Other Comics News Parade-O-Links 01292017

(American Flagg! #10 1983.  Cover by Howard Chaykin.  Stolen from My Comic Shop.)

Here are some things I found interesting in the world of minicomics, comic books, graphic novels, small press, self publishing, zines, webcomics, cartoons, digital comics, other, etc. during the week ending 01292017.

"And I want to say something to the schoolchildren of America who were watching the live coverage of the shuttle's takeoff. I know it is hard to understand, but sometimes painful things like this happen. It's all part of the process of exploration and discovery. It's all part of taking a chance and expanding man's horizons. The future doesn't belong to the fainthearted; it belongs to the brave." - President Ronald Reagan

• Hello sisters and brothers of teh intronets and welcome to another episode of your Other Comics News Parade-O-Links.  My name is Shannon and I'll be your host.  Happy Chinese New Year.  To quote the last prophet of the 90s Keanu Reeves, "whoa".  What a week huh?  Just a week ago when we last spoke we had just seen the inauguration of a new President in these United States and inspiring marches all around the world.  Since then,  every day has been a series of events that were never supposed to be possible. There are millions of Americans and millions and millions around the world right now who are scared.  Their lives are uncertain.  Their future is uncertain.  I have my own fears of course.  Everything is fragile. A politician or an executive I've never met could end my livelihood with the stroke of a pen.  But I'm a white man in America so my fears are those of inconvenience and folly compared to those of different birth country, skin tone or religion.  I don't know much about anything but here is what I know about Muslims. Here is what I know about refugees.  For about four years my next door neighbors were a Muslim family.  They were refugees from Bosnia. If you walked by their house you wouldn't have known they were Muslim.  The father was an auto mechanic.  You'd see him outside working on cars or playing with his kids.  I thought he was Italian at first.  The mother was a brunette.  She was quite but polite and generous.  Most of my interaction was with the kids.  They were always outside playing and my daughter played with them all the time.  The kids had blond hair and blue eyes.  They could have passed for my kid's siblings. They had a trampoline and my daughter would want to bounce with them every day. If you were around enough you'd begin to notice the accent and that the parents spoke to the children in Bosnian.  You'd hear the kids playing games counting in Bosnian.  You'd notice that they had a pit for roasting lamb.  If you were around long enough to notice the lamb pit you'd probably be invited over to enjoy the feast.  They were generous beyond measure.   If they were eating popsicles you had a popsicle.  If the father and his cousins were drinking beer you had a beer.  The father fixed my car for free multiple times.  He loaned me tools.  He loaned me his lawnmower.  They were as good neighbors as I've ever know.  One time we were over for dinner at their house.  I think it was a holiday for them.  They had a lot of family over.  But, then again, it was like that every Sunday there.  They served lamb, beers and strong Turkish coffee.  They had a huge gold embossed painting of Mecca on the wall in the dining room.  I asked the father if he had ever been there.  He laughed.  He said that no, he had never been because he could not give up his beer.  This was a man, an auto mechanic who worked hard for his family.  He loved God and he loved beer.  What's more American than that?  Picture him in your mind.  Out in his yard after a long day of work at the garage working on another car either for extra money or as a favor to a friend.  He's got his blue mechanic's shirt on. It's untucked and his belly shows a little.  The kids are playing in the back yard.  The mother comes out onto the front porch to call them all in for super.  There he is drinking his beer and taking care of his family.  The American Dream.  And he was a Muslim refugee.  

• Look, I'm super liberal but the New York Times and the UN can stick it up their asses.  Will out of touch adults always make bad decisions that belittle and alienate the people they need most and should serve most?  Probably.
• "We are all going to die" or "save us Doctor Manhattan".
• Hold freedom close. 

• Chris Schweizer talked about storytelling with Jerzy Drozd. 
• Also, Schweizer has a Patreon now. 
• Wrestling zine heavyweight champ Robert Newsome of The Atomic Elbow has a piece on Paste about the new DDT Universe streaming service. 
• Speaking of Robert Newsome, Athen Georgia's finest minicomics and zine fest had its registration yesterday and sold out fast.  So, I mean, I guess this news post is worthless to all you longstapler jockeys that might want a table but there's no reason every dang one of us can't go to Fluke on April 29th and have a fine time. 
• The Dollar Bin podcast is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year.   This week's podcast features America's most hugable cartoonist J. Chris Campbell interviewing Adam.  The whole world is upside down I tell's ya. 
• The bad news is that the Steelers are out of the playoffs.  The good news is that world champ sports cartoonist Rob Ullman will be starting a regular gig with DK Pittsburgh Sports. 
• I haven't watched that new Archie TV yet show but Abbey Coleslaw did and that's good enough for me. 
• And finally, Francis has a problem with taking the easy way out...

• Remember pals, life is hard.  Never stop running unless it's to pick up a friend.  Read comics and chew Glorp every day and you'll keep on livin' until you're dead. 

Your best pal ever,

Shannon Smith

p.s. I write comics.  Do you make comics?  Maybe you should hire me to write comics. 
p.p.s Say you want a leader but you can't seem to make up your mind. I think you'd better close it and let me guide you to my twitter feed.
p.p.p.s. Let's pretend we went to high school together on facebook.
p.p.p.p.s. Google + is another place you can read the same thing I posted here.
p.p.p.p.p.s. I'll tumblr for ya.
p.p.p.p.p.p.s.  Yeah, I do Instagram too.  I guess it's a law or something.

Other Comics News Parade-O-Links 01112017

(Star Wars issue 106.  Cover by Cynthia Martin.  Image stolen from Rebel Scum. )

Here are some things I found interesting in the world of minicomics, comic books, graphic novels, small press, self publishing, zines, webcomics, cartoons, digital comics, other, etc. during the week weeks ending 01/11/2017.

"Look, I don’t have time for this." - Steve Ditko.

• Hello sisters and brothers of teh intronets and welcome to another episode of your Other Comics News Parade-O-Links.  My name is Shannon and I'll be your host.  I've been away for a bit.  Well, I've been right here.  I've just been busy.  September through November is my busiest time of year at work.  Then after that holiday and family stuff took over.  Family first right?  But 2017 will be a big year for file under other.  2017 is an anniversary year so more on that down the road. 
• So, here we are.  My head and my heart are in knots.  I appologize in advance that this Parade-O-Links will be short on comics.  That's not comics' fault.  It's my fault.  I'm dealing with some things.  I'll get better.  For the 2nd time in the last five Presidential elections the person that received the largest amount of votes will not be our next President.  It happens.  Some people are concerned.  And with good reason.  Imagine the riots in the streets if two out of five Superbowl Championships were handed to the team with less points.  The last time this happened we invaded the wrong countries and went to war for fifteen years. So... good luck?  Look, our democracy failible.  Our democracy is fragile.  It's scary.  But one of the main reasons these United States have been safe from tyranny is that every four to eight years we have the peaceful removal and replacement of our top leader.  So whether your candidate won or lost, remember, this is temporary.  Maybe. 
• And by Maybe I mean please remember that Vladimir Putin circumvented Russia's constitution and appointed himself Prime Minister and then President after having exceeded Russia's term limits.  Again, democracy is fragile.
• Kompromat. 
• Don't take democracy for granted.  It can end.  Democracies end.  Some times by force and sometimes by will.  Sometimes they get pissed away.  

• Friends.  This isn't a political blog but I'm reporting to you live right now from the Unites States of America and this is just the world around us right now.  I know a lot of very smart people discourage artists, creative types and well, basically anyone that would like to attain employment at some point, to keep the political opinions off social media because it could be held against you and cost you gigs.  I get it. I get it.  But if we live in a country where you have to be afraid to speak your mind then we've already lost.  And personally, I don't want to work for or with people that don't respect my opinion. My mind, my glorious freaking mind, is exactly WHY you SHOULD want to work with me.  And if you're paying  me to shut up then you're wasting your money.  

 

• Guys.  I just need to take a moment to say that this webpage is doing some weird things with font that and alignment that are driving me crazy but I just don't have the patience to figure out right now.  Sorry.

• Enough about the future/end of the free world.  Let's talk about me. I recently drew a four page comic about "Handsome" Jimmy "The Boogie Woogie" Man Valiant and Magnet Man having a monster truck sumo battle for Brien Wayne Powell's Boogie Jam 4Ever. It's great.  You should buy seven copies.  Brien also has what has to be one of the longer running ongoing webcomics about Magnet Man and the Boogie Woogie Man's adventures over at Boogie Jam Online.  I've got some other wrasslin' comics in the works but they are top secret so you will have to wait to find out about them. (Or, ya know, just ask me.)
• Speaking of the word "handsome".  Does the way Taylor Swift pronounces "handsome" weird anyone else out?
• 2016 was a rough one for a lot of us.  It was a rough one for the world.  A lot of people have it worse than I do and I can be pretty miserable. There's a solid chance that tomorrow I'll wake up and my county's schools and hospitals will still be standing.  That's not true everywhere. So many have lost so much.  We focus on the death's of famous people because those folks are like our shared extended family.  There is a commonality there that we can empatize with.  I may know know you but if I know you loved David Bowie then I can understand how much it hurt a year ago when he left us.  You may not know me but if you loved Prince then I can tell you about how I bought my first guitar because of him when I was 15 and that I picked out a white one because of Purple Rain. Carrie Fisher meant so much to so many of us around the world.  She was the first girl I ever wanted to marry. She never stopped inspiring.  We need a million more of her.  Especially now. Comics also lost a lot of great ones. We will press on.  Forward.  Forward.  But don't forget. How could we?

• Those of you have been reading file under other for a while know that I usually end these posts with a video from our youtube pal Francis.  I hate to break internet kayfabe but Francis is just a character.  The man behind Francis is Steven Williams, also known as boogie2988.  I grew up in the same small town, watchin' cartoons and readin' comics at the same library.  He was a year behind me in school but I've know him since pre-school. He's a sweetheart and was always the funniest guy in the room. This past year he received one of the highest honors you can receive in video games without actually making them. I'm proud of ya' Boogie.  Ya done good.  Saint Paul High School represent!
• And now ladies and gentlemen...

THE BEST NEW semi-recent COMIC comics I READ THIS WEEK recently.

Disney Pirates of the Caribbean issues 1 and 2 by Chris Schweizer, Joe Flood and Marissa Louise.  Published by Joe Books LTD.  $2.99.

I didn't know much about this comic going into it beyond the fact that Chris Schweizer was writing it.  I missed the whole Pirates of the Caribbean movie phenomenon at the time the films came bout because my kids were not at the PG-13 age yet.  Those movies came out during a time when I pretyt much only saw talking animal movies.  But, I'm a sucker for any movie with a boat in it so I watched the 1st movie on Netflix recently after I bought these comics at my LCS but before I read them.  I liked the movie a lot.  It had boats in it. 

I loved both issues of this comic.  I think is really lovely from cover to cover. I don't know anything about the publisher Joe Books LTD or why they publish Disney comics instead of a comic book publisher Disney paid billions of dollars for but, the books are as good from cover to cover as anything on the stands and they cost a dollar or two less.  Consider me a fan.  

Schweizer's writing is as great as I expected it to be.  Each comic is a fully realized self contained speedy adventure with a full cast of individually motivated interesting characters.  The character's speech and motivations are consistent with the one film I saw.  The wit is very sharp.  Schweizer doesn't go too many panels without a punchline. 

I was a bit dissappointed to see that Schweizer was not also drawing this book but Joe Flood does a great job.  The design is solid and pleasantly consistent with the Disney Infinity video game style that I love so much.  The real challenge with this book is capturing Captain Jack's mannerism's Flood never drops character.  

The book looks great cover to cover.  Marissa Louise is credited with the colors on the first issue and I'm assuming Flood did the colors himself on the second.  I like the style of both.  My personal preference in colors is for them to be very flat. I don't like colorists that are into rendering. I like flat colors with a bit of that enhance the light and dark of the inks.  That's pretty much the style we see here.  The pallet is a bit brown for my personal tastes but it fits the story, time and location and is consistent with the movie I watched.  Interior and night time scenes are appropriately dark but the characters still pop.  

As I said before, I really don't know anything about Joe Books or these Disney comics yet (I'll look it up eventually) but if they put out 20 more issues of this with Schweizer as the writer I'll be sure to buy them and they'll probably be the first books I read from the ol' pull list any time they come out.  I couldn't find these on Comixology so if you're interested in them I suggest you ask your LCS to snag you some copies. 

• And finally... Hey guys, 2016 wasn't all bad.  Francis made a friend!

• Remember pals, life is hard.  Never stop running unless it's to pick up a friend.  Read comics and chew Glorp every day and you'll keep on livin' until you're dead. 

Your best pal ever,
Shannon Smith

p.s. I write comics.  Do you make comics?  Maybe you should hire me to write comics. 

p.p.s Say you want a leader but you can't seem to make up your mind. I think you'd better close it and let me guide you to my twitter feed.

p.p.p.s. Let's pretend we went to high school together on facebook.

p.p.p.p.s. Google + is another place you can read the same thing I posted here.

p.p.p.p.p.s. I'll tumblr for ya.

p.p.p.p.p.p.s.  Yeah, I do Instagram too.  I guess it's a law or something.

Other Comics News Parade-O-Links 01062013

(Chris Ware covering The New Yorker stolen from the The New Yorker.)

Here are some things I found interesting in the world of minicomics, comic books, graphic novels, small press, self publishing, zines, webcomics, cartoons, digital comics, other, etc. during the week ending 01062013:

 "This has been a struggle in comics. You deal with a lot of different egos, not only egos but failings of human character and behavior. It's a real struggle to uplift. The people that I try to uplift... I'm not some kind of cop, or a superhero, trying to make people better. I care about people, I care about my community, I care about comics way too much to focus only on myself. We live in this curious time right now, we have the DIY tools to only care about yourself, to only pimp yourself, to only hype yourself and your work. I spend an inordinate amount of time hyping other people, basically curating a life of my influences, the things that I like."  -Dean Haspiel.

• Happy new year brothers and sisters!  Here is hoping this year is better for all of us than we deserve.
• "Best of" time of year is upon us people.  Here are the "best new single print comics" that I read each week in 2012 (when I remembered to).  I'm still finishing up my best of 2011 list but I hope to get one up for 2012 soon.  
• Tucker Stone named 19 best comics of 2012.  
• Rob at Panel Patter listed some best minicomics.  
• Forces of Geek had Josh Latta list off some stuff in their run down.  
• Ben Towle posted a solid three pages of goodness from 2012.  
• Patrick Dean was a part of Robot 6's year end thing and showed off a page in progress from his next comic.  Also, Patrick Dean used to draw this own t-shirts. 
• The Beat has its annual year end survey up. 
• Tom Spurgeon at  is The Comics Reporter and he posted 50 positives for 2012.  Tom has also been increasingly hilarious on twitter lately-  "putting final touches on Sunday's feature "11,427 comics negatives for 2012"  Make sure you also scroll through The Comics Reporter site to read all of the holiday interviews.  That Haspiel interview was something. 

• For several hours on Friday of this week, Rob Ullman was the most famous cartoonist in the United States.  For those of you that don't follow sports and are too lazy to click that link, the short version of the story is that multiple sports and news websites picked up on New York Jets' head coach Rex Ryan showing off a tattoo of his wife wearing his quarterback's jersey.  Then, some upaid intern that knows how to use google image search journalist figured out that the tattoo looks a lot like Rob Ullman's good girl sports babe art.  I do follow sports and when I first saw the headline on ESPN I just knew the tattoo would look like Rob's work without even clicking the link.  You can get your own drawings of Rex Ryan's your wife wearing your favorite sports jersey here. 

(Image stolen from Rob Ullman.)

• Some lucky kids got to go check out some Jack Davis art at the Georgia Museum of Art.
• Congratulations George Lucas.  You sell off Star Wars, give the money to charity then get engaged to a  lovely lady 20 years younger than you and filthy rich.  You have won. 
• Cavemen were super into animation.   Personally, I think it is more likely that they were just drawing a full and literal impression of what the creatures did.  Kind of like that thing Grant Morrison talks about how if you did all the same drugs he did you could see your whole past trailing behind you all the way back to the big bang.  Or something. 
• Every once in a while we have to remember to go see what Jeff Bridges has been drawing about lately. 
• Robert Newsome's talking and music podcast went up a day late this week and in the 24 hours or so that I had to wait I almost ended it all thinking it would never happen.  Now I know how your dog feels every time you leave the house.  But high five Robert because it was literally the only weekly podcast I listen to that managed to go up this week.  Sad week for ears.

(Here is a pic of Brad McGinty and Josh Latta just because I love those jerks.  Stolen from Josh Latta's facebook.)

• Rob Clough talked about Ed Piskor's Wizzywig. 
• Pals Matt Smith and Jeremy Massie have a new book in the Diamond catalog.  I ordered a copy.  It was probably the first time I've looked through the Diamond catalog in over six years.  Their book is in the As of the indie section.  In that same section, I noticed there were some older Rich Tommaso books listed.  Miriam and 8 1/2 Ghosts.  I highly recommend those. 
• Peter David had a stroke over the holidays.  Here is how you can help him out.  I met him once and he was very nice.  Nicer than he needed to have been while signing my stack of comics.  I like his comics plenty. 
• Chris Schweizer on leaving SCAD Atlanta to focus on making more comics and forming a studio.  Also, go check out Chris' blog and look at those drawings of Stan Sakai and Jeff Smith. 
• I'm not going to loan out my f#(%ing Playstation to Tom,  He's a dick. 

THE BEST SINGLE NEW PRINT COMIC I READ THIS WEEK...

(Image stolen from ComicVine.)

...was not Avenging Spider-Man #15.1.  That comic is just re-cap and filler behind a cover that hopes to cash in on The Amazing Spider-Man #700 hype.  Nothing in it moves the story or the character and it is really weird that the 1st in continuity appearance of the new Superior Spider-Man would happen in a tossed off point one comic.  It also was not Superman #15.  What a stinking mess.  I really was liking the Scott Lobdell and Kenneth Rocafort team on Superman but now they are stuck in a damned crossover.  Which sums up where the New 52 is in the early stages of its second year- death by editorial mandate.  The best comic I read this week could have been Batman Incorporated #6.  Another good Batman comic from Grant Morrison and Chris Burnham but the story does not move very far.  Batman fights his way through a Game of Death building while exposition is shouted at him through and intercom or something.  Good comic but no, I'll give the edge this week to All-New X-Men #5 by Brian Michael Bendis, Stuart Immonen and a whole bunch of other people.  This comic has been a lot of fun so far.  Everything I want in an X-Men comic.  Most of the characters I'd want and all the X-Men drama an X-Men comic needs.  Bendis is perfect for this people.  Dialog on top of dialog is what he is and that is what the X-Men have been since Claremont's best days.  Duh.  Of course he would nail this.  And Immonen is doing some really great work.  So good that you can actually figure out what is going through the 100 shades of brown the colorist is covering all the art with.   And the amazing thing is that this comic has a story.  Original X-Men in the current X-Men world is such a simple and obvious idea that it is great.  But forget all that, the reason that this comic is the single new print comic that I read this week is because, finally, finally, Kitty Pryde gets her moment.  SPOILER  Kitty Pryde being the mentor to the original X-Men in the current X-Men world is a great comics idea.  And I'm telling you people, Kitty Pryde is the most important X-Man of them all.  Seriously.  I will fight you. 

• And finally...he got that ass whippin' straight out of Burke county. 

Oh, and one more last thing!  Did you know you can leave comments on these posts here at file under other?  It's true!  And, I'll probably respond.  Twitter and facebook killed the message boards but that's no reason why you can't argue with me, praise me or leave me recipes.  It's your intronet.  Have fun!

And that's just a taste of some of the interesting things going out there in the wonderful world of comics and things. I can't keep up with it all but I do keep up with a lot of it on twitter and I try to re-tweet the good stuff. You should probably follow me there. If you did something to make comics better this week then high-five!

Your best pal ever,

Shannon Smith

p.s. Say you want a leader but you can't seem to make up your mind. I think you'd better close it and let me guide you to my twitter feed.

p.p.s. Let's pretend we went to high school together on facebook.

p.p.p.s. Google + is another place you can read the same thing I posted here.

p.p.p.p.s. I'll tumblr for ya.

Other Comics News Parade-O-Links 06172012

(Sexy Stanley Cup Champion LA Kings lady by Rob Ullman stolen from Atom Bomb Bikini.)

Just because file under other does not currently have a lot of time to talk about all the wonderful things that should be filed under other it does not mean that wonderful things are not happening. Here are some things I found interesting in the world of minicomics, small press, self publishing, zines, webcomics etc. during the week ending 06172012:

• This week everything came up Crogan.  The great Chris Schweizer was features in a lengthy interview at The Comics Reporter.  Schweizer was also features on the War Rocket Ajax podcast.  Listen to the very end of the podcast, past the end music to hear a great Schweizer vs. gator story.  Schweizer is a master class level cartoonist and one of the most likable guys you will ever meet but the real thing that sets him apart from common man is that he has gator stories.  Do you have gator stories?
• A lot of awful things happened in comics this week.  Some of them involved Catwoman's butt.  I'm not going to talk about Catwoman's butt.
• Speaking of not-Catwoman's butt- Dale Earnhardt Jr., the world's most popular race car driver (currently ranked 2nd in championship points) will be driving a Batman  (The Dark Night Rises) themed race car this afternoon (and by this afternoon, I mean Sunday June 17 at noon in Michigan, USA.) and it is probably the coolest looking race car I've ever seen.  If the Batmobile wins that race my head will be exploded. 

• The Batmobile pictured above was averaging speeds over 200mph in practice on Friday and Saturday but late Saturday evening NASCAR made the totally insane move of changing the tires that will be used on the left side of the cars during the race.  The different tire is slower but decidedly more dangerous.  The theory is that because the drivers were setting record breaking speeds that the way to keep them from going too fast and possibly having blowouts is to make them use an awful six year old tire that will make them all wreck before they get going fast enough to wreck.  NASCAR is an insane stupid governing body folks.  But at least they ain't professional boxing and them boys (and girls) go real fast.  Oh, and Batman!  (See, comics everybody.  Comics!)
• UPDATE:  The Batmobile won!
• Speaking of Batpants- Batman is crazy yo.
• Speaking of crazy- Oh that wacky Owlman. 
• My pal Jeremy Massie had a new baby.  (Via Jeremy Massie's wife.)  Babies are expensive.  Go buy his comics or something. 
• Can I just take a moment to tell you that I loves me some J. Chris Campbell?  And J. Chris Campbell loves him some Spider-Man.  I loves me some Spider-Man too.  My 1st Spidey comics were Marvel Team-Up 85 and Marvel Team-Up Annual 2.  Both were from 1979 but I'm not sure which came out first.  They are in my basement on a spinner rack.  (Oh, and J. Chris buddy-  you should totally go buy the first three or four Essential Spider-Man collections at HeroesCon for like five bucks a piece.  They are wonderful.) 
• Oh hey wow, HeroesCon is totally a thing that is happening this week.  Most all of my most beloved comics pals and comics heroes are going to be there.  The guest list is staggering.  I hope to be there on Indie Island and I hope to find the time to talk more about it this week. 
• I really want to link to this nice piece Tom Spurgeon did on Daredevil over at The Comics Reporter but teh intronets is currently not letting me access The Comics Reporter.  It tells me it is unable to connect to my database which is totally horse patootie because I can access the rest of teh intronets.  So, here is a link to a really cool thing Matt Seneca wrote about Daredevil. 
• Speaking of Matt Seneca-  Comic books still continue to burn in hell and they seem to be burning better and better each week.  You know what the difference between fanboy podcasts and serious critical discourse podcasts is?  8.6.  That's right.  8.6 on the F-bomb-o-meter.  
• Speaking of podcasts-  Last week's Tell Me Something I Don't Know featured Ed Piskor and it was very good. 
• Shaenon Garrity is most likely insane so you probably want to go check out these webcomics reviews before the flood of webcomic link emails to The Comics Journal shuts down the entire introwebnets forever. 
• Gonna have to cut this week's report a bit shorter than I had hoped.  I've got a notepad full off a bunch of other things I wanted to talk about but I just got back from Chattanooga TN earlier today.  (And by today, I mean Saturday when I typed this up.)  The good thing is, as of yesterday, no one I am related to is in the hospital.  Knock on wood.  The bad news is I've been coughing up something scarier than Prometheus for the past week.  I'ma gonna go to bed.  Oh, but first, let's talk about Tennessee radio.  Tennessee is a radio black hole.  No rock.  No roll.  No sanity.  There are only three kinds of radio in Tennessee-  Country, Jesus and whatever-you-call-the-kind-of-radio-where-they-only-talk-about-impeaching-and/or-murdering-President-Obama.  Black.  Hole.  Good luck not going crazy Tennessee. I honestly very much enjoy Tennessee and its fine people but dang, that radio, whooo hoo wee.  Yalls is crazy.  Jesus may love country music but he does not like hate so you might wanna tone down the whole murdering the President thing.  God bless ya. 

And that's just a taste of some of the interesting things going out there in the wonderful world of comics and things. I can't keep up with it all but I do keep up with a lot of it on twitter and I try to re-tweet the good stuff. You should probably follow me there. If you did something to make comics better this week then high-five!

Your best pal ever,

Shannon Smith

p.s. Say you want a leader but you can't seem to make up your mind. I think you'd better close it and let me guide you to my twitter feed.

p.p.s. Let's pretend we went to high school together on facebook.

p.p.p.s. Google + is another place you can read the same thing I posted here.

p.p.p.p.s. I'll tumblr for ya.

Fluke Loot 2008 part one.

Way back in April I came home from Fluke with a nice big box of minicomics. I promised to review all of the minis that were given to me. This will take several posts so if your mini is not mentioned then just hang in there. I promise I'll get to it. (If I paid money for your mini then maybe not.)

Regina Rich Middle School Detective by Chris Schweizer.

This little book is pretty fantastic. Great production. Full color cover and interiors. The story would be a great read for middle school boys or girls. Schweizer's drawing is nice and thick and chunky and a lot of fun to look at. The story is really clever but not too clever that a "tween" wouldn't be able to follow along and enjoy it. It reminds me of some of the better after school cartoons. It's the type of book I'd love to give to a kid but I'm greedy. I'm keeping my copy.

No Sweat #1 by Allen Spetnagel.

This is just a collection of sketches. I like these little sketch books. They are a great idea for comics and zine shows like Fluke. They are easy to throw together and are good trading and giveaway material. Slightly better than a business card and thousands of times the trouble to make. Genius! All that being said, (and I've said this before here at file under other) they are hard to review. The drawing in this one is nothing especially impressive but there are some funny gags like a unicorn reading a majick book.

Animals With Problems by Joe Rice.

This is another sketchbook mini. Not a lot to it but I like the size of it. It's tiny and the edges are rounded making it a comfortable little thing to hold. The smoking pig pic above pretty much sums up what's going on in this thing. I was more impressed by the art I found on Rice's website.

Mycology by Matthew Hieggelke.

This is a nicely produced little mini with a six page story about a couple moving into an apartment with a serious fungus problem. It's a Twilight Zone kind of story and I always love that type of thing. It's impressive to see it pulled off in just six pages. The drawing is minimal but effective. The cover has this really cool glow in the dark ink but I can't really show that to you with a scanner. Sorry. You'll have to get your own copy to see it.

Everybody Hurts, Even Sith Lords by Alex Bullett.

This is one of my favorite books I picked up at Fluke not only because I'm a Star Wars nerd but because it's really funny and well crafted. The cover is cut to compliment the shape of Darth Vader's helmet and the inside cover has a neat Vader pattern. The drawing has a Jim Mahfood look to it which is great for this kind of comedy. The story is funny and has some good laughs playing on the idea of Vader as a misunderstood love scorned REM fan. Vader apparently has an i pod built in to that chest plate thing but still has to wear headphones. Who knew? There are several fun guest pin-ups in the back. I especially like the one by Sean Knickerbocker. I liked this book so much I bought an extra copy to give to a friend.

More Fluke reviews coming soon true believers!

Your best pal ever,

Shannon Smith