The sing-song-i-est new Online Commentaries & Diversions:

• Review: Drawn Blog features a review of Steven Weissman's Barack Hussein Obama. Dustin Harbin says, "[the comics] seem less humorous and more like the slow aggregation of a large portrait, maybe not of the man, but of the time the man is living in." 

• Review: The Comics Reporter confirms that Dal Tokyo by Gary Panter is THE book to buy this week. Tom Spurgeon states, "This is really the only book you need this week . . . I've been wanting to read a collected version of Gary Panter's strip for a time longer than all about a dozen personal relationships I currently have."

• Review (audio): This week on Inkstuds, Robin McConnell interviews Eye of the Majestic Creature 's Leslie Stein. 

• Plug: Lots of book lust on the Collected Comics Library for the EC Library editions coming out soon featuring work from like Came the Dawn by  Wally Wood, Corpse on the Imjin! by Harvey Kurtzman and future reprints from Al Williamson and Jack Davis. Chris Marshall says, "EC Archives are Dead! Long Live the EC Library!"

• Plug: The sweet people over at Robot 6 on Comic Book Resources started flipping through Previews and flipped out over some of our new releases. John Parkin on Walt Disney's Donald Duck: A Christmas for Shacktown by Carl Barks: "Fantagraphics continues its series of high-end collections of the best of Carl Barks’ duck stories, with the Christmas-themed third volume arriving just in time to be stuffed in somebody’s stocking." Graeme McMillan on The Love and Rockets Reader: From Hoppers to Palomar by Marc Sobel: "As a latecomer to this classic series, I’m looking forward to Marc Sobel’s look back at the first three decades of the work of Los Bros Hernandez to help me get caught up on what I missed the first time around and really need to get in collected edition. I suspect this may end up being an expensive project."

The list of nominees for the 2012 Ignatz Awards was announced today and we are pleased to report that our artists and publications received a total of 6 nominations in 4 categories:

Love and Rockets: New Stories #4 by the Hernandez Brothers:
• Outstanding Artist — Jaime Hernandez
• Outstanding Story — "Return for Me" by Jaime Hernandez
• Outstanding Series

Ganges #4 by Kevin Huizenga:
• Outstanding Series

The Man Who Grew His Beard by Olivier Schrauwen:
• Outstanding Anthology or Collection

"Keith or Steve," Mome Vol. 22, by Nick Drnaso:
• Outstanding Story

In addition to these nominees with our logo on them, Leslie Stein's self-published Eye of the Majestic Creature was nominated for Outstanding Series (Vol. 1 collection, with our logo on it, out now; Vol. 2 out next year) and Noah Van Sciver's The Death of Elijah Lovejoy, which ties in to his debut graphic novel The Hypo, was nominated for Outstanding Mini-Comic! Additional congrats to Kevin Huizenga for sharing another nom with Dan Zettwoch and to Gabrielle Bell & Anders Nilsen for their respective noms. Winners will be announced on Saturday, September 14 at SPX.

The newest (and one old one*) Online Commentaries & Diversions:

•Review: The Hypo by Noah Van Sciver gets the Boing-Boing treatment. Brian Heater states,"The Hypo's relatively limited scope afford the cartoonist the ability to approach the historical giant as a human, offering an empathetic examination of a troubled individual destined for greatness."  

•Review: Heidi MacDonald is excited about The Hypo as well. On The Beat she thinks,"This could be one of the sleeper books of the fall."

•Review: NPR gives Jaime Hernandez's God and Science the run-around and Glen Weldon states, ". . .a book that gleefully grafts a gee-whiz superhuman sensibility onto a set of nuanced, all-too-human relationships. Within its breezily charming pages, the pointless battle between capes-lovers and capes-haters subsides: detente at last."

•Review: The Tearoom of Despair reviews Love and Rockets #28 from a loooong time ago because as Bob Temuka says it is "the perfect comic."

•Plug: The Huffington Post uses some panels from Love and Rockets story "100 Rooms" to illustrate making art in New York and Daniel Maidman says "it changed my life."

•Plug: Graeme McMillan of Robot 6 at Comic Book Resources is adding Gilbert Herandez's graphic novel Julio's Day to his buy list for October. ". . . this never-collected Gilbert Hernandez strip from the second series of L&R is one of those things that goes on my 'Want' list almost as soon as I discovered it existed."

•Plug: Old Spock drawing by Jaime Hernandez on Comics Alliance in Best Art Ever (This Week) by Andy Khouri.

•Interview: Brokelyn interviews three indie cartoonists on 'making it' and sacrifices. Eye of the Majestic Creature's Leslie Stein tells Brad Pearson, "I love drawing New York; it provides so many details for street scenes, from all the shops and people to seemingly insignificant things like takeout menus shoved in doorways and gum spots on the cement. The energy of New York is very inspiring. Everyone is here for a reason; everyone is creative."

•Review: CBR recently found the original Mark of the Bat, Josh Simmons' made before it was compiled in The Furry Trap. Matt Seneca states". . . the violence here is far from entertaining.  It hits like real violence does, as something that shouldn’t be happening, and by forcing the audience to recognize it as such, it casts our gaze back from Simmons’ bootleg onto all the “real” Batman comics we’ve read. . .The proof is here: comics isn’t about “creating IP” or “managing franchises,” and it never will be.  It’s about making as bold a statement as you possibly can with nothing more than ink and paper."

•Plug: The Comics Reporter talks about the state of our interns, L&R and Tom Spurgeon is rather obsessed about Dal Tokyo by Gary Panter: "It seems like that we should be freaking out about this a little bit. I used to dream about reading that work. Granted, I don't have much of a dream life, but Dal Tokyo is basically out."

•Review: Out.Com can't stop talking about No Straight Lines. Jerry Portwood says "You won't find erotic comics or manga, so don't even start. But you will find everything from 'lesbian underground comix, to gay newspaper strips, to bi punk zines, to trans webcomics, and dealing with everything from coming out, to marriage equality, to the AIDS epidemic, to hilarious dance styles, and bad choices for a one-night stand'."

•Interview: No Straight Lines editor Justin Hall and Canadian queer comics historian, Ken Boesem, join Robin McConnell for an excellent Inkstuds podcast.

•Commentary: Projects of Design posted photos and recipes for their Significant Objects drinks from the release party. "It was only fitting that we fête the culmination of the Significant Objects project by honoring the supposed junk items that were raw material for this experiment. Faculty member Emilie Baltz invited three mixologists to have their own hand in creating drinkable odes to some of the items found in the book."

* Did you figure out the older review? Winners receive smug sense of self-worth!

The most delicious comic-con ever debuts this weekend, Saturday, June 16th and Sunday, June 17th... Introducing CAKE: the Chicago Alternative Comics Expo, a weekend-long celebration of independent comics, inspired by Chicago’s rich legacy as home to many of underground and alternative comics’ most talented artists!

While Fantagraphics won't be tabling there ourselves (sob!), many of our wonderful artists will be there, as featured guests, panelists, exhibitors, or probably just walkin' around somewhere.

Some of the featured guests include:

• Jeffrey Brown Table 57
• Lilli Carré Table 1
• Paul Hornschemeier Table 71
• Anders Nilsen Table 80
• Laura Park (who did that gorgeous poster, btw!) Table 1
• Jeremy Tinder Table 3

Some more exhibitors:

• Gabrielle Bell
• Nick Drnaso
• Charles Forsman
• Justin Hall
• Kevin Huizenga
• Tom Kaczynski
• Jim Rugg
• Leslie Stein 

And check out these panels with our Fantagraphics artists! Why, it's the icing on the... okay, I'll stop:

•  Crude and Rude: Comics and Vulgarity: featuring Ivan Brunetti , Lisa Hanawalt, Hellen Jo and Onsmith, moderated by Josh Reinwald and Justin Rosenberg (Sponsored by Quimby’s Bookstore)

•  Jeffrey Brown Makes a Minicomic: Jeffrey Brown makes a minicomic in 1 hour!

•  Double Vision: Comics and Animation: with a Q&A featuring Jo Dery, Jim Trainor, Amy Lockhart and Marc Bell, presented by the Eyeworks Animation Festival (Lilli Carré and Alexander Stewart)

•  Start a Micropress: featuring Sarah Becan, Austin English, Jesjit Gill, Annie Koyama, Greg Means and Caroline Paquita, moderated by Zak Sally

•  Comics In Chicago: The Past 10 Years (Sponsored by the Chicago Independent Radio Project - CHIRP): featuring Ezra Claytan Daniels, Lyra Hill, Paul Hornschemeier, Robin Hustle and Jeremy Tinder, moderated by Edie Fake;

•  Queer Communities, Queer Anthologies: featuring Justin Hall, Robert Kirby and Annie Murphy, moderated by Noah Berlatsky (Sponsored by Little Heart, a Comic Anthology for Marriage Equality)

•  Kevin Huizenga, Anders Nilsen and John Porcellino in Conversation, moderated by Caitlin McGurk

•  Violent Line: Mark-Making and Meaning: featuring Anya Davidson, Charles Forsman, Patrick Kyle, Grant Reynolds, Conor Stetchschulte, Lale Westvind and Mickey Zacchilli, moderated by Noel Freibert

•  Real Life: A Roundatable on Women and Graphic Autobiography: featuring Rina Ayuyang, Lucy Knisley, Keiler Roberts, Marian Runk, Leslie Stein, Julia Wertz

CAKE will be held at the Columbia College of Chicago's Ludington Building [ 1104 S. Wabash (8th Floor) ] from 11 AM to 6 PM. It is free and open to the public.  Go, and give our artists a hug and your money.

Fantagraphics is heading over to the mighty 2012 MoCCA Fest this weekend, with so much awesomeness in store for you all! Visit us this Saturday, April 28th and Sunday, April 29th at the Lexington Avenue Armory in New York City!

First off, take a look at all the debuts we're bringing! Many of these books won't be in stores for several more months, and copies are limited, so make our table your first stop:

• Angelman: Fallen Angel by Nicolas Mahler
• Dungeon Quest 3 by Joe Daly
• The Furry Trap by Josh Simmons

 • God and Science: Return of the Ti-Girls by Jaime Hernandez
• Jack Davis: Drawing American Pop Culture (the fancy new printing!) by Jack Davis
•  Jewish Images in the Comics by Fredrik Strömberg

• New York Mon Amour by Jacques Tardi, Benjamin Legrand & Dominique Grange
• Out of the Shadows by Mort Meskin; edited and designed by Steven Brower
• Tales Designed to Thrizzle #8 by Michael Kupperman
• Walt Disney's Uncle Scrooge: Only a Poor Old Man by Carl Barks Delayed at the printer, sorry!

We're excited to introduce another all-star cast of artists signing at our table:

Saturday, April 28th
12:00 pm-1:00 pm       Josh Simmons / Kim Deitch / Olivier Schrauwen
1:00 pm-2:30 pm         Drew Friedman
1:30 pm-3:00 pm         Nicolas Mahler
3:00 pm-4:00 pm        Michael Kupperman
3:00 pm-4:30 pm        Jason
4:30 pm-5:30 pm        Fredrik Strömberg / Hans Rickheit

Sunday, April 29th
11:30 am-12:30 pm      Fredrik Strömberg / Peter Kielland
12:30 pm-2:30 pm       Jason / Nicolas Mahler
2:30 pm-3:30 pm         Kim Deitch / Michael Kupperman
3:30 pm-4:30 pm         Hans Rickheit / Josh Simmons / Olivier Schrauwen

edit: We're sorry to report that Josh Simmons and Olivier Schrauwen won't be able to make it after all! 

Find all of this, and even more, at the Fantagraphics booth, located at our usual spot at #J1, J2, K1, K2:

And hey! Check out these panels!

Saturday, April 28th

12:15 pm // With Nicolas Mahler and Tom Gauld: Brian Heater interviews two artists; Tom Gauld of Scotland, and Nicolas Mahler of Austria. (Room B)

1:15 pm // Checklist for a New Comic: A Guide to Getting Started: In this brief seminar, Jessica Abel and Matt Madden will walk you through the many considerations you should keep in mind when you embark on a new comic of any kind. Abel and Madden will help you strategize and come up with a working plan for your next project, and will cover: creative block and coming up with ideas; choosing a format and platform that makes sense; setting goals and scheduling your time so that you can reach them; finding an audience and looking for collaborators and/or publishers. So bring some paper and be ready to take notes on your next big (or small) project! (Room B) 

2:15 pm // Klein Award Ceremony with Gary Panter: Gary Panter receives the 2012 Klein Award! (Room A)

3:15 pm // Hans Rickheit in Conversation: Brian Heater takes on Hans Rickheit -- musician, performance artist, cartoonist. (Room B)

3:15 pm // A Nordic Roundtable with Fredrik Strömberg (SE), Peter Madsen (DK), Kaisa Leka (FI), Bendik Kaltenborn (NO) and Mattias Elftorp: The comics culture of northern Europe is brimming with energy, talent and innovation, among other things visible in the new anthology Kolor Klimax from Fantagraphics. Come and meet some of the Nordic artists present at MoCCA. (Room A)

5:15 pm // Carousel with Michael Kupperman, Domitille Collardey, Shannon Wheeler, Leslie Stein, Lauren Weinstein and R. Sikoryak: Live comics brought to life by cartoonists and a team of talented voice actors. With voices by Julie Klausner, Dave Hill, Scott Adsit. (Room A)

Sunday, April 29th

2:00 pm // A Discussion with Josh Neufeld and Shannon Wheeler: These two creators interview one another about their work in comics, especially as it relates to their approaches to documenting tragedy on the Gulf Coast. (Room B) 

Leslie Stein gives you an illustrated and photo-documented glimpse into her life all this week for the latest Cartoonist's Diary feature at TCJ.com. Her self-portrait in the style of Sam Henderson is worth the price of admission alone.

[Follow our Tumblr blog for lots more Things to See every day.]

Today's Online Commentary & Diversions:

• List: The first part of Comic Book Resources' Top 100 Comics of 2011 countdown includes Jim Woodring's Congress of the Animals at #88...

"It takes a bit of daring to be willing to alter the status quo in a respected body of work and considerable talent to be able to do so in as assured manner as Woodring does here." – Chris Mautner

...Mark Twain's Autobiography 1910-2010 by Michael Kupperman at #87...

"Through war, animal make-out sessions and film writing, Kupperman takes Twain through the ringer in a hilariously catastrophic epic that the real-life 'Adventures of Huckleberry Finn' author would surely have appreciated. Although reading it won't score you any points on a history-class term paper, the book will certainly open your eyes to one of the funniest writers working in comics right now." – Brian Warmoth

...and Johnny Ryan's Prison Pit Book 3 at #86...

"The excessive violence is still here, more refined, more imaginative, more disturbing. Ryan pushes himself artistically in the second half of the book, delivering a stunning sequence that still haunts me." – Chad Nevett

...and in the second part of CBR's countdown, Love from the Shadows by Gilbert Hernandez at #70...

"I picture Gilbert Hernandez approaching his drawing board these days like Lawrence of Arabia approaching a Turkish convoy: 'NO PRISONERS! NO PRISONERS!' In a year suffused with comics funneling pitch-black darkness through a combination of sex and horror, none were blacker, sexier, or more horrific than this gender-bending exploitation flick from Beto's 'Fritz-verse.'" – Sean T. Collins

...and Leslie Stein's Eye of the Majestic Creature at #61:

"Leslie Stein burst onto the comics scene this year when Fantagraphics published the collection of four of her self-published comics... The comic is both surreal and mundane, the story of a young woman who moves to a New York complete with humanoid animals and talking musical instruments. ...Stein [is] one of the best independent creators to emerge in recent years." – Alex Dueben

• List: Robot 6's Graeme McMillan picks his 5 favorite books of 2011, including Stigmata by Lorenzo Mattotti & Claudio Piersanti...

"Way back at the end of last year, I called this the best graphic novel of 2011, and if I’m now a little more reticent to make that claim, it has more to do with the high quality of a lot of other releases this year than anything else because this is still a masterpiece that, were I some kind of unlikely comics czar, I’d make compulsory reading for everyone interested in the medium. Just a breathtaking book."

...Ganges #4 by Kevin Huizenga...

"Another book that I raved about earlier this year, and another one that I’m still raving about as strongly months later. A tour-de-force of cartooning from a creator who just continually improves, and pushes at the medium in almost everything he does."

...and Celluloid by Dave McKean:

"It’s a disturbing book in many ways – questions about exploitation and power are very present in the text – but also a beautiful, seductive one. It’s a book that sticks with you for a long time afterwards, and for that alone, it’s one I’ve returned to many times since first reading it."

• List: Panel Patter's Rob McMonigal names his Best of 2011: Manga Edition, with Wandering Son Vol. 1 by Shimura Takako in the #5 spot: "This is one of the most serious manga series I've ever read, and I finished it unable to come to grips with the best way to review it. Dealing with two children who come to realize they are trapped in the wrong gender, it's a story of secrets, revelations, understandings, and occasional cruelty. The book handles the topic with care and respect, however, which is part of why it is so good."

• List: Another top-10 from Panel Patter's Rob McMonigal, whose Best of 2011: Indie Comics, is topped by 3 of our titles: Jason & Fabien Vehlmann's Isle of 100,000 Graves...

"Isle of 100,000 Graves has Jason's trademark deadpan humor, resolute protagonist, and ending that leaves the reader thinking."

...The Hidden by Richard Sala...

"At first, The Hidden feels like a typical apocalyptic story, albeit one painted amazingly well by Sala. But as things progress, the tale morphs and twists into one of the best horror comics I've read, with a twist towards the end that I never saw coming. That's what makes a comic stand out, and puts it near the top of my best of list."

...and Mark Twain's Autobiography 1910-2010 by Michael Kupperman at #1:

"I laughed out loud so many times over this mixture of text and illustration. It's a pitch-perfect book with almost no mis-steps, and I hereby call it my Best Indie Comic of 2011."

• List: At the Forbidden Planet International blog, comics creator John Riordan names Love and Rockets: New Stories #4 as one of his 3 favorite comics of the year, commenting only "My… aching… heart…"

• Review: "I found myself turning back and re-examining the pages often, digging through the many details that the words and images delivered. The story unfolds in earth tone – sepia illustrations, not gaudy, in keeping with the artist’s respect for the story and the subject. Clemente’s early life is here and one gets a real feel for his family and friends, and not without humor.... [21: The Story of Roberto Clemente] should appeal to graphic novel fans, baseball fans,  anyone who likes a great 'bigger then fiction' story, and many others." – Mark Hodgens, Skyscraper Magazine

• Review: "Fantagraphics is now giving Barks’ Duck comics a whirl, and based off this first volume alone if there’s any justice in the comics world, fame should finally (belatedly) be coming for the late, great Barks.... The reproduction on these strips are beautiful; Fantagraphics hired cartoonist Rich Tommaso to re-color the works, and Tommaso wisely uses gentle flat tones to keep with the overall feel of Barks’ crisp, classic art. I also appreciated the essays about the different stories in the back of the book.... Donald Duck: Lost in the Andes is a handsome looking book, and trust me when I say it’s just the first of many I plan on reading by Barks." – Greg McElhatton, Read About Comics

• Review: "So cue the squeals, and scan the racks at your friendly neighborhood comics retailer for writer/artist Michael Kupperman’s Tales Designed to Thrizzle #7. Beyond a cover whose hilarity strangely if successfully depends on its all-day-sucker coloring — tangerine, lemon, lime — this dadaistic offering opens with a six-page excerpt from Scary Bathtub Stories, a faux-Golden Age comic, and thereafter spirals further and further into neo-psychedelic weirdness." – Bryan Hollerbach, PLAYBACK:stl

• Review: "I like to imagine [Michael Kupperman] sitting in some tiny hellhole of a studio apartment packed deep into the bowels of New York -- these noble creatures lose their mystique when they own homes -- doing mutant Thrizzle pages until they stop paying him or until he gets a gig in the back pages of Vice. Some feminine if not female voice of reason hovers next to his desk, thumbing through the newest set as he leans back in his chair, wondering if Fantagraphics paid him enough to afford blowing the budget on a beer, wiping entirely imaginary sweat from his brow." – Patrick Tobin, Multiversity Comics

• Interview: The Comics Reporter's Tom Spurgeon talks to Oil and Water writer Steve Duin: "I'm too new to all of this to fully grasp how the perfect union of writer and artist is formed... and there were times when Shannon [Wheeler] and I struggled to find common ground. But a great deal of my understanding of what we were dealing with in the Gulf owes to Shannon's perceptions and his sketchbook. He was refreshingly aggressive in dealing with the BP clean-up teams disinclined to give us access. His original poster for the group -- a naked woman starring incredulously at the oil derrick in her bed, and saying 'What do you mean, it broke?' -- is brilliant."

• Interview: Bookforum's John Madeira, who says "...Alexander Theroux’s writing... is grandiloquently lyrical, dizzyingly erudite, and often acerbic," talks with Theroux about The Strange Case of Edward Gorey ("a smart, engaging, and insightful monograph asking as many questions about the quirky artist as attempts at answers") and other topics: "Edward Gorey was very ornate — Corinthian! — in his love of language, and when he was in a chatty mood his conversation, crackling with allusions, was rich and often rare, exaggerated, campy to a degree, invariably tinctured with lots of movie-love, sarcasm, irony. Mind you, it was not that the man was trying to be something, contriving, say, to appear a cavalcade of wit, merely that, rather like Dr. Samuel Johnson, he happened to have sharp, remarkable 'views' on all sorts of subjects, almost all worthy of note."

• Plugs: One more from Panel Patter's Rob McMonigal, who recommends some things to pick up in our current 40%-off Inventory Reduction Sale

Today's Online Commentary & Diversions:

• List: USA Today's pop culture maven Whitney Matheson starts counting down her People of the Year at Pop Candy, with Jim Woodring kicking things off at #100 ("This year the artist constructed a seven-foot-long fountain pen that even Lloyd Dobler would be proud to own") and Leslie Stein coming in at #78 ("She had me at the talking guitar: The Brooklyn-based cartoonist's Eye of the Majestic Creature provided a joyous reading experience")

• List (Audio): Jim Woodring's Congress of the Animals and Johnny Ryan's Prison Pit Book 3 are among the books discussed by Inkstuds host Robin McConnell and his guests Tim Hodler, Joe McCulloch and Matt Seneca for his "Best of 2011 with the Critics" episode

• List: Librairie Drawn & Quarterly's Jade names her Top 5 Books of 2011 on the 211 Bernard blog: "Thirty years after the first Love and Rockets issue, the Hernandez Brothers continue to impress with some of their best work to date in Love and Rockets: New Stories #4. Both brothers produce storylines that are absolutely amazing... I can’t even begin to imagine what these guys will come up with next."

• Review: The Seattle Times' Mary Ann Gwinn looks at Pogo Vol. 1 and the "Playing Possum" exhibit at Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery: "Kelly had an uneasy relationship with the newspapers that ran the strip. Though Pogo was hilarious, it could also be extremely pointed. Fantagraphics curator Larry Reid says the Hoover strips, featuring a bulldog with an uncanny resemblance to the FBI director, aggravated Hoover no end. 'He was driven to distraction' by the notion that the strips had hidden messages embedded in them, says Reid. 'He had cryptographers trying to decipher swamp talk.'"

• Review: At Artdish, Gary Faigin also looks at "Playing Possum": "Kelly was both famous and honored in his lifetime (over 50 collections of Pogo were published, and the strip appeared in most major newspapers), but just enough time has passed since his demise in 1973 that many people, younger ones especially, are not familiar with his work.  While that’s a good reason to celebrate the Pogo show and book launch at the Fantagraphics Gallery this month, an even better reason is the opportunity to be reminded how fresh, lively, and relevant his work is, decades after it first appeared."

• Review: "These are deeply strange short stories [in The Man Who Grew His Beard], centered on ideas and effects I’m not sure I’d have come up with even with the proverbial infinite number of monkeys at my disposal; even in this short-story-saturated alternative comics climate, there’s nothing else like his gestalt of finely calibrated nonsense. It’s good to see that comics can do things you’d never think to ask of them in the first place." – Sean T. Collins, Attentiondeficitdisorderly

• Review: "Although Barks didn’t create Donald Duck, it is his interpretation that probably resides in most people’s memories.... Donald in the animated shorts was a hot-headed buffoon. Barks’ Donald was an actor called upon to play whatever role Barks needed: from exasperated parent to worldly adventurer. It was Barks’ duck comics that spurred my early interest in sequential storytelling, and probably my love of reading in general." Norman Cook, Axolotlburg News

• Review: "Love & Rockets is the only series that I don't mind purchasing and repurchasing in multiple editions... I like the way that Jaime Hernandez's stories read in different configurations. Approaching his little slices of life through flashback or in different sequences lets little details, the sort of which most readers probably miss the first time around, take new shapes and new levels of importance. I really love these paperback editions... As ever, there's just a tiny hint of extra-normal fantasy at work in the stories [in Penny Century], just enough for readers to accept that there's something very strange over the horizon or in Izzy's psyche, but never enough to overwhelm the wonderful, human reality of these beloved characters. Highly recommended for older readers." – Grant Goggans, The Hipster Dad's Bookshelf (via The Comics Reporter)

• Plug: Comics Alliance's Caleb Goellner reports on our upcoming Charles Burns-art-festooned "12 Beers of the Apocalypse" with Elysian Brewing, predicting them to be "Apocalypticious!"

Today's Online Commentary & Diversions:

• List: Moto Hagio's The Heart of Thomas tops Deb Aoki's list of the Most-Anticipated New Manga of 2012 at About.com Manga: "This 3-volume story from 1974 has been on many manga connoisseur's wish lists for years, so it's a real joy to see that Fantagraphics will be publishing the entire saga in English in one volume."

• List/Review: Manga Worth Reading's Johanna Draper Carlson ranks Wandering Son the #2 Best New Manga of 2011 and recommends Volume 2 in her review: "Shimura Takako’s young figures are adorable. They look unspoiled, with their future ahead of them, which puts their struggles into greater relief.... Translator Matt Thorn’s essay at the back of this volume addresses the issue of being 'Transgendered in Japan' directly, providing valuable information on cultural context, as well as warning us that the children’s lives may be very difficult in years (and stories) to come. There is no more handsome manga than Fantagraphics’ presentation of Wandering Son."

• List: Forbidden Planet International asks comics creator Martin Eden his 3 favorite comics of 2011: "My attention had been waning a bit with the Love and Rockets comics, and then 2010′s Love and Rockets [New Stories] 3 came out and it blew my mind – it was one of the most incredible things I’ve ever read. So much so, that I found myself re-reading the entire series and tracking down all the issues I’d missed. This year’s Love and Rockets [New Stories] 4... was still utterly mind-blowing, and Jaime Hernandez is producing the best work he’s ever done, in my opinion."

• Review: "One of comics revered masters gets a fresh new reprinting [Walt Disney's Donald Duck: Lost in the Andes ] worthy of his work and accessible to kids.... This volume finds [Barks] at a creative peak, combining the bold adventuring of Tintin with the wisely cynical view of human weakness of John Stanley.... Donald is an everyman of frustration whose life is one big Chinese finger trap—the harder he fights, the harder the world fights back.... Despite the dark undertones, the comic expressions and dialogue is still laugh-out-loud funny. A wonderful project that should put Barks’s name in front of new generations of admirers." – Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)

• Review: "This exceptional first volume of the collected adventures of Pogo Possum should remind readers of the substantial legacy left behind by Kelly.... The volume is beautifully put together, including excellent insights into Kelly and his work... One only needs to get a short way into the adventures of Pogo and his pals in Okefenokee Swamp to recognize the impact Pogo has had on so many cartoonists... With Pogo Possum and [his] supporting characters..., Kelly was able to blend hilarious humor, exceptional storytelling, keen political satire, and brilliant wordplay into a strip that could be appreciated both by children and adults. The more one reads this volume, the clearer picture one has of Kelly as comics’ answer to Lewis Carroll, with Alice having changed into a possum and left Wonderland behind for a swamp." – Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)

• Review: "The Art of Joe Kubert contains extensive commentary by Bill Schelly that contextualizes Kubert's work with the development of comics as a medium. ...[I]t's an informative and briskly engaging essay. ​In reviewing the vast panorama of Kubert's eight-decade career, The Art of Joe Kubert allows readers previously unfamiliar with the artist to share an appreciation of his abiding interest in human nature (as opposed to just superhero theatrics) through a surprising variety of storytelling styles and subject matter. Kubert's great influence on other cartoonists came from the way he embraced the comics medium as a whole, instead of just a particular niche or character type." – Casey Burchby, SF Weekly

• Interview: The A.V. Club's Sam Adams chats with Jack Davis: "I’ve said this many a time; I’ll tell it again. When I was going to kindergarten, and that’s a very young age, my mother used to walk me to school. I would go up past a chain gang — that was the old days when the prisoners wore stripes and everything — and I saw that. I would go to kindergarten, and they’d put a piece of construction paper in front of me, and crayons, and I did, probably, a stick figure, but I put stripes on him. And from that, they thought I had talent. My mother thought I was great. And from then, I’ve always drawn. Drawn pictures. I love to draw cartoons."

• Interview: Nerve gets sex advice from a trio of cartoonists including Rick Altergott — "If you want to talk about inking brushes or pens or what kind of paper or even something as broad as 'who's your favorite cartoonist?' 'Do you know Robert Crumb?' 'Do you know the Hernandez brothers?' Once you get the answer, you can fine-tune it from there. Before you know it, you're probably going to end up in bed." — and Anders Nilsen

• Plugs: The fine folks at L.A.'s Secret Headquarters are posting their staff gift suggestions: Julie recommends Leslie Stein's Eye of the Majestic Creature ("Good for: Anyone with an overactive imagination; fans of whimsy and good times") and Malachi suggests The Cabbie Vol. 1 by Martí ("A European (and comically sordid) take on the American crime genre") and Walt Kelly's Pogo Vol. 1 ("The essential collection of Pogo – A comic that expertly integrates social satire into the daily newspaper format")

• Craft: Kevin Huizenga spills his secrets for using templates to lay out his comics

Read "That Sticky Machine," a charming new 7-page comic by Leslie Stein, at VICE. Flash back to the 1990s with Eye of the Majestic Creature's Larrybear!

[Follow our Tumblr blog for lots more Things to See every day.]