Hello folks! That rascally Hayley Campbell is still sipping sophisticated, exotic Australian cocktails (Cider, lager and blackcurrant? Zany!) on far away shores. Meanwhile I’ll be your blogger on the side, here to bring you up to speed on what’s coming out this week. It’ll be a brief fling, but I hope you’ll always think of me fondly, if not with respect.
Comics!
It’s the end of an era this week, as Vertigo mainstay 100 Bullets comes to its conclusion. Brian Azzarello & Eduardo Risso’s labyrinthine crime saga has been winding its way toward its end for some time now, tying up plot threads and tying off a fair few characters. My recommendation? Go back to the beginning before picking up the end. The complexity of the series rewards it. Additionally, it’s a sad, sad day that heralds an impending lack of regular Risso art. Fans of the Argentinean artist may also want to check out the softcover collection of his Wolverine miniseries Logan, created with Brian K. Vaughn, also out this week.
Cecil & Jordan in New York is a collection of Gabrielle Bell’s short works from the past five years which have appeared in titles such as Kramers Ergot, Mome and D&Q Showcase. Bell is one of the real shining lights of contemporary graphic fiction (if I may be so pretentious). Each of these stories is a showcase of her ability, marrying human concerns to a sense of magical realism which lacks the cloying, irritating whimsy so often present in that kind of work. An indication of the regard in which Bell is held is her collaboration with acclaimed director Michel Gondry on an adaptation of this collection's titular story (with a change in location and title), as featured in the anthology film Tokyo.
If I were to describe Dylan Dog as the Italian Wolverine, you may get the wrong idea. But in terms of his popularity, he’s a match for the clawed Canadian and then some, selling over a million copies each month of his own comic. None other than Umberto Eco, lauded author of titles such as Foucault’s Pendulum and Name of the Rose, said: “I can read the Bible, Homer, or Dylan Dog for several days without getting bored.” A fiction staple in his homeland, the horror-hunting detective has had strangely little success with previous attempts to bring his adventures to English-speaking audiences. On the heels of their successful Savage Sword of Conan reprints, Dark Horse are trying a new tack with a massive omnibus edition of DD stories. At 680 pages of black and white pulpy goodness, you could do a lot worse than dropping £18.50 on the Dylan Dog Casefiles. Tell ‘em Umberto Eco sent you.
Fans of Kieron Gillen (and I happen to know there are many of you) will be thrilled to see the talented young fella getting some more high-profile work with this week’s exhaustingly named Secret Invasion Aftermath Beta Ray Bill: Green of Eden #1. In this mini, the horse-faced alien Thor (it’s a long story) rescues a space-faring alien colony but gets a little more than he bargained for. It all sounds like quite good fun and with art by Dan Brereton, I’m certainly going to give it some quality time.
Kevin Huizenga. Know the name? He’s one of the leading lights of independent comics at the moment, a successor to the likes of Dan Clowes, Chester Brown and all those other guys who don’t draw as many comics as they used to. His titles Or Else and Ganges are wonderful little slices of semi-autobiographical observation, but his new title this week – Fight or Run – is something a little different. In what he describes as “an open source comics game”, Huizenga has created an improvisational, stream of consciousness series of fight or flight responses between ever weirder protagonists. High art it’s not, but a fun experiment it looks to be.
Mr Kane has sourced us another beautiful art book this week in the form of The Whimsical Work of David Weidman, a career retrospective of one of the most influential animators of the 1950’s. Making his name as a background painter for Hannah Barbara, Weidman’s style became the signature look of cartoons of the era. Moving out of the field in the 60’s, Weidman’s work found favour with designers and decorators of the time, and the resultant ubiquity of his designs has made his style instantly recognisable. Highly recommended.
Dungeon Zenith returns at last this week, with Back in Style, the third instalment of Joann Sfar and Lewis Trondheim’s brilliant fantasy series. It’s been a while since they carried on the story of the eponymous lair at its peak, concentrating instead on the various spin-offs such as Early Years, Twilight, Monstres and Parade. Well now it’s back to Herbert, everyone’s favourite enchanted sword-slinging duck, as he fends off the attentions of The Keeper’s wife, Isis. Trondheim sticks to co-writing duties only this time around, with the art now supplied by Boulet.
A quick round-up of some other goodies this week! Incognito #3 ships at last, continuing Brubaker & Phillips’ noir-drenched tale of a bad guy finding it tough to be good. Sure, he riffs on the work of Hammet, Chandler and the like, but did they have a femme fatale named Ava Destruction? I think not.
Insanity abounds in the third volume of Dark Horse’s Herbie Archives. Honestly, all those folks out there who love the craziness of Fletcher Hanks or Boody Rogers should pick these books up. Why? Here’s why.
Paul Pope (no doubt celebrating the optioning of his upcoming Battling Boy) gets a second showing of his wonderful 100% this week, given the same deluxe hardcover treatment that Heavy Liquid had a short while back. With three tales revolving around a near-future Manhattan nightclub, this is one of Pope’s best works as a writer, effortlessly laying out a world that’s a slightly dubious pleasure to revisit. And, of course, it looks stunning.
Speaking of movie options, Ron Howard picked up the rights to a series which is just starting this week, The Strange Adventures of HP Lovecraft. The Image series features a fictionalised Lovecraft as a man whose personal demons are unleashed on the world as he sleeps, a world that only he can them save from himself. It’s HP Lovecraft: Monster Hunter, in a title that seems to be worth a look, particularly given it features all-too rare art from Tony Salmons.
Hey, so you know that Darwyn Cooke, right? Mr DC New Frontier? The stunningly accomplished artist who also turned out to be frighteningly good writer? Well in case you haven’t heard, his latest project is none other than a series of four adaptations of the Parker novels of Richard Stark (aka the late Donald Westlake). A hard-boiled anti-hero, Parker is one of the most memorably reprehensible protagonists in crime fiction, brought to vivid life by Lee Marvin in the John Boorman film Point Blank. The first of Cooke’s adaptations, The Hunter (the source material for Point Blank), is due in July.
The reason for this early heads-up? Well, we’re thrilled to announce that we’ll be doing one of our special, Gosh-exclusive Bookplate Editions for the graphic novel! Strictly limited to 200 copies, the edition will feature a high-quality tip-in art print created especially for us, signed and numbered by Mr Cooke. We’ll post more information soon, including a sneak peek at the plate itself. We expect these to go super-fast, so those who are keen would be well-advised to put their names down now!
And that’s about that. Still no Hayley next week, but perhaps the return of a familiar old face!
Andrew.
Thursday, April 16, 2009
The Gosh! Authority 17/04/09
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
The Gosh! Authority 10/06/09
It’s not a huge one this week but I’m sure there’ll be something here to tickle your fancy. Perhaps it will even calm your screaming rage at the London Underground if you happen to make it in this Thursday.
With Leah Moore and John Reppion’s Sherlock Holmes #2, Sherlock Holmes & Kolchak #2 and the Ians Edginton & Culbard Hound of the Baskervilles out this week we should up and move to Baker Street for the day. You won’t be able to walk past the latter without having a peek at our exclusive Gosh! bookplate, the very first of the lot to be Victorian Gosh-themed. We blogged about this a month ago so go have a read if you haven’t already.
Another cracking creative duo unites for Will Eisner’s The Spirit #29 – Dean Motter and Paul Rivoche of Mister X fame! Newsarama have a preview of the story which somehow sees The Spirit wind up in the middle of a feud between an old tattooist and his hipster rival all because Ellen Dolan wants to get inked.
Then it’s a veritable trevor trove of creators in the Uncanny X-Men First Class Giant-Size Special #1 – a who’s who of comics, if you will. We’ve got Jeff Parker, Scott Gray (Fin Fang Four), and Roger Langridge (Fred the Clown) writing, with Dennis Calero (X-Men Noir), Sean “Cheeks” Galloway, Craig Rousseau (The Perhapanauts), Cameron Stewart (Seaguy, Transmetropolitan), David Williams, and Kevin Nowlan illustrating so it should be as giant as the name suggests. Speaking of Langridge, about a fortnight ago we got a pile of his mini-comic The Show Must Go On Chapter 1: Mackerel and then I promptly forgot to say something in the weekly mail-out because I’m rubbish. It’s the first collection of his webcomic which can be seen every Tuesday here, or at least that’s the way it used to be until he had to do stuff like Uncanny X-Men First Class Giant-Size Special #1 to ward off starvation and ruin and whatnot.
Jordan Crane is someone who should be far more famous than he is. I liked The Last Lonely Saturday and his new stuff in Uptight is great too – even Boing Boing thinks so! The long-awaited third issue is out this week (the last was seen mid-2007) and that BB post even has a couple of preview pages for your perusal. In a side note, while poking about I also noticed they’ve linked to the New Yorker preview of Robert Crumb’s Genesis. (It’s not out yet. I’m only showing you.)
If you haven’t had enough of Grant Morrison after last week’s Batman & Robin/Seaguy double-bill keep an eye out for the Final Crisis hardcover featuring the art of J.G. Jones (52 Covers, plus a brand new cover for this collection), Carlos Pacheco (Superman) and Doug Mahnke (Black Adam). At a whopping 352 pages, it collects not only the core series but also the Final Crisis: Submit one-shot and Superman Beyond #1 and #2.
Beta Ray Bill: Godhunter #1 (of 3) is the beginning of a new mini-series by Phonogram’s Kieron Gillen and sees Bill embark on an insane mission to hunt down and kill Galactus for scoffing the wrong planet. Gillen’s very excited about it as you can see on his blog. As well as the new material this issue also reprints Bill’s very first appearance from the pages of Thor #337 by Walter Simonson.
American McGee’s Grimm #2 looks to be another instalment of delightfully nuttiness. We’ve still got a few copies of #1 kicking about so you can pick ‘em both up at the same time and pretend you got there at the very beginning. The interior art’s rather wonderful and probably of interest to fans of Ben Templesmith (who did the cover for this one that Grant Bond didn’t do), and Eric Powell. Dwight L. MacPherson has some preview pages from the first issue up on his blog.
You’ll find more sinister doings in The Strange Adventures of HP Lovecraft #2 illustrated by the brilliant Tony Salmond who doesn’t really do comics anymore so it’s a rare treat.
This series is a bit like Lovecraft’s own short story Pickman’s Model in the sense that the monsters are real (and if you’ve not read that story I’ve ruined it for you now) but instead of just standing around posing they’re out killing innocent people and leading the trail right back to Lovecraft’s doorstep…
Apparently Ron Howard has signed on to do the movie already. It’s news to me. Check that link for preview pages from the first issue (which we’ve still got if you missed it).
In small press this week we’ve got a new one from Marc Ellerby, previously mentioned on this blog when This is a Souvenir: The Songs of Spearmint & Shirley came out. When he’s not drawing pictures of himself in the Kochalka-y, Scott Pilgrimy autobiographical Ellerbisms he’s working on Chloe Noonan: Monster Hunter which he plans to turn into a series. He says...
Chloe Noonan is a monster hunter (duh) but it's tough being one when you don't have any powers and you have to bring your friend along with you. She's not even that bothered about saving the world really, as running around gives her a stitch. It's a tongue in cheek look at fantasy and puts the b-list character in the foreground. It's less about hunting monsters and more about getting the bus.
Previews on his website.
And finally, Joel Meadows went along to the Alan Moore & Kevin O’Neill (them again) with Christopher Frayling talk at the ICA and writes about it here. By now he’s probably got more photos of Alan Moore than Alan Moore himself, but from all the ones I’ve seen I think I like this best:
And that’s that. I won’t be here next week as I’m going on holiday by mistake.
-- Hayley
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
At The Mountains of Madness Bookplate Edition - Exclusive to Gosh!
Gosh! Favourite Ian Culbard (Dorian Gray, A Study in Scarlet) is no stranger to the bookplate edition. You’ll no doubt remember his last one from the Hound of the Baskervilles by Ian Edginton, a sell-out success and not just because of the Gosh! Comics cameo on said bookplate.
This time ‘round Culbard steps out on his own in a new adaptation from Self Made Hero. At the Mountains of Madness is a tale of Antarctic terror by the master of unspeakable horrors, H.P. Lovecraft. First published in 1936 and now in graphic novel form some 74 years later, this is one Lovecraftian horror worth seeking out.
The barren, windswept interior of the Antarctic plateau was lifeless or so the expedition from Miskatonic University thought. Then they found strange fossils of unheard-of creatures, carved stones tens of millions of years old and, finally, the unspeakable, mind-twisting terror of the City of the Old Ones.
“I could not help feeling that they were evil things – mountains of madness whose farther slopes looked out over some accursed ultimate abyss.”
“There's been a lot of Lovecraftian work over the past few years, but [this] may be the best of them all.”
-- Pornokitsch
I could tell you a vigintillion times over that Culbard’s work is remarkable but instead I’ll point you at several early reviews lavishing praise on his latest effort: The FPI Blog, Butterfly Hunt, and Geek Syndicate.
At the Mountains of Madness: Gosh! Exclusive Bookplate Edition boasts a signed and numbered print featuring all-new art by Ian Culbard for the standard cover price of £14.99. As a gentle nod of respect he’s done a portrait of Lovecraft himself, in blues and blacks and probably colours out of space too:
If you’d like to reserve a copy or arrange a mail order, drop us a line at info@goshlondon.com.
The Gosh! Authority 26/10/10
And so it transpires that the most exciting thing on the shelf this week features six-limbed monsters, a one-armed cyborg and a whole bunch of terrifying floating orbs in a horrifying alien world. And why not? You can’t top something like that; I challenge you to try.
Death-Day Part One by Gosh! Favourite Sam Hiti (Tiempos Finales) is deliriously strange and brilliant. Back in January you probably picked up a copy of the Prologue, a small red pamphlet the contents of which are now lumped in with Part One. You’ll have to choose between two editions depending on how much pocket money you’re willing to part with: there’s the regular softcover for £14.99 or the slightly fancier slipcased deal with a black band for £22.50. The contents are the same and both editions feature an original sketch by Hiti on the title page. Look! You can even see him sketching them in this video because we live in the future and everything is on the internet. Comicbook Resources have a review of the book already. As for other in-stock Hiti books, if your collection is currently lacking signed and sketched-in copies of Ghoulash I, El Largo Tren Oscuro or indeed the Death-Day Prologue you’re in luck.
For more unspeakable horrors you’ll should pick up a copy of Ian Culbard’s At the Mountains of Madness being – as you can probably imagine – a stellar adaptation of the H.P. Lovecraft classic. When it arrives (which could be this week, could be next week) we’ll have an exclusive Gosh! Bookplate Edition featuring an all-new portrait of Lovecraft himself by the exceedingly good Culbard. Want one held aside for you? Just say the word.
No Hallowe’en is complete without new stuff from Jill Thompson (Scary Godmother) so failing to pick up this one would be an embarrassing faux pas. She and her frequent collaborator Evan Dorkin have teamed up with Mike Mignola for a 32-page Beasts of Burden/Hellboy crossover which sees the World’s Greatest Paranormal Detective help the team solve a case of unexplained animal slayings. You won’t be seeing a Li’l Hellboy toddling about in the woods though – Mignola put the kibosh on that idea before it was even suggested. It’s all fully painted by Thompson and if there’s a more colourful, beautiful thing out on Thursday I’ll eat my hat. Preview here.
Having said that, there is brand new stuff from the ridiculously talented Sean Phillips too. He and Ed Brubaker give you another dose of pulp noir in a follow-up to last year’s hit series in Incognito: Bad Influences #1:
“…it touches on some similar things as we did in the first series, but from a different angle now. [Zack is] living in New York City, he has to maintain a secret identity, but he doesn't have to go to a job or any of that other stuff. His job is working with the good guys now. 
A big part of the series takes a darker noir twist on an old pulp and comic book cliche that you'll see when you read the issue. It's a twist I've never seen explored before, so I thought I'd use that as a jumping off point before I send Zack off down the well.”
More of that interview with Brubaker here, and you can see Phillips’ work over at CbR. Incidentally, if you’re not following Phillips’ blog you’re missing out. He frequently posts working sketches, life drawings, and generally interesting bits and pieces. Also he has Gosh! Approved hair and that sort of thing gets you places.
Earlier this week we received Dodgem Logic #6 in which Big Hairy Alan Moore ponders about the possibilities of life on other planets, Iain Sinclair writes about JG Ballard, Stewart Lee says there are no comedy gods and Kevin O’Neill does a full-colour page about – uh – well I think it’s about sex or something. It’s rude, anyway. You’ll find it on the counter like impulse-buy sweets.
We’ve also got Tunes: A Graphic History of Rock ‘n’ Roll SC, being a compendium of vignette comics about rock personalities edited by Vincent Brunner of France’s Rolling Stone. It’s a translation from the French Rock Strips and covers everything from Elvis to grunge, illustrated in black and white by the likes of Serge Clerc, Charles Berberian, Killoffer, Menu and Sattouf. Points awarded to those who recognise the R. Crumb homage on the cover.
For classic Marvel UK Arthurian fantasy you’ll want to grab yourself a copy of Knights of Pendragon Volume 1: Once and Future TP, collecting the first nine issues of the controversial twenty-year-old series by Dan Abnett, John Tomlinson, Gary Erskine and Andy Lanning. Extra bits include reminiscences from the writers and original series editor Steve White about getting the series off the ground in the face of outright hostility from the dudes upstairs, and a cover gallery by the likes of Alan Davis (who coincidentally provides the cover to this week’s X-Men: Nation X TP), Simon Bisley, John Bolton and loads more. Win Wiacek gives you the full history of the Knights over at Comics Review.
In Superman: Earth One HC J. Michael Staczynski (Thor) gives you "an untold period in Clark Kent's life, a year one sort of tale,” according to its artist Shane Davis. It’s the first in a line of original graphic novels from DC by big cheese comics creators called Earth One, a re-imagining of DC’s top heroes. Preview hereabouts.
Last week John Chalmers and Sandra Marrs aka metaphrog came in and signed a pile of the latest book in their line of critically acclaimed ones, Louis: Night Salad. It came out last month and I wrote about it then.
Other bits worth picking up include Rian Hughes’ Yesterday’s Tomorrows at a staggeringly low price of a mere tenner (60% off!). Hughes was last seen on the Gosh! Blog as the editor of Lifestyle llustrations of the ‘60s (reviewed here by The Independent) and has done more for comic book design than you probably know (see also: the Gosh! logo). Yesterday’s Tomorrows is a collection of his comics, mostly written by others (including Grant Morrison, John Freeman, Tom DeHaven) all illustrated in Hughes’ trademark retro style along with covers, sketches, bubblegum cards, and other rare visual treats. Newsarama interview him about the book. Highly recommended.
We’ve also managed to secure a limited pile of Top Shelf gems at stupidly low prices – and so can you if you’re quick! Eddie Campbell’s burglar-stunning behemoth Alec: The Years Have Pants HC was previously £37.99 but you can have it for £22, Alan Moore’s and Melinda Gebbie’s Collected Lost Girls HC is down to £22 from £33.99, and the softcover edition of his first novel The Voice of the Fire is now just £5.50 instead of £10.99. We’ve only got a few copies of each so we can’t hold any aside – you’d best hurry down to the shop with your elbows at the ready.
How d’ya like them apples?
-- Hayley
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
The Gosh! Authority 14/01/09
Top of the muffin to you! Nothing quite as gobsmackingly horrific as Bono’s musical has come to my attention this week so I’ll spare you the sarky intro and head straight to the comics. And if you stick around I might even tell you about the incredibly under-publicised and little-known comic Amazing Spider-Man #583 wot’s got Barack Obama in it (and occasionally on it).
But first of all, here’s something you might have missed in Previews. Hidden way at the back and probably half in the crease (no respect, these young’uns) was James Jean’s XOXO Hugs and Kisses Postcard Book. It was released at San Diego Comicon in very small quantities and now the collection of 30 lovely looking postcards is finally in shops. Ours, specifically. Jean’s work has graced the covers of Fables (all of them recently collected in a big blue hardcover), Time Magazine, Rolling Stone, Atlantic Records and stacks more. Here are some preview pictures from Jean’s blog. Why not do what I do and stick them on your wall to cover up the gaping holes where you put your elbow through the plaster? I reckon Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen probably does it too.
In a similar arty vein, Sparrow has previously collected the likes of Ashley Wood and Rick Berry, but this latest volume is all about William Wray – the fine-art work of a cartoonist you might also know as Bill Wray whose series ‘Monro’ ran in MAD for 100 issues or so.
Have a poke about on his website where you can see examples of his work. Best known for his urban landscapes, he also paints women with their yaps out. Wahey!
Also out this week is MOME Volume 13 featuring the first of three parts of an all-new book by Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers creator Gilbert Shelton! Be a dear and don’t forget about these. There’s also brand new pages by Bottomless Belly Button’s Dash Shaw, as well as Thomas Ott (The Number), Josh Simmons (House), David Greenberger (Duplex Planet) to name but a few. Fantagraphics have put up some preview pictures on their Flickr site. Let’s hope no one goes on vacation and neglects to colour the cat’s leg.
There’s more great artwork in Jules Verne’s 20 000 Leagues Under the Sea hardcover by Gary Gianni. His previous work includes Batman: Black & White, Kidnapped, Moby Dick, Savage Tales of Solomon Kane, and Michael Chabon’s Gentlemen of the Road but he most recently popped up in this blog for his work in Hal Foster’s Prince Valiant. Here he retells the classic tale of Nemo and it looks rather brilliant, unlike the tiny rubbish previews available on the web. They’re postage-stamp sized so I won’t bother linking. Just come have a look in the shop. You’ll be glad you did.
Gosh-favourite Robert Kirkman’s Walking Dead reaches its 9th trade-paperback collection, Here We Remain, this week. Collecting issues #49-54, it sees Rick and Carl staggering on despite everything being irretrievably FUBAR. ('FUBAR' is an Andrew addition. I had to look it up on the bloody internet to figure out what he meant. Turns out it's from the army. Who knew?)
Gary Northfield’s Derek the Sheep strip has been running in The Beano since 2003 and if you’ve not seen it you’re in for a treat. This hardcover collects thirteen very funny stories. Here’s a lovely interview with the man himself. Andrew shouts ‘Tell ‘em it’s fab!’
And finally, here’s some stuff I didn’t mention last week that actually turned out to be worthy of it:
Wolverine Switchback (one-shot) has a great cover by Das Pastoras, and the innards by Pastoras, Joseph Clark, Gregg Hurwitz and Juan Doe are quite good too. We think so, and so do Comicbook Resources. Here! Have some belated preview pages.
Then there’s H.P Lovecraft’s Nyarlathotep, a wee hardcover that’s not comics but actual Lovecraft prose poetry with illustrations by Eisner winning Chuck BB (Black Metal).
Beasts 1 (a softcover after two sell-out hardcover editions) and Beasts 2 (a brand new hardcover) will be of interest to fans of contemporary art. They’re mythological menageries featuring beasties that were once thought to actually exist, depicted by the likes of (deep breath) Tony Millionaire, Souther Salazar, Jeff Soto, Dave Cooper, Tim Biskup, Seonna Hong, Jeremy Fish, James Jean (that guy again), Jay Ryan, Amanda Visell, Anders Nilsen, Andrew Brandou, Art Chantry, Brian Ralph, Bwana Spoons, Dave Cooper, Deth P. Sun, Esther Pearl Watson, Jason, Jesse LeDoux, Johnny Ryan, Jordan Crane, Keith Shore, Little Friends of Printmaking, Marc Bell, Martin Cendreda, Martin Ontiveros, Mat Brinkman, R. Kikuo Johnson, Richard Sala, Sammy Harkham, Seonna Hong, Stan Sakai, S. britt, Stella Im Hultberg, Steven Weissman, Tom Gauld, Tyler Stout… and that’s just the first volume.
Incidentally, Kyle Baker’s Nat Turner was also out in softcover last week. Read it! Gosh approved. Everybody likes Nat Turner.
Don’t forget the sale is still chugging along, with some great deals to be had and new stuff going out all the time. A couple of noteworthy additions this week are the hyperkinetic White Trash trade-paperback, written by Gordon Rennie with amazing art by the late Martin Emond for only £2 (imagine Tank Girl with Axl Rose as the lead), and crime thriller Manhattan 1957 by the father/son team of Yves & Hermann at £4. The latter is a wonderful little noir tale that fans of Ed Brubaker will love.
Alright, since you’ve no doubt knackered your finger in a swift scroll to the bottom, here it is: In celebration of a big nerd hanging his hat in the White House hallway (Joe Quesada said so not me, Mr Obama!), Marvel Comics have not only put Barack Obama on the front of the new issue of Amazing Spider-Man #583, they’ve also had him team up with Peter Parker! Wired tells you all about it here, and there’s a tiny preview here. We’re not going to have any spares of the Obama variant cover but we should have a few of the standard cover left for those who get in quick. We’ll be sure to get in the second printing with The Big O on the cover when it happens, probably a couple of weeks from now.
And that’s that.
-- Hayley
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
In Store 25/07/08 - 31/07/08
Click the full post link below for a list of items in store this week:
Betty & Veronica Digest #186
Jugheads Double Digest #142
2000 AD #1597
Button Man Confession Of Harry Exton TP
Amazing Remarkable Monsieur Leotard SC (Signed Copies)
Art Of Hergé Inventor Of Tintin Vol 1 HC
Babysitter GN
Batman Death Mask #4 (Of 4)
Batman Going Sane TP
New Battlestar Galactica Season Zero #11
Black Panther #39 SI (J. Aaron)
Blue Beetle #29
Captain Marvel Secret Invasion HC
Catwoman #81 (Last Issue)
Contract #1 (Of 3)
DC Special Cyborg #3 (Of 5)
Marvel Masterworks Defenders Vol 1 HC
Doom Patrol Archives Vol 5 HC
Dr Who Battles In Time #49
Dragonlance Legends Time Of The Twins #1
Dream Maiden Megan GN
Dynamo 5 #15
Elephantmen Vol 1 Wounded Animals TP
Essential Fantastic Four TP Vol 7
Fall Of Cthulhu Vol 2 Gathering TP
Fantastic Four True Story #1 (Of 4) (P. Cornell/Dominguez)
Flash The Wild Wests HC
Forgotten Realms Vol 7 Legacy TP
Frank Frazetta’s Creatures #1
Ghost Whisperer #5
Green Lantern #33
Grendel God & The Devil TP
Haunt Of Horror Lovecraft #2
Hercules #4 (Of 5)
How To Love HC (Rutu Modan)
Huntress Year One #6 (Of 6)
Jim Butchers Dresden Files #4
Jokers Asylum Two Face #1
Journey Vol 1 TP (Messner-Loebs)
Justice Society Of America Annual #1
Juxtapoz Vol 15 #8 Aug 2008
Locke & Key #6
Man With No Name #3
Marvel Previews August 2008
Marvel Spotlight Uncanny X-Men 500 Issues
Ms Marvel #29 SI
Mumbai Macguffin One Shot
Narcopolis #4 (Of 4)
New Dynamix #5 (Of 5)
Newuniversal 1959
Northlanders #8
Nova Vol 2 Knowhere TP
Order Vol 2 California Dreaming TP
Our Gang Vol 3 SC (Walt Kelly)
Parasyte GN Vol 04 (Of 8)
Path Vol 3 Death & Dishonor TP
Pathos GN Vol 01 (Of 2)
Pigeons From Hell #4 (Of 4)
Pilot Season The Core #1
Popgun Vol 2 GN (Epinosa, Rugg, Larsen, Haspiel and more!)
Previews Vol XVIII #8
Project Superpowers #5 (Of 7)
Reign In Hell #1 (Of 8)
Robots & Donuts TP
Rough Guide To Graphic Novels TP (Danny Fingeroth)
Sadhu Wheel Of Destiny #3 (Of 4)
Secret Invasion Fantastic Four #3
Silver Surfer Requiem TP
Skaar Son Of Hulk #2 (Greg Pak)
Scalped Vol 1 TP (Bookplate Ed)
Scary-Go-Round 6: Ahoy Hoy!
Skrulls Vs Power Pack #1 (Of 4)
Amazing Spider-Man Extra
Spider-Man With Great Power #5
Star Trek Mirror Images #2
Star Trek Year Four Enterprise Experiment #4
Star Wars Droids Omnibus Vol 1 TP
Star Wars Rebellion #15 Vector Part 7
Superman Batman #50
Tales From The Crypt #7
Teen Titans #61
Thor #10 (Straczynski/O. Coipel)
Thor By Straczynski Vol 1 TP
Trinity #9
True Believers #1 (Of 5)
Ultimate Spider-Man #124
Unearthed Cemetery Blues Vol 1 TP
Un-Men #12
Wildcats #1
Wizard Magazine #203
Wolverine #67(Millar/McNiven)
Wolverine Origins #27
Worlds Of HP Lovecraft TP Vol 01
Deadpool Vol 1 TP
Kitty Pryde And Wolverine Prem HC
X-Men First Class Vol 2 #14
X-Men Odd Men Out
Zombie Tales #3
Zot Complete Black & White Stories TP (Scott McCloud)
MANGA
Baby & Me Vol 9 GN
D Gray Man Vol 10 GN
Eyeshield Vol 21 TP
Fairy Cube Vol 2 GN
Hoshin Engi Vol 8 TP
Kaze Hikaru Vol 10 GN
Me & The Devil Blues Vol 1 Life Of Robert Johnson GN
Muhyo Rojis Bureau Vol 6 TP
Rosario Vampire Vol 2 GN
Short-Tempered Melancholic GN
Steal Moon GN Vol 01 (Of 2)
Style School Vol 2 TP
Tokyo Zombie SC
Toto Vol 2 GN
Wallflower Vol 16 GN
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
The Gosh! Authority 03/11/10
Granted you’ll be too busy blowing stuff up on Friday night to read comics, but when Saturday morning rolls ‘round you’ll have plenty of stuff to read once you’ve dusted the ash off your sleeves.
Last week I mentioned the imminent arrival of Ian Culbard’s H.P. Lovecraft adaptation, At the Mountains of Madness. And you know what? It arrived the very next day. We now have signed, limited bookplate editions on the shelf and they’re just as lovely as we hoped they’d be. If you’ve already placed an order for one rest assured there’s a copy held aside for you now – you’ll hear from me very shortly.
Denys Wortman’s New York TP is an unseen treat that you’ve got James Sturm (Market Day) to thank for. After Sturm found and loved an old book called Mopey Dick and the Duke he took it upon himself to find out everything he could about the author; a totally unknown and long dead cartoonist called Wortman.
Like some sort of private detective he tracked down the guy’s son who revealed an entire shed full of cartoons doing nothing but fending off rats, rusty paperclips, and blizzards. This book is a collection of the things Sturm found – amazing cartoons capturing the life and personality of the city along with correspondence with personal friends such as William Steig, Milt Gross and Walt Disney who all held him and his work in extremely high regard. Looking at this preview over at Drawn & Quarterly makes it seem ridiculous that he’s not as widely known as his pals.
Fellow New Yorker Dean Haspiel’s work is all over the telly (read: my telly) these days in the top notch show Bored to Death, written by his Alcoholic collaborator Jonathan Ames. I’ve been a fan of Haspiel ever since I read Opposable Thumbs ten years ago (good grief!) so I’ll be interested to see what makes it into this book; “a career “introspective” rather than retrospective: instead of just looking back, we're looking back with a forward-thinking and insightful attitude,” says its mastermind Christopher Irving, comics historian.
It’s called Graphic NYC Presents Volume 1: Dean Haspiel Early Years and collects all sorts; from his early autobiographical work to unpublished Billy Dogma stuff alongside an extensive interview and various essays by Irving. You can see eight pages of it on the internet and read an interview with the two of them here and there.
Bent is a new one from Dave Cooper collecting the past five years’ worth of paintings, ink drawings, pencil sketches, and photographs all as bizarre and as strange as you’d expect. Guillermo del Toro (of Hellboy and Pan’s Labyrinth fame) provides the introduction and apparently owns some Cooper originals himself. Preview over at Fantagraphics and a video too if you fancy it.
Also from Fantagraphics is the latest in their flagship anthology, MOME, the landmark 20th volume so they’ve done their maths and provided us with the following facts: 5 years, 20 volumes, 72 artists, and 2,352 pages of comics. Blimey. In this issue you’ll find MOME-debutants Steven "Ribs" Weissman, Sergio Ponchione (doing a full-colour prequel story to his acclaimed series Grotesque), Jeremy Tinder and Aidan Koch, alongside familiar faces Dash Shaw, Sara Edward-Corbett, Josh Simmons, T. Edward Bak, Derek Van Gieson, Ted Stearn, Conor O'Keefe, Nate Neal, and Nicolas Mahler. PDF preview and a video too.
The Art of Frank Cho is a hardcover exhibition catalogue consisting of 48 pages of published art he’s done over the years. All the stuff in it is for sale, though the exhibition opened way back in May so if you’re planning on using it as a shopping list you’ve probably missed the boat entirely. You can see what’s in it over at the gallery’s website.
We haven’t seen a graphic novel from Renee French since the brilliantly weird The Ticking four years ago. H Day is her new one in which she wordlessly illustrates her struggles with migraines and Argentine Ants in her trademark dreamlike pencil drawings. “There's a place I visualise when I have a migraine, to get me through it, and it's got blank buildings and water. I just sat down and made a drawing of that place. Then I realised that's where I wanted to hang out for a while, on paper.” Comicbook Resources have an interview with her, and if you’re not keeping an eye on her blog you probably should be.
How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less HC is a debut graphic novel by self-professed left-leaning humanist and mini-comics scenester Sarah Glidden, who qualified for a program to introduce people of Jewish descent to the Jewish homeland. It’s a travel memoir full of sharp-eyed observations in watercolour. Techland have an exclusive preview for you.
Incidentally, if you’re a fan of mini-comics, DIY zines or even just Black Flag you’ll want to get your mitts on Henry and Glenn Forever which is a basically a beefed-up collection of what is essentially a pretty wrong idea. Picture notorious musclebound punk/metal stars Glenn Danzig and Henry Rollins in love for 66 pages. As this review at Comixology put it, “Henry is the Spock to Glenn's Kirk, to put it in slash-fiction terms.” To quote Rollins himself, “Has Glenn seen this? Trust me, he would not be impressed.” Danzig did actually find out about it eventually and was “less than jazzed”. You have writing/illustrating team Igloo Tornado to thank for it.
As for other stuff, here’s a quick run-down on what’s coming at you:
Joss Whedon, Zack Whedon (Dr. Horrible, Terminator, Fringe) and Chris Samnee (Blackest Night: Tales of the Corps, Daredevil) fill in the details on one of Serenity’s most popular characters in Serenity: Shepherd’s Tale, a new hardcover from Dark Horse previewed here.
Avengers/X-Men TP Maximum Security is a collection of crossover stuff from the 1990s by a veritable who’s who of notable comics dudes: Kurt Busiek, Chris Claremont, Joseph Harris, Dan Jurgens, Fabian Nacieza, Joe Pruett, Frank Tieri, Brett Booth, Georges Jeanty, Andy Kubert, Salvador Larroca, Alitha Martinez, Jerry Ordway, Yanick Paquette, John Romita Sr. and Leinil Francis Yu. You can obviously expect the Avengers and the X-men, but the Fantastic Four put in an appearance too...
Speaking of the X-Men, Kieron Gillen and Salva Espin begin a new ongoing X-series with Generation Hope #1 this Thursday. He talks to CbR about it here and you can have a preview too.
Grant Morrison’s final issue of Batman & Robin hits the shelf on Thursday along with the second hardcover collection of the series, Batman Vs. Robin. Paul Cornell takes over for the next three issues and introduces a brand new villain to the mix too.
“This is the story of the corpse of one of Bruce Wayne's former girlfriends being stolen from her grave, and Dick and Damian trying to deal with a matter that's very personal to Bruce, to kind of shield him from the fallout of it, while Bruce is away in Japan. This is a very dark story, in the Grant Morrison tradition, with some evil stuff going on under the surface and some mad bubbles on top.”
More of that interview here. Peter J. Tomasi takes over as planned from #20. If you want to kick it off your order at any point in the changeover just shout.
Howard Chaykin’s Batman/Catwoman: Follow the Money One-Shot finally sees print this week, four years after the job was completed. In it he brings back Golden Age villain The Cavalier. Chaykin reckons it’s a fun romp – a story about money written before the world went financially tits-up – and you can read more about it in his Newsarama interview.
DC Comics Presents: Chase is another in their line of hitherto uncollected bits and pieces, this time being the D. Curtis Johnson series about Cameron Chase, a government agent with the Department of Extranormal Affairs. Despite DC’s best efforts (crossover stories, introducing the character to Batman, etc) the series only lasted ten issues. Worth a look for early J.H. Williams III (Batwoman) art.
Bullseye: Perfect Game #1 (of 2) by Charlie Huston and Shawn Martinbrough fills in the year when no one knew where he was. Previewed here and talked about here.
Captain America: Man Out of Time #1 (of 5) by Mark Waid, Jorge Molina and Karl Kesel about the rebirth of the Living Legend of World War Two after he is pulled from the sea by the Avengers. Previewed here. Waid tells Newsarama all about it.
Punisher: In the Blood #1 (of 5) by Rick Remender and Roland Boschi sees Franken-Castle return from the dead to wrap up some unfinished business. Previewed here, and Remender interviewed too. Incidentally, Jason Aaron and Steve Dillon’s Punisher Max: Kingpin TP turned up this week as well. You’ll find ‘em side by side.
Superboy #1 is the first of a new ongoing by indie favourite Jeff Lemire (who talks about the series here) illustrated by relative newcomer Pier Gallo (preview). Incidentally, Sweet Tooth #15 is out this week too so you’ll not be lacking in the Lemire department.
And finally, Bill Willingham (Fables) and Neil Edwards (Fantastic Four) give you Warriors Three #1 (of 4) about Hogun, Fandral and Volstagg, allies of Thor. Preview here.
A couple of events worth mentioning before I sign off:
Biannual indie comics anthology Solipsistic Pop is launching its third collection next Friday at Camden’s Black Heart. It’s £3 to get in and £12 for the book, which comes with a free bag of sweets – Oh yes. You’ll be entertained by comedians Bec Hill and Terry Saunders as well as the lovely MJ Hibbett whose song about Alan Moore always plays automatically in my head whenever someone says “Alan Moore” which is pretty much every five minutes in this joint (thanks Mark). Stuff you need to know can be found on their website.
80s comics artist Brett Ewins (Strange Days, Johnny Nemo, Bad Company, Skremer) has been absent from the scene for a bit but a new major exhibition at The Orange Dot Gallery is set to change that. Opening night is this Thursday at 6pm so head along if you can. Don’t know who I’m talking about? Head to Flickr. You have undoubtedly seen his work on the walls before. Details here.
We don’t point you at enough webcomics around here so here’s one from a guy we made friends with in Birmingham. His name is Charles Cutting and does a comic for a charity called Crossroads Care. He also does one over at The Illustrated Ape based on characters by HP Lovecraft. Worth a look, and not just because the author wore a red Dahlia in his buttonhole to a comic convention, of all places.
Speaking of comics on the internet: Read this one when you’ve got five minutes to spare. It’s startlingly chilling, beautifully drawn in a sort of Joann Sfar Euro style, and comes recommended by Andy Nyman via Twitter, who I saw in the excellently terrifying Ghost Stories just last night. His Face All Red, by Emily Carroll.
You’re welcome.
-- Hayley