October 2010
58 posts
3 tags
Reproductive Rights and Wrongs
No, this is not about sex, as much as you might wish it was. Over at Comics Comics, Tim Hodler considers two methods of reproducing old comics for today’s readers. This is an issue I have been thinking a lot about recently, actually because of one of the books Hodler mentions. I think up until a few years ago, I would have preferred the “Theakstonized” approach of upping the...
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TWC News with ADD [102810]
* Avoid the Future interviews cartoonist Kevin Huizenga: “The inner compulsion I have is to put together something with a kind of complex structure, with some complex arrangement of things that surprises me, or makes me feel like my favorite comics do.” More in the link. * At Yet Another Comics Blog, Dave Carter runs down 10 random things about comics. Pay special attention to...
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TWC News with ADD [102710]
* Jim Lee talks to Publisher’s Weekly on the occasion of his 20th year making comics. His ultra-slick-but-still-kinda-awkward style has never been my cuppa, but I have to give him credit for running the imprint responsible for bringing me some of my favourite comics of all time, like Warren Ellis’s Stormwatch, The Authority and Planetary, Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips’s...
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Christopher Allen Reviews Young Lions
Young Lions
Writer/Artist - Blaise Larmee
Self-published. $10 USD. http://cometscomets.blogspot.com
I’ve had this gem for a few months now, always turning up somewhere around the house or in my backpack. I guess I was hoping for that perfect time to review it, when the book had fully crystalized for me. Finally, I realized that wasn’t going to happen, and that’s fine.
Young...
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Christopher Allen Reviews Thirteen Going On...
Thirteen Going on Eighteen
Writer/Artist - John Stanley
Publisher - Drawn & Quarterly
Artists come and go, and one can never tell who will have lasting impact and who will drift into obscurity. Those listening to the radio in the early ’90s may be surprised that Rivers Cuomo has long outlasted Alanis Morrissette, and sold more records than Jewel. Sometimes an artist who helped define...
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TWC News with ADD [102510]
* At The Comics Journal blog, Jared Gardner thinks about the transition from floppy comics to hardcover serial editions, as we’ve seen with Chris Ware’s Acme Novelty Library and now Seth’s Clyde Fans. * This is kind of Inside Baseball, but what the hell, it’s an amusing read about one of the hazards of reviewing comics: Johanna Draper Carlson recounts trying to ignore PR...
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Brubaker, Fraction, and A Comment on The...
My recent mention of The Fan-Fiction Age of Superhero Comics (and a link to my first post on the subject, back in 2007 — boy, superhero comics have generally sucked for years now, huh?) generated this comment from reader Felicity Walker: “The Fan-Fiction Age” is a good name for how I feel about a lot of recent comics. Surprisingly enough, I think part of why modern comics feel...
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TWC News with ADD [102210]
* At The Comics Reporter, Tom Spurgeon reviews Doug Wright’s Nipper: 1963-1964. * Joe Queenan loves Peanuts: “Peanuts was always there as a touchstone and a balm. Unlike so many other venerated objects in US pop culture, it was sweet without being stupid, reassuring without being infantile. In the dark era in which it began, it served much the same function as I Love Lucy. The...
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Guest Post: Kevin Pasquino Looks at Recent DC...
Sometimes I like to imagine that I’m a newcomer to the world of comic books. Sometimes I like to step back and try to look at the medium I love with new eyes. And whenever I do so I inevitably have to scratch my head and wonder if anyone who publishes comic books ever takes the time to examine what image they’re selling (and therefore sending) to the world. And this becomes even more exasperating...
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Heroic Ageism
Wow. Well, we like us some Tony Isabella around TWC and always have, but I’m not really having any part of this post talking about some sort of recent Marvel decline since “The Heroic Age” began. I’m especially not buying it if he’s going to hold up X-Men Forever, sort of the comics version of Ensure to keep old readers from starving when they don’t have much...
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TWC News with ADD [102110]
* In a masterpiece of understatement, Tony Isabella addresses the drop in quality of recent Marvel superhero comics. I’d track the plummet back to Grant Morrison’s departure from New X-Men, but Tony’s been keeping up with things better than I have. Tony champions Chris Claremont’s X-Men Forever in the same piece, but Claremont’s bag of tricks stopped working for me...
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Christopher Allen Reviews House of Mystery Annual...
House of Mystery Annual #2 (2010)
Various Writers and Artists
Vertigo. $4.99 USD
I’m going to cop to unfairness right upfront. I don’t read House of Mystery and I’m not really interested in a comprehensive review of this issue. I thought Matthew Sturges, the regular series writer, created a nice framework with these four trick-or-treaters showing up to The House, whereupon we...
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TWC News with ADD [102010]
* Christopher Butcher presents a long, reasoned and compelling list of reasons why I’m really glad I didn’t go to the 2010 New York Comic Con. Given that Butcher is one of the driving forces behind the Toronto Comic Art Festival, the man knows whereof he speaks, and it behooves the NYCC people to listen. Comic book shows need to be about comics, first and foremost, or else, why bother?...
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Christopher Allen Reviews The Amazing Screw-On...
The Amazing Screw-On Head and Other Curious Objects
Writers - Mike Mignola and Katie Mignola. Artist - Mike Mignola
Publisher - Dark Horse Comics. $17.99 USD
As Mike Mignola confides in the Story Notes at the back of the book, 2003 was a good year, as he won an Eisner Award for Best Humor Publication for the title story here, originally presented as a one-shot, and he and his daughter won an...
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TWC News with ADD [101910]
* At The Comics Journal, R.C. Harvey looks at the history of comics criticism. * Speaking of comics criticism, at Comics Comics, The Comics Comics Comic-Book Club takes a nuanced look at Alan Moore’s Neonomicon. * A great gallery of Tom Sutton-illustrated covers, for one of the most underestimated publishers in comics history, Charlton Comics. (via Tom Spurgeon.) * Speaking of Tom Spurgeon,...
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TWC News with ADD [101810]
* Frank Santoro on grids in comic art, part 2. Focusing on the art of Chester Brown, Santoro notes “Chester was sequencing images one at a time on individual sheets of paper and ordering them on the grid – so it was very immediate, like writing. Chester wasn’t setting out to draw a complex mural-like pages – he seemed more interested to me in timing.” Much, much more in the link. *...
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Christopher Allen Reviews Warlord of Mars #1
Warlord of Mars #1
Writer - Arvid Nelson
Artist - Steve Sadowski
Publisher - Dynamite Entertainment
We seem to be in an age of retooling pulp heroes, with DC recently reviving Doc Savage, The Spirit and The (Crimson) Avenger, while Dynamite has flooded the market with Green Hornet product old and new. Hopefully, Warlord of Mars will be allowed to find its footing the way Lone Ranger did.
...
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Christopher Allen Reviews Doc Savage #7
Doc Savage #7 Writers - Ivan Brandon & Brian Azzarello, Jason Starr Artists - Nic Klein, Scott Hampton Publisher - DC Comics
I hadn’t read this series since the first issue, when it was under a different creative team. It was boring and confusing then. Now, it’s not boring, though still a bit confusing. I can cut it some slack, though, dropping in the middle like this, but one...
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TWC News with ADD [101610]
* Jaunty Sean T. Collins continues Love and Rocktober with a look at one of my favourite Jaime collections, Ghost of Hoppers (here’s my review from when it came out, in 2007). * Prominent retailer Brian Hibbs expounds at length on Marvel and DC’s recent announced price cuts, saying that there are deeper concerns the corporate superhero publishers need to address in order to restore...
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Christopher Allen Reviews Deadpool MAX #1
Deadpool MAX #1 (2010) Writer - David Lapham Artist - Kyle Baker Publisher - Marvel Comics. $3.99 USD
In the past year, I found that I kind of like Deadpool. I never got his appeal in Rob Liefeld’s X-Force (or was it still New Mutants?)…just seemed like a typically overly-accessorized, underdeveloped “extreme” Liefeld character. Nor did I pay any attention to Mark Waid,...
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We Interrupt This Program...
You may have noticed that we’ve added a Paypal donation button to the sidebar to the right. I’ll be right up front and tell you that if you can make a donation to support our efforts here, it would be greatly appreciated and go a long way toward making sure TWC keeps going for the foreseeable future. Prior to our recent re-envisioning, my own blogging efforts had been light because of...
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TWC News with ADD [101510]
* Spend some time with Sparky: CBS News re-presents a 1999 60 Minutes interview with Peanuts creator Charles Schulz. When asked if he is a writer, artist, or philosopher, you have to love his answer: “I am a cartoonist.” * Roger Ebert reviews the movie adaptation of Warren Ellis and Cully Hamner’s Red: [It] plays like a movie made for my Aunt Mary, who was always ...
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I'm Not a Collector (And Other Lies)
I’m not a collector, although I have a nearly 800-book collection of graphic novels. The completist gene just isn’t hard-wired into me. I guess it’s easy to assume everyone involved in comics is a rabid collector with one or more want lists always within easy reach, but what stays on my bookshelves has always been a fluid proposition, both because of my tendency to try to keep my...
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ADD Reviews Amazing Spider-Man #645
There’s a palpable sense of dread permeating this entire issue, the penultimate chapter in a story-arc that I have not been keeping up with, “The Origin of the Species.” Since “every comic is someone’s first issue,” as the pros used to say, I decided to pop in randomly and see if the latest issue of Amazing Spider-Man could please me the way New Ways to Die...
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Christopher Allen Reviews The Best American Comics...
The Best American Comics Criticism
Edited by Ben Schwartz
Published by Fantagraphics Books. $19.99 USD
It’s a mug’s game, editing an anthology. Inevitably, you’re going to find a great piece to include and not get permission. Or it’s just too long. Or it doesn’t fit the tone of the rest. Or it doesn’t fit some other criterion that’s been set for you...
Thermoplymouth
I wasn’t a big fan of Frank Miller’s 300 graphic novel, and especially not the movie. Still, I saw a black Chrysler 300 tonight with the comic/movie “300” logo in red, covering the entire rear windshield, and it was badass. A lot better than The Big Fat Kia.
—Christopher Allen
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TWC News with ADD [101410]
* At Robot 6, Renee French discusses her new book H Day with Tim O’Shea. She also updates the status of work-in-progress Towcester Lodge: ” I filled two notebooks cover to cover with dialogue and story and drawings for Towcester Lodge and then one day a friend came over and we did a timeline of the story on a roll of tracing paper. It took all day. Totally ridiculous. And then I...
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Castaways, Orphans and Outcasts: Life as a Comics...
A long day of comic shops and used bookstores is ahead of me today, as I voyage out in search of some new reading material, trading in the old for the new, and hopefully make a few bucks folding money in the bargain, too. My lifelong interest in comics has almost always had trading stuff in as a significant element. I’ve never been a comics hoarder in the sense of keeping everything I buy,...
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TWC News with ADD [101310]
* At Robot 6, Sean T. Collins interviews Mome editor Eric Reynolds on the occasion of the anthology title’s fifth anniversary. He’s pleasantly surprised at the longevity of the series: “I’m not sure there’s ever been one in alternative comics that’s published more pages of comics than Mome. We’re at around 2,350 pages of comics through issue 20. What are the most successful comix...
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Marvel and DC Price Changes: Retailer Response #6
Marvel and DC Comics have announced that they are reducing the price of many of their titles from $3.99 to $2.99. I asked a number of comics retailers for their thoughts on the change, set to take effect in January of 2011. The following thoughts are from Jevon Kasitch of Electric City Comics in Schenectady, NY. How will the price change affect your store?
I don’t think the change will have...
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TWC News with ADD Extra [101210]
* Food for thought: Neilalien’s complaint about Brian Michael Bendis’s writing is character-specific (Doctor Strange, natch), but gets to the heart of what’s wrong with the current Fan-Fiction Age of Superhero Comics. Most of today’s most popular corporate superhero comic book writers can’t envision a story more complex than a child playing with action figures in the...
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Marvel and DC Price Changes: Retailer Response #5
Marvel and DC Comics have announced that they are reducing the price of many of their titles from $3.99 to $2.99. I asked a number of comics retailers for their thoughts on the change, set to take effect in January of 2011. The following thoughts are from Christopher Butcher of The Beguiling in Toronto, Ontario. In addition to what Peter Birkmoe offered, I’d say I’m probably going...
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TWC News with ADD [101210]
* Former DC editor KC Carlson takes a long look at the history of corporate comic book formats and pricing and ultimately concludes Marvel and DC are making a mistake: “We’re spending too much time talking about the cover price instead of talking about the package. The 32-page comic book is ultimately a dead end. And it has been for a very long time, except no one really wants to talk...
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Christopher Allen Reviews Uncanny X-Force #1
Uncanny X-Force #1
Writer - Rick Remender
Artist - Jerome Opena
Publisher - Marvel Comics. $3.99 USD
So this is the relaunch of a book about the black ops X-Men starring mostly also-rans plus two overexposed characters, written by the guy who gave readers the goofy FrankenCastle version of The Punisher, with art by the guy late of another failed Moon Knight series. Sounds like a recipe for...
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TWC News with ADD [101110]
* Retailer Round-Up: I asked a number of comics retailers for their thoughts on Marvel and DC’s announced price change from $3.99 to $2.99 on some titles beginning in January. Read comments from Robert Scott of Comickaze in San Diego, John Belskis of Excellent Adventures in Ballston Spa, NY, Peter Birkmoe of The Beguiling in Toronto, and J.C. Glindmyer of Earthworld Comics in Albany, NY. *...
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Christopher Allen Reviews Cockbone
Writer/Artist - Josh Simmons Available at author’s website
Once when I was a kid, I opened a book of matches at my grandparents’ house and a litter of baby spiders streamed out of it, over my hand. Now, THAT was disturbing, to the extent I still remember it today. Josh Simmons wants to disturb you, but is way too pleased with his work to be able to hide it. He’s going to call it All About...
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Marvel and DC Price Changes: Retailer Response #4
Marvel and DC Comics have announced that they are reducing the price of many of their titles from $3.99 to $2.99. I asked a number of comics retailers for their thoughts on the change, set to take effect in January of 2011. The following thoughts are from J.C. Glindmyer, owner of Earthworld Comics in Albany, New York. How will the price change affect your store? There may be less resistance by...
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ADD Reviews Spider-Man: New Ways to Die
I think Spider-Man was the first superhero who really grabbed me when I was a child. I don’t know what it is about him, the costume, the pathos, the colourful villains, the hot girlfriends (I have always been a Gwen Stacy guy and I always will be), something about the character seems to engage an awful lot of people. The three movies were as popular as they were in large part because they...
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ADD Reviews Carmine Infantino: Penciler,...
I’ve always had a strange relationship with the art of Carmine Infantino throughout my comics-reading life. I had been exposed to reprints of some of his 1950s Flash work and loved the streamlined look, straightforward storytelling and futuristic cityscapes. But around the same time (mid-to-late 1970s), Infantino was also drawing Marvel titles like Spider-Woman and Star Wars in a more...
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TWC News with ADD [100910]
* In reviewing Jaime Hernandez’s The Girl From H.O.P.P.E.R.S., Sean T. Collins finds common ground between Xaime’s comics and David Lynch’s film oeuvre. Sean also sees the beginning deepening of the Locas neighbourhood of the municipality of Love and Rockets, to strain a metaphor way beyond breaking. * Must-read: Jog on Alan Moore’s Neonomicon #2, at Comics Comics. * Also...
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Shells: A Modest Proposal
I’ve had an idea in my head for a few years now — probably ever since Fantagraphics started issuing their essential Complete Peanuts hardcovers, or maybe when Ivan Brunetti did that fantastic strip Whither Shermy? — that it would have been awesome if there had been an alternate comic strip featuring some of the most interesting or wonky secondary or tertiary characters that came...
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Marvel and DC Price Changes: Retailer Response #3
Marvel and DC Comics have announced that they are reducing the price of many of their titles from $3.99 to $2.99. I asked a number of comics retailers for their thoughts on the change, set to take effect in January of 2011. The following thoughts are from Peter Birkmoe of The Beguiling in Toronto, Ontario. Peter told me that the store’s Christopher Butcher may have more to say on the issue,...
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Harvey's Birthday
On her Facebook page, Harvey Pekar’s widow Joyce Brabner reminds us today, October 8th, is Harvey’s birthday. I still can’t believe he’s gone, myself — Harvey’s writing was such a big part of almost the entirety of my comics-reading life that it feels like someone removed a really key piece from the Jenga game of my interest in the artform. So, Harvey, you and...
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Marvel and DC Price Changes: Retailer Response #2
Marvel and DC Comics have announced that they are reducing the price of many of their titles from $3.99 to $2.99. I asked a number of comics retailers for their thoughts on the change, set to take effect in January of 2011. The following thoughts are from John Belskis, owner of Excellent Adventures in Ballston Spa, New York and organizer of the Albany Comic Con (an advertiser on this site, it...
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Rule of Threes
It feels really wrong to violate the Rule of 3s, but I only have two comments to make, so…
There’s obviously nothing much negative to say about DC and Marvel dropping prices on some books from $3.99 to $2.99. Yes, DC’s move does put more of a pinch on creators due to losing two pages of story (i.e. income), but at the same time, your middling book has a better chance to survive...
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TWC News with ADD [100810]
* As reported here yesterday, Marvel and DC are both planning to roll prices back on some titles from $3.99 to $2.99. In an early analysis at The Comics Reporter, Tom Spurgeon says this is likely good news. * Johanna Draper Carlson describes Top Cow’s plan to give readers a digital download code if they buy a physical issue of Witchblade. I guess it would make some kind of sense if the...
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Marvel and DC Price Changes: Retailer Response
Marvel and DC Comics have announced that they are reducing the price of many of their titles from $3.99 to $2.99. I asked a number of comics retailers for their thoughts on the change, set to take effect in January of 2011, and the first to respond was Robert Scott, the owner of Comickaze in San Diego, California (read my 2008 interview with Robert, also on the subject of comics retailing). How...
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News: Marvel Dropping Prices Too
On her Twitter feed, Heidi MacDonald is reporting that Marvel is also dropping the prices on selected comics from $3.99 to $2.99. At Comics Worth Reading, Johanna Draper Carlson points out that DC is dropping two pages of story, meaning creators will lose income due to the decreased workload. MacDonald’s Twitter post indicates Marvel plans to feature the “same page count,” when...
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News: DC Drops Prices
DC Comics today announced via press release that it is lowering prices line-wide beginning with issues shipping in January, 2011. DC says “all standard length 32-page ongoing comic book titles currently priced at $3.99 [will move to] $2.99.” The announcement was made jointly by co-publishers Jim Lee and Dan DiDio. The press release quotes Lee as saying “For the long term health of...
