Changing the Tune: Better Comics than DC Rebirth you can Buy for the Same Price!

The conversation surrounding DC Rebirth is irritating me to no end. This comic appears to address the failings of the DC Comics of the past decades by actively refusing to do any sort of introspection. It fixes problems by creating more and misunderstanding the core appeal of their own comics. It's done by the same people who did the wrecking in the first place. It seems wrong-headed, mean-spirited and just unwelcoming. I see it in the same way I see the Star Wars Prequels. Maybe Shazam will have midichlorians now, Alfred is Jar Jar...

I also saw this particularly grating comment by Tom Spurgeon on the Comics Reporter to the effect that a comic book store employee recommended he buy the comic because it was cheap: “Should you buy it? I guess. It's like 80 pages for three bucks. You might as well”. That just seems wrong to me, I understand that comic book shop benefits from selling this comic and getting it out there is good for their business, but if the quality of the product is lacking and the story being told is problematic, why would you as a consumer purchase it at all. Are we bound by the need to read a comic simply because of value or does quality has a higher value than simple cost? If as a reader, you've felt betrayed before, why trust that this will be any different?

So I thought to move the conversation towards actual good comics you can buy for three bucks RIGHT NOW that are of good and for which you’ll be supporting artists directly rather than a corporate publishers who, by any indications, seems to actively hate you. There are so much good comics, let's see what three bucks can get you.

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Let's start with Uncivilized books and with Doomin by Derek Van Gieson. It appears to be a riff on Tove Janssen's Moomin, but with a music/drunken twist.

Over at Ray Ray Books, Club Queen Rat King by Emma Louthan, a small comic from the artist behind Three Fates, a comic I really enjoyed. This one is about Club Queen, finding "her rightful place as the object of worship for the denizens of a surreal frenzied night club". Next up is Consumption by Jensine Eckwall, Here's the description from the author: "This winter I got sick, sick in a way I’d ever been before.  In my desperate search for answers, I came across a group of people whose desires had shifted from self-preservation to quite the opposite". There's also the extremely talented Laura Knetzger's Flowering Vine (I reviewed her latest comic Sea Urchin here). Flowering Vine is a comic I have yet to read described as follow: "Wonders blossom in the inner-most thoughts of a young girl’s mind. I'm looking forward to reading this"

Speaking of the incredibly talented Laura Knetzger, her excellent comic Find me, Look for Me (Reviewed here) is available for three bucks over at Yeah Dude Comics.

Over at Czap Book, Rising, comic superstar Cathy G. Johnson & Kevin Czapiewski's newsprint comic He Fought Like a Little Tiger in a Trap loosely based on a novel by Carson McCullers I've never heard of. It's a comic about identity and expression. They also have Rind by MJ Robinson, a comic poem about frustration.

Speaking of poetry, if you want to try something truly different, InkBrick has a bunch of experimental poetry comics for three bucks or less over at the InkBrick Store

Over at Radiator Comics, the sci-fi comedy comic by Miranda Harmon Intergalactic Dance Party will lighten your mood and make you want to dance. Any issues of the series Frankie by Rachel Dukes (about a bizarre cat adopted by a family) are available for two or three bucks. There's an interesting looking comic AND a guide on useful things you should know about by Isabella Rotman called Good to Know . All the issues of Madtown High by Whit Taylor are available as well. 

Moving on to Study Group Comics, a single sketchbook by artist Zack Soto called fukt' bros is available for just three bucks.

Over at 2Dcloud, an avant-garde publisher of quality materials from interesting authors, a few comics of note are available for under three bucks: A Rudy mini comic by Mark Connery, a poetry comic called Easter Island by Christopher Adams of which I know nothing about, Looking Good by Will Dinski on office gadgets; No Title by Ellen Redshaw, and the talented Anna Bongiovanni's mini comic Cavities & Crevices, same with MariNaomi's Great Heights, and a comic by Nicholas Breutzman called Harvest based on Jailhouse stories.

BUT WAIT THERE’S MORE. You want a Universe of comics? At your local comic shop, all the issues of the phenomenal 8 House project and Mirror are $2.99. Lighten up the load of back issues of your local comic shop, they’ll be grateful.

BUT WHAT ABOUT MY ELECTRONIC MULTIMEDIA READING DEVICE?

Digital Retrofit comics: I’m cheating a bit here since I’m suggesting digital comics rather than print comics, but with such a good selection of solid titles, it would be a shame not to point them out. Retrofit Comics have been releasing extremely interesting comic from phenomenal talents for the last few years. Most of those are available as .PDF on their website for just $2.99. The 2014 Ignatz Award winner for Outstanding Comic Wicked Chicken Queen by Sam Alden, Debbie’s Inferno by Anne Emond, Number One by Box Brown, Ikebana by Yumi Sakugawa, Bowman by Pat Aulisio, The Monkey in the Basement and Other Delusions by Corrine Mucha. And a personal favourite, the newly released The Experts by Sophie Franz (reviewed here). Take a serious look at their digital catalog, any of these $2.99 comics will be an impeccable read. That Sam Alden comic and the Sophie Franz comic will change how you think about comics.

Speaking of good digital comics, over at Youth in Decline, you can get the first issue of Lovers Only, an romance anthology by Cathy G. Jonhson, Sophia Foster-Dimino and Mickey Zacchilli for under two bucks.

You can also get any of Sarah Horrocks comics on digital for two or three bucks.

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So there you have it, options of comics for three bucks. None of these comics are mean-spirited, confusing, unwelcoming, angry or filled with pointless decapitation (don't quote me on that last one though, but I'm pretty sure there is no decapitation in those). They don’t require you buy more comics to understand it, nor do they require you to have read 15 to 20 years of comics before it to understand it. It's importance will not be wiped away in 3 months. They will stand as artifacts, intemporal pieces of art, of comics well executed by caring artists, and hopefully will be well-liked by you as a reader. 

Comic book doesn't have to be a spiteful place. You don't have to buy something out of nostalgia alone, you don't have to buy a comic out of habit. You don't have to buy a comic you don't like. It's not fun to "anger-read" books and comics. You are your own person. You can make your own choices. Be the comic reader you want to be. If after looking at all of those suggestions, DC Rebirth still appeals to you, that's fine too. But do let me know, I'll send you the exact location of Alan Moore's grave and we can all go dancing on it while burning money and talking about how good the Batman V Superman 2: Electric Superman Blue is going to be. That scene where Mongul rips Lois Lane in half with her intestines splattered all over the floor. Just the gore movie I think of when I think of a Batman/Superman team-up movie. 

P.S. don't watch the Batman/Superman movie, maybe watch another comic book movie like Turbo Kid instead. It's a better movie in almost every conceivable way, and it's Canadian. Oh did you watch Diary of a Teenage Girl yet? It's amazing!

Book Club Report: So long for now

So long folks!

The Ottawa Comic Book Book Club is adjourned for the moment. We were supported by the Ottawa Silver Snail, who is unfortunately closing. The book club will return in a different format later this year and the book club report may very well come back at that time.

In the meantime, here are the archive:

Astonishing X-Men: Northstar: A discussion with Marjorie Liu
Everywhere Antennas: A discussion with Julie Delporte
Marvel Knight: Spider-Man: by Matt Kindt & Marco Rudy
It Never Happened Again, A discussion with by Sam Alden
Petty Theft: A discussion with Pascal Girard
Shortcomings, by Adrian Tomine
Dotter of her Father's Eyes, by Mary M. Talbot and Bryan Talbot

Book Club Report: Marvel Knights: Spider-Man by Matt Kindt & Marco Rudy: Extreme Highs and Lowest Low

Excellence & Mediocrity

It's been awhile since our group met for Comic Book Book Club, November was cancelled, and December, well everyone's busy in December so that was also cancelled. So here we are, in January 2015, with our first book of the year. This is one of the rare occasions in which we've done a superhero book. We tend to stay away from those for a variety of reasons. They're repetitive, stale, and often time limited in their perspectives. We've done Batwoman: Elegy about 2 years ago as a way to discuss LGBT and style and we haven't done any superhero comics until today. We looked at the terribly uneven Marvel Knights: Spider-Man. The members of the group had very mixed opinions about the book. Some loved it and praised it's artistic boldness, while others hated it, with myself fitting in the latter category. It was an interesting discussion because the book is flawed beyond belief, but there are also some incredible moments within. Let's take a look.

I don't normally split reviews into different components of "art" and "story", but I feel I must in this case. Mostly because superhero comics have long ago compartmentalized those 2 aspects. The focus is usually first placed upon writing the story, and then a group of people will be tasked with illustrating it, often trying to respect the publisher's house style. Specifically here, the story accounts for most of the problems of the book. What is this book about? Well, the book seems to have 2 subtitles, Fight Night and 99 problems. I couldn't tell which one was the correct one, maybe they were both correct. Anyway, Spider-Man (Peter Parker, not any of those guys) is drugged and must fight his way through his entire rogue gallery for no apparent reason or purpose. The back cover says 99 villains, but I honestly couldn't tell how many there were. Not that it matters much anyway. It could have been one elongated fight sequence against 1 enemy and it would have achieved the same effect. Spider-Man is the underdog and he wins, I guess? He goes from one set piece to the next to fight villains, then collapses and wakes up in a new environment where he dukes it out with more villains. Repeat for 120 pages and you got yourself a book! It's revealed in the last couple of pages that it was a bet between the Kingpin and his nephew to see if he could survive fighting 100 people. Are they part of the 99 or are they the people who started this, so 101? That's it, that's all it is. 

The glorious art!

Unfortunately, this is the only thing you'll find in this book. There are no themes, no effort has been put into making this any more than it is. It's really as exciting as an old school video game without cut scenes. It's empty. And yet, this is the first point where our group disagreed. Some of us were thinking, is it enough for a book to simply have a confused guy fighting other guys for 120 pages? Can we expect more from a Spider-Man book than a constant rehash of his concept? Yet some of us, not necessarily superhero comics reader, thought it was just fine. As a standalone comic, it works perfectly well. If it's a standard action plot, should we be expecting more than what we got here? And can we see this book, as an artist showcase and nothing else? I will leave this to the readers to decide. None of us found the story to be particularly good, even those who adamantly defended it. What was surprising was that the writer was Matt Kindt, who most of us knew for writing Mind MGMT and his Top Shelf Spy books. All of his other work we were familiar with is incredibly superior to this. This felt like a wasted opportunity as we were all certain that it could have been much better than it was. 

Pain and memories, Spidey can't manage his mind...

What we could all agree with, though, was that this book was saved by Marco Rudy's incredible art and page design. This is truly what sets this book apart. Rudy cleverly designs his page to reflect the state of mind of our protagonist. At first, when he is stressed out by his life, the page is full and very crowded. When he is drugged, the page design becomes more fluid. It's a mix of painting and standard art. We'd have love to have a longer version of the book with some process pages at the end. 

The glorious art!

I'm not so sure we would recommend this book. In fact, we would recommend an equally gorgeous superior hero book by Frank J. Barbiere and Marco Rudy. New Avengers Annual #1 is the story of Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) as he is asked by a group of techno monks to rescue a young girl who's been possessed by a demon. The story draws parallel with the character origin. Dr. Strange was an arrogant surgeon who, after a car accident, was unable to use his hands again. He began dabbling in the mystic arts and became the Sorcerer Supreme. He had to learn to be humble and discover that there were lots of things he didn't know. Yet to win against this demon and save the girl, he must set aside his humbleness and be confident in his own ability; if he wavers, he will fail. A book about humbleness and hubris, and the art is superb as per the example below. We highly recommend it. It's cheaper too, and your comic book store retailer will be happy to unload copies of back issues. Everybody wins.

New Avengers Annual #1

New Avengers Annual #1

Dash Shaw's Cosplayers - Connection through Deception

Impersonating dishonesty

I have to confess that I love reading books about sad people. More accurately, I love reading stories about miserable, mediocre people. The sadder they are, the more I like it. As long as they are actual characters and not just proxy for horrible misery and gloom. Think about Jimmy Corrigan, the smartest kid on earth. He is a sad, weak, middle-aged man whose melancholy and grief is a product of both his personality and his environment. He is caught in this wheel of unhappiness with endless questions about the meaning of his life, which he eventually tries to resolve. It makes for a fantastic read. He is a fully formed pathetic character and I loved him for it.

Annie the Cosplayer and her nameless friend, which I will refer to as "the photographer" for lack of an actual name (though she is apparently called Verti, according to Fantagraphics), are just as sad and miserable as one could hope for. Both are alone, longing to connect with someone. Their meeting and its connection to cosplaying proves key to understanding their relationship. They first meet at Otakon while Annie is cosplaying as Sailor Venus from the manga Sailor Moon. Cosplay is more than just about the costume. One also adopts the maneurisms, speech patterns, expressions and looks of the subject. It is about becoming the character completely. The cosplayer transforms oneself; acting and behaving like the character they are impersonating. Its obvious that someone dressed as Gambit or Magneto is not truly that fictional character, but it is deceitful nonetheless. This dishonesty permeates the entire book and their entire friendship. It is on nearly every page. Annie even carries a green screen in her own home. Her online interactions are always conducted under a false name (orlyman, lazymercenary, etc.). Special effects are even performed with a hidden camera `spy film`. The entire basis of their relationships is a lie.

The photographer is fascinated by Annie and they become friends, although it seems quite one-sided. Annie is not herself in their first meeting. She is Sailor Venus, played by Annie. She doesn`t just lie to others, but she is constantly playing a role with herself as well. She wants to be an actor and is extroverted when she is cosplaying, yet she is naturally shy and insecure. She displays mean characteristics and completely lacks empathy. The photographer is not any better; she longs for a deeper connection to someone and is willing to trade the truth for it. She maintains their deception until the end; the deception being that what they have is a friendship, and that they are making a film. It is through their deceptions of one another and the rest of the world that they are actually able to connect to each other. "You might see one of us and think we're delivering your mail, or waiting on your table, but we're actually acting and we've given you a bit part". But their friendship crumbles when one of them realizes that her false life leaves her feeling empty. The photographer meets a boy and wishes to form an honest connection with him. Annie discourages her, but she tries anyway. She lies, but it rings false. She convinces the boy with her lies, but she can't convince herself anymore. She is not Scarlet Witch, nor is she Daenarys Targaryen. He is not Magneto, nor is he Khal Drogo. They are who they are, and no one else. The sadness ends once she realizes that she does not need to lie to make a connection.

Just some guy

This comic book is too short and it manages to be more meaningful and more beautiful than most major releases. I didn't want it to end so abruptly, but the experience will stay with me for a long time.

It will all hurt #1 - Where the mind goes

Reverie Fellowship

Farel Dalrymple's It will all hurt is a fantastic comic book. A dreamscape set on a post-apocalyptic earth. A shapeshifter, a wizard, an astronaut, a martial artist, a community forming slowly. A confrontation between them and a Red Sword Wizard named Every will happen eventually, but it is hardly the point of the book. It is a dream we delve into.

Dalrymmple explores themes of loneliness, friendship and adventure. Dalrymple's art, his watercolor landscapes and esoteric characters, is fabulous and delightful to admire. And perhaps this is what truly matters, the journey being more important than the destination. There is a strong feeling of unease for the characters as we know the world is dangerous, filled with rules we do not fully understand yet. The unknown is mysterious and strange. This land is perilous and risky. The adventurers are brave and audacious. It is fascinating.

I have been lucky enough to acquire a print copy from Study Group a few months ago and have since contributed to their kickstarter to obtain the second copy of It will all hurt. It is a fantastic accomplishment and I'm glad I've been able to gaze upon such a wonderful book. The print edition of #1 contains the first two chapters and chapter 3 to 5 are already available on the Study group website. I highly recommend it for any science-fiction and adventure fan. This book is thrilling.