Our weekly strips from Kupperman & Weissman, plus links to other strips from around the web. Running a bit late this week due to your humble compiler being a bit under the weather.

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Up All Night by Michael Kupperman (view at original size):

Barack Hussein Obama by Steven Weissman (view at original size):

And elsewhere:

Belligerent Piano by Tim Lane:

Cochlea & Eustachia by Hans Rickheit:

Ectiopiary by Hans Rickheit:

Humblug by Arnold Roth (6 new udpates!):

Keeping Two by Jordan Crane:

Lucky by Gabrielle Bell (daily diary strips all throughout July!):

Maakies by Tony Millionaire:

Truth Serum by Jon Adams:

Today's Online Commentary & Diversions:

• Commentary: We're pleased (really) to see Adult Video News picking up on our announcement of The Complete ZAP Comix, despite some glaring fact-checking errors in their report (see if you can spot 'em!)

• Review: "The coolest reprints of the year have hit the shelves as Fantagraphics tears it up by releasing Floyd Gottfredson’s run on the comic strip Walt Disney’s Mickey Mouse. To start with, this is a great edition of the material. It looks great, the black and white art is classically bold and pops right off the pages at you, and it’s over 200 pages and bound in a nice hardcover. Readers of this column and site know I can be a little judgmental about the quality of reprints, but there is no need for frowns here as they have done an A+ job. They even packaged it with essays on the strip and artists, and even gave us Mickey’s jungle adventure which ran in the strip before Gottfredson stepped aboard.... Each stroke of ink is perfect under Gottfredson’s direction, and the best years of the comic strip result entirely from the genius of his that lies in these pages." – Drew McCabe, ComicAttack.net

• Plug: "An icon in the animation world, Gottfredson is accredited with making the Mickey strip into a masterpiece, and an imaginative series that is still greatly sought-after by comic fans and collectors.... While the first volume will include some of the series’ more rough and experimental ideas that came before the characters had really found their proper place, this seems like a worthwhile purchase for the traditional Mickey-lover. After all, there is something to be said for the origins of Mr. Mouse and his incredible transformation over the years." – Amanda Correia, The Disney Blog

• Review: "Weathercraft feels like a day-in-the-life story. It’s a weird and wild one, but you don’t have to know anything going on, you just experience it. ...Weathercraft has an arc and a story and all that, but it’s probably not exactly what you’d think if you’re more used to traditional comics. Still, it’s a great piece of fiction to pick up and really experience..." – T.J. Dietsch, United Monkee (via Sean T. Collins)

We just announced our EC Comics Library series less than a week ago and already we're full steam ahead on the books: Straight from editor Gary Groth, here is the lineup of stories for the first book in the series, Corpse on the Imjin and Other Stories, collecting the war stories written by Harvey Kurtzman and drawn by Kurtzman and others:

Drawn by Kurtzman:

November - December 1950 - Two-Fisted Tales #18 - Conquest

January - February 1951 - Two-Fisted Tales #19 - Jivaro Death!

March - April 1951 - Two-Fisted Tales #20 - Pirate Gold!

September 1951 - Frontline Combat #2 - Contact!

September - October 1951 - Two-Fisted Tales #23 - Kill!

November 1951 - Frontline Combat #3 - Prisoner of War!

November - December - Two-Fisted Tales #24 - Rubble!

January -February 1952 - Frontline Combat #4 - Air Burst!

January - February 1952 - Two-Fisted Tales #25 - Corpse on the Imjin!

April 1952 - Frontline Combat #5 - Big ‘If'!

Drawn by others (note that stories may not appear in the order listed here):

November - December 1950 - Two-Fisted Tales #18 - Hong Kong Intrigue! (Feldstein)

January - February 1951 - Two-Fisted Tales #19 - Flight from Danger! (Craig)

July - August 1951 - Frontline Combat #1 - Marines Retreat! (Severin & Kurtzman)

July - August 1951 - Frontline Combat #1 - O.P.! (Heath)

September - October 1952 - Frontline Combat #8 - Thunderjet! (Toth)

September - October 1952 - Two-Fisted Tales #29 - Fire Mission! (Berg)

November - December 1952 - Two-Fisted Tales #30 - Wake! (Colan)

March - April 1953 - Frontline Combat #11 - Rough Riders! (Estrada)

March - April 1953 - Two-Fisted Tales #32 - Lost Battalion! (Craig)

March - April 1953 - Two-Fisted Tales #32 - Tide! (Kubert)

May - June 1953 - Frontline Combat #12 - F-86 Sabre Jet! (Toth)

May - June 1953 - Two-Fisted Tales #33 - Pearl Divers! (Kubert)

October 1953 - Frontline Combat #14 - Bonhomme Richard! (Kubert)

October 1953 - Two-Fisted Tales #35 - Memphis! (Crandall)

January 1954 - Two-Fisted Tales #36 - Battle! (Crandall)

February - March 1955 - Two-Fisted Tales #41 - Mau Mau! (Krigstein)

+ 23 Kurtzman covers!

No, really. That's what the event is called: Comic Book Art Show. 

The brand-new art space GAS (Greenfield Art Salon) is opening their doors with a debut show that calls it like IT IS!  Comic Book Art Show will feature complete comics from the Massachusetts-based art collective known as Mysterious Transmissions, featuring our own mysterious Fantagraphics artist Hans Rickheit.

As GAS explains, "the show will consist of a number of short comic book stories from each artist, presented in their entirety and intended for reading on the gallery walls." See? Comic. Book. Art. Show.

The show opens on Friday, August 5th at 7:30 PM at GAS [ 207 Main St, Greenfield MA ].  With a killer debut show like this, we're excited to see what future events will be held there!

Today's Online Commentary & Diversions:

• Review: "...I’ll admit it: I did not expect to read a Frank book whose final panel made me go 'Awwww!' ...[T]he journey [in Congress of the Animals] takes Frank so far afield that at some point (probably when he gets lost at sea and washes up on some distant shore) he ends up outside the Unifactor’s confines. New information can now enter his world... And at that point all hell breaks loose…which in a Frank comic is to say it doesn’t break loose at all." – Sean T. Collins, Attentiondeficitdisorderly

• Review: "I don't think I'll ever stop marveling at the amazing artwork [Woodring] fills his books with. It contains some of the most solid and tangible representations of fantastical objects and events I've ever seen, along with a deeply unsettling atmosphere, something that either creeps me out or turns my stomach to look at it. There's something about the plantlike growths on animal creatures, the gaping orifices, and the plentiful eyeballs that, while obviously unnatural, goes a step further into a visceral gut-punch, somehow keying into a subconscious urge to look away. This aspect of the work has been present in other Frank stories I've seen, but Woodring seems to crank it up to near-unbearable levels [in Congress of the Animals]..." – Matthew J. Brady, Warren Peace Sings the Blues

• Review: "I recently read the first volume of Jules Feiffer's collected Village Voice comic strips [Explainers], from the 1950s and early 1960s. Reading ten years' worth of weekly strips in a few days probably wasn't the best idea, but I was still amazed at how well Feiffer's early work has aged. Not just the stuff about relationships, but the stuff about politics still works. I guess that's not surprising, since relationships and politics haven't changed much in fifty years." – This Is So Gay

• Scene: Comic Book Resources' Sonia Harris recaps the Love and Rockets anniversary panel at Comic-Con, and in plugging the article (and commenting on Gilbert's revelations) at CBR's Robot 6 Sean T. Collins calls it "pure L&R-nerd heaven for a whole bunch of reasons," which is 100% accurate

• Scene: Corey Blake gives a first-person account of Cannibal Fuckface's appearance at our Comic-Con booth during Johnny Ryan's Prison Pit signing

• Interview: Bust Magazine's Erina Davidson has a Q&A session with Megan Kelso: "I try not  to fall into the trap of thinking something is interesting simply because 'it happened to ME.' Personal memories and experiences are wonderful catalysts, and I think essential to making work seem believable and relatable, but they are rarely enough. One needs also to do some embroidery."

• Interview (Audio): Our Associate Publisher Eric Reynolds appeared on Ed Wenck's program on Indianapolis news radio station WIBC to talk about our forthcoming EC Comics and ZAP Comix reprint projects — listen to the segment here

Tom Spurgeon of The Comics Reporter had first crack at reporting on our EC Comics Library series and talked to our chief and editor of the series, Gary Groth: "The intention, says the publisher, is to present the material to a new generation that may not have been exposed to the EC Comics except in fits and starts, and to better underline specific artistic achievements of creators like Harvey Kurtzman, Wally Wood and Bernard Krigstein.... 'I'm leaning toward treating each individual book as an individual book, customized to the individual artist,' Groth stated. 'I want to get away from treating EC Comics as this kind of cultist monolith. I want the stories to stand on their own.'" Be sure to read the whole thing for many more details.

Meanwhile, over at Robot 6 Chris Mautner broke the news about The Complete ZAP Comix and posted an exclusive Q&A with Gary Groth: "We’re going to reproduce it in a facsimile form, the book will have the covers interspersed throughout, so it will be each issue of the comic chronologically published in the same format as the comic itself, but simply in book form. We’re going to be printing it a little larger than the comic, I don’t know the exact dimensions. It will be oversize, a little larger than the comic itself. The covers will be reproduced in full color, as they were in the original comics." Head over there for the full scoop.

Here's a roundup of more reaction to both announcements from around the web:

Boing Boing's David Pescovitz: "First published in 1968, Zap Comix is considered to be the freaky forefather of the underground comix movement that still thrives today. Created by R. Crumb, the Zap #1 solely featured his work with subsequent issues introducing such groundbreaking artists as S. Clay Wilson, Robert Williams, Gilbert Shelton, Rick Griffin, Victor Moscoso, Paul Mavrides, and 'Spain' Rodriguez. Today, Fantagraphics Books keeps the Zap spirit alive and so I was thrilled to learn that they’ve just announced the forthcoming publication of The Complete Zap Comix. The 800 page, two-volume, slipcased, hardcover set will hit stores in Fall 2012."

The A.V. Club's Noel Murray: "Continuing Fantagraphics’ master plan to separate comics fans from their life savings, the company announced two new archival projects at Comic-Con last week... Both the Zap book and the EC series are due to arrive in 2012, joining Fantagraphics’ other archival lines — like the series collecting the newspaper strips Peanuts, Popeye, Krazy Kat, Mickey Mouse, and soon Pogo and Nancy — as well as the ongoing work of such modern masters as Peter Bagge, Jason and Los Bros Hernandez. So… all the more reason for congress to work together to avert a catastrophic meltdown of the global economy, yes?"

Sean T. Collins at Attentiondeficitdisorderly: "I’m excited about this [EC] project, not just because with Peanuts and Mickey Mouse and the Disney Ducks and Popeye and Krazy Kat and so on Fantagraphics has established itself as the best publisher of archival material, but because their approach here sounds like it’ll be more along the lines of what they’ve done for Jacques Tardi recently, or even the Gilbert and Jaime Hernandez Love and Rockets digests. They’re very good at that sort of thing, too."

Collins also reports for Robot 6: "What sets the Fantagraphics reprint project apart is that individual creators’ work will be culled from the series in which it appeared and presented in a series of black-and-white solo spotlight volumes."

Comic Book Resources' Augie de Blieck: "Fantagraphics has picked up the license to reprint EC Comics. These will be black and white editions, most interestingly broken up by creator. Some of the purists may sputter at that, but I think it's a smart thing. Anthologies don't sell well in this market, even as reprints. I think targeting specific creators in an industry filled with fans who follow creators is the best way to maximize the license."

Chris Marshall at Collected Comics Library: "Well here’s some news we’ve been waiting for a long time.... I admit that I’m a little disappointed that the color Gemstone [EC Archives] books won’t be finished, but I’m confident that Fantagraphics will to a wonderful job and I’ll be sure to collect them."

One of the many awesome things about San Diego Comic-Con was getting to chat with pioneer of female comic art, Joyce Farmer, and current champion of the ladies, Esther Pearl Watson. We talked about how it wasn't always so easy to be a woman in the comics world. So, a show like this, spotlighting the latest wave of amazing women artists, just makes me really, really happy.

Lady Comix Art opens this Saturday, July 30th at the Webb Gallery in Waxahachie, TX. Curated by our own Esther Pearl Watson, the show features fellow female Fantagraphics artists like Dame Darcy and Gabrielle Bell, among an awesome line-up of ladies. The opening night soiree runs from 7:00 - 11:00 PM.

The Webb Gallery is located at 209 West Frankin Street in Waxahachie, TX, and the show runs through September 18th. And here's a print I spotted (and snapped a pic of!) at Esther's booth at SDCC that seems particularly appropriate for the show:

As we've mentioned before on the FLOG, there's a new anthology out now on Rotland Press packing a serious punch of Fantagraphics artists: Black Eye 1: Graphic Transmissions to Cause Ocular Hypertension.  Included in this collection is work from Al Columbia, Robert Goodin, Glenn Head, Michael Kupperman, Mark Newgarden, and Jon Vermilyea.

Brooklynites can get their own black eye -- I mean, Black Eye -- by heading over to Desert Island on Thursday, August 4th, where our own Michael Kupperman, Glenn Head, and Mark Newgarden will be signing along with many other artists!

You can put up your fists starting at 7:00 PM at Desert Island in Williamsburg [540 Metropolitan Ave]. 

The latest print available from Drew Friedman's online Fine Art concern is this magnificent portrait of one of Drew's artistic heroes and a subject near and dear to our own hearts: Will Elder, the Mad Playboy of Art himself. Drew depicts Villy in his studio, brushes at the ready. These suckers are limited-edition, signed by Drew and perhaps will provide you with your own artistic inspiration.

Artist Johnny Ryan

Marketing Director Mike Baehr

Artist Tom Neely

In a hilarious concept devised by fellow Mome artist Robert Goodin, Fantagraphics artists, employees and friends celebrated the SDCC debut of Belgian cartoonist Olivier Schrauwen’s first American book The Man Who Grew His Beard by adding their own chins to the cover! (But, hey, where's Rob's beard in all of this?)