2009 November
The Fifth Color – True Believer
Welcome to the middle of November, folks so bear with me as we take a look back at the beginning of the year for Yours Truly and leave the House of Ideas be this week; the following was written sometime in January, when my laptop finally rested at my side in the Acute Rehab Unit of the UCI Medical faciliy and I had enough finger strength and energy to type:
Well then.
Looks like the mighty Marvel Bullpen had to wait until I was trapped in an Intensive Care Ward, hands unmovable, before taking the winsome Wasp and splattering her against the windshield of Big Event Comics with nary a second thought.
Did you really think I’d let them get away with that?
But before I launch into the rich and honorable history of Ms. Janet Van Dyne, there are a few things I have to say first.
WARNING: Personal note to follow, mostly comics related, spoilers to my recovery ahead.
- November 13, 2009 @ 03:00 PM by Carla Hoffman
Marvel’s monkey business
Who is this monkey? Why is he two-fisting handguns? Who’s his tailor? I have no clue what the answers to these questions are — all I know is he’s drawn by simian specialist Frank Cho and being teased on Marvel.com as “Marvel’s hottest new character.” If there’s one thing for sure about comics fans, it’s that we’re monkey whores, so I am therefore passing this on to you our readers.
Tune into Marvel.com on Monday for the big reveal, whatever the heck that might be. And check out Cho’s blog for a sketch version of the piece labeled “Hitman Monkey.” Are there two more glorious words in the English language?
- November 13, 2009 @ 01:35 PM by Sean T. Collins
Straight for the art | Seth’s new Nancy design
Nancy and Oona Goosepimple, by Seth
Man, that’s a knockout, huh? Feast your eyes on George Sprott author (and all-around Dapper Dan) Seth’s design for Nancy, Vol. 2, the forthcoming installment of Drawn & Quarterly’s gorgeous John Stanley Library.
The image hails from this post by D&Q’s Rebecca Rosen, which you really ought to read if the cult of Nancy has been a bit inscrutable to you like it has been to me. Just for example, the above image is a Seth drawing … which graces a book containing the adventures of a character created by, and best known through the work of, Ernie Bushmiller … but D&Q’s Nancy books collect John Stanley’s run on the character from her comic books, as opposed to Bushmiller’s newspaper strips … but those books were actually drawn by Dan Gormley, working off Stanley’s storyboard-format scripts. Phew! And then there’s the role that Mark Newgarden’s abstractified tribute to Bushmiller’s Nancy, “Love’s Savage Fury,” played in the character’s popularity with cartoonists…and ditto Newgarden and Paul Karasik’s landmark essay “How to Read Nancy” … ah, let Rebecca explain it to you, and why it all matters.
- November 13, 2009 @ 12:55 PM by Sean T. Collins
Robot reviews: Two by Tardi
West Coast Blues
West Coast Blues
by Jacques Tardi and Jean Patrick Manchette
Fantagraphics Books, 80 pages, $18.99.
You Are There
by Jacques Tardi and Jean-Claude Forest
Fantagraphics Books, 196 pages, $26.99.
It makes perfect sense that Fantagraphics would want to start their introduction (or should that be re-re-introduction) of French cartoonist Jacques Tardi to American readers with the release of West Coast Blues. The book, is after all, a tightly-plotted little crime noir, just the sort of thing that today’s discerning comic book readers seem to be interested in these days, given the proliferation of crime books recently.
- November 13, 2009 @ 11:30 AM by Chris Mautner
Straight for the art | My Grandmother’s House, by Cassandra Diaz
From "My Grandmother's House," by Cassandra Diaz
Tor.com has posted a beautiful six-page comic by Cassandra Diaz called My Grandmother’s House. Tor Art Director Irene Gallo describes it as “an ethereal, dreamy moment,” which seems about right.
You can see more of Diaz’s work on her website gallery and on her blog.
- November 13, 2009 @ 10:37 AM by Kevin Melrose
Reader scandalized by exposure to naked Zits
One of the "Zits" strips in question
You have to hand it to readers of the incredibly shrinking comics section: Many of them have a clear vision for those pages, even if most newspaper editors don’t.
The funnies largely go ignored in newsrooms, at least until word comes down that pages must be axed or, else, there’s a once-in-a-blue-moon announcement that a cartoonist or syndicate is ending a strip. But those readers who turn to Cathy or Hagar or Rex Morgan each day know exactly what they want (usually that’s for the page to look the same as it always has).
Take, for instance, Ted Trump of Orleans, Massachusetts. When he opens the Cape Cod Times, he expects to be entertained by Zits — not to be confronted with the type of scandalous nudity that’s been the trademark of Love Is … for the past four decades.
- November 13, 2009 @ 10:03 AM by Kevin Melrose
Comics Cavalcade: Tarzan and Twinkies
The Evil Stranger and Horror in the House
- November 13, 2009 @ 09:30 AM by Chris Mautner
Comics A.M. | The comics Internet in two minutes
Stuck in the Middle
Libraries | There’s still more follow-up to the removal this week of Stuck in the Middle: Seventeen Comics from an Unpleasant Age from two middle-school libraries in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Teachers still have access to the anthology — it depicts language and sexual reference that at least one parent found objectionable — and may use it in class.
An editorial in the Argus Leader calls the school board’s decision “a reasonable approach that balances the need to provide suitable guidance for kids when dealing with sensitive topics without falling prey to censorship.” CBS affiliate KELO, meanwhile, continues its coverage of the story with a look at how books are selected for libraries. Tom Spurgeon also has reaction from two of the anthology’s contributors. [Argus Leader, KELOLAND.com]
Creators | Jeet Heer digs up writings by a young Dave Sim expressing, in no uncertain terms, his disdain for the work of Jack Kirby. [Comics Comics]
- November 13, 2009 @ 08:38 AM by Kevin Melrose
Winners announced for 2009 Friends of Lulu Awards
Friends of Lulu
The winners were announced this morning for the 2009 Friends of Lulu Awards, which recognize “the people and projects that helped to open eyes and minds to the amazing comic and cartooning work by and/or about women.”
Nominees were selected by a panel of judges, with the winners voted on by the public.
The winners are:
Kim Yale Award for Best New Talent: Kate Beaton for Hark, A Vagrant
Lulu of the Year: Danielle Corsetto for Girls with Slingshots
Woman of Distinction: Joanne Carter Siegel
Leah Adezio Award for Best Kid-Friendly Work: Rapunzel’s Revenge, by Shannon Hale, Dean Hale and Nathan Hale
Female Comic Creator’s Hall of Fame: Gail Simone
Best Female Character: Monica Villarreal, from Wapsi Square by Paul Taylor
Brief biographies of each of the winners can be found here.
- November 13, 2009 @ 07:13 AM by Kevin Melrose
Hey kids, comics: a Grumpy Old Primer
Grumpy Old Fan
I am always glad to talk comics with Carla Hoffman, especially when she makes me think hard — and that’s the case today.
In her capacity as a retailer, Carla has been wondering about the relative accessibility of any given DC title, preferably in single-issue form (to accommodate those who, reasonably enough, might not want to start with paperbacks).
- November 12, 2009 @ 02:00 PM by Tom Bondurant
Comics Cavalcade: Hollywood Husbands and Mexican wrestlers
Hollywood Husbands by Jefferson Machamer
- November 12, 2009 @ 01:00 PM by Chris Mautner
Straight for the art: antizerogravity
Mome contributor T. Edward Bak (and creator of the great comic Service Industry) has a new art blog up where he’s posting sketches, illustrations and pages from his next Mome story, Wild Man. (via)
- November 12, 2009 @ 11:30 AM by Chris Mautner
Thin wallets, fat bookshelves: A publishing news round-up
Little Nothings Vol. 3
• NBM announced over the weekend they will release a third volume in Lewis Trondheim’s autobiographical Little Nothings series. You can read samples of the work on the company’s blog.
• The University Press of Mississippi will be publishing My Life With Charlie Brown in April. It’s a collection of essays, lectures and articles by Peanuts creator Charles Schulz. If April seems to far away for you, this book is coming out next month.
• Fantagraphics unveils the covers for their next Krazy and Ignatz book (designed by Chris Ware), as well as the second volume of Prison Pit.
• Van Jensen gives readers the scoop on the upcoming book tour for Pinocchio, Vampire Slayer and announces plans for a sequel in winter of next year.
• Speaking of SLG, they will be releasing an omnibus collection of Gene Yang’s early work, entitled Animal Crackers, in January.
• The Kingdom of New York is a new book featuring essays and articles from the New York Observer magazine. It also sports a spiffy cover and interior art by Drew Friedman. And apparently Fantagraphics will be releasing a collection of Friedman’s celebrity portraits in summer of 2010.
• I don’t know if we caught this on the blog yet, but apparently Chuck Dixon and Gary Kwapisz are forming a publishing company devoted to historical comics.
• Dash Shaw, who has redesigned his Web site, apparently completely reworked his 2006 book the Mother’s Mouth, cutting out pages and changing colors. The alternations are only for the French and Spanish editions, however, which seems a shame.
- November 12, 2009 @ 11:00 AM by Chris Mautner
If this van’s a-rockin’, the spinner rack needs restockin’
I wonder: Will there ever be a movement to legitimize airbrushed van art in the same way that “graphic novels” have given comic books traction with the smart set? ‘Cuz this ain’t gonna help out in either department, but it sure is funny: Maxim lists the 12 Superheroes Who Should Be on ’70s Vans, complete with Photoshopped visual evidence so convincing you can almost smell the newsprint and hear the Foghat.
My favorite’s the Man-Wolf van (or is that the Van-Wolf?), but I also enjoyed the always welcome Thor/”Immigrant Song” gag and the description of Doctor Strange as “the lava lamp of superheroes.” They’re funny because they’re true!
- November 12, 2009 @ 10:00 AM by Sean T. Collins
Con War dispatch: of con guests and collateral damage
Con War is hell, and you never know who’s gonna get caught in the crossfire. Wizard owner Gareb Shamus’s evolving effort to rebrand his publishing and online empire and take on Reed Exhibitions’s C2E2 and New York Comic Con by aggressively counter-scheduling his Anaheim and Big Apple events has produced some nasty peripheral exchanges, even as direct confrontations between the two convention promoters have all but ceased.
Take the back-and-forth we noted last week between PvP creator Scott Kurtz and Comics Alliance honcho Laura Hudso . It started when Kurtz publicly blasted a Wizard/Shamus functionary with both barrels after the staffer obliviously sent him an email addressed to “Kurt” — hey, these things happen — soliciting his attendance at Anaheim Comic Con. Hudson took Kurtz to task for tarring all Wizard employees with a brush perhaps better reserved for the company’s decision-makers. This led to a lengthy and ugly comment-thread roundelay between Hudson — who, as the former senior editor of Tim Leong’s defunct Comic Foundry magazine, need bow to no one in the “taking cheap shots at Wizard and its employees as though the two were fungible entities” department — and Kurtz, some of his fans, and former Wizard staff writer Chris Ward. Over the course of the argument’s five pages, posts were deleted; accusations of trollery, spamming, egomania and hypocrisy were thrown about like so much confetti; Hudson’s problems during her tenure with Jenna Jameson-publishing Virgin Comics were hashed out; former Wizard President Fred Pierce was accused of buying off former Wizard critic Frank Miller; and a horrid time was had by all.
- November 12, 2009 @ 09:30 AM by Sean T. Collins