FLOG! Entries tagged 'Boody Rogers'

Daily OCD: 10/19/10

mike

Online Commentary & Diversions returns after a post-APE hiatus and subsequent sick day:

• Review: "Good Jaime Hernandez comics are always just about the most satisfying books that money can buy, and I was so impressed with how the pleasure of seeing contemporary Maggie again for the first time in far too long [in Love and Rockets: New Stories #3] gave way to the satisfaction of seeing another building block in her curious history, and then everything turned unpleasant in a way that was equally bleak and fascinating. Watching Jaime fit everything together the way he does is breathtaking. Recommended for adult readers." – Grant Goggans, The Hipster Dad's Bookshelf

• Review: It's still "Love and Rocktober" at Sean T. Collins's Attentiondeficitdisorderly: "If Ghost of Hoppers was Maggie's confrontation with adulthood, The Education of Hopey Glass serves up the equivalent for Hopey and Ray. It's fascinating to me to see where their lives have taken them versus where they were — and more importantly, what they represented to Maggie — when they were first juxtaposed. [...] What makes these two stories compelling and connects them to one another beyond the basic idea of the characters coming to terms with their age is how much the stories rely on the kinds of things only an artist of Jaime's caliber can pull off for their telling."

• Review: "Man’s oldest gynophobic horrors and most simplistic delight in sheer physical dominance are savagely delineated in this primitive, appalling, cathartic and blackly funny campaign of cartoon horror. Resplendent, triumphant juvenilia is adroitly shoved beyond all ethical limits into the darkest depths of absurdist comedy. Not for children, the faint-hearted or weak-stomached, [Prison Pit Book 2] is another non-stop rollercoaster of extreme violence, profanity and cartoon shock and awe at its most visceral and compelling. ...[T]his book is all-out over the top and flat out hilarious. Buy and see if you’re broad-minded, fundamentally honest and purely in need of ultra-adult silliness." – Win Wiacek, Now Read This!

• Plug: "...Johnny Ryan’s Prison Pit Book 2... is the funniest shit I’ve read in years." – Sean Witzke, Robot 6

• Review: "Bitter, haunting stories [by Zak Sally] like 'The Man Who Killed Wally Wood' and 'The War Back Home' show a striking willingness to ask uncomfortable questions about himself and the world around him. His account of Dostoyevsky’s time in prison is a real highlight and I think marks a turning point in his storytelling ability. And the fearless, self-lacerating essay he provides at the end brings the book to a near-perfect close. Really, [Like a Dog] is a tight little collection." – Chris Mautner, Robot 6

• Review: "There’s fourteen stories in all in this anthology, beautifully scanned, restored, and reproduced in all their four-color glory. [...] There’s a lot of fun to be had in these pages. [...] Boody properly showcases a sizeable enough collection of complete comics stories by the wildman inkslinger from Texas, finally elevating Rogers into the pantheon he’s always been part of — if only enough folks had been able to access his work. At last, they can!" – Steve Bissette, The Schulz Library Blog

• Review: "The publication of Rebel Visions was a vital riposte to [a] tide of apathy, a vast and authoritative work built for the clear purpose of documenting the entire history of the US underground revolution in a definitive fashion: a not inconsiderable task given the various tributaries that have spewed forth since the early 1960s. [...] Rosenkranz diligently weaves a number of divergent themes using the oral histories of most of the major participants." – Kevin McCaighy, Exquisite Things (via ¡Journalista!)

• Interview: Kat Engh of Geek Girl on the Street chatted with Megan Kelso at APE over the weekend: "I like writing and movies and music and art forms that are about more than one thing. I’m really fascinated by that, and I think that comics really lend themselves to that kind of layering and layers in conflict, because you’ve literally got two tracks of information with pictures and words, and because they’re so separate from each other, they lend themselves to doing different things at the same time. I’ve always thought that if a comic’s not doing more than one thing, it’s not taking advantage of what is, so yeah, I’d say I actively strive for that."

• Interview: At Comic Book Resources, Chris Mautner talks to Fire & Water author Blake Bell at length about Bill Everett — "I think Everett is as unique a stylist as Ditko is. When you see Everett's work, you automatically know who it is if you have any inkling about any of the Silver or Golden Age artists. Secondly, in his own way he's as influential as Ditko. Without question, Everett created the antihero in superhero comics back in 1939 when he introduced the Sub-Mariner. There was no other comic book character like him." — and upcoming volumes of The Steve Ditko Archives.

• Interview: It's the second part of Brian Heater's conversation with Drew Weing at The Daily Cross Hatch: "It’s such a weird time where so much stuff is available online, though I went out of my way to make the book a nice little object. And I feel like it does read better in book form, because it’s a format that you can more lovingly pore over the detail."

• Interview: At Gapers Block, Rose Lannin talks to Jeremy Tinder, who makes his Fantagraphics debut in Mome Vol. 20. This quote is relevant to the Mome story: "I grew up reading newspaper strips, like Garfield. I think it was around age 5 when I really started getting into Garfield and tracing it out of the paper every day. [...] Garfield was my focus in life for six years, I was so into it."

• Coming Attractions: Bleeding Cool's Rich Johnston reports here that "...[I]t seems that Fantagraphics, as part of their current attemp to to translate every French comic book in existence, has seized upon [David B.'s] book, Le Jardin armé et autres histoires or The Armed Garden and are to publish it in August next year," and here about our translation of Tardi & Manchette's Like a Sniper Lining Up His Shot, "...planned for August next year. Which, in terms of European-to-American translation is light speed."

Daily OCD: 10/28/09

mike

Blurbs, "Babe" and big bucks in this episode of Online Commentary & Diversions:

• Review: "The Red Monkey Double Happiness Book features two full-length stories, 'The Leaking Cello Case' and 'John Wesley Harding.' Both stories start off in the every day then morph into oddball mysteries that never go quite where you expect them to. As odd as some of the capers and misadventures get they are always conveyed with a kind of casual, deadpan poker face that manages to make them all the more believable. ... The art is a curious mix of cartoonish realism, and the city of Cape Town is vividly portrayed... Red Monkey Double Happiness Book is a thoroughly enjoyable and entertaining read for the mystery/crime comic fan looking for something a bit different than the harder noir stuff that seems to dominate these days." – Brian Lindenmuth, BSCreview

• Review: "...[T]he appearance this week in bookstores of Hans Rickheit’s comix masterpiece, The Squirrel Machine, is a genuine milestone in the... artistic business of reconciling one’s inside to one’s outside, so much so that I must confess that I am truly taken aback by Rickheit’s entire effort, in the best sense of the word. This carefully constructed tale... strikes me as being one of the few original works of art that I’ve seen published in North America over the last two decades, on a par with the better work of Dan Clowes or Charles Burns. ... This is not a tale for the squeamish nor is it a tale for the literal-minded; it is very much a bravura performance in the tradition of Surrealism, or Fantastic Art, or even Symbolism... In short, strongly recommended!" – Mahendra Singh

• Feature: Matthew J. Brady presents "12 Things I Learned from Supermen!" including "In these stories, disbelief must often not only be suspended, but strung up and mercilessly whipped, then drawn and quartered"

• Events: At his blog, Tom Kaczynski (Mome) reports from the Zak Sally/John Porcellino reading/book launch in Minneapolis last weekend

• Things to see: Pappy's Golden Age Comics Blogzine presents a Boody Rogers "Babe" story that does not appear in our Craig Yoe-edited Boody book (via Stephen Thompson at Yoe's Super I.T.C.H. blog)

• Things to see: Halloween greetings from Richard Sala!

• $$$: Via The Beat, somebody sold a mint slabbed copy of Albedo #2 (1st appearance of Usagi Yojimbo) on eBay for $5100, making it possibly the most expensive Fantagraphics comic ever sold (corrections welcome); Stan Sakai comments on his LiveJournal

Daily OCD: 9/3/09

mike

Online Commentary & Diversions:

• Review: "Monte Schulz proves that his father was not the only talented storyteller in the family.... Monte has carved out his own stake with This Side of Jordan, the first novel of a planned trilogy.... Even though there are moments of brutal violence in the vein of Cormac McCarthy, Jordan is more about the young man facing his future with uncertain terms.... You’ll find yourself enraptured by his style, fittingly written in honor of his father." - Bruce Grossman, Bookgasm

• Review: "Overall, I liked West Coast Blues quite a bit, enough so that it makes me want to search out Manchette's novels that have been translated into English. If you enjoy hardboiled crime graphic novels, you should certainly give this one a try." - James Reasoner

• Review: "Boody’s absurdism is patently blue-collar. There is nothing heady or cynical or mean-spirited in these strips. They owe far more to the tradition of wives tales and folk legends than Kafka. As their syndication would likely demand, Boody’s bizarre comics are Golden Age nuggets of an off-kilter author who found a particular release in his medium." - Erik Hinton, PopMatters

• Review: "Chusid and Economon once again prove to be wise stewards of the Flora archives. [The] Sweetly Diabolic [Art of Jim Flora] reveals many largely unknown aspects of his work, but also fruitfully revisits his classic Columbia-era work. Thanks to the quality of the reproductions and design of the book itself, the vitality of Flora's art comes through on each page. An effective introduction to Flora's art and a satisfying crowd-pleaser for his established fans, Diabolic is another richly entertaining treasury of Flora's 'baroque and subversive' art." - Joe Bendel, J.B. Spins

• Profile: John Mesjak of my3books looks at the works of Jason, with a focus on his "beautiful" new book Low Moon

• Things to see: Frank Santoro shares one of his page layouts for the "Cold Heat" story by himself, Ben Jones & Jon Vermilyea in the upcoming Mome Vol. 16

• Things to see/events: Here's a big ol' update on various products and activities from Dame Darcy

• Oddity: The Village Voice's "Crap Archivist" asserts "no hero inspired me more in my years of temping than Fletcher Hanks' Stardust"

Daily OCD: 7/31/09

mike

Is July really over already? Hoo-ee, time sure flies when you're compiling Online Commentary & Diversions:

• Review: "Based on his research, interviews, and personal experiences in Palastinian Occupied Territories in 1991 and 92, [Joe Sacco]'s comic [Palestine] takes you there and gives you a first-hand account of the atrocities and suffering in the conflict with Israel. He gives you a close up visual rendering of the physical and emotional conditions of the people, who struggle daily for survival... Sacco has rendered the terrible conditions of life into a compelling and sympathetic artistic documentary. It is sad, but most good stories are sad... What’s better, his drawing is detailed and realistic, very approachable and interesting." - American in Auckland

• Review: "Either you think Michael Kupperman's stuff is hilarious or you don't. And if you don't, well, that's sad, because you suck and you have no friends... Kupperman has created a world with its own humor/"Dadaist" vibe, as he puts it in one meta-strip, and no critical breakdown can really relate its LOL-charm... Much of the charm resides in his art, heavily hatched, shadowed, stippled, and Benday-dotted in an old-fashioned style. He slams the retro up against his postmodern wisecracks, and it works nearly every time... This new omnibus of all four of his can't-miss gems from Fantagraphics not only makes it easy to get his out-of-print stuff, it's the only way to go—that's because the reprints are in color for the first time, and it just looks really nice." - Byron Kerman, PLAYBACK:stl

• Review: "The Wolverton Bible is a collection of drawings that Basil Wolverton did for Herbert Armstrong's Worldwide Church of God. I've been hoping for a collection of these drawings for ages... What a great collection. The drawings are nicely printed, very black, on nice white paper... The book is sturdy and feels good... This is a windfall. It's a wonderful additon to any art collection." - Garth Danielson, Primitive Screwheads

• Interview: "[Craig] Yoe revels in the hidden histories of comics, and not just because they’re money at the movies. In Boody: The Bizarre Comics of Boody Rogers, published by Fantagraphics earlier this year, the historian has helped uncover one of comics’ left-field treasures. 'Boody’s comics could survive a nuclear holocaust,' Yoe wisecracked. 'Silliness, sex and surrealism. Why can’t all so-called comic books be like this?'" - Scott Thill, Wired

• Preview: Previews spotlights a selection of pages from the latest volume in The Complete Peanuts (1973-1974)

• Plug: Joe Matt holds forth on camera about our Popeye series (and his favorite DVDs) for Amoeba's "What's in Your Bag?" video series

• Plug: At Akimbo, Robert Dayton mentions the Trevor Von Eeden review in The Comics Journal #298

• Things to see: Tom Kaczynski draws Zak Sally (and reports from the release party for Zak's new album Fear of Song)

• Comic-Con/Things to see: Rickey Purdin's Watchmen con sketchbook filled up with FBI artists (Johnny Ryan, Esther Pearl Watson, Jordan Crane) and friends (Mark Todd, Sammy Harkham & more) at San Diego (via Sean T. Collins)

• Comic-Con: There's a special Fantagraphics guest star in Drawn & Quarterly's con photos

Daily OCD: 7/27/09

mike

Oh boy, let's start our post-Comic-Con Online Commentary & Diversions catch-up:

• Comic-Con: Coverage of our con announcements and happenings from Douglas Wolk for Rolling Stone, Paul Constant at The Stranger, and Chris Mautner of Robot 6

• Review: "...Jason elevates his skewering of filmic genres to a whole new level in his latest collection, Low Moon, which sees his unique takes on film noir, westerns and screwball comedy. All of the tales are informed by his signature clean lines, bright colors, sparse dialogue and taste for a particularly brutal brand of slapstick humor and occasional moments of dark, incisive brilliance that are often reached without uttering a word... Featuring tawdry sex, alien abductions, existential crises, betrayal, and a hundred and one different varieties of murder, this is a book that pretty much has it all." - Ian Chant, PopMatters

• Review: "...Jason's Low Moon... [is] a collection full of mostly wordless comedic pleasures." - Richard Gehr, The Village Voice

• Review: "A question regarding the title of Michael Kupperman's Tales Designed to Thrizzle Volume One: Does 'thrizzle' mean 'pee your pants a little from laughing so hard'? Because if so, it just about achieved its promise..." - Rod Lott, Bookgasm

• Review: "[Boody: The Bizarre Comics of Boody Rogers ] is one of the funniest comics I've ever read, and all I do is read comics... Just looking at his drawings makes me laugh... If you like Johnny Ryan, you should check this out. And they weren't fooling around with that title. These comics are as weird as hell... This book is essential. Get it or get out." - Nick Gazin, Vice

• Review: "[Uptight] doesn't come out often enough... Jordan Crane is an immense talent; I just wished he worked faster. He's one of the best new guys of the past five years." - Nick Gazin, Vice (same link as above)

• Review: "This is one of the greatest works of American art of the past century and fuck you if you were ignorant of this. Prince Valiant was and is one of the greatest comics of all time and most would agree that it's the greatest adventure comic... Reading Prince Valiant has the same thrill as reading Sherlock Holmes. He's smarter, handsomer, and a better fighter than everyone around him. Reading his adventures and watching him sneak around castles, swordfight small armies, and romance medieval bitches is more exciting to me than almost any other comic. I'm getting pumped just thinking about it... It's so beautiful. I want to be Prince Valiant and I want to be Hal Foster." - Nick Gazin, Vice (same link as above)

• Review: "Fantagraphics, the gold standard when if comes to collecting and reprinting newspaper strips, has released the first volume of Prince Valiant, covering the years 1937 to 1938 in all-new remastered color, the result is breathtaking! Foster is truly one of the great comic illustrators who ever lived but has never got his just due it seems because he didn't work in the traditional comic book medium. One needs only to read the first few pages of the book to grasp his incredible ability... This is graphic storytelling at its finest and a true treasure! Grade A" - Tim Janson, Mania

• Review: "The cover [of The Pin-Up Art of Dan DeCarlo] sums it up -- a man who looks disturbingly like Riverdale’s Mr. Lodge gazes lasciviously at a lingerie-clad young woman who looks disturbingly like a (very) bosomy Veronica. That is just so wrong... Breasts swell and sag with the weight of flesh, not silicone; thighs press firmly and meatily together, hips and butts strain against fabric, threatening plentiful wardrobe malfunctions. And the wardrobes!... The overall effect is -- well, I can’t describe the overall effect. Let’s just say that in trying to take it all in I may have stretched my eyes permanently out of shape." - Noah Berlatsky, The Hooded Utilitarian

• Review: "...Peter Bagge's new compilation of comics, Everybody Is Stupid Except for Me and Other Astute Observations... turns out also to be a rude form of local history... [H]is craftsmanship - in the tradition of Mad's Don Martin and Nancy creator Ernie Bushmiller - lies in his ability to reduce his drawings to the simplest possible details needed to tell the story. His rants are funny, but the frictionless gag-delivery systems of his panels are an even more effective rebuke to the willful obscurity of contemporary art." - David Stoesz, Seattle Weekly

• Review: "Collecting 10 years’ worth of cartoons originally done for Reason magazine, as well as a few odds and sods, [Everybody Is Stupid Except for Me] finds Bagge as sharp and irate as ever, and his art has improved while still being recognizably his own. Bagge is also, thankfully, still possessed of a great sense of humor, especially about himself—even the title reveals an element of self-mockery among all the self-righteousness." - The A.V. Club

• Review: "There are few comics in the history of the medium as universally beloved as Love and Rockets... The Palomar stories, while extraordinarily literate and often brilliant in how they straddle the line between magical realism and gritty serial drama, are complex narratives which benefit greatly from being read from the very beginning; Jaime’s lighter, simpler approach is probably a better place to start." - Leonard Pierce, The A.V. Club, offering advice on how to start reading Love and Rockets; here's our advice

• List/Interviews: 3 links from The Vice Guide to Comics: "Gary Panter's Top Ten Comics," "More Al Jaffee Than You Need," and "Big Answers" with Anders Nilsen

• Interview: At Comics Comics, Dan Nadel presents audio of his interview of Paul Karasik at the NYC book release for the second Fletcher Hanks book You Shall Die by Your Own Evil Creation! at Desert Island in Brooklyn last week

• Interview: More Hanks audio! Listen to Paul Karasik talk about Fletcher Hanks on Gary Shapiro's "From the Bookshelf" program on KUSP Santa Cruz radio a couple of weeks ago

• Interview: Robot 6's Tim O'Shea talks to John Kerschbaum about Petey & Pussy, self-publishing and other topics. Sample quote: "It’s what it would look like if Elmer Fudd REALLY blew Daffy’s beak off. But I’ve always felt that humor and horror are very closely related. That they naturally play off of each other. The funny bits make the scary bits scarier and vice versa."

• Interview: At The A.V. Club, Sam Adams gets Michael Kupperman to reveal some of the secrets of his comedy genius and the future of Thrizzle. For example: "Certainly I enjoy the outré and I enjoy artistic comics and surrealism in comics very much. But the decision I made and have stuck with and refined was the decision to try to be funny and communicate humor. Once you put that ahead of everything else, it resolves those other questions for you."

• Plug: Jog - The Blog spotlights 3 of our new releases from last week

• Plug: Boing Boing's Mark Frauenfelder passes along word about the "Someday Funnies" feature in The Comics Journal #299

• Plug: wrd.wthiin.woord spotlights Abstract Comics

• Plug: Between Peace and Happiness is "Kind of in love in Jordan Crane."

• Contest: Quick Stop Entertainment is giving away 3 copies of Michael Kupperman's Tales Designed to Thrizzle Vol. 1. Entry and official rules at the link

Daily OCD: 6/1/09

mike

Your Online Commentary & Diversions for the first day of June '09:

• Review: "Holy cats!... Wolverton's illustrations [in The Wolverton Bible], done in the same unmistakable, stippled style that characterized his grotesqueries, show off the grim, the violent, and the destructive in the Old Testament, putting the blood and guts in the spotlight. The result is like no illustrated Bible you've ever seen... This is a side of Wolverton I never suspected, but it is perfectly him, humorous, grisly, mad and wonderful." - Cory Doctorow, Boing Boing

• Review/Profile: "...Unlovable by Esther Pearl Watson... was for me like discovering a nugget of gold in a sieve! ...really original and fun." - Lezinfo (translated from French)

• Review: "With great candor and wit, [Peter] Bagge tackles [the] issues... in Everybody Is Stupid Except for Me, a collection of his strips from Reason Magazine. As in his previous works like Hate and The Bradleys, Bagge deftly manages to simultaneously anger and amuse the reader with his intensely personal stories about larger topical issues." - Rick Klaw, The SF Site: Nexus Graphica

• Review: "The Bradleys have more vices than virtues and Bagge explores them with a violent and insolent humor." - Intergalacticrobot (translated from Portuguese)

• Review: "...[T]he comics in this collection [of Blazing Combat] are astounding... The art is reproduced from 'the original printer’s films,' so the work is clear and detailed, with the washes and shading providing depth and a feeling of realism... The stories are still timely." - Johanna Draper Carlson, Comics Worth Reading

• Review: "ISB Best of the Week: Tales Designed to Thrizzle #5... Michael Kupperman is hands-down one of the funniest guys in comics." - Chris Sims, Chris's Invincible Super-Blog

• Reviewer: For The Wall Street Journal, Alexander Theroux reviews The Complete Letters of Henry James Vol. 1

• Plug: Jason Permenter spotlights "Twain and Einstein, from the new issue of [Tales Designed to] Thrizzle, which is 'out any day now.' Makes me laugh, audibly."

• Interview: The Comics Reporter's Tom Spurgeon talks to Bob Fingerman about his latest projects, including Connective Tissue. Sample quote: "I think if I did nothing but comics, I would end up hating comics. For a while there I was actually beginning to hate comics."

• Interview: Robot 6's Tim O'Shea talks to Supermen! editor Greg Sadowski about the collection of Golden Age hero stories. Sample quote: "I never liked those 'Archive' editions where they bleach out the old colors and replace them with modern coloring methods printed on glossy paper. That whitewashes all the distinction out of those vintage books and transforms them into a cloyingly slick and artificial product."

• Event: On the MTV Splash Page blog, Rick Marshall talks about meeting Dash Shaw at our booth at BEA

• Video: From Paul Hornschemeier's blog: "Via Tuono Pettinato on Facebook: A Peanuts documentary (broken into 5 parts on YouTube) where Charles Schulz discusses the making of the animated Peanuts and the role of music. It's great footage, and makes me miss Schulz's genius all the more."

• Things to see: On the Covered blog, Johnny Ryan takes on Real Deal #3

• Things to see: Pappy's Golden Age Comics Blogzine presents a vintage Gene Deitch-created rarity, "Clint Clobber"

• Contest: Dorian Wright is giving away "a copy of Boody, the collection of amazingly bizarre and eccentric Boody Rogers comics," to whomever guesses his most-hated comic character

Daily OCD: 5/27/09

mike

Your daily dose of Online Commentary & Diversions:

• Profile: The Oklahoma Gazette dedicates a cover feature (pictured above) to native son Boody Rogers, talking to Yoe, Nadel and Spiegelman about his work. Of our collection of his comics they say "Boody: The Bizarre Comics of Boody Rogers reprints 13 of Boody Rogers' comic-book stories between 1948 and 1950. Although they have fallen into the public domain, publisher Fantagraphics has restored the color and images to its typical standards of quality ... not to mention standards of unapologetic weirdness."

• Review: "...Terr'ble Thompson is... playful fun... [Gene] Deitch’s upbeat mangling of the English language and silly twists will keep readers of many ages entertained." - Michael C. Lorah, Newsarama

• Things to see: Bookforum commissions illustrations from such notables as Paul Hornschemeier, Tony Millionaire, Dash Shaw, Chris Ware and others for their "Fiction Forward" feature (there's a bunch of fiction excerpts to read, too)

• Things to see: Dick Cheney's gonna get that wascally new Pwesident. By Drew Friedman, for The New Republic

Daily OCD: 5/15/09

mike

Pay attention: there's some must-read stuff in today's Online Commentary & Diversions!

• Review: "Castle Waiting #15 - I love that Linda Medley is completely ignoring what makes her setting so interesting for the D&D set and focusing on the characters." - Kevin Church

• Review: "Although aiming at twenty-somethings also interested in getting laid, getting wasted and getting rich, [in Rocky Vol. 2] Kellerman nonetheless manages to move beyond the ever-fertile grounds of the battle of the sexes, bodily functions and morning-after guilt-trips to produce a lot of work that is truly fresh, funny and uniquely personal." - Win Wiacek, Now Read This!

• Review: "Just like Heartbreak Soup and Locas, Luba is hard to put down, and Beto’s art gets better as it gets more experimental... there’s tons of good material here, and the humongous format can’t be beat in terms of bang for your buck." - The A.V. Club

• Review: "The 'family history' graphic novel subgenre can feel overdone at times... but volume one of Carol Tyler’s autobiographical You’ll Never Know is the kind of smartly conceived, affectingly personal work that makes comics and memoirs look fresh... Carol Tyler works wonders with colored pencils and offbeat page designs... the breadth of her visual imagination is so impressive that... overreach is excusable. Also impressive: the thematic complexity of You’ll Never Know... [Grade] A-" - The A.V. Club

• Review: "The handsome hardcover collection The Brinkley Girls brings together a generous sampling of [Nell] Brinkley’s work, leaning heavy on her stories of industrious women and the he-men they love... Brinkley’s art is so drop-dead gorgeous that readers may long to razor out every page to hang on the wall. [Grade] A-" - The A.V. Club (same link as above)

• Review: "...the fantastic Brinkley Girls hardcover put out by Fantagraphics... you would be doing yourself a favor by checking it out. Curse you Fantagraphics, I'm trying to save money you bastards." - This Is Why I Hate You

• Review: "Sally gets the cover in this 11th volume of The Complete Peanuts... Schulz is still in top form here in my opinion. There are few books I laugh at more, or enjoy more thoroughly than these fine collections. Highly recommended!" - Todd Klein

• Preview: Our advance hype for Michael Kupperman's Tales Designed to Thrizzle Vol. 1 has been translated to Español by Cuidadano Pop

• Preview: Robot 6 runs through our Fall/Winter catalog, offering commentary on each upcoming title. A must-read!

• Profile: In The Jewish Standard, Gary VandenBergh looks at the life and career of his father-in-law, Will Elder. Another must-read!

• Interview: The Inkstuds radio program talks with Craig Yoe about his most recent editorial projects, including Boody. The Bizarre Comics of Boody Rogers

• Interview: The CHS Capitol Hill Seattle Blog talks to Ellen Forney and her collaborators in the Capitol Hill art walk about last night's event

• History: Fantagraphics rules 1989-1990 in the "Modern Timeline of Events within the Comics/Movies Industry" from New Destiny Comics

• Things to see: Arlen Specter by Drew Friedman for The New Republic

Daily links: 4/30/09

mike

• Review: "Riveting... Fingerman [is] one of the meatiest cartoonists going... Fingerman makes [Connective Tissue protagonist] Darla so smart and funny and draws so distinctively, like Daumier might for Playboy..." - Booklist (no link; from print)

• Review: "Boody... is a compilation of the wonky comics work of that overlooked genius, Boody Rogers... Rogers' quirky cartooning style is faintly reminiscent of Al Capp crossed with Basil Wolverton, and his creations are wild and strange to say the least. This is an attractive compilation, wonderfully designed by Jacob Covey, that captures the charm and feel of 1940s-era comic books." - Gary Sassaman, Innocent Bystander

• Review: "Humbug is... sumptuous... It is quite possibly the best designed book I've ever seen come out of any comics company, clean and attractive and perfectly suiting its late 1950s time period. ...[I]t's a perfect little time capsule by five cartoonists and humorists at the top of their respective games." - Gary Sassaman, Innocent Bystander (same link as above)

• Review: "Sam's Strip is a whimsical little humor strip... It's a giant in-joke, charming in its inception and invention... and again, it's one damn fine-looking book." - Gary Sassaman, Innocent Bystander (same link as above)

• Review: "Supermen! [is]... in a format (designed by the editor) that perfectly complements its source material... I'm hoping for a second volume." - Gary Sassaman, Innocent Bystander (same link as above)

• Plug: Decider previews our FCBD Love and Rockets comic: "While this teaser doesn’t feature any of the series’ most beloved characters (save superhero wannabe Penny Century), it’s still a good introduction to Gilbert and Jaime Hernandez’s blend of magical realism, goofy wit, and surprising poignancy."

• Discussion: The Ohlone College "Bibliophiles Anonymous" book club is reading Ghost World in May

Daily links: 4/27/09

mike

Due to the somewhat obsessive nature of my link gathering, I had the idea to start calling these posts "Daily OCD: Online Commentary & Diversions." What do you think, readers? Too cutesy-poo? Offensive to sufferers of real OCD?

• List: The Comics Reporter's Tom Spurgeon names "The Ten All-Time Best Long-Running Comics Series," with Love and Rockets Vol. I at #2 ("The best long-running and organic artistic achievement in serial comic book form... The Hernandez Brothers inspired and outworked a greatest generation of comics auteurs. Jaime and Gilbert Hernandez are each among that handful of artists who must be given serious consideration when talking about the best cartoonists working. In Love & Rockets each created fictional worlds for the ages and used them as a vehicle for enormous artistic development, lapping the majority of their peer group. One so inclined could argue with seriousness a top 25 of American graphic novels where 1/3 of the titles listed came from this series") and Acme Novelty Library at #8 ("...a mind-bending achievement... ACME punched right in the scrotum the notion that every issue of a single comic book series had to look like the others... Its primary value is that it presented [Chris] Ware's giant talent to enough of an audience to bring him thousands of hardcore fans... Ware can dream up a single-page that if it were the only thing he ever published people might still know his name")

• List: The A.V. Club's Noel Murray offers commentary on Spurge's list ("There’s no one definitive L&R storyline; it’s just story after amazing story, accumulating over the past three decades like personal correspondence. [...] Ware... turn[ed] comic books into a kind of readable sculpture...") and lobbies for the inclusion of Johnny Ryan's Angry Youth Comix

• Review: "Miss Lasko-Gross' self-caricature in her autobio stories [in A Mess of Everything] is an interesting mash-up of a typical teen with low self-esteem and that of an indignant outsider determined to make her increasingly confident voice heard -- and loudly. [...] Lasko-Gross' greatest strengths as an artist are her character design, gesture and use of body language. It's the way she stages her characters that makes looking at each page interesting... I love the touch of the exaggerated and the grotesque that she injects into her drawings, distorting faces and bodies to reflect emotional tumult." - Rob Clough

• Review: "I read Leah [Hayes]’s whole book, Funeral of the Heart [in one sitting]; I couldn’t stop reading. It’s a beautiful, engrossing book... Amazing." - Anika in London

• Review: "Formerly-suppressed, entirely classic, these stories [in Blazing Combat] are all solid examples of comic storytelling and craftsmanship... [T]he teams here make things look too easy. Not surprising since we’re talking about master artists like Toth, Frazetta, Severin, Crandall and others. The stories have all aged surprisingly well... Highly recommended..." - Matt Maxwell, Robot 6

• Reviewer: At that same Robot 6 link, Miss Lasko-Gross reviews books by Osamu Tezuka and Gabrielle Bell

• Reviewer: Alexander Theroux's latest book review, for Closing Time by Joe Queenan, is up at The Wall Street Journal

• Plug: Biblioteca del Instituto Internacional (an American-English library in Madrid) recommends Castle Waiting by Linda Medley

• Preview: Monster Brains presents 3 pages from Johnny Ryan's Prison Pit Book One (due this fall)

• Profile: The Walrus's article on Seth discusses his design work for The Complete Peanuts in depth

• Events: Portland, your Free Comic Book Day cup runneth over, as Andrice Arp and the other contributors to the excellent free anthology comic Bird Hurdler will be appearing at various locations throughout town -- Andrice has the full itinerary and details on her blog

• Things to see: Pappy's Golden Age Comics Blogzine has an uncollected Boody Rogers story for ya

• Things to see: Three recent illos from the ever-busy Drew Friedman

• Things to see: Another fantastic new story page from Tim Lane

• Things to see: In the next panel, Big Bird kicks Freddy Krueger in the nuts

• Things to see: Ragged Claws Network presents a few of Jeffrey Jones's Jones Touch strips which can be found in the out-of-print collection of the same name from our Eros Comix imprint (NSFW)

Daily links: 4/21/09

mike

• Review: "Supermen! is an interesting book. All these knockoffs of Superman have a certain creepy charm — like an off-brand children's entertainer — and there is some art, especially by Basil Wolverton and Jack Cole, that is literally decades ahead of its time." - Paul Constant, The Stranger

• Review: "...Boody: The Bizarre Comics of Boody Rogers is a real revelation... Boody Rogers' stories... don't seem to follow narrative structure. They're like Robert Crumb crossed with Li'l Abner. And they are amazing. This is the book to get if you think you know anything about comic book history; it will show you something you never would have thought existed." - Paul Constant, The Stranger (same link as above)

• Preview: "Tales Designed to Thrizzle #5: Ain't nothing better than the latest from Michael Kupperman; nothing else to say." - Jog, rounding up this week's new comics

• Preview: "Tales Designed to Thrizzle #5 - Michael Kupperman is the funniest man alive..." - The Rack, rounding up this week's new comics

• Preview: The Inkwell Bookstore Blog thinks that the cover for The Brinkley Girls is cool

• Interview: At RevolutionSF, Jay Willson has a Q&A with Comics Journal and future Mome contributor Noah Van Sciver. Choice quote: "I'm like the Bruce Springsteen of comics, only I'm actually really cool."

• Event: For Robot 6, Chris Mautner reports from Dash Shaw's presentations at Franklin and Marshall College's Emerging Writers Festival last week

• Things to see: Self-rejected Covered entries by Robert Goodin (from before he killed it with that Donald Duck one)

Daily links: 4/16/09

mike

Lots of review love from The Stranger this week:

• Review: "Blazing Combat... [is] packed with gloriously miserable... war stories covering everything from the battle of Thermopylae to Vietnam... all beautifully captured by comics legends like Archie Goodwin, Alex Toth, Joe Orlando, and Gene Colan in appropriately murky grays... Fantagraphics has slapped together a nice, hefty... hardbound collection that's worth a read, whether you're a comic nerd, war buff, one-legged veteran, or one of those snooty I-only-read-graphic-novels types. Bombs away." - Jonah Spangenthal-Lee, The Stranger

• Review: "Miss Lasko-Gross's autobiographical comics are the best in the field since [Lynda] Barry and Phoebe Gloeckner put pen to paper. A Mess of Everything is a collection of short (mostly two to three pages) cartoons about high school. All of Lasko-Gross's cartoons are told mostly in shades of gray and brown, and they're brief, unsentimental anecdotes about shoplifting, pointless rebellion, and boys who fall in love too easily." - Paul Constant, The Stranger

• Review: "[Mome] Volume 14 is the best issue yet. About half of the contributors are new to the anthology, and their work — especially 'The Carnival,' Lilli Carré's bizarre, wistful story of damaged love at a state fair, and Spanish cartoonists Hernán Miyoga and Juaco Vizuete's noir about corruption and fame, 'The New Servant' — is skillful, funny, and possessed of a confident literary quality that many cartoonists, try as they might, can never achieve." - Paul Constant, The Stranger

• Review: "...[T]he Luba stories interweave into a panoramic soap opera that are as much about her friends and extended family as about her, a vast, chaotic superstory of a kind most comics creators can only fantasize about creating... [R]ead individually the stories are good, but read as a unit they really take on a surrealistic yet concrete life, infused throughout with a random coherence that nonetheless unifies into a real experience. It's an impressive act." - Steven Grant, Comic Book Resources

• Review: "If [Fletcher] Hanks’s stories were fascinating for their anger, lunacy, and wild urgency, then these rediscovered gems [in Boody. The Bizarre Comics of Boody Rogers] are a revelation for being every bit as strange, but seemingly on purpose. It’s akin to David Bowie coming along and taking the unstoppable id of The Ramones and The Stooges and crafting something much more complex and layered... Get it together, America. Check out this strange book and dare to dream, one last time, because dark days are ahead, and when the bullets start flying you’ll wish you spent more time laughing." - Tom Batten, Brick Weekly

• Interview: The Daily Cross Hatch talks to Noah Van Sciver, who contributes cartoon interviews to The Comics Journal and makes his Mome debut in the next issue

• Profile: Drawn spotlights the work of Dash Shaw

• Bookmark: Roasted Peanuts analyzes and annotates one Peanuts strip per day, from the beginning (via Mike Sterling)

• Things to see: This New York Times Magazine profile of Margaret Cho features the stained glass windows that Dame Darcy designed for her house

Daily links: 4/15/09

mike

• Reviews: MEGATONik calls Boody. The Bizarre Comics of Boody Rogers "absolutely insane... I would definitely make a case for reading this book no matter what sort of comics you like... These shorts are always funny, and not in an ironic or 'so bad it’s good' way"; and of Supermen! The First Wave of Comic Book Heroes 1936-1941 they say "...the artists here are all early comic pioneers, flexing their muscles, pencilling straight from their crazy guts in a medium with no borders... his is how reprints should be done"

• Things to see: In celebration of Daniel Clowes's birthday yesterday, Entrecomics presents some pages from Ghost World: Special Edition

• Things to see: CD booklet comic by Paul Hornschemeier

• Things to see: Michael Kupperman shares some sparkly screengrabs from the Snake 'n' Bacon TV program debuting on Adult Swim May 10

Daily links: 4/13/09

mike

• Review: The Star Clipper Blog on Boody. The Bizarre Comics of Boody Rogers: "To say Boody Rogers was ahead of his time is an understatement. Boody was underground before there was an underground. His comics were surreal and sexy before the Comics Code was even around to censor such outrageousness. Think of every bizarre and trippy moment from 40's Disney features, the overt sexuality of Fleischer Studios Betty Boop, and a Freak Show and Superman in a blender, and that's not even half as odd as Boody Rogers' comics. Will you have seen anything like it before? No, and you'll probably never see anything else like it again."

• Review: Blog @ Newsarama looks at Boody too: "[W]eirdness... permeates these stories and radiates outward from the pages. To say they're 'ahead of their time' would be an understatement; they seem like they were drawn just last week... [I]t's a beautiful book."

• Review: Obsessive-Repulsive finds a kindred spirit in the pages of the "rad" Ho! The Morally Questionable Cartoons of Ivan Brunetti: "I would go further than saying 'nothing is sacred' in his work and say that nothing is tolerated in Brunetti’s world. He skewers the hypocrisy, cruelty and weakness in people but it doesn’t appear that Brunetti loathes humanity nearly as much as he loathes himself. Check it out! Funny stuff!"

• Review: Comics Should Be Good! enthuses over Supermen! The First Wave of Comic Book Heroes 1936-1941: "I can’t recommend this book enough, people! Run, don’t walk, to your nearest purveyor of comics awesomeness and pick it up. You will not be disappointed... you could not buy another comic this year and be happy if you pick it up. Would I lie to you?"

• Preview: Robot 6's "What Are You Reading?" column's guest contributor this week is Dash Shaw, and regular contributor Matthew Maxwell says of The Wolverton Bible, "Wow. Just wow... man, that’s a piece of work."

• Interview: The Groovy Age of Horror talks to Josh Simmons about House and other more recent work

• Commentary: ReadingArt.ca imagines Snoopy's "It was a dark and stormy night" novel in a context of digital/mobile delivery (calling The Complete Peanuts "fantastically beautiful" while they're at it)

• Things to see/read: Conservative entertainment blog Big Hollywood has posted Steve Ditko's 2007 essay "Toyland" in its entirety (via Slog)

• Things to see (and buy)/bookmark: Jim Blanchard's "Fine Art Chophouse" blog is the place to buy original art and prints from Jim. The latest offering: a limited edition print of Butch & Petey, everyone's favorite Trucker Fags in Denial (only 16 bucks)

New Comics Day 4/1/09

mike

As you might have guessed from today's Daily Links post, we have several new books scheduled to arrive in comics shops tomorrow:

• Boody. The Bizarre Comics of Boody Rogers
• Ho! The Morally Questionable Cartoons of Ivan Brunetti
• Supermen! The First Wave of Comic Book Heroes 1936-1941

Despite being mentioned by other sources, Paul Hornschemeier's Mother, Come Home is not on the official list, but you never know! Contact your local shop to confirm availability of these titles, and hit those links to see previews and gather more info. Happy shopping!

Daily links: 3/31/09

mike

It's a honker today! Lots of good stuff out there:

• Review: Blogger Fionnchú considers the place of Alexander Theroux's Laura Warholic in the pantheon of "big, long, thick" maximalist novels (e.g. Wallace, Joyce, DeLillo, Pynchon)

• Review: The Tearoom of Despair pens a loving ode to The Comics Journal: "...[I]t remains the best magazine about comics I’ve ever had the pleasure to read, offering in-depth analysis that has changed my entire opinion of certain comics... And it has some of the best interviews with comic writers, artists and editors that have ever peen published in any medium... Overall, it is still an absolute pleasure to sit down with a new issue of The Comics Journal and read about the craft and love for the medium that is out there... It has recorded the history of comics with style and panache, has published the liveliest letter page in magazines and has been unfailing in its bid to raise comics as an art form."

• Review: Rob Clough has a typically thoughtful take on The Complete Peanuts 1971-1972: "The latest volume of The Complete Peanuts finds Charles Schulz still at his peak... a perfect blend of fantasy, whimsy, jokes, heartbreak, topical references and sturdy characterization."

• Blurb: The Seattle Times' roundup of notable new local books includes a mention of Humbug: "Includes satirical takes on highway congestion, time travel, consumer reports and perspiration."

• Preview: Fictional or not, The Rack's Lydia recommends Mother, Come Home by Paul Hornschemeier ("Paul Hornschemeier's comics always make me miserable, and in a good way. This is a new edition of my favorite work he's done so far.") and Ho! The Morally Questionable Cartoons of Ivan Brunetti ("I like him a lot, but I think that Johnny Ryan should be cutting Ivan Brunetti a check every month and this collection of gag cartoons will show you why") from this week's new comics

• Preview: Rounding up the week's new comics, Jog highlights Boody. The Bizarre Comics of Boody Rogers ("you will doubt your sanity") and Ho! The Morally Questionable Cartoons of Ivan Brunetti ("excellent, take-no-prisoners gag panels")

• Preview: The Comics Reporter, same tune, different lyrics: on Boody, "Some of the greatest, oddest comics of all time"; on Ho!, "relentlessly naughty... I like these quite a bit"; and on Supermen!, "I liked this book quite a bit... a bunch of frequently weird, hallucinatory adventure fantasies"

• Preview: Atomic Romance also anticipates Supermen!: "In your face golden age stories by some of the greats of comic book history... I love this because it’s a time of experimentation. The writers and artists are learning their craft and there aren’t any established rules yet. Sure to please fans of I Shall Destroy All the Civilized Planets."

• Preview: Yet more blurbage about this week's new comics, this time from Blog @ Newsarama: on Boody, "comics super-genius Boody Rogers’ work... is almost as beautiful as it is weird. Or almost as weird as it is beautiful. At any rate, it’s really weird and really beautiful"; on Supermen!: "[A] must-read... I can’t recommend this one highly enough"

• Interview: Guttersnipe has a 2-part Q&A with Paul Hornschemeier: part 1 includes discusson of Mother, Come Home; in part 2 he discusses his Northwest tour this week

• Interview: Publishers Weekly chats with C. Tyler about her new book You'll Never Know, Book 1; of the book they say "[Tyler] recreates the experience of thought, in which past and present, parents and children, relationships and variations of the self co-mingle, intersect, and layer over one another. Evocative words and images appear in the background or the margins of Tyler’s panels, drawing out subtleties of the story, or clueing us in to unspoken emotional tones."

• Interview: The Daily Cross Hatch posts part 2 of their 3-part interview with Arnold Roth; topics covered: nudism, Hex signs, jazz

• Profile: The Oregonian presents an overview of the career to date of Paul Hornschemeier

• Things to see: The Argyle Academy pays homage to Michael Kupperman's Snake 'n' Bacon

• Good deed: Please consider donating to the S. Clay Wilson Special Needs Trust

Daily links: 3/26/09

mike

• Review: 13 Milliones de Naves says Tim Lane's Abandoned Cars is "drawn with the raw precision of a compassionless physiognomist, with a style midway between Daniel Clowes and Charles Burns... removing the rubble from the shipwreck and bringing to the fore a collection of human beings in the state of abandonment... [T]his book is anything but indifferent; the realistic and stark graphic style of its author shakes with a flying kick... [T]he Lane name has many numbers to enter on the same roster as Tomine, Burns, Clowes and company." (Translated from Spanish with help from Google)

• Review: Bookgasm on Boody. The Bizarre Comics of Boody Rogers: "Each page of Boody is a delight to take in. These comics are colorful, good-natured and good-humored, full of pep and personality... Rogers definitely was ahead of his time, demonstrating more zeal for the medium than much of his contemporaries."

• Review: Rob Clough on Ho! The Morally Questionable Cartoons of Ivan Brunetti: "No other artist in the history of comics has worked out their misanthropy and self-loathing on the page quite like Ivan Brunetti... with each strip yet another needle jabbed into the eyes of his viewers. Brunetti's enormous discipline and talent as a cartoonist shines through in this collection..."

• Review: A Bucket of Instant Sunshine reads Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron by Daniel Clowes: "...I think it's safe to say that if you like surreal imagery, vague noir-ish plotting, and freak shows, then you will probably like this."

• Events: The Daily Eastern News reports from yesterday's Ivan Brunetti talk at Eastern Illinois University

Now in stock: Boody. The Bizarre Comics of Boody Rogers

mike

Boody. The Bizarre Comics of Boody Rogers
Edited by Craig Yoe

Bizarre, wacky, weird, wild and sexy — these are just a few of the adjectives that describe the cartooning of Boody Rogers. Before there were underground comics, Boody Rogers dug deep into breaking the rules; before their was low-brow art, Boody created art that hit hard below the brow. Rogers’s pen and ink outré raucousness was wrapped into great stories, beautifully drawn art, and hilarious gags. Fans of Boody Rogers’s Golden age comic book stories span generations of cartoonists, from Robert Williams to Art Spiegelman to Johnny Ryan. Spiegelman printed Rogers’s work in RAW magazine and recently it also appeared in the anthology book Art Out of Time: Unknown Comic Visionaries (Abrams). Here at last is a single book devoted to this cult comics hero, collecting Rogers's best Sparky Watts, Babe and Dudley stories, as well as much more. This beautifully designed tome also includes an introduction and comic-strip appreciation by editor Craig Yoe (Arf).

144-page full-color 7.5” x 10” softcover • $19.99
Add to Cart • More Info & Previews

Daily links: 3/13/09

mike

• Review: The A.V. Club "Comics Panel" likes Mome Vol. 14, saying of two featured stories, "Both [Dash Shaw and Lilli Carré] combine striking illustration with a nuanced sense of place and character for a winning mix of the classic and the progressive."

• Review: At the same link, The A.V. Club "Comics Panel" finds Boody. The Bizarre Comics of Boody Rogers "wild" and says the stories "read like uneasy fever dreams punctuated by cornpone gags. They aren’t funny ha-ha or funny strange, they’re funny with a touch of madness."

• Review: Italian site Il Sole 24 Ore says our collection of Mort Walker & Jerry Dumas's Sam's Strip is "exceptional... As always, the presentation of Fantagraphics is superb and worth sharing," according to the Google translation

• Profile: Gurldoggie spotlights Dame Darcy in anticipation of her appearance at our store tomorrow night

• Interview: Video blog 3-Minute Egg talks to Zak Sally at the MOMEntum exhibit opening at MCAD last weekend

• Interview: Newsarama talks to editor Craig Yoe about Boody

• Things to see: The Fabuleous Fifties presents a nice selection of uncollected Sparky Watts newspaper strips by Boody Rogers

Daily links: 3/9/09

mike

• Review: Comic Book Resources gives 4 stars to Boody. The Bizarre Comics of Boody Rogers, saying it "features some of the nuttiest comics you'll ever read... Boody Rogers presents an off-kilter world of hilarity that seems like an oft-unheralded link between the Golden Age of the newspaper strips and the underground cartoonists of the 1960s."

• Review: In the weekly Robot 6 "What Are You Reading?" roundup, Chris Mautner says of Humbug, "It’s a really impressive collection of work... and the production design here is nothing short of stunning. Fantagraphics really knocked this one out of the park in restoration."

• List: At New York Magazine, Bob Fingerman, Dash Shaw and a host of other creators pick their favorite New York City-set comics

• Blurb: Trendspotting blogger RobOrange spots The Wolverton Bible

• Interview: The Daily Cross Hatch continues their conversation with Al Jaffee, focusing on his early career

• Things to see/read: Illustration and story by Tim Lane

• Things to see: "I did a whole bunch of illustrations for this Japanese business magazine ASAHI," says Johnny Ryan

• Oddity: Kitchen Synch stumbles across some Duplex Planet Illustrated synchronicity