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Various Artists – The Hic and Hoc Illustrated Journal of Humor Volume One: The United States
The Hic and Hoc Illustrated Journal of Humor Volume One: The United States
Do you like your comics funny? Do you like some or most of the creators I listed in the tags section (right below this post, in big letters, you can’t miss them)? Then this one should be an easy call for you. There, now that I’ve made that case, I’ll go about my afternoon… wait, you want something of substance? Egh, fine. Laurent Barnett does the “Me Likes You” comics (which you should already be reading on a regular basis), and she was one of the editors, so there, that’s substantive. Strips in here include Noah Van Sciver’s fever dreams (both with and without music), funny jokes that aren’t really jokes by Bort, Martha Keavney’s tales of a pet human, Nikki Burch showing us that saying “that’s what she said” too many times will end up with you getting what you deserve, Anne Emond’s cat style, Sam Spina’s ridiculously awesome sex comic, a couple of pages of single panel jokes by Sam Henderson (which should be worth the price of admission right there), Grant Snider’s fears and feats (he had four pages of strips and I don’t want to ruin any of them), KC Green’s depressed fish, Jane Mai’s dream of male lingerie, Nathan Bulmer’s tale of ninja tricks, Julia Wertz’ attempt to get serious and Ian Anderson’s tale of a bear that’s just trying to fit in. But wait, there’s more! And you can discover it for yourself if you buy this. Unless you just have an unnatural hatred for all anthologies, which I guess I could almost understand, but it makes no sense to hate the good ones too, and this is one of the good ones. Hell, just pick three of the names of people who contributed to this, go to their websites and see what there is to see. If you don’t laugh once then I release you from your duty to buy this, but seriously, good luck with that. $10
Aulisio, Pat (editor) – Philly Alternative Comic Con 2010
Philly Alternative Comic Con 2010
Well, at least I think Pat was the editor. He put the book together, anyway, and that’s basically the same thing. Sadly, it’s one of those anthologies without a coherent table of contents (although I did like the look of the one Box Brown put together), so a lot of these stories are going to be reviewed through a bit of guesswork and process of elimination. Stories in here include a very colorful mess from Pat, Liz Baillie keeping the tradition of record collecting alive, Hawk Krall with some disgusting but hilarious pranks, Dina Kelberman’s inimitable comics (with a drunken disclaimer tacked onto the bottom), Mike Sgier with a futuristic tale of trying to cap an uncontrollably spewing well, Ian Harker’s love of flying, L. Nichols and going along to get along, and Sally Bloodbath & Matt Wiegle with a piece on the most horrible child alive and her fitting end. That leaves a few pieces without a noticeable creator, so in no particular order, the other stories in here dealt with making a friend (literally), trying to make art to please a critic, and two grotesque creatures sharing an apartment and their antics. Chris McDonnell probably did the first two pieces and Lance Hansen probably did the last story (which was actually a series of smaller stories), and I say “probably” because that’s where my coin flip landed, and when has that ever been wrong? Box Brown did the covers and has a lovely group of people at the end of their lives bemoaning their lack of buying quality comics in their lives, something you should all take to heart. As this was from a con I have no idea if it’s still readily available to the world, but as it’s all in color, gorgeous and full of talent, you should hunt it down if at all possible. Pat would probably know if it was around, why not check it with him? Or I can post a little update here if I hear anything, how about that? No price, but $5 sounds nice, if possibly too low.
Wiegle, Matt – Underpanting
Underpanting
Underpants! What could possibly be wrong in a comic dedicated to underpants? Not a damned thing, that’s what. The bulk of this comic is specifically dedicated to the underpants of the devil and their travels throughout the years on various people. The powers of these underpants are sporadic and unreliable, and frankly they don’t seem that impressive in any case, except for the page I sampled. There’s also a story about peer pressure and stripping to your underwear with your friends, unless, of course, you happen to live in a fascist society where people don’t agree with your right to stand around in your underpants. Wrapping all of this up is a sketchbook-like gallery with various creatures, real and imagined, standing around in their underpants. This may well be the highlight of the book, even though the parts with actual words are hilarious. The bottom line is that if this concept is funny to you (i.e. if you are someone who is still capable of appreciating humor in this bleak world), then what are you waiting for? Also, I realize that I used up my monthly quota of writing the word “underpants” in just this one review, but it was worth it…$1
Wiegle, Matt – Your Karate Vacation
Your Karate Vacation
See, this is a main reason why I never take names down on this website: you never know when you’re going to see their work again. It’s been a couple of years, but I finally found a new book from Matt, and it’s a wonderful thing. This is a book of advice on how to have a proper vacation while following all the precepts of karate. It’s always a good sign when I could have sampled any page of a book (as the whole thing is hilarious), although if it didn’t take too much away from the story I would have picked the two page spread in the center with the karate master’s advice on how to clear out long lines. Or maybe the panel where he has to concentrate on imagining himself fighting a duck to stay mentally on the path of the warrior. Or maybe it would be his excellent advice about public transportation? You see where I’m going with all this: this book is fantastic and you should think about picking it up. Unless you don’t have a sense of humor about the karate stuff, in which case there’s no help for you. Oh, and it’s only a measly $1!
Mejias, John (editor) – Paping #11
Website (down as of 4/2/10, no other info)
Paping #11 Now Available! $8
This comic is huge! Just wanted to make sure I got that out there, because I shrunk the cover down to better fit on the page. And, once again, my scanner doesn’t do this book justice. More than most comics out there this is a tactile experience from cover to cover. I think it’s already been pretty well established on this page that I’m enjoying the Paping experience, so why not skip all the glowing praise and get right to the stories? You have a one pager by Scott Pefflet that manages to be about all kinds of things,a story from Sara Edward-Corbert (probably my favorite of the bunch) about the smartest kid in class getting outsmarted, Matt Wiegle’s take on wife (and parts) swapping, Andy Bodor’s baptism of Van Halen, a completely unique and indescribable story from Sean McCarthy, John Mejias and his story of Rud, another wordless tale (this time from Shawn Cheng), Zak Smith and the soap box derby, another story from John (this time about being willing to work for it), a white-out extravaganza from Dave Miko, The Boxer from Drew Gold and some comix to read aloud from Jeffrey Lewis. Whew! Good thing I don’t have to follow any rules of grammer or good sentence structure, otherwise I would have gotten in some kind of trouble with that mess of a sentence. This is $8, contact info is up there or you could just pick up a copy in the store, if the feeling moved you…
