I’m scrambling a bit to make up for lost time, so here are two new reviews, for Towerkind #1 by Kat Verhoeven and The Great Moments in Western Civilization Volume 5 Issue 1: Chicago by Caitlin Cass. Or at least I think that’s the title; I got a bit lost in all those words on the cover. More tomorrow probably, everybody go to SPACE in Columbus Ohio this weekend!
Update for 4/10/14
April 10, 2014
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Posted by Kevin
Cass, Caitlin – The Great Moments in Western Civizilization Volume 5 Issue 1: Chicago
April 10, 2014
The Great Moments in Western Civilization Volume 5 Issue 1: Chicago
Ah, Chicago. This comic is all about how Chicago came to be a city, including all the gory details about their attempts to build a sewer system and their inability to get the meat packing plant to quit flushing the heads of pigs into said sewer. Oh, and this also talks about the fire (you know the one), while delightfully leaving off any speculation that it might have been started by a cow. I grew up about an hour south of Chicago and I didn’t know most of this, so huzzah for learning more about my heritage! Well, not really my heritage, as I didn’t grow up in Chicago, but it’s easier to just say that I’m from near Chicago when meeting people instead of telling them about my hometown of about 3,000 people. The bulk of this comic is done as a large fold-out page, with one side dealing with the origin of the town and the other dealing with the fire and the attempts to rebuild/the gifts received from well-meaning but sometimes unhelpful foreign dignitaries. It’s gorgeous and often funny, and probably should be taught in schools, if it wasn’t for the fact that it’s pretty unflinching with its depiction of the meat packing plant. Granted, they are horrible places, and they were significantly more horrible back in the day, but kids are probably not allowed to see such things in school, because why trouble their heads with unpleasant facts? Check it out, learn something about Chicago why don’t you!
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Posted by Kevin
Verhoeven, Kat – Towerkind #1
April 10, 2014
Towerkind #1
Have I mentioned that I love it when people send me entire series that they’ve already completed? Because if that’s a position that you find yourself in (with a finished or mostly finished comics series), you should maybe keep that in mind. Mostly because I’m always happy to have a theme day, so for the next three months I’ll be doing weekly reviews of this series. Unless I get really caught up in it and end up reviewing it in bigger and quicker chunks, but my plan is weekly for now. Anyway! All that rambling and not a word about the actual comic. This is a series about a group of young teenagers living in an overcrowded clump of high rises. In this issue one kid declares himself the king and asks the other kids to bow to him. This goes pretty well until one kid defies him, which leads to what can only be described as an act of super strength (unless dumpsters are insanely light in their neighborhood). It’s an intriguing start, especially because the violence does not go at all in the way that you might suspect after that act. These are a bunch of kids, after all, and most kids aren’t used to the consequences of any kind of violence. Lots more to come about this series, and it’ll be interesting to see which way this one goes. So far it looks like only subscriptions are listed at her website and not single issues, but I’ll check into that to make sure…
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 4/5/14
April 5, 2014Of course I’d get really busy with work/life just as I said that reviews should get back to normal around here. My fault; I was asking for trouble to say something like that. Anyway, new review today for Picnic Ruined by Roman Muradov. Next week should be… nah, better not jinx it. Either way SPACE is next weekend and I should be able to pick up all kinds of new comics to review there. If you live in or near Columbus you should go too!
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Posted by Kevin
Muradov, Roman – Picnic Ruined
April 5, 2014
There are times when I have to admit that I have no idea what I can contribute to the conversation about a comic. No, this isn’t me getting all self-effacing and “aw shucks” about this website, as I think that I do contribute meaningful rambles about comics every now and then, or at least point at books that deserve more attention. It’s just that when I run across somebody like Roman, with his ridiculous list of credentials and clients, it’s clear that the guy is operating on a different plane than me. That’s the basic reason why I barely ever bother to review the new Dan Clowes book, or anything by the Hernandez Brothers, those sorts of things. They know what they’re doing, anything I say would be nitpicking, so why bother? So instead of treating this comic like that, I’m just going to treat it like any old comic and see what happens. This is a comic of shadows holding images and images holding shadows, thoughts that trail off into jumbled messes or moments of insight, thoughts of self-doubt turning into rueful acceptance and/or tolerance of the way things are and maybe even getting to a perfect moment. Or it’s about a guy who wanders aimlessly through his evening, including literally running into a tree while not paying attention. Or both! Things start off at either a really boring porno shoot or a naked art project, which leads our hero to wonder about what things in the world have a foreskin and what things should have a foreskin. Right away Roman has introduced something that I’ve never thought about, which was quickly followed by wondering why I never thought about it, so kudos to him for that. From there our hero flees out of fear of being photographed at this event and into a bookstore, where things get messy in a hurry (with a delightful curse thrown in). The rest of the comic deals mostly with his thoughts, his conversation with somebody who isn’t into indulging him on his shit, and dealing with his self-doubt. In other words, not the sorts of things that are easily reviewed, or are even helpful things to review. On an aesthetic level this is gorgeous, as you can take the linear approach or just follow the lines of dialogue to see if you can spot every random thought that pops into his head but is written down too quickly to be understood. If you’re looking for people punching each other to solve their problems then this book won’t do you any good, but if you’d rather wonder about the universe while wondering if that wondering is itself pointless, maybe you should give this one a shot. $6
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 3/31/14
March 31, 2014Hey look, a new review! For SF v PN from Ryan Cecil Smith, and his title makes a lot more sense if you know what the initials stand for. As for more reviews, I put the call out to a few people, so if they get their comics here quickly I should be able to keep up a relatively normal schedule until SPACE next weekend. You can mail me your comics too, and I’ll talk about them for a bit.
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Posted by Kevin
Smith, Ryan Cecil – SF v PN
March 31, 2014
SF v PN
Just to clear it up right off the back, the title really means “scientist fighters vs. profiteering nasties.” Which is what you guessed, I’m sure. Anyway, this continues Ryan’s masterful run in this universe, and I am greatly looking forward to the day when all of these fantastic smaller stories are bundled together into a big old book. These little snippets are thoroughly entertaining, don’t get me wrong, but it’s so clear that he has a much bigger vision in mind that it’s hard not to come away wanting more. This issue is basically one big old space fight, between the parties mentioned above. The pirates seem to have the firepower, but the scientists have, well, science on their side, and a secret weapon that they may or may not decide to use. So yes, obviously they’re going to use it. What’s the good of having a secret weapon if you don’t use it? If you’re completely new to the series you can safely enjoy this issue, completely unconnected from the rest of the series. If you’ve been following along, then you get a few more tantalizing hints of some of the characters you’ve been seeing in past issues. Check it out and enjoy!
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 3/19/14
March 19, 2014New review today for Agara Book One by S. Tyler Stafford. But it’s still not looking good for new review comics at the moment, so it might continue to be a little slow around here until after SPACE. If it’s still slow after that, then you can panic…
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Posted by Kevin
Stafford, S. Tyler – Agara Book One
March 19, 2014
Agara Book One
Maybe it’s the fact that I’m reading Lone Wolf & Cub again (and if you love comics and haven’t read that series, shame on you), but I’m perfectly content at the moment to let a series take its time in opening up and revealing what’s going on. That being said, the first book of this Agara series came at the perfect time for me. Tyler spends something like the first 20 pages slowly showing this odd alien world and a young alien woman trying to master some kind of mental exercises. She has troubles, the other students get annoyed that they have to start over due to her failures, and a mental battle ensues. From there the story moves to a human man and his teenage daughter. He’s an archaeologist, she’s a mostly indifferent student, and we get to see them go about their days for a bit before he comes across an ancient find that he needs to investigate. Things are slow to get going but, like I said, in this case it’s a good thing, Sure, Tyler could have just said “and that thing over there is ____, while this alien society has been here for ____ years,” but it’s always better to show than to tell, and so far he’s doing a fantastic job of that. And don’t worry, there’s still lots of mayhem here, with some physical fights, some mental fights and some fights that fall somewhere in between. I have no idea how much he has planned for this world, but the mysteries on that first page alone could take a book to explain. The art is mostly gorgeous (although it does look a little rushed here and there) and this is a really solid first book. The one piece of advice I’d offer him is to maybe include a character listing at the start of the next volume, as that can get out of hand quickly in an expansive universe like this. It’s worth a look, is what I’m saying. $12 (also that crappy sample scan is the fault of my scanner, not the comic)
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 3/13/14
March 13, 2014New review today for Welcome to Nursing HELLo by Joel Craig, and unless something comes in the mail tomorrow (or I finally get around to cleaning this damned apartment) I’m all out of review comics for the week. I’ll try to post a review over the weekend if possible. Just in case anybody was really curious about exactly what’s in my head right now…
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Posted by Kevin
Craig, Joel – Welcome to Nursing HELLo
March 13, 2014
Just for the record (assuming that anybody is taking a record of this, which is a bold assumption), that title went from being something that might be a typo to a pretty smart summation of Joel’s efforts to quit cursing so much at work. I always assumed that nurses were required to curse at work to help deal with the shit that they had to put up with, often literally, but apparently such words can still offend people who see horrific injuries all day. Anyway, this is another one of those cases where the story was fascinating and his struggle to maintain a connection to his artistic side while being consumed with work hit pretty damned close to home, but technical issues kept dragging me out of the narrative. Partially this is because I’m a firm believer in always getting the basics right in comics, as I’d much rather focus purely on the narrative, but, as always, this might bother me a lot more than other people who don’t read hundreds of comics a year. So, bad news first: some of the individual pages were lighter than others (making a few things tough to read). That’s probably a printing problem and not on Joel. But the word balloons were most likely his fault, and if you’re spilling out of those (or, worse, having the word balloons burst through the walls of the panel for no reason), then it tells me that you were making things up on the fly. Which doesn’t have to be a bad thing, but it is the sort of thing that should be corrected for the collected edition. There were also some misspellings that could have been fixed with an editor or a proofreader; not lots of them but enough to get my snooty attention. If this was a terrible comic, these little flaws could have dragged me right out of things, and it would have prompted a thoroughly nasty review. But I really enjoyed the story! It’s all about Joel deciding that he wants to be a nurse after studying the program for his husband, how much he learned in two years of nursing school (which he says should be a book all by itself, and I agree), his interactions with his co-workers and patients, and the basic overview of what happens in his life over those four years. He was aware enough to include definitions for all of the medical terms that he used, but it may have helped to repeat them a few times just to hammer them home. Oh, and he had Madonna to turn to as an imaginary friend a few times, and those conversations never failed to put a smile on my face. I brought up the flaws I saw with this mostly because I think he has all kinds of potential in comics and I’d love to see more of this story, which is mostly his life. But if I have one core message from this website (which I certainly do not), it’s to get the basics right. It makes everything else a lot easier. Even with those little problems this is still a thoroughly entertaining book, and you should still give it a shot. $15.99
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 3/10/14
March 10, 2014New review for R.E.H. (Robert E. Howard) #5 by Brian John Mitchell and Adam White. One more month (ish) until SPACE!
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Posted by Kevin
Mitchell, Brian John & White, Andrew – R. E. H. 5
March 10, 2014
R.E.H. #5
Anybody out there know much about Robert E. Howard, the writer who was most famous for creating “Conan the Barbarian”? Besides that fact, I mean? Well, Brian has put out a series of minis featuring quotes from the man, so it’s easy enough to get to know him a little better. Or at least this one has a long quote from R.E.H., so I’m assuming that the issues I missed also have those quotes. Anyway, this time around the quote revolves around Robert talking about getting fan mail, and how he’d prefer to be a manual laborer who does back-breaking work all day to writing. Writing never came easy to him, and that combined with a complete unawareness of how writing worked to the people Robert interacted with had a tendency to make him a little crazy. I particularly enjoyed his comparing writing to boxing, but I won’t spoil why that was such an apt comparison. It’s a fascinating little peek into the mind of somebody who, I confess, I’ve never thought all that much about.
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 3/6/14
March 6, 2014New review for The Van by Matt Reints today. And I didn’t have time to get it, but apparently I have a package waiting for me at the rental office with my name listed as “Sloth.” That should be fun to claim!
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Posted by Kevin
Reints, Matt – The Van
March 6, 2014
The Van
There are times when I’m not sure if something is meant to be funny or if I’m just taking it too seriously in general, and this is one of those times. This comic deals with a summer job that Matt had fixing wiring. There was a 50 mile drive every day to get to the jobs, and they were always driven by the same guy who seemed to have boundless energy. You may be able to see where this is going, but eventually the company mechanic discovered cocaine in a pack of cigarettes left in the van, but the guy who was asked about this was good friends with the driver, so they blamed some other poor schmuck, who seemed to have his life more or less ruined by his failing a drug test. I’m curious if the guy failed a test for cocaine too or some other drug, but that was never addressed. Anyway, overall this is a lighthearted story about working a summer job with a bunch of pranksters, but then I had to go and get all serious all over it. The art looks a little sloppier than the last issue of his that I reviewed (then again, I have no idea of the order in which he made these comics), with some odd blotches and scratches here and there. Like maybe the art being copied a few times? Hard to say. I just flipped through it and noticed that he copied a panel on two pages, which strikes me as a bad idea for an eight page comic. Anyway, I guess it’s clear that I was underwhelmed overall, but hey, I did like his other comic, so maybe you should check that one out instead.
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 3/4/14
March 4, 2014New review for Gag Rag #3 by Jeff Lok. Sorry about another long absence, but I just don’t have a lot of review comics at the moment, or money to buy more. There have to be comics that I haven’t reviewed around here somewhere…
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Posted by Kevin
Lok, Jeff – Gag Rag #3
March 4, 2014
Gag Rag #3
I’d like to start with a personal note to Jeff, just in case he reads this at some point: all those “do not bends” that you wrote on the envelope? Yeah, they don’t work. I wish they did, and I get why you’d put a bunch of them on the envelope, but my postal worker clearly sees those as more of a challenge than anything else. This could also be a note to other people who send me oversized comics, so there you go. Minis can fit in my mailbox easily, so no worries there. Now that I’ve dispensed with the utterly irrelevant portion of the review, how about the rest of this comic? There’s a lot to love, that’s for sure. Subjects include a running story dealing with God, his cat, Father Time and Baby New Year (in case you’re wondering, the name of God’s cat is “Cat”; the story deals with creation and time and all kinds of things), a dancing dog that leads into the title reveal, the farm (and some of the chickens on the farm), buying the lighthouse, dogs and their activities, and the golden egg. There’s also the highlight of the comic, but I say that because I’m biased: a story about the characters from “Friday Night Lights.” You may not know about the show, or you may not even have tried it because it’s about high school football, but you are wrong, and it really was one of the better shows of the last decade, and Jeff’s story of a night at the house of Coach Taylor was funny in all kinds of way. It also turns out that there is apparently an anthology in the world filled with stories like these, and it makes me sad that I don’t own it. Anyway, the thing I liked the most about this comic was the way that any one of the strips could pop up again later in some brief form. They were all mostly self-contained bits, but these characters are clearly trapped in a comic hell, and it’s delightful to read about it. You should read it too!
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 2/25/14
February 25, 2014New review today for Blunderbuss by Aaron Norhanian and Jason Ciaccia. Keep those review comics coming! If you’re going to be at SPACE in a couple of months, I’m talking to you. Also to the people who aren’t going to be there, but mostly you. Specifically!
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Posted by Kevin
Norhanian, Aaron – Blunderbuss
February 25, 2014
Blunderbuss
I really hope the $10 price tag doesn’t scare people away, as this is one hell of a comic. Actually it’s more like three mini comics bundled together (or four, but then the fourth would just be a regular old short story, which would be an odd format for a mini comic). See, there’s your value right there! Things start off with a table of contents that is brilliant because the comments in it can be appreciated before and after reading the stories in entirely different ways. Granted, you probably have to see that to know what I’m talking about, but that only places you at fault for not having the comic yet. The first story is about an awkward conversation on a bus, a misunderstanding of what constitutes a disability and the odd expectation that strangers on a bus will care what you’re talking about. It’s a little grotesque, and I mean that in the best possible sense. The next story answers the question of the origin of the universe, along with many of the questions that go along with it. Will everyone be satisfied? That is an impossibility, but I’m thinking about starting a religion based on this theory, purely so I can be tax-exempt too. The final comic story is a literal interpretation of the “square pegs can’t fit in a round hole” theory, and how the pegs that don’t fit can still make things better. I’m glossing over all the wonderfulness in those stories because only jerks reveal everything about stories where you’d be better off figuring them out for yourselves, but I thoroughly enjoyed all three of them, with the story about the origins of the universe winning the prize for best in the bunch, if such a prize existed. Finally there’s a short story about a beard growing a face by Jason Ciaccia. I go back and forth on short stories in comics, usually coming to the conclusion that they’d be better in zines or books, but there was a lot to love about this one. The central idea is sentient beards, so it’s hard to go wrong when you start with that premise. Check it out, there’s a lot to love here. $10
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 2/24/14
February 24, 2014New review today for Perpetual Motion by Pam Bliss. Anybody else having any more problems than usual connecting to the website or is it just me? Conversely, anybody know a good web hosting service/web design guru who is able to drag this website into at least the last decade, technologically speaking?
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Posted by Kevin
