692 research outputs found
âA Mad Look At Toes: A Tribute To Al Feldstein.â (Part Of A Celebration Of Mad Editor Feldstein)
Iâm bugged by much of the mainstream media attention given to Al Feldsteinâs passing, because it feels less about the editor himself than about websites providing Boomers with yet another opportunity to wax nostalgic: âMadâs editor died? Too bad. Hey, do you remember â2001: A Space Idiocyâ?â For me, Feldsteinâs 28-year editorial run shouldnât be simplified to clichĂ©s about Madâs irreverence. Feldsteinâ achievement is more ambivalent than that, as much about Fordist efficiency and lost opportunities as about the supposed cultural subversions of the âusual gang of idiots.
Column -- "My Friend Dave"
Column published in The Comics Journa
Book Review -- "It Is The Bad Time," Edited By Kazimir Lee Iskander
Bad Time focuses on horror, specifically the aim to cultivate a sense of dread in the cartoonists themselves. Again, Iskander from the bookâs foreword: âMy mission statement was simpleâevery artist involved should write a comic that would contain at least one panel that was frightening or traumatic to draw. The comic itself didnât need to be traditionally horrific, although many would be.â And they are, although not every story is equally successful at transmitting fear and trauma from artist to reader
Providence: Lovecraft, Sexual Violence, And The Body Of The Other
The subject of this essay is the first six issues of Alan Moore and Jacen Burrowsâ Providence, but let me begin with an apology. In Comics Journal #278 (October 2006), I wrote a negative review of Moore and Melinda Gebbieâs Lost Girls, arguing that Mooreâs rigidly schematic plot made the book a chore to read, despite the beauty of Gebbieâs art. I still think Lost Girls is minor Moore, but I went too far in the final paragraph of my review. In response to Mooreâs claims that he was retiring from comics (most fully expressed in an interview in Comic Book Artist #25 [April 2003]), I wrote that he was âleaving comics none too soon and many years too lateâ (138). I was disappointed with much of the Americaâs Best Comics line (though for me Promethea was major Moore), but I regret those words. They show ingratitude to a writer who entertained me for decades while inspiring other creators to produce better comics
Column -- "The Ballad Of Axe-Faced Anne: Comics, Criticism, Contexts" (Part One)
Reading a comic book once made me sick. Like other Baby Boomer kids, I fell in love with Silver Age Marvel Comics, especially the Kirby/Lee/Sinnott Fantastic Four. I was imprinted by Leeâs narrative voice (simultaneously melodramatic and folksy) and Kirbyâs visual imagination: the Marvel aesthetic became my be-all-and-end-all, my standard for quality comics. One day, though, a friend left some comics at my house, and the next morning I casually picked a non-Marvel from his stack to read at breakfast. I started eating and reading: the comic was a weird pre-Code horror anthology, and the first story featured inky, crosshatched illustrations (a lesser artist channeling Creepy-era Reed Crandall, maybe) for a disturbing story about a woman who turns herself into a leopard. I hated it because it wasnât a Marvel comic. I glanced at panels where the woman, with a human head and leopardâs body, prowled over her unconscious lover. I felt nauseous. I threw the comic and my cereal away. Why did I get sick? Why was I so invested in Marvel, and why and how did this leopard-woman horror comic upset my tastes so traumatically? What does it mean to read a new comic
Column -- "Pluto And Doubling"
Welcome to the first installment of âMonsters Eat Critics,â a monthly column Iâll be writing for TCJ.com. I hope that âMonsters Eat Criticsâ sounds like the title of a Z-grade science-fiction movie, because I plan to write about genre comics, including science-fiction comics, rather than the alt-, art- and mini-comics so ably covered by other TCJ critics. Let me make clear, though, that Iâll be saying little about contemporary superhero comics, because Iâm bored by the ones Iâve read and have nothing to express about them beyond a shrug and an annoyance that hype like âThe New 52â gets so much attention, even negative attention, on comics blogs. Even though future columns will discuss creators who simultaneously labored in and transcended the superhero genreâweâll trot Kirby out for obligatory analysis, if only to rile Pat FordâI donât care about superheroes or the superhero-driven business of American mainstream comics. Iâm looking for art in other genres, and Iâll begin with one of the most artistically accomplished genre comics of the last ten years, Naoki Urasawaâs Pluto (2003-2009). Specifically, my argument is that Urasawa builds Pluto on overlapping, complex systems of doubling, and in reading closely to uncover these systems, Iâll be giving away all of Plutoâs major plot points, so beware. We spoil to dissect here
Book Review -- "Treasure Island: Part I"
Book review of Connor Willumsen's Treasure Island: Part I
Column -- "Kirby: Attention Paid"
Last month, I wrote that my âMonsters Eat Criticsâ column would focus on genres other than superhero comics, and this month my topic is (cue trumpets) Jack Kirbyâs Silver Age Marvel art. But I canât help myself. I love the detail in Jack Kirbyâs art. I love how he fills his panels with an almost promiscuous number of real and imagined objects, and Iâm perpetually amazed by his ability to visualize and draw people and things from any angle in 360-degree space. My fascination with Kirbyâs detailed, stylized, three-dimensional spaces has led me to write a few tentative ideas about how Kirbyâs imagesâparticularly in the 1966-67 heyday of the Fantastic Four, for me the visual apogee of Kirbyâs artâstructure a readerâs attention, and how backgrounds generally function in comic art
Column -- "The Ballad Of Axe-Faced Anne: Comics, Criticism, Contexts" (Part Two)
Reading a comic book once made me sick. Like other Baby Boomer kids, I fell in love with Silver Age Marvel Comics, especially the Kirby/Lee/Sinnott Fantastic Four. I was imprinted by Leeâs narrative voice (simultaneously melodramatic and folksy) and Kirbyâs visual imagination: the Marvel aesthetic became my be-all-and-end-all, my standard for quality comics. One day, though, a friend left some comics at my house, and the next morning I casually picked a non-Marvel from his stack to read at breakfast. I started eating and reading: the comic was a weird pre-Code horror anthology, and the first story featured inky, crosshatched illustrations (a lesser artist channeling Creepy-era Reed Crandall, maybe) for a disturbing story about a woman who turns herself into a leopard. I hated it because it wasnât a Marvel comic. I glanced at panels where the woman, with a human head and leopardâs body, prowled over her unconscious lover. I felt nauseous. I threw the comic and my cereal away. Why did I get sick? Why was I so invested in Marvel, and why and how did this leopard-woman horror comic upset my tastes so traumatically? What does it mean to read a new comic
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