Monthly Archives: January 2013

Update for 1/31/13

New reviews today for Fear is the Mind Killer by JP Pollard and Alternative Medicine on Trial!! by Mike Toft, both from the ridiculously huge Lutefisk Sushi E mini comic box.

Pollard, JP – Fear is the Mind Killer

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Website to buy Lutefisk Sushi

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Fear is the Mind Killer

Since I’m generally so nice in these reviews (but not always! Yes, you can find many bad reviews on this site if you look hard enough), I thought I’d start off with a negative: that cover looks terrible. Not the lines or the design, but that awful yellow color. Sometimes simple is best, and a plain old black and white cover would have worked fine here. That being said, I don’t have a whole lot of complaints about the actual story. Sure, I could have done without some of those spelling errors, but that “24 hour comic” on the cover is the great “get out of jail” free card for such things. The story here covers some familiar territory in small press comics (paralyzing self-doubt, wondering why you can’t work up the energy to make comics, letting every little setback throw your whole plan off), but JP has an interesting take on it. He had a job where he was making good money but kind of hated it, so he made a pact with his wife that they would leave their comfortable town, she would get a job in Chicago and he would work on his comics. Then… nothing. Well, she got a job, but he didn’t keep up his end of the deal for quite a while. We see the many reasons why that was the case, his observations from wandering around the town during regular business hours, and how he finally got going with his comics. And would you believe that Henry Rollins indirectly had a lot to do with it (even if JP does draw him as a black and white hulk)? It’s an engrossing story, even if we know how it ends (there are ads for his other comics on the back cover). Not that we really do know how JP’s story ends because hell, it’s still going, right? Here’s hoping he keeps it up, because he had some really innovative uses of words and word balloons in there, among other things.

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Toft, Mike – Alternative Medicine on Trial!!

Website

Website to buy Lutefisk Sushi

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Alternative Medicine on Trial!!

If there’s one thing I’ve learned during my years on this planet, it’s that believers in alternative medicine are rarely swayed by facts or logic. So if you’re one of those people, you’ll most likely just feel that this comic is an attack on you personally and will be offended. If, however, you are at all willing to be convinced, or if you already know that most forms of alternative medicine are pure quackery, you’re going to love this book. This tells the story of a trial involving an acupuncturist, a lady who practices homeopathy, and the head of an actual government organization. This government group is actually real and funded by taxes, in theory to investigate the efficacy of various types of alternative medicine. Mike brings some facts into the discussion, and they’re pretty damned convincing, but nothing drives his point home more effectively than the actual quote of the head of the government group. I thoroughly enjoyed this comic, and you probably will too if you’re willing to give it a shot.

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Update for 1/29/13

It’s Lutefisk Sushi week! Or possibly weeks, as there sure are a lot of mini comics in that box. I’m picking them at random, so today it’s The King of Fort Road by Nate Patrin and Office Ewok by James Powell. And no, I have no idea why those reviews are structured differently even though I posted them exactly the same of way. 11+ years of web ignorance still going strong!

Patrin, Nate – The King of Fort Road

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Website where you can buy Lutefisk Sushi

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The King of Fort Road

Three cheers for local legends! This comic tells the story of a mysterious man who was the “king” of a section of town for roughly a 50 year period. The author of this comic tries to piece together the bits of the legend to come up with a real person and has more than a little bit of trouble. I’m guessing that this isn’t a true story (although life would be better if it was), but Nate does a nice job of showing the variables involved in trying to learn about somebody only from passed down oral history. Nobody seemed to know the king’s real name (eight people came up with eight different names), exactly how he made his living (but he was always paying for meals and showering people with drinks), whether or not he had a family or where he lived. But he was beloved, and the bit about his only rival of consequence was notably short (spoiler alert: the guy wasn’t very successful at replacing the king). It’s a thoroughly engrossing story, which makes it even more impressive that this is Nate’s first comic. He should keep it up to see what else is in that brain of his. As far as constructive criticism goes, a few of the facial expressions seemed a bit forced, but that’s reaching a bit. Another worthy contribution to this giant box of mini comics.

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Powell, James – Office Ewok

Website

Website to buy Lutefisk Sushi

 

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Office Ewok

It’s difficult these days to keep up with all of the rules you’re expected to follow while working in an office. For example: mandatory pants. Who knew that it could be such an issue of contention? As you may have already guessed if you’ve seen the movie referenced on the cover to this comic, Ewoks have always been a pantless society. Well, that may or may not be true; I am not aware of the entire species history of Ewoks (I doubt very much that George Lucas is either). Anyway, this comic deals with the effects of not wearing pants in an office and having to conform to fit in. Really, it’s just an excuse to draw a number of usually pantless Star Wars characters wearing pants (I particularly enjoyed Chewbacca in his suspenders), but what more do you need? It’s a short pile of fun with an office lecture thrown in and a hell of a punchline.$25 for the whole box of 35+ comics (plus shipping)

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Update for 1/24/13

Today accidentally became Craig Bogart day, as I reviewed Craig’s The Ineffables: All of Creation AND Panel #19: Green, which is an anthology by various Columbus Ohio folks, and Craig is included in that group. So happy Craig Bogart day!

Various Columbus Artists – Panel #19: Green

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Panel #19: Green

One thing struck me right off the bat in this 19th (!) installment of one of the better anthologies out there: they really could have raised a bigger stink about this being printed on recycled paper. Or, if that “recycling” symbol on the cover is just for show, they missed a golden opportunity to release this book on recycled paper. Either way, making fun of environmentally conscious folks for their preachiness is just too big of a target to ignore (obligatory disclaimer: I agree with the goals of environmentalists, obviously, but their lack of a sense of humor is quite a target). But hey, at least the paper itself is green. This is the usual pile of short pieces by various Columbus artists, and once again the vast majority of the stories ranged between pretty good and damned great. Things start off with a silent piece by Dara Naraghi and Matt Kish detailing the “life” of a can of soda, and it’s a fantastic example of exactly how many things one piece of trash can affect. Andrew Lee and Ben Smith are up next with a piece about the evils of drugs, as told to a pair of stoners by a cartoon anti-drug man. KT Swartz, Brent Bowman and Dara Naraghi are up next with a story about military training and the dangers of not paying attention to your surroundings. I guess this one was “green” because it referenced the military? Or was it because they were outside? I need to stop taking things so literally. Anyway, the next piece called “Luck of the Irish” by Ross Hardy deals with the death of a leprechaun and the search for his gold, because how could you make a book with that title and not have a story about a leprechaun in it? Finally there’s a space adventure by Tony Goins and Craig Bogart that didn’t do a lot for me (five pages isn’t very much room to jump into a space adventure, but they still managed a few good jokes and some effective shouts of “silence!” by the big baddie), but at least they were nice enough to mention that the space explosions were silent, which is something that most movies don’t even manage to get right. There are also a few full pages spreads, one with that delightful Yoda fellow that is also required by law to be in any anthology with this title. I’d probably rank this somewhere in the middle of the pack in terms of quality in this Panel series, but considering the fact that a few issues of this series are among my favorite anthologies out there, “the middle” is still pretty damned good. And they managed to keep it at an affordable $3!

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Bogart, Craig – The Ineffables: All of Creation

Website is currently down, but I’ll update this when there’s a working website again…

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The Ineffables: All of Creation

Kudos to Craig on that title, as it’s hard to get more literal than that. There have been more than a few Ineffables books over the years, and that fact may scare you away from trying it out, but this one is perfect for new readers. It starts at the Big Band and ends at the Big Crunch; it’s hard to get more self-contained than that. Things start off with the revelation that the hero of the series (well, one of the heroes) is actually an immortal being, as his travelling back in time caused the Big Bang. Which is the kind of time travel thing that can make your head explode, but don’t think about it too much. From there we see the creation of Mason (OR DO WE? (that’ll make more sense after you read the whole book)) and the destruction of the dinosaurs by a group that has a convoluted but effective plan to make the planet more habitable to them. That’s your first chapter and, as spoilers get a bit dicey from here, I’ll just break down the remaining four chapters briefly. We see the death ray of Archimedes, Ineffables traveling back for a big old brawl (including a Mason vs. Mason brawl that is among the best comic book fights you’ll ever see, unless you like punching), android Ronald Reagan fighting giant sea monsters, giant alien bees taking over the planet, a thousand Mason heads raining nuclear destruction from the sky, and the plan to preserve all the knowledge in the universe at the Big Crunch. This series has really taken on a life of its own in recent years, and I love the fact that we’re seeing more and more team members and, well, all of creation. He even sneaks in some funny lines here and there (like Reagan’s “gift” to a liberated society). I do wish that he’d start putting the title on the spine of his graphic novels, but that’s purely as aesthetic thing for the sake of my bookshelf. This could make a hell of a cartoon series if there’s anybody out there willing to finance a smart, scientifically-minded series about time travelers trying to solve some of the bigger problems of existence. Nah, I don’t see anybody willing to finance something like that in this day and age either, sadly enough. But it would be awesome! $12

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Update for 1/22/13

New review today for I Will Bite You by Joseph Lambert and yes, I took a holiday weekend.

Lambert, Joseph – I Will Bite You

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I Will Bite You

There was only one question in my mind when I started reading this book: would it live up to its title? Because that title is one of the best things that I’ve ever seen. As this is a book of short stories, it’s not really fair to judge the whole book by that unbeatable title, but I will say that that particular story more than matched up to it. The gist of it is that there are two suns in the sky, but the cartoon kinds of suns with facial features. They’re coyly in love, sneaking kisses with each other and being very pleased with each other when this happens. Meanwhile, there’s an angry kid on the ground, and he’s going around biting creatures. I’d say “people,” but most of the things he bites are odd beings of some kind or another. Anyway, the kid finally gets punished and he notices one of the two suns laughing at him, so naturally he jumps up to it and takes a bite out of it. What follows is equally hilarious and horrifying, and I’ve already said far too much about this so I’ll leave it up to you to discover. But wait, there’s a whole lot more! Next is “After School Snacks,” in which a posse of creatures terrify a couple of kids after they discover the deliciousness of pudding snacks. It’s a testament to Joseph’s skills that these creatures oozed across the page, and there was also some wildly inventive uses of word balloons as weapons. Other stories in here include “Mom Said” (in which a young boy tries to join in on the activities of his brother and friend, eventually resorting to drastic measures to get their attention), “Turtle Keep It Steady” (a slow build of a story involving a turtle playing drums, trying to compete with a much hipper drummer in another section of the room), “PSR” (a man just tries to eat his damned ice cream without getting it stolen out from under him every year, with one hell of an ending), “Too Far” (we watch a boy swallow his own father in anger and things spiral from there), an untitled piece (about cavemen, the natural order of things, using pterodactyl wings to fly and kissing the sun) and “Every Day” (kind of extended version of the theory behind the ending of “I Will Bite You,” as a boy picks a fight with the sun every day with hilariously predictable results… mostly). Now that these are all arrayed in order, there really isn’t a weak story in the bunch. Some are better than others, as is always the case for books of short stories, but you’d be hard pressed to find a stinker in here. Unless you have a pathological hatred for all stories involving suns with faces, in which case there’s a lot that you could find wrong with this book. This is a hell of a debut book, and yet another piece of evidence that The Center for Cartoon Studies knows exactly what’s it’s doing. And anyway, who wouldn’t want a book with this title sitting on their shelf? $14

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Update for 1/18/13

New review today for Ritual #2: The Reverie by Malachi Ward. Happy weekend everybody!

Ward, Malachi – Ritual #2: The Reverie

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Ritual #2: The Reverie

I’ll occasionally read a comic and it just reaches out and punches me right in the heart. Which isn’t a bad thing, as if you’re not affected at all then a comic isn’t doing its job, but be warned: if you’re looking for a lighthearted romp, go elsewhere. This one starts off with a day in the life of a young boy and his sister, waiting on the couch for their dad to get home after one of them has broken a clock. We see the dad pull up, then we’re transported to a scene three years later of his dad working on a project in his garage. The transition is jarring, but keep reading, as it all pays off in the end. Keep reading the comic, that is, as it’s not like I’m going to spoil the ending for you, or even much of what leads up to it. From here we see the dad working on a much more complicated project five years later, the death of a crucial family member four years later, and the effect on the family (still) six years later. From here we finally get to the meaning of the title, and here’s where it gets tricky in regards to spoilers. I will point out that the first story segment is listed as 2009, so if you do the math you can see that it stretches out well into the future, meaning that you can expect some fantastical hypotheticals. Which is great! I’m all for thoughtful science fiction, and there isn’t enough of it out there in comics, what with the necessity for lengthy comic series to tell the stories and the uncertainty of having a consistent publishing schedule. What’s most important (arguably) in this comic is what’s left unsaid, as we see these people for very brief snippets over the course of years and have to fill in the blanks ourselves as to what’s happened to them. That conclusion was absolutely haunting, and it left me feeling like the “hero” of the book made the wrong choice, even though you could go at it from a different angle and conclude that that was really the only choice available to him. This Malachi Ward fellow is clearly somebody to keep an eye on, and he’s on my list of people to finance (and/or bribe into giving up his day job and only making comics) if I should ever happen upon a giant pile of money. No price listed, but the first issue of this series (which isn’t really connected to this one in terms of story) was $6, so let’s go with that.

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Update for 1/17/13

Sorry about the odd schedule this week, but at least I’m still putting reviews up. Two news ones today for Dog Walk Dog by various folks  Pat Keck, Tom Van Deusen, Karissa Sakumoto and August Lipp) and The Frantastic Four by Sam Spina.

Spina, Sam – The Frantastic Four

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The Frantastic Four

Do you automatically steer clear of any small press comics that you think might be super hero parodies? You do? Come closer to the screen so I can punch you. OK, maybe it’s not always a terrible rule, but you might as well punch yourself in the face if you skip out on this one. So much comic for $5! Things start off with Frank Frantastic being picked to fly to Neptune to check out some strange life sign readings. Frank has always lived in the shadow of his more successful older brother, who “died” in an explosion years before (Frank never bought the official story). He makes it to Nepture, discovers a substance that appears to be alien in nature, and then discovers the creature who was shitting out this other substance. Frank decides that this creature is too much like him to be turned over the government (even though, brilliantly, the creature never says a word), so he makes a plan to sneak him out of the shuttle and back to his apartment, using the hilariously unlikely means of putting a sheet over the creature’s head and leading him out of the space center. Once back at his apartment Frank introduces this creature to his roommate (a robot made years earlier by Frank’s brother), the creature is confronted by another creature who lived underground (he came to the surface after sensing the “evil” nature of the alien), the alien is given a name (“Celery”), and Frank draws the conclusion that they are now the Frantastic Four and that they should fight crime for a living. The rest of this damned hefty book deals with them trying out a number of different careers (as it turns out that nobody pays you to fight crime in such a fashion, and there really isn’t all that much crime to fight to begin with), showing what happened to the crew a couple of years after the events of the comic, and an epilogue where it shows how their lives ended up years later. This makes the possibility of a second issue of this series unlikely, which is a damned shame, but you basically have an entire series crammed into this one comic anyway. I’m increasingly of the opinion that Sam can do no wrong, and this comic has damned near set that opinion in stone. Buy this comic, laugh a whole bunch of times, feel better about the world for a bit! $5

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Various Artists – Dog Walk Dog

Website for Pat Keck

Website for Karissa Sakumoto

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Dog Walk Dog

Huzzah for dog anthologies! Well, pet anthologies in general, as there aren’t nearly enough cat anthologies in the world for my tastes. This one has a collection of fantastical tales involving dogs of some kind (no mushy autobio stuff here) along with a few photos of dogs. Things start off with a story by Patrick Keck about a humanoid dog walking another dog, having a perfectly lovely afternoon or evening. The humanoid dog reminisces about his dog when he was a kid and how he was sorry about how he was only rarely able to let it into the house, which was odd as the humanoid dog was apparently a human boy as a child, but I shouldn’t get wrapped up in such things. Next up is “Woof” by Tom Van Deusen, which probably unnerved me more than was the intention of the story. It’s about a dog and his animal friends playing in a band and having a BBQ, which all sounds perfectly nice, but the way that all of these creatures’ mouths were all the way open when they talked (along with the casual way that the alligator at the deli counter scarfed down a squirrel customer) was more than a little disturbing. And that’s not even getting into his representation of God at the end of the story, or the way his/her/its mouth was a black void of stars, or the horrible dead eyes. Yes, this is more likely to be my own odd hang-ups than the actual meaning of the story, but that’s all I have to work with here. August Lipp has a short piece next about dogs on their humping schedule (of legs, that is), then Karissa Sakumoto tells the story of a half dog, half man creature and how it is unloved in either world. Another one that’s a little creepy, but it was thoroughly engaging. There’s also a centerfold with a new interpretation of the famous dogs playing poker painting, just in case such a thing would push you over the edge into checking this out, you weirdo you. You have to be a fan of the particular animal for most pet anthologies, but for this one you’d be just fine if you hated dogs, what with all the general insanity going on. No price listed, but maybe $3 at a complete guess?

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Update for 1/15/13

Two new reviews today to make up for the missed day yesterday: Super Lobotomy by Sara Lindo and Startled Maggie by Meghan Hogan.

Lindo, Sara – Super Lobotomy

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Super Lobotomy

Have you ever wondered about the domestic life of a walking, talking brain and the piece of itself that was cut off in a lobotomy? You haven’t? Lucky for you, Sara is on the case. The basic story here (and it will be difficult to do this madness justice) is that the vast majority of the brain has no interest at all in household chores, and instead chooses to focus on daydreaming and loafing. Maybe the portion of its brain that was removed was the part that controlled such things? Eh, I’m thinking way too literally and scientifically here, and I apologize. Anyway, the brain sends away for a “hero cape,” it finally arrives in the mail and the brain proceeds to go into town, looking for various ways to save the day. It’s likely that I wouldn’t want to live there, but this world would be a fantastic place to visit. Sentient waffles, one of the ghosts from Pac-Man (purely guessing here) as a criminal, a pineapple parking enforcer, a piece of toast working as a hot dog vendor (would it be unethical for a piece of toast to sell hot dog buns, as they might be related? Yet another thing that I had never considered before reading this comic), and an ice cream cone and a gumdrop playing together. Why does the gumdrop only have one leg while the ice cream cone has two? It’s probably best left to your imagination. My only minor complaint is that, as a silent comic, there are a couple of moments when I had some difficulty following the action. But it always made itself clear in a panel or two, which is why it’s only a minor complaint. This is a pile of fun, and good luck not chuckling at least a few times. $5 (guessing again, as it’s not listed on her website as being for sale yet, but it totally is)

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Hogan, Meghan – Startled Maggie #1

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Startled Maggie

Well, this book took a turn for the better when I found out that this was actually all about Meghan as a kid and not about the early days of her child (if she has a child, which she may or may not, how should I know?). It deals with the first few years of life of a young girl, her various utterances (it’s tough to call them conversations) and happenings. It seemed almost too cute if it was about Meghan’s mythical child, but learning that it was about Meghan as a kid and that she’s doing this series to document the nature of memory and early life makes it a lot more interesting. This wouldn’t be the case if I had a kid of my own and/or shared the belief of all parents that their children and their children alone are precious little snowflakes, but alas, that isn’t the case. It’s irrelevant, as these are all stories told to Meghan by her parents about her very early days. I’d be curious to see a comparison after this is finished between her own memories and the memories that she depicts here. Are they largely the same? If not, where do they differ, and what does that say about everybody involved? This has the potential to be a downright fascinating series when all is said and done. I have no idea how long she’s going to depict this (it would lose some of the point if she kept it up through her teenage years where, if she was like most other teenagers, her parents lost touch with exactly what she was up to on a daily basis), but I am very curious to see how it all shakes out. $6

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Update for 1/11/13

New review for The Return of the Magic Whistle #12 by Sam Henderson! I can’t think of a better comic to send you off into the weekend (meaning that I probably won’t get any updates done during the weekend, but who knows?).