Monthly Archives: September 2010
Update for 9/30/10
New review for The Visible Rooster Jack by Adam Hansen, Ben Zmith & Sara Witty. I’m leaving town for a birthday weekend, so nothing new will be up here until probably Monday. Happy weekend everybody, if you want to send me birthday greetings just buy comics from the site! Then if the ordering system is still messed up like I fear you’ll just send me the money directly to Paypal and I’ll send you the comics…
Hansen, Adam; Zmith, Ben & Witty, Sara – The Visible Rooster Jack
The Visible Rooster Jack
Ah, now I get the title. Kudos on leaving it a mystery until the end of the book. There’s a lot going on in this comic and there are a lot of characters doing the goings-on (I’m still not completely clear on that first page of wordless action), but Adam was nice enough to list all the characters and what they were all about. Concise but effective, while still leaving the reader wanting more. Crap, I’d better be careful with the “kudos” this early in a review. Anyway, Rooster Jack and his band of adventurers is out camping one night when Razzle Dazzle (the perfectly named magician of the group who is “haunted by visions of a late 20th century world”) dreams of “basket of balls” with the ball and parts of the court being on fire. Luckily Razzle Dazzle is able to undo pretty much all the harm he does to the group, and the group sets out in the morning. What they’re out to do is never made clear, as Jack is attacked by a strange woman who tells them her tale of woe and convinces the bunch of them to travel to her besieged town. Things get a little hairy from there, but you’ll get no spoilers here. The mass of characters introduced later did leave me a bit confused, but maybe I’m reading these out of chronological order and there’s more to the tale. Or Adam just packs as much in as possible and leaves it to the reader to keep up, which would also be a good thing. Plenty of amusing bits are contained in these pages, the writing is smarter than you might think if you zoned out once you read “band of adventurers” earlier in the review, and he managed the difficult task of rounding out 5 out of 6 characters in the group in one mini comic. The tiny fairy got short shrift, but other than that I already have an idea of where all these people are coming from. The art was fantastic too; that hall of horrors in particular was gruesome, the backgrounds were impressive and all the characters were instantly unique. A pretty damned good comic, that’s what I’m trying to say, unless you hate adventure stories of all stripes, even ones that are funny as hell, in which case I mourn the lack of joy in your life. $4
Update for 9/29/10
New review for The Trial of Sweetie Snake by Steve Seck and, as Steve was nice enough to take me up on my challenge to send enough comics to make it a weekly thing, it’ll be “Steve Seck Wednesdays” around here for at least the next month. If anybody else wants to take me up on it, I can probably do it for one more day of the week (at least until these run out), then I’m sticking to the random stuff.
Seck, Steve – The Trial of Sweetie Snake
The Trial of Sweetie Snake
It’s not every day that you see a snake with a five o’clock shadow. That’s the adorably named Sweetie Snake on the cover (duh, and no, it didn’t come all crumpled up, that’s just what the cover looks like), and it takes a little while to get him to trial. Sweetie Snake, at the outset, could be mistaken for old school Bugs Bunny, as he is scooped up out of the river by an inbred prospector and goes on to a series of escalating pranks until his true nature comes out. Hey, he is a snake, after all. A sheriff stumbles across the scene, Sweetie ends up on trial for murder, then things get into O.J. Simpson territory, although it’s tricky to say more without giving away the ending. The comic occasionally wanders over the line between funny and mean, but only for a split second and it still manages to keep it funny. That’s probably not going to make sense to anybody without full access to my brain, but it makes sense to me. The art maintains a cartoonish quality, but that probably has something to do with this basically being an illustrated cartoon. I have plenty of other books from Steve to come, as he took me up on my challenge to send enough books along for me to review them once a week, so I should get a better sense of his skills in the coming weeks. As for this one, it was funny, those newspaper titles were hilarious, and he managed to make the very dated O.J. Simpson references seem relevant. Good stuff, that’s what I’m getting at. $4
Update for 9/28/10
New review on Pat Aulisio Tuesday for Philly Alternative Comic Con 2010, which I’m going to go out on a limb and say was the program for the event, but all it has in it is comics.
Aulisio, Pat (editor) – Philly Alternative Comic Con 2010
Philly Alternative Comic Con 2010
Well, at least I think Pat was the editor. He put the book together, anyway, and that’s basically the same thing. Sadly, it’s one of those anthologies without a coherent table of contents (although I did like the look of the one Box Brown put together), so a lot of these stories are going to be reviewed through a bit of guesswork and process of elimination. Stories in here include a very colorful mess from Pat, Liz Baillie keeping the tradition of record collecting alive, Hawk Krall with some disgusting but hilarious pranks, Dina Kelberman’s inimitable comics (with a drunken disclaimer tacked onto the bottom), Mike Sgier with a futuristic tale of trying to cap an uncontrollably spewing well, Ian Harker’s love of flying, L. Nichols and going along to get along, and Sally Bloodbath & Matt Wiegle with a piece on the most horrible child alive and her fitting end. That leaves a few pieces without a noticeable creator, so in no particular order, the other stories in here dealt with making a friend (literally), trying to make art to please a critic, and two grotesque creatures sharing an apartment and their antics. Chris McDonnell probably did the first two pieces and Lance Hansen probably did the last story (which was actually a series of smaller stories), and I say “probably” because that’s where my coin flip landed, and when has that ever been wrong? Box Brown did the covers and has a lovely group of people at the end of their lives bemoaning their lack of buying quality comics in their lives, something you should all take to heart. As this was from a con I have no idea if it’s still readily available to the world, but as it’s all in color, gorgeous and full of talent, you should hunt it down if at all possible. Pat would probably know if it was around, why not check it with him? Or I can post a little update here if I hear anything, how about that? No price, but $5 sounds nice, if possibly too low.
Michel, Doug – Monkey Squad One #5
Monkey Squad One #5
Is Doug secretly Donovan Cater in disguise? Seriously, the similarity in the artwork is uncanny (go ahead and look around at some of the ancient (because he appears to have vanished from comics) Donovan Cater reviews and see if I’m wrong). Well, I’ll go with the theory that it’s a different person, as a close inspection does show that it probably isn’t Donovan. Doug does a smart thing right off the bat: he lets the reader know what happened in the last issue. As this is “#5” that is crucial, but you’d be surprised how many comics creators just don’t bother to keep readers up to date. Anyway, U.N.C.L.E. Doug (leader of Monkey Squad One) is on trial for losing the team, even though they’ve been lost in time and it apparently isn’t his fault. The trial goes badly, Doug has a ridiculously easy time escaping from this supposedly secure facility (he is aided by the fact that gravity apparently doesn’t apply to him), and meets up with some old foes to help him out. They, unsurprisingly, don’t help him out, but it’s a funny conversation that leads them to that conclusion. Things devolve a bit into Star Wars parody from there, and hasn’t the universe as a whole decided that the prequel movies were so awful that people were no longer allowed to parody Star Wars any more? Except for Robot Chicken and Family Guy, but they only get away with it because they’re rich and occasionally have scathing satire. Well, more Robot Chicken than Family Guy on that front, but I’m getting off topic here. The Rancor is played in this comic by Granmonster, who is able to fill that role as well as getting loose in the town and fulfilling the “giant monster on the loose” requirement. The comic as a whole is fairly amusing, even with me being at the point of Star Wars parodies just bugging me. Overall I’ll need another issue to really make up my mind, so it’s a good thing Doug was nice enough to send the next issue along as well. Even with the recap I don’t know if it’s a good idea to start at #5 of a series; if you’re looking to give it a shot maybe see if the guy has earlier issues available. $2.50
Update for 9/26/10
New review for Bachelor Girl’s Mother Goose by Amy Martin, and this one is for all the ladies out there…
Martin, Amy – Bachelor Girl’s Mother Goose
Bachelor Girl’s Mother Goose
If you read an intro for a comic that states that it was conceived while the author was miles away from home, alone and suffering from swine flu, you would probably be right to assume that it would be a little… odd. There may be exceptions, but it seems like a pretty safe bet. This one definitely falls under that category, as Amy takes her Bachelor Girl characters and puts them in situations involving a series of nursery rhymes. I think at least a few of these were original works, but I’m not familiar enough with nursery rhymes to say that for sure; maybe she just plucked a few really obscure rhymes from the void. Anyway, the end result is that pretty much every nursery rhyme you can think of (go ahead, let your mind wander and allow a few to pop into your brain) show up on these pages. Wee Willie Winkle, Georgie Porgie, Humpty Dumpty, Little Miss Muffet, Little Bo Peep, Peter Piper, Jack Sprat, they’re all here. It’s funnier than you may think if you’re as cynical as I am, and Amy shows remarkable self-restraint at not turning even one of these vaguely pornographic sounding rhymes into anything all that risque. Suggestive, sure, but that just adds to the funny. As a single man somewhere in his 30’s, this isn’t exactly targeted at me, but whoever can’t enjoy a book like this has lost all their sense of fun. Check it out, why don’t you, or get a copy for your single friend or relative. Not your girlfriend/wife/mistress though, as it makes the single life look like way too much fun and they’ll probably dump your ass… $5
Jones, Toby – Memory Foam II
Memory Foam II
Huzzah for Roman numerals! Here’s hoping Toby sticks with it long enough to get to the Roman numerals that confuse people, as why not bring that back? A little bit of history never hurt anybody. That page I sampled below hit home with me, and probably with most of you if you stop to think about it: motorcycles. While all people who ride them are clearly not assholes, it does seem to attract some of the scum of the earth. For example, there’s some asshole who drives down my busy street every morning between 2:30 and 3:00 a.m., revving his damned engine at the stop light and most likely waking everybody up who doesn’t have some form of a white noise machine going. If I could string up piano wire across the road and be guaranteed to just take out him or her, I believe the world would instantly be a better place. Toby does me one better in his story by “inventing” a device that makes all motorcycles self-destruct once their noise output gets over a certain level. His comic self was gripped with remorse, but the headlines on the newspaper the next day were priceless: “Countless Jerks Dead:”, “World Better Place”, and “God: ‘Great Job Toby'””. As with many things, I thought South Park handled motorcycle riders best, and seeing as how they have every episode up at their website for free, you can see for yourself if you’re so inclined. If you’re going to defend the assholes that rev their motors at every stop light, I’m sorry, but you just don’t have a case. As for the rest of the comic, it was a pile of great stuff. There’s Toby wondering what’s going to happen to him in the long run, getting a job at a donut factory (and yes, it’s about as bad as it sounds), trying to make time for all his creative endeavours, standing on principle and not eating a piece of stuffed crust pizza (I agree with his crying girlfriend on that one), phrases he’d love to never hear again, dreaming all day, reading online reviews about himself, not saying “you too” when people say “have a nice day”, and how his younger self would view his older self. For what it’s worth the guy worries too much, as he clearly has a boatload of talent, seems to have a fantastic girlfriend and, despite being broke, has enough free time to work on things like this comic, and he’s only 22. The pessimist would say it’s all downhill from there, the optimist would say things are only going to get better, but screw it, enjoy what you have now. And that is my philosophical thought for the day, the first of a one-part series… $3
Update for 9/24/10
New review for Spaz! #3 by Emi Gennis and, as I seem to be getting a ton of comics lately, I will be around this weekend doing reviews. I have an idea for that still-working-on-it comics rental project that would involve me doing it by myself. It wouldn’t be pretty, as I have no skills for this sort of thing, but it would be functional and waiting for web help is clearly getting me nowhere. Would anybody out there be overly offended if the rental service took a bare minimum of work on your end (like cutting and pasting a pile of titles of comics you’d like to receive instead of clicking and having them automatically added to a list) or would you prefer to wait until that mythical day when it’s all done perfectly by a gifted web designer? This isn’t rhetorical, I’m asking for opinions here…
Gennis, Emi – Spaz! #3
Spaz! #3
Leaky ceiling? That’s my guess. Oh hello, you have no idea what I’m talking about if you haven’t read this issue of Spaz. See, Emi woke up one morning with the top of the blanket wet but the underside dry. So peeing the bed was clearly out as an option. Still, she’s left utterly clueless as to what happened. As her reaction shot upon waking up appears to indicate heavy alcohol consumption, might I suggest something from the previous night as another possibility? Maybe a spilled drink while the blanket was pulled back, which would leave the underside dry when she drunkenly pulled the cover over her? Maybe a cat protest of some kind? If alcohol or a cat are not involved, I’m all out of ideas. And as for the guy who woke up to a locked safe being open, on its side and full of water, that is very clearly a prank by somebody else who knew the combination. How many other people could there be? Unless huge amounts of alcohol were involved there too… Sorry, I’m neglecting a proper review of the comic because this mystery has me fascinated. I think ghosts are utter horseshit, so there must be some logical explanation, but I don’t get it from the facts given. So what’s this comic like, other than that utterly engrossing story? There are a couple of bits called “Shit I Worry About” that is, um, shit she worries about, like various forms of cancer, falling down the stairs, having her cat run away, becoming a spinster, and axe murderers in the back seat. Then there are a couple of bits about unusual deaths taken off Wikipedia, although the second one is more hilarious than unusual. Throw in a couple of strips with her talking about sex and being late with Zygote and a demonstration of her holding out for making comics by hand (at least for a little while) and the mysterious story I loved and voila! It’s a comic! She has a deal right now where you can get all three issues for $5, which sounds like a steal to me, and you’d be guaranteed to get a pile of great comics. Assuming that’s your thing, and if it wasn’t why would you be looking around this site? If you already have the first two issues then I suppose you could get this one for $2.
Update for 9/23/10
New review for Aloha by Desmond Reed, and it looks like I’ve had at least one person take me up on my offer to send a chunk of their comics along for weekly reviewing. I don’t want to do that every day, as I think at least some of the fun of this site comes in not knowing what’s going to be reviewed next (or at least I hope that’s fun for people who aren’t me), but hey, there are seven days in the week, I see no problem with 3 or 4 of them being weekly reviews of the same person. It’s not like they can produce infinite comics and keep this up for long anyway. Well, maybe Brian John Mitchell could…
Reed, Desmond – Aloha
Aloha
How exactly does a worm hold an axe? Sorry, my inner comic geek occasionally busts out, much as I would like to keep it down. This simply done comic, which should forever dispel the notion that people who can’t draw can make great comics, deals with three worms having a conversation. Oh, and just so it’s clear, I’m not saying that Desmond CAN’T draw, just that this comic consists of worms, piles of dirt, a flat ground and some darkness. Anyway, these worms are talking, two of them realize (after the third worm has left) that they really don’t like that guy at all and have no interest in meeting him for lunch tomorrow, and they devise a plan to get rid of the worm. With an axe. If you know your science and know what happens to worms when they are cut up the ending will not come as a shock to you, if you don’t know your worm science, well, prepare to be amazed while learning something! Also, if you’re keeping track, that’s two comics by the guy and both of them have been fantastic. Not the fancypants, “discover something new about yourself or the universe as a whole” kind of fantastic, just the “that’s some funny shit that I didn’t necessarily see coming and even if I did it was still pulled off extremely well” kind of fantastic. These things need definition, don’t you know. Desmond is selling his two comics (The Island is the other comic) as a pack for $2. I suppose you could maybe badger him into just getting one or the other, but why? Just buy them both and enjoy.
Update for 9/21/10
New review for Bare Knuckle by Pat Aulisio, and because Pat sent me a bunch of comics recently I’ve decided to do Pat Aulisio Tuesdays for a bit. Hey, if you want the same treatment, just send me 4 or more different comics you’ve done that haven’t already been reviewed on the site. I’m a big fan of themes like that (and I will admit that “Tempo Lush Tuesday” rolled off the tongue a bit better), but rarely get enough comics by one person to pull it off…
Aulisio, Pat – Bare Knuckle
Bare Knuckle
I have very few rules on this site, but a big one is not spoiling the end of a comic. I have broken this rule utterly today, as the sampled image is the last page of this absolute blast of a comic. Why would I do such a thing? Just look at that image. If that isn’t the most awesome thing you’ve seen today, you must have had a shockingly awesome day already. There’s also the fact that practically every page of this short mini has something incredible in it, and you understand my feeling of justification here. This is, essentially, a video game told in comics form. The hero (who looks suspiciously like Ultimate Warrior from the old WWF days) starts off punching flunkies, moves on to a bigger boss, lands in a toxic sewer fighting frogmen and an alligator, before finally ending up fighting the boss of the whole thing. The tacos and turkeys laying around made the comic for me, as who hasn’t played a game with oddly placed food items sitting around to restore your health? Again, I hope giving away the ending isn’t too horrible of a thing to have done but, if you don’t use that line below the next time you see a fight, there is something seriously wrong with you. No idea of a price here, but as it’s all in color it’s probably in the $3-5 range…
Update for 9/20/10
New review for Blaster Al Ackerman’s Tales of the Ling Master #3 by E.J. Barnes. Sure, the title is unwieldy, but the comic is delicious!
Barnes, E.J. – Blaster Al Ackerman’s Tales of the Ling Master #3
Blaster Al Ackerman’s Tales of the Ling Master #3
That “#3 of 3” on the cover worries me. This can’t be the end of the Blaster Al Ackerman tales, can it? There must be more of them out there, or new ones on the way? Frankly, this is a series that is just begging for treatment in an anthology, with a number of different comics writers and artists doing their own take on the character if nothing else. As for the comic, E.J. warned me that this one was a little more “out there” than most, which is a tall order in this series, but she wasn’t wrong. It’s often difficult to review these things without giving too much away, and these stories take that up a notch, but I’ll give it a shot. Stories include a fable about a little boy who teased apples and his eventual meeting with an apple golem, another fable about a canary, a headache and a cigar on a plane, a professional “geek” (the circus kind, not the Bill Gates kind) trying to find out the truth about squid people, and one called “The Blue Catfish.” I don’t want to say a single thing about that one, but due to reviewer obligations I will say that it involves head shrinking, the concept of soul transportation and one of those stores that appear out of nowhere and vanish after you leave. It’s difficult to detail the demented brilliance of these stories, but if you can’t get behind a guy wearing a stained pillowcase as a hood doling out advice at $5 a pop, often in parable form, and generally when there’s at least some veracity to the utterly bizarre questions being posed, I don’t know how to convince you. If you like your comics genuinely different, there are three of these readily available that you should pick up as soon as possible. I’m hoping we can turn it into a cultural phenomena and realize my (five minute old) dream of an anthology with various takes on this character and/or the author. Make it happen America! $3
