May 2, 2010
Website
Adventures of A-Girl #5
Add this to the list of stuff that I didn’t bother to put on the page because I hadn’t seen anything from the creator for a few years. By now it should be obvious that I just miss a lot of the little anthologies and stuff that people put out, and the local comic store usually doesn’t have anything too out of the ordinary (although they are getting better), so it’s not the easiest thing in the world for me to keep up with everything. Anyway, I’ve loved this series for years. It has a whimsical (there’s one word I thought I’d never use in a review) feel to it that is unmatched by pretty much anything else out there. The art style is a bit simplistic, but it fits the mood of the book perfectly. This issue is mostly about A-Girl (the “A” stands for “asexual”, in case you were wondering) showing us around the duplex she lives in. This is just one of those books that puts a smile on my face for the whole time that I’m reading it, and I can’t think of a better recommendation that that. Check out her website to see what she has available. She says that all of the issues are online, which just isn’t true unless I have no idea how to point and click. Which really sucks because I thought I would finally get to read #4, but there you go…
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Website
Huzzah! #1
Well, he already has a good title. From there it’s easy to see that he also has a really great website, and by now you’re probably curious to see how the comic is. It’s all over the place, random, funny stuff. The first half of the book is with the guy on the cover. He gets super powers of some kind and decides to go some good by taking care of all the giant crabs at a restaurant. Stupidity is pretty much the theme of the comic, but it’s done well. The rest of the issue is a bunch of one page strips, about all sorts of topics ranging from evils twins, our robot overlords, Martian hillbillies, and a kid with a sandwich for a head. The art is fantastic, especially for a first issue, and three cheers for clear, concise lettering! This is well worth the buck. Even if you don’t like some of the stuff in here it’s so packed that you’re pretty much guaranteed to get a few laughs out of it. Check it out, like a dollar is going to kill you or something…
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Website
Prelim
See, it’s books like this that show my knowledge of art history to be woefully inadequate and, as such, something that I’m bound to look uninformed and ridiculous in even commenting on some of the phenomenal artwork contained herein. That being said, luckily this is just a website about comics, meant to give smarter and more informed artists nudges in interesting and diverse directions, so let the nudging begin! As you can see from “The art of Chad Verrill” right there on the cover, you might get the idea that this is a collection of drawings, not so much a linear story, and you’d be right there. Chad plays with mirror worlds, various sexual escapades both real, implied and fantastical, and fables, along with more than a few uncategorizable pieces. If you’ve been around this website I’d say this is a cross between Pat Aulisio and Paul Hornschemeier, with maybe a dash of Jim Woodring thrown in, then Chad throws these possible influences away and makes his own unique creation. He also mention several artists who worked in woodcuts as influences (the influences I mentioned came purely from my own head). If you’re an artist who is constantly looking to push yourself, always on the hunt for something genuinely new and different, you’ll certainly find it here. As for me, I’m hoping to set this on a bookshelf, like Chad helpfully suggests, and going back to it in a few months to revisit the images that have stuck in my brain (there are already a couple, particularly the images sampled and some of the more bizarre sexual bits) and see what I can see again as new. $9.95
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Website
Rabid Eye: The Dream Art of Rick Veitch (The Collected Rare Bit Fiends Series Volume 1)
Have you ever wondered why nobody has done a comic that is just their dreams, translated to comics form? Well, someone did. About 5 years ago, Rick Veitch started a dream journal and did at least 11 issues of Rare Bit Fiends. I didn’t stick with it because it didn’t have any kind of a story, which makes no sense at all if you think that these are dreams we’re talking about. The issues of this series that I did read were a unique comic experience, and I wish I had kept going with the whole thing. I’m on the hunt for back issues because it’s probably cheaper than getting the big book, but if you’re interested and don’t feel like seeking all these out, go for it. This guy doesn’t get enough credit, possibly because he did superhero stuff for so long. I have respect for anybody who gets thrown off Swamp Thing in the middle of a major storyline because he wants to bring Jesus into it…
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Fansite
Johnny the Homicidal Maniac: Director’s Cut
I’ve always thought that it was a cop-out for any reviewer to say “Well, I just don’t know” about any book. You have to have some opinion about the thing that you just spent the last two hours reading. Well, I do have an opinion, but it’s mostly indifferent. Don’t get me wrong, I strongly disliked large chunks of this, but when it was all said and done I also liked chunks of it quite a bit. I didn’t like his ripping off Evan Dorkin, but maybe it was a tribute. I doubt it, but I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt. This is about, strangely enough, a homicidal maniac who goes around killing everyone. The first two issues are pure mayhem, and it was disgusting. Maybe I’m getting old, but excessive meaningless violence doesn’t really do it for me. Starting with the third issue, Johnny started to get a reason for killing as many people after the third issue, and I started to like it. Simple as that. This might be the kind of thing that’ll grow on me, or might be the kind of thing that I can’t stand the second time around, but the important thing is that I’m going to read it again at some point, and probably his other book too. Tell you what, I’ll get a highlighter. Send me your copies and I’ll highlight the pages that I think are great. Other than that, it’s at least worth a read to find out about this for yourself.
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Website
E-mail for Terry
Your Puffy Ships Are Sinking
Lookie here, another one of those abstract, mostly wordless comics where I try to determine some sort of meaning in a brief ramble about the contents. What’s the point? What’s so great about nailing something to the real world that quite possibly wasn’t meant to be interpreted into reality? In that vein, screw it. What you have here is a mostly wordless tale involving a creature giving another creature the gift of hair. Said gift gets out of hand, giants need hats, and the whole thing comes together beautifully when one of them literally rides off on a musical note. The image of a character riding off on a musical note, for all you aspiring cartoonists out there, will get a positive review out of me every time; I just can’t resist it. There’s also a little bonus strip that runs along the bottom of the pages, or perhaps it’s part of the larger story and I just can’t see it, involving a man trying to avoid being eaten by a giant apple, at least at first. Isn’t it fun to try and take comics like this literally? My guess is that Garrett did the writing and Terry did the art, but one look at the website has me thinking that’s probably wrong. Oh well, it was called (reluctantly) a jam in the note attached, maybe they both took turns “jamming”. Well worth checking out, it’s probably around $3…
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Website
Celebrity Skint
It’s a day of tiny minis, as that cover sample is only slightly smaller than the actual comic. This is a collection of celebrity quotes paired with their likenesses, although I didn’t know who some of them were. These folks include: Bob Dylan, John Waters (in the sample), Fiona Apple, Shirley Manson and Annie Sprinkle, among others I didn’t know. It’s an interesting concept, although it didn’t do too much for me as I’m way too stuck on the whole “coherent narrative” idea, at least most of the time. Still, there are some pretty good quotes in here, so it’s up to you (as always) to decide whether or not to send a buck her way.
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Amarillo
You know, as far as monotony goes, getting fantastic book after fantastic book is the kind of monotony that I can live with. Another person that I’ve never heard of, another thoroughly enjoyable reading experience. This one even had some pet peeves of mine, like misspellings and typed letters in the word balloons, and it wasn’t anywhere near enough for me to dislike this book. This is the story of a painter who is trying to make it while having “painters block”. He meets his idol and tries to learn from him only to find out that he might not like what he learns. But, of course, it’s nowhere near as cheesy as that, I’m just trying not to give anything away. It’s $10 and you can send him money at: 2484 W. 73 PL Hialeah, FL 33016. He has kind of a scrambled, impressionistic art style and it works perfectly for this. Anyone who has ever tried to create anything can relate to this story. I didn’t like the ending that much, probably because I could see it coming, but it’s still a good ending for this story. Have I mentioned yet that you should try this? I know, you’re probably getting sick of me saying it, but I’ve read a lot of good stuff lately. Really.
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Website
The Job Thing
You know, it just always does me heart good to hear people complain about horrible jobs that they’re had. I don’t know what it is. Misery loves company? Maybe. As a current proud member of the temp workforce (based on the flimsy logic that something is bound to get me out of this “work week” predicament that the rest of the world is stuck in sooner or later), I have to thoroughly recommend this book. It’s around five years old, but Fantagraphics put out another printing of it recently (at least it was on my preorder page a couple of months ago), which shows that they’re trying to keep it in the public eye. Carol really has a great understanding of the workforce in general and what motivated some of her shitty coworkers specifically. She’s been a framer, a clerk at a bookstore, a waitress, a civil servant, and all kinds of other horrible jobs. There’s a neat section in the front that says some of the odder job titles that are recognized by the government and one in the back with stories sent in by readers. Great stuff and you can find it for somewhere between $5 and $8. depending on where you look. The only thing that sucks about it is that this has been out there for years and this is her only book. I hope she didn’t give up and join the work force…
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Website
Sugar & Spite #1
Ah, pseudonyms. As a man who goes mostly by “Whitey”, I am familiar with them. But they do wreak havoc with my orderly “Author Index”… Anyway, the comic is basically a kids book with enough thoughtful humor to keep the interest of most adults. It’s about two five year old girls, one who’s a bit too much into goth (again, at the age of five) and another who wants to be a super hero. There’s a story about an autopsy on a pumpkin, one about a game of hide and seek, and another basically just setting up the characters. The art’s adorable, the story is adorable… everything is so adorable that I’m going to have to play Grand Theft Auto for a few hours just to put myself back on an even keel. Worth a look if you’re a parent or if you have a hard time finding intelligent, cute comics. Check out the website, it looks like she’s taking a break from comics for a while…
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Website
True Loves #1
Why the heck does this art look so familiar? Some random anthology somewhere? Ah well, sorry about the lack of brain functions. This says it’s #1 and it looks great for a first issue, so I’m going to assume that the two of them have done stuff before. It’s basically the story of a girl as she tries to figure out if she’s better off with her kind, if distracted, boyfriend or if she should try to get to know a friendly guy who came into her store better. Friends offer advice and we get to see how the “happy” couple met. Good stuff here. Believable dialogue is a must for something like this, and it’s pulled off really well. The art’s great too and I hate to keep mentioning it, but it’s going to drive me crazy until I figure out either where I’ve seen this before or what it reminds me of. Anyway, it’s a fun book and it explores just what the hell is going on when two people are in love, so I like it. Check out the website, contact info is there (although it offers no clues as to where I’ve seen this stuff before)…
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Website
Link to some of his comics (scroll down)
Spectre Presents The 5:00 Shadow
What the hell did I just read? My roommate went to a zine convention this weekend and picked up a few of the comics there and this was one of them. I honestly have no idea what to tell you about this, because I don’t have a clue what happened. It follows a bunch of random people doing a bunch of random things: a boy burning ants, a man with his pants down outside watching somebody, a crazy woman shooting her lover, a prostitute with sparklers, a hornet leaving in a paper bag tied to a balloon… If this all sounds interesting, maybe I didn’t describe it right. These are all odd things, sure. But we don’t know who any of the people are, and even when he goes back to some of the people he used earlier in the comic, the art is so poor that you can’t tell for sure if it’s the same people or not. It’s “To Be Continued” at the end, so maybe this is all going to make sense in a few issues. As for right now, well, it’s only $1, but I can’t recommend it.
Jim Turek 113 SE 10th St. Gainesville, FL 32601
JJTUREK27@hotmail.com
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
The Last Laugh
This is a pretty huge mini comic for $1.50. It’s the story of a sad comedian who talks to all sorts of folks (a clown, a dummy, and Groucho Marx) in an effort to find out more about comedy and more about himself. Is it nitpicky to mention a few spelling and grammar errors in a 46 page comic? Thought so. Solid, neat art, if a little sketchy on a few of the side shots of characters, but overall pretty good. It’s a fascinating story too. He does a great job with the Groucho character, although in my mind no one but Groucho has ever gotten it completely right. And he forgot to mention Bill Hicks in his list of comedians, but maybe that’s why it’s his list of comedians and not mine. Overall a good story, worth a look if you’re interested in some theories of why people laugh. Send him some money at: P.O. Box 1514 Royal Oak, MI 48068.
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Website
Trubble Club #1
You know, there really are times when it’s pointless to review a comic. It sounds like a cop out, I know, but Trubble Club is a jam comic involving about a dozen cartoonists in Chicago. They meet every Sunday, put together some jam strips, and (I’m guessing here, as the actual information about this process on the website was sparse) put out a new book whenever they put enough material together. Who are these people? Really, this should be all it takes to convince you to check this out: Al Burian, Lille Carre, Ezra Claytan Daniels, Lucy Knisley, Rachel Niffennegger, Bernie McGovern, Onsmith, Laura Park, Grant Reynolds, Becca Taylor, Jeremy Tinder and Marco Torres. If you’re new to this site and these names aren’t familiar to you, plug just about any of them into that search option up there (the full list of artists will be restored one of these days, I swear) and spend some time checking out some quality work. Future volumes, judging from the website, will have other people, and visiting cartoonists will probably get in on the act as well. Honestly, I’m confused as hell about the process here. Every single page is its own story, and it seems most of the time like the next page starts with an idea from the previous page before veering off in its own direction… except for the times when it seems completely new. And I thought for a while that it was one artist per page, but upon closer inspection maybe others are jumping in on different panels. All I know for sure is that this much talent thrown together in a room can’t go wrong, and I hope they keep it up for… let’s see, they’re probably all in their late 20’s or early 30’s… how about another 50 years or so? OK, fine I’ll mention a few of the topics, just to prove how pointless it is to analyze such a thing. An unhygienic stump, Sackley, a doomed giant hot dog, “footsie”, mancakes, and we gotta cook this hog. This is $3 and worth every penny.
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Website (where you can buy his books anyway)
Twitch Vixen #1
Who out there watches a little too much tv? From time to time, pretty much everybody does, unless maybe you have all the money in the world or something. This comic is mostly about Dave’s obsession with tv from a young age, hence that fantastic name for the television. After that you get a couple of stories involving the Honeymooners in one way or another, another with “Scratchface Doodlehead” (another great name) briefly meeting Frankenstein’s monster and becoming a children’s show. Pretty good stuff all around, although it is always jarring to me to see a 14 year old comic. Not to worry, he’s been doing comics for a while, and there are plenty to choose from here, even if I can’t find his personal contact info. $2
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Website
The Great Big Book of Tomorrow
Everyone reading this should buy this book right now. Does that take away some of the suspense of the review? Sorry. Tom (or Dan Perkins, as is revealed in this book) is my favorite weekly cartoonist, so I’m bound to be a bit biased here, but this book is incredible. It’s invaluable for anyone with no sense of history (which is, according to polls, a whole bunch of people), so they can see how what’s going on now in the world mirrors the other Bush presidency. You also get to see some of Tom’s first work, including a couple of regular comic stories he did in the mid 80’s. And to anybody who says that he bashes Bush too much in his strips (and how much is too much for a lying criminal?), read his strips about Clinton from the 90’s. Anybody who is corrupt is a target, and that’s a good thing. I can’t imagine a better retrospective being put together of a career than this. What you get is selected best strips from all eras, strips that were only in a few underground papers and are just now being reprinted, strips that were in papers like The Village Voice and which I’ve never seen anywhere else (in color, no less!), and photos of the author with people like Bill O’Reilly and Marilyn Quayle. I think this is going for less that $13 on Amazon right now, and it took me longer to read this than it did the latest Hunter S. Thompson book, so it’s more than worth your money. The range of topics here is incredible, and I’m just gushing so I’ll stop now, but this is the kind of thing that I’ll be getting extra copies of to give to friends at Christmas. As Sparky says more than a few times, if you haven’t heard a lot of the facts included in here before, isn’t it sad that you had to learn about it from a talking penguin in a comic strip?Buy it right now! Oh, and I was going to put up some samples, but why don’t you just go to his website and read any of his comics that you’d like?
Comments Off on Tomorrow, Tom – The Great Big Book of Tomorrow | Reviews | Tagged: Penguin Soup For the Soul, The Great Big Book of Tomorrow, The Wrath of Sparky, This Modern World, Tom Tomorrow, Tune in Tomorrow, When Penguins Attack | Permalink
Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Website
8 1/2 Ghosts
Here’s another interesting comic from Alternative Comics. This one is about a young filmmaker who’s looking for the perfect place to shoot his “spooky” movie. He finds the perfect place, complete with ghosts who are friendly and willing to show themselves only on film (so as not to disrupt the cast, don’t you know), but things get a little bit out of hand when some angry poltergeists stop by. A great concept, and I know I’ve seen Rich’s art in other places, but it’s perfect for these silly ghosts. There’s also a vampire in here who’s about 20 feet tall, but I don’t want to give anything away. It’s $3.95, huge (in size anyway, the story isn’t any longer than the average comic book), and a good little story. What’s wrong with that? Here’s the website for Alternative Comics, you can get a copy there, if you like, or at your local comic store… ha! I’m just kidding. Your local comic store probably doesn’t even sell this, assuming that you even have a local comic store. But I digress…
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Link to online comics
Brain Food #5
Well, I can say one thing for sure about this mini: it’s wildly inventive. Some of the dialogue seems stilted and some of the pictures look, well, a bit off the mark, but there’s all kinds of crazy stuff going on in the main story. It’s about a punk, a feminist and a straight man (this is according to another review in the book, it’s in the middle of the story so it took me most of the story to figure out who they were supposed to be) on a mission to stick it to THE MAN. It’s odd. I didn’t like it for the first 10 pages or so, but it’s just so earnest that it’s hard not to warm up to it after a while. He’s still learning but hey, who’s doing mini comics (besides John Porcellino) that isn’t? It’s worth a couple of bucks to take a look at this. There are a couple of other stories in this, but after the insanity of the main story it’s hard to be that interested in a trip to work gone wrong. Send him some money at: Free Lunch Media P.O. Box 7246 Minneapolis, MN 55407.
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Website
This Is It #2
It’s not a comic! It’s not a zine! It’s a… has anybody coined a term for that yet? Somebody should really get on that. How about czine? Sounds just like zine, but all the super cool people will know what it means. How indie is that? I win the medal of all indiness! And I’m rambling in a review again. Oops. This one is about half comics and half writing about various topics. The comics include knowing a friend by smell, seeing an old friend, grade school, friendster, and cuddling with friends. Lots of friends in there. The writing was the highlight of the book for me, maybe because the lettering was incredibly sloppy on the comics, to the point that it was tough to read a few things. The essays didn’t have that problem. She wrote about the last year of her life, the nature of space and time, what she would do if her brother fell off a cliff, the midwest and her desperate need to be recognized by friends. She has a real gift in articulating her thoughts, judging from this I’d say she’d make a great weekly columnist… except I don’t know of any paper that’s willing to publish someone who is this brutally honest about her life. Then again, I don’t read many papers, so what do I know? Check out the new website, this one is $2 and I think it’s worth a gander.
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Posted by Kevin
May 2, 2010
Website
E-mail
Bridge Cop
Take a look at that sample real quick before I get started. The whole comic isn’t like that, the panels are a bit more, um normally spaced the rest of the time and he’s not trying to tell an epic story in a single page. Just look at that and tell me what’s going on there, because I have little to no idea. Anyway, this is supposed to be about the whole comic and not just a page, I just wanted to make sure everybody got a good look at it. Bridge Cop is a movie, you see, about a cop who guards bridges (duh) and gets gradually demoted, if I’m reading the whole thing right. But the story is about the guy who goes to see the movie, as he only watches one movie a year. You also have his friend Groomfiend, some kind of a giant talking mouse that walks on two legs. And Tom Chief, the filmmaker. OK, so the whole thing was kind of all over the place and I’m still not entirely sure what I just read. So what? I’ll take that over formulaic crap any day. Here’s hoping I see more from this guy so I can figure out how I feel about the whole thing. I have to admit that’s a pretty sweet cover though…
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Posted by Kevin
