The Gosh! Authority 20/01/10

Twenty-ten, two thousand and ten or whatever you want to call it (2K-10?) is definitely taking its time getting off the ground, comics-wise. Yep, it’s another small one this week but as you’ll see in a minute it’s still worth hauling yourself into the shop for a few noteworthy arrivals.

One such newbie is the latest creator-owned miniseries from everyone’s favourite bald magician, Grant Morrison. It’s called Joe the Barbarian, it’s eight issues long (the first only 75p!) and it’s about a kid with a overactive imagination, Type 1 diabetes and a whole house between him and his life-saving meds. Insulin deprivation transports him Narnia-style to a world inhabited by his toys, making for a story described as a cross between Home Alone and Lord of the Rings. Here’s a preview and here’s what Morrison has to say:

“Joe the Barbarian is about a Boy and his House. It's about a modern kid's journey to Death's Door and what he finds there. Joe's the son of a soldier, like all of us in the military-industrial society of spectacle and denial, and a kid literally facing Death.”

More of that here. It’s illustrated by Sean Murphy (Year One: Batman/Scarecrow, Hellblazer) who also has a few things to say over there. Apparently Joe the Barbarian comes after a long period of Murphy feeling as if he was blacklisted at DC, his picture hung at the front desk to notify the staff if he ever came pleading.

The latest in Drawn & Quarterly’s John Stanley Library is Thirteen Going On Eighteen and it can be all yours this week. The series turned up in the mid-sixties along with Melvin Monster, when Stanley had stopped writing and drawing for already established titles such as Little Lulu and started doing his own stuff. It’s about two female teenage friends and the rivalry and nonsense that comes with being just that. As usual it’s designed by Seth so it’s bound to look bloomin’ lovely on the shelf.

There’s more nice reprinted stuff in the Barry Windsor-Smith Conan Archives Volume 1 HC. Dark Horse have split his seminal 1970s run on the title into two remastered/recoloured hardcover books. Looky here for a preview.

Other than that we’ve got a new four-parter series from Jeff Parker called Avengers Vs Agents of Atlas (preview here) and the next in DC’s line of Blackest Night resurrected titles: Starman #81. Written by James Robinson with art by Fernando Dagnino and Bill Sienkiewicz, it’s one more issue of a series long dead. Robinson tweets "Just so everyone knows now, Blackest Night Starman will feature a Black Lantern Starman. It will feature Opal and characters therein. But It will not have Jack Knight. He is happily in SF like me. And if he ever came back, it should be something bigger then a single issue. But I am very happy with the issue I've written. I think you'll dig it." You probably will.

And that’s about it! Short, sweet and ended while we still think fondly of each other.

G’bye!
-- Hayley