Sunday, November 1, 2009

Sunday, October 25, 2009

The Invention of Hugo Cabret

I recently had the pleasure of reading "The Invention of Hugo Cabret" by Brian Selznick (copyright 2007). This book wraps itself around several forms of media and self-identifies as "not exactly a novel, and it’s not quite a picture book, and it’s not really a graphic novel, or a flip book, or a movie, but a combination of all these things."

I would also say that this book falls into several genres: historical fiction, mystery, and young adult novel. The upside of all this mish-mash is an excellent way to spend an hour or two, immersed in hand-drawn illustrations and compelled by several competing intrigues found in the plot.

If I was to offer any criticism, I would say that the writing is strong but not especially noteworthy and that the physical layout of text on the page often left me feeling empty. Often, an entire page of the book contained no more than a sentence or two. If the text was laid out in a particularly artistic fashion, I wouldn't mind, but instead, I often found myself wondering why the physical book wasn't condensed into something smaller than a tome.

Even so, if you have the chance, this is a fun read.

Thursday, October 22, 2009

Asterix & Obelix Turn 50

The comic Asterix & Obelix turns 50 years old on October 29, 2009.

However, recent reviews of the comic are mixed. The original writer, René Goscinny, died in 1977. Since then, many critics say the writing quality dropped like the strength of Asterix when he runs out of magic potion.

This criticism is heaped on Uderzo, the original artist, who also took over scripting after the death of his colleague. Now in his 80s, Uderzo is also hanging up his spurs, and passing his work to three (as of yet unannounced) younger artists.

While the quality of the comic may be in question, it is still a financial success. The last collection sold millions of copies.

You can read more from the BBC here.

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

The End of Archie, Betty, and Veronica?

Archie, the red-headed step child of newspaper comics, is finally moving beyond his high school antics. For those of you who missed it, Archie married Veronica back in August 2009 (issue #600). Whether or not we liked this choice, we can agree that the gag-a-day newspaper strip finally embraced a storyline with permanent consequences.

But wait, what's this? In Archie #603, available next month (November), Archie will also be marrying Betty. No, he's not a polygamist. Archie is getting a chance at an "It's A Wonderful Life" storyline where he sees the eventualities created from both choices.

So maybe Archie isn't really changing yet. Interestingly enough, the NY Times reports that Jughead is the third most popular choice for Archie's permanent beau. We'll know that Archie is becoming a truly modern comic when this happens. Until then, I'm guessing we'll read the same old story for a long time to come.

Monday, August 31, 2009

Humans, get a freaking grip on yourselves

@warrenellis so I got this phone call from Joe Quesada and it was just the sound of him rubbing himself with money and now I am confused

@the_murphy #disneybuysmarvel #humansfearchange

Nick Main There are companies that Disney doesn't own?
If aren't a comic fanling and weren't sitting next to one at breakfast this morning, you might have missed the announcement that Disney will be purchasing Marvel comics. And count yourself blessed because the fanlings are throwing their shit in the air and fantasizing how Mickey Mouse will come into their homes, pry open their long boxes, and castrate Wolverine with pink, princess ribbons.

Humans! This is a corporate transaction. If, in a few months, there are editorial directives from on high, they'll be policy changes- no one is going to be replace Ghost Rider with Goofy. Besides, Marvel doesn't need any help in undermining their characters by putting them into terrible, cartoony, out-of-place contexts.


If you're a glutton for punishment or camp, click on The Hulk. It's a cheery CD of children's songs about a character who loses control of his emotions and kills.

EDIT: Oh, but if you'd like some serious commentary on what this could mean for both companies, obviously, you should head over to The Beat.

Monday, August 17, 2009

Ravi Comics.com

Hi, all.
Sorry I haven't been posting for some time now. Here's the reason why:
ravicomics.com

Enjoy!

EDIT by Shawn: If you've never read any of Ravi's comics before, here's my warning / sales pitch: Ravi has the sense of humor of a blasphemous 5-year old. His comics will dig into your gut, crawl their way up to your brain and root around until they find the part of you that is also a blasphemous 5-year old. They'll then tickle that 5-year old until he cries, but your brain will be pulped in the process.

Thursday, August 13, 2009

Collected Links

(via @CBCebulski) The Submission Guidelines for every Comic and Manga Publisher in the Universe

(via Warren Ellis) A Gross of Goblins

(via Comics Alliance) The 5 Circles of Baffling Web Comic Hell



(via @mollycrabapple) Conversation about She-Hulk and the upcoming series Strange Tales

(via @ryanqnorth) Interview with Ryan North by cbr

I'd also like to point you to Chris's review column at Comics Alliance, which you should be reading already. Also, my own short fiction can now be found at shawnmain.net. You know, in case you were wondering.

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Direct Market Continues to be Schroedinger's Cat of the Comics Industry

Comics Alliance's lead blogger, Laura Hudson, just put up a great essay on the continuing demise of the direct market. Go give it a read now if you've yet to see it.

I wish I had the historical background (or the time to look up the relevant info) to compare this to the previous publishing extinctions like the end of the pulp novel era or the, for all practical purposes, death of short story magazines, because I've got a hunch there are going to be a lot of parallels between those and what we're going to witness in comics over the next decade or so. Just like we still see short fiction magazines today, we'll still have periodical-length comic books with us for a while, but they're going to become an ever-dwindling portion of the market, a curiosity read by only the most devoted and nostalgic fans.

Recent circumstances for me have led to me switching from someone who usually waited for trades to someone who now, for the first time on any kind of regular basis, is making a weekly stop to the comic store to pick up the week's new releases. And, to be perfectly honest, as a reader I found my previous approach much more satisfying. So I'm not exactly going to be shedding tears if the trade paperback becomes the standard method of release for new comics material.

But the point raised in the piece that's really got me thinking is what this is going to mean for comics publishers trying out new talent. To jump back to a comparison, it used to be that writers trying to establish themselves would start out getting short stories published and then work their way up, but with the increasingly diminished role of short stories today that's often no longer the case. Without weekly comics as a proving ground for new artists and writers, are companies going to be willing to take a chance on publishing a new graphic novel, perhaps equivalent to 4-6 issues in length, from otherwise unknown creators? Is the web and competitions like Zuda going to become the new proving ground? Or are risk-averse publishers going to hold on tight to established creative talent whose names sell books and lean more heavily on them for material?

Also, I'm going to encourage anyone reading this to jump in with comments on Comics Alliance as you see fit. To keep up to date with the site's articles, you can follow either the Twitter feed and/or the Facebook group.

Sunday, July 26, 2009

God Comics

A few months back, I mentioned my excitement -- nay, my child-like glee -- at the web toy, Infinite Monkey Comics. Now shortened to simply Infinite Comic, all you do is type in a word and the algorithm grabs a relevant flickr image and twitter post to generate you a personal comic. I played with this for longer than anyone rightly should and I discovered the secret words that yield the best comics. The key is to choose a word that's charged - a lot of people might have tweets with the word "groceries" but "i need to go buy groceries now" isn't fodder for great comics. Profanity works decently well, so do emoting verbs and intensifiers. But the real secret to getting the best out of the site is to choose words that also require context. "Hate" might give you some interesting tweets, but images tagged with "hate" are going to be fairly homogenous. So which words did I have the most luck with: bleed, fucking, but most especially: god.

Well, now I have a confession to make. I have a bookmark on my toolbar specifically set for Infinite Comic to make me a "god" comic and I've been clicking it one to twenty times a day. Thrilling. Sometimes it fails, but sometimes you get to peer right through people's secrets into something transcendental. And sometimes it's merely hilarious.

Below is a collection of my favorites. I'll note again that I didn't create these. I just typed the word "god" (and occasionally "omg" or "goddess) into the generator. I'm the curator of this exhibit.













http://www.infinitecomic.com

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Thursday, July 9, 2009

Dollars and Cents.


Yesterday saw the release of the first issue of Wednesday Comics by DC. And like most of the second-place company's decisions lately, it is both exciting and dissapointing.

Positive: The content is great. DC assembled top-shelf artists to create a stunningly beautiful collection of "Sunday comics" on a weekly basis. The "one page at a time" format creates an interesting storytelling challenge, that each writer seems to rise to in this first issue. It's successful since I want to see where all of these stories are going.

Massive Negative: $3.99 is a terrible price point for this title. Absolutely terrible. As beautiful as the results are, the book is published on oversized newsprint and only 16 pages long. Ideally, this book should boast a $1.99-$2.50 cover price. In the current marketplace this is essentially an experimental title. And If DC wanted to draw new readers in they shot themselves in the foot by pricing it like a big event title (next weeks 48 page Blackest Night #1 is $3.99). Despite the rave reviews of the content, the cost will hurt the in-store sales of this book. And many readers will miss out on one of the more interesting mainstream comic projects of the year.

Thursday, June 25, 2009

Two Links

After seeing it mentioned on The Beat, I wanted to spend the afternoon watching The Maxx, the animated adaptation of Sam Kieth's bizarre and magnificent hallucinatory, superhero comic from the 90s. But mtv.com inserts a commercial between every scene and it was driving me mad. Someday when I have more patience I'll sit down and enjoy.

Instead, I got sucked into The Comics Curmudgeon. The commentary is pretty amusing, but I think a large part of the appeal is seeing other people get as angry at Archie and Beetle Bailey as I do.

Bright Starts.

Less than a year ago, Murphy commented on a missed opportunity by DC. The success of The Dark Knight film drove new customers into comics stores, looking for new Batman comics. What they unfortunately found was the middle of "Batman: RIP": a densely written, surreal breakdown of the Batman character. I agreed with Chris that despite personally enjoying the arc, it was the furthest thing from a comfortable starting point for new readers. It drew too much from Grant Morrison's previous year of Batman comics and well, basically was a little too Grant Morrison. And on top of that, I never felt Tony Daniel was the right artist for the storyline. In any case, it seemed like a missed opportunity to draw in new readers.

It turns out they missed the mark by a bit under a year, in the form of two of my favorite new releases.

Go buy Detective Comics #854.
Go buy Batman and Robin #1.

The former features Batwoman, a relatively new character getting her long-awaited starring role written by Greg Rucka. The first issue introduces the character, has a Batman cameo to ground it, and sets up her first case. It's engrossing and beautifully illustrated by J.H. Williams III. It's everything an introduction to a comic story should be.

The latter features the new Batman and Robin. It asks for more backstory but that depends on how much the new reader wants to know. The basics are easy. Bruce is gone. Dick Grayson has ascended to the cowl. Bruce's l'enfant terrible Damian is the new Robin. How things got to this point is sort of complicated (and isn't that what Wikipedia and trades are for?) But once you accept the starting point, it's a good one. And it doesn't hurt that it has great (slightly unconventional) artwork, courtesy of Frank Quitely.

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Fresh Ink


Chris is a talented writer, but a poor self promoter. Go check out his weekly Fresh Ink column on Comics Alliance.

Thursday, May 21, 2009

Two links

I've been wasting my afternoon, delighting at TV Tropes and Stupid Comics. The former contains articles like You Fail Biology Forever, Everything's Better With Dinosaurs, and A Wizard Did It. The later collects fantastic and bizarre images, particularly from golden and silver age covers.

EDIT: Also, TV Tropes just led me to this chart, in which you can see both a Robot Lincoln and an Astronaut Vampire. The internet ate my afternoon.

Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Two links

(via Laura Hudson, Comics Alliance)
#hawkeyesopoor Twitter meme Hawkeye jokes

(via Kate Beaton)
Hey Oscar Wilde! Artist depictions of literary figures

Thursday, May 14, 2009

MoCCAfest 2009!

MoCCA art festival 2009, June 6-7. Chris and I will have a table (and hopefully I'll have more than just high fives to offer people). If you've never been, it's pretty awesome- lots of small press and minuscule press and minicomics and webcomics and people who get excited by all these things. Accumulating changes have made the museum less inviting this past year, but it remains an institution worthy of support and this is their big annual event, attracting all sorts of guests and exhibitors. There's no master list yet, but exhibitors include: Kate Beaton, Joey Comeau, and Bill Roundy (let me know more names).

http://www.moccany.org/artfest09-main.html

Making A Softer World

Open Book Toronto made a short documentary about A Softer World, following Joey Comeau and Emily Horne (and Ryan North) as they put together a strip.

Friday, April 24, 2009

Darwyn Cooke preview pages

(via The Beat)

I'm not nearly as familiar as I should be with Darwyn Cooke or Richard Stark novels he's adapting, but there's 21 pages of preview up at IDW and daaaamn, this shit is gorgeous.

http://www.idwpublishing.com/previews/parker/

Thursday, April 23, 2009

Act-i-vate Exhibition

"The Evolution of the Concept of the Superhuman"

Earlier today, Jess Nevins (comics annotator extraordinaire) launched into a history lesson on his twitter account, tracing the history of the superhuman. Fantastic.

http://twitter.com/jessnevins

Infinite Canvas Tour

I just came across youtube videos, which attempted to capture my favorite part of NEWW, the Infinite Canvas Room. It's highly imperfect and was taken in the middle of the weekend rather than the end, but nevertheless fun to watch.


Monday, April 13, 2009

New Site Design


After a lot of wrangling and teaching myself dreamweaver, our fairy detective webcomic has a site design.

Comics after newspapers

Ryan North makes a couple hopeful predictions about usage of the word "comics" in a post newspaper world.

http://qwantz.livejournal.com/107040.html

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

2009 Eisner Nominations

The 2009 Eisner award nominees have just been announced. I wish I could comment on the list, but am embarrassed by how few of the entries I've actually read.

It's interesting to notice that three nominees:
Wondermark: Beards of Our Forefathers, by David Malki (Dark Horse) (Best Humor Publication),
MySpace Dark Horse Presents, edited by Scott Allie and Sierra Hahn (Dark Horse) (Best Anthology)
Fishtown, by Kevin Colden (IDW) (Best Reality-Based Work)
were originally webcomics, but receive nominations only as printed material. Either the judges found a dramatically different experience reading Wondermark online from reading it in print or the digital comics category is so robust that nominees from other categories can't compete in it (that's how I'll choose to interpret). Last year, a Myspace Dark Horse Presents work won digital comics, while Haspiel's Immortal was nominated as a webcomic, but not as print comics this year (although I was heartbroken at the lack of color in the floppies).

And because I can link to them (and will sit down now to read), here's the best digital comics nominees:
Bodyworld, by Dash Shaw, www.dashshaw.com
Finder, by Carla Speed McNeil, www.shadowlinecomics.com/webcomics/#/finder/
The Lady’s Murder, by Eliza Frye, http://theladysmurder.elizafrye.com
Speak No Evil: Melancholy of a Space Mexican, by Elan Trinidad, www.theoryofeverythingcomics.com/SNE/
Vs., by Alexis Sottile & Joe Infurnari, www.smithmag.net/nextdoorneighbor/2008/12/08/story-18/


http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=20716

Sunday, April 5, 2009

Confessions of a Superhero



Confessions of a Superhero is a 2007 documentary, depicting the desperation on Hollywood Boulevard. It goes deep into the troubled lives of four costumed performers.

Friday, April 3, 2009

Happy Belated Birthday to Shawn

Last year, I hoped to surprise Shawn by creating a comic based on a short-story he wrote long ago. However, I did not have the ability to create what I pictured. Now that my digital art skills have reached the pupae stage, I decided to give it a shot. Yes, the text is crammed. and you'll have to zoom in to read it. Yes, my drawings still look like a demented six-year old's. Still, I feel proud in saying, "Happy Birthday Shawn."







Thursday, March 26, 2009

Titans of Small Town

Unfortunately, I'll be out of town, but on April 11th Ryan North (Dinosaur Comics), Chris Hastings (Dr. McNinja), and Chris Onstad (Achewood) will be in Brooklyn for "a kickass one-night webcomics gallery." $20

http://roflcon.org/2009/03/25/dinosaur-comics-dr-mcninja-achewood-titans-of-small-town/

My New Favorite Toy!

Infinite Monkey Comics might just be the pinnacle of human achievement. All you do is pick a keyword or two and from the seething, primordial chaos of twitter and flickr, the randomizer makes you a comic (in the vein of ASW). Go on, try it. I expect to be old and gray by the time it ceases to astonish and delight me.

A few of mine: God, orgasm, succeed, lies, truth, fury, fuck, Shawn Main

Wednesday, March 25, 2009

NEWW Photos


Having failed to collect my thoughts about the thoroughly thrilling Webcomics Weekend, I'll instead link to other people's photos from it.

Specifically, check out Jayson Eliot's collection from the infinite canvas room or these images (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6). Highlight of the weekend. Wish I'd brought a camera to capture the whole room.



http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=neww&m=tags&z=t&page=1

http://www.flickr.com/photos/62711467@N00/sets/72157615771933244/

Wednesday Comics

“The concept is that we are trying to recapture the spirit, format, and sense of enjoyment that people had form reading the Sunday comics that arrive in newspapers every week.” - Dan DiDio, newsarama

This summer, DC will put out 12 weekly enormous broadsheet comics that need to be unfolded like a newspaper to be read. 16 pages each telling the story a different character (some popular, some obscure), each written by a different writer (the names of top talent are being bandied about). It's an interesting experiment in form from a company that's been lagging behind on innovation of late.

"So, let me get this straight: Good creators, making stand-alone stories about good characters in a format that'll allow for experimentation in the form that hasn't been seen since the days of Little Nemo In Slumberland? DC may just have made a significant grab for the comic win of the year." -Graeme McMillan, io9

Muppets Comic

http://comicbookresources.com/?page=preview&id=2275&disp=table

Boom! Studios releases a Muppet Show comic today, created by Roger Langridge. CBR has an 11 page preview. More information about the mini-series can be found here.

This was obviously created with a lot of love, but I always have mixed feelings about re-hashes that read more like tributes and don't bring anything new to the table. I'm worried this suffers from "in the box" thinking. If I were Boom! Studios, I would've gathered every artist with an interest in the property and had them each do a short piece to create a massive anthology style work. 4 issues of 22 Langridge pages feels like something that exists only for the fanboy and fangirl completists.

Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Why I like webcomics, a NEWW recap

I don't write much, it's not my greatest skill. I feel that is a necessary precursor to my attempt to convey an important idea through the written word. Maybe I'll audio record my ideas and attach that at the end.

I just got back from New England Webcomics Weekend. I really like webcomics. A lot. I read 63 different comics online. Ugly Hill ended, bringing that number temporarily down until I added FreakAngels. I will certainly be going through the promotional materials from NEWW and adding a few more to that number. While at NEWW, I had some great conversations with creators, conversations that led me to realize why webcomics are so important to me. Here's my thoughts from two, each with their own insight.

First, in talking with Brad Guigar about the spiraling death of the newspaper industry, I wondered if any other creative art has used the internet to such success as webcomics. iTunes works, yes, but creators didn't come up with that, and there is still a corporate barrier to entry for any new musician. Webcomics creators and the community have been having the conversation about how to make money off of this for over a decade now. There are so many webcomics creators, and between them, they have tried every method of money making that I've heard conceived. So, if any industry is going to give up the analog ghost and join the digital world, they would do very well to look at what various webcomics have done. The Webcomics Weekly crew have talked about this, I'm not coming up with anything new in this insight. It hit me pretty hard though, now having all these creators in the same room, that when talking about what someone has done, you could find them, ask them, and have them tell you that micropayments didn't work for them or that working with a syndicate was a dead end or whatever their experience was. NEWW was infinitely valuable for this, and I hope we do it again.

My second insight, and the one that is more about my personal values, is a specific relationship I see between webcomics and capitalism. Many many people before me have talked about the relationship between art and capitalism, and the full history of art for money. In talking with Chris Yates, I realized that I like that webcomics are free. Not just because everybody likes free stuff, but because the focus and creation of the comic is mostly separate from the question of how to make money off of it. To restate: as far as I can tell, the question of how to make money from webcomics comes AFTER and is secondary to the question of how to make a good comic, how to make good art. I like this. I wish that all art was mostly like that, that creators were able to focus on making something beautiful or funny or touching or sad or whatever first, and then figure out how to survive doing it in a capitalist economy. There are many artists of all mediums doing this, but in webcomics, it appears to me to be the norm. I think that's why I want to be part of the webcomics community, and I hope that doesn't change.

Audio recording:
http://tr.im/ccnewwmp3

Thursday, March 19, 2009

Google #1

At work today, I Googled "considering comics." Nowadays, our blog is coming up as item #1 under this search. This is new. This is exciting. I'm going to go eat a crayon to celebrate.
-Ravi-

Monday, March 16, 2009

Laughing out loud - contemplative sigh edition

Sometimes the goal of a comic isn't to make you laugh, these strips today didn't, but I liked them and wanted to share:

XKCD - Alternative Energy Revolution
Subnormality - Shoveling
BoaSaS - Call it what you will

Thursday, March 5, 2009

Saturday Morning Watchmen

I realize this is parody, but it breaks my heart by becoming the thing it seeks to mock.

Wednesday, March 4, 2009

PDF as gateway

http://wilwheaton.typepad.com/wwdnbackup/2009/02/in-which-an-electronic-version-of-sunken-treasure-goes-on-sale.html

I won't belabor a retelling of the story you can simply read, but here's the short version: Wil Wheaton releases a novel through Lulu print on demand. Decides to also release a $5 pdf of book. Pdf sales quickly match physical sales. Then physical book sales increase as well.

Lock grandpa in the attic, giving it away free (or cheap) online is an entirely viable business strategy.

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Comic Journaling


Every once in a while, I make a comic image to journal a special moment my life. Often, I create these memoirs during my graduate classes, and I hear my classmates snickering over my shoulder. Not surprisingly, I seem to be regarded by my colleagues. I just wish I knew in what way I was regarded.

Thursday, February 26, 2009

Who Wants to Watch the Watchmen?

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/watchmen/

Early reviews
of Watchmen are mixed, to say the least. I've been avoiding paying too close attention because I don't want my palate spoiled, but yet I still feel like I've been battered back and forth between high and low expectations. I've settled now, at the eleventh hour, to a calm expectation and hope. I expect to ignore the soul of the book. I'm not hoping for it to be good. What I hope is that it will do well enough and be intriguing enough to lead a million non-comic book readers into stores to pick up the original.

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

I'm going to shank Jim Davis


http://www.gocomics.com/lifeaccordingtogarfield

Just when Garfield Minus Garfield (Feb 23 was not about me, Chris!) had me wondering if there really was something to Jim Davis, he has to go and turn crap into schmaltz.

I want to see this fail epically. I want Garfield to be the cited reason for newspapers failing. I want websites to crash because they've linked to Garfield. I want the world to discover Garfield at Large books harbored a dormant flesh-eating bacteria and have the apocalypse squarely sit on Davis's shoulders, so that our huddled, paranoid, Mad Max shanty towns of the year 2013 become known as Davisvilles.

You're destroying the known world, Jim Davis. The robots are coming for you.

Sunday, February 22, 2009

Bit of modern comics history


Colleen Doran tells the story of meeting Neil Gaiman back in 1989 and being offered the chance to illustrate Sandman.

Not much to the tale, but it's hard not to coo at their work and I always find it comforting to be reminded that such a staggering work as Sandman was really just built on the backs of casual meetings between peers.

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

I continue to heart Dinosaur Comics

http://www.qwantz.com/archive/001411.html

DC actually capitalizing on anticipated movie success?!?!


http://robot6.comicbookresources.com/2009/02/dcs-after-watchmen-whats-next-promotion/#more-4163

Chris and I have often questioned the editorial decisions going on at DC, even when we've enjoyed their results. However, this one seems like something everyone can appreciate. Counting on Watchmen to bring an influx of comics outsiders in to stores, DC is putting out $1 special editions of other, more literary genre pieces: Swamp Thing #21, Planetary #1, Transmet #1, Preacher #1, and... uh... Identity Crisis #1. Everyone raises their eyebrow at that last one as not quite sitting on par with the others, but DC is welcoming non-readers with very open arms for a change and this is highly commendable.