Rolling comic book thread 2018

ffs

Liiiiiiiike...there's probably a way that that basic plot could be handled in a thoughtful, respectful, and delicate way, but that particular path is so incredibly narrow and precarious that, yeah, if you're a white non-Muslim dude it's probably best to maybe do a story that isn't that story.

As a general thing, I would say, 'Hey, white non-Muslim people: don't ever write another story about a Muslim suicide bomber. Like ever, in any context.'

an illiterate muslim suicide bomber, pls

TBH, my first thought was 'can't wait to see how Kyle reacts after he reads Cartman's press release'.

i blame the writer. mckean can't be expected to sort these things out, he just wants to blow, man

an illiterate muslim suicide bomber, pls

yeah this makes um no sense

how does he read the Koran

with great difficulty, one assumes

Wow, this is practically Frank Millerian in its conceptual awfulness!

i'm curious if this is in fact Millerian or a misguided liberal fool

No mention of our heroic librarygoers clubbing the illiterate Muslim to death with copies of the New Testament so I'd assume the latter by default.

It's apparently adapted from a short story he did for amnesty international. Goodreads reviews are a mix of 1s from people who probably haven't read it and 4s from people who all got sent free copies. My mind is still boggling a bit about the writer even thinking this was a good idea. (McKean has done a bunch of charity work over the years so I guess the amnesty connection is why he is involved)

http://www.comicsbeat.com/abrams-comicarts-announces-spring-2019-titles-with-fies-selznick-griffith-and-mckean/

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Obit of an accomplished artist with a comics connection — he did some illustration work for Atlas and had an association w/Stan Lee: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/21/obituaries/pablo-ferro-dead.html

This interview goes into more depth on the comics angle: http://www.artofthetitle.com/feature/pablo-ferro-a-career-retrospective-part-1/

Well, guys, we did it: https://www.bleedingcool.com/2018/11/24/abrams-cancels-dave-mckean-suicide-bomber-comic/

Don't know if I'll listen to this particular episode but this is one of my favorite podcasts
http://www.scottedelman.com/2018/11/21/savor-a-steak-dinner-with-comics-legend-paul-levitz-in-episode-82-of-eating-the-fantastic/

One of Paul Levitz's just tossed in lines that caught my ear was the one "I got the first 30 years of Marvel Comics along with the DC ones sitting in a storage unit in New Jersey."

There's Berserk omnibuses coming out next year (3 volumes per omnibus) but since they are on larger paper, it's not going to be much cheaper!

Considered giving up on it but a recent volume had a huge dog dragging a coffin and they only come out once a year so it's not a huge commitment at this point.

Just a real shame there isn't a cheap way for people to get into it and Miura probably wont stop doing detours that are never as interesting as the main story.

Superhero stories with guest stars are extremely offputting. Back when I was huge into superheroes I couldn't imagine why people objected to a cool character having a guest spot but now I just want to immerse myself in a world unto itself.

Did anyone read Walter Simonson's Ragnarok series for IDW? Some said it was good.

I remember there being particular cynicism about titles that launched with a crossover and young me was thinking "why wouldn't you want Spiderman in your first issue?" but now it screams "we have no confidence in this new title finding an audience".

Literally my first issue when I took over scripting Robin from chuck d1x0n was a mandated from the top, totally idiotic crossover event with “young justice” which I could not get out of.

*well my first full issue - there was a hand-off issue where D1x0n wrote the first half and I wrote the second

Levitz interview was a lot better than the Marv Wolfman interview (haven't listened to the Don McGregor one), enjoyed his laying out the different models/phases of comics and him saying "is there a gorilla on the cover?"

Really impressed by this Nestor Redondo piece
http://creatfeatforever.blogspot.com/2018/11/the-inheritance-of-blood.html

Wish there were many more comics compilations like Art Out Of Time and Art In Time, or even just more artist focused collections. There really should be books focused on Heavy Metal shorts and similar magazines from around the world. There's probably tons of treasures waiting to be rediscovered, I always wondered what happened to John Zack, he did two eyepopping pieces for Epic Illustrated and I never was able to find anything more by or about him.

Two Don McGregor/Gene Colan collections recently: Nathaniel Dusk Complete and Black Panther: Panther's Quest.

Really liked the moodiness of the latter when I seen it serialized in Marvel Comics Presents but I'll need to see both of these in the shops to judge how well the art has been handled.

Nathaniel Dusk appears to be late.

So... Batman #60 then.

Penguin only really became Penguin because someone (Bane is assumed at this point but given the other contents of the issue is possible it's the BIG SPOILER GUY who's pulled an awful lot of strings for a long time) killed the penguin he was fucking and considered himself 'married' to.

Repeated for the hard of believing: THE PENGUIN HE WAS FUCKING

Jesus Christ Tom King, we thought you were better than this.

Lol - King's dialogue is so opaque, I didn't even notice the penguinsex.

I'm enjoying this Batman run way more than Snyder's (not hard) but it's really variable, huh? Even this issue had great and stupid things in it, sometimes on the same page.

Right now, he seems to have followed Bendis's example - (a) get praise for your idiosyncrasies then (b) double down on them until they become (c) cliches and (d) gibberish.

Enjoying it nontheless. Actually, Bendis's Superman is not-great-but-fun in a similar way.

https://i1.wp.com/www.bleedingcool.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/Image-340.jpg

Feathers and beak isn't that opaque lol.

But yes to this and BendySupes, kind of enjoying both but quality is very variable - as you say, sometimes even on the same page.

Yeah, agreed on all points. I caught the "he's fucking the bird" bit at the start of the penguin arc and was less than amused.
King is starting to suffer this past year from the time-tested method of scuttling your favorite writers: overwork. Too many titles, too much churn.

This week I got the comics fever like I haven't had in months. I even bought Previews despite swearing never to buy it again several times, but I just wanted to get an impression of the direct market these days, promising not to get angry at the contents.

Went to a back issue shop and completely forgotten the pains of searching through comics when they're all tightly packed together and boarded. I remember I used to get the skin above my nails bleeding if I had spent long enough looking.

Kind of surprised that the variant cover trend just keeps getting heavier, not so much in terms of fancy materials but just the sheer quantity. 7 variant covers isn't even a special occasion now, it's just business as usual.

Do the massive omnibuses by DC and Marvel sell well? Will this trend last or will they fill up the shelves and keep getting reduced by shops until they get rid of them? I have to say I'm more impressed by the things DC has chosen to make an omnibus.

Looked at some Young Allies Masterworks and totally forgot about the awful depiction of Whitewash. Not surprised Marvel did a recent revising of the character.

Been getting a bunch of Leiji Matsumoto books. Galaxy Express seems to be the favorite so I don't know why they aren't translating that yet, maybe they're building up to it?

Erik Larsen must have given up entirely on Savage Dragon being suitable for children as there's more sex than ever and Malcolm is having threesomes with his sister (it seems they both share a girlfriend?)

Had a look at that Black Panther book and no, I still cant abide by the color of these reprints. Why do so many comics people have no sense of good color?
Since DC and Marvel might continue their reprint color regime forever and I'm not a torrenting guy, I'm going to get more Essential/Showcase books.

Annoyingly a few of the Showcase books had errors, I just noticed that in the Showcase Ghosts collection, the final page of this story is missing
http://creatfeatforever.blogspot.com/2018/11/death-held-lantern-high.html

First one I'm going to read is the original Doom Patrol.

Been getting a bunch of Leiji Matsumoto books. Galaxy Express seems to be the favorite so I don't know why they aren't translating that yet, maybe they're building up to it?

This is where speaking French helps you out - the French have translated way more manga than the Anglo market. Anyway I read the first volume of Galaxy Express, felt like it could get quite formulaic but there was a weird, melancholic Leone feel to it and of course the spaceship designs are lush.

I do regret not trying harder at school French. Amazon manga searches always turn up a lot of French editions.

https://acomicbooksite.com/2018/09/18/the-crazy-dick-sprang-detective-comics-covers-from-1990/

Had no awareness of this.

I bought those when they came out

me too!

#metoo

#old

I'd love to have seen Dick Sprang take on Scarface and the Ventriloquist. Of all of the modern villains, I think that Alan Grant and Norm Breyfogle really came up with a bad guy that seemed like it came from the golden age of Dick Sprang and Jerry Robinson Batman.

Somewhere on one of the comic art sites I saw a really amazing piece that was done in Sprang's style with Scarface and the Ventriloquist along with some of the later villains like Poison Ivy, Black Mask etc.

I've been bored of comics lately - or current Marvel/DC comics, at least - so I've decided to get my **FIRST EVER** standing order to give me an excuse to visit the store more often. I'm getting:

Al Ewing standing order (i.e. anything he does)
The Green Lantern
Love & Rockets
Saga (whenever that starts again)
DIE
Wicdiv, just for the ending

Any suggestions?

Oh, and Sex Criminals (if that still exists)

I gained access to my longboxes for the first time in years last weekend and discovered that I have both Mat Brinkman’s Teratoid Heights collection and some of the ridiculously rare fort thunder minicomics it collects (Oaf, Flapstack). Despite still feeling shame about selling off my complete run of the original Dirty Plotte minis to make rent in the late 90s I think I’ll sell off the Brinkman minis. No IDEA how to price these for eBay though. There is no evidence online of anyone ever selling one. Judging by the price Teratoid Heights and Fort Thunder posters go for, these should be worth $$. Long story short if there are any Fort Thunder completists ITT who are interested shoot me an email through the ilx robot.

*also gonna sell a couple of Leif Goldberg fort thunders from the same era (Old Burg, Eating Bears) which though just as gorgeous as Brinkman I’m suspect are not as collectible

Sorry for spammin

This is my pull list right now.

Stray Bullets
Ed Brubaker / Sean Phillips
Curse Words
East of West
Black Science
Descender - ended a few months back

I am going to check out Jason Aaron's Conan book.

this seems like the place to ask folks what their fave comix of 2018 were, both self contained and series.

NO. BETTER. WORDS.

I haven't got far yet but I'm enjoying Liana FInck's "Passing for Human"

Aside from that, I think this was the first year that a superhero movie (Black Panther) was better than any single superhero comic I read

Earl, is East of West still worth the effort? I bailed early on but I want a Hickman-type-thing to read

I think East of West is my favorite thing Hickman has done. The series has a big cast and it takes a good long while until you really get to see all the players on the board. It's all going down now.

There is something about the whole series and the style of the artwork that reminds me of Matt Wagner and Grendel.

I like the series and kind of hope they do a follow up prequel outlining how the world came to be in the series filling in the back story.

https://johnleescomics.files.wordpress.com/2013/11/eastofwestchamberlain1.png?w=700

Best comics I read this year, though not all published this year:
https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1418025278l/23709597.jpg Sens by Marc-Antoine Mathieu (theoretically only published in French, but the comic itself is wordless)

https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1448319993l/26240578.jpg Irmina by Barbara Yelin

https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1506458072l/36309646.jpg House of Women by Sophie Goldstein

https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1518197437l/38469986.jpg Girl Town by Carolyn Nowak

https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1513309376l/37533587.jpg Sabrina by Nick Drnaso

This panel makes me want to read Woman World

https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/z67l1v252RD6SbuWAra8ETT6t0U=/0x0:928x865/1120x0/filters:focal(0x0:928x865):no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/13621892/woman_world.jpg

i read it, it's goofy and a light read for the most part

well, the whole part lol

"Is there a gorilla on the cover?"

https://www.comics.org/issue/19893/cover/4/