Mikester
I am very, very sorry for the last link in this post.
- INTERESTING TIMES CONTINUE: The week after DC Comics imprints Wildstorm and Zuda were canned, Bob Harras, former editor-in-chief at Marvel Comics, was named editor-in-chief at DC.
This got some internet pals of mine talking about the Spider-Man Clone Saga, which ran, at least partially, under his watch. My contention was that the Clone Saga, while running way too long, and dealt a nearly-fatal blow to the Spider-Man franchise with the revelation that the Spider-Man we’d been reading for the last couple of decades was, in fact, the presumed-dead clone Spider-Man, started out as a good thing. Sales were strong, readers were interested in the story…it wasn’t the greatest story in the world, no, but it kept people’s attention and entertained them, at least until that particular goose was killed for its golden eggs. And until that saturation point was reached, as a person who was slingin’ funnybooks at the time this storyline was running, I can guarantee you that I was selling plenty of the Clone Saga comics to people who were into the story, and not just buying for investment. You can usually tell the difference.
And, to this very day, I still have kids looking for and buying Clone Saga back issues (and anything involving Venom and/or Carnage). Far more kids, in fact, than are buying the currently-published Spider-Man comics. Or the currently-published Marvel anything. And I can see the appeal…lots of action, lots of villains, lots of just plain’ ol’ things happening in every issue. Frankly, whatever comics excite kids and get them interested in comics, I’m grateful for.
So, there you go. I’m the guy defending the Clone Saga. …And All-Star Batman and Robin. And The Spirit movie. I deserve some kind of medal (“BIGGEST CHUMP, 2010”).
- From a ’90s flashback to an ’80s one: a little bit about comics coloring from Comico Comics.
- And speaking of internet pal Andrew: here’s his latest Nobody’s Favorites entry, featuring a character that, even at the time it was published, had my customers going “what…really?”
- Reader De, in the comments to yesterday’s post, suggested the site Comic Book Cartography, given my recent fascination with comic book maps. There are maps aplenty at this site, as well as other cutaways and diagrams and, thankfully, I didn’t duplicate any of this person’s posts with my recent entries. Anyway, go check it out…lots of good images from funnybooks of days gone by.
- Adam Koford, the fella what does Laugh-Out-Loud Cats, recently uploaded some of his Disney Interactive Toy Story designs, and they’re adorable.
- Longtime internet chum Mr. Dan Kelly gives me the beauty of a giant Luke Cage wall poster. Find more here.
- Oh, dear: Hipster Hitler webcomics. Funnier than it has any reason to be. I double-dare you to wear the shirts from the strip’s store.
- THIS IS TERRIBLE: here’s an auction I found for a JonBenet Ramsey black velvet painting. Nothing to do with comics, I realize, but good gravy, why would…how could…I…what? The description raises more questions than it answers.
Yes, it’s another map from an old comic book.
from Action Comics #337 (May 1966) by Otto Binder & Jim Mooney
You know, given that the Evil-Eyed People only have one entrance to their underground realm, you’d think folks would have since found some kind of alternative path that didn’t lead right towards it.
Then again, who’s gonna feel threatened by these guys?
Now we humans have smallish eyes with lids, and I don’t know about you, but I’m always getting, like, something blown into my eye out of my truck’s air vents, or an eyelash stuck in there, or just some random detritus flung into my eyeballs by a cool summer zephyr. Maybe I’m just lucky like that. But this guy…this guy…he’s gotta be peeling crap out of eyes constantly.
But on the other hand…the Evil-Eyed People are able to shoot fire out of their eyes, so if their eyes can handle straight-up open flame, having a gnat fly in there probably ain’t no big thing.
…This really wasn’t what I meant to talk about, here. I was going to comment on the map, because boy howdy I love maps in comic books, but…seriously, it’s a map with ant people, giant acorn trees (not “giant trees with acorns,” though they are big, but “trees with huge-ass acorns“), and Evil Eye People. What’s not to love?
Sooner or later we need to gather up all these comic book maps, and feed ’em into a Google Maps/Mapquest-esque database: “How do I get to Star City?” “Well, hang a left at Gotham City, go a couple of miles past the Justice Society headquarters, make a right at Titans Tower, and if you’ve reached Gorilla City, you’ve gone too far.”
In other news:
- Amalgam Reborn, by Awesome Hospital artist Matt Digges. Not many there yet, but it starts off with “Batman Beyonder” and how great is that?
- And now…the Worst Comic Book of All Time, courtesy Dr. K., a professor who’s studied, academically, stories featuring Chop Chop from Blackhawk, so he knows from terrible. By the way, the comic under discussion couldn’t be more racist if it tried, so be prepared.
- Superman also hates vuvuzelas.
- Here’s your odd Swamp Thing link of the week: a comparison between the behavior of a particular U.S. political movement of some note and the author’s attempts to cajole his parents into buying him a Swamp Thing action figure. …Certainly wasn’t expecting to read something like that this week. Also, that post made me feel very old.
- Speaking of Swamp Thing, approximately 3,000 of you out there in the Progressive Ruin Super Agent Force emailed me the link to Daniel Crosier’s Deviant Art page featuring a wood-burned art piece of our favorite swamp dude.
Here, let me get this out of the way, before anyone asks this:
FAQ: Wouldn’t Swamp Thing, representative of Earth’s plant life, object to the burning of a piece of a tree?
A: No. Swamp Thing is a fictional character, and can’t object to anything.
- For more recent Swamp Thing-ery, hie yourself hither to Roots of the Swamp Thing, which has had a flurry of entries covering recent events and historical material involving the big green fella.
- And finally:
“The Joker becomes Swamp Thing Alec Holland does not become part of the Green, the Joker does. All Swamp Thing issues are retroactively taken out of continuity, replacing them with Joker-Swamp Thing. How does this affect things?”
I shudder to think.
Look what I smurfed.
It’s only fair that, since I slagged the typeface in the new Smurfs books so hard, I point out when they did something with the lettering that made me laugh.
So here’s this, from The Purple Smurfs:
And let’s compare that “Hey Look!” to the logo on this collection of Harvey Kurtzman’s classic comic strip of the same name:
A closer look at the logo:
And just for the heck of it, here are a couple of samples of the Kurtzman strip, with some variations on that logo.
Now, I have no idea if this little tribute to Kurtzman is new to this volume, and/or if it’s something that everyone knows about and I, Captain Obvious, am pointing out (which I have a history of doing), but I’m putting it out there anyway. So there. Plus, I Googled it and didn’t see anything about it. Well, sorta Googled it. Skimmed a couple of pages of results, anyway.
In conclusion: Smurfs – I have, won’t you?
Speaking of the Googling, in regards to the title of a post of mine from a couple of days ago…I appear to be the #2 Google result for Teaser and the Blacksmith (if the search terms are enclosed in quotes, that is).
And folks thought I’d never amount to anything.
Sluggo Saturday #73.
THE FURRY OF YOUR NIGHTMARES
from The Best of Ernie Bushmiller’s Nancy (1988)
Eat it, Google Maps!
The timing on this worked out fairly well, as I’m under the weather and this is content provided by YOU, the reader. As I was hoping, some of you folks took this map and did something creative and amusing with it, which, as someone in need of some cheering, I very much appreciate.
Swamp pal and damned dirty ape expert Rich Handley put his stinking paws to work on this fine map:
Sleestak consulted the Library of Skulls in the Lost City, and came away with this timely map ripped from headlines of the 1950s…or is it today:
And this last one is from the little stuffed bull to end all little stuffed bulls…the Fantastic Bully, who clobbered me with this:
Thanks, guys…you done good, you mugs.
ADDENDUM: I missed this one that was sent to me by Dave from Dave Ex Machina…sorry, Dave!
I WILL OCCUR AGAIN.
Today’s post title comes from the wide selection of only the finest comment spam my site receives on a daily basis, where, in broken English, the “commenter” extols the virtues of my webpage, describing how my writing “brings great informative on this topic that I find interest,” and ends the response with a promise to “return in short to find more of this content” or, as above, “I WILL OCCUR AGAIN.” It’s like an excerpt from the first draft of General MacArthur’s speech: “‘I will occur again!’ No, no, that’s not it…wait! ‘I SHALL RETURN!’ That’s PERFECT!” Except, you know, with links to v1ag4a sites.
Anyway, enough about that, let’s look at some comics:
- Jeff Parker takes over writing chores on Hulk with #25, bringing the book from its big, loud and stupid beginnings and moving it forward into a big, loud and not-quite-as-stupid future. Not that I’m slamming the Loeb issues…ain’t nothin’ wrong with a comic book that’s just action action action and not a brain cell in sight, so long as it’s fun (and I have been enjoying the book, despite the “event” tie-ins that frankly I’m having less and less patience with). And really, Hulk should be big and loud with lots of action. It’s a Hulk comic, for God’s sake. Anyway, Jeff Parker: good start. Nice art by Gabriel Hardman, too.
- Fantastic Four #583 kicks off the whole “Death of One of the FF” storyline, though nearly everyone who’s reading the book knows that whatever character they kill off, that character will be back sooner rather than later, so it’s kind of quaint that they’re putting this much effort into hyping this storyline. Of course, Hickman is a good writer, and has been doing a strong job on the book, so I expect we’ll be getting more than the typical “oh noes [REDACTED] is dead and gone forever, how can the team go on” kind of thing. …This first chapter is nicely done, and sets up an unexpected alliance between a couple of characters whose interaction certainly grabbed my interest.
- Boom! Studios has a new Muppet Show (#10) written and drawn by Roger Landridge this week, and as usual, it’s perfect funnybooking, and pal Ian has another issue of his Darkwing Duck comic on the stands, and, oh, I guess it’s okay, if you like that sort of thing.
- I haven’t had a chance to read the new Zippy the Pinhead collection, Ding Dong Daddy from Dingburg, but Zippy hasn’t disappointed me yet, and I don’t expect this to be the exception.
- Pal Dorian already reviewed the new editions of the two Smurfs volumes released this week, and I concur with the statements made by the gentleman from Santa Barbara. I would also like to reiterate the apparently near-universal complaint that they used a lousy font on these books, and that it’s too slight and tiny to comfortably read, especially at the sizes these books are printed at. Otherwise, this is classic cartooning and well worth seeking out. Have your jeweler’s glass handy, though.
- The Simpsons’ Treehouse of Horror #16 isn’t as relentlessly weird as last year’s installment, but filled with some good ol’ fashioned Simpsons-style, kid-pleasin’ gore and violence anyway. Particularly in the lead story by Evan Dorkin, which is almost Milk ‘n’ Cheese-esque in the amount of Grand Guignol-ish mayhem dished out on each page.
Lemmy from Motörhead is the celebrity contributor for this ish, contributing the story (with a script by Tom Peyer) for the last segment of the book. Needless to say, this would be the Most Metal Comic Book Story on the stands this week.
BONUS FEATURE: inset sheet of Marge Attacks trading cards. It’s exactly what you’re thinking, and it’s fantastic.
- Justice League: Generation Lost #10 – You know what? I like this series. A lot. It’s very well done, fast-paced, with strong, witty dialogue, and most importantly, doesn’t feel too padded like DC’s last couple of year-long series…which I’m sure cutting the number of issues in half helped with quite a bit.
Also…I liked Kingdom Come. Liked it well enough to get that Graphitti Designs slipcased edition with the Mark Waid and Alex Ross autographs and the extra sketchbook and all that other hoohar.
…But seeing Kingdom Come pop up in Justice League: Generation Lost made me groan just a little. I think I’ve reached my KC saturation point during that eighteen-year-long storyline in Justice Society. I mean, Generation Lost hasn’t disappointed so far, and I’m sure they’ll handle the KC stuff just fine, but…man, I can probably do without seeing any more references to KC for a while. Unless it’s KC and the Sunshine Band, because that’s the way (uh huh uh huh) I like it (uh huh uh huh).
- And I also got Fables #98, which I’m still enjoying, and Legion of Super-Heroes #5, which, I’m sorry to say, the recent relaunch of which hasn’t helped sales any, at least for us.
- Also, I’m still not buying The Flash. Am I missing anything there?
I’m probably the only person amused by this…
…but I love doing things with this stupid map from Sensation Comics #50.
…Like this:
The maps may not be to exact scale. Or have anything resembling actual geographical locations:
Would I pay good money to read a comic with Swamp Thing chasing Arcane on a motorcycle? Yes…yes I would.
This could almost be an editorial cartoon of sorts, if I’d put any actual thought into it:
Yeah, yeah, I know, I’m totally wrong. Here, have at it yourself:
Mr. Terrific’s amazing photographic mind left a bit of the “F” off of “farmhouse.”
image from Sensation Comics #50 (February 1946)
You don’t get enough panels like this in comics anymore. To wit:
Soon perhaps to be the #1 Google result for Teaser and the Blacksmith.
Some of you may have noticed that I had sort of an impromptu Low Content Mode on the site last week, aside from Thursday’s post when I just kinda went on and on. No particular reason for it, other than, you know, having some other things to occupy my precious, precious free time. Like doing a little interior house painting. Or shooting people getting shot repeatedly on Red Dead Redemption. Or actually reading the occasional comic book. Or getting my usual daily dosage of five hours of sleep.
Plus, it doesn’t hurt to ease off a bit to recharge the batteries. I have been doing this daily for nearly seven years, when, after working all day slinging funnybooks at customers, I come home and write about funnybooks on the internet for free (well, mostly free, he said, gesturing desperately at his Amazon links). Please don’t begrudge me doing some “easy” posts once in a while. (And I put “easy” in quotes, because sometimes the simple posts end up taking as much time to put together as the more content-ish posts.)
I’m overreacting…it’s not like anyone really complained or anything, and traffic on the site has been up, and it seems like a lot of you folks have enjoyed the last week’s worth of entries…so consider my behavior encouraged. But I sometimes do feel like I’m skimping a bit when I do a lot of scan-heavy posts in a row, so…well, there you go. I’m a victim of my own guilt.
By the way, remember how like every year I say “okay, I’m going to stop updating every day” and yet I still keep posting every day? There’s something wrong with me, man.
BOO HOO I DON’T WASTE TIME ON THE INTERNET PROPERLY. Okay, enough of that, let’s move on to this:
I’ve been trying to use the category/tagging function of this site a little more frequently, mostly because I’m tired of seeing all my posts read “filed under Uncategorized” and, okay, fine, to make things easier for the readers, too. I’ve been a bit silly with some of the tags…I don’t know that I’ll ever use “worm-suit” again, but I’m sure someday I’ll once again find use for the “tampons” tag. I think my favorite category is “freak-out”…be sure to click that and scroll down for an old favorite of mine (after the much more recent post).
So Tom Spurgeon did one of his regular “Five for Friday” polls where he asked folks to list five favorite Fantagraphics publications that weren’t by Chris Ware, the Hernandez Brothers, Charles Schulz, Dan Clowes, and Peter Bagge. For once I managed to participate in the poll, and you can see my entries about a third of the way through this list of results, somewhere.
I found myself wanting to list far more than the five allowed…I did mention in a note accompanying the list I emailed Tom that the only reason I didn’t list James Sturm’s The Cereal Killings was that he’d already used it in his example list. (And come to think of it…has The Cereal Killings ever been collected? I can’t recall that it has. (For those unfamiliar, it’s sorta like the Watchmen/League of Extraordinary Gentlemen of cereal mascots, only far more low key and melancholy than those comparisons may suggest. Also, it’s brilliant.)
One title I did mention was the sadly uncompleted Eye of Mongombo, but when I Googled it up just to make sure I had the spelling correct, I found the blog for Mongombo creator Doug Gray! Specifically, this post featuring newly (as of 2009) commissioned Mongombo art! Pretty cool. Gray also mentions trying to work on the book again, and I sincerely hope he does.
There were several Fantagraphics publications I wanted to mention, like their excellent Popeye collections, or their Zippy books, or any of their Kim Deitch releases, or the pure evil of Scott Russo’s Jizz, or the assorted J.R. Williams magazine one-shots — but I did list his series Crap. Yes, that’s right…Jizz and Crap. Ask for ’em by name! I also thought about mentioning Don Rosa’s Comics & Stories but wasn’t sure if that counted…but looking at that Comics.org entry which lists Fantagraphics as the publisher, yeah, I guess it would have.
And then I saw other people mentioning Amazing Heroes and Comics Journal in their lists, and I was thinking, damn, why didn’t I think of that?
Oh, man…and there’s Real Stuff, and Anything Goes, and Schizo, and….
Anyway, not sure what the point of all that was, other than “I like a lot of stuff from Fantagraphics and should talk about them more on the site.”
Didn’t see anyone mention Teaser and the Blacksmith, a comic that was…certainly something. Not even sure how to begin describing it, and given the Googling I just performed, if I did describe it I’d become the go-to source on this book and I’m not sure if I’m ready to shoulder that responsibility. (EDIT: Ah, here’s a brief article that notes the premise of the story.)
I was also genuinely surprised no one listed Wendy Whitebread, from Fantagraphics’ Eros division. C’mon, the thing went through multiple printings, and I know I sold a ton of them…some of you have this comic. Don’t deny it.