Ice Cream

Monster

Instructions by Neil Gaiman

I've been listening to Gaiman read The Graveyard Book and was reminded of this piece, which is full of practical advice for the traveler.

Congratulations, Gaiman

Gaiman wins Newbery award for The Graveyard Book.

Read his tale on learning about it on his blog or read his practically minute by minute account of how it's caused him to get dragged around the country on his twitter account or better yet watch Gaiman himself read the book in video from his book tour.

Special on Dr. Manhattan

Dammit. Just when I've steeled myself against any possible frustration by assuming I'll hate the film, evocative material like this has to be released and renew my sense of hope. More pre-bonus material at The New Frontiersman.

The Butter Smuggler

Joe Decie does a strange and hypnotic little webcomic, Here's What I Drew Today, that's not so much autobiography as an outpouring of his brain. If you're intrigued by minimalism and comics that let you peer into someone's mind, it might appeal to you. Either way, the comic to the left, from TopShelf's webpage, made me giggle, cringe, and later I couldn't get the thought of it out of my head.

The Guild

I tend not to be a huge fan of gamer humor, but I do get excited about independently produced, internet distributed projects and The Guild is a pretty nifty series. The acting might be inconsistent, the plot contrived, and the leetspeak crowbarred in, but Codex (writer and star, Felicia Day, also from Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog) and Clara (Robin Thorsen) are phenomenal in their authentic awkwardness.

More on Diamond Policies

Robot 6 rounds up more reactions and predictions about what the new Diamond threshold will do for publishers and direct market retailers.

Comics Reporter gets a few interviews on the subject.

Lying in the Gutters offers a very readable explanation of the difference between the threshold increase now and the one in 2005.

I don't want to weigh in too heavily because I'm entirely an outsider at this point (if only someone who ostensibly contributes to this blog could weigh in with the perspective of a small retailer... if only), but I do want to point out that Diamond isn't acting to crush the dreams of hopeful cartoonists. They're making a business decision. It can be hard and sobering to face the economic realities of art and it's frustrating when you're more interested in the suffering fringe than the relatively robust mainstream, but economy can't support everyone. Perhaps, small press publishers will band together and create a separate distribution service loosing Diamond's virtual monopoly. Perhaps, everyone will flee into the burgeoning graphic novel market or turn their businesses online.

Some will adapt. Some will be causalities. Things will change. That's the reality.

Mr. Tusks Sends Mail

One of three things has happened here:
1. Ryan North (of Dinosaur Comics) received the greatest piece of fan mail ever
2. Ryan North (of Dinosaur Comics) is living an episode of the Twilight Zone in which the things he writes become real and haunt him
3. (and by far the most likely) Ryan North (of Dinosaur Comics) has been receiving missives from a tiny, tinily-troubled elephant and writing true crime nonfiction in the deceptive form of sprite-based dinosaur fiction in an effort to secretly disseminate important information about the impending collapse of Tiny Towne, Tiny Towne Island.

Our prayers are with Mr. Tusks and his towne, Ryan.

Benny Hill

This is far funnier than it any logic dictates it should be: The Benny Hillifier

Insert a youtube clip and it will be sped up and played against Yakety Sax. I'll leave the more inappropriate uses aside and offer this example: Conan the Barbarian

http://james.nerdiphythesoul.com/bennyhillifier

New Diamond Policies

http://pwbeat.publishersweekly.com/blog/2009/01/19/new-diamond-policies-expected-to-have-massive-effect/

Heidi talks with some publishers and has analysis. Small press people predict doom and gloom. This will decidedly shift the direct market landscape.

EDIT: Joe Nozemack makes a few interesting points.

The Middle Future of Comics is Here!

I think Shawn has firmly established what comics will be to come!
I now present a project I am about halfway done with. This is part I of IV. The Roman Numerals make it classy and the last speech balloon is the title of the work.

It's Not the Size of the World You Build, It's How You Use It

Final Crisis 6 came out this week, and it feels as though it's slipping back into the same concerns I had when the series started. There's so much going on, so many storylines each getting a page at a time before they disappear and perhaps reappear for one more page this issue, that it's not pleasurable to read. I applaud Morrison for his ambition, but he's so built up in telling this complex story of interwoven events and their effect on the world that the small stories, the little pieces of life that make a tale worth reading, end up getting lost.

The apocalyptic world-changing events going on in Final Crisis are most interesting to me when they're shown in-depth through the eyes of the characters experiencing them, as in some of the tie-in books DC's put out. Some of which Morrison wrote, including one-shots like “Resist” and “Submit”, others including Geoff Johns' Rogues Revenge and Greg Rucka's Revelations. I'm not saying these books have floored me, but I am saying I enjoyed them more than the central title, which I have to feel is not the goal DC is setting when it puts these books out. Same for Marvel's last two big events, Civil War and Secret Invasion. The tie-ins running in Marvel's regular books always had more time to focus on the issues the event was created to focus on but never had the time to discuss because it's throwing information at you the entire time. It's like reading Final Crisis or Secret Invasion is akin to reading about the history of World War II in a chapter in a high school history textbook, whereas the tie-ins are like watching Band of Brothers or reading Catch-22 (these are generous comparisons not meant to actually compare on quality, merely on scope of story). You need the background in the first to appreciate the second, but there's no way you can actually get a deep, interesting story from the textbook.

This'll be cross-posted over at www.holdreset.com, which will get a real update before the end of the month. I swear.

Your Vagina is Haunted.

Chris Sims reviews what could be the most terrible comic ever written, Tarot #53, but, as he says:

"And yet, it is beautiful in its purity. It is, in two sentences, everything that Tarot: Witch of the Black Rose is about. It’s why I read the book. Because every now and then, it gets so bad, so unrelentingly stupid, that is somehow loops back around to become brilliant for eleven words.

You have to get out of here. Your vagina is haunted.

Amazing."

Thor Watches Over Scotland

Burglar Scared Off By Man in Thor Costume

As Peter Sagal said on Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me: "That must be, in the many thousands of years of human experience, recorded and un, the single most satisfying thing to ever have happened... Sometimes it really is just your day."

3 More Then I'm Done

Here's three more (1, 2, 3). Click on the images to read. All are mediocre, but they were fun to create.

Godot

Sigmund Freud in the Uncanny Realm of the Unconscious!

via Mind Hacks
This is the most beautifully mad comic I've read in quite some time. Sigmund Freud, in the motif of 1950s sci fi with a hefty dose of Kirby at his most bizarre, struggles with the death urge in the zone of repression. Excuse me... "ALONE IN THE ZONE OF REPRESSION, SIGMUND FREUD FIGHTS AN ENEMY HE CANNOT SEE!" It's such a strange concept executed so adeptly that it truly needs to be seen to be believed.

I was essentially unfamiliar with the work of Hans Rickheit until being introduced to this comic. Chrome Fetus Comics contains more of his work and it's as haunting as it is poetic. Truly down-the-rabbit-hole beautiful.

Comiccon Gadget

http://www.mapyourshow.com/shows/mys_v4_01/mys_v4_01.cfm?SHOW_ID=NYCC09

Floor plan and exhibitor search for the New York Comiccon. Hopefully, armed with this, I'll be able to avoid the dreadful fate of so many hapless young fanboys who found themselves trapped for hours in a maze of golden age comic book sellers and overenthusiastic jedi.

Awesomest

I don't know who Jason Forrest is or what this has to do with war photography, but I'm posting this because 1) it's animated, 2) it contains both vikings and giant robots, and 3) Nicole said it reminded her of me.

Someday I may get back to more than just link posting. Don't hold your breath.

I assume she said that because it's so badass.

Stay on target

Doonesbury, 1/13/09

Cerebus: A Diablog

Dave Sim's Cerebus is one of those epic works, like War and Peace or anything by Neal Stephenson, that I really want to have read. I just don't want to read it. I have an appreciation for its role in the history of comics and I'd like to see first hand the spiraling descent into madness that I understand Dave Sim to be. But clocking in at 6,000 pages, the work is daunting when I know I'm not actually going to enjoy much of it.

But I'm motivated to give it a try now as Laura Hudson and Leigh Walton start their weekly issue-by-issue analysis at Cerebus: A Dialog. Even handed and aware, it's a thoroughly interesting read, but lacks any introduction explaining why Cerebus was such a compelling work. Start with the wikipedia entry, pick up the hefty first volume, and read along.

Love

This is me messing around with some photos and Comic Life and seeing what happens. It might be leading towards a new project. It might get taken down in the morning when I decide I hate it. My time will tell.

Comic Life really would be a joy of a program if it didn't make such damn ugly word balloons.

Faces of creators

“I consider Graphic NYC, the upcoming book project that www.NycGraphicNovelists.com is based off of, to be a kind of ‘New Comics Journalism’, combining New Journalism with comics history, and Seth’s lush photography. I’ve been ready to bring a little something new to comics journalism for a while, and this is it.”

For some months now, photographer Seth Kushner and comics journalist Christopher Irving have been crafting portraiture of New York based comics creators. The book looks to be stunning not only for the sweep of its coverage, but for the sheer beauty of the images.

I'll need to track down a copy of the book, but in the mean time, enjoy some of Kushner's photography within.

History! Hot damn!

Continuing tonight's theme of celebrating comics geeks dedicating themselves lovingly to a single niche: Kate Beaton, who at 6:34 pm asked her livejournal audience for suggestions for historical figures to write about and by 11:01 pm had finished 3 comics. Hot damn! I'd never even heard of Isambard Kingdom Brunel or Ada Lovelace. Now I want to go bury my face in history books.

Thanks, Andi.

UPDATE: They's more. I'm linking because I love the Catherine the Great strip, but after this you're on your own.

Comics, Medicine

I'm not the sort to squee, but I can certainly appreciate some high class geekery and damn does Polite Dissent bring it.

I came across the site whilst wikipedia-ing House and delighted in reading reviews of the actual medicine. Then, as I continued clicking, I was thrilled to realize the site was primarily devoted to a critique of the depiction of medicine in comics. This goes way beyond the 10th grader in physics asking, "Where does the hulk's extra mass come from?" It's easy to dismiss this all as overreading fantasy fiction, but when Bendis has a scientist explain the human genome as "It's what makes us... us" then all suspension of disbelief flies out the window.

Of course, special attention is paid to the golden age hero, The Black Terror, super-pharmacist. I'd also recommend the Best and Worst Comic Book Science of 2008 Awards.

xkcd, I salute you

This is a truly noble endeavor. Get this comic into the hands of everyone who understands the value of the metric system enough to want to use it, but isn't a scientist and hasn't worked in a laboratory and thus has never actually gotten beyond thinking "a yard is like a meter."