Stuff of Interest - March 2006

Comics of some interest for March 2006 or thereabouts (The Kirby listed elsewhere). Here are some covers, which pretty much say it all for some of these:

And here they are with words.

LA PERDIDA GN
by Jessica Abel
The first full-length graphic novel from an acclaimed young comics artist. This is an emotional, high velocity tale of a young woman who journeys to Mexico City in search of her true identity, only to discover a self she can hardly recognize.
HC, 8x6, 272pgs,$19.95

I enjoyed the beginning of the series quite a bit, although I thought the end was a bit of a let-down when I first read it. I'll have to re-read the whole thing before I decide if I want it in a more permanent format. I do recommend it for those who haven't read it, for the art if nothing else. And a very good price, a hardcover for $6 less than the separate comics cost. It's enough to put you off serialized comics for good.

SHOWCASE PRESENTS THE SUPERMAN FAMILY VOL. 1 TP
Written by Otto Binder
Art by Curt Swan, Ruben Moreria, Ray Burnley and others
Cover by Swan & Stan Kaye
The super-affordable Showcase collections continue with a volume spotlighting Superman's girlfriend Lois Lane and pal Jimmy Olsen, collecting the first 22 issues of SUPERMAN'S PAL, JIMMY OLSEN and Lois's first solo outing from SHOWCASE #9!
On sale March 15 576 pg, B&W, $16.99 US

It's almost wrong how excited I was when I first heard of this. Over 500 pages of Curt Swan drawing silly stories of Jimmy Olsen. It's almost a shame that there'll be a Lois Lane thing contaminating it at the end (though I'm looking forward to the Schaffenberger version of Lois if there are future volumes)

SOULSEARCHERS #77
by David, Staton, & Milgrom
With the rest of the Soulsearchers involved in their slapstick search for a new group headquarters, Bridget and Baraka follow Cloa Fille's trail to the accursed house overgrown by menacing plants, and find the most audacious adversary they've ever met in the "The Calamityville Horror"!
32pgs, B&W $2.50

This should be good. I'm looking forward to seeing Joe Staton's version of the characters.

PATTY-CAKE & FRIENDS VOLUME 1 TP
by Scott Roberts
At last, Patty-Cake in full color! You knew it had to happen sooner or later! After ten years,multiplee Eisner and Ignatz nominations, Scott Roberts' beloved Patty-Cake is coming to you in color! This special trade paperback reprints the first three issues of Patty's long SLG run (from away back in 1997) as you've never seen them before.
SC, 6x9, 96pgs, FC $12.95

This is really good to see. Roberts' work will look great in colour, and hopefully with their publication of some Disney stuff Slave Labor will be able to make some inroads into mainstream distribution with it.

BIZARRO WORLD SC
Written and illustrated by Tony Millionaire, Kyle Baker, Dylan Horrocks, Eddie Campbell, Harvey Pekar, James Kochalka, Gilbert Hernandez, Peter Bagge and others
Cover by Jaime Hernandez
A heaping slab of great comics featuring Bizarro by a who's-who of fantastic comic artists and writers! It's big! It's indisputably rectangular! It stays crunchy even in milk!
on sale April 26 ' 200 pg, FC, $19.99 US

Might pick this up if I see it on sale somewhere. I got the first volume a while back, and while I didn't like most of it, there were a few gems, so if this is the same I'd probably be happy to pay about half that cover price.

SHOWCASE PRESENTS TEEN TITANS VOL. 1 TP
Written by Bob Haney, Marv Wolfman and Len Wein
Art by Nick Cardy, Bruno Premiani, Bill Molno, Irv Novick, Lee Elias, Bill Draut, Sal Trapani and Jack Abel
Cover by Cardy
The "Showcase" format continues with a volume collecting BRAVE AND THE BOLD #54, 60, SHOWCASE #59, and TEEN TITANS #1-18. Robin, Wonder Girl, Kid Flash, and Aqualad unite for adventures only a teen team could handle!
on sale April 5 ' 528 pg, B&W, $16.99 US

While not quite as glee inducing as 500 pages of JIMMY OLSEN, this is still going to be well worth picking up. Cardy's artwork is great on these stories, and it's probably my favourite of Bob Haney's books.

LITTLE LULU: LUCKY LULU TPB
JOHN STANLEY (W/A) and IRVING TRIPP (A)
On sale April 12, SC, 200pg, b&w, 6" x 9", $9.95
For eight-year-old Lulu Moppet, nothing is impossible even if the results of her efforts are impossibly imperfect. Need to quell the fury of a rambunctious two-year-old? Lulu's got a hilarious fairy tale brewing in her brain that'll do just the trick. Father needs his best suit taken to the tailor? Lulu can handle it - so long as Pop doesn't mind if she makes a few unplanned and wholly unpredictable stops along the way. Have a wayward ghost in your house who needs a new home? Lulu's your girl!

Glad to see Dark Horse is getting these out on a steady basis. I've really enjoyed those I picked up so far, and look forward to getting all of them at some point.

RUNAWAY COMICS #1
by Mark Martin
After a hiatus from a regularly serialized comic - but not from comics - Mark Martin debuts his new, semi-annual title Runaway this month. The first issue begins the longest story starring his popular character Montgomery Wart (from Tantalizing Stories) - plus several shorter stories to round out the first issue. The book is full of Martin's patented visuals, slapstick humor, perfect timing, distinctive character designs, and rambunctious storytelling. Find out why so many cartoonists, from Scott McCloud to Jim Woodring, love Martin's comics.
MATURE THEMES
24pgs $3.50

Good to see Mark Martin back on the printed page, even if just on a semi-annual basis. More than worth taking a look at.

USAGI YOJIMBO #92
STAN SAKAI (W/A)
On sale March 29, b&w, 24pg, $2.99
Internationally acclaimed storyteller Stan Sakai presents another adventure from feudal Japan! The foxy thief Kitsune visits the Geishu clan in this issue, and the rabbit ronin is caught between his friendship with the charming thief and his loyalty to the Geishu clan... and how will Tomoe react when she meets Usagi's beautiful and flirtatious friend? It's a meeting of two fan-favorite characters, with the long-eared samurai caught in the middle! As if that weren't enough, when Kitsune's young protege Kiyoko steals a priceless temple scroll, the man who wants it would rather kill the pair than pay for it. Can they get out of this mess before permanent damage is caused to the clan? Find out, this month in Usagi Yojimbo!

I guess there are only so many ways to say hey, it's Sakai, it's Usagi, it'll be good.

SGT. ROCK: THE PROPHECY #3
Written by Joe Kubert
Art and cover by Kubert
Sgt. Rock and Easy Co. continue on their mission to bring "“The Prophecy"” to Estonia. After a harrowing shootout with a band of renegade Nazis, the combat-happy Joes of Easy Company and their precious cargo stumble upon a place they've never seen before and one they won't soon forget.
On sale March 22 3 of 6 ' 32 pg, FC, $2.99 US

And of course Kubert doing Rock is always going to be good to look at.

I don't really care about this comic enough to even copy the solicitation, and won't be picking it up, but I really really like this Brian Bolland cover.

I traded your soul...

I traded your soul for Alf pogs. Remember Alf? He's back. In pog form.

Doctor Who - "The Christmas Invasion"

...or, for Canadians, "The Boxing Day Invasion". This slightly longer than usual episode (it ran in a 90-minute timeslot, with commercials, but didn't fill it) introduces the latest Doctor, who'll be headlining the next season in a few months. He and Rose return to modern day Earth, just in time for a massive alien invasion. We also get a hint of the new spin-off series TORCHWOOD.

I was pretty unimpressed with it, unfortunately. While there were a few clever bits, they were few and far between, and a lot of the stuff between them wasn't worth watching. Overall ranks close to the bottom of new series episodes.

The good news is that this doesn't mean much for the upcoming season, since the new Doctor spends most of this lying around doing nothing. The actor didn't seem to bad in the few bits he had, and maybe if they have him doing more it'll pick up some. The end of the episode had a few clips from the upcoming season, and while some of them don't seem too promising (as I've said before, I think DW should avoid Victorian England, so actually having Queen Victoria herself can't be good news), there are a few bits for the long time fan that I'm looking forward to, already leaked in rumours, but I won't mention them here.

I also just got the first tape of the original series from my library in a while, "Terror of the Zygons", from the Tom Baker years, with Sarah Jane Smith and Harry and the Brigadier, so that'll be a good way to get this latest thing out of my mind.

EC - Upheaval (Williamson)

Upheaval!
art by Al Williamson, story by Al Feldstein & Harlan Ellison
Weird Science-Fantasy #24[#2] (1954)

Some sources seem to indicate that this was an unauthorized adaptation (a la the first few Bradbury adaptations) of an early Ellison short story, "Mealtime", others seem to indicate that it was authorized. In any case, it was the only Ellison story published by EC. The story concerns an exploration mission, looking (so far in vain) for signs of intelligence on other worlds. The captain is convinced that humanity is the pinnacle of evolution and they won't find anything, until they come onto a seemingly empty world, which swallows up their spaceship and the crew. After barely getting out with their lives, the skeptical captain is now convinced that he was wrong, and the world they just left is an evolved intelligent world, far superior to the parasite based evolutionary model of Earth.

 

Cute story, but more interesting for some really nice Williamson artwork (with some possible assist by Roy Krenkel). In addition to the usual great space-men there's a nice sequence of flash-backs to the evolution of life on earth, and any chance to see Williamson drawing battling dinosaurs and cavemen (separately, of course), even for just one panel each, is well worth reading.

My Collection - CRITTERS [1986 Series]

Critters [1986 series]
40 issues [1986 - 1990]
1 - 38, 40, 50

A very entertaining funny animal book from Fantagraphics, CRITTERS ran as an anthology with up to #38, then ran various full issue stories from #39 to #49, returning to the anthology format for a big finale for #50.

I didn't start reading it until after it was cancelled, soon after I started reading USAGI YOJIMBO and looking for all the earlier stories. I liked the rest of those issues enough to start picking up the non-Usagi issues (Sakai has work in about a third of the issues).

Of course some were harder to find than others, and I only finally finished my collection of the anthology issues earlier this year. I still haven't read all the continued stories that appeared in it, as I was waiting to have all the chapters. And you hardly ever see the non-anthology issues around (I suspect they might sometimes be filed by the feature name, like "Fission Chicken" or "Birthright").

Still worth keeping, even with all the Usagi stuff available in tradepaperbacks. The "Gnuff" series by Freddy Milton (a heavily Carl Barks inspired series about a dinosaur family) appears in about half the issues, and is always worth reading. A good mix of single issue stories and serialized stories throughout. Also notable, #23 has a flexidisc with Ty Templeton's "Teddy Payne" on one side and Alan Moore's "Sinister Ducks" on the other.

Random TV stuff

Yeah, haven't been posting much lately. Don't know why, it's not like I get a lot else done. I'm not sure this weblog has found the voice i wanted yet, so it's easier to post on one of the more focused ones. I'll have to get on that soon.

I have been watching a lot of TV recently. I was able to borrow an almost complete set of NEWSRADIO tapes, so I watched those. I loved that show when it was on, but missed a handful of episodes both originally and on syndication, so it was great to revisit the old favourites and get the occasional new shot. I can't believe how good that show was. I'm going to have to pick up the full season DVDs at some point (first two seasons are out, third apparently out next year). I hear the commentary tracks are really good.

I also just recently got into ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT. I'm not sure why, but the show managed to fly completely under my radar for the first two seasons. I knew it existed, I knew Jeffrey Tambor, who I liked from the LARRY SANDERS days, was on it, but not much else. Fortunately that's been corrected now, just in time for the series to be cancelled, it seems. Ah well. Anyway, one nice thing about catching on to a series late is that I got to watch almost fifty episodes in just a few months, which really works for a show like this, which has a lot of running jokes and references to past episodes.

The news that John Spencer passed away prompted me to dig out some videos I kept of the first few seasons of THE WEST WING. For a while there, from the middle of the first season to early in the fourth, it was my favourite show on TV, so I still have tapes of most of those (those were the days before DVD box sets became inevitable for most shows. I probably should look into buying the early ones for WEST WING). I still watch the show, mostly out of habit and affection for the characters, but I forgot just how good it was when all the pieces were in place early on. And of course John Spencer's character, Leo McGarry, was an integral part of that, especially early on, I think it was his presence which held the show together long enough for the rest of the cast to catch up. Really not sure if I'll be able to watch the show without him, especially if it continues past this season.

Mod and Mad

I've always liked this 1968 cover by Curt Swan and Neal Adams, especially the unique integration of the logo into the action, but seeing it with this extra promotional dress from a period house ad makes me absolutely love it. "Mod and Mad"? So, so, hip...