New review for Herman the Manatee #4 by Jason Viola. The fundraiser really picked up steam today, as I now need just $30 over the next 14 days to keep this site going for another year. Don’t stop now!
Update for 10/13/11
October 13, 2011
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Posted by Kevin
Viola, Jason – Herman the Manatee #4
October 13, 2011
Herman the Manatee #4
I don’t know how this issue of Herman got shuffled out of the rotation, as I like these comics a bunch, but there it was at the bottom of another pile of minis. Time to get my (imaginary) comics secretary in here to clean the place up. I remember wondering in the first issue if the shtick of Herman getting bonked on the head by passing boats would get old, and here we are at #4 and Jason has almost entirely taken that gag out of the strip. Oh, it still shows up a few times, and if anything it’s even funnier because you don’t know when it’s coming. Other than that this volume focuses a bit more on Herman’s friends (as you could guess by that fantastic subtitle), with a special 100th strip at the end that shows Jason’s creative process to get into Herman’s head. The other strips include Herman getting pushed around by the narwhal, trying to make friends with Lester, getting organized, summing up Hamlet in a beautiful way, being seen in 3D, putting god to sleep, and imagining a better life for himself. That’s maybe a third of the strips, but you should discover everything else for yourself. That’s assuming you haven’t been keeping up with this series, as you really should be. It’s not everybody who can make me rethink my “ongoing strips are generally just not funny” theory, and Jason did that in a big way. Of course, I don’t think he’s published in any newspaper or alternative weekly (although please correct me if I’m wrong), so here’s hoping he doesn’t give up. You giving him money for comics would probably be a nice motivation… $4
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 10/12/11
October 12, 2011New review for Jam Days by Emma T. Capps. Hey, the fundraiser has moved past the theoretical stage! I got a $5 donation today, which just proves that it really wouldn’t take all that much to get to $100 if a few dozen people sent in a few bucks. Or just ordered some comics, which would make more sense if it was me.
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Posted by Kevin
Capps, Emma T. – Jam Days
October 12, 2011
Jam Days
Comics folk who are older than 14, you need to step up your game. Emma is coming to steal your job! Well, not really, as there’s more than enough room for all kinds of people to make comics. However, she is 14, and gets 100 points (if I awarded points) for presentation alone. This comic came (along with another comic that I’ll get to in a week or so) in a blue folder, with a few pages of praise from critics and a long letter telling me all about the comics. There was also a greeting card, as she apparently does that on the side, and the whole package really made me take note. Not that you comics folk who just send a comic along with no note are jerks, as I do get the general idea when I get comics like that in the mail. One tip for Emma: if you want to make sure your comic gets to somebody without it getting all bent up, put a small piece of stiff cardboard in with the book. It doesn’t weigh much and the postal workers won’t have a chance to really bend it no matter how hard they try. And believe me, some of them will try. Some of them seem to take the “please do not bend” notice on packages as a challenge. So how about the comic? Well, I loved the fact that the inside front cover was a backwards version of the front cover, even though it had nothing to do with the story. She also mentions that she won the gold medal for comics in the Alliance for Young Writers and Artists, and I can’t tell you how happy it makes me that such a thing exists. Anyway, Emma finds out that there’s no jam in the house so she decides to go out and get berries to make her own. The trouble is that they’re all high up on trees, and one of the trees is near a house, so there’s significant trouble getting the berries down in one piece. It’s full color and she’s already using pretty inventive comics panels, as her breaking down her effort to get one troublesome berry into nine panels worked perfectly. Technically it’s pretty impressive, and it sure looks like the (comics) sky is the limit for her, assuming she keeps at it. Having Dan Archer as a mentor doesn’t hurt even a little bit either. $3, and looking at the website it looks like you can get this in different sizes if you’d like.
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 10/11/11
October 11, 2011New review for Ex: Cloves by Mary Golding. The fundraiser to keep the site running another year is gradually reaching “is this thing on?” territory, as I’m still looking for $100 over the next 16 days. Has the site just run its course? Would somebody even tell me if it had?
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Posted by Kevin
Golding, Mary – Ex: Cloves
October 11, 2011
Ex: Cloves
One good thing about going through old minis is that I can find stuff that I should have reviewed ages ago. Mary (who always seems to go by Meg, but I was told to list her as Mary (or my brain fell out and I’m making that part up)) sent this one probably a year and a half ago and, even though it was a shimmering silver cover, it somehow got buried in the comics mounds. It’s a shame because it’s a damned fine comic and people should know about it, assuming that she still has copies. I didn’t see any on her website, but then again I didn’t see ANY comics on her website, and that can’t be right. Anyway, this tells the story of Mary trying to come out of a difficult breakup. Like all recovery periods, lying to yourself is a big part of it, as is hooking up with somebody on a purely physical level to ease the pain. This also happened right around the time when she was moving out of a city, so everything took on a sped up “what does it all mean?” quality. It’s heartbreaking and empowering at the same time, as she ends up being significantly happier with the guy who made her no promises than she ever was with the guy who broke her heart. Contact her if you want a copy, which you should if you’ve ever struggled through a difficult breakup, which is probably everybody reading this. Or maybe you’re one of the lucky few who only does the breaking up, in which case you might want to read this to see what happens after you leave. No price, but that fantastic cover alone has to make it at least $3.
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 10/10/11
October 10, 2011New review for PDX 100 by Matt Sundstrom, and no, the comic doesn’t have anything to do with racing bikes or exercise plans, if that’s what you were thinking. My (so far) purely theoretical fundraiser continues, and you reader types still have 17 days left to help me raise $100 to keep the lights on in this joint for another year. By buying comics from me, I mean, although you can always just send Paypal money to my e-mail address if you somehow don’t care for comics but would like for me to keep the website going.
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Posted by Kevin
Sundstrom, Matt – PDX 100
October 10, 2011
PDX 100
Well, this isn’t a good sign. Here I am trying to convince people to fork over the cash needed to keep this website going for another year, and I don’t have a damned thing to say about this comic. This is a gorgeously produced $10 comic that contains 100 drawings of different parts of Portland. And… that’s it. Matt drew different sections and sorted them all into geographical locations, so if you’re a local you can at least flip to a certain section of town to try to find something recognizable. If you’re not a local of Portland and if you really have no interest in the city one way or another, I’m completely comfortable telling you to skip this one. Basing this review purely on technical terms, there isn’t a thing wrong with this comic. I also don’t want this to seem like I’m crapping on Matt, as he’s done other comics that I’ve enjoyed, and I think there’s even another comic of his around here somewhere that I still need to review. It’s just that I don’t see why this comic exists. Looking around on the internets a bit I can see that this was published by a company that just publishes Matt’s books and it’s based out of Portland, so this does make sense in that context. Matt also apparently spent a lot of time wandering the city, as several of the pictures are of what appears to be random houses, so I’m sure the whole thing was a blast for him. Maybe I get stuck too much on price tags, and $10 does seem to be about right for a book of this size and quality. It just seems excessive at a time when so many people are broke and mini comics as a whole are becoming more and more of a luxury purchase. At least give me something to convince people to buy! Ack, I didn’t intend for this level of vitriol, as it’s a mostly harmless book for the world at large and probably quite a nice thing to have if you live in Portland. I’ll shut up now and suggest that you just buy some of his other comics instead. $10
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 10/9/11
October 9, 2011New review for Cross-Eyed by Adam Meuse. Still looking for $100 in comics sales in roughly the next 18 days. You guys do know to contact me if there was some problem with your attempt to order comics, right? Just making sure…
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Posted by Kevin
Meuse, Adam – Cross-Eyed
October 9, 2011
Cross-Eyed
Eyeballs! Everybody has them, so why not make a comic about them? Adam goes a bit further than that, theorizing that everything has eyeballs, and from that idea several strips were born. The big story in here is more or less an extended illustrated poem, in which Adam talks about how even eyes have eyes, and their eyes have eyes, onwards to infinity. Excellent punchline, but I’ll say no more about it. Other strips are shorter and generally deal with various crises from these creatures, including the beach, ocean and sky all not knowing their own vastness, clouds complaining to a rainbow, another poem with that sort of fell apart but was saved by another nice punchline, raindrops wondering what they’ll be when they hit the ground (and the moment of realization of what they really are when they hit the ocean instead), and a confused desert island. Existential crises galore, that’s what I’m trying to say, with the occasional bit of complete silliness thrown in to keep any readers from falling into a funk. Right up my alley, in other words, but your opinions may vary. I didn’t see this listed on his website, but then again I couldn’t find a website of his that had comics on it, so I’m not sure of the price. I’m going with $4 in my role as arbiter of such things. Not that I ever asked for such a role, but as fewer and fewer people tell me what their comics cost, I’ve decided to just make things up and stick with them, evidence be damned.
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 10/8/11
October 8, 2011What, you thought I was kidding about weekend reviews? New review today for Nothing is Private by Luis Echavarria. Roughly 19 days left in the fundraiser, I still need $100 to keep this site going for another year. I’m going to avoid pessimistic comments about the state of the fundraiser until there are 10 days left, then I’m going to get all emo on your asses.
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Posted by Kevin
Echavarria, Luis – Nothing is Private
October 8, 2011
Nothing is Private
It’s probably impossible to tell from that scan, but you open this comic by pulling the key out of the keyhole, which is ingenious. The whole comic is impressively put together, as there’s also a transparent sheet when you open the book with the title on it. This is a story from Luis growing up. Back in the day he would share a shower with his younger brother (he was 11 and his brother was 5) and the two brothers were perfectly content to keep showering together, but their older sister would consistently barge into the bathroom looking for some small item that most likely could have waited until after the shower. This went on for awhile, word got out to the rest of the family, and between that and the embarrassment of Luis’ younger brother pointing out his early pubic hairs, Luis put an end to it. That still left some revenge on their sister to take care of, but kids like that aren’t always the best at plotting such things, and the revenge backfired horribly. Without giving too much away, let’s just say that they barged in on the wrong family member. There’s also a pretty great ending bit involving his younger brother and his own first “pubic hair.” This is a damned solid book; the facial expressions were fantastic, and there was substantial attention to detail. Maybe that’s supposed to be the norm, but I see a lot of minis and a lot of people wouldn’t have bothered drawing the tiles on the bathroom wall, or the rich wealth of items surrounding their dinner table. I have no idea on the price, as nothing was listed on his website (which is in Spanish, by the way, but Google can translate it for you), but judging from sheer quality alone it has to be at least $5. Luis was also nice enough to send along several more minis and I’m looking forward to going through them. Well, I’m looking forward to them if all of the comics are of this same level of quality. If this was some bizarre fluke then it’ll be a different story…
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 10/7/11
October 7, 2011New review for Cereal With a Fork #1 by Kyle Courcy. I figured that since I’m doing a fundraiser to try and get the $100 needed for the yearly website fees in roughly 20 days, I might as well do daily updates until it’s through. So that means yes, weekend updates. Now somebody order some damned comics so I don’t have to worry about whether or not I can pay these bills…
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Posted by Kevin
Courcy, Kyle – Cereal With a Fork #1
October 7, 2011
Cereal With a Fork #1
A funny thing happened while I was reading this comic. Well, several funny things, as it’s a collection of over 100 strips varying from one to several panels (but mostly one panel). The thing is that it wasn’t all that funny at first. The humor was either stupid or just not that funny, and the art didn’t do it a ton of favors. Then it started getting gradually funnier, then suddenly I was laughing out loud on a fairly regular basis. The strip sampled below was the one that totally convinced me, although your opinions may vary. The art never did get all that complicated, but who cares? It’s the humor that matters in something like this, and Kyle figured that out pretty well after he worked the kinks out. He also mentioned in the afterward that this was the first time he had drawn anything since maybe grade school, so that’s a perfectly respectable learning curve. So what are the comics about? Well, keeping in mind that there are more than 100 of them, some of them are about bad advertising for a coffee shop, the difference between somebody wearing a bluetooth and the same person not wearing one, the Douche Palace, a beginner piano, and suddenly being transported 10,000 years into the past. There’s also a continuing gag for a few strips that starts off with a family of pizzas ordering a medium human, with the following strips documenting the imaginary reactions to this strip. If you want to know more, you’ll be happy to know that this behemoth is only $3, and if you need more convincing he has all kinds of samples up at this site. The ones I saw all looked funny, which indicates to me that he has the hang of this daily humor thing now. It’s a difficult thing to keep up, but he’s off to a pretty damned good start. $3
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 10/6/11
October 6, 2011New review today for Star #1 by Brian John Mitchell & Kurt Dinse. Fundraisers of any sort rarely work for me, but it’s the time of year when I have to sign up for the domain name and all that jazz, which usually runs around $100 when it’s all said and done. This time around I may or may not have the money to keep this thing running, as things are exceptionally tight. If you good folks were to buy roughly that amount of comics, well, then I could keep the lights on for another year, no problem. If not I’m still going to do all that I can to keep things going, but food and rent does have to come first. So buy comics! Or, if you have more money than you know what to do with, send money to my paypal address at whitey@opticalsloth.com. I have right around 20 days before I have to start paying people…
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Posted by Kevin
Mitchell, Brian John & Dinse, Kurt – Star #1
October 6, 2011
Star #1
These comics of Brian’s are often illustrated simply, at least partially due to the size constraints (if you’ve never held one of these comics, they’re about the size of your thumb). This one breaks that trend in a big way, as Kurt Dinse makes this book gorgeous. I’m assuming that he drew these larger and then shrunk them down, but it wasn’t done in a way to detract from the art. This is the story of a rock star who’s trying to outrun his past of summoning demons. His lifestyle helps in this endeavor, but his utter lack of concern for all of the other people who are damaged from his actions makes him a less than sympathetic character. Still, that’s half the fun for most of Brian’s characters, and he generally he has me caring about them in the end anyway. Like all of his #1 issues, this is primarily just setting up the character and what’s happening. Frankly, I don’t know if it would have been all that compelling with stick figure art, but Kurt’s drawing really do wonders for this story. I don’t know how the man crams that many foreboding shadows on such a tiny page, but kudos to him for doing it. This is $1, like pretty much all of his books and, as always, I advise you to spend at least $10 and get a sample package of these l’il treasures.
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 10/5/11
October 5, 2011New review for Indestructible Universe #7 by Morgan Pielli, in which I still try to puzzle out how the scanner works on this computer. I more or less failed.
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Posted by Kevin
Pielli, Morgan – Indestructible Universe #7
October 5, 2011
Indestructible Universe #7
No, the pages aren’t that strongly yellow, but a new computer means trying to figure out how the scanner works all over again. Three stories in this one, and I wish that Morgan would make the titles a little more distinct so that I know that a new story is starting. I was a few pages into the second story before I understood that this was an entirely new thing. It’s also possible that I’m just dense and he’s doing it fine, which is the most likely answer. The first story is a creepy little tale of a man and his apprentice building a long set of stairs. The master tells how the steps are numbered (gold, silver, and death) and what it means to step on each one. I didn’t understand exactly why the ending went down the way that it did which, again, is more likely due to my denseness than anything else. It just didn’t make sense to me who the apprentice was in relation of the master, but it’s entirely possible that it wasn’t supposed to. The second story… holy crap, I think there are actually four stories. Yeah, he does need to work on his title placement. There was no clue that there was a third story starting. Anyway, the second story deals with a new venereal disease that appears to remove the lips and leave only a patchwork mouth. The afflicted are also drawn to other people who share their primary number, which I shouldn’t get into too much without blowing the story. The third story is a shorter piece about a man who breaks in to the home of a long-time adversary and ends up on a horrific, inescapable trap. Finally we get the continuation of the Driftwood story from the last issue (you know, the one that I was already confused about due to the lack of any kind of a recap of previous entries) and things start coming together a bit this time around. Frankly, it’s still too jumbled for me to be sure, so I’ll refrain from saying much, but it looks to be going in an innovative direction. Frankly, all of his stuff is innovative and deeply weird (which is always great in my book). The only troubles I have are with the technical aspects. Maybe a table of contents? That would have shut me right up about anything wrong with the book. I don’t see this listed on his website, but I think the last issue was $5, so this one must be close to that.
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Posted by Kevin
Update for 10/4/11
October 4, 2011New update today for Life is Good #6 by Steve Seck. Last week got away from me, so sorry about the missed updates again. As for yesterday, it was my birthday and I was breaking in a new computer, so I was too dazzled to do any actual work. Should be smooth sailing from here, as this computer should be good for years (provided that I don’t break it somehow) and the scanner even works on it. What could possibly go wrong?
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Posted by Kevin
Seck, Steve – Life is Good #6
October 4, 2011
Life is Good #6
Huzzah to Steve for including a concise, informative recap of past issues right on the inside front cover! Hey, if I’m going to bitch about all the people who don’t take that simple step, it stands to reason that I should praise the people who manage to do it, right? Anyway, if you’re not caught up in the series and have plans to at some point (it’s generally funny with a thoroughly ridiculous cast of characters and it looks great, so why wouldn’t you?), I’ll probably spoil a few bits from the past. This time around Charles is trying to come to grips with his “littering addiction,” Sewer Gator gets his revenge on Charles (possibly the most good-natured beating I’ve ever seen), and Peace Rock and Unity Flower continue to see their relationship fall apart (and she finally starts to see through Unity Flower). Also starring Brownie! Seriously, it’s odd that what started out as the main character gets less focus this time around, but at this point all of the other characters are more interesting anyway. Not that Brownie doesn’t have a thing to do, as his crudely drawn daily comics are discovered by Sewer Gator, who then exploits them for all they’re worth. That opening scene with Charles talking about his litter addiction in front of an AA group was beautiful, as was Unity Flower’s hiring a worker to take care of his duties. Steve’s built up a nice little universe here and it’ll be interesting to see what he makes of it over the coming issues. $4
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Posted by Kevin
