Borders

Retailing | Borders Group, the second-largest book chain in the United States, reported a loss of $132.3 million in April, its second full month in bankruptcy. That figure follows on the $52.6 million loss reported in February and March as the bookseller sought Chapter 11 protection and began liquidating 226 locations. [Detroit Free Press]

Publishing | Ira Rubenstein, executive vice president of Marvel’s Global Digital Media Group, has left the company to become executive vice president of digital marketing for 20th Century Fox. He begins the new job in Los Angeles on Monday. Rubenstein joined Marvel in 2008 after 12 years at Sony, and oversaw the launch of the publisher’s digital subscription service. His departure comes less than two weeks after news surfaced that Ron Perazza is resigning as DC Entertainment’s vice president of online. [Variety]

Publishing | Ada Price surveys the graphic novel exhibitors at this year’s BookExpo America, which opens today in New York City. [Publishers Weekly]

Publishing | Publishers Group West will be the book market distributor for Archaia Entertainment beginning June 20. [press release]

Phoenix Comicon

Conventions | Brad Hamilton and Benjamin Leatherman preview Phoenix Comicon, which kicks off Thursday at the Phoenix Convention Center in Phoenix, Arizona. [Modern Times, Phoenix New Times]

Conventions | Jason Baxter wraps up Saturday’s 10th annual Olympia Comics Festival. [Weekly Volcano]

Creators | Roger Langridge discusses his work on Marvel’s Thor: The Mighty Avenger and BOOM! Studios’ The Muppet Show. “It’s not like I have a lot of affection for the original material,” he says of Thor. “Being allowed to play with those toys wasn’t really the attraction for me. I was interested in being given a superhero concept to play with and seeing if I could push myself to do that. I wanted to see if I had it in me to make something that works within those parameters.” [The New Zealand Herald]

Creators | Gail Simone chats briefly about superhero comics, Women in Refrigerators, Twitter, and considering a relocation to Asheville, North Carolina. [Mountain Xpress]

Comics | Fans weigh in on the cycle of death and resurrection in superhero comics: “”It’s daytime drama for guys. It’s accepted that death isn’t permanent.” [The Capital]

A page from a Muppets comic we may never see

On his blog, cartoonist Roger Langridge muses on the fate of the last Muppet Show comics he drew for BOOM! Studios. We learned a few weeks ago that Disney had moved the license for Pixar comics from BOOM!, which had been making them for two years, to Marvel, but the fate of The Muppet Show license was conspicuously not mentioned. From what Langridge says, though, it looks like BOOM! has lost that license as well, leaving Langridge’s last Muppets story arc, The Four Seasons, in limbo:

As far as I understand it, the unpublished work I’ve done for Boom isn’t technically Disney’s until it’s published, and obviously Boom can’t publish it without a license. So it’s in a kind of limbo right now. In the best of all possible worlds, I’d like to think that Boom and Marvel can come to some kind of arrangement whereby Marvel can eventually release the work.

He posted a few inked pages from the story to tide us over while the suits figure it all out. BOOM! Studios had no comment.

Adrienne Roy

Passings | Prolific colorist Adrienne Roy, who was a fixture of DC Comics for more than two decades, passed away on Dec. 14 following a year-long battle with cancer. She was 57. Although Roy’s work appeared in countless DC titles, from Green Lantern and Superman to Warlord and Wonder Woman, she’s best known for her extensive runs on Batman, Detective Comics and The New Teen Titans. Mark Evanier notes that “Her long tenure on Batman (more than 600 issues of various comics featuring the character) meant that her credit appeared on more tales of the Caped Crusader than anyone else except for Bob Kane.” CBGExtra posts an obituary written by her husband Anthony Tollin. [News from ME]

Publishing | Rich Johnston reports on rumored contract changes at DC Comics that would affect all new creator-owned titles in the DC Universe and Vertigo imprints. [Bleeding Cool]

Publishing | Storm Lion, the Singapore-based multimedia studio behind the 2008 Radical Publishing miniseries Freedom Formula, has closed on the heels the summer layoff of 30 employees in Singapore and Los Angeles. The closing leaves a planned movie adaptation, to be produced by Bryan Singer, “in limbo.” [The Straits Times]

Josh Blaylock

Publishing | Josh Blaylock, founder of Devil’s Due Publishing, frets that sudden cover-price cuts by DC and Marvel will lead to a “direct market massacre” in February: “Even in the best of times the holiday spending craze is over, everyone has spent their post-X-mas, January gift money, and the lull begins, and this will likely be one of the flattest X-Mas seasons in memory. This year, as our currency buys less and less essentials (I’m talking food and clothing, not your essential weekly publications), February is already poised to be tougher than ever, but it’s also running parallel with the forced 25% drop in sales from the majority of DC and Marvel titles. It’s an open wound plus salt.” [JoshBlaylock.com, via The Beat]

Retailing | Frances Dinkelspiel follows up on last week’s report about the imminent closing of legendary Berkeley, Calif., store Comic Relief. The article mentions that two employees have been laid off, but that the family of founder Rory Root is apparently talking to a potential buyer. Rich Johnston and Heidi MacDonald have commentary. [Berkeleyside]

Retailing | Drew Sullivan, owner of Ash Avenue Comics and Books in Tempe, Ariz., said his store had an exceptional November, thanks in large part to brisk sales of The Walking Dead, triggered by the popularity of the AMC television adaptation: “That comic book is one of our biggest sellers right now. We can’t keep it stocked. [...] It’s basically introducing new customers to the world of comics.” [East Valley Tribune]

Publishing | Robot 6 contributor Brigid Alverson considers the pitfalls of comics age ratings. [Graphic Novel Reporter]

Sleeper: Season One

Publishing | Tom Spurgeon pens a eulogy for WildStorm, complete with a list of favorite titles. [The Comics Reporter]

Conventions | Jayson Peters previews Amazing Arizona Comic Convention, which will hold is debut event Jan. 8-9 at the Mesa Convention Center in Mesa, Ariz. Guests will include Robert Kirkman, Rob Liefeld, Jeph Loeb, Joe Benitez, John Layman, Ryan Ottley, Cory Walker, and cast members from The Walking Dead. [East Valley Tribune]

Creators | Dean Haspiel posts his comic-strip tribute to Harvey Pekar that appears in the year-end issue of Entertainment Weekly. [LiveJournal]

Creators | Amy Mebberson talks about kids’ comics and BOOM! Studios’ Muppet Show titles. [TFAW.com]

Best of the year | David Allen Jones compiles his favorite comics of 2010, including Scalped, The Sixth Gun and Empowered. [Popdose]

Best of the year | Larry Cruz looks at the “Webcomic Moments of 2010.” [The Webcomic Overlook]

Originally announced in 2007 at Comic-Con International, BOOM Kids! didn’t hit shelves until 2009 but did so with a bang with a stellar line-up of comics based on various Disney/Pixar properties including The Incredibles, The Muppet Show, Darkwing Duck and Mickey Mouse & Friends. Combining reprintings of foreign-produced comics and out-of-print classics with new works, BOOM Kids! made a real mark.

There’s no word on the exact shape of BOOM Kids! 2011 plans are, but one could easily picture an expansion of its Disney/Pixar line-up and perhaps some new original projects.

Morning Glories #2

Welcome once again to our weekly round of “What would you buy if your budget was limited?” — or, as we call it, Food or Comics? Every week we set certain hypothetical spending limits on ourselves and go through the agony of trying to determine what comes home and what stays on the shelves. So join Brigid Alverson, Chris Mautner and me as we run down what comics we’d buy if we only had $15 and $30 to spend, as well as what we’d get if we had some “mad” money to splurge with.

Check out Diamond’s full release list if you’d like to play along in our comments section.

JK Parkin

If I had $15 …

Morning Glories #2 ($3.50)

Image promoted this book pretty heavily before it came out, and I hope it paid off … I really enjoyed the first issue, and I hope it sticks around for awhile.

Unwritten #17 ($3.99)

This issue hearkens back to the days of my youth with a “Choose Your Own Adventure” issue, as Mike Carey and Peter Gross continue to have fun with literature of all sorts (with an assist from Ryan Kelly this issue). I was always a total cheater — I would read ahead to get a good ending, which is probably what I’ll do with this issue.

Joe the Barbarian #7 ($2.99)

Grant Morrison and Sean Murphy’s story of Joe’s trek to the kitchen prepares to wrap up.

True Blood #3 ($3.99)

Once again, for my wife. Hey, if it means she’s reading comics, I’m cool with it.

If I had $30, I’d also get …

Brightest Day #10

Brightest Day #10 ($2.99)

Featuring the new Aqualad in all his glory.

Thunderbolts #148 ($2.99)

Considering who their leader is, I guess it makes sense that the Thunderbolts would eventually find their way into the Shadowland event. I trust Jeff Parker to make it interesting.

DMZ #57 ($2.99)
Northlanders #32 ($2.99)

It’s a really heavy Vertigo week for me, with two titles by Brian Wood. Typically for this exercise I would have chosen one or the other, meaning DMZ probably would have stayed on the hypothetical shelves, but I can’t pass up on a Cliff Chiang sighting.

Amazing Spider-Man #643

I bought the “One Moment in Time” storyline just because I was curious to see how the whole thing played out … and it didn’t play out well. What did play out well, though, was issue #642, featuring the beginning of the “Origin of the Species” storyline by Mark Waid and Paul Azaceta, the team behind the wonderful Potter’s Field. So I’m looking forward to this week’s installment.

Splurge item: I’m actually going to skip the splurge this week and just point out what I think is a great deal instead, The Dynamite Reader Starter Set ($6.99). According to the solicitations, it’s a sampler set of six of their comics — from The Boys to Super Powers, Green Hornet to Army Of Darkness, Red Sonja to Legendary Tailspinners and more. If you’ve never picked up any of their titles, here’s a good way to see if you’d like them.

Brigid Alverson

The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service Vol. 11

If I had $15 to spend…

I’d get the latest volume of Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service ($11.99). I loved the first few volumes of this series. The stories are clever, and I like Housui Yamazaki’s clear, crisp line, even when he is drawing shredded corpses. This series is definitely not for the squeamish, but it is very clever and always a good read.

That leaves three bucks, and I guess the best use of that money this week is the first issue of the Muppet Sherlock Holmes series.

At the $30 level, that changes—I’d skip the Muppet Show comic and instead get Koko Be Good, by Jen Wang. I have really liked Jen’s webcomics, and I’m looking forward to seeing how she does in long form. (OK, Koko and Kurosagi together cost $30.98, but I’ll take it out of next week’s splurge.)

Splurge time! Two books jump out at me, and neither is terribly expensive, so if I’m splurging, I’ll go for both: The first volume of Dark Horse’s Harvey Comics Treasury ($14.99), which features both Casper the Friendly Ghost and Wendy the Good Witch on the cover, and Hill and Wang’s Anne Frank biography, which I know is going to be terribly earnest, but which I simply can’t resist anyway.

Chris Mautner

If I had $15:

Prison Pit Vol. 2

I’m lucky to have $2 to spend on comics this week let alone $15 after going to SPX, but let’s play along anyway. If I did have $15, you can bet one of the first things I’d buy is Prison Pit Vol. 2 ($12.99) Johnny Ryan’s sequel to his exquisitely Grand Guginol, no-holds-barred, incredibly violent and scatological action comic. To say this comic is not for the faint of heart is the understatement of the year — it features an insane amount of blood and viscera, an abundance of fecal matter and the forced rape of a female flying dinosaur creature. It’s also rather brilliant at the same time — a free-flowing, constantly imaginative display of pure cartooning power that is both disgusted and invigorated by the horror of its ideas. The first volume was one of the best books of last year. Will the second match its power? Bet on it.

If I had $30:

I’d get Stephen DeStefano’s Lucky in Love Vol. 1 ($19.99), which would put me a little over budget but heck, I’m already over budget this week.

It’s been awhile since we’ve seen much from DeStefano — he’s been busy with animation projects and illustration work — but I’m intrigued by his attempt to tell the story (working with writer George L. Chieffet) of WWII soldier Lucky and his various sexual misadventures with a number of women. DeStefano has a nice, thick, rubbery line that I really appreciate, so I look forward to lingering over these pages.

Splurge: The “book about comics” choice of the week is Daniel Clowes: Conversations ($22), a collection of interviews done with the Wilson creator over his career, edited by Ken Parille and Isaac Cates and published by University Press of Mississippi. Parille showed me a copy of the book at SPX this past weekend and I have to say it looks pretty good.

Since I’m splurging, I’ll also pick up a copy of Too Soon? by Drew Friedman, because, you know, it’s Drew Friedman.

Scarlet #1

Hello and welcome once again to What Are You Reading?, where the Robot 6 crew talk about the comics and graphic novels that they’ve been enjoying lately.

Today’s special guest is Ryan K Lindsay, a staff writer for comic news and reviews site The Weekly Crisis. He also runs a comic scripting challenge site called thoughtballoons where each week a character is picked, and every member of the site must write a one-page script about that character. He’s also been known to throw a think piece up at Gestalt Mash and is hoping one day to have his many comic pitches drawn by people with pencils.

To see what Ryan and the Robot 6 crew have been reading this week, click the link below …

*****

Sean T. Collins

The Man With the Getaway Face

This week I read three books that tried with varying degrees of success to put their stamps on familiar genres. Click the links for full reviews…

The Man with the Getaway Face by Darwyn Cooke (IDW): This short-form adaptation of one of Richard Stark’s Parker novels incongruously meshed Stark’s no-nonsense plotting and prose with Cooke’s nostalgic, luxurious-looking art for a “two great tastes that taste weird together” whole.

Artichoke Tales by Megan Kelso (Fantagraphics): A killer clear line and an extremely sophisticated take on personal and political history make Kelso’s decade-in-the-making fantasy a must-read.

Second Thoughts by Niklas Asker (Top Shelf): A familiar-feeling but nevertheless beautifully drawn and surprisingly subtle take on sexy twentysomething relationship angst.

Tim O’Shea

I often point to the small details in explaining why a book clicks with me. In The Muppet Show #9, when Statler and Waldorf heckled Fozzie, writer/artist Roger Langridge perfectly captured the beaten-down humiliation of Fozzie that’s done in such a way that still captures Fozzie eternal belief he can someday make them laugh. OK, maybe I was reading more into the panel than Langridge intended, but it clicked for me.

Jonathan Hickman continues to reveal his affinity (and wealth of knowledge) for the Howling Commandos in this final part of the Last Ride arc in Secret Warriors. And Alessandro Vitti gives this impressive moment where Dum Dum Dugan leaps into battle only to realize the odds are stacked against them. To see the battle-seasoned face of Dugan shift to fear/awe was effective, as well as a nice juxtaposition to the present day scenes where Dugan testified in front of a UN Security Council. I tip my hat to Hickman for pulling off a story that jumped between three to four different times/places and held together tightly/effectively.

Superman/Batman #75

Superman/Batman 75 is worth buying just for the two-page Joker and Lex story by Azzarello & Bermejo, executed as a twisted homage to Bill Watterson’s Calvin & Hobbes.

Captain America #609 had a few surprises for me, none of them involving James Barnes. First off, does anyone else think that Butch Guice’s approach to drawing the Black Widow is similar to the way she is rendered by Gene Colan? I love it. Also I did not expect to see Falcon back on his feet (he was seriously injured in part 1 of this arc), but it allowed Brubaker to ever fleetingly give us the old Steve Rogers/Falcon team-up for a few moments. You rarely see writers work in scenes where a character makes a mistake (without it being a plot advancement aspect). But I love the scene (spoiler) where Rogers is interrogating a Zemo associate and accidentally breaks his hand, admitting: “I…I thought it was robotic…not a glove.” Honestly while violent, there was almost a comedic element to the scene, though I’m unsure if that was Brubaker’s intent.

I’ll admit, I’ve not been very partial to Ariel Olivetti’s art style, but Olivetti draws a pompous Namor quite well in the first issue of the new ongoing, Namor: The First Mutant. After talking to writer Stuart Moore earlier this week, I’m eager to see what he does with the character coming out of this initial vampire arc. I cannot thank Marvel enough for trying to summarize Namor’s history in an eight-page back up feature. It was an effective summary of his long history and also reminded me how absurd he looked with long hair in the 1990s.

Speaking of vampires, judging from the first issue I can see myself really enjoying the ““Medieval Vampire Prince Meets Corporate CEO:Compare and Contrast” (as writer Daryl Gregory described it to me in our recent interview) that is the backbone of the Kurt Busiek-conceived Dracula: The Company Of Monsters. Any story that tackles 1462 and present day is both covering a lot of ground as well as drawing some parallels that give me pause. Plus, hey it’s Dracula according to Busiek, it’s bound to be fun and quirky with Gregory writing it.

Joey Weiser was kind enough to send me an advanced review copy of Mermin #3 (It will be on sale at SPX or from Weiser at his site. I use the term “review” in the interest of full disclosure, but honestly my 11-year old son came home, saw Mermin on my desk and said: “Hey, is that the latest issue of Mermin?” So really, it’s only a review copy for a short while, then it becomes my son’s coveted copy. The only other comic that makes his eyes light up and react like that is Langridge’s Muppet Show. Mermin‘s storyline (a fish-boy washes up on the beach and is befriended by three kids) has hooked my son (as well as myself). In this issue, I also appreciated the design of the characters sent to come after Mermin. I’m looking forward to seeing where the story goes in issue 4, particularly given that Weiser tweeted to me after I praised 3 (and expressed interest in seeing where the story goes): “Hint: Things get cray-zay!”

Michael May

Sweets #1

Talk of Kody Chamberlain’s Sweets has been all over the Twitter lately and I finally decided I couldn’t wait for it anymore. I’ve read the first two issues and they’re every bit as cool as I’ve heard. Kody’s crafted a fine mystery and given us a couple of detectives I care about to solve it. Better than that though is the look he’s created for the series. Everything from the colorful palette to the antique fonts to his stylized, but detailed line-work puts me right in New Orleans during easier times. As does the important role that Southern cooking plays in the tale and the atmosphere. Kind of makes me feel at home, except for all the murders and the big storm all the characters say is coming.

Brigid Alverson

When I was a kid, my mom used to make a dessert from three things I loathed on their own‹canned pears, coconut macaroons, and sour cream‹but that were delicious in combination. I never could figure that out. Joann Sfar’s adaptation of The Little Prince is like that for me: I usually don’t care much for Sfar’s art, and I hated The Little Prince (it struck me as twee), but when Sfar illustrates The Little Prince, it’s a whole ‘nother story. In fact, as I read it, I felt that story is really well suited to the graphic novel format. He brings the narrator, author Antoine de Saint-Exupery, into the art, and Sfar’s drawings are livelier and more robust than Saint-Exupery’s thin line drawings. It is an audacious challenge to take on a much-beloved classic like this one, and a lot of advance reviewers seem to be put off because the graphic novel doesn’t look much like the original, but I regard it as an improvement.

A Friendly Game is ironically named; it’s the story of two friends whose dare escalates into the deadliest game of all. Both are young boys, maybe 10 or 12, which makes the book all the more shocking. They start out killing a mouse on a lark, then progress to larger and more complicated kills, assigning points to each according to difficulty. This escalates until one friend starts to falter, then takes a sharp turn in an even darker direction. It’s not for the squeamish, but what keeps this book from being the graphic-novel equivalent of a splatter film is the story that runs through it, of one friend goading the other on, using both blame and shame to keep the other from betraying him. SLG Publishing gives the book a young adult rating, which gave me pause given the high level of violence, but I can see where it would hit a chord with teenagers. While the story is extreme, it is also a skillful portrayal of peer pressure, and of doubt and guilt. While it’s a difficult book to read, the relationship between the two boys rings true, and the contrast between good and evil is evident but not clear-cut.

Chris Mautner

King

This is the third time I’ve read Ho Che Anderson’s King — the first was when it was serialized (three volumes in ten years, take that Bryan Hitch), the second when it was collected in trade a few years ago and now the third, a hardcover “Special Edition.” Sadly, while I’ve come to appreciate it’s better qualities more in the ensuing years, I still think it’s a flawed, terribly uneven book that doesn’t due it’s subject — Martin Luther King Jr. — justice.

There are certainly high points. The book starts off strong enough, showing the bus boycotts and how portraying the steely hatred of racist southerners. And whenever Anderson deals with King’s interpersonal relationships — especially with his wife and family, the book is at its best. But it frequently gets bogged down, especially towards the end, in lengthy conversations about the effectiveness of King’s nonviolence policy that go in circles. As a result, we learn a lot a bout the times, but not enough about the man. It doesn’t help that Anderson frequently draws King in heavy shadow, to the point where by the last third he has to color King’s speech balloons blue so you know which speaker is him. It’s never a good sign you have to start color coding your word balloons.

Much better, in fact quite excellent really, is Anderson’s more recent book, Sand & Fury: A Scream Queen Adventure. Freed from the burden of making a “serious” work, Anderson delves into some grim and gritty pulp material, and you can feel his relish and delight coming off the page. Sand basically deals with the story of a murdered woman who comes back from the dead as a banshee and eventually seeks revenge against her killer, who in turn may be a supernatural demon himself. It sounds like a Jim Balent comic, but Anderson creates a lovely noir atmosphere here, full of blood, sex and other nasty goings-on that never once becomes camp. It’s a nice, effective little horror comic.

Ryan K Lindsay

I’m preparing to move house so plenty of stuff is in boxes, but the things that don’t get packed immediately are all of the baby items, in case he comes early before we’re in the new house, and an emergency stack of book supplies to keep me going over these next few weeks.

The Amazing Adventures of the Escapist

The Amazing Adventures of the Escapist
I picked up the second volume of the Amazing Adventures of the Escapist through the Barnes & Noble remainder books sale. I have a massive history of love for the Escapist, a fictional comic creation by Michael Chabon in his novel The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay. I’d easily claim the novel as my favourite book of all time (finally dislodging The Shining after a 12 year stay) and the comic additions have been very decent.

The first volume of the Amazing Adventures of the Escapist was good fun as this trade is working out to be as well. A slew of creators take stabs at giving us short tales of the Escapist and you never really know what to expect. Every writer uses a different voice, each artist finds a new angle and it works because the Escapist has been, supposedly, published over decades and been influenced by plenty of real creators and movements. An EC style tale, done. A Kirby-esque cosmic tale, done. Anything goes and it really opens the creators to have some fun and it’s good value to just sit back and enjoy.

But if you really dig the character you MUST seek out Brian K Vaughan’s The Escapists mini series as it just might be best supplemental tale to a novel ever published in comics form.

Marvel’s Icon Imprint
Doing some packing is certainly a good way to catch up with old friends. I was rearranging some shelves and I came across my stack of comics published through Marvel’s Icon imprint. I had a good chance to sit down and just catch up on good ol’ times.

Incognito still packs a punch, and I cannot wait for the next series to begin. This first volume was my pick of top comic for last year and looking back over it I can see why. Sean Phillips makes it all look so dirty and yet real. If he does nothing but work with Ed Brubaker for the rest of his career I’d be a happy reader. I also dig that the book feels mired in the past as a pulpy pleasure but is also given a very new age feel through the female characters, mostly. Brubaker knows how to write some nasty chicks and does a great job of it here with both his superpowered and normal femmes.

I then picked up the first issue of Scarlet, again, and I’m still liking its vibe. I’m not a massive Bendis fan, but this series will hold me for a little while longer, that’s for sure. It’s kind of a shame you only get it bi-monthly but then that also works for me, it’s less of a monetary commitment and so is an easier fit into my budget. It means only one arc a year but when the quality of art is this good it’s well worth the wait.

I also got to look at Casanova (and yes, the Image floppies now sit in the Icon stack as their new home) and while the story has held up to many repeat readings by me ultimately it’s the back matter I love. Fraction really opens himself up in each issue and it’s almost like a personal conversation. He puts everything down on the page and sometimes after reading these journal entries (as they really are) I feel a little exhausted, as he most certainly is. It’s a taxing job to produce comics, and Fraction shows us this with each issue produced. I love that the reprints include new back matter, it’s just a classy move.

Marvel’s iApp
I got an iPhone just weeks before Marvel launched, through ComiXology, their digital application for the masses, and I have not once looked back. Each week Marvel unleashes a glut of new and FREE material to this application and so far I have collected 66 free titles, and I haven’t even grabbed each one as it’s available. Most titles are released for one week only for free so you have to pounce quickly, like a lion in the Serengeti, but if you do you are duly rewarded.

Lately, they’ve been offering the first issues of some smaller titles so I’ve had the chance to sample Black Widow, Hawkeye & Mockingbird, Young Allies and Atlas debuts for free. They also generally give out the first issue of any newly added arc so you can get anything from JMS’ Thor to Runaways to Ultimate Spidey to Astonishing Spider-Man/Wolverine. I have plenty I haven’t read yet, but I’m saving them for the birth when I’m stuck crashing out on hospital floors, and my wife is passed out from all the screaming at me.

Daytripper #1

Daytripper
This is going to be the new comic you can hand to anyone to prove that this medium can hold itself up with any other. This tale has some serious gravity, which is interesting because we don’t even know if it all counts or not. In this we follow our main man, Bras, as he lives one day, and dies in it each time. Fabio Moon and Gabriel Ba find new ways to kill off Bras so that each time the emotional impact is felt even more. They kill old man Bras, and little kid Bras and every time you know it’s coming but damn sure hope it isn’t.

Now there’s only one issue left and I can’t help but wonder what will happen. Will Bras finally survive an issue? Have all of these deaths been fantasy obituaries written by Bras himself? I don’t know the answer, and wouldn’t want to before I’ve read it all, but I am certainly intrigued. This series has stood out as such a stellar example of words and art mixed together and it’s masterful how well the creative twins have been able to capture the exact feeling of heart break, or familial love, or longing, or first love. They nail absolutely every issue and if this doesn’t get them an award somewhere down the track then the machine we’re in is broken and needs a maintenance repair man, stat.

Pregnancy Books
Finally, I’ve spent the last eight months reading lots of pregnancy books. And none of them have been in comic form. Is it too much to ask for Marvel to put out a pregnancy guide for the emerging fanfather? Instead of images of women I don’t know pregnant, how about a cross section of Emma Frost’s uterus (there’s a phrase that I never thought I’d type and will cause all sorts of grief for this site in searches)? Why can’t this information be packaged into a neat and tidy four colour bundle? And don’t think I’m not being serious.

I’m not expecting new superheroic names to be given to the stages of pregnancy, and I don’t want origin stories featuring colostrum, but a simple guide in comic form would be pretty handy. Instead I’ve had pages of thick and dense text to slay through and it’s not always fun. A comic guide, either Marvel or independent, would be much more soothing I feel, and lends itself to the diagram heavy style of the genre anyway.

But who to tap for the job? I don’t want these pregnant women sounding like Garth Ennis or Bendis so maybe I’d go for someone more like Kieron Gillen or Brian K Vaughan. The art could have multiple artists for the different phases, John Cassaday for that perky beginning, Frank Quietly for the brutal truth of late stage, and the Dodson’s for that breast feeding after glow. Whattayathink?

If you’re headed to San Diego later this month for Comic-Con International and you’ve been wondering what exclusive merchandise you’ll be able to get at the show, wonder no more … the con’s site has a whole slew of exclusive items that’ll be available from various retailers, publishers and such at the show. Yes, everything from variant covers of BOOM! books — from Roger Langridge’s homage to Comic-Con to Darkwing Duck’s homage to Frank Miller — to Venture Bros. figures to Hot Wheels versions of Wonder Woman’s jet and the Ecto-1. Check them all out right here.

by David Petersen

It’s been 20 years since The Muppet Show creator Jim Henson passed away, and ToughPigs.com paid tribute to him by asking several artists — including David Petersen (above), Amy Mebberson, and Roger Langridge, among others — to contribute original illustrations honoring the visionary creator. Go take a look.

Welcome to another edition of What Are You Reading. Our guest this week is blogger and critic David Uzumeri, who can be frequently found at Funnybook Babylon, Savage Critics or Comics Alliance. Guy gets around.

And now we have him here as our special WAYR guest! To find out what David and everyone else at the mighty Robot 6 is reading this week, simply click on the link below.

Twin Spica

Brigid Alverson: For some reason, Twin Spica looks much older than it is—the cover has a yellowish cast, and the images of shooting stars have a Sputink-era feel to me. It actually came out in 2000 in Japan, and it has a really timeless, very classic manga feel to it. It’s the story of a young girl, Asumi, who is training to be an astronaut. This first volume is partly a story of the kids making it through the first round of rigorous tests and partly the backstory of Asumi, her family, and the mysterious lion-headed man that only she can see, all of whom have associations with space. It’s a very good read, with plenty of challenges for a  nice assortment of likeable characters, so I’m looking forward to following the whole thing.

Nathan Edmondson gave me an advance peek at the first two issues of The Light, which he is writing and Brett Weldele is illustrating. The story is classic horror—incandescent lights have suddenly developed the power to kill anyone who looks into them. I love the art in this story—in keeping with the theme, the art is very luminous, and Weldele does a nice job of capturing different types of light, such as streetlights against a sky at daybreak, incandescent light on a gray afternoon, or a plane silhouetted against its own lights. The story looks like typical horror: A Terrible Peril has occurred and the hero must flee. Like many horror stories, this seems to assume that the danger is geographically limited—if incandescent lights are emitting a strange virus in one town, wouldn’t that be true everywhere? However, Edmondson quickly sketches out a few strong characters, including an interestingly flawed hero and his obnoxious teenage daughter, which grabbed me right from the start.

The webcomic Cleopatra in Spaaace! flagrantly fails the Zuda Test: Cleopatra and her cat have spent the first 15 pages battling robots, but I have no idea who they are or why they are doing this. Doesn’t matter. Mike Maihack’s lively cartoony art makes this comic a delight to read, and the fact that Cleopatra is now escaping in a space bicycle shaped like The Sphinx gives me hope that there will be much zaniness to come. I liked it so much that I went and checked out Maihack’s earlier comic, Cow and Buffalo, in which the eponymous animals are barnyard superheroes. It’s goofy and funny, and reading the archives should keep me going until the next Cleopatra update.

Artesia Vol. 1

Michael May: I’m going through Mark Smylie’s Artesia series again and just finished the first book. I remember being struck with the beauty of his art the first time around as well as the depth of the world he created. It’s almost too deep a world with all the names of gods, kingdoms, and a huge cast of characters being overwhelming at times. But it’s impossible to let that put you off reading it. The art and characterization pull you through. Artesia herself is a fascinating, seductive character and you can’t not want to spend time with her. And of course, the proper names and plot not only get easier to manage in subsequent readings, but becoming familiar with them also lets you discover nuances that you missed the first time around. If anything, I love it more now than I did when I originally discovered it.

I also read the first issue of Saint James Comics’ Indigo Blue. It’s a dystopian-future story about people who are genetically spliced with animals and end up being hunted. The main character is a half-man/half-dog named Blue who’s an agent in an underground organization trying to fight back against their oppressors. It’s a clever way of doing an anthropomorphic animal comic. When I say that, it reminds me a bit of Elephantmen, but there’s such a different tone to Indigo Blue that comparison is unfair. Unlike the dark, luxuriously paced Elephantmen, Blue is a fast-moving adventure comic. What the two do have in common though is that I like them both quite a bit.

Muppet Show #3

Tim O’Shea: It’s Schrödinger’s cat week for comics apparently. Why? Well, when I opened the latest issue of Roger Langridge’s Muppet Show comic (issue 3 of the ongoing series), I was bewildered and surprised to see the Muppets Lab sketch use the Schrödinger’s cat reference involving Beaker and a number of ties. I saw one of Langridge’s bits involving Fozzie coming from a mile away (as he probably intended). But the writer/artist gave a depth to Fozzie that: A) I never thought was a phrase I would say in reference to a Muppet B) Allowed the issue to end on an incredibly sweet note, which is not one might expect from a bear that personifies vaudeville

Jeff Parker’s approach toward the Avengers (in Avengers vs. Atlas 3) demonstrates yet again his strong grasp of Marvel’s history and character dynamics. I was rolling along enjoying the time travel-based tale, more so because the writer used the characters’ confusion about being displaced in time to clarify the story for readers (for me, time travel stories too often fail because the narrative gets too jumbled to simply follow and enjoy). Then I was slightly bemused when Bob (The Uranian) started explaining Schrödinger’s paradox to Ken (Gorilla Man), but only thought of the Schrödinger coincidence for a second–given that I was enjoying the story. Two other nuances to Parker’s writing to enjoy. At one point in the battle Namora returns Cap’s shield to him (by throwing it in a rampaging Hulk’s face). This prompts Cap to say: “Thanks for getting her back.” I didn’t ever recall it being referred to as having female characteristics before so I asked Parker on Twitter if this something he’d come up with doing. Parker’s response was “Yeah, I’d like that one to catch on!” Secondly I enjoy the manner in which Parker shows what a tight-knit team they are, given that the Atlas team members do not call each other code names in the heat of battle, but rather call each other by their first names.

Imagine my surprise in the midst of Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning’s Nova 35 (with Mahmud A. Asrar and Scott Hanna on art), when Reed Richards started lecturing his fellow heroes about the principle of (wait for it, wait for it…) Schrödinger’s cat. That is right, I pulled the Schrödinger hat trick of comics reading. Or maybe I should call it the Schrödinger turkey. I might have suffered the Schrödinger coincidence in this instance a smidge better, if the quality of art and pacing in this installment had not seemed rushed and somewhat forced.  I’m all for a monthly comic meeting its deadline, but I would be willing to wait a few weeks if it meant the art team could bring a stronger story.

Hercules: Fall of an Avenger 1 (of 2) reminds me of the kind of Marvel comics I read in the 1970s and 1980s (in a good way). I cannot recall the last time I read a Marvel comic that actually referenced previous adventures, complete with footnote references of what issue was being referenced. It was a nuance that warmed the heart of this silly fanboy.

I’m no fan of the X-Men Forever series, given that writer Chris Claremont has an affinity for convoluted continuity. But I was overjoyed when I found out that Louise Simonson was coming back to do an X-Factor Forever five-part miniseries, taking off from when she left the original X-Factor series back in the early 1990s. I like how Simonson views the core X-Factor characters, as evidenced in this late 2009 December CBR interview: “Writing them again is a lot of fun – like visiting with old friends. These characters are ‘retro,’ in that they’re heroic. Sure they’re tortured and flawed, but they try to use the powers they’ve been given to protect the weak and make the world a better place. Even though, sometimes, it’s hard to know what’s right and what’s wrong in an imperfect world.” It’s a series where Hank McCoy has never considered using a litter box, he’s actually happy–he smiles. Sure it’s retro, but it’s the closest that Hank has been to his old Stars-and-Garters self than he has in years. (Speaking of Stars and Garters–you must visit Bully’s Beast/Stars and Garters celebration that he hosted this week — bonus points to Bully for his hilarious Amazon bargain banner)

Befriend and Betray

Matt Maxwell: BEFRIEND AND BETRAY – Alex Caine
How does someone go from blue-collar Montreal to Special Forces to working undercover against drug triads, the KKK and not one but two infamous motorcycle clubs (Los Bandidos and the Hell’s Angels)? If you ever wanted to know, then this is the book to read. As much as I’d like to say this was pleasure reading this was…you guessed it…research. But at least research allows you to read interesting things sometimes.

Spent four solid days on Google for the following keywords:
Maya civilization, Maya priesthood, Tezcatlipoca (who is Aztec, not Maya), Tohil (who is Maya, not Aztec), Maya sacrifice, Maya ritual practice, maya ritual object, modern mayans, life in a Yucatec village, maya cosmology. More often than not, I was doing image searches and then finding related text sites. Google is a truly awesome for breadth of research. I mean, awesome. Depth? Well, not so much, really. Not unless you have membership on various academic sites.

Various translations of the Popul Vuh. Some more interesting than others (yawwwwwn).

Someone needs to do some awesome Mayan comics. Unfortunately, it’s not going to be me.

Oh, started reading SWALLOW ME WHOLE, but I’m going to have to reserve comment until I get through the whole thing. Which should be around Christmas at this rate.

Prison Pit Book One

David Uzumeri: Aside from the standard bevy of weekly comics I buy – which is a lot, usually between 15 and 25 – I’ve been doing a lot of external reading and related watching.

My main reading project, which I’m taking a short break from, is Dave Sim’s infamous Cerebus – an insanely fascinating thing to be coming at from a first-time reader’s angle. I’ve got a longer post coming up this week on Comics Alliance about my experience reading the first two phonebooks, but in short, I’m continually bowled over by the book’s intelligence and creativity. By the time you hit High Society, it’s abundantly clear why the book has the creative legacy it does. It’s a shame about where it’s all going to go, but balancing act between genius and madness and all that.

Johnny Ryan’s Prison Pit is something I keep coming back to – and not just because it’s the only comic book I’ve ever seen that can actively liven up a party. It’s a hilarious, visceral and quick read – if you’ve been reading for fifteen minutes, you’re studying it too hard – and while it’s not something I’d recommend to everybody, it’s still over a hundred glorious pages of Jack Kirby via… shit, I can’t even think of anything as extreme as this. The Postal videogame, maybe. But for really dumb fun, this is pretty much unbeatable. I’ve considered that maybe the fun isn’t as dumb – that maybe Cannibal Fuckface’s journey through the wastes of the prison pit are a Bunyan-style metaphor for, I don’t know, man coming to terms with the restrictions of modern life, but then I remember it’s a comic that features the term “burnt jizz,” and I stop thinking and laugh.

I’m still habitually rereading Grant Morrison’s clockwork-precise Batman run, as well, largely because every new issue seems to reveal new layers in all that’s come before. This book is still a puzzlesolver’s dream, riddled with clues and hints and revealing metaphors. Meanwhile, at Marvel, Jonathan Hickman’s work – especially the excellent Secret Warriors – is doing the same, providing real reread value through careful teasing of the central mystery. Not that this is all of the appeal of these titles – they both feature good character work, excellent pacing, etc. etc. – but the way these titles are almost reader-participatory in the way they disseminate clues is insanely fun.

Finally, I’ve been watching (not comics, but related) the entire Doctor Who/Torchwood sequence, in order because I’m the sort of continuity nut who wants to properly follow plot threads between the two parallel narratives. Until about a month ago I’d never seen an episode in my life, but starting with Eccleston’s first episode I was almost immediately able to interpret aspects of Who continuity as they were introduced by finding incredibly similar comics-related concepts. The “time war” that separates the old production of the show and the new, for instance, is a pretty direct analogue to Crisis on Infinite Earths, filling an almost identical narrative function – to reboot the universe, keeping what the writers liked and dumping what they didn’t. On top of that, though, it’s just clever, rollicking sci-fi action, at its worst entertaining and at its best, like when Steven Moffat or Paul Cornell are writing, thought-provoking and affecting.

The Toon Treasury of Classic Children's Comics

The holidays are a time for family, food, fun and, of course, the spirit of giving. I thought I’d check in with the members of the Robot 6 crew to see what comic-related gifts they received this year, along with any they gave as presents. Feel free to share anything comic-related you gave or got this year as well.

Tom Bondurant: I got The Toon Treasury of Classic Children’s Comics (Abrams Comicarts), selected and edited by Art Spiegelman and Francoise Mouly. A good bit of Carl Barks Duck work, from what I can tell. My parents gave it to me.

Absolute Death

Michael May: Some friends of mine gave me the Absolute Death. They’ve been giving me the Absolute Sandman volumes for Christmas and my birthday for the last couple of years, so this was a perfect way to cap off that tradition.

I was much cheaper in my comics giving. My nephew is a fan of Coheed & Cambria, so I got him the second volume of The Amory Wars. My youngest brother doesn’t follow any monthly comics, but he does love Superman, so it was All-Star Superman Vol. 1 for him.

Brigid Alverson: My brother went to Ireland this year and he brought me back the modern incarnations of my childhood favorites, Beano and Dandy: Dandy Extreme, which is an amped-up version of the old Dandy, and an anthology of “classics” from a variety of DC Thompson comics. The anthology is interesting because it’s a weekly, which suggests there is a demand for this sort of thing, but of course it’s always a shock to see something from your childhood being presented as if it’s a museum piece.

Sam's Strip

Chris Mautner: We focused largely on the kids this year, so I only received two presents from the missus, one of which was Sam’s Strip, a complete collection of the self-referential daily comic strip Mort Walker and Jerry Dumas did back in the early 1960s. It’s full of references to older strips — Happy Hooligan keeps stopping by, as does Krazy Kat and various other classic characters. What’s more the two (and only) main characters are always breaking the fourth wall — directly addressing the readers, getting “cartoon props” out of their storage closet, stuff like that. They don’t go quite as far with the concept as they could, but you can sense the two of them having fun with the possibilities.

My daughter, however, made out like a bandit, comics-wise, scoring the fourth issue of the first Muppet Show mini-series (she already had the other three), a Little Lulu volume, the fifth Bone volume (the Scholastic color version) and the latest Babymouse book.

Thor: Ages of Thunder

JK Parkin: My sister-in-law gave me the Thor:Ages of Thunder hardcover, which collects several Thor stories by Matt Fraction. She also gave me the recent Neil Gaiman novella, Odd and the Frost Giants, which come to find out is a different take on one of the old Norse legends that Fraction adapted in Age of Thunder. Which was an interesting bit of symmetry.

My wife, meanwhile, gave me the Locke and Key collection by Joe Hill and Gabriel Rodriguez.

Giftwise, I gave each of my brothers a copy of Parker the Hunter this year, and I also gave my younger brother the first Unknown Soldier collection from Vertigo. And my older brother’s girlfriend has been into Jonathan Lethem recently, so I gave her a copy of the Omega the Unknown collection he wrote for Marvel.

Check out their full schedule after the jump.

COMIC-CON ’09 BOOM! STUDIOS EXCLUSIVES:

* KILL AUDIO PREVIEW BOOK – $5
* KILL AUDIO VINYL TOY “Monotone Variant” $40
* FARSCAPE Vol. 1 Limited Edition HC “Scorpius Edition” – $50
* THE MUPPET SHOW COMIC BOOK HC, Limited to 250 – $50
* THE INCREDIBLES: FAMILY MATTERS HC, Limited to 250 – $50
* CARS: THE ROOKIE HC, Limited to 250 – $50
* THE INCREDIBLES: FAMILY MATTERS #1 C,D Holofoils – $20
* IRREDEEMABLE #4 Cassaday Sketch Variant – $10

Kill Audio preview book

SCHEDULED SIGNINGS AND PANELS:

Wednesday, July 22 – Preview Night
6:00 – 9:00 – Roger Langridge, Keith R.A. DeCandido and Michael Alan Nelson signing all day
6:00 – 7:00 – Exclusive Disney Pixar Hardcover signing w/ Langridge, Waid, Porter
7:00 – 8:00 – Mark Waid Signing

Thursday, July 23
9:30 – 7:00 – Roger Langridge, Keith R.A. DeCandido and Michael Alan Nelson signing all day
11:00 – 12:00 – Exclusive Disney Pixar Hardcover signing w/ Langridge, Waid, Porter
12:00 – 1:00 – Mark Waid Signing
12:30 – 1:30 – Indie Comics Marketing 101 Panel with Chip Mosher ROOM 4
1:30 – 2:30 – Spotlight on Jerry Robinson Moderated by Waid ROOM 4
3:30 – 4:30 – Digital Comics Now! Panel with Chip Mosher ROOM 4
4:00-5:00 – Spotlight on Gail Simone Moderated by Waid ROOM 5B
6:00 – 7:00 – Mark Waid Signing
9:00 – ?:?? – BOOM! Drink Up hosted by Mark Waid at the Manchester Hyatt Grand Lobby Bar

Friday, July 24
9:30 – 7:00 – Roger Langridge, Keith R.A. DeCandido and Michael Alan Nelson signing all day
10:15 – 11:15 – Farscape 10th Anniversary Panel ROOM 6BCF
11:00 – 12:00 – Exclusive Disney Pixar Hardcover signing w/ Langridge, Waid, Porter
1:00 – 2:00 – BOOM! Studios Panel ROOM 32AB
2:00 – 3:00 – Mark Waid Signing
2:00 – 3:00 – Farscape’s Rockne S. O’Bannon Signing
3:00 – 4:00 – Eureka’s Andrew Cosby and Ed Quinn Signing
4:00 – 5:00 – Claudio Sanchez Signing
5:00 – 6:00 – Mark Waid Signing

Saturday, July 25
9:30 – 7:00 – Roger Langridge, Keith R.A. DeCandido and Michael Alan Nelson signing all day
10:00 – 11:00 – Exclusive Disney Pixar Hardcover signing w/ Langridge, Waid, Porter
11:30 – 12:30 – Spotlight on Sheldon Moldoff Moderated by Waid ROOM 10
1:00 – 2:00 – Mark Waid Signing
2:30 – 3:30 – BOOM! Farscape Comics Panel ROOM 10
3:45 – 4:45 – Farscape’s Rockne S. O’Bannon Signing
4:00 – 5:00 – Claudio Sanchez Signing
5:00 – 6:00 – Mark Waid Signing

Sunday, July 26
9:30 – 5:00 – Roger Langridge, Keith R.A. DeCandido and Michael Alan Nelson signing all day
10:00-11:00 – BOOM! The Muppet Show Panel w/ Roger Langridge ROOM 32AB
11:30 – 12:30 – Exclusive Disney Pixar Hardcover signing w/ Langridge, Waid, Porter
2:00 – 3:00 – Mark Waid Signing
2:00 – 3:00 – Art of Pixar’s Cars w/ Alan Porter ROOM 5AB

The Muppet Show #4

Given today’s announcement that Roger Langridge will be appearing at this year’s San Diego Comic-Con, it seemed like the ideal time to run my email interview with him regarding his Muppets work at BOOM! Langridge’s industry profile has been elevated by his recent Muppet work, and it was my pleasure to interview him about it.  His grasp of the Muppets characters is amazing and given that I’m a longtime fan of the Muppets, I’m truly enthused when he says some of the characters have “hidden depths you could spend a lifetime mining.” I could spend a lifetime reading what Langridge mines, honestly.

Tim O’Shea: Your Muppet work for BOOM! Studios was the first time I saw you work in the Muppet-verse. But you worked with the Muppets back with the Disney Adventures magazine. How much has your Muppet style changed (if at all) between the Disney era work and now?

Roger Langridge: The Disney Adventures stuff was a bit less on-model; they’d been running some Mickey Mouse cartoons by Glenn McCoy that were drawn in a raggedy, undergroundish sort of style and they were popular enough that they were looking for something similar with the Muppets, so I was encouraged to just go with my own style entirely. The BOOM! material, being more in the nature of a piece of official merchandise, is stylistically somewhere between that and the official models: not entirely my own take, although still recognisably “me.”

O’Shea: How did the Muppet assignment come about–did you contact BOOM! or did they seek you out?

Langridge: They found me! I guess the unpublished Disney Adventures material had been circulating behind the scenes, and I suppose somebody liked it well enough to track me down.

O’Shea: What kind of editorial guidance does editor Paul Morrissey give you, or does he pretty much let you have free reign with the characters?

Langridge: Paul is fairly hands-off, but it would be misleading to suggest that that’s the same thing as giving me free reign! There are further layers of approval to jump through with Disney, so Paul’s style seems to be that he knows what’s coming and doesn’t try to complicate things any further. The main editorial mandate I’ve had at BOOM!’s level is to think in terms of four-issue story arcs, which I admit I’m struggling to make work. It’s not the most natural thing for me. I’m more of a three-minute pop song kind of cartoonist.

O’Shea: In issue 2, you had an entire one-pager/one panel traveling song sketch based on the 1905 song, In My Merry Oldsmobile. How did you ever did you come up with that idea for a sketch? And in picking the song, were you aware (as I learned thanks to Wikipedia) that the song was “often used by Carl Stalling, long-time music director for Warner Bros. cartoons”?

Langridge: I wasn’t consciously thinking of Stalling, although I’m a huge fan; got his soundtrack albums and everything. As for coming up with the idea, I think the musical numbers are a crucial part of the show, but in order to do them without making things unnecessarily complicated, I have to either write the songs myself, or dredge up something that’s out of copyright and in the public domain, which is where “In My Merry Oldsmobile” came in. It seemed like a good fit, inasmuch as I could well imagine it appearing on the original Muppet Show pretty much as-is.

O’Shea: While BOOM! is breaking the issues of up in four-issue increments (and numbering), you consider the Muppet Show assignment as an ongoing monthly. How are you adjusting to working the monthly grind, while juggling other assignments and maintaining your online presence with Mugwhump the Great (which recently went on break)?

Langridge: I guess the answer to that is that I’m not coping very well! As you mention, I’ve had to drop Mugwhump for the moment, which kills me, as it’s the only thing I was working on that was really mine. Apart from that, the only regular thing I’m doing right now is a weekly caricature for a British soap-opera gossip magazine called Inside Soap, which I’m clinging onto to stop my bank manager from sending me rude letters. Everything else I’ve got coming out is something I worked on pre-Muppets; this really is a full-time gig, and then some! I work from 5:30am to 11pm every weekday on the book, and even then, each issue slips a little bit further behind, and there goes my weekend – I can’t remember the last time I spent Sunday with my family. We’re looking at doing one-shot fill-ins drawn by another artist between story arcs, so I can stay on top of it. The current pace isn’t sustainable indefinitely. I’m not as young as I used to be, and I’d like to see my kids occasionally!

O’Shea: How did you (and BOOM!) decide upon the concept for the next four-issue arc, The Treasure of Peg Leg Wilson?

Langridge: It was one of the ideas I submitted when I was asked to pitch some ideas for four-issue story arcs. I was trying to think in terms of subplots that could be running behind the regular Muppet Show shenanigans, so there’d be something to tie each arc together while the show could carry on as usual for the most part.

O’Shea: In working on the book, how much research do you do in order to give the characters the right look?

Langridge: I’ve got huge, groaning ringbinders full of reference. Gradually I’m finding my feet with the main characters, so I rarely need reference now for Kermit, Piggy, Fozzie, Rowlf, Gonzo, Scooter or the band. It’s taken me six months to get to that point! The first couple of issues were a bit of a nightmare as far as getting everyone looking right was concerned. Now I usually only need reference for the more obscure characters. (Obscure characters are a big part of the book, of course!)

O’Shea: Your backgrounds are quite rich with visual gags, do you try to give Digikore Studios (the colorist) certain tips on how to color them in a way that plays the elements up without hitting readers over the head–or do you trust the colorist to make your work look right without any feedback?

Langridge: I’ve been trusting Digikore completely, not only because they’re doing a spectacular job, but also because managing the colouring would be one more drag on my time that would slow me down even further. But I couldn’t be happier with the work they’re doing. Top notch stuff. (And I should mention the lettering by Deron Bennett as well, which serves the material perfectly. They’re all making me look great!)

O’Shea: What’s the biggest challenge of drawing comedy with characters that have such a rich history–a situation where you strike a balance between doing your own comedy while remaining loyal to the source material?

Langridge: I guess I’m lucky in that my own sensibilities and those of the Muppets coincide in many respects. I was already doing stories set in a vaudeville milieu, with absurdist humour, daft characters and made-up poems, before being asked to work on the Muppets; so you could argue that I was halfway there already. As far as writing the characters goes, it’s much the same as writing any character: you try to listen to their needs as characters and not write anything that doesn’t ring true. I’m fortunate to have Disney watching my back there. They’re not shy about telling me if they think I’m getting it wrong. That rarely happens, I’m happy to say!

O’Shea: You clearly love working with the Muppets, what is it about the characters that appeal to you and plays to your storytelling strengths?

Langridge: I like the fact that they’re mostly failures of one sort or another; the Muppet Theatre is like the level they’ve found as they all head their way down the showbiz ladder. That’s very easy to empathise with. I like the heart that underlies the characters; they’ve all got prickly exteriors to a greater or lesser degree, but they have fundamentally generous spirits at the bottom of it all. It’s almost as if that’s the reason they’re failures; they refuse to give up their humanity to achieve success, and it’s this quality that redeems them. I like the fact that they all embrace contradictions within themselves, specially Piggy and Gonzo, who have hidden depths you could spend a lifetime mining. And I love the off-the-wall randomness of so much of the humour. Very much my cup of tea.

O’Shea: What would you say to Muppet fans that don’t normally read comics to entice them to check out the project?

Langridge: I’d probably point out that I’m bending over backwards to make it feel as much like a “lost episode” of the Muppet Show as I can.

O’Shea: Other than the Muppets and the packaged release of the Fin Fang 4 Return stories (which originally ran at Marvel Digital) what else is on the horizon for you in 2009?

Langridge: Not much! I’ve got a few things coming up which I was working on before Muppet Mania consumed my life: a handful of Captain America backup stories in Marvel Adventures: Super Heroes, written by me and drawn by Craig Rousseau, featuring a World War Two version of MODOK; a two-pager that’s just come out in Uncanny X-Men: First Class Giant-Size #1, written by me and drawn by Jeff Parker; a short piece in Marvel Adventures: Spider-Man #50, written by me and drawn by Sonny Liew; a short story called “Venus in Fur” for an anthology called Snow Stories, edited by Mike Getsiv; a short piece in Strange Eggs Jumps the Shark, written by Chris Reilly and drawn by me, published by Slave Labor Graphics; and a “Mugwhump the Great” short story in IDW’s upcoming Act-i-Vate Primer. This is all stuff that’s already been completed, some of it a couple of years ago. Once those come out, I suspect that’ll be my last non-Muppet work for a while. Those guys don’t draw themselves, you know!

Whatever Happened to the World of Tomorrow?

Welcome to What Are You Reading, where we talk about stuff, but mostly books, especially comic books. Our guest this week is our fellow CBR blogger Brian Cronin, whom most of you no doubt know via the excellent blog Comics Should Be Good and author of the new book Was Superman Was A Spy: And Other Comic Book Legends Revealed!

To discover what Brian and the rest of the crew are reading, simply click on the link below.

Prince Valiant Vol. 1

Chris Mautner: I spent most of the past week reading the first volume of Fantagraphics’ new hardcover edition of Prince Valiant — the company had originally published the entirety of creator Hal Foster’s run in the 90s, but has decided to go back to the well with better production values, including sharper colors.

I had always equated Valiant with everything that is dull and lifeless and boring and supposedly good for you, but it turns out I was completely and utterly wrong. On the contrary, it’s a rip-snorting good time, full of high adventure and thrilling escapades. And Valiant, far from being the schoolmarmish goody two-shoes I imagined him being, is full of piss and vinegar and quite a bloodthirsty young chap, which makes him a good deal more interesting than some of his contemporaries on the comics page.

I also started reading God of Comics: Osamu Tezuka and the Creation of Post World War II Manga by Natsu Onoda Power and published by the University of Mississippi Press. As anyone who reads this column regularly knows, I’m a pretty big fan of Tezuka, so I’ve been looking forward to digging into this, though I haven’t gotten very far yet, and Power seems to be taking her sweet time in getting to the meat of her book. More impressions later, hopefully.

Yuri Monogatari 6

Brigid Alverson: I had the pleasure of having dinner with Erica Friedman last week, and she gave me a copy of Yuri Monogatari 6 to review. Yuri manga features romantic relationships between women, and Erica’s company, ALC Publishing, is the only dedicated publisher of yuri manga in the U.S.

Yuri Monogatari features short Western and Japanese comics, linked only by the fact that they’re about lesbian couples, and as is always the case with anthologies, there is a mix of subjects, styles, and quality. As a manga lover, I particularly appreciate the opportunity to see some new Japanese manga in non-mainstream styles. I always enjoy Rica Takashima’s work (Shaenon Garrity described her work as “cute as a blenderful of kittens,” which about sums it up), and the other Japanese stories tend to be very high quality as well. The non-Japanese stories are more of a mixed bag, and some are closer to indy comics than manga. Some are very good, and I have noticed a sharp uptick in quality from YM4. It’s nice to see a new generation of artists coming into their own.

From girls to boys: I picked up volume 3 of Naoki Urasawa’s 20th Century Boys last week. I like Urasawa’s work a lot, but there was something ultimately unsatisfying about Monster—he set up a complicated, multi-plot, multi-character story, but I felt like the story didn’t quite jell in the end. He left some plot threads dangling, and the end of the series raised more questions than it answered. Beyond that, I felt like he was always skirting something—some engine that was driving the story—but he never really showed it. After two volumes of 20th Century Boys, I’m worried that he’s heading down the same path, but I’m giving it another volume and hoping he will change my mind.

Detective Comics #854

Tim O’Shea: Leaving for vacation in 22 minutes. I’m sure a lot of reading will be done there. Not much time to spare. But I must must must highly recommend the Question co-feature on the backside of Detective Comics 854. Cully Hamner art colored by Laura Martin. Exquisite. One minor request for DC–when you have talent the like of Hamner on the inside, figure out a way to tell me on the cover, please.

JK Parkin: I saw somewhere (probably on Twitter) where someone described Fred Chao’s Johnny Hiro as “Scott Pilgrim in Brooklyn.” I didn’t make that connection when I was reading Johnny Hiro, but thematically, it makes sense — two young guys trying to find their way in the world, with the women they love, with a mix of zany, fun, fantastic elements thrown in for good measure. But there are a lot of differences, too, particularly in tone and the visuals.

Johnny Hiro, Vol. 1

But anyway, what I liked about Johnny Hiro was just how unpredictable it was. You move from big blockbuster-esque scenes involving Johnny fighting dinosaurs to scenes of Johnny’s girlfriend, Mayumi, dealing with office politics to guest appearances by New York Mayor Bloomberg and, um, the cast of Night Court. Which sounds cheesy, and in the hands of someone less talented than Chao, probably would be. And it’s that ability to move so effortlessly and naturally from the fantastic to the mundane that makes this such a wonderful comic.

Brian Cronin: Brian Fies’ follow-up to Mom’s Cancer, Whatever Happened to the World of Tomorrow, was a worthy successor to the magnificent Mom’s Cancer. World of Tomorrow examines the relationship of a father and son through the years as America (and the relationship) becomes progressively more cynical – interspersed with depictions of culture similarly changing over the years (like the change in Superman comics over 70 years). It’s a strong, poignant work by Fies.

Alexander Irvine has been doing a wonderful job with the Daredevil: Noir mini-series where he is matched perfectly with Tomm Coker’s beautiful noir-style artwork.

Scalped #29

Jason Aaron’s most recent Scalped storyline ended beautifully as Aaron managed to have a series of “spotlight” issues that still managed to tie together to form a cohesive and intriguing whole – the twists even followed organically. Meanwhile, after a somewhat disappointing first issue, his Wolverine: Weapon X series has been quite strong with the latest two issues.

J.H. Williams III gave us all one of the most amazingly illustrated comic books of this, or any, year with the debut issue of Batwoman in Detective Comics. The Greg Rucka story was pretty good, but my goodness, the art was simply stunning – Williams conveyed more mood, tone and characterization in one issue of Detective Comics than most artists convey in a year’s worth of books. Cully Hamner does a fine job with the Question back-up, as well, but boy, it has to be tough to be the back-up artist in a book with J.H. Williams doing the lead feature!

Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips continue to do wonderful noir work with Incognito. It often seems as though reviews of the series spend more time comparing the series to their other works together and less time just appreciating the fact that it is yet another well-written, well-drawn comic book from the pair.

Brubaker also produced an excellent lead story for Captain America #600, weaving together different artists to produce a commemorative issue that really felt like it was celebrating the whole tableau of Captain America stories (having back-ups by past Cap writing greats like Roger Stern and Mark Waid certainly did not hurt). It was too bad that Steve Epting didn’t get to draw any of the issue, though.

Tales Designed to Thrizzle #5, like all the previous issues by Michael Kupperman, did not fail at thrilling or dazzling me. The extended Twain and Einstein feature was brilliant this past issue (I particularly enjoy the parts where Kupperman does homage to classic comic book genres, only with Twain and Einstein).

Roger Langridge is about as close to a flawless comic book creator as you can get, and his work on the Muppet Show has been great, and hopefully it’s opening up new audiences to his brilliant work. In the Muppet Show #2, he even managed to get some pathos into the series! Such wonderful writing ability is almost unfair belonging to such a talented artist – he shouldn’t be allowed to be brilliant at both!

The latest Seaguy mini-series concluded with a final issue that was strong that it likely overshadowed the excellent work that Grant Morrison did in Batman and Robin #1, which is saying a lot, since Batman and Robin #1 was a very strong introductory issue featuring what seems to be the first impressive addition to the Batman’s Rogues Gallery in years. Also, one word – paracapes!!! So cool.

If I don’t stop myself now, I’ll just keep going for way too long. I read too many comics.

From "The Muppet Show" #1, by Roger Langridge

I never thought I’d miss “Can’t Wait for Wednesday,” the labor-intensive comics-of-the-week feature I wrote with Chris Mautner at our former online home. But this is one time I wish we were still doing the column, if only so I could name The Muppet Show #1 as my Pick of the Week.

I grew up with The Muppet Show, both in its original run and in later rebroadcasts, so my opinion is undoubtedly tinted a little by nostalgia. But, man, Roger Langridge really nails it. This first issue — out today — is the next-best thing to watching the TV show. All that’s missing is the celebrity guest host.

If you need more convincing, Langridge provides a glimpse of a panel from Issue 3, featuring Gonzo as the Mad Hatter.