Without the title on there I'd have thought that Alex Ross was doing Prison Pit fanfic.

This is huge — EVERY issue of The Comics Journal is now on sale! All available issues through #287 are HALF OFF and #288-300 are 1/3 OFF! Plus, all Comics Journal Library books and Comics Journal Special Editions are also HALF OFF!

In preparation for the sale we scoured our warehouse and discovered two classic old issues from deep in the past which were previously thought out of print: The landmark #38 from 1978, named a Top Ten Issue of TCJ by Love & Maggie and a personal favorite of Kim Thompson's, features coverage of DC Comics' cover-price increase, Gary Groth's historic interview with Gil Kane, reviews of Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Allegro Non Troppo, the first ever "Blood and Thunder" letters column, and much more! And the jam-packed #139 from 1990 includes Peter Bagge interviewing Aline Kominsky-Crumb, part 2 of an Alan Moore interview, Jim Woodring's post-mortem on Weirdo, reporting on the Florida retailer obscenity bust, a Lloyd Dangle sketchbook and more. That's just a tiny sample of the kinds of great features that await you in the pages of this award-winning, critically-lauded magazine.

This sale lasts for a VERY limited time and who knows when we'll repeat it (it's been over 3 years since our last TCJ sale) so don't hesitate to load up on the world's best magazine about comics! It's all over at the end of the day next Friday, May 14, 2010.

Daily clips & strips -- click for improved/additional viewing at the sources:

• A new Amazing Facts and Beyond with Leon Beond strip by Kevin Huizenga

• From Steven Weissman, this week's "I, Anonymous" and the piece that gives the Butter and Blood art show at GR2 its name

• At last, those misty color backgrounds that Frank Santoro's been posting make sense

• A midday visit to the lake by Debbie Drechsler

• Two new illustrations by Sergio Ponchione, including... the world's first Muslim online sex shop? (completely SFW)

• It's Paul Hornschemeier's new weekly t-shirt design for his Forlorn Funnies Shirt Shop

• Don't miss Bunny Quacker, Josh Simmons's counterpart to his Quacker Bunny above, at his & Wendy Chin's Quackers blog — he's just as grumpy

• A montage of new Frank drawings by Jim Woodring... is that our first glimpse of Frank's female counterpart that Jim's mentioned? Also, Jim would like to see you at TCAF

• More glimpses and test images for Derek Van Gieson's Mome story "Devil Doll"

• Jon Vermilyea shows off the printed cover and pages of his new Pizza Time zine

Online Commentary & Diversions:

• Review: "Is your brain drained? Is your soul cold? Does your ticker need a snicker?  Then arrange your face with a grin in place. Read The Culture Corner by Basil Wolverton. Fantagraphics has just published this comprehensive collection of a rare and genuinely silly strip by a great cartoonist. ... The collection will crack you up, especially if you enjoy goofy phrases. Wolverton was a master of the craft.... It’s a must-have for any fan of cartooning." – Beth Davies-Stofka, Super I.T.C.H.

• Review: "If someone tries to tell you Fletcher Hanks was a genius, don’t believe them. If someone tries to tell you Fletcher Hanks was an important figure in the development of superhero comics, don’t believe them. But if someone tries to tell you Fletcher Hanks was one strange, f-ed up bastard who created some of the weirdest, creepiest, and (entirely by accident) most revealing comics of the Golden Era, that you can take to the bank." – Steve Hockensmith (author of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies), Comic Book Galaxy

• Plugs: The Gosh! Comics Blog spotlights Mome Vol. 18 and the softcover editions of Abandoned Cars and Blazing Combat among the week's new arrivals at their shop

• Interview: Blog de Cómics surveys Johnny Ryan for his favorite comics, movies, food, etc.

Yes! For the first time ever, Fantagraphics will be heading to the great white north for this year's Toronto Comic Arts Festival.  I'm looking forward to seeing everyone, and yes, I'll confess, I'm looking forward to trying one of those Canadian donuts I've heard so much about.

Yours truly will be manning the table, along with Denise and Helen from esteemed establishment The Beguiling. So, let me answer you now, "No, Eric, Gary, and Kim are not here," and "No, we're not accepting submissions, but please visit our website for details on how to submit your work..."

We'll be bringing a bevy of sweet, tasty, chewy... um, books for you to buy (dammit, sorry, still thinking about donuts), including:

• Artichoke Tales
• The Artist Himself: Rand Holmes Update: Oops, this one won't make it.
• Billy Hazelnuts & the Crazy Bird
• Captain Easy
• Meatcake
• MOME 19
• Prince Valiant, Vol. 2
• Set to Sea Update: Sorry, this won't make it either.
• Wally Gropius
• Weathercraft
• Werewolves of Montpellier

Swing by the Fantagraphics table (see map below) to pick these up, and get some books signed by our artists:

SIGNING SCHEDULE

Saturday 12:30-2:30: Jim Woodring (at The Beguiling signing tables)
Saturday 2-3: Blake Bell & Roger Langridge
Saturday 4-5: Dash Shaw

Sunday 12-2: Ho Che Anderson
Sunday 1-2: Roger Langridge
Sunday 2:30-4:30: Jim Woodring

(Times may be subject to last-minute change.)

And be sure to hit up some of these great panels, too:

SATURDAY

Feature: Daniel Clowes, James Sturm, Seth, Chester Brown, and Jim Woodring
11:30 – 12:30pm, Learning Center 1 (Located at Toronto Reference Library 789 Yonge Street, 1st floor, in the main atrium space)

Five of the world’s most respected cartoonists in one room, on one panel! Moderated by Tom Spurgeon.

Spotlight: Paul Pope and Dash Shaw
12:00-1:00pm, The Pilot (22 Cumberland Street, across the street from Toronto Reference Library)

TCAF Featured Guests Paul Pope and Dash Shaw are two of the most exciting creators in comics, mixing their influences and innovations to create groundbreaking work. Now Inkstuds Radio/Podcast host Robin McConnell will moderate a conversation between these two creators about the role that influences play in creating comics, ranging from traditional comics to film and music and from classical to contemporary works. This also includes a discussion of education, some key points in creating your own vision in comics, and an examination of how to make influences work and finding out where they lead you.

SUNDAY

Spotlight: Jim Woodring’s Weathercraft
12:30 – 1:30pm, Learning Center 1 (Located at Toronto Reference Library 789 Yonge Street, 1st floor, in the main atrium space)

Jim Woodring’s cartoons chart a course through some of the most surreal imagery ever seen in any artistic medium, drawing visions from the realms of the subconscious to create a graphic world of dreams. But while his work may speak in the language of dreams, Woodring’s life has often led him into nightmare territory… Now venture into Woodring’s interior world with Weathercraft, the newest book in Woodring’s Frank world. Joining Jim Woodring will be journalist Sean Rogers, who will interview the author in a moderated Q&A.

The New Graphic Novelists: New Creators Transforming the Medium
Sunday, May 9th, 2:15 – 3:15pm, Learning Center 1 (Located at Toronto Reference Library 789 Yonge Street, 1st floor, in the main atrium space)

There is a pantheon of great graphic novelists — folks who started thinking about comics as singular, book-bound creations.  But that concept has shifted since its conceptualization, and a collection of young creators are pushing the medium in fantastic new ways. Creators Joshua Cotter, Colleen Frakes, Ryan North, Dash Shaw, and Raina Telgemeier will discuss their experiences producing comics that alternately defy and embrace the term ‘graphic novel”. Moderated by Eva Volin.

Research and History: Inspiration versus Obligation
Sunday, May 9th, 3:00 – 4:00pm, The Pilot (22 Cumberland Street, across the street from Toronto Reference Library)

A discussion about different approaches and uses of research from the hardcore to the writers of historical fiction. Inspiration versus obligation … for everybody. A lively discussion led by Kathryn Immonen, and featuring Stuart Immonen, Jim Ottaviani, Kate Beaton, Ho Che Anderson, Willow Dawson, and Matt Kindt.

Russell Patterson and the Patterson Girl
Sunday, May 9th, 4:30 – 5:00pm, Learning Center 1 (Located at Toronto Reference Library 789 Yonge Street, 1st floor, in the main atrium space)

Russell Patterson got his start in Montreal as a newspaper cartoonist. He then went to Chicago, where he eventually made a name for himself as an illustrator of flapper era nightlife. His “Patterson Girls,” which appeared in magazines and various comic strips (Flossy Frills; Gloria Gets Her Man; The Patterson Girl), were intended as caricatures, and between 1925 and 1960 they go from being fun and liberated to being sexist and shallow. Jaleen Grove, editor of Top Hats and Flappers (Fantagraphics) traces this progression in the context of the entertainment industry and its exploitation of glamour, looking at how models used illustrators and vice versa to further their careers.

Come on down to Fantagraphics Bookstore this Saturday, May 8 from 6:00 to 9:00 PM to welcome gifted cartoonist Michael Kupperman to Seattle. He’ll be signing copies of the brand new issue of his sensational TALES DESIGNED TO THRIZZLE comic book and other publications. The appearance includes an exhibition of his dazzling original art and a continuous screening of the animated “Snake ‘n’ Bacon” pilot episode.

Kupperman’s unique graphic sensibility combines elements of anachronistic pulp detective magazines textured with references to contemporary art and popular culture. This results in singularly seductive and hilarious comics.

Michael Kupperman’s appearance coincides with the colorful Georgetown Second Saturday Art Attack. In addition to diverse visual and performing arts, the May 8 installment includes the Georgetown Super 8 Film Festival featuring continuous screenings of over 50 three minute films at venues throughout the historic neighborhood.

Saturday’s event features an extraordinary cartoonist, an esoteric soundtrack by DJ “Fallout” Russ, and complimentary beverages. Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery is located at 1201 S. Vale Street at Airport Way S. only minutes from downtown Seattle. Open daily 11:30 to 8:00 PM, Sundays until 5:00 PM. Phone 206.658.0110.

Anders Nilsen is part of a group art show at Home Gallery in Chicago, opening this Saturday May 8, 2010 at 6 PM, with a closing brunch on Sunday May 30, 2010, at noon. More info and show previews here.

Daily clips & strips -- click for improved/additional viewing at the sources:

• Stephen DeStefano announces that his graphic novel Lucky in Love (coming this Summer from Fantagraphics) is in the can and reveals these character designs for the sequel, already in progress

• The Esther Pearl Watson 's Unlovable Fan Page on Facebook presents a classic Tammy strip as it first appeared in Bust magazine

• Steven Weissman continues to tease his pieces in the Butter and Blood art show at GR2 with "Wah! Wah! I Wanna"

• Nut shot! It's this week's Belligerent Piano by Tim Lane

• This week's Truth Serum by Jon Adams

Online Commentary & Diversions:

• Guide: At Time's Techland blog, Douglas Wolk tells you "Where to Start with Love and Rockets": "Fantagraphics actually has a guide to navigating the various overlapping reprints of the three Love and Rockets series (and assorted associated projects) to date, since everything's been repackaged and reformatted so many times. That's useful if you want to read everything in chronological order – but I'd actually suggest that you don't."

• Review: "The solid blacks and blocky grotesquerie of The Lagoon strongly recall Charles Burns’ Black Hole, a story in which adulthood is equated with monstrosity. In The Lagoon, too, sexual maturity and horror are linked. But that link is mediated by a third term — a metaphor, a song." – Noah Berlatsky, The Hooded Utilitarian (reprinted from the Chicago Reader)

• Review: "The mind of Tony Millionaire is a funny, wacky and kinda disturbing place, but man do I love it! ... Billy Hazelnuts and the Crazy Bird is an incredible book for all ages. There is nothing else like it being published today and I think that is why it’s so special! In a time when comic fans are counting every penny and scrutinizing every purchase, rest assured this book is worth every penny." – Secret Identity

Due to arrive in comic shops this week (read on for more info and new-release commentary from the comics blogs):

Krazy & Ignatz 1916-1918: Love in a Kestle or Love in a Hut
by George Herriman

160-page black & white/color 9" x 12" softcover • $24.99
ISBN: 978-1-60699-316-3

Comics Comics' Joe McCulloch describes it thusly: "This is a new Fantagraphics softcover collecting the earliest Krazy Kat Sunday pages, thus looping this most venerable Golden Age of Reprints project around to material Eclipse covered one year at a time back in the late ’80s (the Fanta effort began with 1925, where Eclipse left off). I think this one should include three of the ’80s volumes, thus topping out at 160 pages, with the original supplements preserved, but also updated annotations and a new Chris Ware design." Douglas Wolk at Comics Alliance: "In which Fantagraphics' splendid Krazy Kat Sunday strip reprint program loops back around to the beginning of the series' run, previously reprinted by Eclipse/Turtle Island about twenty years ago. This edition also features a brief portfolio of some of the appearances of a little black cat in George Herriman's pre-Krazy comic strips, and a few other curiosities from the early days of the strip." Tom Spurgeon, The Comics Reporter: "Still the greatest comic. The design on this is like it's the ninja issue of the series." Cyriaque Lamar of io9 takes note: "the classic cat-and-mouse series gets the paperback treatment."

Our customary PDF excerpt and video/photo slideshow is available at the link above. Your local shop can confirm availability.