Rick Geary shares some pencils from the next volume in his Treasury of 20th Century Murder series. This one takes as its subject the double murder of Rev. Edward Hall and Mrs. Eleanor Mills in New Brunswick, NJ, in 1922. What’s interesting is how just the frontispiece and two maps present so much information in such a compact form. I know absolutely nothing about this murder, but now that I have a few glimpses, I’m looking forward to reading the book and finding out who the victims were (obviously married, but not to each other) and what the significance is of the crab-apple tree.

Robot 6: Why are you so interested in murder, and how has it held your interest through so many books?

Rick Geary: I’ve been a “fan” of crime, both fiction and non-fiction, since the early 1970s. I lived in Wichita, Kansas, and a friend of mine, a former cop, gave me a copy of the complete police file on an unsolved murder in Wichita from the 1960s. It fascinated me, and I used it as the subject of my first published comic story in 1977. Since then, the exploration of the dark side of human behavior has been a continuing obsession.

Robot 6:Would you ever do a book about a modern murder story, or do you prefer to stick to stories set in the past?

Rick: I prefer dealing with cases from the past, because with them the urgency and emotionalism have dissipated, and I’m able to get the proper ironic distance in my treatment. That said, I’d love someday to do the OJ Simpson case or JonBenet Ramsey or even Casey Anthony.

Robot 6: What was there about the Sacco and Vanzetti case that made you want to do a book about it?

Rick: It has all the ingredients I look for in a classic murder case: controversy, mystery and world-wide attention—plus a political dimension that divides people to this day.

Robot 6: There seems to be a lot of ambiguity about this case. How did you research it, and was it difficult to find objective sources?

Rick: The Sacco-Vanzetti case has been studied and written about over the years by both political partisans and objective historians. I searched out all the books available and had no trouble finding sources that dealt with the story even-handedly.

Robot 6: Did your ideas about the case change as you did your research?

Rick: I usually try to pick a case about which I have very few preconceived ideas, so the research phase is one of discovery and education for me. I’m finding out new things through every phase of the book’s production, right up through the final inking, so the piece is in a constant state of flux.

Robot 6: Drawing a comic set in the past has challenges of its own. What do you do to prepare yourself not only to portray it accurately but to avoid anachronism?

Rick: In relating these cases, I try for accuracy and clarity above all, because many of them have acquired, over the decades, layers of mythology and faulty information. I always keep a photo file for the period I’m treating: clothing, interiors, automobiles, carriages, etc. Old catalogs are an especially valuable resource.

Robot 6: You favor a cool voice—the narration in Sacco and Vanzetti almost seems like the narration in a documentary. Do you ever have a strong emotional response to your subjects?

Rick: With any murder case, the horror and grimness and strong feeling are built into the material, so I figure my best approach is one of detachment. Especially with an unsolved case, I like to lay out all the elements and clues in a rational way, so readers can either solve it themselves or realize anew why it remains unsolved.

Robot 6: What are your plans for Comic-Con—and beyond?

Rick: I’ll be at my usual table (F-6) selling my new and older books, as well as postcards. I’m also working on my next book in the murder series: “Lovers’ Lane,” an account of the Hall-Mills double murder of 1922.

Jayms Blonde

Legal | The Second Circuit Court of Appeals backed the 2010 decision by a federal judge to dismiss a comic writer’s claims that Adam Sandler, Judd Apatow, Columbia Pictures and parent company Sony Picture stole his idea for a hairdresser-turned-hero and transformed it into the movie You Don’t Mess With the Zohan. Robert Cabell filed a copyright-infringement lawsuit in February 2009 accusing the moviemakers of ripping off his comic The Hair-Raising Adventures of Jayms Blonde, about a Navy SEAL-turned-hairdresser who fights crime armed with a blow dryer. [The Hollywood Reporter]

Creators | The Hero Initiative reports that comics creator Josh Medors, who has a rare form of cancer, has been released from the hospital after being treated for a lung infection. [Hero Initiative]

Creators | Dave McKean discusses his most recent work, the erotic graphic novel Celluloid. [Suicide Girls]

Rachel Rising

Creators | Terry Moore talks at length about his upcoming comic Rachel Rising, the end of Echo and and the in-the-works film by Lloyd Levin and screenwriter Kerry Williamson. He says the idea for Rachel Rising came from an unused idea he had while working on Birds of Prey for DC: “The rough idea was a woman committing a crime, like burglary, when Batrat drops in and a minute later she’s dead. A terrible accident. He pretends to care, blah, blah. He’s in the morgue watching them slide her drawer shut. That’s that. The next night he’s taking a leak off a rooftop or whatever it is a guy with his underwear on the outside does at night on rooftops, and there she is. The girl from the morgue is back, robbing the shop below. He engages the suspect. Damn if she doesn’t get killed again. Swear it wasn’t Fatman’s fault. Morgue. Next day, she’s baaaack. Get the idea? That was Deadgirl. I loved her. Unfortunately, I left Birds of Prey before I could use my secret weapon, so I put her in a drawer for later. Meanwhile, the name of Deadgirl was copyrighted at Marvel, so when it was time for my new series I re-titled it Rachel Rising. And that’s where she came from.” [PopMatters]

The Lives of Sacco & Vanzetti

Creators | Rick Geary reveals the roots of his fascination with true crime. [NBM Blog]

Commentary | Melinda Beasi thinks publishers, and readers, should take more pride in manga that is created by and for women, rather than apologizing for that fact or brushing it aside. [Manga Bookshelf]

Comics | As the final issue of Mome rolls off the presses, Brian Heater talks to editor Eric Reynolds about the anthology’s genesis and the purposes it served. (Part 1 of 4.) [The Daily Cross Hatch]

Movies | Daniel Snyder lists five fatal errors for comic book movies. [The Atlantic]

Criticism | Jason Thompson takes a long look at Junji Ito’s Uzumaki, a horror manga that relies on creepiness rather than shock. [Anime News Network]

Conventions | The Miami New Times profiles this weekend’s Florida Supercon. The show’s guest list includes Dennis Calero, Charlie Adlard, Paul Gulacy, Ariel Olivetti, Tony Bedard, Duncan Fegredo, Sean McKeever and musical guest Motion City Soundtrack. [Miami New Times]

Comics | Stan Lee gets the Bluewater treatment. [Bluewater Comics]

Hello and welcome to another edition of What Are You Reading? Today’s special guest is Shannon Wheeler, New Yorker cartoonist and creator of the Eisner Award-winning comic book Too Much Coffee Man, Oil & Water, the Eisner-nominated I Thought You Would Be Funnier and the upcoming Grandpa Won’t Wake Up.

To see what Shannon and the Robot 6 crew have been reading, click below …

*****

Tom Bondurant

Superman Family #203

Last week my brother-in-law was in a used bookstore — actually, I guess “used-book store” would be more accurate — and called me asking what random old DCs and Marvels I’d like. One of the fruits of his labors was September-October 1980′s Superman Family #203, a decent little anthology inked mostly by Vince Coletta (so they all tended to look the same) and written and penciled by various DC stalwarts. The lead was a Supergirl story, “The Supergirl From Planet Earth,” written by Jack C. Harris and penciled by Win Mortimer. Seems there’s a formerly-comatose blonde teenager in Kara’s old hometown Midvale who suddenly starts manifesting Kryptonian powers and zipping around in a certain blue-skirted super-suit. Moreover, when questioned by Supergirl, the new kid pretty much recites Kara’s first speech to her cousin, about the destruction of Argo City, etc. Naturally I was reminded of Peter David and Ed Benes’ “Many Happy Returns” storyline, but Harris and Mortimer only have 12 pages to introduce another complication and then resolve everything — and resolve it they do, using X-Kryptonite, a medallion made of lead, and some conveniently-placed acid. It’s a neat little story which, although inconsequential in the greater scheme of things, is still entertaining.

Since I’m always interested in how a Lois Lane solo series might work (once more), I read “Lost,” another 12-pager, written by Marv Wolfman and penciled by Bob Oksner. As with the Supergirl story, there’s a lot of plot in these pages: Lois is kidnapped and mind-wiped, escapes, gets picked up by a helpful widower, falls in love with same, and then uses her (unwiped) martial arts skills to fight off the goons who eventually catch up with her. The story ends with an amnesiac Lois wandering off into the woods, Bruce-Banner-style, so I’ll have to seek out #204 to see how it ends. Here, I’m not sure the format does this story many favors (especially with regard to Ted, the widower). It might do better played out over a few issues of that hypothetical solo title. (That would also leave room to cross over and/or be mentioned in the main Superman books, too….)

Finally, “The Critic Killer” (written by E. Nelson Bridwell and penciled by George Tuska) is a tale of the Earth-2 Lois and Clark, set in the early ’50s when the two were newly married — and when TV was still new enough that the Daily Star didn’t have its own critic. Along comes Lana Lang, daughter of a professor Clark knew from Smallville, seeking to carve out some column space for just that purpose. Clark (editor of the Star, like you didn’t know) gives her the job, and she promptly goes all scorched-earth on the new sitcom from a notoriously thin-skinned writer. Lois realizes nothing good can come of Lana’s scathing review, and sure enough, the writer traps Lana and Lois in a specially-modified elevator car. Because Lois — in what strikes me as a bit of Earth-2 Superdickery — is wearing a “mood ring” which telepathically alerts Clark to sudden changes in her emotions, Superman saves them (of course). However, we learn that the writer bought his elevator-trap from Luthor, still in prison but still scheming about taking down Superman. Dun dun dunnnn! Again, it was a clever little tale whose eight pages were more concerned with establishing Lana’s bona fides (this was apparently the retcon introducing Lana to Lois and Clark) and maybe making Lois a little jealous, than with a straightforward adventure/suspense story. Along those lines, it laid the groundwork for future stories involving Lana and/or Luthor, and I’m now curious to see how fleshed-out the “Mr. And Mrs. Superman” stories got.

And speaking of Earth-2, I read Invaders Classic Volume 1, written by Roy Thomas (who else?), penciled mostly by Frank Robbins, and inked by Vince Coletta and Frank Springer. This paperback reprinted the first several issues of The Invaders, plus ancillary issues, and it’s pretty much non-stop action from page one. Essentially, the Invaders — Captain America and Bucky, the Human Torch and Toro, and the Sub-Mariner — fight Nazi super villains, as depicted by Robbins’ hyperkinetic pencils. What I took away from this book, though, was that even though he was working at Marvel, and even though DC was, at the time, doing contemporary Earth-2 stories featuring the Justice Society, Roy Thomas desperately wanted to write a wartime JSA book. I have no idea how much Thomas drew from those old Timely comics to come up with the various Axis bad guys and the heroic Liberty Legion (although reprinted text pages help out in this regard) — but there sure are conspicuous references to moving “faster than a speeding bullet” and being part of “seven soldiers” of something-or-other. Actually, I take part of that back — the first baddies the Invaders face are a trio of faux-Teutonic godlings, and I thought “oh, here’s a riff on Evil Thor.” Still, though, the Liberty Legion contains 1) a speedster, 2) a guy who stretches, 3) a superheroine with black hair and a red-and-blue costume, 4) the Blue Diamond, who kinda looks like Green Lantern if you squint, 5) a flying guy with big bird-wings on his back, 6) Jack Frost, an ice-based hero who looks like he’s got Aquaman-style scales, and 7) the Patriot, another red-and-blue-clad figure who’s the group’s moral center. Maybe it was just me, but I had more fun looking for those kinds of references than I did reading the stories themselves. Lucky for the series, though, the last couple of issues introduce Union Jack and Baron Blood, a British hero and his undead foe, and The Invaders starts to build its own little corner of Marvel history, instead of reminding readers of others’. Lucky for Roy Thomas, too, that it wouldn’t be long before he was writing DC’s All-Star Squadron — otherwise, I suspect his brain might have exploded.

(By the way, I’m not up on Marvel history as much as some — but doesn’t Union Jack’s debut in World War I make him Marvel-Earth’s first costumed hero, preceding the Human Torch by at least 20 years?)

Michael May

Lois Lane and the Resistance

As I said in this week’s Food or Comics, I wasn’t sure if I was going to buy Lois Lane and the Resistance or not. I flipped through it in the store though and decided to get it for its visuals and action sequences. It looked like fun. And there were some exciting parts, but unfortunately, this still isn’t the Lois Lane comic I’m waiting for. Lois spends the entire issue running around doing the bidding of other people. The story opens with Perry White’s sending her on a fluff piece instead of covering the impending war. The Lois Lane I want to read about doesn’t get sent to cover Fashion Week. She doesn’t have to whine and argue that she’s a serious reporter; everyone should know that she is and treat her that way. But this Lois…even when the story gets going she’s still acting as someone else’s agent, and not even a particularly competent one. This isn’t the story of a strong, empowered reporter that I’ve been craving.

I also read Mystery Men #2 and liked it, but it reminded me why I became a trade-waiter. The first issue got me all excited to continue the story, but now I’m growing impatient with its being rationed out in small chunks. Some cool stuff happens this issue — another masked hero joins the investigation and there’s a major revelation about the villain — but it’s hard to say that I enjoyed this particular chunk of the story as its own, self-contained unit.

Finally, I read the first volume of Jason DeAngelis and Aldin Viray’s Captain Nemo, a manga re-telling of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. There are some cool, imaginative things going on in it, like the story’s taking place in an alternate timeline where Napoleon won at Waterloo and has taken over the world. The 19-year-old son of the original Captain Nemo is operating the Nautilus II in rebellion against the French Empire, providing this version with an actual plot (something that Jules Verne’s novel lacks). Viray’s obviously had a great time creating the steampunk world for the story; the environment of the book looks great. And I like how it’s still hitting major beats in Verne’s story, but reworking them enough to keep them exciting and follow DeAngelis’ plot.

But the book falls victim to some standard manga tropes and the characters are boringly familiar. Nemo is the classic manga hero: handsome, but stand-offish, but really very gentle at heart. Camille Pierpont (who stands in for Professor Aronnax, Conseil, and Ned Land by ending up prisoner on the Nautilus II after Nemo saves her from drowning) is the traditional manga heroine: headstrong, judgmental, entitled, but supernaturally gifted with wild animals and really just one good kiss away from calming down into someone likeable. Even the characters’ designs are unimaginative; something that Aldin admits to in the sketchbook section where he says that he gave Nemo “the standard Harlock look” and Camille “the typical female lead character look.” The other crew members of the Nautilus II are just as immediately recognizable: Smart and Cocky Guy With Glasses, Bad Attitude Girl, Plucky Kid, etc.

Brigid Alverson

Treasury of Victorian Murder

This week was murder, at least in terms of what I have been reading. I got an advance copy of Rick Geary’s latest Treasury of Victorian Murder book, The Lives of Sacco and Vanzetti, which will be debuting at San Diego Comic-Con this year. Like all of Geary’s books, it’s cool, almost clinical, with the timelines and details carefully laid out in a heavy-bordered grid and a narrative voice straight out of a PBS documentary Geary’s objective voice suits the story well, because the guilt or innocence of Sacco and Vanzetti is a matter of some controversy, but it does make the book seem rather dry.

Also on the stack is The Green River Killer, written by Jeff Jensen and illustrated by Jonathan Case. Jensen’s father was a detective on the case, and the story is told from his point of view. The story gets rolling with Gary Ridgeway’s confession and skips back and forth in time as the police bring him to the sites of the murders and then flash back to their first encounters with the same scenes. The art is straightforward and linear, but there are some nice atmospheric moments.

And in the prose realm, I’m reading The Poisoner’s Handbook, which would be more aptly titled “The Toxicologist’s Handbook.” Set in 1920s New York, the book follows the work of pioneering medical examiner Charles Norris and toxicologist Alexander Gettler as they investigate various murders — grouped by the poison involved. Some they solve, some they don’t, and sometimes they are simply frustrated by the difficulty of proving their toxicological case in court. It’s a bit overly dramatic but a good read nonetheless, and I’m learning a bit of chemistry from it too.

Tim O’Shea

IDW’s Rocketeer Adventures #1

Rocketeer Adventures #1 and #2: OK, I have to admit, I completely missed the first issue’s release. So I picked up issue #2 this week, Mark Waid teamed with Chris Weston, Darwyn Cooke, Geof Darrow, Lowell Francis with Gene Ha (all colored by Dave Stewart) and realized: “you were a fool to miss issue #1.” Fortunately I snagged the last copy of issue #1 at my local store. And I am torn which is my favorite from that issue, it’s a close race between John Cassady colored by Laura Martin or Kurt Busiek teamed with legendary Michael Kaluta (honorable mention Mike Allred colored by Laura Allred). But after serious consideration I have decided that Kaluta (inked by Stewart) is my favorite. There’s not a bad story in either issue–and I am looking forward to issue #3.

Thunderbolts #159 is a double-sized issue with multiple creative teams on different tales. But all you need to know is this: Jen Van Meter writes a team-up (of sorts) between Ghost and John Walker. I really hope that Marvel announces some more work for Van Meter at San Diego, because she deserves a monthly assignment.

Captain America: Given Bucky’s current status quo (given the Fear Itself event), I am confused as to why I would care what happened to James in this issue. But all my annoyance washed away when I got to see Chris Samnee draw more Nick Fury in the second half of the issue.

Did you catch my interview with Roger Langridge about the preview of his new Kaboom book, Snarked #0, which will sell for $1 in August? Did I convince you to tell your retailer to get a copy for you? You have until June 30 for the Previews deadline (Diamond Code: JUN110963). I mean it when I commit to this series being destined for my best of 2011 books.

Shannon Wheeler

Paying for It

There’s a narrow road to success if a creator already has a lot of good books. If it’s too different from what came before, I’ll hate it, and if it’s too similar to what came before, then I’ll hate it, too. Chester Brown created my favorite comics: Ed the Happy Clown and The Playboy. So, of course, I was disappointed with Paying for It.

It’s an autobiographical book about Chester Brown’s decision to satisfy his sexual needs by being with prostitutes. The best part of the book is when he details his internal conflict and anxiety when he first hires women to have sex with him. Unfortunately, the book drags as he uses his friends as characters to stage pro and con arguments regarding prostitution. The books drags even more when he reiterates his beliefs for the third… and fourth time. He avoids talking about his final relationship in respect for her desire for privacy. This could have been an emotional resolution in the book — Chester finding a relationship that he’s comfortable with. They are both happy with monogamous, but independent, lives where he continues to pay for sex. Any editor could have trimmed 20 percent of the redundant ranting to make it a smoother read and then pushed for a conclusion with emotional depth and acute observations similar to the book’s beginning. Chester Brown could have had a book that matched or succeeded his earlier work. As it stands, the book is a vaguely interesting read as a political diatribe and an okay read as an emotional journey, but is redundant as one and unresolved as the other. Chester is still a great creator; it’s too bad his editor hasn’t kept pace. It’s a good book that could have been a great book.

Okko

Okko

It’s a solid read that takes place in old Japan with demons, ronins, monks and magic. The book is skillfully put together with natural storytelling, attractive drawings and pretty coloring. It’s not a book you’ll ponder much after putting it down. As a book in the same genre as the great Usagi Yojimbo, it holds up as a solid and entertaining read.

New Yorker: On the Money

I always grab collections of New Yorker cartoons. This one has the strength of being assembled by the New Yorker’s current cartoon editor, Bob Mankoff. By choosing financially themed comics from 1925-2009, Mankoff shows an economic history of our country through humor. It’s telling that the rich-screw-the-poor is a recurrent theme that doesn’t change from the earliest comics to the recent ones. The repetition left me a little cold. Maybe not cold – but depressed. If the economics of this country could change the way families, gender roles and race relations have changed, I might like the book better. But I guess that’s not really the book’s fault.

Cowboy Wally

Always funny. I’m constantly amazed at how well this book has held up. I consider it one of the best comics created.

Underground

I just picked this one up, but the first issue shows potential. I love the art and story. Jeff Parker and Steve Lieber are great comic creators. I’m sure they’ll deliver.

If you are a comics creator or publisher, and you’re planning to bring something new to the con — a sketchbook, a print, a graphic novel debut, etc. — then we want to hear from you. Drop me an email at jkparkin@yahoo.com and let me know if you’ll have something cool on hand that attendees should know about. Feel free to send any artwork as well.

*****
Aspen Comics sends word of two variant covers they’ll have at the show, for Executive Assistant Iris and Charismagic

Executive Assistant Iris by Joe Benitez

Charismagic by Khary Randolph

*****

A Treasury of Murder: The Lives of Sacco & Vanzetti

NBM Publishing writes to let us know: “We’ll be debuting Rick Geary’s latest Treasury of Murder volume, The Lives of Sacco & Vanzetti and offering copies of a limited (to only 25 copies) hardcover edition of the book, bound in cloth with a silver-stamped jacket. Each copy will have an original plate signed and numbed. Rick will also be at SDCC and will be happy to personalize them as well.”

*****

And creator Mary Bellamy will be in the small press area with her new sketchbook and a plush toy line: “I have a table over in Small Press under Zorilita-Mary Bellamy and I’ll be debuting my new sketchbook: Sugar Bits, a 150 page sketchbook full of sketches, inked drawings ranging from super cute to pin ups. I also will have volumes 1-3 of Faux Facts – The Truth Can Be Strange! and volumes 1-2 of Ah Heck!! The Angel Chronicles. I also have my brand new plush toy line available this year.”

Here at Hogwarts

Welcome to What Are You Reading?, our weekly discussion about the comics we here at Robot 6 have been checking out lately. Today’s special guest is Lauren Davis, who blogs about webcomics at Storming the Tower and io9, and is the editor of the San Francisco comics anthology The Comic Book Guide to the Mission.

To see what Lauren and the Robot 6 gang have been reading lately, click below …

*****

Tim O’Shea

Knight & Squire #6

Good lord. When I read Paul Cornell’s final text piece for Knight and Squire #6 I was astounded to learn that 130 new characters had been introduced in the six issue miniseries. I still cannot believe the narrative curveball that Cornell threw readers in the last issue, but the whole damn thing comes together quite nicely in the conclusion. And even though I read all the single issues, I have a feeling the extras that Cornell is gonna toss in the collection will make that worth picking up as well. Page 2 of this issue is worth the purchase alone for the classic comics writer names that are plastered in graffiti on the wall.

Xombi #1: Not much of a fan of supernatural, unless it’s classic material by Archie Goodwin or current stuff by Jason Aaron. But DC Comics was kind enough to send me an advance copy of Xombi #1. Not to sound like a total idiot, but Fraser Irving is perfectly suited for supernatural tales like this material. And any writer like John Rozum, who references NC Wyeth in the first panel of a story draws me in with pop culture fun. I’ve not read any of the past Xombi material–and the nice news about that is even though I did not know a damn thing about David Kim before this story, I was interested in the character by the fourth page. Plus there’s talking coins at one point in this story. Kudos to Rozum (a longtime friend of Dwayne McDuffie) for dedicating this first issue to the recently departed writer.

Superman #709: Kevin Melrose has already documented one of wacky, enjoyable aspects of this issue. Roberson’s ability to work little elements into the story, like the fact that Supes and Flash have a conversation at superspeed in the time that a waitress almost trips and falls (as the scene ends, of course, Flash saves her from a fall). Until DC makes an official announcement, I will keep writing: “Give Chris Roberson a permanent assignment as writer of Superman. This guy turned a floundering arc into something entertaining.” Small smarky aside: When all is said and done on this Grounded storyline, I am going to check and see how many issues featured a scene with a white picket fence.

Avengers Academy #11: Christos Gage remains the most engaging writer on an Avengers-related title at present. And in the current arc, he gets to use a hell of a lot of Avengers, not just the academy students. How many, you may ask? Tom Raney draws characters I never even recognize, that’s not a complaint. I still remember back in the 1970s when I first read the Avengers and there would be a character I would not know about. That would not make me feel left out, quite the opposite it would leave me wanting to learn more. And that’s the feeling I get when I read Gage’s writing. Some writers when they use Jocasta characterize her as nothing more than a high-quality PDA, Jocasta by Gage is an asset to the Academy staff and the book’s cast (though you always have this suspicion fomented by the Gage that she can go Ultron on the team at any point). After this pivotal issue, I’ll be curious to see where the creative team takes Veil, in particular.

Thunderbolts #155: Jeff Parker’s affinity for Dr. Strange (who lends a hand in this single issue only) is clear from the issue’s outset. Getting the voice of Stephen Strange just right is no easy feat, but Parker does it. To me, the sign of a good writer in a team book like the Thunderbolts is when they can make the guest stars shine in an ensemble cast without taking away from the title’s core group dynamics. That’s what Parker achieves with Dr. Strange–and Kev Walker gives Strange almost a Russian look to a certain extent. It’s an immensely iconic tone to a certain extent. While it may be too early for another Dr. Strange miniseries, I would love for Parker & Walker give it a go.

Chris Mautner

Noche Roja

Noche Roja by Simon Oliver and Jason Latour is the latest entry in the Vertigo Crime, and like previous efforts it’s a rather enjoyable effort, though it slips easily from your mind once you put it down. It’s about a former, washed-up cop now private detective who heads across the border to a small factory town in Mexico where young women are being rather gruesomely killed. It’s well done, I particularly like Latour’s just-cartoonish-enough art style, though the cheap paper it’s printed on does it no favors, particularly when Latour uses as much ink and ben-day dots as he does.

I suppose my big problem with Noche and much of the Vertigo Crime line is that it’s so plot-heavy that there’s little room for style or characterization. I realize that this genre tends to be rather plot-heavy in general anyway, but for me the pleasure usually resides in the character studies and little flourishes, and Noche Roja doesn’t have too many of those.

A more satisfying crime book to me, by far, was The Terrible Axe-Man of New Orleans, the latest entry in Rick Geary’s ongoing Treasury of 20th Century Murder. This time Geary tackles a rather obscure — nay, all but forgotten — tale of random and rather ugly murders that occurred in the Big Easy around 1918. Here the thrill exists in Geary laying out the various strands of the story. The case was never solved, adding an unsettling tone to an already grim story, and Geary’s methodical detective work makes the tale even more deliciously eerie.

Tom Bondurant

Welcome To Tranquility

This week I re-read just about all of Welcome To Tranquility (everything except the “Worldstorm” crossover) and I’d like to think there’ll be more from Gail Simone and company even with WildStorm gone. Eighteen issues (twelve of the regular series and last year’s 6-issue sequel) is a good bit of space in which to build a world, but Simone and artist Neil Googe got much of it done right out of the gate. The rest is mostly character studies — the revenge-driven gunslinger, the undead rockabilly star, the lawmen with unconventional backgrounds — which prove immediately engaging. Especially in the One Foot In The Grave miniseries (drawn by Horacio Domingues), I could see the same kind of dark streak which powers Secret Six, butting against the tenacity of Birds Of Prey. Moreover, since the villain of OFITG is a “forgotten character” from Tranquility’s past since turned into an unstoppable evil, I can see the sequel miniseries as something of a reaction to the Superboy-Prime style of stories. While some of OFITG‘s plot elements steer awfully close to women-in-refrigerators-type moments, I don’t think they’re meant to have the same effect; and in any case, the end of OFITG suggests that such things should never have happened to begin with. I’m eager for another sequel because OFITG seems to leave one plot thread dangling, and since it affects a couple of major characters, I hope it has a chance to play out.

I also picked up a few of Titan Books’ Star Trek reprints, specifically the first several issues of DC’s 1983 series and the first year or so of the ’89 relaunch. In a nutshell, while the first series (written by Mike W. Barr, pencilled by Tom Sutton, inked by Ricardo Villagran) was both entertaining and true to the spirit of Kirk-Movie Trek, I have to say that Peter David and James W. Fry’s work on the ’89 relaunch is zippier and more witty, with more detail-oriented art. (I do think Paramount should have let David and Fry use M’Ress, though.) The ’89 relaunch started off with a mega-arc about Kirk running afoul of The Salla, unquestioned charismatic ruler of his eponymous fanatical race. Kirk’s unconventional tactics in dealing with the Salla land him in hot water with both the Federation and the Klingons, naturally, and at the end of the issue I just finished, he’s assigned a “protocol officer” to keep him out of trouble. Then it gets wacky, with Kirk battling a bounty hunter “played by” John Cleese, and there’s a trial, and it’s a whole big thing. Still better than Star Trek V.

Anyway, I did want to mention one of the Barr/Sutton stories, “Mortal Gods” from the first series’ issue #5. This might have been the only one of Sutton’s issues not inked by Villagran, and by his absence he demonstrates how much his style sometimes overwhelmed Sutton’s pencils. In fact, Sal Amendola’s inks are practically delicate in comparison, bringing out the detail in faces and technology that Villagran often didn’t. The story is familiar Prime-Directive stuff — a stranded Starfleet captain changes the course of an alien society’s history — but this time it’s one of Kirk’s students, and he’s using his “alien powers” to stop warring factions from killing each other. That’s all well and good, and Kirk’s solution is, as you might expect, is about as radical as the original “fix.” However, I was surprised, and then a little amused, at one minor plot point. Captain Hodges’ ship was destroyed in the war with the Klingons which took up much of issues #1-4. Regardless, he had time to a) demonstrate his “godlike” powers to his new neighbors, b) impose his will on them, and c) fall in love, all in maybe a week to ten days. Either the war lasted a lot longer than I thought, or Hodges was just as good, if not better, with the ladies than his old professor….

Lauren Davis

I’m not a huge fan of the Harry Potter series, but that doesn’t stop me from enjoying Lucy Knisley and Nora Renick-Rinehart’s Here at Hogwarts. I adore Knisley’s comic essays at Stop Paying Attention, so a 36-page Knisley comic is a real treat. She and her studio mate decide to visit the Wizarding World of Harry Potter – with detours through Disney World and even a Jesus theme park. Knisley manages to take a clear-eyed view of the parks without being overly cynical. She investigates the ploys the parks use to keep visitors happy and spending money, but decides that, ultimately, trips like these are about recapturing joy.

from Spacetrawler

Moving from Orlando to a solar system far, far away, I’m reading (or, more accurately, re-reading) the first collected volume of Chris Baldwin’s webcomic Spacetrawler. Space opera comics are a tricky thing to pull off – as are comedic space operas – but Baldwin nails it with his tale of human abductees roped into an alien activist mission. The characters have such remarkable chemistry, and there are some genuinely shocking moments where I still laugh out loud.

The webcomic I’m most excited about this week is Tom Siddell’s Gunnerkrigg Court, which is back after a brief hiatus. The underlying tensions of Gunnerkrigg Court are set between the Court, the technologically advanced boarding school Annie and her friend Kat attend, and the mystical Forest ruled by the god-like Coyote. After two years at Court, Annie decided to spend her summer break in the Forest. Now that she’s back at school, that decision is having powerful repercussions for her friendship with the scientifically minded Kat – and likely her larger life at Court. Siddell has done a beautiful job aging up the characters, and I find I’m dying to know how Annie spent her summer vacation.

Even though I picked it up at my local comic book store, To Timbuktu, by Casey Scieszka and Steven Weinberg, isn’t exactly a comic. Scieszka provides the words and Weinberg the illustrations for this post-collegiate travelogue about their journey from China (as English teachers), through Asia, and eventually to Mali for Scieszka’s Fullbright grant study. I’m obsessed with the minutiae of other people’s lives, and To Timbuktu delivers on a number of fronts: a formerly long-distance relationship that becomes suddenly intimate, the daily routine of life in a foreign country, two people trying to grow into who they are as adults. I suspect that if I’d read this in college, I would have dumped all my grad school plans and run off to China.

art by Robert Wilson IV

The webcomics collective Act-i-vate has kicked off a new ongoing anthology called Panels for Primates, where various comic creators will create comic strips featuring monkeys, apes and other primates to help raise awareness and, hopefully, money for the Primate Rescue Center in Nicholasville, Ky.

While the stories can be viewed for free, they include a promo at the end encouraging readers to donate money. Per a press release, upcoming stories will “offer an eclectic mix of creators and content, with the only common denominators being high quality and primates.” The first story, “Ilya’s Back Pages” by Stuart Moore and Rick Geary, is up now. The cover, above, is by Robert Wilson IV.

Scott Pilgrim, Vol. 6

Welcome once again to Food or Comics? Every week the Robot 6 crew lists what comics we’d buy if we had $15 to spend, if we had $30 to spend and if we had extra money to spend on what we’re calling a “Splurge” item.

So join Brigid Alverson, Chris Mautner and me as we run down what we’d buy this week, and check out Diamond’s release list to play along in our comments section.

Chris Mautner

If I had $15 …

The obvious choice seems to be the newest and final volume in Bryan Lee O’Malley’s Scott Pilgrim’s Finest Hour (none of my local comic stores are getting the book until Wednesday, the stinkers). I’ve been a fan of the series for awhile (http://www.comicsreporter.com/index.php/cr_holiday_interview_101/) and am anxious to see how it concludes. (Unfortunately, I don’t actually have $15 of real world money to spend this week, so I’ll have to wait another week or two.)

If I had $30

The Terrible Axe-Man of New Orleans

Rick Geary’s latest entry in his wonderfully gruesome Treasury of 20th Century Murder series arrives this week, so that would be the next entry on my shopping list. Titled The Terrible Ax Man of New Orleans, it’s the grisly and for some reason little known tale of ugly doings that transpired in the Big Easy immediately after World War I. To add to the mystery (cue the ominous music) … the killer was never found! Probably not to be read just before bed but definitely worth reading nevertheless.

Splurge:

My daughter and I have been enjoying the heck out of Tove Jansson’s Moomin comic strips so I shall beg, borrow or steal to ensure that I get a copy of Vol. 5, which comes out this week. It’s the final volume of strips that Jansson drew. Her brother, Lars, who was already handling the writing chores at this point, took over the art as well as Tove apparently felt increasingly trapped and stifled by her creation. Still, any Moomin is good Moomin and I’ll be picking this up as soon as the gods of finance smile upon me.

Brigid Alverson

If I had $15 to spend…

CBGB

I was thinking it was going to be all trades this weekend, but then I saw that the first issue of BOOM!’s CBGB ($3.99) is coming out, and that is too awesome to pass up. It’s an anthology of stories about musicians and others hanging out in and around the legendary New York nightclub of the 70s. I’m in!

And then I’ll follow that up with an Super Pro K.O. ($11.99), Oni’s wrestling comedy that looks like America’s answer to Shonen Jump. I used to watch a lot of professional “wrestling” back in the 80s, and this looks like it brings back the verve and goofiness of those days, with plucky Joe Somiano taking on a motley crew of costumed rivals with names like Tomahawk Slamson, Yoko No-No, and Mr. Awesomeness 2.

That puts me just a hair over the line, at $15.98, but maybe I can get a discount if I buy some more…

If I had $30, I’d spring for some more floppies, mostly light-hearted as it’s been a tough week. Archie #611 ($2.99) is the second issue of Tom DeFalco’s Man from. R.I.V.E.R.D.A.L.E. arc, so I’d go for that. I have never read the kids’ comic PS238 but Johanna recommends it, so maybe I’ll pick up issue #45. (2.99) And then just for fun, the latest Futurama ($2.99) and Scooby Doo ($2.99)—I see that Edgar Allen Poe features into the plot of the latter. Good times!

Splurge

Weekly World News

My splurge item takes me back to another of my bad habits from the 80s, reading the Weekly World News every week. I wasn’t so much a fan of Bat-Boy as the space aliens who made presidential endorsements, the talking carp, the man who could fry eggs on his bald head, and, of course, Ed Anger, America’s angriest columnist, who makes Rush Limbaugh look like a hippie. Ed started every column with a phrase like “I’m madder than a canary in a blender” and spiraled downward from there into sheer insanity. Of course, the newspaper format, with its thin veneer of believability, is what made the whole thing work. IDW’s Weekly World News comic ($17.99) takes the characters from the pages of the WWN and mashes them together into a single story, so they’re walking a different line here, but it’s a great cast of characters—you have to hand it to these guys, they had imagination. So sign me up for that one. And since I’m over-spending on unhealthy literature anyway, I’ll make a day of it and get Rick Geary’s The Terrible Axe-Man of New Orleans ($15.99), because who doesn’t like a good bloody murder story?

JK Parkin

If I had $15 …

True Blood

True Blood #1 ($3.99)

IDW adapts HBO’s hit vampire show into comics form, as Sookie and several other characters from the show are trapped in Merlotte’s during a storm. Although I enjoy the show, this is more for my wife than me, as she’s a huge fan of both the show and the books that inspired it. (IDW)

Avengers #3 ($3.99)

Brian Michael Bendis and John Romita Jr. take the Avengers on a ride through time, as they try to fix the broken time stream, meet their children and no doubt get into it with the Hulk: Future Imperfect‘s Maestro. (Marvel)

Walking Dead #75 ($3.99)

After a few months of living in a happy, sheltered community, away from the “walkers,” Rick and co.’s peaceful existence seems to be coming to an end, as the solicitation promises that “the peace and tranquility of the community is shattered.” This issue also features a color back-up tale drawn by Ryan Ottley. (Image)

Atlas #3

Atlas #3 ($2.99)

It’s unfortunate that this series will end in a couple of issues, but I look forward to seeing if and how Jeff Parker and co. end it with a bang. (Marvel)

That’s $14.96. Sweet.

If I had $30, I’d also get …

Legion of Super Heroes #3 ($3.99)

I’ve been enjoying the relaunch of Legion of Super-Heroes by writer Paul Levitz, esp. the addition of Earth-man to the team. I’m curious to see what happens with his new ring … (DC Comics)

New Avengers #2 ($3.99)

Two Avengers titles in the same week; while the adjectiveless team tackles time, the New Avengers team tackles magic. (Marvel)

Thunderbolts #146 ($2.99)

I guess if we can’t have Atlas anymore, at least we have Parker’s writing on this. This issue sees the team investigating a batch of “impure Terrigen crystals,” which generate the Terrigen mists the Inhumans use to make themselves … inhuman. (Marvel)

Welcome to Tranquility: One Foot in the Grave #1 ($3.99)

I really dug this series the first time around, and while I’ll miss Neil Googe doing the interiors, the new book looks like fun. This series focuses on Mayor Fury’s return to Tranquility after his murder trial. (WildStorm)

Mondo Urbano

Another $14.96, bringing my total to $29.92.

Splurge

I’m gonna cheat here and say that my “splurge item” is all the great releases that publishers are no doubt releasing just in time for San Diego. Brigid and Chris already covered two books I’m really excited about, the last Scott Pilgrim volume and Super Pro K.O., but as long as I’m splurging, I’d also throw in Mondo Urbano by Rafael Albuquerque, Mateus Santolouco and Eduardo Medeiros; The Troll King by Kolbeinn Karlsson; and the pocket edition of the RASL collection by Jeff Smith. No doubt all of these will provide some nice reading material while I’m waiting in line for the True Blood panel at Comic-Con.

What do you plan to get this week? Let us know in the comments section below.

Famous Players

Rick Geary has been regarded as an “underrated” cartoonist for so long now that it’s almost a cliché at this point to label him as such. But in the many years he’s been making comics, he’s produced an impressive body of work that seems to escape a lot of folks notice. His stellar Victorian Murder series, now bumped up a few decades to encompass the 20th century, alone show such a high and consistent degree of quality that most cartoonists would give their eye teeth to have on their resume.

Having made his name with true crime, he’s recently attempted to tackle the biography genre, producing two books for Hill and Wang’s graphic line, one on J. Edgar Hoover, and most recently, one on Leon Trotsky.

I talked to him recently from his home in Kansas City, Missouri, about his new Trotsky bio as well as the latest book for NBM in his Murder series, Famous Players, about the mysterious and currently unsolved slaying of silent movie director William Desmond Taylor. Here’s what he had to say:

Q: I wanted to start by asking you what originally prompted you to do the Murder series. I get the sense that true crime is a subject of great interest for you.

A: Yeah. I got interested in true crime cases years and years ago. I think it dates back to when I was living in Wichita, Kansas, back in the late ‘70s. I had a friend who was an ex-journalist and ex-policeman. He gave me this collection of mug shots he had accumulated over the years. I get into things through the visual end most of the time, and those pictures kind of got me going. I did research on local unsolved murders and that was about the time that the BTK killer was around in Wichita. I don’t know if you’re familiar with that case.

Q: I don’t think so.

A: He was a serial killer who operated in Wichita back in the early ‘70s. He was only just recently captured and put in prison a couple of years ago. That kind of started me out. When I started doing I just naturally turned to those kinds of subjects.

Q: Why initially Victorian murder?

A: The publisher, Terry Nantier at NBM, suggested the idea to me. I had done a couple of stories for different publications, shorter pieces that dealt with cases of the Victorian era. He suggested doing a whole book of Victorian cases. That kind of mustered from there into the series.

Q: What prompted you to move into the 20th century? Did you feel like you had covered the 19th century pretty well?

A: There are still more cases in the 19th century, but I felt like I kind of, as you say, had done that era and I wanted to move on to more recent times, especially the early 20th century. There are a lot of juicy stories. More than I could ever do.

Q: Focusing on the new book, Famous Players, what drew you to this case?

A: That’s another case I’ve been interested in for years and years. I’ve always been a movie lover and been interested in the early history of Hollywood. And since that’s the very first unsolved murder in the Hollywood community, it’s one I was fascinated with.

In fact, back in the early 80s, I had actually stared to do a graphic novel about the case, although they weren’t called graphic novels back then. It was just going to be a long story that I was going to see if I could publish myself and do as a mini-book, but that never came to fruition. There’s been a lot more information uncovered about the story since then so I’m glad I waited. I just found it was a natural for me.

Q: What sort of new information?

A: At the time, back when I was first researching the case, it was [believed] that Taylor was this extreme womanizer and there were all these rumors going on about the affairs he had and the stuff that was found in his apartment, which was mentioned in newspaper accounts at the time. More recent researchers have found that to be totally false. Things like the women’s negligees and lingerie that were supposedly hidden away in a drawer. Each one of them had a name and a date attached, chronicling his conquests. More recent research has uncovered that he was bisexual and wasn’t nearly the womanizer that people thought he was.

Q: Is there something that defines 19th century murder versus 20th century murder?

A: Not that I can think of. People’s motives for murder remain constant through history, either for personal gain or out of some kind of psychopathic undercurrent to their personality. I’m not sure that the actual motives are that different from era to era. It’s the details and the trappings that change.

Q: It does seem that when you say Victorian people have a certain image in the mind of foggy nights and back alleyways versus modern times.

A: Serial killers aren’t really a modern phenomenon. Jack the Ripper was in the 1880s and H.H. Holmes in the 1890s. I’m not sure what would typify a modern case because the elements remain the same.

Q: I guess the thing is that people want to typify.

A: That’s a good way to put it.

As an illustrator I really enjoy drawing the details of the Victorian era, the interiors and the costumes and hairstyles. Horses and the harnesses and carriages and wagons and stuff like that. Now I get to draw early-day automobiles, which is a whole different route to go. I find it different in that regard. Otherwise I don’t look at it that way. I don’t see it as a different era as far as the content is concerned.

Q: Was there anything about this particular story that seemed different from the others you’ve done? There seems to be a greater mystery, even compared to the Lindbergh case, in that so much seems to be unknown about Taylor’s death.

A: I know. I’m really drawn to the stories that are unsolved and have a lot of unknown elements. Those are my favorites. I like getting all the details straight and laying out the mystery in as clear a way as possible. I try not to push any theory of my own. I just want to lay it out so the reader can make up his or her own mind if possible. Or else just leave it as a mystery. I think questions are more interesting than answers most of the time.

Trotsky: A Graphic Biography

Q: Is there a trick to doing that in comics? I would imagine there is a temptation to push a theory one way or the other.

A: Well, in the Lindbergh story for instance I have my own idea about the case, but I tried not to push it or lean on it. I took pains to illustrate all the different theories that are out there, no matter how unusual or silly they may sound. There are a lot of them. I don’t know if there’s a trick to it but it is something you have to really be careful about. I don’t know if I’ve really mastered any trick.

Q: What’s your next entry in the Murder series?

A: I’m finishing up and inking the next book, which is about the Ax Man of New Orleans, who is a pretty obscure serial killer. I don’t think he’s widely known because he was never captured or identified or anything.

Q: I don’t think I ever heard of him.

A: He operated in New Orleans in the 1918-19 period and used an ax to break into people’s houses and chopped them up. It put the city into a panic for a while. And then he just vanished. There aren’t any major theories about who it was or what happened to him. It’s a real foggy mystery, but there are a lot of juicy details. I had to use newspaper archives to ferret out the details, because no one’s done a book about this particular killer.

At the moment I’m doing research for the book after that which will be the Sacco and Venzetti case.

Q: Now that case I’ve heard of.

A: That’s another one where I have to keep an even tone and not play sides.

Q: It strikes me in a lot of these cases like the New Orleans one and the Beast of Chicago that you really try to avoid getting too gory, even though a lot of these cases are rather gruesome. You hang back a little.

A: I do. It’s not me being squeamish. I just think it’s effective to leave things to the viewer’s imagination. I am kind of reticent about portraying extreme gore and gruesomeness. But I have to say with this Ax Man story it’s pretty gruesome. There’s a higher blood quotient than most of the stuff I’ve done before.

Q: But even in something like Bloody Benders, I noticed at the time how careful you were to avoid the gore. And it made for a much more intense read I think.

A: I hope so. That’s my own predilection.

Q: Who do you look for as an influence in that manner? Is there anyone in comics who’s good at that sort of thing or do you look more towards movies or other mediums?

A: As I said I’ve been a film buff for years and I tend to look toward certain directors from a long time ago rather than other comic artists for my inspiration. Hitchcock of course. And a lot of the filmmakers from the film noir period of the 40s or the Val Lewton films of the 1940s. They get across horror without being gory or direct. It’s less in-your-face than the movies of today, that’s for sure.

Q: I also wanted to ask you about the Trotsky biography. I was curious why Trotsky instead of, say, Lenin, Marx or Stalin?

A: Actually, I was assigned Trotsky. I wouldn’t have chosen him. My first choice would have been Rasputin. I suggested him to the publisher, but he said, “Let’s do Trotsky instead.” I’m fine with that. I didn’t know much about his life at all when I started it. And it was a learning experience for me all the way around.

J. Edgar Hoover

Q: I thought it was especially interesting since your previous biography was about J. Edgar Hoover.

A: Talk about opposites! That’s one thing I liked about it. I get to take on this large swath of history and take someone’s life from a totally different angle.

Q: Did Hill and Wang come to you initially with this idea of doing biographies?

A: Yeah, they contacted me. The editor, who was working on the series got in touch with me and said. “We’re doing these graphic biographies,” and asked me to do one.

Q: Are you going to do any more for them in the foreseeable future?

A: Well, I’m told the market has gone soft so I don’t know. They’re holding off. We shall see.

Q: What are the challenges in trying to summarize someone’s life like Hoover’s or Trotsky’s? You’re working with a larger span of time and have a lot more detail to cram in than something like Bloody Benders.

A: That’s true. It’s certainly a more daunting project than the Murder books, especially with someone like Trotsky who is a very contradictory character. He was heroic to some people and a real negative character to others. It was kind of a balancing act. I tried to be as even handed as possible. Same with Hoover.

Q: I did notice with Hoover you didn’t come down one-way or the other.

A: Yeah, when there was some kind of scandalous accusation I put it in terms like “Some people say.” There wasn’t anything scandalous in Trotsky’s life except his affair with Frida Kahlo in his final years.

Q: Is it difficult to edit down, once you have all the information on a person, to pick and choose which events or what to put in or leave out?

A: There’s always too much information. It’s a matter of winnowing down. With Trotsky I tried to find the most dramatic aspects of his life because most of his biography is pretty un-visual. It’s these internal disputes within the Bolshevik party or the different questions of setting up a new country. The more dramatic episodes of his life like escaping from exile, where he was on this reindeer sleigh, and later on when he was the military leader during the civil war, those are the incidents I wanted to give more play to because they were more visual and more melodrama.

Q: Tell me a little bit about the research you do for both the murder books and these biographies. I would imagine in both cases it’s difficult to find the right book or biography but visual research as well.

A: That’s true. When I decide on a subject I read as much as I can on it; as many books as I can read and keep on the deadline. I use a lot of online sources as well. I can usually find pictures of just about anything I want – anything that’s out there anyway. For the Ax Man of New Orleans book the only visual references I found were in this old newspaper file that had photos of the murder scenes and the victims and overhead views of the house. That was really all I had for this book. Other cases like Lindbergh there’s more visual reference than I could possibly use. It’s the same thing with books on that case. Some cases have a library of stuff written about them.

Q: What do you do when it’s like the New Orleans case, when you don’t have a lot to go on?

A: I never have anything less than I need to do an eighty page book. This and the Bloody Benders, there wasn’t much info about them. If I need to I can fan it out by having a double-page spread or having an illustration fill up a whole page. There are ways to finesse it visually. But sometimes you can tell when there’s less information out there.

Q: Whether you’re doing Trotsky or Famous Players, what’s your work method? Once you have all the information you need, how do you go from research to book?

A: Once I’ve done all the reading and taken all the notes, I write a pretty detailed script. The script for these murder books I don’t include visuals I just write bits of information that eventually form into the captions under each panel. My publisher at NBM has gotten used to this. The visuals are either self-explanatory from the captions or else I don’t know what they’re going to be until I actually sit down to draw the page. Hill and Wang demanded a little more detailed script and description of what the visuals were going to be in each panel. So I make it up if I can’t think of something off the top of my head. That’s usually how it turns out in the final comic. Or it’s something completely different.

When I have the script done I start penciling each page one at a time. When I’ve got the whole book completed in pencil then I go to the inks. If all goes well.

Q: You have a really neat visual style. It’s slightly photorealistic but also slightly cartoonish and you have this spare line you use for your shading that I admire. How conscious were you in developing this style?

A: I don’t know. I feel that a style develops in a semi-conscious way. I just know I go for a certain feel or texture in the line work. I really don’t know much more to say about it than that. It just comes out of working. It just emerges.

Q: More intuitive than anything?

A: That’s how I think of it. This is stuff I’m not used to ruminating on. But it emerges the more work you do. I know my stuff falls in this crack between straight illustration and the more exaggerated kind of cartooning. There’s a humorous edge to these things.

Brave and the Bold #27

Sunday’s here and that means it’s time once more for What Are You Reading. Our guest this week is the incredibly talented cartoonist Rick Geary. Geary has two books out this fall, his latest entry in his ongoing XXth Century Murder series, Famous Players, and a biography of Leon Trotsky that should be coming out from Hill and Wang any day now.

Look for an interview with Mr. Geary appearing on this blog in the coming weeks. For now though, let’s just see what he’s currently reading …

Drifting Classroom

Chris Mautner: I’m finally, finally, finally getting around to finishing Kazuo Umezu’s seminal horror classic The Drifting Classroom. One of the things I like about the manga is how it’s just one damned thing after another. No sooner are the hapless elementary school kids attacked by horrible mutants than they somehow disappear and make way for a toxic gas. The best part is the mutants are barely mentioned again. Whatever terror has passed is nowhere near as horrible as the one in front of them.

I also just, just got in the mail the new book from Sunday Press Books, The Upside Down World of Gustave Verbeek. Verbeek was an early 20th century comic strip artist whose claim to fame was that his strip relied on optical illusion. If you turned it 180 degrees the whole picture changed and you could keep reading the story. I haven’t gotten far enough in it yet to make any comments, but I look forward to diving into it this week.

I also finally saw the first Fantastic Four move, courtesy of the FX channel and Comcast’s free movie selections. Boy am I glad I didn’t pay any reasonable amount of money to see that on the big screen. A really dumb, loud, incoherent movie, with little in the way to recommend it beyond Michael Chiklis’ performance as Ben Grimm. The guy playing Dr. Doom was especially horrible. I can’t imagine the sequel being any improvement.

American Born Chinese

Michael May: I’m reading Steve Niles and Ben Templesmith’s Dark Days again. Partly because Halloween is coming; partly because news about the direct-to-DVD movie adaptation is getting me excited about revisiting the story. It’s my favorite of the 30 Days of Night stories and I keep finding new stuff to like every time I read it. Dane’s emotional journey is what keeps drawing me to the book, but this time around I’m also especially curious about his partner Yuki. There’s an untold story there.

I’m also revisiting American Born Chinese and it’s even better the second time around. My first reading was great, but you have to spend some energy trying to figure out what the three plot threads have to do with each other. Since I already know that this time, I’m able to concentrate better on how he tells the overall story and – more importantly – how beautifully and powerfully he communicates his message. I’m really sorry that I’m almost done with it. I already want to read it yet again.

Marvel Monsters

Tom Bondurant: The Marvel Monsters hardcover was half-off, but a bargain at any price. It’s got a lot of great stuff, blending classic Kirby monster reprints (and one from Don Heck) with the stories from the “Marvel Monsters” event from a few years back. The highlight for me was Scott Gray and Roger Langridge’s original “Fin Fang Four” story, just a gem of a thing which has the robot Elektro finding love and Fin Fang Foom working as a chef in a Baxter Building restaurant. I especially liked Langridge’s page of the Thing as romance-coach. The book opens with a fun Devil Dinosaur/Hulk battle (orchestrated by a couple of middle-management Celestials) from Tom Sniegoski and Eric Powell. The new stuff is all in the same good-natured vein, like Keith Giffen and Mike Allred checking back in with Bombu and Peter David and Arnold Pander revisiting Monstrollo. The book also reprints a text-oriented special cataloging the various Marvel monsters, which is nice as reference, but I would have liked more classic reprints (like the original Tim Boo Ba story, for instance). Still, though, overall quite a nice package.

I thought JMS’s first issue of The Brave and the Bold was something of a missed opportunity. From the “Death of a Hero” title I could see where the story was going. Admittedly, I wasn’t expecting the twist JMS put on it, and I suppose Batman’s closing speech was meant to make it all work out, but I can’t help but think what a Waid, Morrison, or Busiek could have done with Batman dialing the H-Dial. At the very least I was expecting the H-Dial’s heroes to be credited to readers….

Beasts of Burden #1

Tim O’Shea: Evan Dorkin’s and Jill Thompson’s Beasts of Burden is even greater than I expected it to be. When I interviewed Dorkin about the series a few months back, he definitely got me enthused for the series, but he and Thompson far exceeded my raised expectations. It may seem like a simple compliment, but I love Thomspon’s layout sense for how it heightens the drama and action in the book. Also the facial expressions she gives the animals are amazing. Dorkin’s gift of dialogue reaches it’s pinnacle for me with Pugs’ line “A mother-humpin’, big-ass, giant frog.” It was only on my second reading that I really grew to appreciate how much Jason Arthur’s lettering (particularly with the dialogue of the aforementioned mother-humpin’ frog) adds to the tale.

When I was a kid, what appealed to me about Captain America was his secret identity. I distinctly remember one issue where Cap was vacuuming his apartment, cleaning up the mess after the Constrictor had driven a car through it. OK, so as a 41-year-old man, I realize my critical mind was dormant in the 1970s. He’d have to do a hell of a lot more than vacuuming to fix that apartment. Heck it’s been 30 years since I read the comic, I might be misremembering the scene. As I’m older now, I realize what actually appealed to me about Cap was his relationships with folks like Sam (Falcon) Wilson, Nick Fury and Sharon Carter. During Mark Waid’s run on Cap, he emphasized the friendship with Clint (Hawkeye) Barton. Captain America Reborn 3 reveals a few things to me. Ed Brubaker would write one extremely good Avengers book. Brubaker clearly loves romping through Cap’s history (best part in this issue is either Cap reliving the hell of his frozen man period; or the all-out action of the Kree-Skull War). But best of all, Brubaker shares my love of Cap’s relationships, as exemplified by his outstanding use of Cap’s supporting cast.

Speaking of Nick Fury, another book with a great supporting cast is Jonathan Hickman’s Secret Warriors. (But boy when does Black Widow sleep, what with her role in Reborn and Secret Warriors). When Norman
Osborn ultimately gets taken down (please tell me that’s coming soon, Marvel), I’ll be curious to see if Nick gets the pleasure of dethroning Normie. As an aside, does anyone else wish that Bendis and Marvel editorial had picked someone other than Osborn to be the ringleader behind this Dark Reign malarkey? I prefer Norman Osborn as the traditional crazy myopic “must ruin Peter Parker” character. Sure it’s a one-note character, but it’s a damn good note. The present day Osborn just smacks of a heavily medicated Lex Luthor with a hate-on for every superhero. Sorry, went off the rails there … really enjoying Secret Warriors.

I enjoyed the latest issue of Batgirl, mostly because a good chunk of it was devoted to Oracle. I was absolutely flummoxed, however, that they devoted so much storytime to having Oracle’s servers crap out
(the woman that plans everything does not have a back-up server?) so she had to drive over to the Batcave (that’s right, Oracle could not just hack into the Batcave, she had to drive over there) just so Stephanie could look at the shrine of costumes (hey where’s Bruce’s, Dick?) and a discussion that will either please or annoy DC/”Stephanie should have had a shrine” critics.

J. Michael Straczynski finally begins his run on The Brave and The Bold with issue 27. It’s not a traditional team-up with Dial H for Hero and that’s actually what makes this issue work. Even better, the issue is that rare endangered comic book species–the one-and-done issue.

This past week at my pop culture blog, Talking with Tim, I interviewed Mike Sacks about his book (that I am still enjoying), And Here’s the Kicker: Conversations with 21 Top Humor Writers on their Craft. Unfortunately Sacks was not able to include all the interviews he wanted to feature. So instead he’s offering those four interviews for free on the book’s website . Those interviews include Daniel Clowes and Roz Chast.

Both interviews are great (as is the whole book, Sacks offers snippets from each interview at the book’s site, Chast talks about a variety of topics from Charles Addams to Diane Arbus. But, here’s my favorite snippet from the Clowes interview, talking about his 2007-08 New York Times experience:

As far as subject matter, they never said a word, but as I said they were very touchy about language — their little “stylebook” is very important to them. Aside from “Jesus,” for instance, I wasn’t allowed to use the word “schmuck.” Mad’s been using the word for fifty years! It’s not as if I were using it in the Yiddish sense: “Wow, that guy has a huge cock!” I even found an old William Safire column from the NY Times magazine about “schmuck.” He wrote something like, “The original meaning of the word has long ago been forgotten, and it’s commonly accepted for general use.”

I showed this to the editors, but they told me, “No. We can’t run the word.” I could have acted like an asshole and told them I was going to end the strip halfway through, but this was a really good assignmentfor cartoonists. I didn’t want to be the guy who killed it for everyone else.

Stone Rabbit: Deep Space Disco

Brigid Alverson: I haven’t had a lot of time for reading this week, but I got a review copy of Stone Rabbit: Deep Space Disco, and that was about right for a quick read during a busy week. It’s a kids’ comic in a handy digest size, and although Craddock puts a lot of imaginative detail into his panels, including giant robots and all sorts of bizarre aliens, the pages never get too crowded or chaotic. I think that’s because he limits himself to one or two panels per page and manages to create a hierarchy, keeping the main characters in the foreground and letting everything drop back a bit. That seems simple and obvious, but a surprising number of artists can’t do that and instead let foreground and background blend into one confusing web. The story is pretty straightforward — an evil alien switches places with Stone Rabbit and
wreaks havoc on earth, while Stone Rabbit is prosecuted for his crimes on his home planet. There’s more action than talk, and lots of giant robots, so it really is a great kids’ comic — it has a real Saturday morning cartoon feel to it.

On a completely different note, I also got review copies of Eric Heuvel’s  A Family Secret and The Search, two comics about the Holocaust, sponsored by the Anne Frank House and originally published in the Netherlands. At first glance, they look uncannily like Tintin — not only does Heuvel work in the ligne Claire style that Herge pioneered, but the design of the book, the page layouts, and even the lettering are similar to Tintin. However, the stories are obviously more serious. A Family Secret is told in flashbacks, and because the creator has to give a history lesson to set the scene, the dialogue is a bit stilted. Still, the characters are three-dimensional, and it’s interesting to watch them struggle with the difficulties of living
under German occupation (without the hindsignt of history to sort things out for them). It’s also interesting that it’s written from the Dutch point of view; the main character is a Dutch girl who befriends a Jewish refugee from Germany. I am only about 20 pages in, but it looks very promising.

Sacco and Vanzetti

Rick Geary: I’m currently immersed in research on the Sacco & Vanzetti case for my next 20th Century Murder graphic novel. I’ve finished two books about it and now I’m in the midst of a third, entitled simply Sacco & Vanzetti by Bruce Watson. The other two books were rather dry accounts of the legal issues involved and the international uproar following the sentencing. This one, though, is a full-bodied rendering of the entire story, featuring dramatic details, and rich characterizations.

Next up is The Quaker City, or The Monks of Monk Hall, A Romance of Philadelphia Life, Mystery and Crime by George Lippard.

Petey & Pussy

This John Kerschbaum interview is long overdue. After I interviewed John Arcudi back in January 2009, he suggested I interview John Kerschbaum. In fact, he mentioned Kerschbaum in the course of our interview: “Petey and Pussy creator John Kerschbaum is the best cartoonist working in funnybooks right now. And he’s not working nearly enough.” My apologies to Kerschbaum for the time it took to make this interview happen (he agreed to it back in late January, but I was unable to get questions to him until May), so I am really glad to run this finally. Kerschbaum, who was a 2008 Eisner nominee in the Best Humor Publication category for Petey and Pussy, was kind enough to discuss this most recent Fantagraphics book as well as the work he has self-published through his own Fontanelle Press. Enjoy.

Tim O’Shea: Looking at your work to date, is there any line of comedy that you are afraid to cross?

John Kerschbaum: I don’t know if I’m motivated by fear, per se, but I tend to shy away from specifically offending people. That is, I avoid ethnic, political or religious humor, that type of stuff. I like to think I’m more of an equal-opportunity offender.

But that’s not to say I think any of those topics are taboo. There are talented cartoonists, humorists and comedians that mine those territories for humor whose work I really enjoy. It’s all about the context in which it’s being done and the abilities of the cartoonist doing it. Just because something CAN be funny doesn’t mean is always IS. There’s a time and place for everything.

O’Shea: That being said, as an artist who has an ability to execute grotesque or disconcerting scenes that are at the same time funny, how do you strike that balance that allows it to remain funny?

Kerschbaum: Well, in the end it’s just a comic. The violence is grotesque, but in a way over-the-top, cartoony way. I think what strikes the reader is the detail in which the result of the violence is drawn. It’s what it would look like if Elmer Fudd REALLY blew Daffy’s beak off. But I’ve always felt that humor and horror are very closely related. That they naturally play off of each other. The funny bits make the scary bits scarier and vice versa.

O’Shea: In terms of influences, which artists or storytellers have the ability to make you laugh and helped form your unique sense of humor.

Kerschbaum: My biggest, earliest comic/cartoon influence was MAD magazine, in particular Don Martin. Dr. Seuss, William Steig, B. Kliban and Edward Gorey were all favorites of mine early on. I had a subscription to National Lampoon in the early ’80′s — and especially liked the work of Gahan Wilson, S. Gross, Rick Geary, Bobby London and Shary Flenniken. I used to get Heavy Metal as well and the New Yorker just for the cartoons. And I always read the newspaper comics — Peanuts, Ziggy, and Herman were favorites. But humor-wise I’ve been greatly influenced by TV. I loved watching Looney Tunes, Rocky and Bullwinkle, Get Smart, Monty Python, Fernwood Tonight, David Letterman, Garry Shandling, Saturday Night Live — which introduced me to the humor of Steve Martin, a huge comedic influence.

O’Shea: You appear to enjoy the art of self-publishing. Why I say this is the distinctive approach you take in compiling some of your works. For example, Junk Drawer sports a corrugated cardboard cover and sports periodic folded 8.5 x 11 layouts. How hard was that to bind and assemble?

Kerschbaum: Well, appearances can be deceiving! For the most part, I’ve self-published out of necessity. I find the “business” end of self-publishing soul-crushing. I often liken it to a middle-aged man’s equivalent of running a lemonade stand except that lemonade is easier to make and has a higher profit margin. And while I do get some pleasure from designing and even constructing the mini-comics, I do not like single-handedly mass-producing them on the scale needed to sell them online and at conventions.

Junk Drawer is, by far, the most ambitious mini-comic I’ve made. I really wanted to get some work that I’d done for various anthologies as well as some older work that had never seen print or was out of print into the hands of readers. Technically, it was a very difficult undertaking. Each one has my blood, sweat and tears in it. Originally I was going to make 150 of them and each copy was going to have a small plastic bag taped to the inside back cover that had an actual piece of junk from my studio (a dirty pipe cleaner, paper clips, an old key, etc.) But I ran out of steam at 80 copies (but still managed to crank out 100) and decided to just keep my junk. But I’m proud of the way it came out and I’ve sold almost all of them. Still, I’ll never do anything like it ever again!

O’Shea: In reading your late 1990s work on The Wiggly Reader, I really love your covers–in particular the multiple versions of Mary and Abe Lincoln at Ford Theater. It’s been more than a decade, I realize, but how did you come up with a cover like that?

Kerschbaum: I’m delighted that that cover seems to really resonate with people. It is admittedly kinda nuts. All I can recall is describing the idea for the drawing to friends — long before I ever decided to use it as the cover for a comic — and getting a very positive response. But for the life of me I cannot remember its origins. The cover for the third issue by the way was inspired by a Robert Capa photograph.

O’Shea: While you have self-published a great deal, last year saw the release of Petey & Pussy published by Fantagraphics. Do you find the creative process any easier when you work with a publisher rather than being a publisher? What other advantages or differences did you find working with the publisher (if any)?

Kerschbaum: Actually, I waited until Petey & Pussy was nearly completed before I submitted it to publishers, so the creative process was, for the most part, over with before Fantagraphics got involved. But they were very supportive and enthusiastic about the book. It was the first time, however, I had someone else design the package for one of my stories. I tend to be very hands-on so it was an exercise in letting go for me. But Jacob Covey was really easy to work with and I’m thrilled with what he did. I think the cover looks really sharp and bold but then has all these little hidden jokes and subtle visual gags scattered about in a way that I like to think nicely reflects my work. He’s a very talented guy.

O’Shea: Congrats on the Eisner nomination for Petey & Pussy, what’s been the positive fallout from that nomination to date? How did you find out you had gotten the nomination? [Side Note:  Herbie Archives, by “Sean O’Shea” (Richard E. Hughes) and Ogden Whitney (Dark Horse) won this past weekend at SDCC.]

Kerschbaum: Thanks! I have to admit I was quite surprised. I figured that because of the rather visceral humor and the salty language that it was the kind of thing that could easily be dismissed. So I’m really pleased it’s been nominated and I hope that it piques the interest of some folks who might not have otherwise been inclined to check it out or for that matter even heard of it. I’m not sure that’s happening, but it’s fun to pretend!

And I found out the same way everyone else does, I believe. Mr. Eisner came to me in a dream to tell me the book had been nominated. He also mentioned that he’d roll over in his grave if it won.

O’Shea: Not all of your work is for adults, in fact your work has appeared frequently in Nickelodeon’s magazine, and you recently did a rather large ambitious project for The Metropolitan Museum of Art. How did the Met project come about–and given it’s complexity how long did it take you to do?

Kerschbaum: I enjoy doing stuff for kids. The next two personal projects I hope to tackle are a children’s picture book and an all-age graphic novel. And Nick Mag is one of my favorite clients [Side note: Much like my interview with Evan Dorkin last week, this interview took place before Nick magazine's unfortunate demise]. They are great to work for and I consider myself lucky every time they give me a call. In fact, the project I did for the Met sprung from one of the first assignments I did for Nick; a puzzle maze of an art museum. It’s a piece I still consider a highlight of my career. I took it to Masha Turchinski in the Education Department at the Met, for whom I had previously done work for, and proposed doing some sort of puzzle for them, unsure of the context. As it ended up they were in the initial stages of redesigning their Family Map and she thought my idea would work nicely in it. I originally thought it would take a year or so to complete but it ended up taking nearly four. They were incredibly patient and supportive and I believe they’re happy with the outcome. They’re in the process now of turning it into a jigsaw puzzle for sale in their gift shop.

O’Shea: You wrapped the comic Randy and The Christmas Pimple with red bow. When you first conceived the story, did you always plan on wrapping it in a bow (that blocks the title and throw off people’s expectation for the story) or is that an idea you came up while developing the story?

Kerschbaum: As much as I enjoy doing the covers for my comics and minis I don’t consider myself a real “designer.” My basic strategy is that every element has a reason for being there. Subverting the reader’s expectations is something I enjoy doing. So it just made sense to wrap what I think may be one of the nastiest X-mas stories ever told in a pretty bow. As with all my covers, it came about after the story was done.

O’Shea: Do you think that web comics will entertain you long term as a creator as much as self-publishing clearly has?

Kerschbaum: I should point out that I’m not super web-savvy but it seems to me that it’s currently the best, cheapest way to find and build and audience. I think cartoonists today need to have some kind of online presence. I’m thinking of launching a weekly online strip just as a test for myself; to see if I can keep to such a schedule. But for it to make sense to me, it should be the kind of thing that for whatever reason, could ONLY be read online. I haven’t figured that part out yet. Maybe it’s not necessary… I’m not sure. In the meantime, I add content to my Fontanelle Press website semi-regularly. And I hope to get some new comics up there soon.

O’Shea: What’s on the creative horizon for you?

Kerschbaum: I’m currently working on a short story for a Sammy Harkam-edited Simpson’s Treehouse of Horror anthology (issue #16, I believe) which, to the best of my knowledge, has an awesome group of cartoonists involved as only Sammy could put together.

40th Anniversary Souvenir Book

The 2009 San Diego Comic-Con is less than a month away, with preview night kicking things off on Wednesday, July 22. If you are a publisher, creator, retailer or any other kind of exhibitor who would like to let folks know about any special plans you have for the show (panels, signing schedules, exclusives, debuts, etc.) drop me an email and I’ll run it here.

Also, to the right is the 40th anniversary souvenir book cover, featuring art by the great Rick Geary. Comic-Con debuted it on their Twitter feed, where they’ve also been announcing panels and auctions for membership badges.

Publishers | Red 5 Comics will be at booth S-9 in the small press area, with the creators of We Kill Monsters, Neozoic, Atomic Robo and Afterburn available for signings.

Books | Scott Morse says he’ll have about 100 copies of The Ancient Book of Sex and Science, which sold out before its release after being mentioned on BoingBoing. He’s also taking orders for a signed and numbered edition, which he’ll bring to the con if you order one.

Exclusives | Becky Cloonan will have a set of four silkscreen prints at the con, limited to 100 “signed, numbered, stamped and enveloped” copies.

I asked if she and the 5/Pixu crew had another book planned for this year, but she said they’ve all been so busy they haven’t been able to do one. She also said she’ll have a big announcement at the con, and she’ll have a table with with Brian Wood, Cliff Chiang and Jill Thompson.

Mini-comics | According to Ben Towle, J Chris Campbell of Wide Awake Press is putting together a Michael Jackson memorial mini-comic to sell at the con, which will feature stories and pin-ups of the King of Pop.

Panels | The Crogan Adventures creator Chris Schweizer sent over a list of panels he’ll be at this year, providing more pieces in the ever-growing Comic-Con schedule puzzle:

THURSDAY, JULY 23:
3:00-4:00 Oni Press: Panelmonium 2009-Often imitated but never duplicated, get up close and personal with trend setting indie comic powerhouse Oni Press. Join in the Q&A with your favorite Oni creators including Ross Campbell (Wet Moon), Jamie S. Rich (You Have Killed Me), Greg Rucka (Whiteout), Bryan Lee O’Malley (Scott Pilgrim), and Chris Schweizer (The Crogan Adventures). Get sneak peeks at upcoming Oni projects, news on Oni Press fan initiatives, free Oni comics, prizes and more! Guaranteed by Oni Press’ totally biased employees to be “the most fun you’ll ever have at a panel.” Room 10

Crogan's Vengeance

SATURDAY, JULY 25:
5:00-6:00 Graphic Novels: Sense of History-There’s a wonderful world of history awaiting you in numerous graphic novels available now. Whether it be real life stories adapting historical events to the comics form, or fiction taking place in a specific time, these practitioners of the historical graphic novel are all presenting work at the top of their form. Moderator Randy Duncan (co-chair of the Comics Arts Conference) talks to Comic-Con special guests Rick Geary (Treasury of XX Century Murder: Famous Players), David Petersen (Mouse Guard), and Stan Sakai (Usagi Yojimbo), plus Jason Lutes (Berlin), Chris Schweizer (Crogan’s Vengeance), and Eric Shanower (Age of Bronze), about their individual takes on history. Room 8

SUNDAY, JULY 26:
10:00-11:00 Kids’ Graphic Novels- What’s new and wonderful in the world of comics and graphic novels for kids in 2009? Moderator Robin Brenner, creator and editor-in-chief of NoFlyingNoTights.com highlights the works of panelists Lewis Trondheim (Tiny Tyrant), Gene Yang (American Born Chinese), Derek Kirk Kim (The Eternal Smile), Eric Wight (Frankie Pickle and The Closet of Doom), Chris Schweizer (Crogan’s Vengeance), Jennifer Holm (Babymouse), and Jarrett J. Krosoczka (Lunch Lady), who all recommend other great titles. Room 3

2:00-3:00 Kids Write!-Kids, join creators Chris Giarrusso (G-Man), Chris Schweizer (Crogan’s Vengeance), Eric Wight (Frankie Pickle), and Gene Yang (American Born Chinese) as they draw the story you tell! Moderated by Cory Casoni (Oni Press). Room 30CDE

Panels | Mark Evanier lists all the panels he’ll be moderating at this year’s con, including a spotlight on comics legend Gene Colan.

Exclusives | The Comic-Con official website posted a whole bunch of exclusives that’ll debut at the show, including Avatar comics, Dark Avengers minimates, a Stay Puft Marshmallow Man bank, signed and numbered copies of The Hunter by Darwyn Cooke and more. Hasbro has a cool Invaders action figure boxed set (right) and a black-and-white Captain America that look like they’re worth checking out. I also like the Peanuts shirts and the Astronaut Snoopy figurine.

Movies | Footage from Matthew Vaughn’s big screen adaptation of Mark Millar and John Romita Jr.’s Kick-Ass will debut at the con.

Television | The Sci Fi Channel has announced their line-up of panels, which will include one devoted to Caprica and Battlestar Galactica: The Plan. They’ll also be showing episodes of Warehouse 13 and Eureka.

Merchandise | Cartoon Books has three new Bone shirts that they’ll be selling at Comic-Con. Or you can buy them now online.

Movies | Speaking of Bone, there will be a screening of The Cartoonist, the documentary about Jeff Smith, on Friday at the con.

Movies | King of the Hill and Office Space creator Mike Judge will show footage from his next movie, Extract, on July 25 at the con.

Movies | Comic-Con has released the schedule for their International Independent Film Festival, which will run all four days of the con. You can find it here.