(Click to enlarge)

Yeah, we're great, and our books are late. Why, what did you think the headline meant?

Anyway, a new year is upon and it's time to 'fess up about all the late Fantagraphics titles you were expecting to have by now, and don't, because we suck. Specific apologia and weaseling have been added to some titles, others we just pass under mortified silence. 2011 will be better!

The following are printed, on their way to us across the Pacific Ocean, and expected to be available in January or February 2011:
• FREEWAY by Mark Kalesniko (usually original graphic novels are late because the author was overly optimistic about how long it would take to write and draw it, but this time it was entirely our fault.)
• KING OF THE FLIES VOLUME 2: THE ORIGIN ON THE WORLD by Mezzo and Pirus (and in case you're wondering, Volume 3 is scheduled for September 2012 at this point)
• KRAZY AND IGNATZ: 1919-1921 by George Herriman
• THE LAST ROSE OF SUMMER by Monte Schulz (again, entirely our fault and neither the author's nor cover artist Cathy Malkasian 's, both of whom are champs and pros.)
• MOME #21 edited by Eric Reynolds
• POPEYE VOLUME 5: "WHAT'S A JEEP?" by E.C. Segar
• ROY CRANE'S BUZ SAWYER VOL. 1: THE WAR IN THE PACIFIC
• THE STRANGE CASE OF EDWARD GOREY (NEW EXPANDED HARDCOVER EDITION) by Alexander Theroux
• TWILIGHT OF THE ASSHOLES by Tim Kreider

The following are at the printer and are expected to be available in March or April 2011:
• THE COMICS JOURNAL #301
• LOVE FROM THE SHADOWS by Gilbert Hernandez
• SAFE AREA GORAZDE: THE SPECIAL EDITION by Joe Sacco

The following are expected to ship sometime during the Spring of 2011:
• CAPTAIN EASY: THE COMPLETE SUNDAY STRIPS VOLUME 2 by Roy Crane (we had a hard time collecting a few of the last strips on this one-but we're almost there now)
• DRAWING POWER edited by Rick Marschall and Warren Bernard
• WANDERING SON BOOK ONE by Shimura Takako

The following have been rescheduled:
• THE ANTIC CARTOON ART OF T.S. SULLIANT will be reformatted, rethought, re-solicited, and released in early 2012
• FORLORN FUNNIES VOLUME 1 by Paul Hornschemeier will be released in the Summer of 2011
• THE HIDDEN by Richard Sala will be re-solicited and released in July 2011
• HOW TO READ NANCY will be re-solicited and released in 2012 in a vastly expanded version from what we first expected
• IS THAT ALL THERE IS? (né MODERN SWARTE, originally announced for 2007) in late Fall 2011: Yes, Joost has turned in all the files and publishers in three countries are synchronizing their watches!
• NANCY IS HAPPY will be released in late 2011: It turns out that there was more production work than we anticipated to make the book as perfect as humanly possible.)
• POGO VOLUME 1 will be released in the Fall of 2011 - yes, seriously, for real this time

This post has been in progress for nearly a month now... with so much to catch up on, I'll just be highlighting a few selected items and then giving you links to the regularly-updated stuff. As always, click for better viewing and possible commentary at the sources.

• At The Hooded Utilitarian, Ng Suat Tong reports on some recent Jaime Hernandez original art sales, with lots and lots of images

• At Not Quite Clobberin', a scan of a seldom-seen 1997 autobio strip by Jaime Hernandez

• Doc Shaner posted a bunch of Popeye art on his Tumblr last week, including this amazing "Sgt. Popeye's Lonely Hearts Club Band" by Stephen DeStefano

• Shucks, it's an illustrated love letter from 1916 from E.C. Segar to his wife-to-be Myrtle, at Letters of Note (via The Comics Reporter)

• Jason reveals the cover art for the French edition of Isle of 100,000 Graves (L'Île aux 100 000 Morts); plus early strips, illustrations, outtakes and film reviews at his Cats Without Dogs blog

• A new comic for Vice by Johnny Ryan

• Bob Fingerman's They Live poster for an art show at Maxwell's in Hoboken

• Three from Covered: Mome contributor Jon Adams does Yosemite Sam #2; Tom Pappalardo does Acme Novelty Library #1; and Dyna Moe does Tales Designed to Thrizzle #3. Also see Jon's latest Truth Serum strips

• Two from Repaneled: Matthew Allison takes on Johnny Ryan's Prison Pit and Steven Weissman gets in on the fun; also catch up on Steven's latest "I, Anonymous" spots and sketches on his Chewing Gum in Church blog and more on his Flickr page

• Eleanor Davis's letterpress print for The Cloudy Collection; plus her latest sketches, works in progress and other illustrations at her We Be Ouija blog

• Dig Gary Panter's logo design for his multimedia "band" Devin Gary & Ross

• A two-page all-ages horror story by Richard Sala

• A new war-story page by Tim Lane, with interesting background info; plus recent installments of his ongoing Belligerent Piano strip at his Jackie Noname blog

• At Gabrielle Bell's Lucky blog, the concluding installments of her "San Diego Comic-Con Comicumentary" (which Anthony Vukojevich interprets at Repaneled) and some "embarrassing older work"

• Paul Hornschemeier's weekly t-shirt designs at his News and/or Head Lice blog

• Noah Van Sciver's "Blue Wilson" and lots more drawings, strips and news on his blog

• "The King & The Beast" is a 2006 comic by Ray Fenwick

• New installments of the latest Simon & Jack (& Rosalyn!) story by Jordan Crane at What Things Do

And please catch up on the last few weeks worth of the following:

• Amazing Facts and Beyond with Leon Beyond by Kevin Huizenga and Dan Zettwoch; more Kevin at The Balloonist and New Construction

• Matthias Lehmann's Bloc-Notes blog and stunning new originals for sale

• Sketchbook drawings at John Hankiewicz's Clip Joint blog

• Drawings, paintings, collages and other images by Frank Santoro at the Cold Heat Comics blog

• Artwork, dolls, fashions, other handicrafts and spells from Dame Darcy

• Artwork & illustrations from Émile Bravo

• Illustrations & sketches at Marco Corona's Il Canguro Pugilatore blog

• Vintage Jim Flora illustrations & artwork (plus merch) at the Jim Flora blog

• Nature sketches with running commentary by Debbie Drechsler at her Just Around the Corner blog

• Lots of sketches for Mark Kalesniko's forthcoming graphic novel Freeway (just sent to the printer!) and drawings of women wearing things at his blog

• Comics, illustrations and news from Sergio Ponchione at his Mondobliquo blog

• Laura Park continues to add artwork to her Flickr page

• The latest Josh Simmons sketches, panels and updates at The Furry Trap and The White Rhinoceros and (with Wendy Chin) The Randy Gander and Quackers 

• An entire month's worth of drawings, sketches, photos and jewelry (!) from Renee French

• Animated drawings and Eyeworks Animation Festival updates from Lilli Carré at her Kettle of Fish blog

• Dash Shaw's daily drawings at The Ruined Cast blog

• Sketchbook drawings and comics by Sophie Crumb at her blog

• Caricatures, a new Need to Know video, and commentary on current events by Steve Brodner

• Sketchbook comics etc. by Anders Nilsen at The Monologuist

• More pages from Hans Rickheit's graphic novel in progress Ectopiary, plus other material and commentary at his Squirrel Machine blog

• Pages and panels by Derek Van Gieson at his These Days I Remain blog

• The latest Maakies strips and other updates from Tony Millionaire

• Drawings and works in progress by Joe Kimball on his Flickr page

Online Commentary & Diversions:

• Reviews: At Vice, it's time for another installment of "Nick Gazin's Comic Book Witch Hunt":

"Name a funnier comic than Popeye. Wrong, idiot, there isn’t one. Not only is Popeye the best ever, but this volume of Fantagraphics Popeye series is the best one yet. Oh yeah? Name a better one. Wrong. ... Like most great strips, Popeye has a strong philosophy. That philosophy is the world’s full of crooks. I wish there was a real Popeye to enforce some sort of rough fist-justice but I’m pretty sure there’s no justice and there’s certainly no Popeye, just crooks."

"The original [Prince Valiant] was a giant Sunday page with some of the greatest illustrations ever done. The colors in the latest reprint series are so superior to those in the previous printings that the old ones might as well have been in black and white. This shit is tremendous. ... Get this book or I’ll get you."

"I keep waiting for the quality of the comics in these [Complete Peanuts] books to take a sharp downturn but it hasn’t hit yet. ... So many personality types that I find in adult life were first found in these comics."

"Jason returns with another really good comic [Werewolves of Montpellier]... Jason uses just a few lines but his aesthetics are super superior and he can express intense emotions with simplicity."

"...[T]he art and colors [in Captain Easy Vol. 1] are mind bogglingly beautiful. It’s like Darger. Beautiful candy-colored lunacy."

"You know the drill. The art’s kinda like clip art and a bunch of really funny things are said and done [in Tales Designed to Thrizzle #6]."

• Review: "Dungeon Quest: Book One offers an interesting and amusing read, full of lots of laughs about youth and nerd culture, with a surprising layers of sardonic social commentary folded in for good measure." – Jordan Magill, San Francisco Book Review

• Plug: Michelle from Giant Robot left the following message on our Facebook page: "Oscar Nunez from The Office came into GR today looking for Michael Kupperman, on the recommendation of Conan O'Brien. You guys win!"

Online Commentary & Diversions:

• Review: "Set to Sea's one-panel-per-page layout lets Weing's visual storytelling shine, but only if you resist the urge to tear through the pages quickly. Go too fast, and you'll miss the touching, wordless way Weing communicates the death of a supporting character. Or, worse, you'll skim over a gorgeous arctic sunset clearly inspired by the Gustave Dore engravings for Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner." – Glen Weldon, NPR

• Plug: "Drew Weing’s graphic novel debut [Set to Sea] is a Popeye-esque delight. Weing’s linework — and abundant crosshatching — is a visual feast that well serves the story of a deadbeat poet who is shanghaied and learns to live and love the yarns he’s been spinning." – Benn Ray (Atomic Books), Largehearted Boy

• Plug: "I don't know Drew but I've been reading [Set to Sea] online and I think it's a damn fine yarn worthy of your dollars and a place on your bookshelf." – Steve Rolston (Queen & Country, The Escapists, Ghost Projekt)

• List: "Featuring riotous fake ads, and strips like 'Snake and Bacon,' TDTT is subversive, twisted and awesome. With the 'can comic books be funny?' debate ever-raging, Tales Designed to Thrizzle answers a glorious 'Yes!'" – Max Minor, "Comic Books You Should Be Reading," Nerd City

• List: io9's Cyriaque Lamar recommends the Love and Rockets "Maggie the Mechanic" storylines as one of "5 comic books that will see you through Scott Pilgrim withdrawal," saying "these initial forays into scifi strongly resemble the unexplained weirdness of Pilgrimverse." (via Newsarama)

• Commentary: "Love and Rockets is spectacular, and amazingly approachable (What brought me over to the dark side of actually reading it was free time and finding Locas in my local library...), and the kind of thing that I feel embarrassed to have been reticent to read in the first place, which explains why I admit to it in public like this." – Graeme McMillan, Robot 6

• Commentary: The Hooded Utilitarian's critical roundtable on Popeye concludes with Robert Stanley Martin: "I perceive Segar’s Popeye as a period piece, but I can’t summon a rigorous aesthetic basis for that view. All I can muster is my own idiosyncratic opinion."

Online Commentary & Diversions:

• Review: "From the start, Cathy Malkasian's turbulent fantasy Temperance reels you in... It is not hard to spot allegories in this to today’s war on terror, and to the Cold War, in Temperance‘s portrait of siege mentality and the exaggeration of external threats. ... No Shrek or Toy Story, Temperance confounds fairy-tale expectations with a disturbing, resonant parable about propaganda, memories and other lies." – Paul Gravett, The Times Literary Supplement

• Review: "First of all, I have to say how much I enjoy the format.  Fantagraphics has done a fine job with this book, with a striking cover, sturdy spine, and essentially giving me everything I want in my comic books in terms of collected treatment. ... Jason’s simple, elegant artwork... allows any reader to dive right in. ... He’s a master of pacing out a gag, and he appreciates the fun of genre entertainment while still acknowledging the absurdity of it all. If I had to sum up Jason’s comics in one word, that word would be silly. They’re funny, and absurd, tinged with sadness and loneliness, outrageously goofy, slapstick, human and just plain pretty to look at. But mostly, they’re delightfully, delightfully silly. It’s a treat to enjoy a comic like Almost Silent." – Michael C. Lorah, Newsarama

• Review: "Prison Pit is fucking awesome and you really need to read it. It’s a kids book, in the sense that it very likely was something Johnny Ryan created when he was 12 years old, assuming the man was sniffing a lot of glue and simultaneously watching Cannibal Holocaust and WWF wrestling as a pre-teen. ... Grade: A" – Chad Derdowski, Mania

• Review: "Prison Pit 2 is mental, obscene, and grotesque... But the book is also pretty astonishing and at least several parts awesome... I'm dazzled by the bloody chutzpah and dirty bravado of Ryan's fight comic, the sheer devotion he shows to violence for violence's sake, thoroughly removed from any hollow 'redeeming values' or 'character development.' ...[T]o anyone wondering if Prison Pit 2 really delivers all the weird, filthy violence it promises, the answer is a resounding yes." – Jason Michelitch, Comics Alliance

• Review: "I read Megan Kelso's Artichoke Tales almost in a single sitting, which is probably a good way to do it. ... This book deals with some standard themes — strong women and intellectual, impractical men, the impulse that leads to war, technology vs. rural simplicity — but none is treated in a standard way. Kelso definitely has a point of view, but she doesn't insult the reader's intelligence, and there's plenty of nuance; she's telling a story, not making a point. Also, it's beautiful just to look at." – Bridgid Alverson, Robot 6

• Review: "Honestly, I’m still not sure how I ultimately feel about Artichoke Tales. I was put off by the book’s downbeat, resigned demeanor, yet at the same time impressed by Kelso’s ability to handle such a multi-layered story so effectively. Perhaps my feelings toward the book can be best summed up by the same word that one would use to describe both the political and personal relationships found in the book, and the real-life relationships she no doubt hoped to evoke: complicated." – Chris Mautner, The Comics Journal

• Interview: Robot 6's Tim O'Shea talks to Megan Kelso about Artichoke Tales: "The artichoke people started as a casual doodle. I think I was riffing on The Jolly Green Giant's sidekick, Sprout. So I just started drawing these people whenever I was on the telephone, or just playing around in my sketchbook. The more I drew them, the more ideas I had about their world, and I just slowly started to build a story about them. This was the first time since starting to make comics, that I generated a story from a drawing rather than from an idea, or from something I'd written. It was excitng to me because it seemed more like 'pure comics' to me, coming from a drawing."

• Review: "Birdland is a rare venture into the world of folly and fetish by award winning Gilbert Hernandez. ... [L]ocate a copy of Birdland yourself and enjoy and marvel at the bewildering release of limbs, torsos and groins in a madcap sexual adventure. The term 'graphic novel' will never mean the same again!" – partikal7

• Plug: "Rip M.D. is a creepy, fun-filled all-ages adventure saga... [Mitch] Schauer told ICv2 that the inspiration for Rip M.D. was all those horror and monster movies he saw as a child — movies that made him care more about the fate of the colorful monsters and fiends than the B movies' human characters who always seemed to triumph in the end. Rip M.D. is the logical emotional outgrowth of those accumulated cinematic disappointments, the story of a boy who is able to help the horror and monster movie characters that he loves the most." – ICv2

• Plug: Richard Bruton spotlights The Extraordinary Adventures of Adèle Blanc-Sec Vol. 1 by Jacques Tardi at The Forbidden Planet International Blog Log (although we should note that the release date is actually in October)

• Analysis: At Techland, Douglas Wolk looks at The Troublemakers by Gilbert Hernandez as an example of the successful use of a "widescreen" panel layout: "Aside from its title page, the entire thing is laid out as four identically shaped wide horizontal panels on each page, and the movie-screen shape is formally appropriate — the book is supposedly a kind of comics translation of a (nonexistent) B-movie. The Troublemakers is brutally effective as cartooning, though: Hernandez has designed it so that something's happening horizontally in almost every panel, and there's usually a different kind of motion from each panel to the next."

• Analysis: Love & Maggie continue their series of detailed, annotated rundowns of their Top 10 Issues of The Comics Journal with the first part of their examination of issue #71

• Commentary: The Hooded Utilitarian's critical roundtable on Popeye continues with Andrew Farago's look at the character's various multimedia incarnations

Online Commentary & Diversions:

• Review: "...I had more fun reading this book than just about any other comic I’ve read so far this year. ... There’s a sort of Hergé-like mechanical perfection to his artwork; not only is it super-clean and super-crisp, but the panel-to-panel consistency is so strong that his characters sometimes don’t look drawn so much as stamped out by some sort of automatic drawing machine. ... Steve and Millennium Boy are funny — sometimes on purpose, sometimes not — and it’s a pleasure to walk around with them. ... I haven’t played an RPG since I was a teenager, but I think I’d play a Dungeon Quest one in a heartbeat." – J. Caleb Mozzocco, Newsarama

• Review: "This amazing, sweeping epic... spans decades of time and hundreds of miles of geography, and it deals with no less than war, fear, religion, trust, memory, violence and the mysterious, barely understood ways in which these broad, vague emotions are used to form communities and society, and/or how they can tear them apart. ... I can’t recommend Temperance highly enough. It’s a book that everyone should read, and then reread." – J. Caleb Mozzocco, Newsarama

• Review: "If the message and method of delivery seem simple, the artwork is anything but. In that regard, Set to Sea is the comics equivalent of good poetry. It’s not what’s being said so much as how beautifully Weing’s saying it." – J. Caleb Mozzocco, Las Vegas Weekly

• Review: "Combining the utterly irresistible power of nostalgia and insatiable curiosity with science-fiction, conspiracy theory, urban history, fact and legend, show-biz razzmatazz, supernatural horror, Film Noir and a highly developed sense of the meta-real, [in The Search for Smilin' Ed] Deitch once more weaves an irresistible spell that charms, thrills and disturbs whilst his meticulous drawing holds the reader in a deceptively fluffy, yet inescapable grip." – Win Wiacek, Now Read This! (via Bill Kartalopoulos)

• Review: "Widely acknowledged as the greatest adventure strip ever created, Prince Valiant is also arguably the best comic strip in that medium’s history. However, reprint collections have failed to truly capture the beauty and consummate artistry of Hal Foster’s creation…until now, that is. ...[T]his new Fantagraphics edition goes beyond simply correcting the shortcomings of past reprints — in truth, it is more of a revelation than a mere restoration. ... Ultimately, Prince Valiant is much more than a series of fantastic adventures in some legendary era; rather, it is a depiction of the making of a fully rounded and realized human being. ... Hal Foster’s Prince Valiant is a story to be read and cherished — today, tomorrow, always." – ForeWord Reviews

• Plug: The New Yorker's Sally Law talks to Jordan Crane about his webcomics concern What Things Do

• Analysis: Love & Maggie return to their detailed, annotated rundown of the second chronological issue on their list of the Top 10 Issues of The Comics Journal, #59

• Commentary: Vom Marlowe is the latest to weigh in in The Hooded Utilitarian's critical roundtable on Popeye 

Online Commentary & Diversions:

• Review: "A refreshing counterpoint to the vampire meme... In true Jason form, Werewolves of Montpellier neatly packs a chockful of romance, recreational crime, and existential thrills in this full-color 48-pager." – Space 15 Twenty

• Review: "Norwegian cartoonist Jason's book The Last Musketeer is the kind of whimsy that's easy to do wrong and nearly impossible to get right, but Jason gets it very right indeed. ... It's a story that follows a dreamlike, comic logic, always silly and always fun, and every page has several large grins waiting to jump onto your face as you read." – Cory Doctorow, Boing Boing

• Review: "It should go without saying that if you’re at all interested in women’s comics or manga, you should buy [A Drunken Dream and Other Stories]. But in all honesty, I think even if you just like comics and beautifully-told stories, this should be a part of your bookshelf. ... Hagio’s art is, of course, constantly gorgeous. ... Thorn’s translation definitely seems to be true to Hagio’s stories. He is obviously a great admirer of her and he does her justice. ... This is a beautiful book by an incredible creator. Whether or not you knew of Hagio before or this is going to be your introduction to her, it’s a book you need to have." – Eden Miller, Comicsgirl

• Review: "Underground comics were once the bastard stepchild of the industry. ... These days though they get their due as actual art, and their slouch towards respectability gets a big boost with Fantagraphics Books’ The Artist Himself: A Rand Holmes Retrospective. The collection combines a fascinating biography of Holmes... with chapters of his finest work... The Canadian rarely gets his due among comics aficionados, but The Artist Himself should go a long way toward putting this underground legend on the list of greats." – Alonso Duralde, Modern Tonic

• Review: At The Comics Journal, Bart Croonenborghs looks at the work of Olivier Schrauwen: "Here are some keywords though for the unintiated: Belgian, comic genius, graphical masterblender, darkly ironic, perfectionist."

• Profile: Santiago Garcia uses the release of The Search for Smilin' Ed by Kim Deitch as "an excuse to get an overview of the latest productions of this extraordinary author, who belongs to the first generation of the West Coast underground and has not stopped working from the 60s until now." (Translated from Spanish; via Bill Kartalopoulos)

• Interview: Larry Reid's appearance on The Marty Riemer Show podcast is now archived for your listening pleasure

• Commentary: The Hooded Utilitarian's critical roundtable on E.C. Segar's Popeye continues as Chris Mautner takes a tangential look at the topper strip Sappo

Online Commentary & Diversions:

• Review: "Originally serialized in the late ‘90s, this cartwheeling shaggy-dog story begins, like a lot of metafiction, with the semblance of reality... But by the time a frog demon reanimates a 19th-century French peasant whose brains it has eaten, it’s fairly clear that Deitch is making stuff up. The fun of [The Search for Smilin' Ed] is the way it constantly darts back and forth across the line between genuine show-business lore (a favorite Deitch theme) and delirious whole-cloth invention. ... Deitch’s artwork... is... utterly confident, building on the stylistic gestures of both the underground-comics scene that launched his career and the classic animation that inspired his talking-animal characters." – Publishers Weekly

• Review: "Some of the best comics of the last couple of decades are Jim Woodring’s wordless Frank stories. Dreamlike, idyllic and mind bendingly horrific visions are rendered with immaculate penwork and pacing. This tidy, near 200 page collection of black and white stories [The Portable Frank] is sufficient to put a permanent dent in your brain pan." – M. Ace, Irregular Orbit

• Review: "Fantagraphics cycles back to the first three years of Herriman’s Sunday Krazy Kat strips [in Krazy & Ignatz 1916-1918]. I do enjoy these early years of the kat kronikles — a bit more lyrical, a bit more varied, a bit less centered on the kat/mouse/cop routine. Yes, you need it. Of course." – M. Ace, Irregular Orbit

• Interview: In virtue of the Criterion Collection release of Crumb on DVD and Blu-ray, The A.V. Club talks to director Terry Zwigoff: "And I said, 'What did you think of it?' And he said, 'It was mortifying.' I said, 'Is it a bad film?' And he said, 'No, but I’m looking at myself in a mirror, so what am I supposed to say? Is it good? Is it bad? I just don’t want to look at it.' Something like that."

• Interview: Kliph Nesteroff's conversation with Drew Friedman (previously transcribed at WFMU's Beware of the Blog) is now available as an audio download from the Inkstuds podcast

• Panel: The Comics Journal presents video of the "International Comics and Graphic Novels" panel at Comic-Con International last month, with Moto Hagio, Émile Bravo and others — part 1 is embedded above, with 4 additional parts at TCJ.com

• Commentary: Noah Berlatsky takes his whack at Popeye in the critical roundtable at The Hooded Utilitarian

We're celebrating Father's Day with a one-week-only, first-time-ever sale on our collections of classic comic strips! Save at least 20% on volumes of The Complete Peanuts, Dennis the Menace, Krazy & Ignatz, Popeye, Prince Valiant, and much more, including one-off collections of rarities like Betsy and Me, The Brinkley Girls, Red Barry, Sam's Strip and more. The sale even includes the brand-new Captain Easy Vol. 1! Browse all sale items here. Order online now or by phone Monday-Friday 9 AM - 6 PM at 800-657-1100 (206-524-1967 outside the U.S.). Sale prices not effective at Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery. Sale runs through next Friday, June 25, 2010.

Online Commentary & Diversions:

• Review: "Peter Bagge’s not-so-yearly update on the life and times of his signature character Buddy Bradley takes up about half of Hate Annual #8... It’s a funny story with a confident, natural progression and some keen observations to make... [T]his is... a welcome renewal of one of alt-comics’ most treasured series… [Grade] A-" – The A.V. Club

• Review: "The mid-’70s found Schulz pushing the strip further and further into the oddball, mixing fantasy and reality in extended storylines... The strip as a whole feels less scrappy and more settled in this era, though it’s no less inspired, and Schulz was clever enough to keep working his own state of mind into the finished product. The Complete Peanuts: 1975 - 1976 collects comics clearly drawn by a successful man still nagged by feelings of inadequacy not easily explained away… [Grade] A-" – The A.V. Club

• Review: "Don’t be misled by High Soft Lisp’s cover. This isn’t just comic book smut or an adult version of Archie. Gilbert Hernandez has created some of the most fleshed-out and memorable women in comics since launching Love and Rockets with his brother Jaime in 1981. Their breasts might be outsized, but so are their minds and souls." – Garrett Martin, Boston Herald

• Review: "Fantagraphics’ fourth oversized collection of Elzie Segar’s legendary Thimble Theatre strips, famous as the birth place of Segar’s notorious Popeye the Sailor, continues the winning standard set by earlier editions. ... Fantagraphics’ enormous format remains among the best-looking strip reprints available." – Michael C. Lorah, Newsarama

• Review: "Levin’s is not often a forceful tone; he digs up information and can deliver it in a scholarly enough manner, but also will follow his muse, digressing into dry humor and even an admitted Faulknerian flight of fancy. He’s fully engaged, grappling with the facts and the issues as he uncovers them, and the reader grapples right along with him. [Most Outrageous] is a much more compelling book for the fact that Levin doesn’t try to wrap it all up in a bow." – Christopher Allen, Comic Book Galaxy

• Plug: Emily Dresner of /project/multiplexer recommends Joe Sacco’s Safe Area Gorazde and Palestine: "...Joe Sacco blends embedded journalism on the ground with his art to make very compelling graphic novels."

• Woof: At her blog 1920 A.D., Ainur Elmgren looks at Nell Brinkley's depictions of dogs in The Brinkley Girls: The Best of Nell Brinkley's Cartoons 1913-1940