Rolling Comic Books 2022

Breaking my nearly 100% lurker status to share some thoughts on comics I've read recently:

The Children of Mu-Town by Masumura Jushichi - a quiet tragedy about a gradually dying housing complex in Tokyo called Marigaoka. The story centers around two friends Juichi and Hajime, yakuza related maybe earlier twenty somethings trying to figure their shit out. Vivid spectacular art, a story centered around the brutality of neoliberalism (sorry) and gentrification, and writing that somehow manages to feel sparse and dense and confounding all at once.

Heaven No Hell by Michael Deforge - fantastic collection, my introduction to Michael Deforge, a writing style that reminds a lot of the best of James Tate. Hilarious and confident and a wonderful rendering of this burdensome world.

Magician A by Natsuko Ishitsuyo - six short stories that are interconnected in slight ways and are all about sex, but honestly saying that they're about sex seems shallow and nearly misleading. Sex here is adjacent to pleasure and more a method of maybe gaining some competitive edge in their worlds. Success, whatever that might mean, is the main drive of all the various protagonists, and they aim to achieve it with a casual ruthlessness and a resolve that suggests that makes it appear as though they will never reach resolution. It's not meant to be titillating, is weirdly funny, surreal, complex, unsettling and has haunted me since i read it.

Liked those first two, will check out the third!

Ant Colony is another DeFporge banger.

Oh great, I will definitely seek out Ant Colony

even bad deforge is generally worth a read

i will check out Mu-Town

I’m finally reading Tom Strong, which I always assumed was the dud of the ABC line and avoided, but it’s fun! Chris Sprouse’s work improved somewhat since his JLI work.

oh yeah, it totally ruled

Yeah loved Tom Strong. As far as ABC duds go I remember losing my patience with Promethea's "magic: let me explain you it" thing but it's been ages since I read it.

https://www.tcj.com/this-town-is-big-enough-for-all-of-us-ralf-konig-on-lucky-luke/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=this-town-is-big-enough-for-all-of-us-ralf-konig-on-lucky-luke

Cool interview with Ralf Konig on his new Lucky Luke volume.

Really enjoying this collection of the Friday Foster newspaper strip from the early seventies - gorgeously groovy artwork from Jordi Longarón:

https://www.comicsbeat.com/friday-foster-editor-christopher-marlon-interview/

that's on Hoopla - will check it out. I remember greatly enjoying the Pam Grier movie

Figure this makes more sense on here than on the ILB what you reading thread:

Very close to finishing All The Marvels, an ex-ilxor's book of essays based around his reading, indeed, everything Marvel published since the first appearance of the Fantastic Four.

I suppose the point of the book is that the continuity modifies the reading experience, that having decades of writers and artists work on these properties makes new moments resonate in ways that would otherwise be impossible. Obv I'm not impervious to that, or I'd never have gotten into Marvel and DC in the first place, but on that level the book doesn't really convince me much that it's all worth it; the reboots and re-imaginings are described in ways where you can see how they would matter to the character, but not why they would "matter" in a larger sense outside of insular continuity porn.

Prob the weakest chapter is on the NORMAN OSBOURNE PRESIDETN era, partially because there's so much happening that the chapter has much more description than analysis, but then the analysis itself suffers majorly from this weird liberal amnesia - he views the whole thing as prophetic of Trump, when really it was writers reacting to and digesting the Bush era.

Much more enjoyable are the chapters where he focuses on a single character - Shang Chi, Black Panther - and just kinda guides you through what the best runs of it are, and usually the strenghts he pinpoints in those are unrelated to continuity. The chapter on Ms Marvel and Squirrel Girl is also v good.

I'd be totally up for further installments of just letting me know who his fav runs on Doctor Strange or Ghost Rider or whoever are.

That project reminds me of the Flaming Carrot’s origin story: “he read too many comic books in one sitting, and became simple”.

haha, quoted in the first chapter!

Lol

Ut!

Has anyone read Island Book and/or its sequel by Evan Dahm?
Kinda fascinating to me - definitely aimed at kids, kind of a moral adventure/fable fantasy that delves into different theologies and politics. It's good work, I think. The author also did another GN (for adults) called The Harrowing of Hell, a telling of Christ's descent into the underworld following his cruficixion, to give you where his head may be at.

came across a long LOC from Ward Fowler in a 1985 comic.

Oh gawd. IIRC I had LOCs in an issue of Love and Rockets (terrible teenage rubbish from me but at least I was on the right side of history) and in an issue of Thriller by Robert Loren Fleming and Trevor Von Eeden (which history has p much forgotten, but was considered something of a big deal among my circle of London comic bk fans in the 1980s).

tbf Thriller lasted about four issues before the creative team imploded or were driven off by editorial interference or w/e, so even a collection of the full 7 or 8 issues would only further impede historical recognition

*checks: seven issues with the creators, 12 in total.*

I had a letter printed in the Marvel UK punisher series, and in Justice League Europe ragging on Gerard Jones (!) so at least I was on the right side of history there too

It goes without saying that my entire head and torso would implode from embarrassment if I saw them again

I remember feeling v proud to be published though. I didn't realise until I worked in magazines two decades later, that basically no one writes letters and basically every one gets printed

I had one in Yummy Fur, a few issues into the Ed sequence… I THINK that was all but there might be something horrid I have suppressed

Oh I also had a letter in an early issue of Warrior where I think I said something like, this Alan Moore fellow seems quite promising ...

A friend once submitted a long, thoughtful letter to the American Marvel comic The Champions. it was printed, complete with his name and address, but severely cut down to read just "The Champions issue X was a masterpiece of comic book art!"

lol the champions

Micronauts #26 back in the day, had letter printed for a No-Prize (signed by Bill Mantlo).

A year or so later, I got a letter from an African kid/guy (who I assume got my address from that issue), which started out "Hey, let's be pen pals" and ended with "Can you send me $250?".

Micronauts 26… that was during Broderick’s run iirc? I remain an unabashed fan of that series incl the ‘new voyages’

I was printed in Mickey Mouse! At 13!

Yes on Broderick, good memory!

This publisher is new to me
https://starfruitbooks.com/
Hideshi Hino book I haven't read and I've never heard of Noroi Michiru

I had a letter in Legion of Superheroes in, I don’t know, 1990-1992 timeframe? That’s the only one I think, though I sent a few to different comics over the years.

Inspired by that Douglas Wolk book, I'm reading Christopher Priest's run on Black Panther. Pretty fucking badass! Acknowledging the US govt (even with the fig leaf of "a rogue faction of") working with South American mercenaries to topple T'Challa in Wakanda, a govt spook saying "we could have given this to the Hand or Mossad", Black Panther making it clear he joined the Avengers because he saw them as a potential threat to his country (really annoying that the Coates run had him walk this back).

Yeah, I reread it a few years ago, it still holds up! I held off the reread for a while because I thought I was missing an issue near the end, which I thought I must have somewhere around here, but of course it was Marvel sticking in a random two-parter from someone else just before the final arc.

I want to strongly recommend "The Days That Disappear" by French writer/artist Timothé Le Boucher. It's a sci-fi psychological romance thriller of sorts that... you know what, it would be best to just go in cold. It's not available in English to the best of my knowledge but there's a scanlation by the estimable phillywilly available online in two parts here:

https://readcomiconline.li/Comic/The-Days-That-Disappear/TPB-Part-1?id=181860
https://readcomiconline.li/Comic/The-Days-That-Disappear/TPB-Part-2?id=181861

The art, the concepts and the writing are remarkable. Moebius-level good imo.

2-for-1 gift voucher sale at Fantagraphics this weekend: buy the upcoming Love & Rockets box set, get $400 in discounts off future purchases.

So glad to hear they're finally reprinting Love & Rockets. The wait is over!

tbf there will be pages and stories in this that have never been reprinted

Well of course there will be. Which was enough of a reason for me to order the forthcoming Woodring collection (of material I otherwise already own) but I own some of the L+R material in three different formats at this point, which seems like a sane place to stop.

oof, $400 far too rich for my blood. if i ever get back to collecting L&R i'll probably stick to those small paperbacks

Read a Lupin III collection. Very fond of Monkey Punch's facial expressions (closer to Mad magazine than anything in US superhero comics) and how his backgrounds bend and strech in this expressionistic manner. But boy are these stories rapey.

L&R collection looks amazing in theory, but I have never not hated the comic reading experience with big hardbacks

I also put off buying their hardcover Eightball set because of $$$, even tho my original comics are long gone, so I'm glad to see they're going to bring out a cheaper paperback edition of that, and maybe they'll do something similar with L&R.

https://www.fantagraphics.com/products/the-complete-eightball-1-18-reprint

Facsimile editions of the L&R issues themselves probably still the best way to read this material imho, where the separate worlds are rubbing up against each other rather than kept apart.

I don't know if I agree with that - having read the books in the giant hardcover collections I think made me appreciate it more than I would have in a drip feed. It's not the easiest to follow as it is with the massive number of characters and stories over decades

My problem with L&R remains that they are just too dense and rich to binge, but too complicated to read here-and-thee

*there

Picked up the Sobek one shot by James Stokoe, gorgeous and grody as always. Love that croc.

Now I'm reading the second volume of the Misty reprints. First storyline, The Sentinels, features both interesting kitchen sink period detail (family squats in haunted high rise because all the Council could offer was for kids to be taken into care and parents to live in a bed & breakfast) and just an absurd amount of guilt/masochism.

I love the Chick tract with the Stewie Griffin cameo because it seems to think he's some sort of beloved character aimed specifically at children like Elmo pic.twitter.com/ozQGdSK39c

— Zack Budryk (@BudrykZack) March 29, 2022

What happened to Jack Chick? The Chick I knew would make it clear BOTH families are going to hell, what is this weak boomer bullshit.

I binged the entirety of Love & Rockets during the first year of the pandemic when I had a broken leg and couldn't get around well. I've tried to reread it some and it reminds me too much of being miserable and on pain meds and I cannot go back to it. Gave the TPB's away to a friend because they bum me out.

Just finished the Captain Britain omnibus. Pretty good, but the coloring reproduction is awful. I'm impressed by how fast things move; those comics were pretty short.

The Moore/Davis Cap Britain stories were originally printed in black and white, so 'colouring reproduction' isn't quite accurate (sorry to be a pedant). I used to have a Marvel US trade paperback of those stories with equally lousy colouring, so I wonder if that's what they've used/referenced for this new hardcover (haven't seen inside it yet). The pages were also drawn for UK magazine format and don't squish down that well to US comic book page size. And I'm guessing that Marvel UK never took decent stats of the pages at the time. So short of an 'artist's edition' shot from the original artwork, I think repro on these stories is always going to be an issue.

The omnibus also collects before and after Moore’s run. I have the tpb of Claremont’s Captain Britain that came out around the time of the Excalibur comic so I can directly compare them. For the Claremont issues, it doesn’t appear that they have been recolored, but poorly copied. In the trade the colors are bright and vivid while in the omnibus they are washed out and muted.

that's disappointing to hear. I haven't read those stories yet but i guess i'll pass on this version, or maybe just go digital

i flip through the current books but it's impossible to care tbh

I got the Dorian Gray adaptation by Corominas today and it's pretty stunning, I haven't seen much else like it. I don't think it has ever been in english but I guess a familiarity with the source material will help
https://www.danielmaghen-editions.com/catalogue/dorian-gray/

Kentaro Miura - Giganto Maxia

Kaiju desert adventure with nice creature and setting designs. The main characters (an increasingly young looking girl who pisses on a wrestler to keep him energized) are insanely powerful so it feels like the opposite of the struggle in Berserk.

I found it a little slight and it seemed just open ended enough in case he managed to finish Berserk so who knows if there was grander plans.

I didn't think Japan (written by Buronsen) was especially good but I hadn't heard of King Of Wolves until today, has anyone read it?

Reading the first Nemesis The Warlock omnibus in honour of Kevin O'Neill. I love that the humans are the bad guys but not in an essentialist way - there are humans who join the good side but crucially they are not promoted to main character status for it. Also surely this is one of the main influences on Warhammer 40k?

The art is uniformly excellent, wild stuff - by O'Neill but also Bryan Talbot and Jesus Redondo, whom I'd never heard of but who def holds his own.

I know I'm late to this, but I've just noticed how much Martínez looks like his face has been drawn by Ken Reid in this picture

https://pbs.twimg.com/card_img/1606364688756899844/UAUvB9Wa?format=jpg&name=medium

really should be speech bubble next to him saying "ERK!!"

i am doing my yearly reread of Berserk in honor of the final miura volume being released. astonishing how quick he got so good and how incredibly complex and dark the story is.

exporting the ILB what did you read this year tradition because hell why not:

* - I really loved this

Grandville: L'integral, Bryan Talbot
Gil Jourdan - Premieres Aventures, M. Tillieux
Hyperthick #1-3, Steve Aylett
*Crisis Zone, Simon Hanselmann
*Warlock, Jim Starlin et al
Popeye Vol.1: 1986-1989, Bobby London
Mickey Mouse: Race To Death Valley, Floyd Gottfredson
The Caterer, Steve Aylett
*Red Flowers, Yoshiharu Tsuge
Dancing Plague, Gareth Brookes
*Black Panther, Vol.1, Christopher Priest, Mark Teixeira et al
Lupin III: Greatest Heists, Monkey Punch
Miles Morales, Vol.1, Saladin Ahmed, Javier Garron et al
Sobek, James Stokoe
Misty, Vol.2-3, Malcolm Shaw et al
Mickey Mouse: The Man From Alcatraz, Romano Scarppa
*Chartwell Manor, Glenn Head
The Swamp, Yoshiharu Tsuge
Beta Ray Bill: Argent Star, Daniel Warren Johnson
Guardians Of The Galaxy, Vol.1, Al Ewing, Juann Cabal et al
*Hellboy Vol.6, Mike Mignola, Scott Hampton et al
Poussey: L'integrale, Peyo
*The Thief Inoue Akizazu, Osamu Tezuka
Apollo's Song, Osamu Tezuka
*Red Seas, Vol.1, Ian Edginton, Steve Yeowell
* The Good Asian, Vol.1&2, Pornsak Pichetshote, Alexandre Tefekghi et al
The Birth Of Kitaro, Shigeru Mizuki
* Paralell Lives, Oliver Schrauwen
Concrete Surfer, Pat Mills, Christine Ellingham
The Man Without Talent, Yoshiharu Tsuge
Judge Dredd: Complete Case Files Vol.1, Matt Wagner et al
TMNT Adventures, Vol.2, Dean Clarrain, Ryan Brown et al
Seven Soldiers Of Victory Vol.1-4, Grant Morrison et al
*Chainsaw Man, Vol.1-6, Tatsuki Fujimoto
Good Night, Hem, Jason
Umma's Table, Yeon-Sik Hong
Jinty: Land Of No Tears/The Human Zoo, Pat Mills et al
Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter, Dan Abnett, Tom Mandrake et al
Falconspeare, Johnson-Cadwell
Orochi Vol.1-2, Kazuo Umezzo
*I Want You, Lisa Hanawalt
Keeping Two, Jordan Crane
*The Best Of 2000AD, various
Something Is Killing The Children, James Tynion IV et al
*Newburn, Vol.1, Chip Zdarsky, Jason Phillips
Stages Of Rot, Linnea Sterte
Reckless: Follow Me Down, Ed Brubaker, Sean Phillips
Absolute Sandman, Vol.1, Neil Gaiman et al
*Nemesis The Warlock, Vol.1, Pat Mills, Kevin O'Neill et al

> *Nemesis The Warlock, Vol.1, Pat Mills, Kevin O'Neill et al

oh, i should've picked this up from home at christmas.

and then sold it on amazon to some sucker

"1 Used from £190.00"

points of overlap

*Crisis Zone, Simon Hanselmann
Mickey Mouse: Race To Death Valley, Floyd Gottfredson
Sobek, James Stokoe
*Chartwell Manor, Glenn Head
Apollo's Song, Osamu Tezuka
* Paralell Lives, Oliver Schrauwen
*I Want You, Lisa Hanawalt
*Newburn, Vol.1, Chip Zdarsky, Jason Phillips

Something I should say more often: nice drawings, shame about the faces

Here are the TCJ Best of 2022 lists:

The Best Comics of 2002

My reaction is similar every year to the point where it's a ritual: I look forward eagerly to the lists; once I read them am horrified by the bulk of them*; find comfort in the lists of Jog, Tucker, Cynthia Rose**, Ristau, Nicholson***, one or two others; revert back to my default state of ruing the State of Modern Comics (TM) (or should that just be modern comics criticism).

*Giving the side-eye this year to any list featuring Jordan Crane. Great editor, good cartoonist, but some of the most bathetic scenarios known to mankind (which is saying a lot in indie comics).

**Had no idea there was a new version of Objectif Pub (a gorgeous 1980s compilation of ads drawn by cartoonists, mostly of the ligne claire/Atom Style a la Chaland, Benoit, Clerc etc.) - one of my most treasured, ah, objects.

***Even the good lists suffer from a fill-in-the-blanks predictability: here's RJ Casey with a New Yorker cartoon, here's the 2000AD entry for Jog; here's Tucker with the edgy DC genre entry.

Ah, I'm just being crabby.

Rolling Comic Books 2023