The Gosh! Authority 10/03/10

Afternoon, all. We’re knackered after a week of rough justice so I’m putting things back the way they were by sticking the best looking book at the top of the list like some unfair popularity contest. It just so happens to be incredibly worthy as well (conveniently) so here ‘tis:

The Complete Milt Gross Comic Books and Life Story HC is another handsome piece of work from IDW’s new (Craig) Yoe Books imprint which last gave us the much fawned-over Art of Ditko. Milt Gross is the chap responsible for what is arguably the first graphic novel ever, He Done Her Wrong - The Great American Novel and Not a Word in It — No Music, Too (review here) published way back in 1930. He was also an animator in the ‘20s and wrote a few screenplays with Charlie Chaplin. I first came across him and his hilarious cartoony Yiddish-isms when I found Dunt Esk!! on the bookshelf at home, which was by far the oddest thing I’d ever read at the time and still undoubtedly remains so (Time magazine have a wee excerpt here; I love the internet). This IDW book collects and restores everything Gross from the now incredibly rare and hard to find comics from the ‘40s. There are photos, sketches, some unpublished stuff and even a special fold-in introduction by the man who invented the fold-in thing in the first place, Mr Al Jaffee of MAD. This one looks like a good’un and if I’m wrong I’ll eat my hat.

Here’s a tale of exciting publishing controversy for you. You may have noticed that Modern Masters Volume 24 is out this week showcasing the rather wonderful Guy Davis. Eagle-eyed Goshers might have also noticed one if not two of the following interesting facts: Volume 22 is out next week, and Volume 23 has entirely disappeared off the face of the Earth. That’s excitingly, no? Well, perhaps not. Anyway, next week you can expect the Mark Buckingham edition but if you ever wanted the Darwyn Cooke one you’re out of luck. It was supposed to come out last year around the same time as The Hunter but it has since been removed from the publisher’s schedule and there is no mention of its existence on their website at all! We’re good at scandal, us. We’re like News of the World.

In trade-paperback this week you can have Greek Street Volume 1 if you fancy something with strippers, gangsters, murderous yoot and Greek mythology. It collects the first five issues of the Peter Milligan series (which is proving to be rather popular, I might add), the first of which you can read online. Here’s Milligan talking about it with CbR back last year.

There’s also Hellboy Volume 9: The Wild Hunt which saw Mike Mignola reunited with the great Duncan Fegredo. Remember when we had some of the original pages up in our shop? That was nice.

Grant Morrison’s Batman & Robin #10 is the start of a new three-issue arc called Batman Vs. Robin – you get a new artist an’ all. Andy Clarke started off in 2000AD but you will have seen him most recently in R.E.B.E.L.S. and Batman Confidential. He talks about the Batman & Robin stuff here and you can see a preview of it this way.

Then there’s Breaking into Comics the Marvel Way #1 (of 2) which is kind of a how-to and it kind of isn’t. Along with a commentary about how to get your work seen and various submission tips, it’s an anthology of break-out work from twelve up-and-comers selected by Marvel editor C.B. Cebulski. There’s a preview thing here and a teaser video over at Comics Alliance with an interview with the man wot done it.

Other comics this week include James Robinson’s (Starman) Justice League Rise and Fall One-Shot (preview) and the first part of a three-issue miniseries by the same guy, Superman: Last Stand of New Krypton (preview of that one here). The Mystic Hands of Dr Strange has several noteworthy people in it so you’ll probably want to grab a copy this Thursday too. It’s an all-black-and-white one-shot special by Mike Carey (Lucifer), Kieron Gillen (Phonogram), Ted McKeever (Eddy Current) and Peter Milligan (that man again). Preview!

And last one: The Twelve: Spearhead is a one-shot by Chris Weston who not only draws but writes this one too taking his cues from JMS. The “spearhead” refers to Hitler’s most prized possession; an Austrian occult relic called “the spear of destiny”. It’s superheroes vs. Nazis.

And finally, a belated happy 90th birthday to Ronald Searle! From now until July 4 there is an exhibition of his stuff ‘round the corner at the Cartoon Museum. I would have mentioned this last week only I didn’t know it was on until people came in the day after opening night gushing about it. Over at the Searle blogspot you can see pictures from the opening night and YouTube videos of him on the telly. Don’t miss it.

(Random Searle image pinched apologetically from here)

-- Hayley