September 13, 2011
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My Life in Records
It’s always a little tricky to pull off music in comics, but I think Grant nailed it here. This one is split into three stories, and the first one is entirely about music. There’s his first record, how certain songs trigger a nostalgic reaction or bring up distinct mental images, the air guitarist gradually moving up to the actual guitarist, all ending in a cacophony of sounds and images. Next up is a story of Grant growing up (Grant must be his middle name, as he’s called Tom in this one). It starts off with explaining the items that meant the most to each of the three brothers, then moves on to drawing in the early Saturday hours and how his only knowledge of Sesame Street was through a record with Bert and Ernie. There are also bits about growing up in a small room with two brothers (then the shock of moving to a house where they all got their own room) and trying to get a few glimpses of television when they visited their grandparents. This is the bulk of the book and it looks like the start of something bigger, and he’s gotten off to a fantastic start. Finally there’s a story about seeing Pinocchio in the theater when he was a kid, how he tried to make a Halloween costume of Pinocchio as he was changing into a donkey, and how he learned the difference between the “good” and “bad” record players. All of this is full, gorgeous color, so for $5 I’d call this a damned good deal.
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Posted by Kevin
September 12, 2011
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Monkey Squad One #7
OK, I’m officially converted. I was on the fence after the first couple of issues of this (that I saw, anyway, as I missed the first four issues), but then loved the recent annual. This particular comic is a thing of beauty, and I’m going back and forth on either explaining every bit of this comic or leaving it all to your imaginations. A happy medium would be best, don’t you think? It was mentioned in the last issue that the squad would be escorting a rapper to an awards show. But, thanks to the fact that this comic comes out on a regular basis and Doug has time to spend on such things, we get a few pages of backstory for this rapper before things get going. Then we jump to the gang sitting around listening to the rapper tell his story, and a fantastic ongoing gag begins: this group of kids trying to understand the language of an old white rapper. There’s plenty of comedy gold to be mined from that subject. Then we get to the digestive issues (that I could have done without, but hey, it is a group of kids we’re talking about), a roadblock, and then: zombie apocalypse. Regular readers of the site can stop right now, as that’s generally enough to get my seal of approval, but wait, there’s more! This is where it gets tricky in terms of saying too much, but the conversation about the believability of zombies in movies being turned into zombies while they were in full gear (cheerleader, clown, that sort of thing) never striking them as all that believable was fantastic. Anyway, the whole comic was a good old fashioned blast, and that full page of images of puzzles that they had to solve (all video game staples and cleverly done) now holds a special place in my heart. See, this is why I always tell people whose work I’m on the fence about to please keep sending me their stuff and to try and work out the problems that I point out. Not that I’m a guru at making a successful comic, but I like to think I at least have a few useful pointers on how to make it look more professional. Doug has improved by leaps and bounds in a few issues (not that he was terrible to begin with by any stretch) and now I have one more comic that I love seeing on a regular basis. $2.50
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Posted by Kevin
September 9, 2011
Sorry, but the week got away from me again. I got behind in my work and, as that’s the writing that pays the bills, it has to take precedence. 5 reviews next week at a bare minimum, that’s my pledge. Barring a full computer meltdown it should be possible. I also wanted to mention the current Top Shelf $3 sale. There isn’t a better deal in small press comics. The money from this sale pays for a lot of their yearly operating costs, and you get to have a whole pile of comics for cheap. There’s the cheaper versions of the collections and hardcovers (hardcover copies of the gigantic From Hell and Alec: The Years Have Pants for $25 each), $10 or $8 sales on much more expensive books (if you’ve missed any Jeffrey Brown comics, now’s your chance) and the $3 and even $1 books. You can get the two Hutch Owen collections by Tom Hart for $3 each along with even more Jeffrey Brown comics, and for $1 you can get all of the Happy comics by Josh Simmons, Hey Mister by Pete Sickman-Garner and a few Jennifer Daydreamer books among many other things. Check it out, buy comics and be happy.
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Posted by Kevin
September 7, 2011
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Window #11
Dave changes things up a bit in this issue by making the entire thing about one story. That cover page sums it up pretty well, as one of the bigger girls at Dave’s school tries to get a Tamagotchi from a smaller girl and her friend. The smaller girls make it clear that the device isn’t with them at school, things escalate for the poor girl on the cover (things get even worse than that for her), and somebody in authority is finally called in. I was a little annoyed at the lack of resolution until I realized that bullies and beatings like this rarely got satisfying resolutions when I was in school either. Teachers would get both sides of the story, one of those sides would be completely fabricated, and the frazzled teacher would have too much going on to make an accurate call, so they would usually split the difference. Dave wasn’t physically present in this issue, so I’m left wondering how he pieced this together. Did he get the accounts of the girls involved? Bits and pieces from various teachers who observed certain parts of this exchange? Either way it does an excellent job of summing up the chances these kids have of getting things decided fairly. It’s probably best to get them used to such disappointments at an early age, he says pessimistically. These books remain hard to find, but if you can’t they’re generally only a buck of two, so be on the lookout.
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Posted by Kevin
September 6, 2011
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Indestructible Universe #6
Would you like to know exactly how far my annoyance at people who can’t spell extends? Well, not so much people who can’t spell, as they can always ask friends who can spell to proofread their work, or use a spellchecker, or even plug a word into Google to get the correct spelling. When the comic with the terrible spelling is crappy anyway, the whole enterprise is easy enough to dismiss. For a comic like this, it gets a little more complicated. Morgan is a graduate of the Center for Cartoon Studies and studied under Jason Lutes, Steve Bissette, Eddie Campbell and James Sturm. That’s an impressive group of teachers right there, and this book is gorgeous in many ways, from the basic images to the inventive use of panel layouts. But is there no class at that school where they stress learning how to spell? For me that simple act of laziness at best or willful ignorance at worst makes me question the whole comic. Yes, I am aware that I’m getting all worked up over a “little thing” like proper spelling, but it takes a book that could easily pass as a professional comic from Fantagraphics or Drawn & Quarterly and makes it instantly amateurish. Feel free to chuckle if the culture has passed me by on this and nobody gives a shit about such things, but I’ll stick my curmudgeonly ways on this one, thanks all the same. So after that rant, what about the actual comic? Like I said, this book is gorgeous. I’m always up for a smart science fiction story, and this one either has potential to be that or is already there (this is the first issue I’ve read, so I have no idea what happened in the previous issues). The first story deals with some holy men and their task of keeping people from turning into werewolves with lanterns that they carry around, while other citizens get addicted to moonlight and have to be “healed.” There were more ideas in this eight page story than there are in many comics and I’d love to see them expanded upon, if they haven’t been already. The next story deals with the evolution of man and their constant efforts to control or curtail death. Next is a fantastic little fable about a group of animals combining their resources to reach the moon and steal back the piece of everybody that was left there to hold us all back. Finally there’s the ongoing story called Driftwood and, while I loved that “the story so far” page, it didn’t do a whole lot to explain what happened in previous issues. Still, it had another great fable (this time about a bird that outsmarted a hunter) until all of the characters get trapped in a traffic jam, which is apparently a bad thing. Logs are also involved, but I’m clearly not caught up on the story to make a coherent judgment on it. All in all I loved most of this comic, and if there were only a few spelling errors I could get past it, but there were several. If Morgan can do better in that department I think he’ll be an important voice to watch. Well, he’ll be that either way, but I’m not the only person in the world who tunes out when the spelling flies off the rails. At least I hope I’m not, although with the way the world is going it’s entirely possible. No price listed, but this beautiful and hefty book is at least $5.
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Posted by Kevin
August 26, 2011
New review for Mortal Tedium by John Robbins. I sometimes ask you readers to buy comics, like now if you want to celebrate or otherwise mark the 10th anniversary of the website. Still, I never recommend comics for people who might be intimidated by the 450+ comics to choose from. So, in no particular order (as I’m not a fan of lists, which is why I don’t grade comics by a star or numbered scale), here are 10 comics that I didn’t know about when I started this site but now consider necessary reading for any fan of the genre.
Honorable mentions go to entire series where I don’t want to single out one issue, like Slither from Kelly Froh, Reich by Elijah Brubaker, And Then One Day by Ryan Claytor, Ruffians by Brian Canini (also a good bet for bargain hunters), True Travel Tales by Justin Hall, Tales to Demolish by Eric Haven, Shuteye by Sarah Becan, Legal Action Comics anthologies edited by Danny Hellman (and featuring everybody you’ve ever heard of in the comics business as of five years ago when they were released), Unlucky by Matthew Hawkins, Watching Days Become Years by Jeff LeVine, Tear Stained Makeup AND Carl by Marcos Perez, King Cat by John Porcellino (duh, but just on the off-chance that you aren’t already reading it), Unlovable by Esther Pearl Watson, Reporter by Dylan Williams, and Lackluster World by Eric Adams. If your comic wasn’t mentioned here and you’re annoyed, please keep in mind that I genuinely like a good 99% of the stuff in my store and that I was trying to make a finite list. Happy weekend everybody! Watch out for that hurricane…
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Posted by Kevin
August 26, 2011
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Mortal Tedium
If my website somehow exploded in a giant orange action movie ball of flame tomorrow, at least I would have comics from people like John Robbins that I never would have heard of otherwise to comfort me. Assuming that I survived the explosion of my website, as I have no idea of the blast radius of such a hypothetical thing. This is a collection of seven short stories, although they were all released first in different anthologies. Believe you me, John is living in Dublin and there’s no way in the world that you’ve already read all seven stories. I’d read the ones from Gin Palace #2 and the Side B anthology, but that was it, and I keep up with this sort of thing for a “living.” Dog-Eared is the story from Gin Palace #2, and it deals with an aging writer coming across a copy of one of his old books in a used bookstore. Upon closer inspection he sees that this was the copy that he gave a past girlfriend, which brings a flood of memories and regrets. Caro Mio Ben was from Side B and it details the desperate attempts to remember someone through the music that they enjoyed. Other than that (in order of personal preference) there’s The Receiver(computer support gone horribly wrong), Dad’s Head (in which John explains the various ways in which something is not quite right with his dad’s head, right up until the delightful mindfuck of an ending), Dental (the random sentences of a very small child), Troubled (idealism meets reality) and Zero (the heftiest one page story you’ll ever see dealing with a man who can’t forget childhood torments). If you think that that means that I hate the last story just because I listed it last, please be aware of the fact that every one of these stories is fantastic in its own way and you should all be so lucky as to be forced to read a “bad” John Robbins story. No price listed, but I’d guess that $5 or maybe even a little less could get you a copy.
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Posted by Kevin
August 25, 2011
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Monthly
With the pace that Brian has established in making comics, it might be tempting to take that title literally. You’d be wrong, as it’s actually about a suicidal werewolf, but it would be an easy mistake to make. Anyway, yeah: suicidal werewolf. The only way this werewolf can be killed is by being shot through the heart three times by someone who loves him, so he has to spend the time between changes getting somebody to fall in love with them while still keeping them willing to kill him when he changes into a werewolf. Naturally this is a difficult trick to accomplish, as all the “I’m a werewolf” talk in the world wouldn’t keep you from being any less terrified when the actual change occurred. This first issue is mostly setting all that up, but it also managed to include a few intriguing questions. He still seems to chat with his mother, for example, and he can only be killed by somebody he loves, so… Well, it was intriguing to me anyway, but come to think of it I still haven’t seen a finished series by the man. It’s another fine addition to his comics pile, and if you liked his previous stuff I sure don’t see a reason for you to avoid this. I poked around on his website a bit today and saw that he has a number of past issues available for free download (including this one), so why not check out a few for free and see what you think? Then at least buy a few of them, as it’s a little sleazy to just read all his stuff for free. Yes, I am in fact one of the few people left who cares about such things. $1
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Posted by Kevin
August 23, 2011
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Last Slice
It’s going to be a long time before we all figure out just how devastating the loss of Harvey Pekar was to the small press comics community. Sure, there was his own incredible work, and the world is poorer for the fact that there will be no new stuff (unless there are unfinished bits and pieces out there, but it’s still a damned finite resource). But the greatest thing about Harvey in my mind was the fact that he was a relentless champion of the medium and did all he could to help out artists that he liked. I’m bringing all this up here because Jaime mentions in one of his strips that he had actually stopped drawing entirely for five years before Harvey tracked him down and talked him back into it. I’ve been a fan of Jaime’s work for years and to think that all that talent was hanging on that thread is disturbing. Here’s hoping that other respected comics elders take up the slack, as I frankly don’t think people like reviewers have the standing to pull it off. So how about the actual comic? Yes, I do remember that that is the point of a review. These are the best of the “Slice O’ Life” strips (as chosen by Jaime, obviously), but he mentions that he had to cut some of them down from six to four panels, which immediately makes me wonder what that changed. He also mentions that these strips lack the detail that he uses on his other comics, as the strip was being printed in color and all that detail didn’t come out anyway, but there’s still more detail in each strip than I see in plenty of entire mini comics. Anyway, these are all four panel strips about a variety of different topics, with 40 of them in all. Topics include a dangerous stretch of river current, creepy religion, a crappy day, entertainment on the bus, the circuitous logic of a running man, assholes telling their most intimate details while talking on their cell phones, a dedicated drunk/druggie from high school, the meaning behind empty vanilla extract bottles that you might see lying around, the best surfer in the world, how risky activities have changed from when he was a kid to now, Santa in the hood, how the “razors in the apples” Halloween rumor ruined the free local caramel apples, the things that a dog brings home, and George Hamilton. That’s just the first half, you can discover the second half of strips for yourself. In case that wasn’t perfectly clear, you should buy this comic, and anything else he does (although I will mention it if he does a terrible comic, it’s just that I haven’t seen one yet). Don’t let this man drift away from comics again… $4 (?)
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Posted by Kevin
August 22, 2011
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Bad Breath Comics #3
“Too” and “to” are two completely different words. Just saying, as that was the only glaringly obnoxious thing that stood out to me from this comic. Not that Josh is the only person who makes that mistake (far from it, sadly) but it still bugs the hell out of me every time I see it. So how about the content? It was strange and uneven at times, with hints of possible greatness to come. Or not, but I see potential. Stories in here that I enjoyed include an old man and his seagulls, the one about car auctions (until it devolved into utter nonsense in the last few panels, which sure looked to me like another one of those “I have no idea how to end this so I’ll just stop” stories), a long but oddly rewarding setup for a dragon pun, the CEO asking for more money on a street corner, a wordless protest against bras and fights (I think that’s what it was about anyway, but in any case it was a good excuse to have a naked woman running around for a few pages), and the dumb fuck trying to find a box of cereal. The long piece about a fake cola company trying to win over the public while doing some horrible stuff behind the scenes didn’t always hold together very well and it had another awkward ending, but I’m all for somebody at least trying to be political in their comics. Things have been falling to shit for ages now and people who speak up even a little bit should be encouraged. That cover is delightfully awkward, with nothing to do with the contents, and the back cover is pretty great too. That seems to be pretty much all of the stories that I enjoyed at least a little bit, and when I say that this was uneven I mean that most of the individual stories felt that way, but this also looks like early days for Josh in the comics business. With that considered he’s off to a fine start on his way to putting out 6-12 more comics of increasing quality until he takes a proper job and leaves all this behind. Not that I’m feeling overly cynical today or anything. But hey, $2 for this much content is a steal any way you look at it.
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Posted by Kevin
August 19, 2011
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Team Girl Comic #3
It’s finally happened: my brain is falling out. I can’t think of any other reason why a good chunk of these stories left me utterly flummoxed. Well, other than the fact that maybe they weren’t particularly good stories. Just to get this out of the way early, I know that some contributors to this comic are young (13ish) girls, and if I happen to overly criticize one of their stories, it’s meant to maybe give them constructive criticism that will help them over the long run (you’d be hard-pressed to find ANYBODY who was a brilliant comic artist/writer at 13). It’s a fine line to do that without also looking like a jerk, so my apologies in advance if I wander over that line. I have only the best of intentions! Anyway, it’s best to start with the stuff that I liked. Hoo boy, a functioning table of contents would have been nice too. OK, positive stuff, like I said: Karena Moore with the dog and the magic talking boots, Colleen Campbell with a funny one panel strip, Gil Hatchers’ strip on the problems of huddling for warmth with a mechanical bear, Penny Sharp and her series of fake full page phone ads, Emma McLuckie commanding a robot, Gil Hatcher lamenting her terrible skills as an older sister (before getting a nice physical reminder of why she’s too hard on herself), Laura Armstrong and her tale of robot rights, the smudgingly creepy ending to the story by Heather Middleton, Karena Moore’s midge story and Gil Hatcher’s story about trying to hide a candy purchase. The other stories either made no sense to me or left me cold. The story about the bear hugs was OK, but it was clearly resized for the comic (not the fault of the artist, obviously) and that really screwed up the look of it. The wordless “welcome home” story made no sense at all to me, “the interns” could maybe get better but it’s “to be continued” after two pages, the wordless story with a security camera flew right over my head and the “kids” story had a punchline that wasn’t remotely funny to me, but maybe it would make more sense if I had kids. Yes, I purposefully avoided using artist’s names for the bad bits, but that’s also because I wasn’t sure who did at least a few of those stories. If you’re looking for a good/not so good percentage (always useful in an anthology), I’d put it at roughly 80/20 good to bad, which is still a great ratio for one of these things. That and the fact that this group of women mostly from Glasgow is doing this at all is something that should be strongly supported by anybody who complains about all the middle-aged white guys in comics. Oh, and have I mentioned how much I love that cover? No price listed, but $5 seems like a reasonable guess.
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Posted by Kevin
August 18, 2011
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The Escapologist #1
For those of you who were dying to solve the mystery of “Simon M.,” , I give you Simon Moreton! For everybody else who has no idea what I’m talking about, Simon is the guy who did all of those delightful Smoo comics that I’m sure you all dutifully purchased after I told you how much I enjoyed them. Simon is starting a new series with this comic, and a quick check of his website shows that #2 is already done (he’s just working on the publishing end of things at the moment) and that he’s also working on #3. Well, so much for my theory that this comic was one of those one-shot comics that small press writers invariably put a “#1” on. It’s easy to think that, as this is a comic about everything. I mean that: everything. It’s a lot to convey in eight pages, so it ends up being confined more to Simon’s general area, but it’s there. Things start off with Simon on the street, staring at birds, before he leaves his body and takes a journey of the city. then pulls it all back together with mentioning the fact that we also all hold together the very ink on the pages. It’s all very self-contained, which makes me a little surprised that #2 is already done, and more than a little curious to see what it’s about. This is mostly a wordless tale with one fantastic quote at the end. To me this comic was both a chance to escape for a minute or two (as the title implies) while also contemplating the manner in which the entire world fits together. That’s damned tricky to accomplish, and it may or may not have been what he was shooting for, but that’s what I saw. No price, but I think it’s around $4.
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Posted by Kevin
