Dustin Harbin: "No Time for Tim"

This weekend, I made my way up to Charlotte, N.C., to catch up with my pals Johanna Draper Carlson and KC Carlson, who also drove down to attend the 35th Anniversary of the Charlotte MiniCon. I enjoyed attending the Minicon (seeing folks like the always photogenic and hilarious Dustin Harbin [yeah, I had to photograph him...again], as well as Jason Latour, Matt Wilson, Bridgit Scheide and Rich Barrett). Yet as I was in the middle of having fun, I realized I wanted to enjoy it as a consumer, not cover it as a journalist. So if you are looking for coverage of the Minicon, I highly recommend Johanna’s coverage over at Comics Worth Reading.

That being said, I could not go to Charlotte and not take some pictures. Despite the fact I have attended HeroesCon for the past several years, I have never shopped at the legendary retail store, Heroes Aren’t Hard to Find. Until this past Sunday. Here’s the evidence of my fun.

The shot where I show I can cross a street for a photo.

KC Carlson indulges my request for a peek-a-boo game. (Mary Jane Watson by Adam Hughes)

Price check under the giant Spidey!

Doc Ock makes sure no one messes with the cash register

My favorite art in the store (Superman by the late great Mike Wieringo)

I did not take pictures of my purchases, but I was able to score copies of the first few issues of Terry Moore’s Rachel Rising, as well as X-9 Secret Agent Corrigan Volume 3 by Archie Goodwin and Al Williamson.

Most people would settle for being a death-defying stock-market genius and leave it at that, but noooooo, not Annie Koyama. She had to go and form Koyama Press, creating a home for acclaimed cartoonists like Michael DeForge and Dustin Harbin, and racking up Joe Shuster Awards for Outstanding Comic Book Publisher and, via the comics duo Tin Can Forest, Outstanding Comic Book Cartoonist. Not one to rest on her laurels, Koyama has provided Robot 6 with an exclusive look at her very strong-seeming 2012 line-up. It features new books from Tin Can Forest, DeForge, and Harbin–including the children’s comic The Playground War, whose cover you’re getting a peek at above–as well as the Koyama Press debuts of Jesse Jacobs (Even the Giants) and Julia Wertz (The Fart Party).

The full press release and the covers for the new Jesse Jacobs and Tin Can Forest books are after the jump.

[PRESS RELEASE]

2011 was a breakout year for Koyama Press that saw the publisher win 2011’s Shuster Award for Outstanding Comic Book Publisher, in a field of nominees that included Canadian publishing luminaries such as Drawn & Quarterly, and several of the publisher’s titles won major industry awards and made a number of “best of” lists. The year finished off on a high note with the launch of a beautiful new website designed by Squidface & the Meddler.

2012 looks to be an equally exciting year for the innovative publisher. Spring 2012 will see a new release from artist and illustrator Jesse Jacobs whose book Even the Giants (AdHouse, 2011) marked his major publishing debut after several award-winning self-published titles. Jacobs describes his new comic work, By This Shall You Know Him, as coming “out of the darkness of oblivion.” Within the book’s confines, Jacobs states that the reader will “bear witness to the limitless ambitions of a gang of celestial beings as they fiddle and fuss with all sorts of molecular arrangements, creating infinitely detailed patterns and strange new worlds brimming with bizarre life forms. Part art-book, part graphic novel, By This Shall You Know Him depicts all manner of beast running, crawling and slithering towards death’s cold embrace.”

Tin Can Forest (aka Pat Shewchuk and Marek Colek) whose Koyama Press debut Baba Yaga and the Wolf was nominated for the 2011 Doug Wright Award for Best Emerging Talent, and won the duo the 2011 Joe Shuster Award for Outstanding Comic Book Cartoonist will release Wax Cross also in spring 2012. The artists describe the new work as “an alchemical folk-tale set in the twilight of the modern age, when the moon has devoured the sun, the mechanical ocean has evaporated into silence, and the decaying corpse of electric current sleeps eternally in a casket of orange lichen. Featuring a cast of characters as familiar as the faded Polaroids in a photo album salvaged from the flooded basement of a condemned church, Wax Cross presents illustrated transcriptions of ectoplasmic revelation, fibrous and grainy folklore, and unbridled bestial merriment, accompanied by textual incantations and occult decoration.”

The New Year will also see Koyama Press publish Lose 4, the most recent issue the critically acclaimed, one-man anthology by Michael Deforge who Rob Clough of The Comics Journal has called “the most startling, fully-formed young cartooning talent to burst on to the scene since Dash Shaw.” 2012 will also see new work by cartoonist Julia Wertz, author of the autobiographical comics The Fart Party and Drinking at the Movies. Her work has received praise from a number of outlets including, Bust, LA Times, USA Today, The Comics Journal, and New York Magazine. Dustin Harbin’s children’s comic The Playground War will debut in the spring as well.

These books are just some of the new titles that are set to be released by Koyama Press in 2012, a year that promises to maintain the publisher’s momentum as they continue to promote and support a wide range of emerging and established artists.

Harbin’s point is that Williams created a publishing house designed to make the kinds of comics he wanted to see a reality, so that thinking about his death is as much thinking about the presence of comics he brought into the world as it is about the absence of the man himself. And with the welcome news that Sparkplug will be continuing under the auspices of Williams’ wife Emily Nilsson, his friend Tom Neely, and his colleague Virginia Paine, it looks like that aspect of his legacy will continue to be honored.

First up, Diary cartoonist and Casanova letterer Dustin Harbin brings us “The Faces of RoboCop,” a 16-panel portrait of the cast of Paul Verhoeven’s Detroit-dystopia sci-fi satire. I’m particularly fond of “Psycho That ’70s Dad,” but you’ll have to click the link to see him. I’d buy that for a dollar! (Sorry, I couldn’t resist.)

Next, I Want You cartoonist and Pizza Island member Lisa Hanawalt reviews Michael Bay’s Transformers 3: Dark of the Moon in words and pictures. It’s a harrowing, heartbreaking, ultimately uplifting tale of human perseverance in the face of adversity and atrocity — I’m talking about the review, not the movie. (Oh God, definitely not the movie.) It also features the best portrait of Rosie Huntington-Whitley ever drawn. Chewy indeed!

The Incal

Welcome to another edition of What Are You Reading. JK Parkin is off in San Diego trying to get that Elvis Stormtrooper’s autograph, so I’ll be your host today. Our special guest this week is George O’Connor.

O’Connor is probably best known as the author of the ongoing Olympians series of graphic novels, which attempt to retell classic Greek myths (the latest, Hera, just came out from First Second). He’s also the author of such books as Journey Into Mowhawk Country and the children’s picture book Kapow, as well as the artist of Ball Peen Hammer, which was written by Adam Rapp.

To see what George and the rest of the Robot 6 crew have been reading …

Chris Mautner: Dustin Harbin is quickly becoming one of my favorite cartoonists, at least among the under-35 crowd. I love the amount of detail he throws into his drawings, even the tiny ones; his gift for caricature and goofy faces; and his genuine wit.

Thankfully, Koyama Press has two new books out from Harbin right now: The second volume of his Diary Comics, now published in a (perhaps more appropriate) mini-comic size; and Dharbin!, a collection of his first two self-published comics, most of which contain simple one or tw0-page jokes or stories. OK, so it’s not all entirely new material, but it is quite good. Harbin is a born raconteur, and he has a gift for making even simple events like hanging out with friends or working late at night seem special or revealing. Plus, he’s a really funny guy.

Daredevil #1

Tim O’Shea: How happy am I after reading Daredevil 1 by Mark Waid along with artists Paolo Rivera and Marcos Martin? After finishing the issue I felt as hopeful and engaged as I did in the early 1980s after reading Walt Simonson’s Thor 337 (the first issue in his epic run). Now while I sincerely doubt that I will get a three-issue run from this creative team, I am hopeful that I will least get a year. It was interesting to see how both artists experiment with how to convey DD’s radar sense. Of the two styles, I find myself partial to RIvera’s approach. Also Riviera does nice little details to his story, such as when Murdoch is going through a metal detector and has to take off his trademark ”blind” glasses. And I have to quote and agree with Michael May from this week’s Food or Comics?, who wrote: “Mark Waid fills me with confidence about every Marvel or DC series he writes, but I’m just happy to see a superhero smiling”.

Hated seeing the six-issue Vertigo miniseries Cinderella: Fables are Forever, by writer Chris Roberson and artist Shawn McManus, end this week. Of the Fables (hell Vetigo) universe, CInderella has become my favorite character.

Judging by the female empowerment speech that Matthew Sturges gives Power Girl to say in  the opening of Power Girl 26, I find myself hoping that in the coming days of the new 52 DC Comics the writer finds himself an assignment. He’s a solid writer who should have been on one of the creative teams in the first place (instead of some of the questionable creators that garnered assignments instead).

Archie & Friends 156

Brigid Alverson: I have been reading a lot of Archie comics lately. I don’t think I would have picked up Jughead at all if it wasn’t for the much-praised Jughead #200, written by Robot Chicken creator Tom Root, but it’s actually one of the more interesting comics in the Archie line. In Jughead #207 and #208, written by Craig Boldman and illustrated by Rex Lindsey, Jughead actually leaves home after a blowup with his father. First he settles at Archie’s house (having discovered that he and Archie are distant cousins), then he moves to Ethel’s for a spell. I particularly liked the first story, as it showed a bit more depth than your typical Archie comic; the parents get involved in the situation, for instance, and Jughead shows a remarkable (for him) capacity for introspection. The story isn’t over yet, and I’m more than mildly curious to see what happens next.

Of course, it’s all in good fun, and so is Archie & Friends #156, which is set at Riverdale Comic Con. The script is by Archie Comics publicity director Alex Segura, who knows a thing or two about cons (he came to Archie from DC Comics), with pencils by longtime pro Bill Galvan. The whole gang shows up in costume, and they are followed by a mysterious but obnoxious robot as they sample the delights of the con and compete in a costume contest (with real-life movie producer JJ Abrams as the judge). It’s a very Archie plot, complete with an itching-powder double-cross (who carries itching powder any more?), but Segura and Galvan toss in some sly insider references, both verbal and visual (Archie dresses as Pureheart the Powerful, the gang heads to the MLJ Comics booth to see Dan Parent, and Archie is searching for a back issue of The Shield, a character he replaced in Pep Comics). Incorporating current pop culture into a comic is risky, but Segura and Galvan pull it off nicely.

Finally, let’s talk about Kevin Keller, who gets his own series next year. Kevin Keller #1 (actually Veronica #207) is scripted and penciled by Kevin creator Dan Parent, who gives the characters a smoother, simpler look than the traditional Archie style‹he eschews those two parallel lines across the bridge of the nose that are such an Archie trademark, for instance, and his Veronica doesn’t have bangs, which really changes her look. The basic conflict is a contest again (they seem to have a lot of those in Riverdale); this time, it’s Jughead versus Kevin in a pie-eating contest. The story includes a flashback into Kevin’s past as a nerdy kid with braces who rescues a friend from a mean trick, and it introduces Kevin’s father, Col. Tom Keller. Yes, Kevin is an army brat, and he wants to go into the service himself someday, which is just fine with everybody (well, Veronica worries that he will get wounded somehow, but Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell doesn’t merit a mention). We even get to see Kevin come out to his parents. But the place where the story really breaks new ground is with the pie-eating contest, because (spoiler alert!) Veronica has left the cream pies in an overheated car, a fact that Kevin and Jughead learn only after eating six apiece. I believe this is the first time anyone has ever vomited in an Archie comic, although of course we don’t see the actual act. Anyway, the comic has a lot of backstory and goes a long way toward establishing Kevin’s personality. If he has one flaw, it’s that everyone likes him too much (apart from the central-casting bullies in middle school). I’d like to see Reggie pull some pranks on him and Veronica give him the frosty treatment‹then we will really know he is one of the gang.

George O’Connor: Wow, thank god you’re asking me this while I’m actually reading some interesting things.

The Incal Classic Collection, by Alexandro Jodorowsky and Moebius.. I finally picked this up, because (A) I just don’t have enough Moebius in my collection and (B) a couple of my studiomates (cartoonists Jason Little and Joe Infurnari, to be specific) are huuuge fans of Jodorowsky and so I figured, hey, I really ought to check this guy out. Story-wise, I have to admit it’s not particularly gripping me. It reads easy enough, but the characters slip out of their humanity and into being these, I don’t know, super-evolved avatars a bit too often, and kind of fly around delivering exposition. That said, Jodorowsky does an even better job of pulling out crazy ideas that Grant Morrison, and the artwork by Moebius—wow.  If you too do not have enough artwork by Moebius, get some. He’s incredible. In this collection in particular I can see his influence on such masters as Dave Gibbons and P. Craig Russell.

The Mighty Thor Omnibus by Walter Simonson and Sal Buscema. Simonson’s run on the Mighty Thor was largely responsible for turning me into the comics fan (and pro) I am today. This absolute cinder block of a book has been sitting on my nightstand table for a month now as I slowly but surely wade through its contents, which is the entirety of Simonson’s 1980s run on the Mighty Thor book, as well as the Balder the Brave miniseries.  A lot of this I hadn’t read since high school, and I’m pleasantly surprised at how well it holds up. The new coloring is actually quite nice too. My one complaint is the enormous dent it’s putting in my sternum as I read this thing.  Seriously, it must weigh 25 lbs.

Tekkon Kinkreet: Black and White, by Taiyo Matsumoto. My girlfriend and I had seen the anime made from this previously and LOVED IT, so I finally got around to picking up the original Manga.  I’m actually lying a little bit when I said I’m reading this now—it would be more accurate to say I was reading it, but my girlfriend has now absconded with it and now she’s reading it. My impression: the story is very familiar to what I’ve seen in the anime, but there’s a rougher edge to the artwork by Matsumoto that I’m really digging. Strangely, publisher Viz Media opted to print this western-style, so the book is read from left to right., as opposed to traditional Japanese right  to left.  To accomplish this, Viz must have reversed all of the artwork, which, in my experience, must have distorted it somewhat. I’m going to have to track down a Japanese version one of these days just to see the art how Matsumoto intended.

Fear Itself by Matt Fraction, Stuart Immonen, and Wade von Grawbadger. Normally, I’m one of those guys who grumbles about crossover series like this, but I love Stuart Immonen’s work and had to pick this up. Now that I’m looking at them all together, I seem to be missing one of the issues, but writer Fraction does a very good job of moving the story along at all the points it needs to hit, and man, Immonen can draw.  Von Grawbadger is his best inker, and the whole team has created the perfect comic-book equivalent of a popcorn flick, at least so far. Sometimes these things fall apart in the climax, you know?

Finally, the last book I’m reading is a bit of a cheat, as I’m included in it, but I literally only drew one page. Twisted Savage Dragon Funnies, featuring the work of 31 different cartoonists and edited by Michel Fiffe, is an anthology book featuring twisted takes on Erik Larsen’s venerable Savage Dragon and his supporting cast. The contributors are almost exclusively “indie” cartoonists, and they each bring their own idiosyncratic takes to their short tales of the Dragonverse. Some standouts so far are Kat Roberts “2000 Light Years from Home”, Chris Sinderson’s “Vicious Circle Therapy Group” and the aforementioned Mr Fiffe’s “The Date”, featuring a rotting character with the awesome name of Abner Cadaver. My own contribution was part of a short story ‘jam’ written by Joe Keating, and featuring artwork by my studiomates Simon Fraser, Tim Hamilton, Mike Cavallaro, Joe Infurnari and Dean Haspiel, with bookends by Mr Larsen himself.

FLUKE 2011 at 40 Watt (Photo: Dustin Harbin)

This marks the third year I have covered FLUKE for Robot 6. In past years, I was pressed for time and was unable to stay long. This year, my 11-year-old son was able to join me. As a Georgia native, I am embarrassed to say FLUKE 2011 was the first time I ever set foot in the legendary 40 Watt Club. I promised myself that unlike last year, I would not leave FLUKE without seeing Joey Weiser. It helped that the main reason my son wanted to attend FLUKE was to get an autograph from Weiser, the creator of one of his favorite comics, Mermin.

Here’s the challenge for someone like me–I stink at being a networking journalist and a parent at the same time–my ability to focus as a journalist falls by the wayside. Case in point: In my search for Weiser, I asked friend of the blog/SCAD professor/Crogan Adventures creator Chris Schweizer–as he stood in front of Dustin Harbin’s table, if he knew where Weiser had a table. Imagine my mortification when Schewizer pointed out I was literally standing next to Weiser. Really. So, at that point I realized, if my son and I were going to have fun at this year’s FLUKE I was going to have to focus on that and be a journalist later. (Did I mention we could only stay two hours? I swear one of these year’s I will have my entire Saturday free for FLUKE promise, just not yet…)

So this year, rather than giving a play-by-play of my walk-around of the FLUKE floor, I am letting folks that had tables at FLUKE 2011 share their perspective.

There was no way I could include everyone, so if you attended or participated in some fashion (or have any kind of opinion), by all means chime in, in the comments section.

Josh Latta

Fluke’s attendance seemed way up, but it’s always hard for me to tell if it’s people wondering in off the streets, or all the money comes from and is in the same room. Speaking of which, the tables went pretty much instantly leaving me to wonder if the organizers will be forced to take pre registrations. That might not be such a bad idea, but I guess the tables could still go pretty fast that way too.

Sales-wise, personally, I  have never done better.

Allen Spetnagel

Fluke is my favorite comic book convention because it allows creators to completely and easily bypass the publishing establishment in order to distribute their work.  Everyone is always hoping to eventually be picked up by a publisher, but, in order for that to happen, you have to get your work out there first.  Unlike most conventions, the fee for a table is always less than $10.  There were a lot of new faces at FLUKE this year, and holding it at the renowned 40-Watt Club in Athens added a prestigious feeling to the convention.  I think that organizers Robert Newsome and Patrick Dean did an exceptional job putting together the 10th anniversary FLUKE celebration.  These guys are committed to supporting independent comics in the Southeast, and I am very appreciative to have an inexpensive venue for showcasing and discovering indie work.

Chris Pitzer & New Friend

Chris Pitzer (excerpt from his AdHouse FLUKE report)

So, yes, FLUKE I love you. Thanks for holding me in your arms this past Saturday. It was special. (I picked a quote that bemused me, but you really need to read Pitzer’s full perspective)

Joy Taney

The new venue was great. The theme of the anniversary show seemed to be all about the personal connections–getting new contacts, meeting your favorite artists, and making new friends. Myself and the people on my row, including Allen Spetnagel and Meg Golding, had some of the best table positions in the house, but most of us seemed to be selling less than we had in years past (possibly because this year’s expo was smack between Passover and Easter, two religious holidays?). Of course, with the extra five minutes here and there to get to know the artists around us, the value of coming away with new friends far outweighed any concern over making a few dollars less than last year.

The best part is, with the focus of my and my tablemates’ Fluke being on making lasting personal connections, Fluke fans have even more reason to get excited about the work debuting at Fluke 2012. After all, when was the last time you met a group of artists who were NOT constantly inspiring each other?

Robert Venditti

This was the best FLUKE I’ve attended. There was a lot of energy in the room, and the creators set up at the show were topnotch. I’m not exactly sure how many I’ve been to (I think this may have been my fifth or sixth FLUKE). This year had the highest traffic and most creators of any I’ve been to. The move to the 40 Watt was a great idea, both providing more space and putting all of the people into one room.

I met Chris Sims and Chad Bowers from Action Age!, which was great. I also bought minicomics from Luis Enrique Echavarria Uribe and Pranas Naujokaitis, two creators whose work I hadn’t seen before, but really caught my eye.

Shannon Smith

It was a great show for me.  I stayed busy the whole day.  I kept expecting some downtime to be able to just walk around an check stuff out but the down time never really came.  Which is great.  Thanks to the kindness of J. Chris Campbell, Josh Latta and the Top Shelf folks I had a really good location so I think most all of the people that entered the show passed my spot at some point.  Sales were good but I had a lot of items in the one to three dollar range.  I sold out of a couple of my minis very quickly.   I should have had a new book to sell but that is another story.

This was my 6th show.  Maybe 5th.  I used to live in the Atlanta area but now I’m in Virginia so I can’t quite make it every year. I think the 40 Watt was/is the best location so far.  At least twice as big as the old Tasty World spot but the creators and attendees seemed to fill that room as soon as the doors opened.  It was certainly the longest line I’ve ever seen prior to the doors opening. It was also easier to get in and out of.  No stairs.  I parked right on the street and did not get a ticket.  It was a great experience all around.  The best Fluke I’ve been to and I’ve had a great time every time I’ve been.

FLUKE 2011 Anthology

I’ve not had a chance to look through my loot so I’m sure I’ll have some different things to be excited about after I read through it all.  I was excited about the Fluke anthology.  It looks really great.  Nice stuff from Sally Bloodbath and Joey Weiser.  I’m super excited that there is a new Drew Weing Blar story in there. Very excited about Josh Latta’s new Rashy Rabbit comic Droppin’ Anchor.  I’ve known Dustin Harbin through HeroesCon for a while but this was the first show I’ve been to where he was set up as a creator so it was nice to look through his stuff.  I picked up a couple of his books that I was missing and scored an original page from his diary webcomic/book.  I don’t live near any comics shops or book stores that carry much alternative material so it’s big treat for me that Top Shelf and AdHouse were set up.  I could spend all day looking through their stuff.  I picked up the Ax Anthology from Top Shelf.  They had that huge new Eddie Campbell collection.  Very impressive.  Intimidating actually.  Andy Runton had the Owly children’s picture book.  That thing looks beautiful.  I was missing Patrick Dean‘s book, Bit Lip.  I think its been out a while but I did not have it so I was excited to get that.  Meg from I Feel Twitchy was there wearing a jacket that was a comic.  Neat idea but it was also drawn well and funny. Another book I was really excited about is Delanie’s new Not My Small Diary minicomic anthology.  It’s minicomics’ best kept secret.  It should be on every year end favorite anthology best of list evey time she puts one out.

(Be sure to visit this other Smith site in the next week or so, as he intends to post a FLUKE report there.)

Dave Wheeler

My Fluke experience this year matched the awesome nature of the past four years for me. It is the very embodiment of artistic passion. Think about it all of us that were exhibiting our wares were sacrificing a beautiful Saturday to get our work into the hands of people to enjoy!

My first Fluke was 2006, I was a freshman at SCAD and had no idea about mini comics up until about 2 weeks prior to Fluke, my buddy Jon Chad and myself created a mini that introduced two ridiculous characters that stick with me to this day; The diabolical, dictator dinosaur the Hateasaurus Rex and the Maniac with a toaster on his head, Captain Toast. Flash forward 5 years and these characters are the lead villains in my creator owned series The Misadventures of Wonderboy! That first mini sold a whopping 15 copies. Issue 1 of Wonderboy has just hit it’s 1100th copy sold (At Fluke no less!). While I grew up reading the pages of superheroes and mainstream books, my roots in telling stories is in Mini Comics and they hold a very special place in my heart.

All the creators at Fluke were blowing me away left and right, I am a bit biased to my friends. The young and talented Pranas T. Naujokaitis, Jeremy Nguyen, Kevin Burkhalter, Joey Weiser, Chris Schweizer,  Drew Weing and Eleanor Davis. The list goes on and on. These guys are the raddest, seeing their silk screened master pieces and kitchy stories makes me psyched every time I pick up their works. It’s awesome to see their bigger works too, like Schweizer’s Crogan’s books. It’s always a fun time to be around such creative people and I believe that everyone that was there deserves some props for pumping out the work they did! Also major props go to Patrick and Robert for organizing and rocking Fluke as they always do, two of the nicest folks in comics they are!

Dustin Harbin

Harbin & PBR

This was my second Fluke, but my first as a 100% cartoonist (as opposed to being there to promote HeroesCon like last time [in 2008]).

It was super awesome! I did good sales, had a great time, and more than anything was really delighted with how well-organized and simple everything was. Being tabled between Derek Ballard and Chris Pitzer didn’t hurt either.

Unfortunately I didn’t have time to really walk to floor, except to and from the bar, but I did manage to get Eleanor Davis’s new sketchbook mini and a couple of prints. Buying one thing by Eleanor is like five things by regular mortals, but still I wish I’d gotten to look around a little more.

(Harbin has a much more in-depth report at his own site, but I wanted to include a snippet of Harbin, so I could run his intimate FLUKE moment with PBR [a photo I was proud to take, I must add])

Chris Schweizer

This year’s Fluke was the best one yet. The new venue is much larger, and has a much friendlier layout, and the amount of casual attendees was significantly higher than it seemed to have been in previous years. It’s always a fun show – I get to see folks with whom I’m close emotionally if not geographically – but the thing I love about Fluke is how I’m always surprised by somebody. There’s always someone whose work I haven’t seen before, and who I end up loving.

This time around, it was Cassie Kelly. She had an adorable Empire Strikes Back picture that first caught my eye, free with the purchase of an even more adorable book called Washington’s Waltz, a beautifully illustrated series of drawings of presidents engaging in alliterative dances (Jitterbug Jackson, Macarena Monroe, etc.), accompanied by a little-known factoid (“before his presidency, Grover Cleveland was a public executioner”). All of her art was amazing and the book is the best thing I’ve picked up in a long time. I spent most of the rest of the show going from table to table and showing them to friends so that they wouldn’t miss out. Kelly said she lives in Charlotte, so I hope that she’ll be at HeroesCon – this is definitely an artist worth checking out.

Christian Sager

This was my first Fluke as a creator and my second overall. The old space was tiny compared to the 40 Watt, so it certainly had more room for creative people to share their wares. I heard somebody say it was more like a flea market than a comic convention, in that most of the business took place between creators and by its nature, anyone can get a table as long as they get there early enough. In that respect I like the vibe, but some people made comments that sounded like they considered our products too “professional” for a show like Fluke. Regardless, I enjoy the DIY ethos of the show and hope to continue doing it in the future.

The creators that caught my attention were Cassie Kelly and her husband Drew. They were selling a book called Washington’s Waltz that they funded through Kickstarter. It’s a beautifully packaged hardcover that runs through the history of America’s presidents.

(Speaking of Kickstarter, Sager and artist E.C. Steiner have their own Kickstarter project–THINK OF THE CHILDREN, a 24-page, one-shot, satirical horror comic about the events leading to the original Comics Code Authority.)

Joey Weiser

Joey Weiser

FLUKE was really great this year! I’ve seen and heard a lot of “Best FLUKE Ever” proclamations, and I think I agree. I’ve been going to FLUKE since the year of the big ice storm (2005?) and have seen it in all its many venues. It’s amazing to consider its growth from a few tables by the bar, to the entire upstairs at that same bar, to a special room at a theater/bar, to the legendary 40 Watt club. And the 40 Watt is THE spot for FLUKE. The atmosphere was just right, the lights and decorations made it feel really fun, and the space was perfect. I hope FLUKE can stay there, at least for the next few years.

AdHouse Books, the publisher behind my two graphic novels, The Ride Home and Cavemen in Space, was a sponsor this year, and it was their first time at the show. It was great getting to show publisher/pal Chris Pitzer around the city a bit, and see his enthusiasm for the show.

Sales were pretty good. Especially for a show which I didn’t technically have anything new at. Mermin issues 4 and 5 hadn’t been at a show before, but have been out for several months, so that’s the closest thing I had to “new” material. Still, sales were good, and I think I introduced some new people to my work as well as connected with those who have seen my work before. My webcomic, Monster Isle, runs in the local paper in Athens, so I got to meet a few folks who recognized my work from that. Lots of trading went on as usual, so I’ve ended up with a ton of new books and mini-comics. I’ve only begun to dig into my pile, and already I’ve read all sorts of memorable work!

When I think about the show, I think of great times with friends, beautiful works of art, an amazing venue, and FLUKE 2012!

Andy Runton

This year’s Fluke was my best yet both in terms of the time I had and financially. I had a blast!

I think I’ve only missed two Fluke shows. Once it happened when Atlanta was snowed in, and last year I was sick.

I always have a great time at the show but the new space (and how much space we all had) made it easier to move around and talk to fellow creators. The new space is absolutely incredible and the show was a great mix of all ages. I had an absolutely wonderful time at this show. The great weather, the laid back crowd, the excitement from all the kids, and the positive vibe really got me excited about what we do… Comics!

As usual, I spent the majority of my time with J. Chris Campbell, Josh Latta, and my friends from Wide Awake Press. It was great to see Chris Pitzer there with all of his amazing books, the always enthusiastic Dollar Bin crowd, and I was quite impressed with Shawn Daughhetee’s first mini-comic!

Jackie Lewis

Jackie Lewis

I had an awesome time! I got to see some of my comics friends, and I got to meet a ton of cool comics fans. That’s one of the things that’s great about Fluke; it really gives people a chance to talk comics. It’s not overwhelming like some of the bigger shows, and the creators actually have time to talk.

I got some really good responses to a couple of my books, like “Sad Baby Monsters“, BC/CC, and Skein. I can’t wait to print up more books; I’m definitely going to have them available at Heroes Con.

One of the folks whose work stood out to me was Eleanor Davis and her book Beast Mother, a beautifully drawn book about a hunter tracking down a forest beast. Her book The Secret Science Alliance and the Copycat Crook is also crazy good, intricately drawn, and undeniably appealing to all ages.

One of the books that I was looking forward to picking up was Drew Weing’s Blar. It’s a great book if you like guys with big swords, cutting through hordes of monsters. And it’s funny as hell.

Also, check out Kevin Burkhalter’s “Boogers” series. Kevin traded me Boogers #1, and it’s the cutest booger adventure I’ve ever seen. EVER. (Also, check out the way he numbers his pages. It’s precious.) Burkhalter and Kasey Paulk also made First Mate, a cute story about a whale finding love. It came free with a purchase of one of Kasey’s stuffed whale pillows, and it’s totally worth it! (The whale pillow even has a little pocket to hold First Mate for you when you’re not basking in its cuteness.)

Beard by Pranas T. Naujokaitis is a great book. The interior art and story are straight up awesome and hilarious, and the cover alone makes it worth buying. Get one the next time you see him.

Faylnn K

The venure was just right, the crowds came in but it was never too crazy or too hot, and there was a nice mix of both first time comic artists trying their hand at tableing at a convention, as well as some tried and true vetreans, and of course a couple publishing complanies like top shelf and ad house. One of my favorite minis was Pranas Naujokaitis’s Monster Town, which is just adorable for kids, and I like that Fluke is all ages and family oriented. I love to visit Athens and will be planning on coming to Fluke again and again.

Brian Prince

I had alot of fun getting to know the other artists.  Because Fluke is mostly mini comics you get more for your money as well as see a different side of the comics community often overlooked by the media.  I met some really great people and I’ll be carrying my inspiration into next years event.  You can definitely expect to see me behind a table next year.

Erin Gladstone

FLUKE was awesome, as usual! This was my third year in a row and I loved the new venue and table layout, they made the whole experience less claustrophobic and kept table traffic flowing.

Jackie Lewis totally caught my attention, despite the fact that I’ve known her for years. Her minis were some of classiest I’ve seen and watching her chat with everyone who came by her table made me want to do so much more for this con next year.

Shawn Daughhetee

Shawn Daughhetee

This is the second year that the Dollar Bin has set up at FLUKE and the third year for me going. Adam Daughhetee and the rest of the Dollar Bin have been going for four or five years now. I love going to FLUKE. We always have a blast. A lot of our friends are there so it is a perfect place to catch up and hang out. Plus, I love checking out new comics. FLUKE has introduced me to some incredibly talented creators (like Jason Horn and Pranas Naujokaitis). One of the standouts for me this year was Luis Echavarria. His stuff was amazing! Our sales were better this year than last year, which was awesome. We don’t go to make money. We set up to help spread the word about the Dollar Bin and hopefully make a little extra spending cash. I debuted my first-ever mini-comic this year. I was very happy with the reception and I met my sales goal. I was extremely happy to actually sell a comic that I made (and some copies were sold to people who I don’t personally know which was also exciting). This was also the first year that the Dollar Bin did an anthology for FLUKE. The contributors wrote pages about our experiences at FLUKE and we got our friends to draw them. It was a lot of fun to do and we think it really turned out super awesome.

Adam posted our FLUKE show on Tuesday. It has the two of us talking about our experience and it has interviews with Patrick Dean and Robert Newsome, Josh Latta and Chris Schweizer.

And I posted the pictures that I took on our Flickr site.

Comic-Con International

Legal | Two Los Angeles men accused of selling counterfeit passes to this year’s Comic-Con International have pleaded guilty to theft and were placed on probation for three years. Farhad Lame and Navid Vatankhahan, both 24, were each ordered to pay a $750 fine, complete 10 days of community service and pay restitution to the victims.

Prosecutors say the two photocopied Comic-Con badges and sold them on Craigslist to people looking for last-minute memberships. They were arrested in July after two of their victims attempted to enter the convention using the counterfeit badges, which the women bought for $120 each. [The San Diego Union-Tribune]

Technology | Tech blog Chip Chick names DC Entertainment President Diane Nelson as one of its “Top 13 Women Who Impacted Technology in 2010.” [Chip Chick]

Archie Comics

Publishing | A woman who attended the junior prom with Archie creator Bob Montana contends recent Archie Comics developments — the introduction of gay Riverdale resident Kevin Keller, the death of Geraldine Grundy — wouldn’t have taken place if the cartoonist were still writing the stories. “It wouldn’t be what he would have written,” Jane Murphy says. [Eagle-Tribune]

Education | Manga and anime programs at Japanese universities are drawing more interest from foreign students. [The New York Times]

Retailing | Nathan Solis profiles Los Angeles store Comics vs. Toys, which last month changed its name from Mini Melt Too. [Eagle Rock Patch]

Best of the year | Johanna Draper Carlson and Manga Xanadu select the best manga of 2010. [Comics Worth Reading, Manga Xanadu]

Comic strips | R.C. Harvey concludes a two-part essay on the end of Brenda Starr. [TCJ.com]

Kiel Phegley

Blogosphere | I’ve somehow fallen way behind on linking to Tom Spurgeon’s wonderful holiday interview series, so I’m going to slap a catch-all “blogosphere” label on this and play catch-up: cartoonist and longtime retail/convention employee Dustin Harbin; Drawn and Quarterly Associate Publisher Peggy Burns; Malaysian editorial cartoonist Zulkiflee Anawar Ulhaque (aka Zunar); and Comic Book Resources News Editor Kiel Phegley. [The Comics Reporter]

Creators | Brian Heater begins a four-part interview with cartoonist Sarah Glidden, creator of How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less. [The Daily Cross Hatch]

Comics | Douglas Wolk rattles off the comics he’s most looking forward to in the new year. [Techland]

Changing Ways

Welcome to this week’s edition of What Are You Reading?, and a big thanks to Chris Mautner for helping out last week.

Our special guest this week is Larry Young, AiT/Planet Lar publisher and one of the editors behind the Kickstart Comics. To see what Larry and the rest of the Robot 6 crew have been reading, make with the click below …

*****

Brigid Alverson

The New Frontier, Vol. 1

After hearing Darwyn Cooke talking about The New Frontier at NYCC, I really wanted to read it, for two reasons: I like Cooke’s work, and I want to read about superheroes without all the complications of continuity. Cooke’s style is fresh and accessible and he does a good job of creating the world, even adding in a fake newspaper story for context. What makes the book hard to follow is that the stories are told in tiny slices—three or four pages on one character and then off to the next. I was somewhat familiar with the characters, so I had an idea of where it was going and who was who, but I can see the book being confusing for a complete newbie. Still, this is the first superhero comic I have enjoyed in a long time, and I’m looking forward to reading the second volume.

I also read Daniel Clowes’s Wilson for the first time. I felt like I already knew the book because I have read so many reviews and commentaries—if it’s not the best book of the past year, it’s certainly the most talked about. What I came to appreciate in actually reading it is the way Wilson reflects popular wisdom, the sort of empty wall of rationalization that you see in self-help books and mass-market magazines. Clowes captures that very well. And although the book is done in a variety of styles, there is a unity to it, not just with the storyline but in the way that the style of each page matches Wilson’s mood in that moment. On the downside, there were too many gaps in the story—I felt like we had the framework but not the connecting pieces—and I kept wanting more depth in Wilson’s feelings and reactions. But I guess that’s the point, isn’t it?

Finally, I read CBGB, which is due out from Boom’s indie imprint Boom Town next month, having already been released as four single-issue comics. It’s great! The first story is an introduction to punk rock and to CBGB’s, via a riff on Dickens’s A Christmas Carol, and from there it goes off in all sorts of different directions. I particularly liked Ana Matronic’s story of a writer who finds her muse at CBGBs and Kelly Sue DeConnick’s tale of a young girl who comes to New York and finds love and friendship there. As with all anthologies, it’s a bit uneven, but every work has something to recommend it; while Kim Krizan’s story of the primitive precursors of CBGB’s inhabitants stretched on a bit too long, Toby Cypress’s lovely art made it more than tolerable. There’s something sort of young and eager about this anthology—it’s a real fan’s book—and I hope it finds its audience.

Tom Bondurant

Final Crisis: Legion of Three Worlds

Taking a break from Showcase Presents Legion of Super-Heroes Vol. 4 to crack open the paperback of Legion Of Three Worlds is kind of like going from a 200-level class to advanced graduate studies. I am not really a Legion scholar — at first I thought the threeboot’s Element Lad was its Sun Boy — but I am familiar with crowded, detail-intensive George Perez events, and of course I read LO3W when it first came out. Even so, re-reading the collection was at once mesmerizing and frustrating. There is just so much going on in practically every panel, not just with Perez’s Easter eggs but with Geoff Johns’ breathless plotting, that I felt myself being hustled through the story when I kept wanting to slow down and drink it all in. I mean, Johns is weaving together plot elements from Action Comics, Justice Society, and Green Lantern in order to revive Superboy and Kid Flash and (oh by the way) re-establish the Legion and the 31st Century’s Green Lantern Corps. And yet it doesn’t feel cluttered or impenetrable, mostly because Johns’ script and Perez’ layouts are so efficient. I imagine that’s a nice way of saying there’s not much room to get bogged down in things like characterization or nuance, so you don’t notice their absence. Still, LO3W‘s enthusiasm is hard to resist, and it’s the kind of book which would have encouraged Young Tom to dig deeper into the Legion’s past.

And obviously, the digging continues with the aforementioned Showcase Presents. This volume covers the Legion’s farewell to Adventure Comics and its time in the wilderness of Action Comics backups (where I am presently) before finding a new long-term home in Superboy. It’s also the end of the Jim Shooter era, which apparently is going out with a “parents just don’t understand” vibe. The story I finished most recently comes from Action #381 (October 1969) and concerns Matter-Eater Lad’s rebellion against his working-class background. He supports his parents with his Legion paycheck, but his dad is a chronic gambler, yadda yadda yadda. It’s all too much for MEL, so he blows off steam by treating himself and Shrinking Violet to an ultra-fancy, super-expensive date. That turns out not to be the point of the story –Violet still loves Duplicate Boy, who’s stuck off-world — but MEL’s actions end up convincing his dad to stop gambling. I know there’s only so much you can do in 12 pages, but I was surprised that Shooter tried to do so much, and clearly with an eye towards injecting some “realism” into the world of the Legion. It’s not a bad story, especially when MEL brushes aside Duplicate Boy’s wrath, but I suspect it’s indicative of the Legion’s late-Silver-Age growing pains.

Chris Mautner

Diary Comics

I’d like to take a moment this week and give a shout-out to Koyama Press, which has been stealthily releasing a number of exemplary comics recently, such as Michael DeForge’s fantastic Lose.

Koyama recently published Diary Comics by Dustin Harbin, a collection of … well, you figure it out. These sorts of autobiographical comics can be hit or miss with me, but Harbin has a self-effacing, witty sense of humor that carries him through the more mundane aspects of his daily life. What’s also nice is the book starts out all loose and sketchy but gradually tightens up and becomes more detailed over time. I love seeing that sort of process unfold as a read.

Koyama also recently published Spirit City Toronto by Aaron Leighton. It’s basically a series of photographs of the city with various “creatures” drawn in them to make it look like their part of the landscape. Leighton’s spirits are cute and colorful, and they’re composed nicely within the picture as well, but they’re a mostly twee lot — they don’t carry any sense of awe or menace that would levitate a project of this nature into “truly inspired” country. In fact, in some cases I’d say the photos were lovely enough on their own that the art’s inclusion only served to clutter it up. I had fun flipping through Spirit City, but I can’t say it will linger in my brain for very long.

Sean T. Collins

LOVE AND ROCKTOBER marches on as I continue reading and reviewing my way through Los Bros Hernandez’s Love and Rockets, starting with Jaime’s “Locas” stories. This week I read the Jaime collection The Education of Hopey Glass and his contributions to Love and Rockets Vol. 2 #20 Love and Rockets: New Stories #1-2. From schoolteachers to superheroines, they’re a suite of stories about the Locas (and Ray) coming to terms with bona-fide adulthood. Click the links for full reviews!

Larry Young

First off, what with all the stuff going on in October, it seems I can never do APE. But all my pals come into town and tell me about all the best stuff, so it seems to me like I went. Just without all the schlepping. This year, my good friend Rich Starkings turned me on to Pixar artist Josh Cooley’s MOVIES R FUN:

It’s an incredibly charming little book, printed in the style of toddlers’ books; you know, that honkin’ chipboard stuff that ostensibly makes the books impervious to hard playing but in reality ends up being the kids’ first exposure to a high-fiber diet? Each page features a scene from a great sci-fi or action movie, done in the style of an easy reader. Rich bought me two autographed prints from my two favorite movies:

…and a spooky one of HAL from 2001 telling Dave he can’t do that. Check out Cooley’s site for more, including scenes from LEON, TERMINATOR 2, and THE BIG LEBOWSKI.

• I’ve very much enjoyed CHANGING WAYS by Justin Randall and published by Wolf Bylsma’s Gestalt Publishing. I’m not that big a fan of horror books, but this one is such a perfectly-paced, perfectly illustrated masterstroke, it’s hard to ignore its superiority. Check out these sample pages, and then order it, read it, devour it. Or it might just get you, first.

• Everyone knows I love beer. Even artist/writer Stephenny Godfrey’s parents know I love beer, so much so that they muled two bottles of my Absolute Favorite Beer of All Time over to the States for my birthday.

…and what goes better with beer than reading about beer? BEER (The Newsstand’s Most Desirable Beer Magazine) is an enthusiasts’ dream. No dry tome about hops and sugars, this one sports articles about drinking beer and ghost-chasing, brewery tours, recipes, gear, the whole nine yards.

• I’ve also been reading the latest CINEFEX, which puzzles out some of the shots in INCEPTION and that crazy tank shot in THE A-TEAM. But the one I’m paging through like Oliver Stone watching the Zapruder film is the glorious MAKING OF THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK. Hard to believe that movie’s thirty years old, but it’s about time someone did such an in-depth survey of it. I’m also about to crack open Russell T. Davies’ THE WRITER’S TALE, but I think I’m going to have to have one of those Speight’s to steel myself for that 704-page leviathan.

Diary Comics 1

Dustin Harbin is a cartoonist who considers his craft and the comics industry from a pragmatic vantage point. I say pragmatic, because, to be perfectly honest, the first few questions I fired at Harbin were skewed a tad negative, completely on my end. I think it’s to his credit that rather than going the easy, negative or defensive routes, he offered nuanced, yet candid responses to my questions. We dispensed with those questions fairly quickly and from there got into the meat of why I wanted to talk to him: his ongoing work as letterer of the relaunched Matt Fraction/Gabriel Ba & company’s Casanova (Icon/Issue 4 set to come out on October 13) as well as his own Diary Comics #1 (Koyama Press) [48 pgs | b&w w/ color covers, endpapers {$6 ($10 w/sketch)}], which premiered at SPX. Harbin describes Diary Comics 1 as “this–THIS!–is your opportunity to splash on in to six months of one dull dude’s life, as originally seen in the daily DHARBIN! diary comic. Covering topics including girls, dharbins, other girls, more dharbins, depressions, some conventions, more depressions, tons more dharbins, AND MUCH MORE!!” On the con front, Harbin will be at APE this month (October 16-17), then BCGF in Brooklyn in December. My thanks to Harbin for indulging my questions.

Tim O’Shea: Is it me, or judging by recent tweets, are you pulling the kid gloves off in terms of your opinions since you are no longer a HeroesCon official?

Dustin Harbin: Haha, well while not being part of the public face of something besides myself DOES free me a little bit opinion-wise, I think I’ve always been fairly vocal about my disgust with some of the crappier blog sites out there. Not working for HeroesCon just means that I don’t have to worry about it reflecting on Shelton Drum. That dude is super-friendly, he would never publicly run something down, he’s too classy, unlike me.

O’Shea: And on a related note, what’s your issue with the Hooded Utilitarian?

Harbin: I’m not sure I have an ISSUE with the Hooded Utilitarian; it’s just another hateful, pseudo-intellectual comics blog where someone (or in this case, a few someones) try hard to sound smart about something, usually at the expense of something else. It’s like an all-Napoleon mutual appreciation society. Distilling the vitriol, smugness, semantic chicanery, and snark of the Comics Journal messageboard into a blog is a service that the comics industry could probably do without.

O’Shea: Back when we talked in October of last year, you said ” Sure I have a lot of ideas about comics, but a lot of them are negative, and I hate to get into that stuff sometimes because of my dayjob…” That dayjob’s over, so hit me with your top three negative ideas.

Harbin: I’ve been getting in trouble for negative ideas lately–or not trouble, but… well, on the internet, when you espouse a viewpoint, the immediate response is take a binary view of that view, meaning you’re either passionately for or passionately against it. Before SPX I got this rep as an SPX-hater because I spoke openly about things I disagreed with about the show, mainly from a business standpoint. Stuff like that really itches my ass–why can’t I wish that SPX was cheaper to exhibit at, or charged less at the door, or was in some place besides Rockville, Maryland, where it could attract some kind of larger non-comics traffic? These are all valid criticisms, and each has any number of valid arguments against it. But in Internet-ese it’s simpler to just assume that disagreeing with something means you hate it–that’s an easier position to state in 140 characters or less, is it not?

Stupid internet, that’s one negative. I’d say that most of my negative opinions start there. There are way too many really amazing, positive things going on in comics to yak about negative stuff more than that, you know? “Stupid internet” is enough for now.

O’Shea: What’s the biggest challenge to the Casanova lettering gig, and what storytelling lessons are you taking away from the Fraction and company? Finally, what’s been your favorite scene to letter so far?

Harbin: Easily my favorite scene to letter in the book is–well, maybe it’s not that easy. Most of issue #3 was really good–to me it’s the issue where Casanova really pulls its feet under it and starts to get something great going. Lettering that book has been extraordinarily englightening, holy crap–if you think about it, I’m essentially close-reading every issue at a glacial pace–I write everything down twice, once in pencil, then in ink. In effect I’m almost meditating on the book, just slowly sounding out every line in my head for weeks. So I have tons of time to think about the pacing, the language, dialogue–especially dialogue. Matt’s got really great dialogue, especially when he’s going pop-pop-pop sharp and fast.

Plus, looking at Gabriel Ba’s art with Cris Peter’s coloring every day is incredible–being the least-talented person on a team is pretty humbling. And it’s not like I have NO talent or anything, you know? Pretty amazing team.

O’Shea: Ruminating on Fraction’s dialogue; what bit of dialogue stays in your brain all of the time?

Harbin: Well, if you read volume one, there’s a LOT going on, not only in terms of what’s actually on the page, but also–maybe even moreso–the overall plot of the book. And by “the book” I mean just the first 4-issue arc. I’ve spoken to Matt about his plans for the book, and while I tried to steer clear of any true spoilers (I’m a fan after all, even if a somewhat better-informed-than-normal fan), it was clear that Matt has the entirety of Casanova plotted out from start to finish. More I think I’d better not say just in case.

Oh wait you said dialogue. Some of my favorite dialogue is in issue #4, which comes out next month I believe, and which is already at the printers, nervous as a new bride. I’m not sure what I can say about it, although those of your readers who read the book in its original incarnation may remember the fight scen between Casanova and young Kaito, custodian of a giant robot left over from World War II. The combination of Casanova and Kaito’s differing levels of sophistication makes for some pretty hilarious dialogue. Not to imagine a really obscure joke revolving around the name of the robot, which I had to ask Matt about just to make sure it was right. Once I’d had it explained to me… well, I’ll leave it for you to figure out.

O’Shea: What does the inclusion of color on Casanova add to the book?

Harbin: I don’t want to run down the old book–I liked it then, and I still like it. And I liked the balls of doing a low-priced book–I was ordering comics for Heroes Aren’t Hard To Find back then, and to me a new story at a $1.50 or $1.99 or whatever that original price-point was–I loved it. I was shocked when Matt told me that retailers complained all over the place about that format. We sold tons of Fell‘s and Casanova‘s at Heroes. Anyway, oops, tangent. Having said all that, I like the new colors 100x better than the monochrome palette. I’m into the original idea, but you just can’t fade the gorgeous Technicolor touch the new ones have, especially the really out-there scenes. Or if you flip through the new issue, issue 3, the scenes on the island are just SUBLIME, all oranges and reds and umbers, just gorgeous. When I do my sound effects, I color those myself, and in general I try to make them as little of a distraction as I can. It’s like if you started singing along with an opera from your seat.

O’Shea: When you write a post like this on politics, do you fear alienating your readers–or do you think your core readership shares your political perspective?

Harbin: Oh, I don’t care about that. I’m not super interested in talking about politics, and certainly don’t feel a “need” to talk about that stuff on my site–if anything, it’s a distraction. But I AM trying to post random opinions a little less on Twitter–it’s easy when you’re at a computer all day to just start dumping every random thought you have into whatever social network you use. Besides the obvious annoyance to your readers, the inevitable discussions that pop up around that kind of stuff just clog up the stream for everybody.

But yeah, if someone reads my blog and gets offended that I think opposition to gay marriage is moronic… well, I can afford to lose that reader, probably.

O’Shea: Take a strip like this, where you have a friend shooting daggers at you, do your friends ever get annoyed when you feature them?

Harbin: My friends get annoyed when the cartoon versions of them don’t look enough like them. Seriously, it comes up all the time. ESPECIALLY the breasts. I try to tell them, “no one knows what your breasts look like, the shape of your breasts is not the point of these strips.” It always comes back to the breasts, Tim.

O’Shea: OK, tell me the story of Loopy Horse. I want a whole book built around this bastard.

Harbin: There’s no story there! That’s just a goofy sketch I did. I hate it! There’s your story. “Cartoonist Loathes Self.”

O’Shea: What attracted you to using Chris Pitzer’s AdDistro?

Harbin: Chris Pitzer is one of the best people in comics, period. Anything with his name on it somewhere is of the highest possible quality. WOULD DISTRO AGAIN.

O’Shea: Why is “a carpenter/seamstress union, possibly the best union for a cartoonist to decant from“?

Harbin: Imagine the engineering and religious significance of being the son of a carpenter, combined with the functional-but-charming aesthetic of a seamstress! Imagine the possibilities! I do!

O’Shea: Just how much do you love Koyama Press, can you count the ways?

Harbin: The ways I love Koyama Press, publisher of my new book DIARY COMICS #1, are without number. I can’t overstate how inspiring and enabling Anne Koyama has been for me this year, not only in terms of making art, but in being able to AFFORD to make art. Just an amazing lady and a great publisher.

O’Shea: What’s next creatively for you other than your Casanova work and Diary Comics 1?

Harbin: More Casanova for sure, and I’ll continue daily Diary Comics through the end of the year. Other than that the next thing for me is getting caught up on freelancing and then starting some longform memoir work, possibly with an eye towards a longer book publication at some point. In the short term I’m on the hunt mainly for money and cred, the latter of which I’ll trade at some point for more money. How’s that for an artistic statement?

By Dustin Harbin

The above is a pipin’ hot new strip from cartoonist Dustin Harbin. Harbin, who recently left his job working for Sheldon Drum’s Heroes Aren’t Hard To Find comic store and companion comic convention HeroesCon, has embarked on a full-time career in comics writing, drawing and lettering — the latter seen in the pages of the Marvel/Icon edition of Casanova. I hope this lands him a stint on Superman — seriously.

Don't mess with Dharbin

“I can’t BELIEVE MoCCA’s table prices. They are drinking the same hubris Kool-Aid as SPX. Why are the charity shows always the cheekiest? I saw it and I was like *slaps head*. Although to be fair, I’ve never exhibited there, just been a crowded hot attendee. (I read some interviews with them after the super hot year, they were all like ‘hey listen, it’s summer, it gets hot.’) Not to mention how expensive NYC is in general! Just makes it easier to skip. Also today I got my acceptance letter (???) for APE, after applying 3 months ago. Due date for payment: 1 week from now. I had always heard about how well-run HeroesCon is from guests, but now I see why. Indie shows are organized like block parties. Except the kind of block parties where they charge you like $50 to come in, then charge you for beer too. ‘Dude it’s for charity!’ SPX is pretty fun, but TCAF is the best one easily–plus Toronto = my favorite city! Wait, please exclude TCAF from that mini-rant. TCAF is a dream, a dreammmm. Other shows take note! Okay back to lettering, sorry.”

—Cartoonist, Casanova letterer, and “nicest guy in comics” candidate Dustin Harbin has an uncharacteristically grumpy moment on Twitter over the prices that the MoCCA Art Festival is charging exhibitors, and the administration of indie/alt-comics shows generally (except TCAF, of course). It’s hard out there for a minicomics creator.

Afrodisiac cover

Welcome once again to What Are You Reading? Our guest this week is Van Jensen, writer of Pinocchio, Vampire Slayer and Pinocchio, Vampire Slayer and the Great Puppet Theater. To see what Van and the rest of the Robot 6 crew are reading, click below.

*****

Sean T. Collins

Ex Machina

I burned my way through a minicomic and a couple of lengthy runs this week. Click the links for reviews:

Ex Machina Vols. 1-9 by Brian K. Vaughan and Tony Harris: Ambition trumps awkwardness in this slow-burning superhero tragedy.

Pluto: Urasawa x Tezuka by Naoki Urasawa: Nakedly emotional science fiction from Japan’s grandmaster. The ending doesn’t quite live up to the promise of the early going, but that’s almost beside the point.

Studio Visit by James McShane: A portrait of the artist as an artist. A slight but solid minicomic.

Michael May

I finished the Adventures of Red Sonja reprints with Volume 3. Unfortunately, I didn’t enjoy this volume as much as the other two. The Marvel series took a nasty dip around issue 8 that lasted through issue 13. It was this too-long saga that involved crazy – even by Hyperborian standards – sorcery and a nonsensical quest through goofy settings for generic fantasy items that are always proclaimed to be vital at the time, but are discarded as irrelevant in the following issue. It’s taxing to read. The reason that sorcery works in the REH stories is that Conan hates it and avoids it when possible, so it’s used very sparingly. Claire Noto and Roy Thomas over-indulged themselves for six issues and it’s no wonder that the series was canceled two issues after that. Which was kind of a shame, because those last two issues got back to Sonja’s wandering mercenary concept and were a lot of fun.

Even more fun though was my re-reading the first Atomic Robo volume. I will never ever get tired of “I just used my violence on them.”

I also checked out the first issue of Joe the Barbarian, which I picked up for free at C2E2. I was pretty sure I wanted to get the collected volume when it comes out, but now I’m positive. Sean Murphy’s art is awesome and Morrison’s set-up is much less like Life on Mars than I feared it would be.

Chris Mautner

Garo Manga: The First Decade, 1964-1973

Jog was kind enough to loan me the new catalog for the Garo Manga: The First Decade, 1964-1973, now on exhibit at the Center for Book Arts in New York City. For those who don’t know, Garo was the leading alternative manga anthology for decades, highlighting works by singular, idiosyncratic artists like Yoshihiro Tatsumi. A lot of Westerners (alright, just me) tend to compare the series to Zap or some other alt-comic equivalent, but curator and catalog author Ryan Holmberg argues that is completely not the case.

Holmberg’s main thrust of his essay is that Garo, at least in its early days, was driven by an interest in left-wing politics and social change much more than any sort of interest in alternate forms of visual expression in manga. Co-creator Sanpei Shirato was much more interested in giving readers (especially young readers) an antiwar, pro-democracy, pro-working class point of view via his classic series, The Legend of Kamuy, than in making any sort of attempt at avant-garde self-expression or testing the limits of the medium. In fact, he argues, many of the contributors during this period were attempting to come to terms with the still relatively new, post-war Japan and underscore a distrust with the new, modern world and their role in it, especially when it comes to sexual relations.

Holmberg’s essay is succinct and revelatory. He provides a knowledge and perspective about not only Garo, but Japan itself, that is severely lacking among most manga critics these days (myself included). His thoughts on Yoshiharu Tsuge’s work, particularly “Screw Style” is nothing short of fascinating (I would have never made the connection between the war dead had he not pointed it out). As Jog put it, the thing it really underscores is that we need more critics who can actually read Japanese.

If you’re interested at all in manga or good criticism in general, I urge you to go online and buy a copy ($20), as I likely will once I return this copy to its rightful owner. It’s one of the best critical pieces I’ve read all year and I can easily see myself using it as a reference again and again.

You can read more of Holmberg’s thoughts on the subject here.

Brigid Alverson

Smile

I’m going to be interviewing Raina Telgemeier onstage at the American Library Association annual meeting next weekend, so I re-read Smile this week in preparation. The first time I read it, I was absorbed in the story and the atmosphere of it; this time I could pull back a bit and look at how she does it. Telgemeier interweaves the story of her dental problems with a narrative of growing up in a happy, middle-class family; there are no earth-shattering events (except for the San Francisco earthquake, and that’s only earth-shattering in the literal sense). The thing that sticks out for me is that Raina really remembers what it feels like to be a middle-schooler. She notes the little awkward and ambiguous moments that might be glossed over by an adult writing for kids. I’m really glad to have read it again. Also, I went over some of Raina’s earlier work and was reminded of this wonderful little webcomic, Beginnings, and how in three pages Raina sketches a whole family and brings her main character to an epiphany—about comic books, no less.

Tim O’Shea

My pal Dugan Trodglen was kind enough to give me a copy of The Comics Journal 293. I really wanted to read it as it had an interview with S. Clay Wilson from 2008 prior to his November 2008 severe brain injury. It’s a fascinating interview and painful juxtaposition to the recent update that his companion Lorraine Chamberlain provided (thanks to Tom Spurgeon for making me aware of it). Consider this observation from Chamberlain:

“I have put together a Special Needs Trust for him, since he is no longer capable of earning a living. He receives Social Security and Disability benefits which barely cover expenses. This Trust gives him a little security for his future needs, although it is not growing very quickly. This gifted artist who has worked as hard as he partied is now in need of everyone’s generous help. He is still capable of worrying about the future even though he does not fully understand what has happened to alter it.”

Please read the Wilson update and consider donating to the Trust.

Marvel has finally gotten the right team to do a Black Cat miniseries. Unlike some artists who have drawn the character as damn close to a porn star (really some of the folks that drew Black Cat seemed to forget she was supposed to be a cat burglar…). But fortunately Javier Pulido is perfectly suited to convey the acrobatic nature of the character. In the first issue (in a four-part miniseries) writer Jen Van Meter gives folks a dash of Spider-Man and a healthy supporting cast.

Van Jensen

For the most part, I’ve been trying to find time to read everything I picked up at HeroesCon. It’s hard to pick a favorite, but the hardcover Afrodisiac collection earns that nod. I’m a big fan of blaxploitation films, and Jim Rugg and Brian Maruca take that framework and inject their overabundant creativity and energy. The humor shines through in the dialogue and bizarre situations, Rugg draws the finest ladies this side of Rob Ullman and the packaging is ridiculous. Every page reveals how much thought and love went into the book.

Midnight Sun

I also picked up the historical fiction one-two punch of Ben Towle’s Midnight Sun and Chris Schweizer’s Crogan’s March. Both books are smart, informative and enjoyable yarns. Schweizer, in addition to growing a hell of a mustache, is one of the most talented artists with a brush and ink. He’s also one of the greats when it comes to character design.

Heroes was a stellar show for mini comics as well. Dustin Harbin’s newsprint Enquirer was the steal of the show at a dollar apiece, even if the stories are online for free. Brad McGinty’s two new minis are hilarious (of course), as is Josh Latta’s latest, A Rabbit in King Arthur’s Court. Then I had to pick up everything Joseph Lambert brought down from Vermont. That dude is insane. I always come away from his work jealous of both the skill he exhibits and the uniqueness of his stories. I really recommend Food/Fall and Turtle, Keep It Steady!, but you honestly can’t go wrong.

I also just finally got through the December 2010 issue of Fierro, an Argentinian comics anthology that I picked up on a trip to Buenos Aires. Argentina has an amazing tradition of cartoonists, but it has a lot of new talent as well. I’d wager we’ll start to hear more from the country in the coming years. And it’s not comics, but the novel The Imperfectionists by Tom Rachman is an amazing book, especially for a former newspaper guy like myself.

Jeff Parker

Lava Men!

I’m excited by a NEW GRAPHIC NOVEL from Paul Tobin and Colleen Coover that is coming out from Top Shelf this year, that I don’t think I can name because they haven’t formally announced it yet. But really, those two names and a full length work should be all you need to hear to know I’m right.

What I’m most excited about that I’m involved with comes out in just a few weeks, it’s AVENGERS VS. ATLAS from Marvel, where I think my collaborators Gabriel Hardman, Elizabeth Breitweiser and I have really gelled. Even if you’ve never read an Agents of Atlas story, I bet you’ll enjoy seeing the original lineup of The Avengers back on the scene.

Or you’ll at least want in for the LAVA MEN.

Jeff Parker writes a whole bunch of great comics for Marvel, including all the Agents of Atlas projects and Thunderbolts. He also helped us out last year with our Robot Love posts at Valentine’s, in a post titled I ♥ learning from comics. Tim O’Shea also interviewed him about Underground earlier this year, along with artist Steve Lieber.

Paul Pope

First of all, I am excited about turning in Battling Boy, my next major graphic novel, to be published in 2011 by First Second Books. Battling Boy has been years in the works. I have a lot of faith in this project. There is a bunch of stuff related to the potential film which I would like to discuss–but can’t as of now. Same goes for the book. I have spent most of 2009 engaged in the film and book productions of this story. But the book is coming regardless of whether or not a film is made, and I am putting a lot of love into it. I hope the readers really get into it.

I am proud to say that Wednesday Comics will be collected as a large oversized book in May 2010. My 12-page “Adam Strange” strip– a tribute to heroes of yesterday like Flash Gordon and Cap’n Easy– is featured in this DC Comics special HC edition.

As far as American comics go, I am probably most excited about Sam Hiti’s new project, Death Day. He is a top cartoonist, and his latest project is full of force and menace.

I am really curious to see the Kick Ass film and the Scott Pilgrim film. I wish the creative teams on these films the best of all possible successes.

I am excited to see new work from Dustin Harbin and Kate Beaton. These are two talents I feel deserve as many new readers in 2010 as they can get, both are excellent and both have their best days ahead of them.

Paul Pope is the creator of many great comics, from 100% to THB. He has a blog that we like to link to a lot. I believe Battling Boy was also the most-named project for 2010 by the folks I contacted for this post.

Matt Kindt

Revolver

I’m really looking forward to the new series by Cullen Bunn and Brian Hurtt from Oni called The Sixth Gun. It looks to be a crazy horror/western and I’ve had the unique privilege to see some of Hurtt’s art for the first few issues and it’s some of his best work. I’ve never seen a writer/artist team work as well together as they do together and gives me hope that writers and artists maybe can work to make something greater than the sum of the parts. Here’s a link.

As for a project I’m excited about — I’m looking forward to my first Vertigo graphic novel “Revolver” coming out this summer. Here’s a link for that.

Matt Kindt is the creator of Super Spy and 3 Story: The Secret History of the Giant Man, which Tim talked to him about earlier this year. We also ran one of his stories from Super Spy: The Lost Dossiers earlier today.

Evan Dorkin

I’m looking forward to IDW’s King Aroo collection, their continuation of the Dick Tracy and Little Orphan Annie series, the long-delayed fourth volume of Walt and Skeezix from Drawn and Quarterly, Melvin Monster vol 2 and Thirteen Going on Eighteen from D&Q’s John Stanley Library, DHC’s new Harvey reprints and their Trump collection, new Yotsuba volumes from Yen Press, new Blackjack volumes from Vertical, anything by Jaime and Gilbert Hernandez, a number of recently announced Fantagraphics reprint projects (a Toth collection, the pre-code horror collection, the Jack Cole collection, the Dick Briefer Frankenstein book, etc), as well as Popeye vol 5, Captain Easy vol 1 and Prince Valiant vol 2. Anything DC reprints of Jack Kirby’s that I don’t have. Mostly, work by dead people.

Since you asked about our own projects, I’m anxiously awaiting the Beasts of Burden hardcover collection Dark Horse will be publishing. It will collect all the material Jill Thompson and I have done on the series to date, going back to the first short story from 2003 and finishing up with the recent limited series. Other than that I’ve got some Bart Simpson comics I wrote and drew coming out next year from Bongo, I’m writing two comics for Dark Horse which should be pretty nifty if all goes well, and I’m hoping to get something of mine finished up for SLG to publish next year. Not holding my breath on that, though.

I’m also hoping things will work out so we can manage to attend TCAF next year.

Evan Dorkin shares information on his comics, like Beasts of Burden, and Milk & Cheese, over on his livejournal. He spoke with Tim O’Shea about the former back in July in an interview Tim still raves about.

C. Tyler

Most excited about in the world of comics:

San Diego Con, July 2010. I’ll be there as a guest. Last time I was there: 1988.

Most excited about personal:

Book II of my trilogy. “You’ll Never Know: Collateral Damage” is due out Fall 2010.

Earlier this year Tim O’Shea spoke with C. Tyler about the first book in that trilogy. She may have had the best opening line of the year in one of his interviews.

Dustin Harbin

Elephant Adventures by Dustin Harbin

COMIC-WISE, WHAT ARE YOU MOST EXCITED ABOUT FOR 2010?

Oh man. I have to say, I’m still kinda starstruck over all the stuff that came out in 2009, much of which is still on my to-read pile. As I’m finishing up Tardi’s YOU ARE THERE I’ve got FOOTNOTES FROM GAZA and ALEC: THE YEARS HAVE PANTS piled up on my table. How can you top a year with all this plus ASTERIOS POLYP? Oh wait you asked about 2010–

The very first thing that comes to mind is my fervent hope that the third volume of MOURNING STAR comes out. I’m at the point where I anticipate new Mourning Star volumes with the same sweaty zeal as POPEYE; it’s monstrously exciting to see genre comics being done in a fresh way by a young creator–the idea that something can be well-written and funny and adventurous and dramatic all at the same time is sorta rare in American comics, if you think about it. I’m glad that manga is finally starting to rub off on American creators in a deeper way than just drawing everyone to seem vaguely catlike.

Also: DEATH DAY, by Sam Hiti, currently being serialized on his site in massive chunks will see its first book collection in 2010, which will almost certainly be near the top of a ton of end-of-year lists in a year’s time. So amazing, Sam Hiti is easily the MOST undersung cartoonist working today. OH! And speaking of Sam, his stylistic antecedent Paul Pope is finally releasing BATTLING BOY this year I think, ZOMG. I’ve seen some of these pages, and they’re pretty face-melting. This is like a kids’ book you wouldn’t necessarily want your parents to know you were reading, full of monsters and violence and gods and all the stuff that’s usually bled out of this sort of thing.

In my own world, in 2010 I’ll be starting a long cartoon memoir project called THE DHARBINS, which I’ll be serializing on my site. I’m still working out the somewhat surprisingly complicated plot–surprising mainly because my life isn’t particularly complicated, and it originally happened very much in order–but in the meantime I’ve been trying to flex my cartoon muscles with a bunch of one-off and short-series cartoon exercises, which I’ll be collecting this year in my first color special.

I’m also one of the organizers of the yearly Heroes Convention, which of course I’m professionally very excited for, this year maybe more than ever–besides a ridiculous profusion of guests like Ben Templesmith, Brian Bolland, and Guy Davis, this year Indie Island will be swollen to the gills, including a bunch of first time guests from the webcomics world, including Kate Beaton, Ryan North, and Christopher Hastings. It’s going to be like Tron in Indie Island this year for sure.

In addition to all the cool stuff Dustin mentioned above, he also spoke with our Tim O’Shea this year for Talking Comics with Tim. Twice.

C.B. Cebulski

Personally, I’m excited about the release of How to Break into Comics the Marvel Way in March, which has been a long time coming! I think they’re going to be great comics that offer wonderful insight into how Marvel works and what we’re looking for from up-and-coming comic creators who want to work for us. Plus, it will feature original stories by some of the world’s best and brightest new artists who were the finalists of ChesterQuest, my international talent search.

Overall, with the world getting increasingly smaller thanks to the Internet, I’m looking forward to seeing more and more new writers and artists making their debut in any of the growing number of ways comics are released in this day and age. There are so many new voices just waiting to break out in 2010 and I can’t wait to discover their work!

C.B. Cebulski works for Marvel as a new talent scout and has written a fair share of comics himself, like X-Infernus, Loners and Wonderlost. You can follow him on his blog and on Twitter, where he’s been known to offer advice to aspiring creators.

Faith Erin Hicks

Brain Camp

In 2010, I’m most looking forward to continuing down the rabbit hole that is Naoki Urasawa’s comics. Pluto will be ending in March, I think, and 20th Century Boys will continue on for many more twisty volumes. I find Urasawa’s comics thrilling in a way no other comics are … and by now all my friends are completely sick of me breaking into conversation to talk about how freaking awesome he is. I’m contemplating starting some kind of support group. For some reason he hits my storytelling sweet spot at this moment in time, just like Jeff Smith did with Bone when I was a teenager. I’m thrilled I have many more Urasawa comics to read… blessings upon the Japanese comic making machine that forces him to churn out 1200 pages a year! I feel terrible for the guy’s wrist, but you can never have enough Urasawa. I’m also looking forward to seeing what else Viz Signature publishes, as I’ve very much enjoyed Children of the Sea, Solanin, What a Wonderful World! and Ooku, all published by them.

As for something of my own that I’m looking forward to in 2010, my first graphic novel with First Second Books comes out in the fall. It’s a middle grade horror/comedy/coming of age graphic novel called Brain Camp, written by Susan Kim and Laurence Klavan with me on art duties. I’d never before drawn someone else’s script, which was both challenging and rewarding. I saw my artwork improve a lot over the course of the book, which was encouraging… although I’m still nervous to see what the reaction will be. Like me, nice comic reviewer people, like me!

I’m also planning to finish up drawing my second book for First Second in June, which I both wrote and drew. It’s called Friends With Boys. It’s a semi-but-not-really autobiographical story about a homeschooled girl entering public high school, and her gang of large hairy manly brothers. I’m just finishing up Christmas break with my family, and every year my brothers seem to get larger, hairier and manlier… I think they’re part Sasquatch. Anyway, I’m really thrilled that First Second is publishing this book, and I hope people will like it. Here’s a drawing of the main character, Maggie.

I’m also hoping that SLG Publishing, who published two other graphic novels by me, Zombies Calling and The War at Ellsmere, will be able to publish my long running webcomic Ice… provided I finish the sucker and all the stars align. Fingers crossed that the Small Press Comic Gods will be kind to us in 2010, and we’ll be able to make that happen. Hey comic folk, buy a book by an indie publisher today, they do awesome stuff!

I’m excited for 2010. It seems like over the ’00s we saw an amazing diversity of new comics being published, both online and offline, and I got to read them all and be a part of that. I sound like a total sap, but there’s a richness to the comics world now that I really love… I feel like I can find comics written FOR me, which is amazing. I hadn’t really felt that in the 90s, when I was a kid interested in comics and not sure what to read. I can’t wait to see what the ’10s bring us. GO COMICS! (Imagine me throwing up a couple of pom-poms here.)

Faith Erin Hicks is the creator of Zombies Calling and The War at Ellsmere, both available from SLG, in addition to the new projects she mentions above. She helped us out back in February with a post titled “I ♥ Anticipating Comics.” Follow her on livejournal.

Randy Lander

I’m excited for a lot of comics-related things next year, but the big ones are actually probably the movies. I wasn’t huge into Kick-Ass the comic, but those trailers for the movie are a blast, and I’m especially excited to see Iron Man 2, given how great the first one is and how slick that first trailer looks.

I’m also excited for STAPLE! 2010, the independent media show that I’ve been helping to put together (and co-sponsoring) for several years. This year our guests of honor include Guy Davis, who is one of my top five favorite artists of all time, plus Andy Runton (Owly) and Chris Schweizer (Crogan’s Vengeance) and a huge selection of other creators as well. It’s always a good time, and seems to be getting bigger and better this year, and I can’t wait until it’s March and time for the big show again.

Happy New Year!

Randy Lander is the owner of Rogues Gallery Comics & Games, which you should visit if you’re ever in Round Rock, Texas. He can also recommend some good places to get Tex Mex in the area.

Graeme McMillan

I’ve managed to somehow lose touch with a lot of the weekly comings-and-goings of superhero comics in 2009, but I’d be lying if I said that I wasn’t curious about seeing the new “Heroic Age” status quo of the Marvel Universe and post-Blackest Night DC Universe, if only to cynically see how long this latest version of bright, positive, optimistic superhero status quos will last. Being a sucker for DC books, I’m also looking forward to both the conclusion (conclusion-ish?) of the long-running Superman plots from the last couple of years with the “War Of The Supermen” crossover, and Grant Morrison going bat-guano crazy with The Return of Bruce Wayne, but both come with a very quiet, very small print “Oh Please Do Not Suck I Want To Like You So Bad” trailing along behind. Can I say that I’m genuinely excited about Girl Comics without the internet jumping up and down? Never mind my misgivings about the title and the whole “2010, Marvel Remembers Women Exist!” branding; ignore the gender of the creators involved and, man: That’s one of the most talent-filled anthologies around.

What I’m maybe most looking forward to are new books from people whose work I’ve come to love recently: Scott Pilgrim 6, obviously (And the movie, too), but also James Stokoe’s Orc book at Image, and the unseen King City second half by Brandon Graham. Hope Larson’s Mercury has me very excited, as does the rumored possibly maybe new possibility of new Casanova. Is Paul Pope’s Battling Boy coming out this year, as well? If so, then I’ll be first in line for that and then some. I’ve read the first issue of Joe The Barbarian, and it’s got a lot of potential – Morrison’s script is a little rough, but it’s a stunning looking book; Vertigo’s made a quiet comeback over the last couple of years, I think, and between Joe The Barbarian and Fabio Moon and Gabriel Ba’s Daytripper, they’re coming out with some great stuff that not enough people are paying attention to.

Really, though, I’m looking forward to things that I don’t know anything about: Something that’ll knock my socks off without me seeing it coming. Come on, 2010. As Pat Benatar once said, hit me with your best shot.

Graeme writes about comics and other things over at io9.com, and recently contributed to our What are you reading? feature. And of course he used to blog with us back when we were at Blog@Newsarama, so he’ll always be family.

His comics ain't so bad either

Brian Michael Bendis! At least according to Samuel Rules of Are You a Serious Comic Book Reader? In a post stuffed with evidentiary linkage, Sammy proclaims “No one used Twitter better in 2009 than Bendis,” citing the Siege writer’s honesty and humor, as well as the “little insights into his life” he provided. “I used to talk a lot of trash on him,” Sammy recalls — “Upon discovering his Twitter, however, I started to understand him as a person, and then kinda wanted to hang out with him.”

Which got me thinking: Who would I proclaim comics’ Twitter-er…Twit…uh, Tweeter of the year?

Would I stick with Bendis, for his informative Q&A alone?

What about Matt Fraction, for his performance-art masterpiece Hobo Darkseid?

Michael Kupperman, for a consistently hilarious feed that’s like reading Tales Designed to Thrizzle in pictureless 140-character snippets?

Paul Pope, for his philosophical musings?

Kate Beaton and Dustin Harbin, the dynamic duo of Tweeting webcartoonists?

Ryan “Agent M” Penagos, for having more followers than the rest of the comics industry combined?

But then I remembered the one man whose Twitter account impacted my life, or at least the blogging side of it, more than anyone else. For my money, no one tops the ever-interesting, refreshingly candid Tom Brevoort. Why, just the other day he took to his feed to breathe a sigh of relief about Captain America: Reborn finishing before The Flash: Rebirth as he predicted, size up his chances regarding Siege finishing before Blackest Night, criticize Rebirth artist Ethan Van Sciver for drawing convention commissions while his book is delayed, and defend Reborn artist Bryan Hitch from accusations of habitual lateness. Can you imagine if everyone in comics were that forthright? I can, and it looks like heaven from here. Tweetin’ Tom Brevoort, we salute you!

Dune art by Paul Pope

Cartoonist and Heroes Con creative director Dustin Harbin is obviously a comics guy. But even for sequential-art partisans, every once in a while the literary spice must flow. Thus Harbin has created the Dune book club, a weekly discussion of the original science-fiction classic by author Frank Herbert, hosted on Harbin’s blog. In addition to thought-provoking posts and comment-thread chats about the book, which Harbin calls “probably my favorite novel ever,” the book club is also something of an art club, with Harbin, Paul Pope, Patrick Keck, Peter Lazarski, Pen Ward, Thomas “Smo” Smolenski, and Evan Dahm all providing luscious comics and stand-alone illustrations based on the book. (Pope, another big-time Dune devotee, had already drawn a scene from the book in the style of a Wednesday Comics page.) Personally, I’m waiting for someone to take a crack at a sandworm.

Dustin Harbin

A few months back when I interviewed Dustin Harbin regarding this year’s HeroesCon, I made a mental note to follow-up with Harbin in another interview, where we could just discuss his creative projects/process. This interview was conducted via email several weeks back. Late last week, Harbin let me know that while he’s remaining as Creative Director at Heroes Aren’t Hard To Find and Heroes Convention, he will be reducing his hours at the store and has “gone full-time with cartooning”. My thanks to Harbin for another interview, I’m happy to say this one was even more fun than the last.

Tim O’Shea: How much are you paying Tom Spurgeon to pimp your work? Seriously, Spurgeon praises many talented storytellers, but he seems to be your number one fan. Did you buy him a lot of meals when he came to HeroesCon in 2008 or what?

Dustin Harbin: I remember having to argue with Tom just to be able to bring him a water: I tried hard to buy him a drink at the hotel bar, but he was leery of my seductive ways. I think Tom is like a lot of us–he’s a passionate advocate for people he thinks deserve wider recognition. I’m not basing this just on the very VERY kind attention he’s showed my comics so far, but he’s the reason I discovered Richard Thompson’s work, who you’ll agree Tom is an even more vociferous a supporter of. I don’t know what attracted Tom’s good feelings, but I’m incredibly grateful for them.

O’Shea: When you tackle a story like “What is with the women?”–do you ever fear alienating half of your potential audience? I’m not saying you were bashing women in the story, but anytime you put crazy anywhere near the word woman, you’re risking a world of hurt (same risk that would occur if a woman did a similar story…BTW).

Harbin: Do you really think a woman would get the same flak? I’m not disagreeing, it just seems odd in my head. Probably because, ha ha, most of the lady cartoonists I know are too smart to waste their time doing comics about how men are crazy. I do not labor under the burden of being too smart, fortunately for all those who love crazy women comics.

I worried a little bit about alienating, but not too much–they’re autobio strips, and to remove all the honesty from them would leave them pretty boring I think. Still, I know some of my least favorite autobio comics ever are pretty much all the muckraking negative ones, so I was more leery of just seeming petty than of alienating women in general. I did hear from a couple of ex-girlfriends, and at best their reaction was, roughly, “hpmh!” At worst, it was much louder.

O’Shea: Why do you think you’re “terrible at drawing women“–or if it’s easier to describe, what challenges you about drawing women?

Harbin: I don’t have any real education in art, so most of the stuff I grew up drawing was just an endless progression of misshapen heads, odd stuff, and the occasional building. The last couple of years, having gotten serious about drawing comics, is really the first time I’ve ever had to draw outside my comfort zone. It’s exhilarating and enormously frustrating.

Women, in almost every detail, are visually much more nuanced than men. You can bend a dude’s head and body and hands all over the place, but if you are drawing a woman, especially one you want to at least PASS for attractive, then you have to work harder to make those curves and lines work together. By “curves” I mean less the obvious connotation, and more the curves of the brushstrokes you might use to delineate the line of a woman’s jaw, or where her knee meets her calf, et cetera. Those are hard things to do right; not so hard for men.

O’Shea: Your website reveals how you’re creatively plugged in on flickr, twitter and myspace. As a creator who clearly embraces technology, do you intend on trying to get your work into the platform for handheld devices?

Harbin: Maybe. On the surface it’s not that interesting to me, I guess–there is really nothing I hate worse than reading comics on a screen. It drives me crazy–it’s less than I’m more into print (though I am) and more that my mind just doesn’t really absorb information on a screen the same way it does on paper. Though I know a lot of web cartoonists, there are only four webcomics in my RSS folder, not counting PBF, which of course is on more-or-less permanent hiatus.

And almost without exception, those are all shortform comics–I find webcomics more interesting as short strips, in the same way old adventure strips were self-contained each day, but contributed to larger plots. I’m struggling with this myself–I want to do longer stories, but the navigation of a web interface just seems so clumsy to me. And for a cellphone–whoa nellie! But every time I say something’s dumb, I end up eating crow a few months later and announcing to all my friends that it’s the best thing ever. “Have you guys ever heard of WEBcomics?”

O’Shea: Back in July, you gave a talk at a library about comics and cartooning. In the warm-up to doing the presentation, you wrote: “This is the second time I’ve donned a fake mortarboard (I never got a real one, having never graduated anything before) to fake teach–I enjoyed the first time, although it was both more and less difficult than I’d thought it would be.” Does it bother you that you’ve never graduated anything (it has not seemed to impede your creative pursuits from my perspective) or did you merely write that to set up the “fake teach” line. What was more difficult about that first time you taught. And how did things go on this second round?

Harbin: Well, the first time was technically a longer class, an 8-week continuing-ed class at our local community college, and the recent one was just a talk at a library to some kids, showing them some basics, etc. So the first time was harder–I love talking to kids, and I’m CRAZY good at it.

But no, lacking a high school diploma hasn’t gotten in the way of anything so far for me. I’m not dissing the idea of graduating–if for no other reason than that it’s so incredibly easy. But I have also been lucky, and have worked at the same place since I was 21, where my boss has rewarded me over time for becoming better at my job. So I have been spared a lot of the challenges another dropout dummy like me might have faced elsewhere. Not to mention I’ve had time to foster my own interest in cartooning, in arguably the best possible place, insofar as being able to meet all the people I admire, making tons of contacts, all that stuff.

O’Shea: Am I correct in thinking you’re experimenting with a new art style of late–what prompted the switch and how is it working out for you?

Harbin: I am always trying to find a style, but have pretty much locked down a particular one for my autobio strips, pretty much exactly like the one I just finished, the one about all those wang-dang-doodle crazy ladies. Mainly I’m trying to work as small as I can, because I have some sort of low-impact OCD that makes me want to fill everything up with lines and details and cross-hatching and all that stuff that ruins a lot of otherwise good comics. It’s a struggle! Plus I’ve recently been reading all the Jaime Love & Rockets stories for the first time, so that’s really crushing my spirit as far as spotting blacks and composition goes.

O’Shea: Judging by this piece, you love coming up with absurd sound effects, don’t you?

Harbin: Yes! One of the sound effects in that strip was originally “SPELUNK!” but I had to change it because it didn’t make real sense. I’m reading Kevin Cannon’s awesome FAR ARDEN right now, and he does a hilarious thing where pretty much everything has a sound effect, but it’ll be like “PREPARES TO PUNCH” or “KICKS RIGHT THROUGH!” Sound effects are one of the weird meta-jokes you can only pull off in comics, and I love those meta-jokes.

O’Shea: Am I correct in thinking that you listen to music while you work? Does music help keep the creative juices flowing when you’re putting long hours in the chair?

Harbin: I do listen to music, but only when I’m planning the comics and maybe pencilling. All the brainless stuff like inking and coloring I like to listen to audiobooks or podcasts or what-have-you. Although I’ve found that listening to jazz, especially really deep stuff like Coltrane, while inking is pretty deep–you really get into it, you can really fall into that music more because only a small part of your brain is thinking about dragging a brush across the paper, and the rest is wishing John Coltrane was still alive.

O’Shea: Given your work as a comics retailer, as a creator what big lessons have you learned of what NOT to do when trying to sell your work?

Harbin: Haha, I almost never sell my work! Or do you mean just selling books to people? I haven’t learned anything, actually. In the store I almost never mention that I even draw, let alone that I have two or three comics right there for sale. And at conventions I act like a carnival barker, greeting anyone who gets within three feet of my table, then watching dejectedly as they notice Joe Lambert next to me. It’ll be even worse tabling with Scott Campbell. It’s hard to have such talented bros, Tim. It’s hard.

O’Shea: How did the poetry reading, on the occasion of your 35th birthday, go?

Harbin: It went great! Thanks for asking. Writing poetry is not something I really do except for once in a great while, but it’s fun to burn off that urge by reading a bunch of it in front of a big audience. Everyone had a good time, I didn’t even get a hangover, although I DID wake up the next day as a 35-year old. You win some, you lose some.

O’Shea: The last time we talked you said: “I have a lot of ideas about comics.” Care to share any remaining ideas? What do you want to talk about?

Harbin: Sure I have a lot of ideas about comics, but a lot of them are negative, and I hate to get into that stuff sometimes because of my dayjob (as Creative Director at Heroes Aren’t Hard To Find and Heroes Convention). Plus negative stuff–well, it’s easy to talk smack, less easy to talk nice.

But it seems to me that the gulf between good comics and bad comics is growing wider; or at least that the no man’s land of mediocre comics between those poles is becoming more vast. All these grim/gritty superhero stories lately, which still feature a bunch of guys wearing tights and strippers with their boobs hanging out–it’s just impossible to take that stuff seriously, isn’t it? Sometimes I want to–I read that Marvels Project comic a few weeks ago, and it was just a cool WWII-era intrigue story, no strippers yet. I don’t mind superheroes per se, but the more adult and realistic we try to make them, the dumber they seem–it’s a lot easier to enjoy All Star Superman because Morrison and Quitely didn’t try to set the story in anything like the real world. It’s in that wacky 50′s era Superman mythos, and everything works and he’s able to explore issues that start with capital letters.

But these current stories that seem to want to cram as much murder and death and rape onto a page as possible, crowding it in their with the weird power fantasies and boobs and all that–it’s kind of a gross pastiche I think. None of those elements are served by being mashed into a big stew together like that.

I like genre storytelling, I think it’s cool. And it’s incorrect to think that comics writers shouldn’t ASPIRE to doing something really adult and amazing with superheroes, a la Watchmen or All Star Superman. But I think it’s a high bar, and regular mainstream comics–especially the big “event” books that are aimed at the widest possible audience–may not be the best laboratory to try out those ideas.

But what I LOVE about comics lately is the growing–even mushrooming–community of DIY and indie creators, a lot of whom are connected via Twitter or Facebook or their various sites and blogs. Being connected to that is incredibly energizing–it’s easy to get down on your stuff when you’ve been looking at it for ten hours and wrestling with it and it’s weeks from being done. But getting a kind word from someone whose work you admire is like opening your wallet and finding a gold brick in there. These young indie creators are going to be the Bendis’s and Morrisons of tomorrow too–it’s in THEIR laboratories, in their cramped little studio apartments in their various cities, where the next big innovations in comics are taking place, and being involved even tangentially with that is enormously exciting. Excelsior!