials from now on.

*****



Title: Anhedonia
Creator: Rusty Jordan
Publishing Information: Tender Loving Empire, mini-comic, 32 pages, $5
Ordering Numbers:

This is an art book, essentially, by the Portland-based gallery and sometimes publisher Tender Loving Empire. Jordan favors a lot of thin lines and a pretty standard critique of what he sees around him that concentrates on grotesques and the generally unattractive. I like his lettering more than the drawings, I think, or at least I can't see anything special in the work as it's presented here.

*****



Title: Nobody Can Eat 50 Eggs #30
Creator: S. Steiner
Publishing Information: Self-Published, mini-comic, 24 pages,
Ordering Numbers:

I have to assume that some recent movie re-purposed the old Cool Hand Luke line that is the title of this 'zine, because I can't imagine any younger kids today going back to get their healthy dose of Paul Newman and George Kennedy. Although I suppose it wouldn't be as big a surprise as the comics in this 'zine, which are energetically drawn humor strips of the Al Feldstein, pulled off with a promising level of panache. There's a lot of JR Williams by the way of John Kerschbaum, but which I mean a kind of broad sense of gag sketch comedy interspersed with some energetic, almost visceral stabs at the visual component. I have a suspicion that the cartoonist is very young, which might even count as exciting if there's still a lot of natural development to come. My favorites were "Art is Cruel," where a struggling artist known as "the famous art-eest" shits all over talented kids due to the poisons and frustrations floating around his sytem, and "attention deficit monkey" which I thought was a pretty good gag.

*****



Title: My Crow Comics #1
Creator: Dan W. Taylor
Publishing Information: Weird Muse Productions, mini-comic, 4 pages, 50 cents
Ordering Numbers:

At four pages, you should be happy to receive a poem about a ghost shrimp and a couple of sight gags. The art here is pretty slick, and there's none of the usual clumsiness when it comes to placing text over drawings. Still, there's nothing here I'd go out of my way to see, even though I am quite fond of a small silhouette of a man flushing a toilet.

*****



Title: The Backwards Folding Mirror #1
Creator: Jesse Moynihan
Publishing Information: Nonlocal Books, comic book, 24 pages, 2005, $2.50
Ordering Numbers:

I didn't think I wanted to know what a comic would have looked like if John Hankiewicz and Greg Stump had moved to Providence in the mid-1990s, hung out with the Fort Thunder gang, and did some work together, but I rather enjoyed this mix of oddball deadpan humor, dream comics and out-there design. In fact, this entire exercise was made worthwhile by my finding out about a second issue. It's not like this kind of humor is rare these days -- absurd overreaction and straight-faced ridiculousness isn't on the decline in certain realms of comics. Still, it's always nice to have one more place to go; I'll be watching this one.

*****



Title: Eight Way Bandits #1
Creators: Vincent Van Hustle, Stevie Street Hustle, Federico Zumel, Jeffrey LaJaunie, Bob McLeod
Publishing Information: The Hustle Brothers, comic book, 24 pages, April 2006, $3.50.
Ordering Numbers:

I didn't think that comics like this existed anymore, although you have to on some level appreciate the enthusiasm with which the creators plunge into their indy-comic-circa-1992 milieu of rudimentary crime comic pumped up with Kung Fu and cybernetics. It was hard for me to keep track of what the heck was going on, I felt like I was fast-forwarding through some 1980s cable movie looking for the naughty parts, except here the panels that make you stop and stare are the ones involving ultra-violence.

*****



Title: The Good Spot
Creator: Tommy Reeves
Publishing Information: Self-Published, mini-comic, 32 pages, 2002, $2.25
Ordering Numbers:

I love the bleakness of Tommy Reeves' story about a homeless man who works his way towards the "good spot" where the begging is at its best by killing off various homeless people in line for the spot. Reeves could use a lot of work in terms of art; a lot of his figures were roughly drawn and the buildings looked less like actual structures or their suggestion and more like drawn environments. To his credit, the cartoonist employs variations in page structure panel placement and seems to give some thought to how certain visuals communicate the passage of time. Still, there's a long way to go, from the only-on-TV elements of lottery ticket ending to a greater sense of continuity between depictions of various individuals.

*****



Title: Out of Water
Creator: Matthew Bernier
Publishing Information: Self-Published, mini-comic, 44 pages, 2005
Ordering Numbers:

One of the longer and more attractive major mini-comics of the last few years, Out of Water claims to be an adaptation of the Greek myth, "The Boy and the Dolphin" -- not one with which I'm personally familiar, but the story itself indicates that kind of lineage or at least an affection for stories of that type. The narrative is fairly: boy has friendship with dolphin, dolphin saves boy, dolphin worries about boy and makes sacrifice in order to renew their friendship. For a mini-comic it's very visually assured: the pictures are attractive, the design on the boy doesn't drive me crazy but he functions well within the comic and the other designs are lovely, there are some visual asides worthy of Dan Zettwoch where we see how the dolphin perceives the boy and how a predator is injured by the dolphin later on. It's just sort of an attractively done comic, nothing that would make you want to stalk Bernier, but definitely something where you want to see the big-book debut. Even the lettering is carefully placed and lovingly executed. It's amazing that this almost two years old; I assume we're going to see something impressive from the cartoonist soon.

*****



Title: How To Date A Girl in 10 Days (Or So)
Creator: Tom Humberstone
Publishing Information: Self-Published, comic book, 16 pages, March 2007
Ordering Numbers:

I think there's some promise in Tom Humberstone's abilities as put on display in these giveaway-looking comics about relationship troubles among and the general anxieties shared by a group of friends in their 20s. It has a nice, laconic pace, and the dialog is understated. The visuals show no such restraint and wildly careen between series of funny faces to suggest a progression in dialog to really over the top single-picture events -- two of the characters even stop to point out the use of leaves to suggest the passing of time. Humberstone would have to be a thrower of ink on the level of Jaime Hernandez to make us keep coughing done such sumptuous, overloaded pages, and he's not. Still, I have sympathy for any writer who wants to write about those years but wants to do so through incidental detail rather than a break-up, a funeral or a murder.

*****



Title: Schmapples
Creator: Eric Lappegard
Publishing Information: The International Cartoonist Conspiracy, webcomic, 52 pages printed out, 2007.
Ordering Numbers:

Eric Lappegard was a well-liked cartoonist who died this past summer well before his time. He spent the last seven months of his life working on an autobiographical comic strip. On the surface, a lot of it is terrible rough, just not well-crafted enough to communicate things clearly and to emphasize certain effects while reading the strip based on the way the art or the dialog is put on the page. Yet there are elements that held promise: a Sam Hurt-like tendency to fold fantasy elements into the strip without blinking, and a real knack for capturing his own likable everyman tendencies on the page -- not the easiest thing in the world to do. In a perfect world, this would have been a page of material showing up in a Comics Journal interview some ten years from now, but in ours it's a way to spend some time in the company of someone who was very much liked.

*****



Title: Their Condolences
Creators: Eve Englezos, Josh Moutray
Publishing Information: Icecreamlandia, mini-comic, 8 pages, 2007
Ordering Numbers:

I'm not sure how Eve Englezos and Josh Moutray work on their comics, but what it usually entails once completed is a series of nicely drawn pictures in portraiture form making some sort of bizarre or ironic or incongruous statement. This is one of their better offerings, if only because the portraits tend to draw a little bit more in the way of weird from the creators. On the negative side, there's not much too it; you won't be thinking of reasons to return to the works, let's say. One thing I find odd is that this work seems perfectly for a dedicated web site, but the on-line presence of Icecreamlandia is more removed than accessible.

*****



Title: Inconsequential Art #1
Creators: Alex Wilson, Dennis Culver
Publishing Information: Self-Published, mini-comic, 8 pages, 2007, $1
Ordering Numbers:

This is a tiny (see above) mini-comic relating an even tinier story where a man tries to get over with a woman who smokes only to overdose on nicotine and end up in the hospital without even the insurance covering it. It's odd, and kind of disjointed, but fairly cute. Plus there's a great cover. I love micro-minis, as tossed off as this or as elaborate of those thumb-sized books Chris Ware used to do. Reducing your comic in size is like adding a puppy to a family photos: suddenly, everything is adorable.

*****



Title: The Astounding Wolf-Man #3
Creators: Robert Kirkman, Jason Howard
Publishing Information: Image Comics, comic book, 28 pages, October 2007, $2.99
Ordering Numbers:

For those of you who don't pay a ton of attention to comic books, particularly independent comic books, Robert Kirkman has one of the unique pedigrees going right now -- two actual non-Marvel/DC books perceived to be hits: The Walking Dead and Invincible. It's worth keeping in mind because when creators who do most of their work for the big companies think about doing an indy comic, they think in terms of replicating Kirkman's success with his projects, not the vast majority of such books that don't move off the stands. The Astounding Wolf-Man appears poised to be the third big book in that portion of Kirkman's array of assignments (which includes a variety of work), although now in its third issue it's either supposed to suggest a feeling of discombobulation to mirror it's wolf-man protagonist, or it simply hasn't found its balance. The theme seems to be the ability of men to control their world, which is a tried and true were-wolf story point. This book seems suspended between a super-hero expression of what the Wolf-Man does and the more horrific or even conspiratorial/hierarchical elements of such stories. It read like pretty much a mess, and a thin one besides. The good thing is that Kirkman's two big hits were slow builders, and there's plenty of ways to write something into a more effective place when you control its entire world and the audience takes a while to claim its own stake in things.

*****

Well, that's it for this time around. Considering the number of distractions both voluntary and involuntary and the fact that I didn't have a scanner so I had to skip some comics that would have been easy to write about, I'm pretty happy with the number. I'll do another one the Sunday after Thanksgiving. I hope these were valuable to someone, and I hope if one of your books is above you'll forgive me these cursory words instead of a more complete review. I hope to do a better job with reviews in the future.
 
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If I Were In Philly, I’d Go To This


 
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Five Link A Go Go

* go, watch (not comics): Graham Annable zombie cartoon

* go, read: I'd make fun of this, but I've worked on a project with a similar end result.

* go, watch: Kazu Kibuishi interviewed on video

* go, read: The Adventures of Waddles

* go listen (not comics): Bill Simmons on the writer's culture at Saturday Night Live, which since it's remained much the same for the show's 30-plus years you don't need to have seen it in the last decade to enjoy the chat.
 
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Fff Results Post #95—Tough Guys

Five For Friday #95 Results

On Friday afternoon, participating CR readers were asked to "Name Five Memorable Tough Guy Moments from the Comics." Here are the results.

*****



Tom Spurgeon

1. Wolverine vows to kill everybody back when you believed him
2. Judge Dredd's Fist of Dredd
3. Noted medieval dandy Prince Valiant shows up at the bottom of my Sunday newspaper page whipping the shit out of an entire army
4. Palestinian woman interviewed by Joe Sacco talks post-torture smack to the Shin Bet
5. Superman repurposes Heat Vision after decades of using it to build giant statues of Lois Lane and repair the space zoo

*****



Ted Dawson

Neal Adams' Batman shackled and thrown into a shark tank (Batman #251) along with wheelchair-bound man by the Joker. Uses shackles to break shark's neck and wheelchair to bust out of tank.

Daredevil says What the hell and lets Bullseye fall several stories to the pavement below. DD #181.

Arrogant Sasquatch decides to test his strength by fighting the Hulk (Hulk Annual #8). Gets his butt whipped but even though Hulk is as angry as he's ever been, Hulk decides Sasquatch is not worth the final death blow.

In Spider-Man 2099 #5, Spidey is attacked by the samurai-ish Specialist, who mocks Spider-man for having no killer instinct. After Spidey saves the villain from a fall, the Specialist continues to attack him. Enraged, Spidey instinctively slashes his throat with his claws.

*****



Tony Collett

1. Wolverine doing his best "Dirty Harry" impersonation against the Hellfire Club guard, Uncanny X-Men 133
2. Popeye by E.C. Segar, before the cartoons got 'a holt of him
3. Lobo Paramilitary Special
4. (tie) Uncle Scrooge tearing up the saloon in "Back to the Klondike" by Carl Barks/tearing up Soapy Slick's riverboat in "Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck" by Don Rosa
5. Beau Smith

****



David Gallaher

1. Captain America vs. Thanos, Infinity Gauntlet #4. Thanos has killed all the heroes in a rather colorful and cruel manner. The only one left is Cap who says, "As long as one man stands against you, Thanos, you'll never claim victory."
2. Daredevil vs Nuke, Daredevil, "Born Again," #233. After getting the beating of his life, Daredevil fights back, leaves Nuke broken. 'white'
3. Slapstick beats the crap out of Gauntlet, Avengers: The Initiative #6. Damn. I never saw that coming. A short and sweet beating recapped in just one panel.
4. Thor takes out Iron Man, Thor #3. Iron man had it coming -- but wow -- this was beautiful.
5. American Eagle vs. Bullseye, Thunderbolts #115. Way to breathe life into a fourth tier character Ellis! American Eagle cripples Bullseye -- and uses the law to escape prosecution.

*****



Dave Knott

* Just about any Captain Easy fight sequence
* Marv gets the electric chair and, after riding the lightning, asks "Is That all You've Got?" (from Sin City vol. 1)
* Batman punches out Guy Gardner (from the Giffen/DeMatteis Justice League)
* Popeye takes something like 6 dozen bullets and keeps on coming (from Popeye vol.1)
* Superman is asked to fight Muhammad Ali and goes through with it, even though the fight is under a red sun and he knows he's gonna receive the beating of his life

*****



Marc Singer

In ascending order, because that's more bad-ass:

5. The Hyperclan realizes Batman knows their secret
4. Daredevil takes down the town of Broken Cross without uttering a single word
3. Edin walks to Grebak for food, and walks back
2. Richard Sheridan faces down the Deep Six, and his father, on the Glory Boat
1. Warpsmith Aza Chorn, eyes gone somewhere cold, somewhere beyond the pain, faces death like an albino samurai and insolently stares it down... for just one vital instant longer.

*****

Thanks to all that participated!
 
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First Thought Of The Day

The only thing that car alarms have done is to make us stop reaching into other people's cars to turn off the lights.
 
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Please To Worship My Giant, Fat Head



* interview with me at Blog@Newsarama, part one
* interview with me at Blog@Newsarama, part two

art by Michael Netzer for which I'm grateful; it's not his fault I look like a thumb with lips
 
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If I Were In Bethesda, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In LA, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Madison, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Boulder, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Ravenna, I’d Go To This


 
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Wenn ich in Frankfort war, würde ich zu diesem gehen


 
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CR Week In Review



The top comics-related news stories from October 6 to October 12, 2007:
1. The appropriate board accepts the resignation of Guilford, CT teacher Nate Fisher.

2. Another week, another campus cartoon controversy.

3. Steven Massarsky, one of the ownership group behind the late '80s/early '90s publisher Valiant, passes away.

Winner Of The Week
Brian Selznick

Loser Of The Week
Carlin

Quote Of The Week
"That pompous phrase was thought up by some idiot in the marketing department of DC. I prefer to call them Big Expensive Comics." -- Alan Moore on the term Graphic Novel, in the Telegraph.

this week's imagery comes from pioneering comic book house Centaur Publications
 
posted 10:30 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Five For Friday #95—Tough Guys

Five For Friday #95 -- Name Five Memorable Tough Guy Moments from the Comics


1. Wolverine vows to kill everybody back when you believed him


2. Judge Dredd's Fist of Dredd


3. Noted medieval dandy Prince Valiant shows up at the bottom of my Sunday newspaper page whipping the shit out of an entire army


4. Palestinian woman interviewed by Joe Sacco talks post-torture smack to the Shin Bet


5. Superman repurposes Heat Vision after decades of using it to build giant statues of Lois Lane and repair the space zoo

*****

This category is now closed. Thanks to all that participated!

*****
Five For Friday is a reader response feature. To play, send a response to that week's question while it's still Friday. Play fair. Responses up Sunday morning.
 
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Friday Distraction: Panel Borders


 
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If I Were In LA, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In DC, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Bethesda, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Birmingham, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Bethesda, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Chicago, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Ravenna, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In SF, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In DC, I’d Go To This


 
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Priego: Not Denied Entry Into USA

According to a statement made by someone claiming to be comics scholar Ernesto Priego on the blog of The International Comic Arts Forum 2007 Chair Marc Singer, he was not denied an entry into the United States to present at ICAF, as was asserted on his behalf. Priego:

"I appreciate the post, but I would like to say that I wasn't 'denied entry'; my visa was not renewed, most probably because I did not apply for it in person and did not submit enough documents proving what I'd be doing in the States. So they didn't know I was going to a conference. I had just applied for a normal renewal.

I don't want to make any further public comments on this matter, but I wanted to publicly clarify the distinction between being denied entry as a scholar and not having gotten the paper renewed. Information travels very fast on the Internet, and sometimes it gets distorted as it flies over the seas of bits and pixels.

I am, of course, profoundly sorry I won't be able to attend ICAF..."

I regret running the story when I did, although this exactly why one tries to source things in the body of an article in terms of claims and statements, so I don't feel too badly there. I find a lot of things confusing here, actually, including the chasm between the ICAF's take and Priego's, the seeming disconnect between the two just in terms of being in contact, that Priego waited two days to reply to anyone's questions and that now he doesn't want to make comments on a story he says doesn't exist. Although for all I know there's layers and layers of story here yet to be uncovered. Or perhaps this all wrapped up in people having galaxy-wide differences of opinion on the implications of being denied a visa for unknown reasons. I don't know.
 
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Guilford Board of Education Accepts Teacher Nate Fisher’s Resignation

This piece in the Hartford Courant brings the facts, quotes from Nate Fisher, and a healthy dose of derision over the whole matter of a high school teacher resigning after giving a student a copy of Eightball #22 as a make-up assignment. One revelation in there that I hadn't seen before is that Fisher assigned the comic, later re-released into a stand-alone hardcover by Pantheon, because it was something that might allow the student to more quickly catch up. Another is that there might be two investigations as a follow up, and still another is that at least from Fisher's lawyer's perspective, labeling the book as pornography when it was clearly not pornography colored the entire affair and severely limited options for the 29-year-old non-tenured teacher.

That last notion just kills me, because the pornography designation was on the face of it wrong, and should have been the first item of business, and all the back and forth with people wailing about parents having the obligation to be protective of their children as if anyone on earth was contesting this idea drowned out what should of been an industry-wide, assumption-shattering, voice-as-one protest to this awful, unfair, dangerous and flatly false label.

Although it's done now, I think that based on what we know this outcome sucks, in no small part because it is not an outcome based on what anyone learned but instead was inexorably determined by what a few people were quick to presume. One hopes that any investigations into Fisher's conduct based on this perfect storm of overheated stupidity comprised of upset parents, lazy press people, and the fear-of-lawsuit-handcuffed administration figures enjoy all the success of a Vinko Bogataj ski-jump. It would also be nice if people make good on those glimmers of behind the scenes work on Fisher's behalf to help him find a new job or to provide as full a defense as possible if anything more dreadful comes up.
 
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Go, Look: Matt Wiegle’s Site


 
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If I Were At SPX, I’d Do These Things

The Small Press Expo (SPX) begins today. SPX is one of a handful of premier events for small press and alternative comics in all of North America, and with its single-room, single-hotel nature retains a summer camp (I guess now it's a Fall retreat) intimacy and friendliness that makes it a favorite with a lot of pros.

If I were there, this is some of what I would do.

1. I would attend a lot of the excellent-sounding programming, particularly the spotlight panels. If I could only go to one, it would probably be Kim Deitch, one of the great living cartoonists. There are also fine panels with artists that don't tend to do a lot of panels, like C.F. and Nick Abadzis.

2. I would take a slow walk around the room, looking at all the booths, taking as much time as I can, with one rule: I can't buy anything. This has commercial advantages in that you don't end up impulse buying, but mostly it's one of the few shows that you can take in all at once, and it's an interesting snapshot of the comics art form.

3. I would buy things on a second pass around the room, concentrating on mini-comics with high-end production values, but only from people who weren't annoying pieces of shit the first time around. In addition to lots of new work from alt/indy giants like Drawn and Quarterly and Top Shelf (Super Spy is an interesting book), I would look closely at everything offered by Bodega Distribution, PictureBox Inc. (is Maggots out yet?), Partyka, Buenaventura Press (buy Elvis Road if you haven't yet) or Sparkplug. I really like David King's work, and would seek out his latest from the Sparkplug people, even though he's not going. I'd also buy anything I found from Warren Craghead, who may go but isn't listed.

4. I would buy as much original art as I could afford. I love this show for original art. You know what would be awesome? Eleanor Davis original art. Roger Langridge sells freakishly lovely pages if you've never seen them.

5. I would take a photo of Larry Marder and every other cartoonist there from the 1980s generation, because their being at SPX is one of the best things about SPX. On a certain level, the show is still Camp McCloud, with Scott as the Camp Director, people like Tom Hart and Brian Ralph as the C.I.T.s and emerging artists like the I Know Joe Kimpel bunch as the campers. In fact, I would try to take as many photos of as many cartoonists as possible.

6. I might go to the comics criticism panel, but I kind of think there's been a lifetime's worth of talk on writing about comics recently, and that this time could be better spent just doing more and better work. If I went to any theme panels, I would try to ask a question or two of whatever unfortunate soul that gets stuck up there with three or four big-name super-talkers -- this always happens, and is always funny.

7. I would try as best as I could to have a lot of free time to hang out and chat. It's a very chatty show, and attracts some of the nicest comics talents. I would tell a lot of stories about previous Expos, none of which would be true.

8. I would try to break bread with some old friends, and invite along some new friends.

9. I would try to hang out a bit with my writing-about-comics peers like Mr. Wolk and Mr. Mautner and Mr. Collins and Ms. MacDonald.

10. I would try to buy a copy of the new Special Edition of Joe Sacco's Palestine. That work has gotten only better with age, the new edition is gorgeous, and the supplementary material is thoughtful and well-designed. It will be gone in a heartbeat, and two months more to wait is two months I could be reading the thing. In general, though, I wouldn't worry too much about making sure I got whatever gets called "the book of the show." In most cases I find buying for my bookshelf ten years from now always serves me better than buying for the on-line conversation next Tuesday.

11. I would ask someone from the area meet with me for a couple hours of the show, ideally someone who loved comics but wasn't immersed in the scene aspects of it, because that kind of outside perspective can be fascinating. And devastating.

12. I would sit in the back of the Ignatz Awards and make jokes, but not so loud I would ruin the experience for anyone else.

13. I would find the time to eat a giant, unhealthy breakfast.

14. It would be cool to meet Bill Griffith.

15. I would choose an outdoor Sunday activity over an indoor Sunday activity.
 
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Go, Look: Jeff Smith Our Gang Cover


 
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One Has to Admit: Jesus’ Return Would Alter The Muhammed Cartoons Story

The Muhammed cartoons controversy as a hypocritical over-reaction designed to mask the war-like tendencies of Muslims plotting to overthrow the West isn't a take you see make it into published form a whole lot, so it's nice to be reminded it's out there, if only to have a complete representation of opinions. It's also interesting to see the often savage nature of Muslim press cartoons brought into the debate, as there was one point a while back I was completely certain this is where the cultural discussion would shift.
 
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Go, Bid: Dave Sim Original Art Auction To Benefit The Doug Wright Awards


 
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Nude Cartoon Angers Namibian Chief

I'm not sure this is a major story, and it's hard to comment without the specifics in front of me, but it's interesting to note that the concept that certain figures should be afforded dignity by cartoonists has some worldwide currency. Although as members of a group that was once a victim of attempted genocide, those in the herero tribe may be more sensitive to certain portrayals than others.
 
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Happy 60th Birthday, Pat Brady!


 
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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* as if there were any doubts that comics or discussions of comics are just about everywhere now, Mike Catron notes an article in the LA Times about Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia name-dropping Lex Luthor.

* one blogger asks: the most racist strip ever?

* definitely not comics: So Star Wars, Lost, X-Men to a certain extent and now definitely Star Trek are all engaging this notion of looking at one's past and finding all the players from one's present already acting as agents in one's life. What is that impulse all about?
 
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Happy 42nd Birthday, Dan Abnett!


 
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Quick hits
Giant Interviews
The Wright Opinion: Shannon Wheeler
Daily Cross Hatch: Paul Gravett, Nick Bertozzi 01
Daily Cross Hatch: Paul Gravett, Nick Bertozzi 02
Daily Cross Hatch: Paul Gravett, Nick Bertozzi 03

Exhibits/Events
SPX Previewed
Mike Luckovich Exhibit Opens
Rutu Modan Appearance Previewed
Forthcoming Schulz Exhibit Previewed
Foglios, Randall Monroe Speaking At Conference

History
Comics Are American Culture

Industry
Layoffs at ADV
How To Save Comics... Now With Charts
Some Webcomics Revenue Models Not For Everyone

Interviews/Profiles
Newsarama: Scott Shaw
Inside Pulse: Tom Brevoort
Walrus Comix: Dean Haspiel
Creative Loafing: Mike Luckovich
Another Lisa Moore Opinion Piece
The New York Sun: Marjane Satrapi
Profile of Scary Secret Scanning Society

Not Comics
Comic Provides Wisdom
Brandon Routh Playing Dylan Dog
Noah Berlatsky on the Catwoman Movie
Captain America's Goofy-Looking New Costume

Publishing
IDW to Publish Snaked
Backstage to Act-I-Vate
Robot Dreams Previewed
Which One's the Zombie Cover?
Comixology Launches Columns With Kristy Valenti
SilverBulletComicBooks.com Becomes ComicsBulletin.com

Reviews
Van Jensen: Sentences
Matt Brady: MPD Psycho Vol. 1
Jason Green: Fox Bunny Funny
Rob Clough: I Killed Adolph Hitler
Tim Hodler: Omega the Unknown #1
Graeme McMillan: Green Arrow and Black Canary #1
 

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CR Review: Power Glove



Creator: Chris Duffy
Publishing Information: Webcomics Nation, ongoing, 10 chapters to date, Free
Ordering Numbers: Webcomic

There are three reasons worth checking out the adventure comedy serial Power Glove at Webcomics Nation. The first is that Duffy is the comics editor at Nickelodeon and according to Jordan Crane an exacting one, so a look at his own comics might provide a clue as to how Duffy likes his comics constructed or at least what he finds funny. The second is that Power Glove embraces some of the virtues of webcomics, such as the ability to get playful work out in front of a public without worrying about return and lengthy, drop-away tiering of the narrative. The third is that it's entertaining to read, which is really the only one you need.

Power Glove follows three acquaintances -- Paul, Angela and Casey -- as they interact with a glove Paul drags home from the job which seems to have magical, or least super-scientific abilities. Basically, the glove is just a plot trigger that allows Duffy to do things to the characters. More importantly, it gives all three something over which to obsess, which reveals character and leads to much of the comedy. What's surprising given the Will Elder-esque density of some of Nickelodeon's cartoons and the rat-a-tat panel to panel clarity of others, Power Glove fairly rambles, loping along at its own speed and sometimes almost by accident slipping into a joke or two. It reads sort of like Lapinot, only without the self-improvement aspects, the kind of from-the-journal comics making that a cartoonist might create in his neighbor's living room while babysitting very quiet and well-behaved children. There's no sense of beginning or end, only middle. While Duffy's art is generally crude and his ability to build progressions seemingly limited for the roughness of the craft, the quality of the pictures bounces around enough to make me believe he's not always pushing at the far end of his talent. Then again, why should he? This is a comic about a mischievous rubber glove whose power may have come from the toilet, two idiots acting as a kind of 1a and 1b of impulsive juvenile activity, and a (so far) sensible person whom we can't truth for the company she keeps.

It's very pleasant, actually, with a couple possible exceptions. There some sequences where Duffy crosses the line from a kind of careening, carefree rhythm to his back and forth exchanges and into a kind of self-indulgent storytelling that isn't unfamiliar to similarly loose comics. It should also be noted that almost no one finds abrupt fake-outs of the "Really? No, not really." variety funny except the person who writes them. Mostly this comic is good company. If this is Duffy doodling into a pad, and there's a lot to suggest he might take any doodling more seriously than this comic, there are worse things than having a guy like this pass you notes in class.


 
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If I Were In DC, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Bethesda, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In NYC, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Maryland, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Bethesda, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Minneapolis, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Barcelona, I’d Go To This


 
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Hybrid Hugo Cabret Is NBA Nominee



The Invention of Hugo Cabret, a work appropriate for younger readers by the successful book illustrator Brian Selznick that contains within it several comics sequences, has been nominated for a National Book Award in the category of Young People's Literature. Cabret may be the best example of a hybrid prose-comics work to date. These are mostly prose works where pages are given over to comics for some reason, generally to show the work of a character within the book who is a cartoonist. In Selznick's book, the visual sequences provide propulsive bridges between portions of the story, and, I'd say more importantly, suggest the silent film aspects of the book's plot. Heidi MacDonald caught that one of the books vying with The Invention of Hugo Cabret for the award is Sherman Alexie's The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, which features illustration from cartoonist Ellen Forney. The awards will be announced during a ceremony on November 14.
 
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Peru’s Carlin Faces Potential Jail Time

A bit of news-gathering and caveat-making at the Forbidden Planet International blog indicates that Peruvian cartoonist Carlos "Carlin" Tovar faces a fine and a potential two years in jail from coverage of a 2005 incident concerning Peruvian Interior Department official Gladys Barboza Pena and I believe her having her visa denied by the US. Like FPI, I find it almost impossible to track a news story in Spanish, so I'm not sure about the status of the fine relative to the status of the sentence, or, really, what the heck is going on. This seems on the surface of it quite horrible, though.
 
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I Love This Milton Caniff Panel



thanks, Jacob Covey
 
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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* Mike Lynch weighs in on a recent story whereby one of the cartoonists working with Platinum on a strip find themselves looking at someone else doing that strip for web publication. I haven't really commented on the story myself because I think it's just sort of obviously terrible in a way that seems really self-apparent. It's not solely a matter of people signing or not signing contracts that say certain things, although that's a huge part of it. At this point it's that such a contract exists at all, and that they specifically exploit economic inequities and the desire for newer talents to make it in the field.

* Not Comics: Marvel has a lead-in-their-toys problem.

* If you weren't sad that Disney Adventures shut down before, maybe you'll be upset to learn that this likely means a lot of planned Roger Langridge comics featuring the Muppets may not see the light of day beyond a Fozzie the Bear cartoon that found its way into the publication's last issue. Or maybe you won't, I don't know.

* Humble Stumble gets the NEA's special Christmas comic strip slot. I really like the idea of a special Christmas comic strip.

* Kathleen O'Brien at the Newark Star-Ledger, one of the very best and attentive newspaper writers when it comes to covering comics issues, unpacks the post-Lisa Moore's death Funky Winkerbean. Current strips deal with the direct aftermath of Moore's passing through her husband dealing with it at some future point in therapy. On October 23, a "10 Years Later" storyline will kick off and the label at least will stay until the end of the year. What's fascinating about the 10 Year Later storyline -- and O'Brien's article indicates it may not be permanent, although everything we've heard up until now suggests a new status quo -- is that this puts the topical strip (the Iraq War, for one) into the future.

* Tripwire may follow up this year's comeback glossy with three magazines, two tied into popular cross-media properties.

* I liked the mostly Adrian Tomine-related photos on the Drawn and Quarterly blog (scroll down). You can read photo subject Anne Ishii's take on the event here.

* Here's a potential campus cartoons controversy too obtuse for me to even understand what it's about. However, if it's about Joe Paterno, let me once again state that it's totally eerie how much the football legend looks like Emil Gargunza.

* Speaking of Funky Winkerbean, as I did a few items back, does his coloring look pretty great or what? It's not anything that would blow you away, but there's a lot in the way of muted colors and gradations that I'm not used to seeing in the color versions of black and white dailies. Most of the coloring on King Features dailies was at one time done at the production facility rather than by the cartoonists -- even though the production people used the Sundays as a guide, the effect was sometimes more colorized than colored, if you know what I mean. This looks quite close to the Sundays.

* Ammar Abboud makes a couple of notes about recent posts here concerning the passing of Serge de Beketch and Les Humanoides Associes.
 
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Go, Look: Robot26.com


 
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Two Rights Groups Back Irfaan Khan

The International Press Institute and the World Press Freedom Committee issued a press release earlier this week condemning the recent decision of a court in India to sentence four journalists including cartoonist Irfaan Khan for contempt charges because their work portrayed a former justice in a less than totally flattering light. Those sentences were suspended for the sake of another hearing yet to be held. The release is useful if you want to read an advocacy-type summary of the case to date, and may be that much more helpful if you follow the links provided and choose to see the case portrayed in the context of other Indian abuses of the journalistic class. It's not a reach to see the court decision -- which decided to ignore both the status of the justice as an ex-member, and, oh, the simple matter that all four journalists stand behind their takes as 100 percent true -- as part of a presumption that exists in some places in that country's culture against the kind of press freedom you might expect to see in a mature democracy.
 
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OTBP: Big Top 2


 
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Another Campus Controversy: University of Arizona Cartoon Labeled Anti-Semitic

According to media reports, on Tuesday the Arizona Daily Wildcat published Joseph Topmiller's cartoon featuring a restaurant credit slip with a seven percent tip apparently left by someone named "Mark Goldfarb." Underneath that was the message "Attention all crappy-tipping Jews!!! Just because you're 'screwing' the server... does not mean it's a mitzvah."

Negative on-campus response was immediate: complaints from students, student leaders, school administration, directors of the campus' Jewish Studies programs -- about 30 formal complaints in total. Some of them that took the form of letters to the paper can be found here. While the paper ran an apology yesterday, editors claim they did vet the cartoon and that it wasn't malicious in intent. The humor, they say, was directed at people who think Jewish people are cheap rather than at Jewish people being cheap. Opinion writers at the publication offered up a variety of takes here. A number of letters in support of the cartoon's publication from various points of view (the sophistication and actual target of the humor, the principles behind free speech, "lighten up") can be found here.

Topmiller's latest comic can be found in the paper today. I believe the offending cartoon has been eliminated from the paper's archives, but Dirk Deppey has a copy up in today's Journalista! if you want to scroll down a bit.
 
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Happy 92nd Birthday, Joe Simon!


 
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Time Warner Target: Comics Site, Too?

The initial news reports about Time Warner filing a trademark infringement case against a British Columbia company called Adult Cartoon Network all casually indicate that this somehow involves the free download of comics as well as cartoon video on demand. Not only is it difficult for me to find the site in question -- news of the suit dominates mentions of the site on-line and the site's own google status -- but the site I think it may be doesn't seem to offer a lot of comics, if any. To be honest, a kind of anopsia sets in whenever I try to work my way around a naughty site, so it may be I just can't find it.

There's probably something glib to be written about the relative chances for a suit against some site out there that may facilitate illegal downloads and a suit against a site like this coming under fire for trademark infringement, and maybe something even more not comics to be said that notes criticism of the animation channel's sometimes-mature comics from cultural forces that are a bit freaked out when any of the cartoons offered may not be totally as safe for children as a visit to Fred Rogers' house. But I'm not sure I can go much further than to introduce the subject. The suit was filed October 1.
 
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Happy 55th Birthday, Jim Woodring!


 
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Quick hits
Exhibits/Events
Erica Friedman at MangaNEXT

History
Thinkpiece on Schulz Book and Previous Writings

Industry
I Hate Your Cartoon
I Hate Your Cartoon
I Hate Your Cartoon
Sean O'Reilly to Platinum
Steven Grant on Industry Journalism
Sean Kleefeld on Industry Journalism

Interviews/Profiles
Pulse: Dean Haspiel
Pop Candy: Adrian Tomine
Express: Richard Thompson
Blog Mundo Fantasma: Kevin Scalzo
Occasional Superheroine: Jeff Lemire
Blog Mundo Fantasma: Vanessa Davis

Not Comics
He Doesn't?
Adair Tishler Likes Comics
You Had Me Until Paragraph Two

Publishing
Save Scalped
Funnybooks For Jesus
Alice in Sunderland Reaches 10K

Reviews
Sean May: Ex Machina
Chris Butcher: Best of '06
Paul Buhle: Life, In Pictures
Marc Mason: Jungle Girl #0-1
Johanna Eubank: With The Light
Ancient Brian Doherty Round-Up
Eddie Campbell: Graphic Witness
Michael May: Honour Among Punks
Jason Green: Black Ghost Apple Factory
David Welsh: Manga: The Complete Guide
Leroy Douresseaux: Black Ghost Apple Factory
Leroy Douresseaux: Inubaka Crazy For Dogs Vol. 5
 

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CR Review: Glister Vol. 1


not exactly the final cover, but close

Creator: Andi Watson
Publishing Information: Image Comics, soft cover, 64 pages, August 2007, $5.99
Ordering Numbers: 9781582408538 (ISBN13)

There are works out there as sound in their conception as Andi Watson's new book Glister -- an intimate size, a likely to please price point, attractive covers and sturdy interiors, and a story with a female protagonist who takes an active role in solving supernatural problems that happen to her through no fault of her own -- but not many. Where Glister truly distinguishes itself is in Watson's absolute confidence in the visual storytelling. In this first book, Glister Butterworth encounters a haunted teapot containing a lousy writer named Phillip Bulwark-Stratton (a name convincing enough I'll admit I double-checked by looking it up), who drafts Glister into helping in the creation of another work. Eventually, Glister brings the situation into a satisfying close, not through a sudden bolt of inspiration, but by working through the problem and a number of potential solutions.

Watson adds depth to his storytelling and builds a sense of narrative density by confidently moving back and forth between storytelling modes. There are close-ups and cutaways, tableaux that sustain a single story point, complex panel constructions on a single page, and even static sequences that are designed to build into a rat-a-tat rhythm through which the quickly rolls forward. A lot of the images are themselves really lovely, against which the more simplified characters fairly pop off of the page. This is made necessary by a story that lopes along at a pleasant but not inspiring pace; it's not up to the skill with which it unfolds as performance. The overall effect is one of engaged, pleasant conversation, though; I feel Watson's getting close to find a tone that would indulge the graceful and manic qualities inherent to his work, and have great, transcendent qualities of its own. It's always fascinating to see Watson work in such a controlled fashion, even with years of work of that type behind him; the Skeleton Key back-up contains more frenetic, funny and visually chaotic moments -- but maybe for the first time, the bigger name back-up really does seem like a back-up.



* Kurt Busiek was the first of seven people to write in to inform me that Phillip Bulwark-Stratton is of course a parody of Edward Bulwer-Lytton, "the originator of 'It was a dark and stormy night' and the bad wordsmith 'honored' by the annual Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest," -- well, the spirit of that statement or one of its parts, because only Kurt used that exact phrasing.
 
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Newsmaker Interview: Larry Marder



The cartoonist and famously well-connected comics industry veteran Larry Marder announced on his blog this week that he was leaving his position as president of McFarlane Toys. I wanted to ask him a few follow-ups for clarification purposes, if only to find out what was next and what it was like to commute every week by airplane.

I apologize for any time I took him away from his signature creation Beanworld, and my thanks to Larry for agreeing to answer my questions.

*****

TOM SPURGEON: Can I ask how long the decision's been in the works, and if there were any triggering factors that led to it taking place right now, even if it's just time of year or something like a break in the work calendar?

LARRY MARDER: I had been restless for about a year now because the internal dynamics of McFarlane Toys were in flux. I was increasingly uncomfortable with decisions that were being made. As a result, Todd and I fell out of sync. It is his company and he has the final word on all policy. I no longer had the ability to make a serious contribution to the direction of McFarlane Toys so it was time for me to move on.

As Jack Kerouac wrote in Lonesome Traveler, "I have no axe to grind; I'm simply going to another world."

In my case, that is Beanworld.

SPURGEON: Can you talk more explicitly about your creative plans for the near future, where Beanworld fits into it, and how this change in employment will help or perhaps hinder those plans? Basically, you're back on Beanworld now, right?

MARDER: Right. I'm going to concentrate on Beanworld for the immediate future. The old trade paperbacks are mostly out of print. So one of my most immediate tasks is to get all the previously published material back in print in a viable format for today's marketplace. Plus, the material that would have made up the fifth collection was never published at all. And there are various other Beanworld odds and ends floating around that are probably worth being collected too.

To me Beanworld isn't just my comic book -- it is also my sense of aesthetics. I plan to do other things with Beanworld that go beyond comics or animation. It is an amazing thing for me to have my imagination and creative abilities focused on only one thing, me, after so many years at Image and McFarlane.

SPURGEON: When you started working with Image a decade and a half ago you held one of the only positions of its type. Now it seems like there are a greater number of opportunities for well-connected insiders in terms of comics publishing and related industries, both in consultant terms and in staffed positions. Do you foresee yourself eventually seeking out work on that side of your professional resume in this new marketplace? Are you open to that possibility?

MARDER: Sure, I would welcome an opportunity to try my hand at something like that again. I'm always open to interesting challenges. I like to solve problems through careful analysis, consensus and cooperation.

I definitely achieved that at Image Comics. I always said that being Executive Director of Image was like being a head coach of an all-star basketball team where the players were also the owners. It was a volatile time in the industry and the Image partners were young, cocky, and their pockets full of cash.

But at the heart of the Image Revolution there was a great tale. Through industry speeches and advertising I told the partner's story to the world-at-large in a concise fashion that turned the company's public face around. At Image I was a very public person.

At McFarlane Toys, I did more or less the same thing but it was more internal than external. My position at McFarlane was very behind-the-scenes. It was my job to keep all the various divisions scattered all over the globe pointed in the same direction. Sometimes it seemed like I talked on the phone for eight years. If I wasn't on the phone, I was in someone's office listening, gathering facts, analyzing.

I perceived the McFarlane empire as a giant jigsaw puzzle and it was my job to collect all the pieces and fit them together and be able to make sense out of it all. I was very good at this for a long time. I could explain Todd's mission to a new employee or a supplier or a licensor or a lawyer or a banker far more efficiently than anyone else.

SPURGEON: You've been away from comics without being away from comics. Now that you're re-orienting at least a part of your life towards comics -- I know you're going to SPX this week -- what's your general feeling about the market and the culture as it's developed since you played such a significant role giving the market its current shape while at Image?

MARDER: When Marvel bought Heroes World in the mid-90s and knocked the Direct Market out of its orbit, almost every decision made for the next year to 18 months was knee-jerk, defensive, and reactive. Everyone was looking for a deep foxhole to hide in. The business transmuted into what it is today.

Fortunately, the Internet came to the rescue like the proverbial calvary. Now, once you get their attention, today's creators and publishers can communicate directly and immediately with their fans. No more garbled messages filtering through the magazines and papers.

I was shocked at how quickly the word traveled that I had started a blog last summer. I went online and the Beanworld community immediately showed up and said they were happy to see me.

SPURGEON: Now that it's over, what was that commute like? What's it do to a person to have that lengthy of a trip to work every week for so many years? Do you have a lot of frequent flier miles? Will you ever step on a plane again?

MARDER: Every Monday morning, I would wake up in California at 4:15 am to catch a 6:45 am flight to Phoenix. It's only an hour flight and it is amazing how many of the same people I'd see every week, doing the same thing as me. Then, every Friday night, I'd catch a flight after work and fly home to California. On Friday, I often flew with many of the same folks as I had the previous Monday. The commute became very routine. I could do it in my sleep and often did.

What is even funnier, often, as part of my responsibilities, in the middle of one of those weeks, I would have to fly on a day trip to LA or Burbank to call on a movie studio licensor.

[Part] of my job was also, coordinating with McFarlane Design, the toy company's R&D division in New Jersey, and I flew out there to visit for a full week about four to six times a year. Over the last five years, I also spent a lot of time in Hong Kong and China, with the McFarlane employees at TMP ASIA. That office coordinates all the engineering and quality control of the toy manufacturing process in the Chinese factories. Between April of last year and June of this year, I made seven trips to Asia. The jet lag one experiences upon the return of one of those trips is staggering.

Yeah, I have a lot of miles. And I won't miss constantly flying one iota.


 
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This Isn’t A Library: New and Notable Releases to the Comics Direct Market



*****

Here are those books that jump out at me from this week's probably mostly accurate list of books shipping from Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc. to comic book and hobby shops across North America.

I might not buy all of the following -- I might not buy any -- but were I in a comic book shop I would likely pick up the following and look them over, potentially resulting in mean words and hurt feelings when my retailer objected.

*****

AUG071978 BRAWL #1 (OF 3) (MR) $2.99
AUG070016 BPRD KILLING GROUND #3 (OF 5) $2.99
The best of the comic book-type comics in a week where Chris Butcher says that manga volumes outstrip comic books, which is sort of amazing, but mostly from a "holy crap, that's a lot of manga" end of things. No one in the entire world thinks there are two few comic book titles being published.

JUN070034 LITTLE LULU VOL 17 THE VALENTINE TP $10.95
The reprint series of great comics no one ever talks about continues.

JUN070259 ABSOLUTE SANDMAN VOL 2 HC (MR) $99.00
The first one was beautiful looking, and given what comics from this time period look like 15-20 years later, I would have to imagine this is the best way to collect Neil Gaiman's landmark fantasy series.

AUG070203 CAPTAIN CARROT AND THE FINAL ARK #1 (OF 3) $2.99
Eventually, they all come back.

AUG070217 SUICIDE SQUAD RAISE THE FLAG #2 (OF 8) $2.99
See what I mean?

MAR073414 JAMES STURMS AMERICA HC (MR) $24.95
How sick is it when a work of this obvious quality hits the market and you make a mental note to promote it so that it doesn't get lost? It's an embarrassment of riches in comics right now. Really, unless you read the component works and simply didn't care for them, you need this book. Along with the forthcoming special edition of Palestine, this book marks a major Fall for pantheon-level alt-comics work in reprint form.

MAY073421 JOSEPH GN (MR) $9.95
Nicolas Robel's short story is more a series of special moments than an engrossing, single story, but what moments! Plus: pretty.

JUL073923 NARUTO VOL 19 TP $7.95
JUL073924 NARUTO VOL 20 TP $7.95
JUL073925 NARUTO VOL 21 TP $7.95
Naruto's assault on the pocketbooks of America's youth continues with another three books out.

JUL073524 SHORTCOMINGS HC (MR) $19.95
Adrian Tomine's best work to date and along with the Sandman book the first big bomb of the Holiday comics shopping season.

JUL073563 MINESHAFT #20 (MR) $6.95
Old school comics and comics-related stuff 'zine, with everything cool and everything frustrating that such a statement implies.

AUG073662 TOWN BOY SC $16.95
The work of Lat's that all of my friends like and probably his best drawn work. I like it, too.

MAY073423 WALT & SKEEZIX VOL 3 1925-1926 HC $29.95
JUL073808 SUNDAYS WITH WALT AND SKEEZIX VOL 1 HC $95.00
Probably the must-have-now books of a very strong week. I think the dailies are the greater achievement, but who doesn't love the Sunday Gasoline Alley strips?

AUG074029 YEARBOOK STORIES 1976 1978 (MR) $4.00
This is a collection of the shorts Top Shelf's Chris Staros has written over the years. Publishers named Chris are required by law to make comics of their own.

AUG073289 YOTSUBA MANGA VOL 5 TP $9.99
A fine comedic series with a zealot's clarity in recalling the high energy and innocence-through-ignorance of being around little kids several hours a day.

*****

The full list of this week's releases, including some titles with multiple cover variations and a long, impressive list of toys and other stuff that isn't comics, can be found here. Despite this official list there's no guarantee a comic will show up in the stores as promised, or in all of the stores as opposed to just a few. Also, stores choose what they carry and don't carry.

To find your local comic book store, check this list; and for one I can personally recommend because I've shopped there, try this.

The above titles are listed with their Diamond order code in the first field, which may assist you in finding comics at your shop or having them order something for you they don't have in-stock.

If I didn't list your new comic, you're welcome to assume the worst of me, but it's likely I just missed it. I am not a good person.
 
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If I Were In NYC, I’d Go To This


 
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October 9, 2007

Comics Scholar Ernesto Priego Denied Entry Into USA To Present At ICAF

Marc Singer, Chairman of the Executive Committee of the International Comic Arts Forum (ICAF), a leading North American event for comics scholarship whose 12th edition starts in Washington, D.C. October 18, has informed CR that one of their presenters, Ernesto Priego, has been denied entry into the United States. According to Singer, the US government has declined to renew Priego's visa. A statement on their site reads as follows:

Ernesto Priego is unable to present his paper at ICAF because he has been denied entry into the United States of America. The U.S. government has not renewed his visa, nor have they given him any explanation why he will not be allowed into the country. ICAF protests this refusal of entry, part of a recent and disturbing trend of excluding foreign scholars, as an infringement on academic freedom.

A native of Mexico and a published poet, Priego is currently a doctoral candidate at University College in London. He was scheduled to present a paper called "The Tell-Tale Smell of Burning Paper: 'Logic of Form' and the Origin of Comics." This was scheduled for the theory and practice of comics studies track headed by Charles Hatfield.

ICAF only learned about the denial on Tuesday, and it's believed that Priego learned about the matter himself very recently. An e-mail to Priego has yet to be answered. Singer says that Priego has been held up by US immigration before while coming to attend other conferences in the states. He suggests that this denial fits a recent pattern of "excluding foreign scholars from visiting or working in the US, usually because they have been critical of the current administration." (One such recent case is that of South African scholar Adam Habib.)

Singer added further comment today at his widely-read blog, including the abstract of Priego's paper.

UPDATE (10/13): Priego has since publicly stated he was not denied entry and simply didn't renew his Visa properly. In fact, he states that the problem may have been he did not renew his Visa with his academic intentions stated, from which I assume he means to indicate he believes this would have been a boon to coming over, not a hindrance. Although it looks like some people including those quoted from above are shifting their reading of what happened from the suggestion of an overt attempt against Priego speaking in America and into an arbitrary action that still limits academic freedom, I don't agree with them in terms of the severity of what happened and despite that being a stupid policy it's not one I would have given an article over to covering, nor would I have repeated the language used such as "denied". Oddly, Mr. Priego has declined further comment.
 
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Someone Please Publish This Book


 
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Your Danish Cartoons Hangover Update

* The Finnish Broadcasting Company has apparently decided not to show Karsten Kjaer's documentary on the Danish Cartoons Controversy of 2005-2006, Bloody Cartoons. I had not known that the documentary was one of ten being shown in several countries on the nature of freedom.

* Danish Comics Controversy major player Flemming Rose talks about the impending broadcast in Denmark.

* The Guardian writes about one group that grew in part out of its ability to raise interest in protesting against the cartoons back in 2006.

* one Turkish group was able to mobilize 80,000 at a protest last year despite crippling poverty in part because it's stepped in to provide social services.
 
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Go, Look: Mycose Comix Factory


 
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Serge de Beketch, 1946-2007

The right-wing French journalist Serge de Beketch, who collaborated on comics and provided humorous prose pieces to Pilote in the late 1960s and early 1970s, died on Saturday from complications due to Hepatitis B, which he contracted a decade and a half earlier while treating his Hodgkin's disease. He was 60 years old. I believe his primary comics writing achievement was a collaboration with Loro on the series Thorkael, which had two serials in the 1971 and 1973 and was reprinted a couple of times subsequently. Thorkael was a modestly successful version of the kind of wildly-illustrated French science fiction comics that made an impression on United States audiences in the 1970s and early 1980s. He also worked on French versions of stories from Warren magazines such as Eerie. He would leave Pilote when Rene Goscinny departed in the mid-1970s, at which point he began more fervently the contentious journalistic career for which he would become best known.

This article at ActuaBD.com seems to detail how de Beketch worked in not-always flattering commentary about the world of comics and its best-known practitioners into his more flamboyant writing. That article and other suggest he did some minor work with collaborators like Jacques Tardi and Enki Bilal during their younger days, although what exactly that entailed I have no idea.
 
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Go, Look: Chris Hipkiss


 
posted 10:08 pm PST | Permalink
 

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CR Commentary: The Entirety of My Thoughts on the State of Comics Industry Journalism


 
posted 10:06 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Bid: Seth Does Jack Kirby’s Groot To Raise Money For Wright Awards



Seth's cool-looking depiction of Jack Kirby and Dick Ayers' Groot goes up for bid on Ebay; monies raised will be used to help fund the Doug Wright Awards. The auction is scheduled to end on Sunday.
 
posted 10:04 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* the forthcoming biography of Charles Schulz, Schulz and Peanuts, continues to be a leading entertainment feature piece. This article, for instance, spent yesterday on the front page of msn.com -- a hugely trafficked portal. Dave Astor at Editor & Publisher takes a look at the story.

* Dirk Deppey points to this commentary by T Campbell on both the Zuda Comics contracts and his take on the weight of opinion in the webcomics community regarding same. Deppey makes some succinct points of his own regarding the nature of the contract.

* Newsarama reports on that dream rarity in comics: a Direct Market retailer with the apparent cash reserves to buy a copy of Detective Comics #27 that ended up in their store.

* the cour d'appel de Bruxelles says that painter Ole Ahlberg can continue to use imagery from Herge in his satirical paintings. The Herge estate had been joined by folks representing the painter Magritte's work to challenge the Ahlberg's employment.

* the awards season in the French-language comics market seems highly refined and established in a specific way the American awards en masse never will be, so it might come as a surprise to hear of a prize for female BD creators and realize that there may not have been an award of that kind before now.

* the publishing enterprise Les Humanoides Associes will have its books marketed and I think maybe distributed by the gigantic, collaborative entity DelSol for the conceivable future.

* Editor & Publisher notes the second anniversary of invaluable Alan Gardner's Daily Cartoonist site, and Gardner's post about his site's latest birthday and the most popular posts of the last two years. Congratulations to Alan.

* nobody at all notes the third anniversary today of the Comics Reporter site. To be honest, I wouldn't have either except that last piece made me go and look it up. I have no idea what my most popular post was, but I suspect from e-mail commentary that I do well with a) Muhammed and b) any story with boobies. In fact, if some enterprising European artist out there would just draw some boobies on Muhammed, I'm pretty sure we could raise our advertising rates. Since we don't say it often enough, our thanks to the advertisers for their support; Bart, David, Whit, Gil, Eric, Sam, Darwyn and Andrew for their contributions; and every single reader for the gift of their interest and attention.
 
posted 10:02 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Quick hits
Craft
Drawing a Funny Cartoon in 20 Easy Steps

Exhibits/Events
Trudeau to CCS Preview
CBR on New Yorker Superhero Panel
GalleyCat on New Yorker Superhero Panel
Another Library, Another Discussion Group
Johanna Draper Carlson's Extended Write-Up on 2007 Harveys

History
Punch 3.00
Classic Jack Davis
Naked Wonder Woman

Industry
Major Profile of IDW
PWCW's Best Sellers List
A C- Paper From Comics 101

Interviews/Profiles
PWCW: Jim Massey
PWCW: Percy Carey
Pulse: Eric Shanower
Manila Bulletin Online: Gerry Alanguilan

Not Comics
Yow
Isn't This Years Old?
Chris Butcher In Japan 06
Comic Inspired Nobel Prize Winner
Spider-Man Musical Lead Front-Runner
The Positive Is You Won The Election...
Perhaps Die In Street With News Vendor Guy

Publishing
Artemis Fowl Project
Follow-Up On UK Story
Submit Work to Girlamatic
He Loves His Weird Comics
Go, Read: Mark Burrier Comic
Col. Sweeto Press Run at 36,000
They're Just Begging For a Snarky Joke
Kare-Kare Comics to The Chemistry Set
On Steve Gerber and New Marvel Comics
Whedon-Monitored Funnybook Season of Angel

Reviews
Jog: Town Boy
Jog: Tekkonkinkreet
Brian Heater: Exit Wounds
Richard Bruton: Phonogram
Andrew Wheeler: Super Spy
Jason Green: Injury Comics #1
Matt Brady: I Killed Adolph Hitler
David Usborne: Schulz and Peanuts
Leroy Douresseaux: Rough Stuff #1
Derik A Badman: The Three Paradoxes
Jeff Lester: Confessions of a Blabbermouth
Chris Butcher: The Best American Comics 2007
 

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CR Review: Joseph



Creator: Nicolas Robel
Publishing Information: Drawn & Quarterly, Petits Livres, soft cover, 64 pages, September 2007, $9.95
Ordering Numbers: 9781897299319 (ISBN13)

This is a lovely little comic, a short foray into a child's memories and concerns that may pierce into your heart for the specificity of memories it recalls and the general underpinnings in regards to present-day sadnesses it invokes. A small boy with oversized hands, or at least imagined-to-be-oversized hands, longs for a caring father and a supportive group of friends and some level of competency in the activities he pursue. He doesn't achieve many of his goals, and the victories he does enjoy are short-lived. The factors lifting this out of a lifeless mopefest are the quality of Robel's visual imagination (the book looks nice), the way in which perspectives careen all over the map but always manage to convey mood or story in doing so, and the sense of humor that informs the bleak themes -- the book ends on a physical gag, of all things.

If there's anything to complain about it with Joseph it might be that the strongest moments are individual ones, set pieces found within the narrative rather than a more significant and last effect wrought by the story entire. I know that my memory fails when I try to recall the story's sweep, but scenes where the kid wreaks (what one would guess to be) imaginary havoc on a playground, and a touching panel where he embraces a tree, those will linger. Others may point to price point slightly out of current favor, an admission cost that doesn't seem as fair in a time when twice the money buys you a hardcover of three times the thickness, and half the money snares you a similarly formatted book from a lot of other publishers. I think it's the former that worries me more than the latter -- consumer math only takes you so far when it's art and not appliances you're buying. I'd pay this much every time if it guaranteed a book this good, and if it found narrative cohesion to match its high points I'd pay any price you could name.
 
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If I Were In Milan, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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October 8, 2007

Marder Leaves McFarlane’s Employ?

I'm going to try and send an e-mail for confirmation and clarification if I have an address somewhere, and I'm a C- writer when it comes to industry moves so I could be missing something obvious to everyone else, but I would assume from this post that cartoonist and industry veteran's industry veteran Larry Marder has left his position at Todd McFarlane's toy empire and has gone freelance. That's a significant move in terms of Marder's status within the industry, as I believe he was still President of McFarlane Toys, and an even more significant one considering the history involved, as Marder being brought into McFarlane's sphere began back in the early '90s when he consulted for Image and then became that company's Executive Director. In that position, Marder did much to help correct Image's industry havoc-wreaking in terms of publishing and planning before it could rattle that company apart, and then was a part of some crucial 1990s business decisions for the industry entire, most importantly Image's choice to go with Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc. rather than Capital City, a move that either set or at the very least accelerated the progression of the Direct Market into its present form.

Marder has recently announced his intention to return to his well-liked Tales of the Beanworld series, and one hopes that might be his focus in the immediate future. Also, if I remember correctly, such a move will end a pretty major city-to-city commute for the cartoonist.
 
posted 10:26 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 69th Birthday, Russell Myers!


 
posted 10:24 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Your Danish Cartoons Hangover Update

* here's a long article summarizing the Lars Vilks Saga to date. Vilks is the artist who drew Muhammed's head on the body of dog, sparking the current run of Muhammed-and-art stories.

* I linked to a story about the conservative newspaper Western Standard losing its print edition without providing any context. As this story discusses, the paper's claim to fame in its short publishing history was being the only Canadian publication to publish the Danish cartoons as they were claimed as the cause for riots around the world in Winter 2006. What I didn't know is that they're still facing hate crime charges for doing so, a trial that will start in November. That's awful. As much as I question the wisdom of their original publication, it was an absolute, proper application of journalistic mandate for any and all news organizations to reprint those cartoons when what they looked like was a huge issue in an unfolding news story.

* One of the men serving time for inciting racial hatred during a protest of the cartoons in London is back in the news for writing aggressive anti-Western poetry. Not to make light of someone acting out of a sense of injustice, but I think that guy should find a friend to follow him around who will cuff him on the head whenever he decides to go anywhere, say anything or write stuff that keeps him from his family.
 
posted 10:22 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 64th Birthday, Mike Peters!


 
posted 10:20 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Irfaan Khan Contempt Case Profiled

Here's a lengthy profile in editorial/advocacy mode about the ongoing contempt case against four journalists in India, including cartoonist Irfaan Khan, that's more than worth your time if you want to refresh your memory as to what's happened and what's at stake when the legal maneuvers start anew. This is also one of the few articles that describes Khan's cartoon. I think most comics folk will agree with the eminent logic and justice of Khan's position over that of the oppressive courts.
 
posted 10:18 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 58th Birthday, Jim Starlin!


 
posted 10:16 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Martha Montoya Wins Hero Award

Among the recipients of International Human Rights Hero Awards for 2007 given out by Artists for Human Rights on October 2 was cartoonist Martha Montoya. While I don't have any idea what Artists for Human Rights is beyond my supposition based on their founder and the awards show's location that it has something to do with the Church of Scientology, it's always interesting to me when Martha Montoya's name pops up in the news. The Southern California-based Montoya is one of those hidden cartoonists, like Don Rosa or Randall Monroe -- someone who has a sizable readership, in her case a slick juggernaut of a licensing program, and a successful career by any measure, despite not really being a presence in one of the traditional mainstreams of comics and cartooning. Or at least not discussed as one of those people. Here's a profile of the cartoonist, whose creation is Los Kitos.
 
posted 10:14 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 53rd Birthday, Mike Catron!


 
posted 10:12 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Look: Del Close Skull Comics

When ComicMix re-launched with a bunch of web comics to present in addition to their commentary and newsblogging features, I have to say the last thing I expected to see right away was a Skip Williamson-drawn science fiction comic book written by John Ostrander featuring as its lead the skull of the late Chicago improv legend Del Close. In a move that some of you might remember was borrowed and then folded into the Canadian television series Slings and Arrows as a humorous sub-plot, when Close died in 1999 he left his skull to Chicago's Goodman Theatre. As the joke repeated in that mini-profile goes, this is the only way one gets to play the part of Yorick in Hamlet. Re-launching Munden's Bar seems to be a bonus.
 
posted 10:10 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 52nd Birthday, Michael Netzer!


 
posted 10:08 pm PST | Permalink
 

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CR Commentary: Family Values Don’t Extend to Credit

Dirk Deppey makes a good point today and yesterday that I should have in writing about the passing of the late Archie executive and editor Richard Goldwater: not only didn't his father create Archie as is claimed for him in the press release, but the son should never be seen as the creator of things like Josie and the Pussycats simply for being in charge when a creator like Dan DeCarlo worked his craft in that direction. The massive lack of generosity on the part of such companies in dealing with creators, both financially and in terms of the historical record, is shameful no matter if it is or is not permitted by legal construction. If this were boiled down to a story in their comics, it's hard to imagine Archie would be cast in the role of the company man.
 
posted 10:06 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 46th Birthday, Matt Wagner!


 
posted 10:04 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Quick hits
Craft
Mike Manley Paints
Dave Lasky Teaches
Eddie Campbell Makes a Cover

Exhibits/Events
Heidi MacDonald Could Use a Ride to SPX
Future of Graphic Literature Panel Coverage
I Could Use a Ride to New York City Come November 4

History
Naughty Alex Raymond
Frankenstein Was USA Shortcut
John Byrne Did Not Approve of Captain Carrot

Industry
Secrets of Platinum
The World That Is Coming
Quinlan Keep Closes In MO
Worst Danish Cartoons Theory Ever
Retailer: POS Doesn't Solve All Problems

Interviews/Profiles
Wizard: Ryan North
Pulse: Steven T. Seagle
KABC: Marisa Marchetto
Newsarama: James Sturm
The Telegraph: Alan Moore
Paul Gravett: First Second Books

Not Comics
Yikes
Everyone's a Critic
Jeff Smith Hits The Desert
This Poet Loves The Comics
They Don't Beat Kids Up For This Stuff Anymore

Publishing
Web Strip Continues After Creator Forced Out

Reviews
Rob Clough: Various
Paul O'Brien: Various
Paul O'Brien: Exiles #99
Paul O'Brien: Hugs: Bloodpond
Paul O'Brien: Wolverine Annual #1
Paul O'Brien: Uncanny X-Men #491
Paul O'Brien: Vinyl Underground #1
Gary Thompson: The Devil Within Vol. 1
Rosalind S. Fournier: Schulz and Peanuts
Jerome Maida: Captain America: The Chosen
Leroy Douresseaux: The Drifting Classroom Vol. 8
 

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CR Review: Justice League of America #13



Creators: Dwayne McDuffie, Joe Benitez, Victor Llamas, Pete Pantazis, Rob Leigh
Publishing Information: DC Comics, comic book, 32 pages, September 2007, $2.99
Ordering Numbers:

I found this comic slightly unsettling on a couple of levels. The first is the cover I have doesn't match up with the one above, which I take to means the book has two covers. This means that they're pulling cover stunts on a healthy, top of the charts title? A brief look around the Internet indicates that this is common practice. I don't know what it means when a company like DC feels the need to pump up bestselling titles when the bottom is falling out of the other end of the market, but it can't be good. The second thing I found odd about this comic is that I couldn't tell right away why on earth they would make a special point of sending this around to C-list review sources like this site. Apparently, this is the first issue of a new creative team, featuring among other talents veteran writer Dwayne McDuffie. There's little to no sense of anything new in the comic, however. Not just since prose author Brad Meltzer's departure. More like since 1978.

Justice League of America #13 is basically a 1970s superhero comic of the "DC reacts to Marvel's new formula not as well as Marvel does it" variety, only with DC's patented early '90s rubbery-looking art and a series of oddly inappropriate-seeming butt-shots. The story consists almost entirely of two different teams within the Justice League going to two different locations and having two very calm, controlled fights with two groups of bad guys from a team called The Injustice League. (The bad guys in the DC Universe harbor no illusions about being bad guys.) The fights and the other scenes in the issue -- a kidnapped Batman grunts and disobeys his way to an implied off-panel ass-beating, still-free members of the JLA have a multi-page, watching the paint peel talk about the strategies they'll pursue, Superman acts like a swell fella of the Andy Taylor variety to another member of the team -- all take place in generic locations with no people in them, like the smoothed out corridors of a video game. Sometimes the world drops away altogether (see page below). This might be okay if the figures that were therefore thrust into focus were doing anything interesting, but the physical confrontations play out like a strategy card game: one team presents its members, other team presents its members, members start trumping each other in succession until the people that have the best card in reserve trump everything and win. It's not quite that simple, but it's not much more complicated, let me assure you.

In the end, this is a comic book whose most memorable moment is a radio conversation about Black Lightning's afro, and even that was hardly one for the ages. There are funnier exchanges to be found in re-runs of Becker. The dominance of empty backgrounds combines with the grim, plodding progression of the fight scenes to suck what little life one might guess remains in a super-team formula 65 years or whatever since its inception. The whole exercise seems tired. I can't work up any excitement about the return of the Injustice League, and it's been about 30 years since I've seen them. God help the more regular reader who's probably seen them seven or eight times in their reading lifetime. It looks like DC has created yet another comic where the narrative beats depend on an unbelievably high interest in seeing various characters strike a pose and march through their paces. It offers little more than a series of pin-ups where even a karate kick to the face depends on knowledge of recent DC continuity. What a weird book.


 
posted 1:00 pm PST | Permalink
 

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October 7, 2007

Richard Goldwater, 1936(?)-2007

Archie Comics President and Co-Publisher Richard Goldwater passed away last Tuesday, October 2, after an extended battle with cancer. Goldwater was a longtime comics company executive and a key figure in building on the company's solid success and fashioning a benign, wholesome set of licenses that were required to nod towards current culture without breaking out of those more wholesome elements. Goldwater was the son of company co-founder John Goldwater, and began to work at his father's company while still a teenager, taking a full-time position by the late 1950s, eventually settling in as the company's long-time managing editor.

According to Mark Evanier's post on Goldwater's passing, he and lifelong friend Michael Silberkleit (son of orginal co-founder Louis) bought the company from their fathers in the early 1980s (assets from a third co-founder, Maurice Coyne, had been brought into the company earlier. Richard and Silberkleit formed a classic creative/business pairing, and Goldwater remained involved in creative decisions even after handing over full editorial duties to hand-picked heir Victor Gorelick -- although I'm not certain from some conflicting reports if Goldwater was named to the duties he performed until his death or assumed them upon taking controlling interest.

According to the obituary released by Archie, Goldwater was a key figure in bringing in additional licensed properties, forging licensing partnerships that extended into other media, and in publishing the material internationally.

He is survived by three daughters. A memorial service is planned for Mamaroneck, New York on Wednesday.
 
posted 10:24 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 38th Birthday, Tom Hart!


 
posted 10:23 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Your Danish Cartoons Hangover Update

* in one of the few lingering court cases involving the 2006 protests and violence over the 2005 publication of Muhammed-related cartoons in a newspaper in Denmark, two television journalists in Algeria were acquitted. They had faced a potential of five years in jail for what they claim was mistakenly showing the cartoons on air.

* this article provides a rough idea of the shape and form of the recent flurry of violence madness in Nigeria over drawings of Muhammed and accusations of drawings of Muhammed.

* missed it: this article late last week in the Copenhagen Post talks about a new documentary concerning the Danish Cartoons Controversy. The film apparently confirms what many thought at the time was the fact that most protesters hadn't seen the cartoons. More importantly, it identifies a trigger event for the worst of the violence: Sheik Yussuf Al-Qaradawi declaring February 3 2006 "Anger Day" on his TV show. The documentary ran last night on Denmark TV.

* just in case you need reminding the ridiculous spark for a cartoonist's jailing, violent protest and calls for newspaper closure in Bangladesh, bookmark this page.
 
posted 10:22 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Read: LAT on Gilbert Hernandez


 
posted 10:20 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* while negotiations went well between the Birmingham News and local leaders including members of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference about recent problems they had with coverage, Editor Tom Scarritt was clear that cartoonist Scott Stantis will not be fired as the protest leaders had initially demanded.

* the comics news, previews and interview site has announced its acquisition by on-line super-site network Imaginova. As they discuss, this should allow them to expand their coverage and otherwise upgrade their site, faint rumors of which had preceded today's statement. Congratulations to a very enthused-sounding Matt Brady and Michael Doran.

* a lengthy profile of Milton Caniff, his career and recent books about and by the great cartoonist in the Columbus Dispatch in advance of this month's Caniff-focused Festival of Cartoon Art at Ohio State University drew this response about some of the history from Mark Evanier.

* here's a pretty good article on the New York Times web site about family disappointment in the new David Michaelis biography of Charles Schulz, Schulz and Peanuts. There's a lot of stuff in there that makes it a bit more than the standard "you got it wrong" piece: some nuanced and I think admirable statements from Jean Schulz, some contextual work, what factual errors are actually being claimed, and so on.

* speaking of which, here's an interview with Michaelis whose introduction describes the book's genesis.
 
posted 10:18 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 68th Birthday, Harvey Pekar!


 
posted 10:16 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Steven Massarsky, 1948-2007

The attorney and New York businessman Steven Massarsky, one of the co-founders of Voyager Communications, the parent company behind the early 1990s comics market mainstay Valiant Comics, died on Friday afternoon in Manhattan from complications due to cancer.

Massarsky was born in Weehawken, New Jersey, and attended Brown University and the Rutgers University School of Law. He owned an artistic management company which eventually became a thriving entertainment law practice. Among his clients at the former were the Allman Brothers Band; at the latter, Nintendo and Aerosmith. The statement that hit the wires Friday emphasized his role in helping launch the career of pop singer Cyndi Lauper.

In 1989, Massarsky teamed with deposed Marvel Editor-In-Chief Jim Shooter and J. Winston Fowlkes to create Voyager Communications Inc. and Valiant Comics. Massarsky had employed Shooter to do some work on a Marvel-related license before they became partners. Backed by the venture capital group Triumph (who owned 40 percent of the company) and employing key licenses from the defunct publisher Gold Key (Turok, Doctor Solar, and Magnus Robot Fighter), Valiant launched as a kind of tightly edited and plotted alternative superhero/fantasy line in an era that had come to be defined by looser writing in service of extravagant art. In 1993, with the market surging due to a number of confluent factors, Valiant's expanded line and series re-launches gave the publisher its greatest success in terms of individual issue sales. According to a statement by Jim Shooter, Massarsky, who along with Shooter and Fowlkes was a 20 percent owner of Voyager, was in charge of marketing at the company. One thing he did in that position, according to a poster at Newsarama, was to call a fan based on a random selection from that month's mail and solicit their opinion about the company's output.

(Jim Shooter's contentious, personal take on that time period -- he was eventually forced out of the company -- including his view on Massarsky's various actions can be found here.) The Newsarama thread linked to above contains similar discussion of that same period.

In summer 1994, Voyager Communications Inc. was sold to Acclaim Entertainment, Inc. (one uncredited source had it as a $65 million sale). Massarsky remained as the division's President and Publisher. Like most comics companies in the mid-1990s, Valiant experienced a sudden downturn in sales. This was followed with a number of periodic reorganizations, abortive re-launches and name changes through the parent company's bankruptcy in early 2004. In a way, Voyager and its comics company Valiant was emblematic of a time of a brief but chaotic period in American comic books where a rush of success could be followed by an extended tumble, where having many of the trappings of a prominent publishing effort were no guarantee of sustained market presence and long-term viability. It was also a model for current comics companies in its blend of original and licensed properties.

More recently, Massarsky was founder and CEO of a company called Business Incubation Group, which provided advice and resources to entrepreneurial effort at key points in their early development. That company was founded in 1999. A listing at a mentorship program at Brown in which the deceased was active indicates Massarsky resigned his positions at that company, although no date for that event was given.

The site ComicMix provided in its coverage a quote from two unnamed comics industry sources, one positive and one negative.

He is survived by his mother, two sisters, two brothers-in-law, five nieces, one nephew and a fiancee. A service was held yesterday.
 
posted 10:14 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 42nd Birthday, James Sturm!


 
posted 10:12 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Josette Macherot, 1929/30-2007

ActuaBD.com brings word in brief form that the colorist Josette Macherot died on Friday. According to their report, Macherot worked on her husband Raymond Macherot's career-making Chlorophylle and the first albums of the Sibylline series. Both of those series were critically-praised anthropomorphic comics, foundational works in Raymond Macherot's lauded and perhaps under-appreciated career. Josette Macherot was 77 years old and is survived by her husband.
 
posted 10:10 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Schedule: Garry Trudeau at CCS




Go see Mr. Trudeau and support the Center for Cartoon Studies.

Or make a little trip of it.
 
posted 10:08 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Protest Over Cartoon at University of Kentucky Leads to Apologies, Resignation

A cartoon appearing in the Friday edition of the University of Kentucky's student-run publication The Kentucky Kernel sparked an impromptu protest of about 100 students that day. At issue was the use of slave auction and chain visual to parody the integration attempts by a few of the campus's fraternities. The cartoon was drawn by staff cartoonist Brad Fletcher.

Fletcher apologized here. The newspaper's apology, by Editor Keith Smiley, appears here. And it was probably a bad day to be the other Brad Fletcher.

The newspaper's opinions editor, Chad Reese, resigned his position after being told his column defending the cartoon's publication would not run in today's Kernel.
 
posted 10:06 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Look: Craft Week at The Process



Site here. Top of the blog here. This week's craft-related promotion explained here.
 
posted 10:04 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Quick hits
Craft
Whoa, Check Out The Mattotti

Exhibits/Events
Discussion Series on Graphic Novels

History
Today's Kiddietorial

Industry
I Hate Your Cartoon
Bruce Plante Moving to Tulsa
E&P on Bruce Plante Moving to Tulsa
Biased Cartoons Trump Biased Writers

Interviews/Profiles
CBR: Billy Penn
Wizard: Ryan Estrada
CHUD.com: Troy Nixey
Stuff.co.nz: Gemma Corin
Globe and Mail: Kevin Smith
Ottawa Citizen: Derek McCulloch

Not Comics
Nerds Now Rule
Snoopy Vs. Osama
I Had It First, Wizard
Comics Teach Science
Western Standard Done
They Still Do Superhero Novels
Books May Not Be All The Way Dead
Don MacPherson on Superman: Doomsday DVD

Publishing
Another Comics Blog
Takehisa Comic Planned
Anti-Korean Manga Phenomenon

Reviews
Mike Fish: Various
Don MacPherson: Various
Richard Krauss: Capacity #7
Zenbullets: Empowered Vol. 2
Richard Krauss: Thought Cloud Shrines
Eric Lorberer: Jack Kirby's Fourth World Omnibus

 

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October 6, 2007

CR Editorial: Face/Fight/Flee The Future! Talking About Webcomics



I've been thinking a lot about comics on-line recently, which is why I was delighted to receive the following Suck It, Grampa letter from reader Winston Rowntree.

Your web site is focused primarily on print comics that Nobody Reads. There are thousands, like myself, who think of comics primarily as an online medium and we read online comics almost exclusively (and I don't mean manga and gamer comics). We see the internet as the Future of comics, and are aware of emerging business models that support this theory by proving that online comics can succeed by selling merchandise and advertising associated with a freely-distributed webcomic. This is, in fact, The Future. Pretentious Art Comix from Drawn & Quarterly that 130 people buy are not the future. They are The Problem. Your website seems to ignore The Future, albeit with the occasional obligatory reference to The Perry Bible Fellowship. Granted, The Future of comics has not arrived yet, but you'll look really smart if you get on the bandwagon now before it fills. If you want to present a comprehensive picture of the comics world, then you have work to do. There is a world of high-quality work out there on the internet, if you know where to look. Will you champion it? Thank you and forgive my youthful and swinish arrogance.

Now that's how you kick off a discussion. My thanks to Mr. Rowntree.

Leaving aside the distorted argumentation, the basic criticism here is well-founded. CR doesn't engage webcomics as passionately and as thoroughly as it should: not as a news blog, not as a platform for editorials, not as a place for criticism. That's on me. I plan to write more frequently about webcomics as a critic, and just kind of getting in there and embracing the work of doing that is the only solution to the problem of meager critical dialog. My guess is that I'll just make a priority of reviewing one a week for a while until interacting with that material becomes more natural, a bigger part of my comics reading life. This site has a huge gap to make up when it comes to a critical dialog with translated manga as well, which should make 2008 an enjoyable year in terms of getting into work with which I'm largely unfamiliar. I plan on similar initiatives regarding news coverage in those areas as well.

However, this letter both puts on the table and embodies some of the difficulties I've had engaging with the on-line portion of the comics medium. I thought maybe by listing a few of them here I could encourage further dialog, invite sympathetic e-mails of general assistance, or at least get some of this off of my chest.

1) Basically, I Don't Give a Crap About the Future as a Value in and of Itself -- My primary concern with comics isn't in the mass thrust of its most popular aspects but in its best work, its value as edifying and significant art. If the great art is on-line, I'll follow it there. If it's in the 130-copy press run comic sold by an art comics publisher, I'll engage it there. If it's in a mainstream comic book, I'll go after it there. In comics, touting the future resembles a more abstract version of pushing comics' present. Both are tricks of marketing-driven rhetoric that stretch past the presumption of great work to isolate a value that's distinct from content. There's a limit as to how far I'm willing to let such an element dictate terms. If that means I miss the bandwagon, well, at least I'm not living down a bunch of articles describing in great detail all of these specific visions of the future of comics that never came to be. Webcomics culture would impress a lot of us a lot more if it emphasized the greatness of its offerings, not simply their hit counts, or the hits in years to come.

2) I Also Don't Care As Much As One Might Think About Bottom-Line Business Matters -- Clearly, the biggest problem when examining webcomics as business is the level of ancient astronauts-level bullshit sometimes involved in the way figures are reported or asserted or hinted at. I'm burdened with a second problem in that when I look at business, my primary concern isn't the number of zeroes in the bottom line or the projected possibilities for same but in the creation of an ethical playing field that favors opportunities for artists to succeed according to their abilities. A lot of news about on-line comics comes in the form of trumpeting how much money is either made or is possible in X, Y, or Z initiative. There's a "read it and weep, chumps!" element to a lot of the way entities present business success in webcomics. Don't get me wrong: making money is great. It's preferable to no money, that's for sure. But there are competing values, and that's true in webcomics the same way it's true in mainstream comics or editorial cartooning. The sooner webcomics folk stop talking about their financial news as if they're riches struck by an enterprising pioneer and more in terms of an industry and regular opportunities for artists, the better.

3) Not Only Do Most Webcomics Suck, They Suck in Particularly Aggravating Ways, And Not Enough People are Willing or Perhaps Able to Say So -- Most art is wretched. Most comics are terrible, too. It's not surprising, then, that most webcomics are awful. Further, any publishing platform with a low threshold for participation yields a lot of less than stellar work, and gives that work a pride of place that others might not. Still, I'd suggest that webcomics may outstrip even mainstream superhero comic books when it comes to ignoring fundamental breakdowns in craft and execution, both in their creation and during discussion of their overall quality. I don't mean the too-rigid applications of what good drawing or good writing means, something you see when mainstream and alternative comics fans do battle on this subject. I don't even mean failures in craft, which by themselves are a part of a lot of still-wonderful art. What I'm talking about are great heaving collapses married to what seems like aphasia when it comes to pointing out the broken thing in the room. As a critic, knowing that you're going to have to argue fundamental issues and first causes makes reviewing those comics a bit more daunting, and the resulting criticism a lot less effective.

You know, in this way webcomics has a lot in common with non-superhero comic books of 25 years ago, although I think on-line work is even more untethered. I experience the same thing when it comes to webcomics that I used to live through 25 years ago encountering people into alt-indy comics: folks recommending works as equally valuable where one seems obviously very good and one seem obviously not good at all (distinctions that were later borne out). Scenes around art forms or expressions within an art form tend to suffer from aesthetic myopia.

4) I Don't Think Much of On-Line Comics Interfaces -- I may be alone in this, and this may be my version of my parents not being able to work their VCR, but I have a harder time than I think I should interacting with the way comics are published on-line. I'm always scrolling around more than I like, or adjusting my screen size, or getting some things that pop up with new episodes and others with coming soon pages, and I'm not always sure how to read past installments. I'm also frequently uncertain if a strip is ongoing or has just ended or is in repeats or is current. I like to think I'm not a dope. I make part of my living on-line, and I'm passionate about the subject matter. I would be as hesitant to send one of my non comics-savvy friend into an open-ended search for webcomics as I would to send them to a standard-or-better comics shop. I'm never this confused with other art forms I like much less than I like comics. I don't know if this lack of a killer app for comics reading, or just a system of interacting with a public that's developed in a dysfunctional, obtuse manner, but I thought things would be a lot easier by now.

5) Do Such Discussions Really Matter? -- Recent news stories about print stalwarts For Better or For Worse and Funky Winkerbean had crucial and perhaps more significantly undiscussed on-line elements to their development. Book iterations of on-line strips like Micrographica and Jellaby have begun to hit their markets without being explicitly tied into their on-line version as an adjunct or as a tie-in or (god help us) as an ultimate goal. All of the strip syndicates are on-line, as are the vast majority of editorial cartoonists. Comic book publishers like SLG Publishing are mixing up how and in what form work gets released, and one can imagine most prominent North American comics publishers adding such versions of all their books as the field begins to open up to more readers in that direction. Livejournal-based collectives such as Act-I-Vate have done well bringing public and professional attention to their members' web work. People will also continue to put material up on-line on their dime, with a range of aims in mind.

While there will always be cultures inherent to forms of production, and art that takes advantage of formal differences, and repercussions cascading through business and art as one type of delivery becomes more prominent than the others, the basic interaction between medium and reader stands a good chance of remaining the same. I'd suggest that the similarities between my reading Achewood and my father reading Barnaby are more significant than the differences in our reading them. I look forward to the day when webcomics are simply, well, comics.

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An Extremely Short List of Ten Comics I Read On-Line, A List That Doesn't Include Perry Bible Fellowship

To allow this article maximum linkage, to potentially provide some new comics reading experiences to those of you not webcomics-savvy in any way, to provide a snapshot of the riches of work to be found on-line and thus provide a reason why the subject's worth talking about it in the first place, and to test myself as to what I really think when I think webcomics, here are the first ten comics that popped into my head writing from scratch into an empty word document. There are dozens as-worthy reading experiences out there, from a more diverse array of creators than I came up with during this exercise. Hopefully, we can all find out about more of them in the weeks to come.

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Achewood
The best comic strip of this decade?

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AD -- New Orleans After the Deluge
Both the specific subject matter and the general treatment of disasters in art are subjects that interest me greatly, so I'm there.

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American Elf
I'm a compulsive reader.

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Ben Katchor in Metropolis
Some of the best looking work available anywhere.

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Copper
I like the way this feature looks, and I like its general Sunday Newspaper ethos.

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David Rees' Comics
Irregularly updated and thus I only check it irregularly. I like how Rees puts jokes wherever the heck he pleases.

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Dinosaur Comics
I'm not sure why this one popped into my head over some others, except maybe there's something very webcomicky about its basic approach.

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Dwarf Attack
I love Greg Stump's comics, and I'm delighted there's a place to read a lot of them.

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Les Petits Riens
Lewis Trondheim's comics blog.

*****


NYT Sunday Magazine's Funny Pages
Most of what I've read about these comics has been grousing about them not meeting some perceived NYT standard of justifying one's lifelong hobbies to everyone who raises an eyebrow at them, and the PDF system is odd, but I've enjoyed all of the serials.
 
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If I Were In Minnesota, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In SF, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Brooklyn, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In NYC, I’d Go To This



I believe today's comics-related event involves Bob Mankoff.
 
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Five Link A Go Go

* go, watch: odd Batman fan film

* go, read: recently firewall-freed NYT piece on cartoon pin-up books

* go, look: Nikki McClure

* go, watch: A Taste of Cherry Reunion

* go, look: Hulk PC mod
 
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Fff Results Post #94—Bring Out Yer Dead

Five For Friday #94 Results

On Friday afternoon, participating CR readers were asked to "Name Five Memorable Comics Deaths." Here are the results.

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Tom Spurgeon
1. Lisa Moore
2. The Swordsman
3. George Stacy
4. Speedy Ortiz
5. Raven Sherman

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John Vest
1. Speedy Ortiz
2. Dr. Franklin Storm
3. Belit
4. Captain Marvel
5. Fritz The Cat

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Jeet Heer
1. Farley the dog (For Better or For Worse, 1995)
2. Eli Eon -- The first sympathetic character to die in Little Orphan Annie. (Little Orphan Annie, 1935)
3. Mary Gold (The Gumps, 1929)
4. Tonantzin (Gilbert Hernandez's Human Diastrophism)
5. Andy Lippincott (Doonesbury, 1990)

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Scott Cederlund
1) Edsel from Mage
2) The Comedian from Watchmen
3) Supergirl in Crisis on Infinite Earths
4) Kid Miracleman
5) Boston Brand

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Sean T. Collins
1. Jason Todd (Batman: A Death in the Family)
2. Jeepers Jacobs ("Jeepers Jacobs")
3. Mary Kelly (From Hell)
4. Marv (Sin City)
5. Jon (Hey, Wait...)

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Jones
1. Drinky Crow, repeatedly
2. Cerebus
3. Every other issue of What If? when everyone died and the entire universe was destroyed
4. Ethel Briggs
5. Tim O'Neil

*****


Dave Knott
* Kraven the Hunter
* Art Spiegelman's father
* Dick Davenport
* Kid Miracleman
* The dead bird (from Calvin and Hobbes)

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el.tio.berni
1. Speedy Ortiz
2. Captain Marvel
3. Leonidas (+ 299 spartans)
4. Sandman
5. Cerebus

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Nat Gertler
1. Bizarro (DC Comics Presents 97)
2. The presumed off-panel death of The Kid Who Collects Spider-Man
3. Andy Lippincott (Doonesbury)
4. Phoenix
5. Sgt. Fluffy (normalman), primarily for the cover copy "Who Killed Sgt. Fluffy This Time?"

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David Welsh
1. Andy Lippincott in Doonesbury
2. Lacey Davenport in Doonesbury
3. Farley in For Better or for Worse
4. Phoenix in Uncanny X-Men (the first time)
5. Sue Dibny in Identity Crisis (memorable doesn't automatically connote "good," does it?)

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Joe Schwind
1. Davy Crockett (Davy Crockett at the Alamo, Dell Four Color 639, 1955)
2. Elena (The Greatest Horror of Them All, Black Magic #29, 1954)
3. All the Martians (War of the Worlds, Classics Illustrated #124)
4. Fritz the Cat (Fritz the Cat, Superstar in The People's Comics, 1972)
5. Jesus (The Story of Jesus, Classics Illustrated Special Issue, Dec. 1955)

*****


Marc Arsenault
* Moon Maid. I had just started reading Dick Tracy in the paper maybe a week before that happened and it was really freaky
* Jack Murdock. I probably read the Fireside Marvel Origins books a hundred times each by the time I was 10. There's a pretty high body count in those. Coming from a working class boxing obsessed town I could relate to Daredevil more than other heroes, and loosing a dad is a biggie.
* Rorschach
* (When we finally find out that) Alec Holland (is DEAD in Saga of the Swamp Thing 21)
* That poor little girl in "A Frog is A Frog" by Steve Bissette and Stephen Perry in Bizarre Adventures

*****

Thanks to all that participated!
 
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First Thought Of The Day

This site has now been around long enough that about once a week I think, "Man, it would be nice to review that book," or "I sure would like to interview that cartoonist someday," and then I find out I've already done it and I'm sad.
 
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If I Were In SF, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Minnesota, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In NYC, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In NYC, I’d Go To This



Today's comics-related event is a superhero panel.
 
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CR Week In Review



The top comics-related news stories from September 29 to October 5, 2007:

1. Deaths in Nigeria reported potentially related to recent rash of Muhammed-related cartoon protests.

2. Little, Brown drops Tintin Au Congo from its publishing plans.

3. Small protest group asks that Scott Stantis be fired.

Winner Of The Week
Tom Batiuk

Loser Of The Week
Michael George

Quote Of The Week
"...The threat of a caricature by Drew Friedman, the Thomas Nast of our time, should be enough to bring these vain creatures to heel." -- Ron Rosenbaum, on how to wean magazines away from the celebrity profile and their attendant demands.

this week's imagery comes from pioneering comic book house Centaur Publications
 
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October 5, 2007

Happy 49th Birthday, Mike Carlin!


 
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Five For Friday #94—Bring Out Yer Dead



Five For Friday #94 -- Name Five Memorable Comics Deaths

1. Lisa Moore
2. The Swordsman
3. George Stacy
4. Speedy Ortiz
5. Raven Sherman

*****

This category is now closed. Thanks to all that participated!

*****
Five For Friday is a reader response feature. To play, send a response to that week's question while it's still Friday. Play fair. Responses up Sunday morning.
 
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Friday Distraction: Vinetas Blog


 
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If I Were In Edmonton, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In SF, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Jacksonville, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Chicago, I’d Go To This


 
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If I Were In Charlotte, I’d Go To This


 
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October 4, 2007

Protest Group’s Demands Include Firing of Editorial Cartoonist Scott Stantis

A small protest gathering in Birmingham led by local Southern Christian Leadership Conference chapter president Bishop Calvin Woods called for an apology from the Birmingham News and the firing of prominent editorial cartoonist Scott Stantis. The paper and the cartoonist are charged with being racist and unfair in terms of their local coverage. Two cartoons by Stantis, one printed and one put up on the web site briefly -- as a mistake, editors say -- on the subject of the use of race in political campaigns drove the call for the cartoonist's dismissal. Stantis is a well-known conservative editorial cartoonist distributed by Copley News Serve and also the creator of the strip Prickly City. He has been at the News since 1996. The editors deny any and all bias in their coverage.
 
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Go, Look: MikeBertino.com


 
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Manfred Sommer, 1933-2007



The invaluable Forbidden Planet blog brings word through Neorama that the classic comics illustrator Manfred Sommer has recently passed away after a year-long illness. Sommer was best known for series like El Lobo Solitario, Polux, El Tigre and Frank Cappa, and an approach to comics illustration that matched the approach of classic adventure comics artists like Milton Caniff and Hugo Pratt. He began work in comics as a teenager in the late 1940s, and sold several piece through an agent to the British comics market, but most would say the artist hit his stride with the above-mentioned adventure work (Cappa, for instance, was a military correspondent) in the early 1980s. Although I'm not sure when exactly this took place, Sommer would go on to handle some art duties on the Bonelli series Tex, and had 90 pages on a new story completed at the time of his death. He was 74 years old.


 
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Happy 85th Birthday, Bil Keane!


 
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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

A smattering of articles and features out there on a Friday morning:

* In what seems like fairly major news but also self-evident and dependent on execution so I don't mind putting it here, Publishers Weekly reports that the significant retail company Trans World Entertainment Corp. (TWE) has contracted with Bookazine to create manga sections for its mall-friendly stores, an effort that will be carried by that company's Popazine initiative.

* You can go here to see photos of Craig Thompson drawing in collaboration with band Menomena.

* I'm not totally sure what's going on in these videos of Jose-Luis Munuera at Angouleme, but I've seen so little video from that show's floor, I thought the background details made it worthwhile.

* Hopefully not betraying some subconscious disdain for manga, I skipped posting links to this two part interview at the comics business news and analysis site ICv2.com. The stuff in part two about digital downloads of manga, and how the American and Japanese markets differ, caught my attention.

* Alan Gardner celebrates a second anniversary at Daily Cartoonist and takes stock, including some hit numbers.

* Here's a video I haven't watched yet using the comics holdings at VCU as its revolve-around point. Since multiple people e-mailed this to me, I'm guessing someone posted it this morning or yesterday, and my apologies for not knowing who that is.
 
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Happy 45th Birthday, Jeff Nicholson!


 
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Your 2008 Prix Tournesol Nominees

While the American major comics award season lasts from late Spring to Early Fall, the French-language industry seems to me like it runs from Fall until January's Angouleme Festival. It's kind of shocking to see an award with "2008" next to the title, or really "2008" anything, so the list of nominees for Le Prix Tournesol seemed worth noting:

* Betelgeuse Vol. 5, Leo (Dargaud)
* Chronique du proche etranger : en Tchetchenie, Rash and Tamada (Vertige Graphic)
* Comic Styx, Marco (Orbis Pictus)
* Dictature ecologiste, Jean Bourgignon (Groinge)
* Les indegivrables Vol. 2, Xavier Gorce (Inzemoon)
* Nina au coeur de la favela, Loic Sergeat (Albin Michel)
* Toxic Planet Vol. 2, David Ratte (Paquet)
* Voyageur Vol. 1, Pierre Boisserie and Eric Stalner (Glenat)

I'm not familiar with the award, but apparently it goes to a book that throws a spotlight on a social issue.
 
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Collective Memory: Stumptown 2007



Links to stories, eyewitness accounts and resources concerning the 2007 Stumptown Comics Fest, held September 29 and 30 at the Lloyd Center Doubletree in Portland, Oregon.

This entry will continue to be updated for as long as people .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

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Institutional
City
Location of Show
Web Site

Blog Entries
100 Industries
101jdalton

Arjache
Ask Dr. Eldritch

Beren deMotier
Bigtime Livermore
Bigtime Livermore 02
Brendan Wright

Calwong

Dark Horse Comics
Dear Jack
DemiHappyCow
Designer Toast
Designer Toast 02
Dragon Robbie Green
Dylan Meconis

Ekiben

Fantagraphics

Geminica
Gwog!
Gwog! 02

i prefer trees
It's Art

Jamie S. Rich
Jerald
Joelle Jones
Joelle Jones 02
John C. Worsley
Journal of an Inept Haus Frau
Journal of an Inept Haus Frau 02

Kaiwryn
Kickstart
Kid Beowulf
King Clayholio
Knowmad

Laural Winter
Letters to a Wild Boar
LoveMotionStory

Matt Maxwell
Matt Silady

Neal

Peachke
Puddleville

Rachel Edidin
Rachel Edidin 02
Reediewes

Sara Ryan
Shannon Wheeler
Shannon Wheeler 02
Skullyflower
Snips and Snaps
Steve Duin
Steve Duin on Josh Kemble

The Baby Grind
Trillobite

News Stories and Columns
Editor & Publisher Preview
PWCW Report
The Oregonian

Photos
Aaron McLeod
Backstabbers
B Zedan 01
B Zedan 02
Calwong
Comics and Collectibles
Copacetique
ellafine
Fantagraphics
FuR
greyaenigma
Indy 1725
Jamie S Rich
lovemotionstory
lovemotionstory 02
mattdpdx
mclzines
Mike Bertino
Ocean Yamaha
photophonic
Puddleville
roadsidecomics
Stumptown Pool
Tugboat Press
Zack Soto

*****

.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

*****
 
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Go, Read: Casanova #8


 
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Quick hits
Craft
Go, Look: Awesome Drew Friedman Illustration

Exhibits/Events
Birmingham Previewed
Go, See: Jim Blanchard

History
The Face
Bully's Headquarters Gallery
Eddie Campbell on Jerry Robinson

Industry
CBR Sales Analysis
The Norm Goes Mobile
Your Japan Media Arts Festival Nominees

Interviews/Profiles
CBR: Eric Reynolds
Explorer: Matt Diggins
Comic Wire: Bill Amend
Forward: Brian K. Vaughan
iFMagazine.com: Scott Allie
Daily Californian: Adrian Tomine
Living Between Wednesdays: Josh Elder
Silver Bullet Comic Books: Brian Azzarello

Not Comics
Warner Gets the Peanuts Specials

Publishing
Betsy Streeter Has a Blog
The Trek Life Up To 3X Week
Joey Manley on ComicMix.com
Jeff Stahler on Funky Winkerbean
Dabel Brothers Picks up Dresden Files

Reviews
AJC Staff: Various
Shawn Hoke: Super
Jog: Omega the Unknown #1
 

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CR Review: Korgi Book 1



Creators: Christian Slade
Publishing Information: Top Shelf, soft cover, 88 pages, May 2007, $10
Ordering Numbers: 9781891830907 (ISBN)

Not only am I about 30 years older than what I'm guessing is the best audience for Christian Slade's Korgi, I think Welsh Corgis are ugly little dogs, bred to nip at the heels of livestock and always at least a little bit in danger of giving themselves spinal damage by jumping off any piece of furniture more than two feet off the ground. This may make me heartless, but it also puts me in the useful position of not falling in love with the book right away simply because of how it constructs its fantasy setting around a juiced-up faerie-wise equivalent to that breed of dog.

In this introductory chapter to what one suspects is going to be a successful series, we follow the young girls Ivy and her Korgi Sprout as they wander around their home area and have a few adventures. The pictures are attractive, although uneven. For instance, sometimes the figures aren't as lively in some scenes than other, which can be disconcerting because Slade counts on his figures to carry our attention through the narrative. It almost feels like Sprout has stand-in. The designs are enjoyable -- I prefer many of the monsters to those dogs -- but there are several narrative shortcomings that reveal themselves in terms of staging. We're moved into positions and perspectives that don't convincingly build off of the moments just preceding them, making those individual scene changes a bit unsettling and after time, casts a lot of the book as manipulative. That's a real danger with this kind of episodic fantasy because the genre's ability to introduce elements from such a wide-ranging array of options smacks of loading the deck to begin with. Not all fantasies need to be about world-building, but if the background elements don't feel legitimate and consistently so throughout, the set pieces begin to feel like a series of sketches improvised on stage rather than something that's happening in another world.

I can't imagine that any young people -- or older people -- that want to enjoy a straight-forward adventure story about a young person and her dog will notice or care where the seams come apart a bit. Still, there's a big difference between a serviceable book and a classic, and there's no question right now in which category this book belongs.

Then again, I take it all back if the Big Bad ends up being Mark McGowan.


 
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October 3, 2007

Has the Recent Bangladeshi Cartoon Incident Led to Deaths in Nigeria?

There seem to be a number of distressing yet important stories this morning regarding various protests and turmoil related to cartoon depictions of the prophet Muhammed in various places throughout the world:

* This piece dissects and analyzes a recent news story that the cartoon by Arifur Rahman that used a Muhammed-related piece of wordplay

* Not that this is important in any way, but this is the first place I've seen that puts Rahman at 23 years old as opposed to 20. Also the first picture I've seen.

* Flemming Rose attempts to process the information that he may have been a target of a group of terrorists currently on trial in Odense, as reported. He does a much better job of it than I would were our situations reversed. It's probably worth noting that I say "may have been" not because he wasn't named -- he was -- but as both articles point out in fascinating fashion, this kind of threat often exists on the borderline between playfully joking around with an idea and becoming an actual locked-in plot.

* This piece in The Guardian takes a hard look at the practice of policing potentially offensive speech.

* The dense block of text kept driving my eyes right off the screen, but I think this is a close look at the role of religious tolerance plays in such events, courtesy of someone who has worked on and advised newspapers on such matters.

* One of the more distressing events of 2006's Danish Cartoon-related violence was the slaying of a priest in Turkey, Father Andrea Santoro. A Turkish court has upheld their 19-year sentence against the 16-year-old who performed the killing.
 
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Lisa Moore Passes in Funky Winkerbean

Today is the day where the Lisa Moore character passes away in Funky Winkerbean from complications due to cancer, a plotline which has brought a ton of attention to Tom Batiuk's strip and even revived an old argument about whether comic strips should engage real world issues or provide a safe haven from them. All of the usual sources I checked this morning for the strip were overloaded, but Alan Gardner has it, with some commentary to boot. The New York Times notes the plot point. Comics Curmudgeon notes the Funky strip and a similarly-tinged For Better or For Worse offering in what is sure to be the most entertaining response thread on the matter. Here's a note on both the fact that the related book may set a record for being out on the heels of a strip's newspaper progression, and the fund set up to benefit cancer treatment. Here's an example of the general press coverage the plot has received in papers coast to coast. Chris Mautner talked to the cartoonist.
 
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OTBP: The Pinwheel


 
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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* the comics business news and analysis site ICv2.com provides an update on the status of Diamond's new Point of Sale-system offering and makes the case for why the implementation of such systems are important.

* the recent spate of Adrian Tomine-related press coverage continues with pieces like this one in The Daily Californian.

* an interview causes Matthias Wivel to re-examine a set of arguments he made months ago about a certain kind of European comics work.

* this piece by Alex Chun on a major ongoing Basil Wolverton exhibition at the Grand Central Art Center in Fullerton, California reads like a model for such stories: it tells you about the artist and the aims of the show, but also digs into where the art displayed come from and what it means to the person who currently owns it. In this case, that's Glenn Bray, who apparently also provided much of the Harvey Kurtzman work that appeared in the Masters show. Wolverton had one of those truly vital careers start to finish, and any attention that might lead to a reconsideration of his body of work is more than okay with me.

* I think this sounds promising and even potentially paradigm-shifting if things fell into place a certain way, but that's true of nearly every major on-line comics initiative announced in the last three years. It's the second act that's more important with projects that seek to warp the industry around them; not the opening or even the playbill.

* Heidi MacDonald notes that on-line strip juggernaut Perry Bible Fellowship has enjoyed a crush of pre-orders on-line through Amazon.com. Since I suspect that Amazon.com order numbers and rankings were brought into this world just to make Diamond sales estimates look revealing and exact, I'm not sure much more can be taken from this other than a sign that some people are going to be interested in this book. I know I am.

* it's odd to call two of the three Naruto books sold in a bunch under the Naruto Nation promotion holding to a couple of places on the USA Today charts a few weeks into their appearance as a freefall or whatever; while I think there's probably something to be gleaned from how those books leave the charts as opposed to how the Naruto book leave the charts when they're being sold individually, that's still a mighty performance, with one week before the next wave of volumes shows up.

* Chris Butcher sort of agrees with me in sort of agreeing with Gary Tyrrell about an initial take on Zuda.

* Matt Thorn on conservative Japanese readers

* Steven Grant backs away in honorable fashion from the Diamond-criticism portion of his statements last week on bar codes as a destroyer of the small-press comic and decides on other factors that are keeping the kind of self-published work that was common two decades ago from seizing a place in the current market. I'm usually all for the kind of market critique that talks about how certain kinds of approaches are picked at and wounded until they kind of fade from view, but I'm not sure that this is exactly what's going on here. For instance, there are publishers that specialize in work that I think would have found expression in self-published form had those publishers not developed the way they did, which I think is a different set of pressures with a different set of consequences than the ones Grant describes. I greatly appreciate a creator like Grant looking at issues like this, though, and wish such discussions were more widespread.
 
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Happy 55th Birthday, Tod Smith!


 
posted 10:12 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Fall 2007 Arts Conference Updates

* Editor & Publisher has an information-packed piece up on the Festival of Cartoon Art taking place in Columbus in conjunction wit OSU's Cartoon Research Library in late October. A few originally-announced speakers are apparently out, including Jules Feiffer; there look to be plenty of substitutes and additions. That's really shaping up to be an interesting show.

* The International Comic Arts Forum, the organization and show still known by the short-hand of "ICAF", has a schedule up for its show the weekend previous to the Ohio function. The name that pops off their schedule is Lat, whose presence makes me want to be there all by itself. Not that I needed any prompting given ICAF's usual line-up of artists, academics and special events.
 
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Happy 52nd Birthday, Chris Warner!


 
posted 10:08 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Not Comics: Marvel Stock News

Financial news confuses me, but it looks to me that Marvel Enterprises stock has received a recent boost after a designation of "outperform" (meaning they think it will outperform the stock market) from the analyst Cowen & Co. This seems to me like it might be the first positive nod in the direction Marvel is going with funding its own movies starting with 2008's Iron Man. It's interesting to me how attitudes have changed towards Marvel's move into funding films, from something of a widespread skepticism regarding the quality of intellectual properties Marvel had left after the last seven or eight years of big budget movies to a more qualified appraisal of those properties given Marvel's somewhat solid performance with second-tier properties previously and the notion that the IP landscape isn't exactly a super-rich one in general right now. While Iron Man might have seemed a second-class customer in a year that includes a Lord of the Rings movie, an early Harry Potter flick and one of those awful Star Wars prequels, it looks like a much better bet to make its share of money in a year that includes an untested Mach 5 and Indiana Jones' 130-year-old fedora.
 
posted 10:07 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 32nd Birthday, Mike Dawson!


 
posted 10:04 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Quick hits
Exhibits/Events
Comic Book Giveaway
Cartoonists With Attitude at SPX
Boldman, Borgman and Coverly in Cincinnati
Shaenon Garrity, Andrew Farago on Phil Frank

History
Iraq War Through Comics

Industry
I Hate Your Cartoon
Comics' New Golden Age
Mumbai Schools Use Comics
Now and Then May Go or Not
Ed Koren to Receive VT Award
Gay Chicago Magazine Hires Cartoonist

Interviews/Profiles
ScrippsNews: Gene Yang
Newsarama: Tom Beland

Not Comics
Brian Posehn Likes Stuff

Publishing
Newsarama on American Cartoonists at Soleil

Reviews
Chris Mautner: Various
Brian Heater: Eating Steve
Dick Hyacinth: Mourning Star Vol. 1
Richard Bruton: Crecy, Doktor Sleepless
Jesschn: Schulz and Peanuts: A Biography
 

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CR Review: Incredible Change-Bots



Creator: Jeffrey Brown
Publishing Information: Top Shelf, soft cover, 144 pages, July 2007, $15
Ordering Numbers: 1891830910 (ISBN10), 9781891830914 (ISBN13)

The wonderful thing about the Summer 2007 Transformers movies is that it marked something of an official shift by Hollywood out of the cheap entertainment icons of my generation's childhood and into the things that shaped the early memories of our younger siblings and babysitting clients. In other words, I and my friends were too old for Transformers and Go-Bots and all the other toys of things with the ability to change other things. It seems likely that a person in my age group would miss out on many of the subtleties in a satirical take on those kinds of stories as represented by Jeffrey Brown's Incredible Change-Bots. Luckily, there are almost no subtleties involved, and it's easy to project back on the original items Brown jokes about here: the arbitrary transformations, the dopey coincidences of the plot, the goofy life lessons human to robot to human again. It's like one of those old MAD parodies where they would be ripping into Dog Day Afternoon or whatever, something far beyond your ability to see, but it was easy to get a picture of the item being satirized from the humorous material itself.

The story's much too dumb to re-explore but from memory there are two warring tribes on the planet Electronocybercircuitron: Awesomebots and Fantasticons. The former group is supposedly marginally better in a moral sense than the latter, although Brown seems to have some fun tweaking that notion, too. They inexplicably end up on planet Earth and undergo a series of battles and betrayals, sometimes intermixing with humans, sometimes not. And that's about it. What impresses here is Brown's more than serviceable color art, and the breadth of joke-telling he embraces. Brown mines humor out of pointing the idiocy of source material (a character named Big Rig turns into a Big Rig on Planet Earth), exaggerating absurdities (change-bots made of microwaveable soup and popcorn bag), character-based gag humor (Shootertron's over-zealous proclamations), and even standard set pieces (a robot who disagrees with the plan while the leader proclaims all agree with the plan). It's a funny little comic.

In fact, Incredible Change-Bots is about the best parody comic one can imagine of robot changing toy line tie-in entertainment by a cartoonist better known for his observational moments. There's a low ceiling, and while Brown rams into it like 50 times he never comes close to a moment that transcends the book's origins. If you fall into the passionate or the don't-care end when it comes to entertainment like this you're likely to be angered or bored. All in all, I had fun reading it.


 
posted 1:00 pm PST | Permalink
 

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This Isn’t A Library: New and Notable Releases to the Comics Direct Market



*****

Here are those books that jump out at me from this week's probably mostly accurate list of books shipping from Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc. to comic book and hobby shops across North America.

I might not buy all of the following -- I might not buy any -- but were I in a comic book shop I would likely pick up the following and look them over, potentially resulting in mean words and hurt feelings when my retailer objected.

*****

MAY070015 CONAN THE PHENOMENON HC $29.95
Looks like they've officially run out of Conan titles.

JUN070036 HARVEY COMICS CLASSICS VOL 2 RICHIE RICH TP $19.95
I'm glad these exist, although I haven't seen one yet. Giant piles of Richie Rich comics were a part of summers growing up for me and my comics-reading pals as much as Claremont/Byrne's Uncanny X-Men were.

AUG070017 LOBSTER JOHNSON THE IRON PROMETHEUS #2 (OF 5) $2.99
JUL073228 BLACK DIAMOND #4 (OF 6) $2.95
AUG072222 HOWARD THE DUCK #1 (OF 4) $2.99
FEB073882 GUMBY #3 (RES) $3.95
AUG072249 OMEGA UNKNOWN #1 (OF 10) $2.99
These look like the best in a rich week for old-fashioned comic book-format serial titles. The belle of the ball here from an anticipatory standpoint is the Jonathan Lethem/Farel Dalrymple Omega the Unknown book, which has been coming out since forever.

MAY070027 SOCK MONKEY INCHES INCIDENT TP $9.95
I buy Tony Millionaire sight unseen.

JUN073564 COMPLETE IRON DEVIL HC (A) $26.95
Completely hardcore, foul porn from Frank Thorne; his art has never looked better.

APR070053 KUROSAGI CORPSE DELIVERY SERVICE VOL 4 TP $10.95
JUL073846 DRAGON HEAD VOL 8 GN (OF 10) $9.99
Unless I'm missing something these are the two best manga trade series with new books out this week.

AUG074291 LIO HAPPINESS IS A SQUISHY CEPHALOPOD TP $12.95
The most popular new newspaper strip of the last couple of years. I can't remember seeing a collection in a comics shop before, so I'd definitely be checking it out.

JUL073561 MOME VOL 9 GN $14.95
A solid issue of the mostly young cartoonists' comics anthology.

MAY073459 NIGER #2 $7.95
MAY073455 GROTESQUE #1 $7.95
MAY073461 REFLECTIONS #3 $7.95
Three new books in the Ignatz line, a newbie and two follow-ups, all handsomely drawn. I've been collecting all of these.

AUG073868 REMEMBRANCE THINGS PAST PT 2 BUDDING GROVE VOL 2 HC (O/A) $16.95
I haven't seen this yet, either, but it sounds like an interesting project.

JUL073552 WALKING MAN GN (O/A) (MR) $16.99
JUL073550 JAPAN AS VIEWED BY 17 CREATORS TP (SEP052929) (MR) $25.00
Two re-releases of books carried only sporadically the first time around; Walking Man in particular has been a real attitude changer for several Western comics readers vis-a-vis how they look at comics from Japan.

JUN073555 WHERES DENNIS MAGAZINE CARTOON ART OF HANK KETCHAM TP $19.95
A quirky and entertaining little book, although more for Ketcham completists and magazine panel cartoon fans than comics generalists.

MAY073456 I KILLED ADOLF HITLER GN $12.95
Another Jason book. Jason has a very strong and very specific following, which you can understand the moment you read one of his books.

JUL073390 COMIC ART MAGAZINE #8 (O/A) $19.95
JUL073389 COMIC ART MAGAZINE #9 $19.95
A new, great issue of the now Buenaventura Press-published comics magazine.

JUL073391 INJURY COMICS #1 (MR) $4.95
Ted May's return to comics shelves is good news, although I'm more interested in reading an issue #8 or #9 at this point from the cartoonist in question as opposed to another first issue. Hopefully, I'll get the chance.

*****

The full list of this week's releases, including some titles with multiple cover variations and a long, impressive list of toys and other stuff that isn't comics, can be found here. Despite this official list there's no guarantee a comic will show up in the stores as promised, or in all of the stores as opposed to just a few. Also, stores choose what they carry and don't carry.

To find your local comic book store, check this list; and for one I can personally recommend because I've shopped there, try this.

The above titles are listed with their Diamond order code in the first field, which may assist you in finding comics at your shop or having them order something for you they don't have in-stock.

If I didn't list your new comic, you're welcome to assume the worst of me, but it's likely I just missed it. I am not a good person.
 
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If I Were In NYC, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:35 am PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In Amsterdam, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In Vermont, I’d Go To This



"This" being a signing with James Sturm for his new book (above) at Elixir in WRJ, Vermont, tonight, 6-8 PM.
 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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October 2, 2007

Other Motives At Work In Bangladesh?

This fine summary article of the controversy to date in Bangladesh, over a comic by Arifur Rahman that featured a wordplay joke using the name Muhammed, points out that the current Information Minister owns a rival publication to that which ran the cartoon. It's one of many suggested contextual notions that make the piece worth reading.
 
posted 10:22 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 40th Birthday, Ivan Brunetti!


 
posted 10:20 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Little, Brown Drops Tintin Au Congo

As the French publisher Casterman works with the Herge estate to resolve complaints emanating from sources in that country about the outdated to awful depictions of Africans in Tintin Au Congo, the American publisher Little, Brown has pulled the book from its list and decided against its inclusion in a forthcoming complete Tintin set. Kudos to Publishers Weekly for picking up on the story.

This is a terrible move by Little, Brown. It establishes an unfortunate and massively untenable precedent, invests in the book a kind of power that is better off being defused by rational engagement, and as it's likely the company is either unwilling or unable by contract to let someone who wants to publish the book in a competitive edition, this decision effectively keeps it from market in a way that approaches the thoroughness as if a law were passed against it. It's worse in America than it would be in France, even, because the notion of a culture moving a book from the shops to the library shelves is more convincing in a country where you can believe it would be available in most libraries.

A lot of art offends without directly meaning to, embodying elements of racism, sexism, classism, and for those of us with religious beliefs or even certain political beliefs dozens of other upsetting notions if not outright instances of venomous reprisal against values we hold dear. I imagine a lot of Tintin offends someone, not just this one book. I don't understand the put in a drawer notion, because no drawer will ever be big enough. I guess this is the point where I make the joke that if this somehow ends up with future generations never having to see Cuba Gooding Jr.'s performance in Lightning Jack, it's all good. But I'm not certain there's anything funny about this.
 
posted 10:18 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 40th Birthday, Rob Liefeld!


 
posted 10:16 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Consume: Bits of Comics History

* columnist Abhay Khosla's recent post at Savage Critics about the cartoonist Percy Crosby, one of America's most popular comic strip creators who spent the last years of his life institutionalized, resulted in an equally enlightening post from Eddie Campbell quoting from Jerry Robinson's Skippy and Percy Crosby. Does anyone out there know what became of Robinson's plans to have that 1978 book re-published?

* it's more publishing news than history, but since the publication of English-language versions of manga more than a decade old is so rare, I'll let it count: IDW will be publishing Kazuo Umezu's odd and unsettling 1960s word Reptilia.

* although I'm not sure why they're farming these out rather than archiving them on their own site, it's hard to care when you get a chance to listen to this 1992 super-daffy encounter between Todd McFarlane and Gary Groth, one of the most entertaining confrontations between comics personalities in the modern era.
 
posted 10:14 pm PST | Permalink
 

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OTBP: Whores of Mensa #3


 
posted 10:12 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Watch: Joe Kubert, John Romita Sr.

I totally this missed this charming video of Joe Kubert and John Romita Sr. at the Baltimore Comic-Con, as captured by the Hero Initiative, picked up by the great afNews.info blog. I plan on watching the whole thing myself at some point today.
 
posted 10:10 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Bookmark: ComicMix Relaunch


 
posted 10:08 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Columnist Asks: Where Is The Contempt

This piece reads like a level-headed discussion of the issues involved in the case of cartoonist Irfan Khan and three other journalists being sentenced under contempt charges for a story about a retired Supreme Court Chief Justice, a sentence currently suspended awaiting a hearing on the matter in early 2008. Some of those issues include: the fact that it should be more difficult to lower the prestige of the court when it's a retired judge being examined, that this decision indicates truth is no defense against such charges, and the existence of applications of this kind of law against the sources of other criticisms of the court indicates a general suppression of truth could be in the offing.
 
posted 10:07 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Bookmark: Bob Fingerman’s Blog


 
posted 10:04 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Quick hits
History
Punch 2.00
Abhay Khosla on Percy Crosby

Industry
I Hate Your Cartoon
I Hate Your Cartoon
Peoria Down to One Store
Viz Dominates Category Chart
Editorial Cartoons Still Powerful
Maybe He Simply Meant What He Said

Interviews/Profiles
Playback: Jim Valentino
PWCW: Dark Tower Team
Gothamist: Adrian Tomine
Newsarama: Adam Warren
NYDailyNews.com: MF Grimm
The Underwire: Mary McQueen
Moscow Times: Viktor Bogorad
RedAndBlack.com: Scott Selsor
PWCW: Mike Baron, Steve Rude
Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel: Max Estes

Not Comics
Eee-Freakin'-Yikes

Publishing
ADV Manga to Publish More
Andrew Wahl Launches Site
PWCW on ComixMix Re-Launch

Reviews
David Welsh: With The Light
Leroy Douresseaux: O-Parts Hunter Vol. 6
Andrew Wheeler: Kampung Boy, Town Boy
 

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CR Review: Black Ghost Apple Factory



Creator: Jeremy Tinder
Publishing Information: Top Shelf, comic book, 48 pages, 2006, $5
Ordering Numbers: MAY073772 (Diamond)

I love the look of this comic -- seven and a half inches tall by five inches wide, no spine, a decent number of pages and a cool price point, and it's hard not to become immediately sympathetic with its aims. Rather than add one more earnest tale of longing to Top Shelf's catalog, Jeremy Tinder does his best to shove and slap that kind of comic around, like some tough guy movie-era fight on an elevator. Therefore we get a series of stories where at least one fact seems to cut into the general "woe is me" melancholia with a nasty-sounding hiss. In the first one, from where the title comes, the romantic notions become overwhelmed by an odd, fantasy activity whose practice provides much of the narrative structure. In the second, straight-faced exaggeration puts a spin on things, and skipping ahead to the volume's final effort the readers is subject to an old-fashioned plot twist that recasts the emotions on display in an amusing light.

Any shortcomings in Black Ghost Apple Factory tend to fall into the area of execution rather than concept. The stories could go further; some of them feel close to dithering on the page for what seems like wanting to have its cake (an emotionally affecting story) and eat it, too (making a satirical point about such stories, or at least tweaking the formula for the sake of tweaking it). Tinder's art is serviceable without quite being elegant; more suggestion than delineation. It adds very little to the stories except a certain amount of clarity in the straightforward nature in which each one is presented. Tinder tends to favor certain angles, and while they're not overtly noticeable, it's easy to pick at the passages that are bit more boring than others and recognize those moments feature a certain amount of visual repetition. It's certainly an entertaining comic overall, and I think it's flattered by the format. One wishes that, like the one-man anthologies of the early '90s it resembles, Black Ghost Apple Factory were coming out four times a year so that we could more directly track its creator's progress.


 
posted 1:00 pm PST | Permalink
 

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If I Were In Brussels, I’d Go To This


 
posted 6:30 am PST | Permalink
 

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October 1, 2007

CR Commentary: Flemming Rose Interviewed at Reason

Although it's actually not been one but two years -- almost to the day -- since the newspaper Jyllands-Posten published the infamous 12 caricatures of or touching on the subject of the Prophet Muhammed, this interview at Reason with the editor Flemming Rose is more than worth your time this morning. I agree with much of what Rose has to say. He makes a matter-of-fact case that many politicians acted in embarrassing fashion, that there was an abdication of the responsibility to inform and educate by members of the Western press that chose not to reprint the cartoons (I'm probably more angry about this than Rose seems to be), that the situation was manipulated to political advantage by certain forces in a way that changed this from a dramatic incident to a deadly one and they should shoulder the blame for these machinations, and that there were fundamental values of free expression at issue. I look forward to his book.

I still think Jyllands-Posten has a lot to answer for, and I wonder if anyone in the press will ever pursue what I think is a pretty basic line of inquiry.

As much as they are protected by the rights we afford to free expression, free speech stunts are not journalism. When Jyllands-Posten stepped away from their journalistic mandate to argue this point, really to pick a fight, no matter how ultimately just a fight, they stopped being journalists and acted, at least in part, as a member of the cultural and political community in which they operate. This brings with it a different weight, a different set of expectations and consequences, than when such speech is brought to bear by artists making art, or emerges in the course of journalists pursuing a version of the truth. That element of public standing is why the protest against that publication gained its initial traction and whiff of legitimacy. It's why a massive newspaper full of very smart people quickly lost control of a debate it instigated while a single artist, Lars Vilks, in doing what an artist does, seems so much more capable in his case of taking all comers in the resulting skirmish of ideas. I don't think this has been explored enough, if at all.

Related to that, I also don't buy the "we couldn't see it coming" defense. No one in Fall 2005 could have seen 100-plus deaths on the horizon from the resulting riots and political turmoil, but any adult could have and should have seen major potential for a negative outcome of some sort. In fact, I'd suggest it's that risk of a negative outcome that provided the action with the gravitas that made it worth doing. When you begin to make points that you know will have a negative outcome, an outcome you may not be able to control, you begin to step away from the exercise of free speech and start to stumble towards its abuse. Just because expression is protected doesn't make it a good idea. I hope that we may one day become comfortable enough in the absolute righteousness and necessity of the first notion that we can soberly consider the second.
 
posted 10:30 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Michael George Arraigned on Monday

Pennsylvania retailer and Pittsburgh Comic-Con co-founder Michael George was arraigned on four felony charges yesterday:

* first-degree murder
* an unspecified firearm charge
* insurance fraud
* obtaining money under false pretenses

George is accused of killing his then-wife in his Michigan area comic book store 17 years ago, in order to collect on her $125,000 life insurance policy and take over the entirety of their estate. In a statement yesterday reported in the article linked to above, Macomb County Assistant Prosecutor Steve Kaplan said "One of the motives is that he preferred his mistress to his wife." The George family has retained former Macomb County Prosecutor Carl Marlinga to defend the 42-year-old accused. A motion by Marlinga that George be allowed to stay in his mother's home was denied, and George will be kept in jail. George had last week waived his right to an extradition hearing, and arrived in Michigan on Friday. The next stage, a preliminary exam, is scheduled for October 12.

George maintains his innocence.
 
posted 10:14 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Look: Pierre La Police


 
posted 10:12 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Random Comics News Story Round-Up

* NBM's Papercutz line has apparently acquired the Classics Illustrated library, both the material published 40-50 years ago and the book published by First Comics during their last few years of existence. They have announced on project from this group of material, Rick Geary's adaptation of Great Expectations, but future publications looks like they will depend on the company's ability to get a publishable version of each book in-house.

* Danish Cartoons Do-Over: The Musical.

* This interview with Adrian Tomine is a great enough read to snatch it out of the quick hits section and put it here.

* Gary Tyrrell features an extended look at the ZudaComics.com contract with a lengthy summary article. It's a good piece. He avoids getting into the legalities of it and simply argues from the perspective of what a standard DIY approach to a webcomic offers and what the Zuda approach to the same webcomic offers. I believe I agree with Tyrrell's summation, with the added emphasis that Zuda has no track record. That's a very important additional grain of salt with which to take their overture. It's one thing to offer a deal with certain contractual limitations after you have a proven track record of getting stuff over with an audience, and another thing to hand a certain amount of control over to a company with no displayed ability to do what it promises in terms of putting the project in front of people. Now, this could change really quickly, and they could come out gangbusters, but until then I think you have to look at the contracts differently.

As always, the one thing that all the critics and Zuda itself can agree on is that you should hire a lawyer the second you seriously begin to consider submitting something. Hire a lawyer if you see z-u-d-a in your alphabet soup, for pity's sake. And then listen to that lawyer. Ask them every question you can.

* Here's an editorial in the Hartford Courant that raises an eyebrow at the extent of controversy surrounding the Guilford Incident by which a teacher resigned after giving a high school student a copy of Eightball #22, and notes how much of that is driven by our culture's specific reaction to visual art.

* Here's a nice summary article on the various issues surrounding Tom Batiuk's controversial cancer storyline in Funky Winkerbean.
 
posted 10:10 pm PST | Permalink
 

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OTBP: Reich #2


 
posted 10:08 pm PST | Permalink
 

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CR Commentary: The Entirety of My Thoughts on Using DM Sales Estimates For Focused Analysis


 
posted 10:06 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Happy 47th Birthday, Barbara Kesel!


 
posted 10:04 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Go, Read: Bangladeshi Blogger Reaction

This article looks at the reaction of bloggers and human rights organizations to the jailing of Bangaladeshi cartoonist Arifur Rahman. The young cartoonist was jailed two weeks ago because of a cartoon that ends in a word play using Muhammed -- Rahman's own first name, and a common name given by Bangladeshi men -- as the name of a cat. This incident has represented an almost nightmarish stretching of reaction to art related to the Prophet Muhammed, and has provided an example how legislation designed to mitigate civil unrest can lead to artists being put in jail. Unlike most articles of its type, the survey piece also includes a badge (seen at left) to put somewhere on your site in support of Rahman, and invites you to join a facebook group for updates.
 
posted 10:02 pm PST | Permalink
 

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Quick hits
Exhibits/Events
Trudeau at CCS 10-22
Blogger Art Show Opens 10-5
Report on Drawn to Comics Exhibit
NYCC Hires Manager of Programming & Education

History
Johnny Ryan Poop Story
More George Herriman Cartoons
Article on Compilation Paperbacks
Decade-Old Reason Article on Selling Out

Industry
Big Planet Adds Store
Let's You and Him Fight 01
Let's You and Him Fight 02
ComicBookShelf.com Donates
Comic Shop Immune to Bridge Closure

Interviews/Profiles
F-List Show Profiled
NPR: Nicole Hollander
CBR: Jonathan Lethem
Wizard: Jonathan Lethem
Profile of Big Monkey Comics
ComixTalk: Shayna Marchese
InsideBayArea.com: Lark Pien

Not Comics
Saving Journalism
This Was Kind of Funny
Goodbye, Miss Moneypenny
Non-Dilbert Adams Book Due
Scott Adams on the Future of Newspapers

Publishing
New Comic Debuts at Split Lip
Barnes and Noble Review Launches
Combined Paper Means More Comics
Tree Fort Press Debuts Western at SPX

Reviews
Rob Clough: Various
Paul O'Brien: Various
Paul O'Brien: X-Men #203
Matt Brady: Killing Girl #2
Paul O'Brien: X-Men: First Class #4
Laurel Maury: Sentences: The Life of MF Grim
Doug Wolk: Alan Moore's Complete WildC.A.T.S.
Don MacPherson: Graphic Classics: Bram Stoker
Marc Singer: Astro City: The Dark Age Book Two
 

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CR Review: Fox Bunny Funny



Creator: Andy Hartzell
Publishing Information: Top Shelf, soft cover, 104 pages, June 2007, $10
Ordering Numbers: 9781891830976 (ISBN13)

This compulsively readable series of escalating comics short stories may put some in the mind of similar debuts of still sort-of recent vintage by Graham Annable and John Kerschbaum. Like Annable, it's clear that cartoonist Andy Hartzell has an appealing, stylized form of presentation that boasts a certain level of craft chops as its backbone. Comparable to Kerschbaum's work, Fox Bunny Funny is odd and unsettling and even lacerating when it comes to laying out the uglier aspects of the human condition, both by way of its story details but also in drawing on the cartoonist's ability to bolster the disturbing moments through qualities of the art. It's not a debut, really, but I imagine for a lot of people Fox Bunny Funny will act as a statement book of the kind that will send them scrambling for his beautifully packaged mini-comics and other previous work.

A silent comic, Fox Bunny Funny has us follow an anthropomorphic fox through their world of institutionalized exploitation of abuse from fox onto to the bunny. We quickly learn our identity figure sympathizes with the bunnies to the point of wanting to adopt bunny characteristics. We see the open murder and consumption of bunnies or the reflection of such acts in several set pieces that play up the humor of adorable characters committing atrocities, and eventually march with the character into a moment of transcendence regarding this situation, and leave the book bathed in their resulting happiness. The journey is more fun than the destination, the deliberate pacing and the design chops that come slipping out in a few really knock 'em dead moments like a two-page cityscape spread. Once you catch your breath, the message at the book's heart may feel less universal than generic, a fable of identity that suggests we may be trapped in physical circumstances that are very different than the true selves we suspect we may be. This becomes more greatly shaded to a slight extent by the last few pages and the relationships depicted in those city scenes, but even that feels like noise more than a metaphorical build. I certainly look forward to the next book, where I hope to find a better match between the complexity of the themes explored and the intricacies of Hartzell's comics-making.


 
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If I Were In NYC, I’d Go To This



I'm afraid you have to scroll down to the October 1 entry
 
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