X-Men Unlimited #50 Koike Kazuo, Koji Kengo, Paul Smith, Brad Anderson Marvel Comics, 2003 Koike Kazuo writing Wolverine is a thought too good to sound too good to be true. You have to believe in it, before you read it. You need to believe that good things can come from good ideas. But it was not…
The Crow Girl: Kindness in an Unexpected Form
The Crow Girl Erik Axl Sund Harvill Secker, 2016 Erik Axl Sund is the author of this book, but he is a composite creature. Jerker Eriksson and Håkan Axlander Sundquist are lifelong friends and collaborators elsewhere–in music, in the art world, etc. To write with a peer can produce popular work (see Good Omens, for…
Animated Wakakozake Is the Best of All
Wakakozake is available in three forms: manga (original), anime, and drama. The best one is the anime.
The Artist: Trying in the Spirit of Failure
The Artist Anna Haifisch BreakdownPress, 2016 Breakdown Press’ hardback release of Anna Haifisch’s The Artist is a print compilation of nineteen strips that appeared on VICE.com between September 2015 and January 2016. Since then, VICE has also digitally published a second season of Artist strips. They are worth having on paper, worth appreciating in ink,…
I Asked A Bunch of Marvel Men About Their Feminist Agendas
And only three answered. After Chelsea Cain was run off from Twitter by the baying of hounds affronted by a word (“feminist”), I decided to ask Cain’s peers, co-workers and higher-ups a question. Joelle Jones’ cover for the final issue of Mockingbird featured heroine Bobbi Morse in a t-shirt that read ASK ME ABOUT MY…
Extreme Ghostbusters: Sex in Kids’ Cartoons is Good, Actually (Sometimes)
Extreme Ghostbusters’ working title was, as it goes, Ghostbusters Dark. Clearly this is hilarious (and #radical), but despite its basic applicability I propose an amendment: I propose that Extreme Ghostbusters might just as well be referred to as Ghostbusters: Dirrrty. Yes, friends, with three Rs. Ghostbusters was never an especially chaste property. There-is-no-Dana-there-is-only-Zuul pretty much…
Chloe Grace Moretz and Girls Who Game (the System)
Launching today, Chloe Grace Moretz is heading a three-part series “in which she aims to challenge the current perception about what a “gamer” is,” according to Mashable’s report. ScreenRant suggests the series is “intended to highlight the involvement of girls in the gaming community,” suggesting perhaps that her series may bring a Hollywood spotlight to…
And Then They Died: Sean Poppe’s Cackling Horror Comics
Disclaimer: This review is based on a review copy provided by the cartoonist. Short horror fiction has perhaps the widest reach of all genres. Campfires, midnight radio, parody advertisements, pulp fiction for eight-year-olds, and anthology television all boast a firm ground in the genre-format. Readers and viewers alike love the twist in the tale that so…
Dear Scott Adams, Rhetoric is Not Reliable Camouflage
Well, Dilbert Man has struck again. He’s a cartoonist, he’s got reach, he’s a silly and unpleasant misogynist. He’s bad. We’d have said something sooner, but as he himself boasts women hardly pay attention to him — your honours, we did not know. Scott Adams is the man behind long-running and (sub-ironically?) mainstreamed cartoon strip Dilbert….
Good Butt Cracks & Bad Butt Cracks: The Nuance in Old City Blues
Cyberpunk police story? Corporate interests versus morality, in a mech-filled, nourished dystopia? Patching in–Old City Blues.
Craft in Cartooning: Five Slices of Octopus Pie
Octopus Pie won Meredith Gran an Ignatz, and maybe you don’t know why yet. Or maybe you’d just like to bask in the quality of this comics? Sailor, either way, I’m here to help ya. I have made a list. It’s five points long and I’m sure you can’t believe what I left off—but that’s great too!…
Why Your School Library Needs QUEER: A Graphic History
QUEER: A Graphic History Julia Scheele & Meg-John Barker Icon Books September 2016 QUEER: A Graphic History is the gender and sexuality textbook every school library should stock–on every shelf. It runs at an unrelenting pace, if you keep turning the pages, but each leaf has enough information and suggestion packed into a short paragraph…