The internet may exhale.
*Finally, some very necessary conclusions around here.
LAST WEEK'S REVIEWS:
--Désastre Hurlant: I Miss It Already--
Part 16 (a huge post of short reviews, covering the expectations surrounding French comics of the Humanoids sort, in the form of Transgenesis 2029, El Niño, Thousand Faces, Deicide, The Fourth Power and The Hollow Grounds)
Part 18 (a brisk concluding exchange of 10,000+ words between Tucker Stone and myself, covering both volumes of the Chaland Anthology and By the Numbers; many pictures)
Love you, goodbye.
*Updates Dept: Since I said I'd get back to it - official details on the return of Elaine Lee's & Michael Wm. Kaluta's Starstruck! The comic!
Apparently, IDW will be releasing a 13-issue(!) series of newly re-colored material starting in August; Lee Moyer is the colorist, and Charles Vess will be inking Kaluta on some Galactic Girl Guide backup materials. Given the extent of the project, it's probably safe to presume this is the Expanding Universe version of the stuff Dark Horse released in b&w back in the early '90s.
I used to have a picture of the cover art here, but it gave photobucket an erection so I had to be punished. Won't the Galactic Girl Guides come to my rescue?!
Oh:
Truthfully, photomaster Johnny Bacardi was on top of this stuff months ago, thanks to his newsgroup perusing, so check out some coloring samples at his place.
*Remember - if your store didn't get The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Century #1 last week (review here), it's coming on Wednesday. This issue is best taken sung aloud.
*Also, if you absolutely cannot get enough of that Alejandro Jodorowsky character -- I've gotten used to seeing him in my dreams every night -- I suspect the new issue of Heavy Metal should be showing up in Direct Market stories soon (the July 2009 edition, girl with weapons on the cover; it's already on newsstands), and it's got the third installment of Jodorowsky's and Milo Manara's Borgia, relating all the fun a good-natured clan can have up at the Vatican. This was supposed to be the final installment, but now it's not.
Hey, what the... that's the Pope and his daughter, not a son and his mother!
Ha ha, good ol' Jodorowsky - still mixin' it up.
THIS WEEK IN COMICS!
From the Ashes #1 (of 6): Being the new faux-autobiography series from the very good Bob Fingerman, following his sepia-toned (and otherwise) exploits with his wife in a post-cataclysm NYC. Looks perfect in the longbox next to Peter Bagge's Apocalypse Nerd, I'll reckon; more alternative cartoonists need to do these. From the very active IDW; $3.99. Big preview here.
Clive Barker's Age of Desire: New from Desperado Publishing, an arms-swinging hymn from grandma's porch on a Sunday afternoon about "the last days of a genetically altered and homicidally ecstatic sexual compulsive." Story by Barker, laid out in panels by P. Craig Russell and drawn by Tim Bradstreet, partially in the early '90s, which was when Eclipse was supposed to publish the thing. Then the company went under and some of the art apparently went missing, but then it got found and Russell wound up drawing a handful of new pages recently to finish it off; samples. It's a 64-page b&w hardcover, $14.99.
Codeflesh Definitive Edition: Another Man of Action release from Image, this time compiling Joe Casey's & Charlie Adlard's tale of a superhuman bail bondsman -- originally presented in the 2001 Image anthology Double Image -- into a deluxe, $34.99 hardcover. AiT/Planet Lar released a b&w softcover collection of this stuff years ago, but this edition restores (or in some cases approximates) the original color, and adds an all-new story. Sample chapter here. I do believe Casey also has a story in Ardden Entertainment's Flash Gordon 75th Anniversary Special this week - it's a $14.95 hardcover featuring stories from a whole bunch of people. In case you wanted to see Flash Gordon from the writer of Gødland.
The Complete Chester Gould's Dick Tracy Vol. 7: 1941-42: Vol. 7 isn't bad at all. And I think we're nearing the prime period stuff too. Another 344 pages, another $39.99. Publisher IDW (them again) also has Harold Gray's Little Orphan Annie Vol. 3: And a Blind Man Shall Lead Them, packing in 288 pages of stuff from April 1930 through the end of 1931, for the same price.
Secret Wars II Omnibus: But you wanna know how I'm sure we're deep into the intestines of the Golden Age of Reprints (which is an organic entity)? Simple: 1184 pages of Secret Wars II for $99.99. You might as well buckle up for The Compleat Evolutionary War Hardcover Treasury (with Alf tie-in variant cover), since I'm sure that'll be along soon enough. Hey, there's an X-Men 2099 trade out this week too! Only $29.99 for nine big issues, but I'd hold out for Ghost Rider if I was you; Ashley Wood drew a few of those.
Thor: Tales of Asgard by Stan Lee & Jack Kirby #1 (of 6): So just in case you thought some of the stuff Tucker and I were going on about in that thing we just finished wasn't relevant to our comics world today, look what Marvel's got for $3.99 - a whole miniseries dedicated to applying modern coloring to vintage Lee/Kirby tales, and it's about what you'd expect. I've seen plenty worse, sure - The Incal, for one. This stuff looks like a mildly subtler version of the kind of colorization you'd see in the '80s, the really rich stuff that'd sort of stick to the lines and give it a painterly tone, if you squint. I see the point, but not the appeal... but yeah, this is happening.
Howling Commandos #1: Despite its branding as a 40-page one-off Sgt. Fury comic (previously titled Shotgun Opera, which might still be a subtitle), this $3.99 Marvel deal actually seems to be some sort of lead-in to the upcoming Jeph Loeb/Tim Sale Captain America: White series, although I'm sure it'll sort of stand alone, at least. The draw is artist John Paul Leon, working from a script by television writer/executive producer Jesse Alexander. Interview with the writer and uncolored art samples here.
Elephantmen #19: This is the second of three issues (all standalone stories) to be drawn by artist Marian Churchland, whose work I hadn't seen before; I like her marker coloring, and there's little touches to her forms (particularly her animals) that suggest something interestingly liquid centered in her manga-informed character art. For example. Worth keeping an eye on. Also: Elephantmen is up to issue #19. Not a common creature's feat these days...
Jack Staff #20: Paul Grist, as always.
Rawbone #2 (of 4): Sleaze on the high seas, from Jamie Delano and Max Fiumara.
B.P.R.D.: The Black Goddess #5 (of 5): Polishing off this particular miniseries, which is really only the second part of a trilogy that's supposed to wrap up a bunch of the larger series' lingering plotlines, although part three isn't coming next. First there's another War on Frogs special (with art by Karl Moline), then the second of occasional co-writer Joshua Dysart's 194x period miniseries (1947, with art by Fábio Moon & Gabriel Bá), then I think another (fourth, final) War on Frogs, and only then the rest of this thing, around Christmas or early 2010, if I'm not mistaken. Preview.
The Umbrella Academy: Dallas #6 (of 6): But why wait for the summer when you can have your Gabriel Bá on Wednesday? How is this series anyway? I've been waiting for it to finish before I jump in, and I haven't picked up a lot of discussion at all, particularly compared to the first one, which obviously could just be the novelty wearing off. Holding steady?
LAST WEEK'S REVIEWS:
--Désastre Hurlant: I Miss It Already--
Part 16 (a huge post of short reviews, covering the expectations surrounding French comics of the Humanoids sort, in the form of Transgenesis 2029, El Niño, Thousand Faces, Deicide, The Fourth Power and The Hollow Grounds)
Part 18 (a brisk concluding exchange of 10,000+ words between Tucker Stone and myself, covering both volumes of the Chaland Anthology and By the Numbers; many pictures)
Love you, goodbye.
*Updates Dept: Since I said I'd get back to it - official details on the return of Elaine Lee's & Michael Wm. Kaluta's Starstruck! The comic!
Apparently, IDW will be releasing a 13-issue(!) series of newly re-colored material starting in August; Lee Moyer is the colorist, and Charles Vess will be inking Kaluta on some Galactic Girl Guide backup materials. Given the extent of the project, it's probably safe to presume this is the Expanding Universe version of the stuff Dark Horse released in b&w back in the early '90s.
I used to have a picture of the cover art here, but it gave photobucket an erection so I had to be punished. Won't the Galactic Girl Guides come to my rescue?!
Oh:
Truthfully, photomaster Johnny Bacardi was on top of this stuff months ago, thanks to his newsgroup perusing, so check out some coloring samples at his place.
*Remember - if your store didn't get The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Century #1 last week (review here), it's coming on Wednesday. This issue is best taken sung aloud.
*Also, if you absolutely cannot get enough of that Alejandro Jodorowsky character -- I've gotten used to seeing him in my dreams every night -- I suspect the new issue of Heavy Metal should be showing up in Direct Market stories soon (the July 2009 edition, girl with weapons on the cover; it's already on newsstands), and it's got the third installment of Jodorowsky's and Milo Manara's Borgia, relating all the fun a good-natured clan can have up at the Vatican. This was supposed to be the final installment, but now it's not.
Hey, what the... that's the Pope and his daughter, not a son and his mother!
Ha ha, good ol' Jodorowsky - still mixin' it up.
THIS WEEK IN COMICS!
From the Ashes #1 (of 6): Being the new faux-autobiography series from the very good Bob Fingerman, following his sepia-toned (and otherwise) exploits with his wife in a post-cataclysm NYC. Looks perfect in the longbox next to Peter Bagge's Apocalypse Nerd, I'll reckon; more alternative cartoonists need to do these. From the very active IDW; $3.99. Big preview here.
Clive Barker's Age of Desire: New from Desperado Publishing, an arms-swinging hymn from grandma's porch on a Sunday afternoon about "the last days of a genetically altered and homicidally ecstatic sexual compulsive." Story by Barker, laid out in panels by P. Craig Russell and drawn by Tim Bradstreet, partially in the early '90s, which was when Eclipse was supposed to publish the thing. Then the company went under and some of the art apparently went missing, but then it got found and Russell wound up drawing a handful of new pages recently to finish it off; samples. It's a 64-page b&w hardcover, $14.99.
Codeflesh Definitive Edition: Another Man of Action release from Image, this time compiling Joe Casey's & Charlie Adlard's tale of a superhuman bail bondsman -- originally presented in the 2001 Image anthology Double Image -- into a deluxe, $34.99 hardcover. AiT/Planet Lar released a b&w softcover collection of this stuff years ago, but this edition restores (or in some cases approximates) the original color, and adds an all-new story. Sample chapter here. I do believe Casey also has a story in Ardden Entertainment's Flash Gordon 75th Anniversary Special this week - it's a $14.95 hardcover featuring stories from a whole bunch of people. In case you wanted to see Flash Gordon from the writer of Gødland.
The Complete Chester Gould's Dick Tracy Vol. 7: 1941-42: Vol. 7 isn't bad at all. And I think we're nearing the prime period stuff too. Another 344 pages, another $39.99. Publisher IDW (them again) also has Harold Gray's Little Orphan Annie Vol. 3: And a Blind Man Shall Lead Them, packing in 288 pages of stuff from April 1930 through the end of 1931, for the same price.
Secret Wars II Omnibus: But you wanna know how I'm sure we're deep into the intestines of the Golden Age of Reprints (which is an organic entity)? Simple: 1184 pages of Secret Wars II for $99.99. You might as well buckle up for The Compleat Evolutionary War Hardcover Treasury (with Alf tie-in variant cover), since I'm sure that'll be along soon enough. Hey, there's an X-Men 2099 trade out this week too! Only $29.99 for nine big issues, but I'd hold out for Ghost Rider if I was you; Ashley Wood drew a few of those.
Thor: Tales of Asgard by Stan Lee & Jack Kirby #1 (of 6): So just in case you thought some of the stuff Tucker and I were going on about in that thing we just finished wasn't relevant to our comics world today, look what Marvel's got for $3.99 - a whole miniseries dedicated to applying modern coloring to vintage Lee/Kirby tales, and it's about what you'd expect. I've seen plenty worse, sure - The Incal, for one. This stuff looks like a mildly subtler version of the kind of colorization you'd see in the '80s, the really rich stuff that'd sort of stick to the lines and give it a painterly tone, if you squint. I see the point, but not the appeal... but yeah, this is happening.
Howling Commandos #1: Despite its branding as a 40-page one-off Sgt. Fury comic (previously titled Shotgun Opera, which might still be a subtitle), this $3.99 Marvel deal actually seems to be some sort of lead-in to the upcoming Jeph Loeb/Tim Sale Captain America: White series, although I'm sure it'll sort of stand alone, at least. The draw is artist John Paul Leon, working from a script by television writer/executive producer Jesse Alexander. Interview with the writer and uncolored art samples here.
Elephantmen #19: This is the second of three issues (all standalone stories) to be drawn by artist Marian Churchland, whose work I hadn't seen before; I like her marker coloring, and there's little touches to her forms (particularly her animals) that suggest something interestingly liquid centered in her manga-informed character art. For example. Worth keeping an eye on. Also: Elephantmen is up to issue #19. Not a common creature's feat these days...
Jack Staff #20: Paul Grist, as always.
Rawbone #2 (of 4): Sleaze on the high seas, from Jamie Delano and Max Fiumara.
B.P.R.D.: The Black Goddess #5 (of 5): Polishing off this particular miniseries, which is really only the second part of a trilogy that's supposed to wrap up a bunch of the larger series' lingering plotlines, although part three isn't coming next. First there's another War on Frogs special (with art by Karl Moline), then the second of occasional co-writer Joshua Dysart's 194x period miniseries (1947, with art by Fábio Moon & Gabriel Bá), then I think another (fourth, final) War on Frogs, and only then the rest of this thing, around Christmas or early 2010, if I'm not mistaken. Preview.
The Umbrella Academy: Dallas #6 (of 6): But why wait for the summer when you can have your Gabriel Bá on Wednesday? How is this series anyway? I've been waiting for it to finish before I jump in, and I haven't picked up a lot of discussion at all, particularly compared to the first one, which obviously could just be the novelty wearing off. Holding steady?
Labels: this week in comics
posted by Jog at 11:00 PM
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