Mature Reading – Page 73

March 16, 2011March 19, 2011

Twilight of the Assholes: Cartoons and Essays

By Tim Kreider (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-398-9

This book is intended to make adults laugh and think. If the title isn’t clue enough, please be warned that these pages contain nudity, sexual imagery, intentionally insulting images of political figures and rational opinions clothed in harsh language and thought-provoking political comedy.

If that sort of thing offends you or you believe that blasphemy is a sin and/or a crime, read no further and don’t buy this book. The rest of us will just have to manage without you.

The early years of the 21^st century were plagued with horrors and disasters exacerbated by a hideous global proliferation of lying, greedy, venal, demented and just plain stupid rulers and governments who finally elevated politicians to that phylum of useless tools and pimples on the butt of humanity once only occupied by lawyers.

Since then bankers, astrologers, wedding planners, doorstep evangelists, celebrity gossip columnists and all types of psychics have joined their rarefied ranks and I’m thinking I need to cut down on coffee or tighten my critical parametersâ€¦

When George Dubya Bush acceded to the throne of America there were a lot of apologetic liberals and whooping goons. There was also cartoonist Ted Kreider.

Born in 1967 and raised on comicbooks whilst actually paying attention in school, Kreider is an erudite and passionate man with thoughtfully reasoned opinions on politics, religion and the human condition among many other things. He is also an extremely gifted writer and cartoonist who began self publishing in 1994.

By 1997 The Baltimore City Paper had picked up his deliciously polemical panel strip-with-accompanying essay ‘The Pain – When Will it End?’ and they were closely followed by the Jackson Planet Weekly, Illinois’ Indy in Bloomington-Normal, The New York Press, The Stranger, Philadelphia Weekly plus other independent and alternative papers. In September 2000 Kreider began releasing the material as a webcomic.

Although a self-confessed left-leaning Democrat, that hasn’t ever stopped him punishing his own camp’s many gaffes, goofs, lies, embarrassments and ideological idiocies. Like our own Gerald Scarfe and Steve Bell with Margaret Thatcher, Kreider was lucky enough (if you discount elevated blood-pressure, maxed-out sense of disbelief and perpetually outraged moral compass) to have been given the gift of a perfect incumbent target in the Bush administration of 2000-2008 and the greater, right-wing anti-intellectual, Christian-fundamentalist crusade/pogrom that brought them to power.

Along the way Kreider also managed to incense other churches and faiths from Catholics to Moslems, all manner of bigot from racists to homophobes and outrage proponents of all those other aspects of modern US society that makes all us non-Americans nervous and giggly in equal measure.

Subtitled ‘Volume II of the Chronicles of the Era of Darkness 2004-2009’ this weighty and hilariously biting collection of gags and commentaries covers the – to Kreider especially – incomprehensible re-election and second term of the Republican Saviour and his dark apostles Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rove, Rice and the rest, whilst still finding room and Reasonable Cause to pictorially pummel Chinese expansion, assorted religions’ definitions of life and attitudes to sex, aspects and definitions of Freedom, geopolitics and Big Oil, Intelligent Design, the new Russian Empire, Secret Fantasies of the rich and statesmanlike, Crackpot Theories and all sorts of Science: from the author’s spirited defence of Pluto’s planet-hood to Human-Animal Hybrids, Parallel Universes and new roles for the Giant Squidâ€¦

With stunning examples of the cartoonist’s eternal roles as social conscience, intellectual champion, puncturer of pomposity and lampooning last bastion of grace under oppressive political pressure, Kreider boldly kicks the shins of the smug over-class and stamps on the toes of all the entrenched whited sepulchres and obnoxiously applied shibboleths that made him annoyed and ashamed of huge swathes of his fellow Americans. Not that Britain or any other colonial power has any moral high-ground to sneer down fromâ€¦

The work covers the period November 4^th 2004 to October 29^th 2009 and includes the shocked rapture of a Democratic win and the nation’s first non-white president â€“ and ends with a shaky dawning suspicion that all politicians might just be the sameâ€¦

Particularly effective are ‘Jesus vs. Jeezus’, ‘The Conservative Christian’s Guide to Compassion’, ‘I â€œheartâ€ Saddam’, ‘The War on Christmas’, ‘Americans vs. ‘Muricans’, ‘What is Freedom?’, ‘Me & George, We Got Problems’, ‘Silver Linings of the Holocaust’, ‘What You Can Do to Fight the War on Sex’, ‘Everything I Know I Learned from the Bush Administration’, ‘Secret Vices of the Liberals’, ‘Republican Sex Toys’, ‘God: Republican or Democrat?’, ‘After All the Money’s Gone’, ‘We Even Yet?’ and the 5-part ‘Contributions of the World’s Religions’ but there’s guaranteed to be something to shockÂ or offend everybody here – you might even be compelled to think for yourself and question a little bit moreâ€¦

Excoriating, withering humour and viciously necessary satire tellingly rendered and savage yet personable and winningly intimate reportage make this one of the best cartoon coshes ever applied to the politics of this century.

His previous collections include The Pain – When Will It End? (2004) and Why Do They Kill Me? or: Scream, Honkey, Scream (2005), and I look forward to more from Kreider in the sorry certainty that people won’t get less stupid, rulers can’t change their spots and religions will never stop dictating what their followers can think or feelâ€¦

March 15, 2011March 14, 2011

Axa volumes 3 and 4

By Donne Avenell & Enrique Badia Romero (Ken Pierce Books)
Vol. 3 No ISBN: 0-912277-00-9Â Vol. 4 no ISBN: 0-912277-00-9

During the 1970s British newspapers radically altered much of their style and content to varying degrees in response to the seemingly inexorable move towards female social emancipation and sexual equality. Nevertheless, this somehow allowed newspaper editors to squeeze in even more undraped women, who finally escaped from the perfectly rendered comics strips and onto the regular pages, usually the third one, the centre-spreads and into the fashion featuresâ€¦

The only place where truly strong female role-models were taken seriously was the aforementioned cartoon sections but even there the likes of Modesty Blaise, Danielle, Scarth, Amanda and all the other capable ladies who walked all over the oppressor gender, both humorously and in straight adventure scenarios, lost clothes and shed undies repeatedly, continuously and in the manner they always hadâ€¦

Nobody complained (no one important or who was ever taken seriously): it was just tradition and the idiom of the mediumâ€¦ and besides, artists liked to draw bare-naked ladies as much as blokes liked to see them and it was even educational for the kiddies – who could buy any newspaper in any shop without interference even if they couldn’t get into cinemas to view Flashdance, Trading Places, Octopussy or Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone without an accompanying adultâ€¦

Sales kept going upâ€¦

Take-charge chicks were almost commonplace when the Star Wars phenomenon reinvigorated public interest in science fiction and the old standby of scantily-clad, curvy amazons and post-apocalyptic wonderlands regained their sales-appeal. Thus The Sun hired Enrique Badia Romero and Donne Avenell to produce just such an attention-getter for their already well-stacked cartoon section.

Romero had begun his career in Spain in 1953, producing everything from westerns, sports, war stories and trading cards, often in conjunction with his brother Jorge BadÃa Romero. He even formed his own publishing house. â€œEnricâ€ began working for the higher-paying UK market in the 1960s on strips such as ‘Cathy and Wendy’, ‘Isometrics’ and ‘Cassius Clay’ before successfully assuming the drawing duties on the high-profile Modesty Blaise strip in 1970 (see Modesty Blaise: The Hell Makers and Modesty Blaise: The Green Eyed Monster), only leaving when this enticing new prospect appeared.

In 1986 political and editorial intrigue saw Axa cancelled in the middle of a story and Romero returned to the bodacious Blaise until creator/writer Peter O’Donnell retired in 2001. Since then he has produced Modesty material for Scandinavia and a number of projects such as Durham Red for 2000AD.

Axa ran in The Sun Monday to Saturday from 1978 to her abrupt disappearance in 1986 and other than these slim volumes from strip historian Ken Pierce has never been graced with a definitive collection. It should be noted also that at the time of these books the strip was still being published to great acclaim.

In the first two volumes Axa, a pampered citizen of a sterile, domed community in 2080AD, rebelled against her antiseptic society’s cloying strictures and escaped to the ravaged, mutant-infested post apocalyptic wilderness to be free. Her journeys took her across the ravaged planet, discovering lost enclaves and encountering bizarre new tribes and cultures.

The third volume opens with an avid appreciation by C.C. Beck, the â€œCrusty Curmudgeonâ€ most celebrated as co-creator of the Shazam!-shouting Captain Marvel before the nubile nomad resumed her explorations in ‘Axa the Brave’ with her latest companion Jason Arkady in tow. Crossing a frozen wasteland reclaimed by wolves after man’s Great Contamination excised human civilisation, the pair stagger into a lush tropical valley populated by dinosaurs and cavemen.

The historical anomalies are disturbing and dangerous enough, but when they were invited to join the new stone-agers they uncovered an even greater enigma: the cave-walls were covered in paintings of robots and weird machinesâ€¦ The secret of the hidden valley is yet another example of the brilliance and folly of the lost human civilisation and leads the unstoppable freedom-seeker to a swamp-city where an enclave of scientists had survived the disasterâ€¦

The hidden sages had a big plan to reshape the world and wanted Axa aboard, so they built her the perfect companion: a faithful, semi-sentient laser-wielding robot dubbed Mark 10 who instantly aroused the jealous ire of Jason. As so often the case however, Axa’s male benefactors had hidden plans for her but the scientists had built too well and the utterly devoted Mark came rattling rapidly to her rescueâ€¦

In ‘Axa the Gambler’ the winsome wanderer, with Mark and Jason faithfully following, stumbled onto a community where wagering was the basis for existence and pilgrims came from miles around to bet with the fervour of religious zealots.

In The City of Hope patrons worshipped Las Vegan relics, seeking instant gratification for their greedy, hungry prayers. Soon Jason had caught the bug and gambled away all their meager possessions including the magnificent ancient sword Axa had carried since her first escape from the Domed City.

Of course the game was fixed, but with Mark’s cybernetic intervention Axa recouped all their losses, narrowly escaping the hidden penalty that underpinned the barter-economy of the City: when you don’t have any more goods to wager with, you become the property of the houseâ€¦

When Jason discovered a historic family link to big boss Mr. Nero he switched allegiance and Axa ended up fighting for her life and liberty in the gladiatorial arena beside motorcycle warrior Dirk. With freedom her greatest love, Axa inevitably engineered Nero’s bloody fall, but lost Jason to the lure of greed and an idle life of pleasureâ€¦

Axa 4 begins with an appreciation and â€œpreviously onâ€¦â€ by publisher Bernie McCarty before ‘Axa the Earthbound’ saw the blonde bombshell and Dirk hunting the missing mechanical Mark 10 through a haunted, monster-haunted swamp until they stumbled upon a lost oasis of beauty – a veritable paradise amidst the ruins of the world.

In a ramshackle old house lived aged Joy Eden who happily welcomed the wanderers to stay. Axa was subtly drawn to the aged free spirit’s talk of Mother Earth and pagan renewal but Dirk had his suspicions: did the old lady thrive despite the mutants and mud-monstersâ€¦ or because of them?

Deeply steeped in Earth-magic and transformative mysticism, did the lonely old crone have another reason for keeping Dirk and Axa within the tumbledown walls of her â€œSeventh Heavenâ€â€¦ and just what did happen to the coldly technological but absolutely loyal Mark?

Ending as always in bitter revelation, chilling conflict and spectacular conflagration the denouements led the explorers back into the desert wastes in ‘Axa the Tempted’. Their trek brought them to the coast where mutated seaweed and giant sea-life threatened to end their trials for ever and whilst fleeing giant land-crustaceans the couple found an ancient beached ocean-liner from where inbred pirates raided other coastal settlements for slaves, provisions and â€œOld Peopleâ€ technological artifacts.

Escaping from â€œThe Crewmenâ€, Axa and Dirk allied themselves with the united sea-villagers and the heroic Cap, King of the Coast, who protects the scattered communities from pirate depredations. The wily wild-girl was strangely attracted to the larger-than-life champion and his luxurious life of adventure, excitement and bold deeds, but Dirk had mysteriously vanished and something just didn’t ring true about the magnanimous warrior-kingâ€¦

Once more bitter disappointment and righteous indignation awaited Axa as she once more learned that no matter where she roamed men were all the same whilst greed and depravity had not vanished with the Old Ones and their Great Contamination.

These tales are superb examples of the uniquely British newspaper strip style: lavishly drawn, subversively written, expansive in scope and utterly enchanting in their basic simplicity – with lots of flashed flesh, emphatic action and sly humour. Eminently readable and re-readable (and there’s still that dwindling promise of a major motion picture) Axa is long overdue for a definitive collection. so here’s hoping there’s a bold publisher out there looking for the next big thingâ€¦

March 14, 2011March 12, 2011

John Constantine, Hellblazer: Tainted Love

By Garth Ennis & Steve Dillon (Vertigo)
ISBN: 978-1-85286-994-6

John Constantine is probably the greatest anti-hero in comics: a cynical, wide-boy magician and seedy, troubled soul who danced on the edge of damnation every minute of his life, ever unsure of his own motives, shrewdly manipulating events and standing back just to see what happens.

Collecting issues #68-71 of the monthly comicbook, the Heartland one-shot, Hellblazer Special #1 and the Constantine tale from Vertigo Jam #1 this volume describes with astonishing effect the absolute nadir in the Scouse sorcerer’s chequered career and also reveals some hidden secrets from his sordid pastâ€¦ Also included herein is an impressive ‘Hellblazer Gallery’ with stunning contributions from Glenn Fabry, Gary Erskine, Richard Case and Phil Winslade as well as the beautiful Fabry covers which accompanied the original tales.

After years of saving the world without even knowing why – although he feared it was just to spite beings who thought themselves better than him – Constantine fell in love with Irish ex-pat Kit Ryan and seemed on the verge of turning his hell-bent life around, before as usual, his magical heritage and nasty nature messed it all up.

Kit returned to Ireland and Constantine fell apart, hitting the bottle harder than ever and ending up a booze-soaked derelict on London’s cold, hard streets. However, as low as he’s fallen, the entities he’s mocked, manipulated and made mischief with are unforgiving and ready to make things as bad as they can ever getâ€¦

This eclectic collection of most-modern horror-thrillers opens with the two-part ‘Last Night of the King of the Vampires’, the final encounter between Constantine and the supernal monster who had fed on humanity since we came down out the trees. Immortal, worldly-wise and blasÃ© as he was the undying lych had never been so grossly insulted as when he first met and propositioned the arrogant magus in Hellblazer: Bloodlines.

Now in ‘Down All the Days’ the decadent bloodsucker executes his revenge on the debased, addled, gin-soaked street trash, determined to wring the last vestige of humiliation, pain and terror out of his fallen foe, commencing by killing the only person still talking to the Hellblazer in ‘Rough Trade’.

However, even in the very pit of despair Constantine had a surprise up his tattered sleeve. It’s not even that he particularly wanted to live; it’s simply his accursed pride wouldn’t let an overbearing, smug, supernatural tosser have the last wordâ€¦

The second story-arc ‘Fall and Rise’ opens with the eponymous ‘Tainted Love’ (from Vertigo Jam #1) as the old souse relates a salutary tale to a fellow drunk. Once upon a time Constantine had a mate who was a bit of a player. And when Seth cheated on his girlfriend the wizard was there to profit from the revenge sex with Annette. Trouble was the wronged girl had more in mind than tit-for-tat and sneaked a peak at Constantine’s spell-books. Before the blood and dust settled Seth and Annette had both learned not to meddle with the dark arts and that in the end love hurtsâ€¦ and hurts and hurts and hurtsâ€¦

Whilst the mage was pickling his brains and liver, Kit Ryan had returned to her home and broken family in Belfast. ‘Heartland’ – a superbly poignant shaggy dog tale – saw Kit revisit her formative years and able demonstrated that not all horror stems from devils and demons. Too often the monsters are usâ€¦

Constantine’s return to grace and glory finally began with ‘Finest Hour’ as the burned out wreck lay down to die by the river and was sucked into the life and final moments of a Spitfire pilot who had been shot down in flames during the Battle of Britain. Revitalised by his death-or-life experience the wizard took hold of himself and sobered up; ready to face the world once more, beginning with giving his ghostly saviour a decent and long-deserved send-offâ€¦

This episodic and eerily eccentric compendium closes with ‘Confessional’ (from Hellblazer Special #1) as the cleaned up conjuror has a chance second encounter with a defrocked priest who nearly succeeded where uncounted eldritch horrors had failed. Long ago a runaway teen named John Constantine hitched a lift with the wrong man, and now decades later there’s a piper to be paidâ€¦

I’m once again avoiding specific details since these masterful examples of bravura storytelling from Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon should be enjoyed without any dilution – but for the greatest impact you should also have handy their other collaborations. So track down >Hellblazer: Dangerous Habits, the aforementioned Bloodlines, Fear and Loathing and Damnation’s Flame to embark on a truly moving, terrifying and incredible experience.

Hellblazer is a superb series about flawed heroism and desperate necessity, with a tragic everyman anti-hero compelled to do the right thing no matter what the cost, arrayed against the worst that the world can offer. It’s also the best horror drama in comics and worthy of your devoted attention. Adult comics just don’t come any better than this

March 10, 2011March 12, 2011

StormWatch: Final Orbit

By Warren Ellis, Bryan Hitch & Paul Neary, Michael Ryan & Luke Rizzo and Chris Sprouse & Kevin Nowlan (WildStorm/ DC Comics/Dark Horse Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-84023-381-0

One era ended and another began with the brace of tales collected in this slim tome: a rare positive example of the often vilified (by me particularly) movie property/comicbook crossover events and one which actually impinges on and affects the continuity of one if not both partners in the enterprise.

StormWatch was the UN’s Special Crisis Intervention unit; created to manage global threats and superhuman menaces with international ramifications. From their Skywatch satellite in orbit above Earth they observed, waiting for a member nation to call for helpâ€¦

The multinational mini-army comprised surveillance and intelligence specialists, tech support units, historians, researchers, detention facilities, combat analysts, divisions of uniquely trained troops, a squadron of state-of-the-art out-atmosphere fighter planes and a band of dedicated superheroes for front-line situations beyond the scope of mere mortals. In the pilot’s seat was the incorruptible overseer codenamed â€œWeathermanâ€.

The title was part of the 1990s comics revolution which saw celebrated young creators abandon major â€œwork-for-hireâ€ publishers to set up their own companies and titles – with all the benefits and drawbacks that entailed. Like most of those glossy, formulaic, style-over-content, painfully derivative titles, it started with honest enthusiasm but soon bogged down for lack of ideas.

Warren Ellis took over the moribund morass with issue #37 (collected in assorted graphic novels and reviewed in here recently) and immediately began kicking some life into the title. Soon the series became an edgy, unmissable treatise on modern heroism and the uses and abuses of power. Making the book unquestionably his plaything Ellis slowly evolved StormWatch out of existence, to be reborn as the no-rules-unbroken landmark The Authority.

This volume collects the concluding issues of the comic’s second volume (#11-12) between which a WildC.A.T.s/Aliens one-shot neatly slotted in to change that particular fictional universe forever.

It all begins with ‘No Reason’ (illustrated by Bryan Hitch & Paul Neary and Michael Ryan & Luke Rizzo) as the assembled heroes and foot-soldiers of the UN Crisis Intervention organisation detect an odd asteroid moving towards Earth. Dispatching two shuttles to examine and divert the giant rock before it can fall into our planet’s gravity-well, the explorers soon realise it’s a vessel of unknown origins.

When contact is lost the assorted tensions rise, but the re-routing of the ominous astral intruder goes off as planned and the mysterious moonlet is soon heading into the sun. However only one ship is returning to Skywatch and they aren’t answering the radioâ€¦

WildC.A.T.s/Aliens (Ellis, Chris Sprouse & Kevin Nowlan) opens with a StormWatch life-pod crashing into Manhattan: its few battered survivors telling of an alien attack by creatures all fangs and rage and spitting acid. The creatures were unstoppable and as soon as the refugees had escaped Weatherman sealed the space-station in an unbreakable quarantineâ€¦

Rogue heroes WildC.A.T.S, fearing the aliens are their marauding Daemonite enemies, decide to break the global protocols and investigate the locked down StormWatch citadel. But the beasts they find there are like nothing they have ever experienced beforeâ€¦

In one of the few comics situations where Ridley Scott and James Cameron’s Aliens truly worked and fully displayed their awesome ferocity, the WildC.A.T.S only just rescue the scant survivors of StormWatch’s 500+ compliment of mortals and metahumans, before sending the irreparably contaminated space station plunging into the sun after the star-rock that brought the Aliens to our doorstepâ€¦

With the immediate threat to Earth averted, ‘No Direction Home’ wraps up the tale and the saga of StormWatch as the organisation’s Black Ops unit Jenny Sparks, Jack Hawksmoor and Swift go deep undercover to tie-up all the loose ends preparatory to re-emerging as The Authorityâ€¦

Combining low key drama and oppressive tension with staggering action and adventure this chilling tale was the perfect palate-cleanser before the landmark step-change of The Authority and their in-your-face, unconventional, uncompromising solutions to traditional costumed crusader problems.

StormWatch: Final Orbit – although certainly not to everybody’s taste – perfectly closes one chapter of the post-modern superhero saga: solidly in tune with the cynical, world-weary predilections of many older fans and late-comers to the medium.

March 8, 2011March 5, 2011

Will Eisner’s New York the Big City

By Will Eisner (Kitchen Sink Press)
ISBN: 0-87816-020-5 Â Hardcover: 0-87616-019-1

William Erwin Eisner was born in 1906, on March 6th in Brooklyn, and grew up in the ghettos of the city. They never left him. After time served inventing much of the visual semantics, semiotics and syllabary of the medium he dubbed â€œSequential Artâ€ in strips, comicbooks, newspaper premiums and instructional comics he then invented the mainstream graphic novel, bringing maturity, acceptability and public recognition to English language comics.

In 1978 a collection of four original short stories in comics form released in a single book, A Contract With God and Other Tenement Stories. All the tales centred around 55 Dropsie Avenue, a 1930’s Bronx tenement, housing poor Jewish and immigrant families. It changed the American perception of cartoon strips forever. Eisner wrote and drew a further 20 further masterpieces opening the door for all other comics creators to escape the funnybook and anodyne strip ghettos of superheroes, funny animals, juvenilia and â€œfamily-friendlyâ€ entertainment. At one stroke comics grew up.

Eisner was constantly pushing the boundaries of his craft, honing his skills not just on the legendary Spirit but with years of educational and promotional material. In A Contract With God he moved into unexplored territory with truly sophisticated, mature themes worthy of Steinbeck and F. Scott Fitzgerald, using pictorial fiction as documentary exploration of social experience.

Restlessly plundering his own childhood and love of human nature as well as his belief that environment was a major and active character in fiction, in the 1980s Eisner began redefining the building blocks unique to sequential narrative with a portmanteau series of brief vignettes that told stories and tested the expressive and informational limits of representational drawings on paper.

In New York the Big City he took nine themes pertaining to life in the Big Apple and pictorially extemporised combining drama, comedy, politics, adventure and fantasy: producing urban art-music from Blues to Punk, Soul to Ragtime and Gospel to sweet, hot Jazz – all with a pencil and brushes.

Many of these enticing, entrancing micro-plays are silent; but whenever necessary and apropos Eisner’s ear for idiom and inflection made miracles and his affection for the ambient sounds of the streets always underscores the harsh, happy and wholly immersive experience of living for The City.

Delivered in monochrome line and seductive grey wash tones the impressionistic voyage begins with ‘The Treasure of Avenue ‘C’‘ which explores the all-encompassing maw that is a street grating with ‘The Ring’, ‘The Money’, ‘The Weapon’, ‘The Key’ and the connective punch-line ‘The Treasure’. ‘Stoops’ similarly examines the lives that pass before the ubiquitous front steps of tenements, beginning with ‘Witnesses’, ‘Supper Time’ and ‘Home’ before concluding with a description of ‘Stoopball’.

Each individual section is preceded by a moving and expressive tone-painting of the unmistakable cityscapes, and none more powerful than the view from an â€œElâ€ train that introduces ‘Subways’. Included are ‘An Affair on the BMT Local’, ‘Theater’, ‘Art’, ‘Night Rider’, ‘Blackout’ and ‘The Last Man’. Wherever people congregate there is ‘Garbage’ and Eisner’s sly, witty but compulsively human commentary comprises a look at ‘Cans’, ‘Trash’, ‘The Source’ and ‘Waste’ whilst ‘Street Music’ more closely scrutinises the makers of the messes in ‘Love Song Fortissimo’, ‘Pianissimo’, ‘In Concert’, ‘Opera’, ‘Aria’, ‘Decibel’ and the hilarious ‘Rhythm’.

‘Sentinels’ tackles the monuments of street furniture with ‘Hydrant’, ‘Wayside’, ‘Fountainhead’, ‘Fire Alarm’, ‘Mailbox’, ‘Dead Letter’, ‘Last Minute Mail’, ‘Signal’, ‘Lamppost’, ‘Ringeleivio’, ‘Sewers’ and ‘The River’ whilst ‘Windows’ uncovers all the world’s secrets with ‘A View of Life’, ‘Crows Nest’, ‘Observer’, ‘Fire Exit’, ‘Privacy’, ‘Disposal’, ‘Peeper’, ‘Prisons’, ‘Worm’s Eye View’ and the powerfully evocative ‘Sermonette’.

‘Walls’ are everywhere and here they describe ‘Space’, define ‘Freedom’, delineate a ‘Maze’ and ‘Man’s Castle’, act as a ‘Bulletin Board’ and offer ‘Enclosure’ and ‘Escape’. Moreover ‘Walls Have Ears’, promote another kind of ‘Privacy’ and provide a unique ‘Backdrop’, before re-enacting ‘Jericho’ and becoming ultimately the ‘Last Frontier’.

In NYC everything revolves around ‘The Block’; it is ‘The Old Neighborhood’, home of the ‘Neighborhood Girl’ from ‘Our Block’ on ‘The Good Street’ where ‘Aliens’ get a particular welcome. Eventually though, the homeliest slum inevitably becomes a ‘High Rent District’ and even ‘The Belmont Avenue Gang’ has to yield to the inexorable force of ‘Gentrification’â€¦

Eisner’s elegiac fascination with city life, deep empathy with all aspects of the human condition and instinctive grasp of storytelling produced here another magnificently mortal and compellingly mundane melodrama, moving and uplifting and funny and deeply, wistfully true.

You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll be amazedâ€¦

As ever the Medium is the Message, especially when the artefact is such a substantially solid tome delivering comics gold in beguiling, incisive black and white – and once again I’m smugging it up because my hardcover with tipped in illustrative plate has proved to have been well worth the initial investment as Will Eisner’s New York the Big City is a veritable cartoon touchstone of all that’s best about the art of cartooning.

Whether it’s your first or ten thousand and first time of reading, this is a tome every comics aficionado will treasure forever, so any edition you can get, you really, really mustâ€¦

March 6, 2011March 2, 2011

Last of the Dragons – A Marvel Graphic Novel

By Carl Potts, Denny O’Neil, Terry Austin, Marie Severin & James R. Novak (Marvel)
ISBN: 0-87135-335-0

During the 1980s Marvel was an unassailable front-runner in the American comicbook business, outselling all its rivals and increasingly making inroads into the licensed properties market that once went to the Whitman/Dell/Gold Key colossus. Much of their own superhero stable might have become cautious and moribund, but the company was expanding into many other arenas.

When the direct sales market began Marvel started its own creator-owned, rights-friendly fantasy periodical in response to the success of Heavy Metal which in turn led to a blossoming of many bold but comparatively low-selling titles in a host of varied genres.

From that ground breaking Epic Illustrated magazine comes this gloriously absorbing East-meets-West period fantasy (beginning with #15, October 1982 through #20 at the end of 1983) by then-newcomer Carl Potts who plotted and pencilled the tale for scripter Denny O’Neil, inker Terry Austin and colourist Marie Severin to finish and Jim Novak to inscribe.

Collected in 1988 under the Epic Comics imprint and released in the extravagantly expansive European Album format (a square high-gloss page of 285 x 220mm rather than today’s elongated and parsimonious 258 x 168mm) which delivered so much more bang-per-buck, The Last of the Dragons did its part to popularise the now over-exposed Japanese cultural idiom – but it still reads superbly wellâ€¦

‘The Sundering’ opens in 19^th century Japan as aged master swordsman Masanobu meditates in the wilderness until a young warrior disturbs his contemplation by attacking a basking dragon. The magnificent reptiles are gentle, noble creatures but the samurai is hungry for glory and soon wins his bloody trophyâ€¦

After the arrogant victor has left Masonobu meets Ho-Kan, a young priest and caretaker of the Dragons. The youth is filled with horror and misery at the brutal sacrilege, but worse is to come for the tearful cleric. As he returns to the temple he stumbles upon a faction of his brother monks secretly conditioning young forest Wyrms, training them to deny their true natures and kill on commandâ€¦

‘The Vision’ finds Ho-Kan returned to the temple too late: the aggressive monk Shonin has returned from a voyage to the outer world and has reached the conclusion that the Dragons must be used to preserve Japan from insidious change threatened by the encroaching white man’s world. In fact he has already been training the beasts.

When the elders object Shonin’s followers massacre the monks and set out for the wilds of America where they will breed and train hordes of killer lizards under the very noses of the enemy. Few escape the slaughter, but Ho-Kan is one and he will stop the madness somehowâ€¦

In a meditative vision he sees Takashi: a half-breed boy whose Christian sailor father abandoned him. The outcast boy was eventually adopted by a ninja clan and became a great fighter. Somehow he holds the key to defeating Shoninâ€¦

In ‘The Departure’ Ho-Kan hires the ninjas to stop the warmongering monks but, when he also tries to enlist Masanobu, Shonin’s acolytes capture him. Under torture he reveals all and the wicked clerics then trick the sword-master into fighting the ninjas for them. After killing all but Takashi the monks thereafter invite Masanobu to join them on their journey to the West. The elderly swordsman has no idea that the beasts he guards are hopelessly degraded monsters now.

In ‘The Arrival’ the monks and their hidden cargo take ship for California, unaware that a half-cast crewman has enlisted on a closely-following ship. Takashi the last ninja is bound in his duty and hungry for vengeance. He will not be deniedâ€¦

When they disembark on a remote bay on the American coast the priests’ intention of slaughtering the sailors and Masanobu goes awry when one of the baby dragons escapes. In the ensuing melee the aged swordsman realises the true state of play and flees into the forests.

The Native American tribes of the Californian forests are helpless before the martial arts and war-dragons of Shonin in ‘The Meeting’ until they meet Takashi – hot on the trail. He defeats and then joins with them. As Takashi and the assembled braves stalk the monks they encounter Masanobu who is also determined to end this dishonourable travesty once and for allâ€¦

All of which results in a tumultuous and stirring climax in ‘The Decision’ as all the disparate faction meet to forever decide the fate of a nation, the nature of a species and the future of heroesâ€¦

This is a magically compelling tale for fantasy fans and mature readers: an utterly delightful cross-genre romp and one more masterful tale to add to the â€œwhy is this out of print?â€ list.
Â© 1982, 1983, 1988 Carl Potts. All Rights Reserved.

February 28, 2011February 25, 2011

Y- The Last Man: volume 8 Kimono Dragons

When a plague killed every male on Earth, only Yorick Brown and his pet monkey Ampersand survived in a world made instantly utterly all-girl. With a government agent and a geneticist escorting him across the devastated American continent to a Californian bio-lab, all the young man could think of was re-uniting with his girlfriend Beth, trapped in Australia when the disaster struck.

The romantic fool trekked from Washington DC overland to California, getting ever closer to his fiancÃ©e, whom he presumed had been stranded in Oz since civilisation ended. His reluctant companions were secret agent 355 and Dr. Allison Mann, who was trying to solve the mystery of his continued existence. The latter feared she might have actually caused the plague by giving birth to the world’s first parthenogenetic human clone.

Also out to stake their claim and add to the general tension were a crack squad of Israeli commandos led by the steely-willed General Tse’Elon, plus post-disaster cult Daughters of the Amazon who wanted to make sure that there really were no more men left to mess up the planet. To further complicate matters, for much of that journey Yorick’s occasionally insane sister, Hero, was also stalking them across the ultra-feminised, ravaged and now utterly dis-United States.

After four years and some incredible adventures Yorick (a mediocre student but a rather proficient amateur magician and escapologist) and entourage made it to Australia, only to discover Beth had set off for Paris a year previously. Along the way Dr. Mann had discovered the truth: the reason Yorick was alive was that Ampersand was inexplicably immune and had the disgusting habit of â€œsharingâ€ his waste products – if Yorick couldn’t duck fast enoughâ€¦

As this book opens (reprinting issues #43-48 of the award-winning comics series) the lad and his extremely tolerant lasses have reached Japan, following a ninja who had stolen the crucially important monkey. ‘Kimono Dragons’ (illustrated by Pia Guerra & JosÃ© MarzÃ¡n Jr.) finds the wanderers in Yokogata Port, joined by Rose, the ship’s captain who befriended them. They soon split up though, when Ampersand’s tracking device starts working again: Yorick and 355 follow it to Tokyo, whilst Rose and Allison explore a different path.

Dr. Mann is a brilliant scientist, but not as smart as her parents: both radical geneticists with major personal issues. She is convinced that her mother had something to do with the plague and Ampersand’s abduction. She’s right too, but as she and Rose reach the elder Doctor’s rural laboratory they have no idea that the pesky little simian has escaped and is loose in Tokyo somewhere. They are equally unaware that the lethally ruthless ninja is searching for the lost capuchin tooâ€¦

Meanwhile, the heavily disguised Yorick and 355 have reached Tokyo, a city seemingly unchanged by the disasterâ€¦ but appearances can be horrifyingly deceivingâ€¦

â€¦And in Kansas, Yorick’s sister finds a hidden enclave where she sees proof that he is no longer the last male alive (See Y The Last Man volume 3: One Small Step)â€¦

Ampersand’s trail has led Yorick and 355 into conflict with the now all-women Yakuza. They find an ally in undercover cop You, but her plan doesn’t inspire much confidenceâ€¦

â€¦And when Allison’s mother – let’s call her Dr. Matsumori â€“ finally appears, Rose and Allison are too slow to prevent a bloody assault. As the aging doctor works to save a life, she reveals the hidden agendas and reasons why American politicians, Israeli soldiers and greedy opportunists around the globe have been hunting Yorick and Ampersand for the last four yearsâ€¦

In Tokyo the raid to recover the monkey has also gone brutally awry, but the big surprise occurs in Yokogata, as Allison learns who the Ninja actually works for and who has orchestrated the whole affairâ€¦ the family member who actually designed and released the plagueâ€¦

As renegade Israeli General Tse’Elon invades the Kansas enclave where Hero Brown is helping to raise the last children born on Earth, ‘Tin Man’ (with art from Goran SudÅ¾uka& JosÃ© MarzÃ¡n Jr.) traces the convoluted history of Dr. Allison Mann as her biologist parents broke scientific barriers, ethical codes and each other’s hearts fighting over her affections and reveals the implications of the broken family’s genetic meddling,Â before this volume closes with ‘Gehenna’ (SudÅ¾uka& MarzÃ¡n Jr.), an equally illuminating examination of General Tse’Elon’s past: how she rose to power before the fall of man, and how far she’ll go to achieve her ends, ending the book on a chilling cliffhangerâ€¦

By crafting his slow-burning saga with carefully sculpted, credible characters and situations Vaughan built an intellectually seductive soap-opera fantasy of telling power. As the impressive conclusion neared, this well-paced, dryly ironic, moving and clever tale blossomed into a very special tale that should delight any fan of mature fiction. Bear down, the best is yet to comeâ€¦
Â© 2006 Brian K Vaughan & Pia Guerra. All Rights Reserved.

February 26, 2011February 25, 2011

Passionate Two-Face Book 1

By Youjung Lee (NetComics)
ISBN: 978-1-60009-177-3

Here’s an intriguing change of pace from the usual manga/manhwa love story: one aimed at a slightly older and more discerning audience.

Sangbaek Oh is a thoughtful young food science student desperately in love with Hyeji Min, the girl next door. He’s adored her since elementary school and now, back from his first term at University, he can’t wait to see his girl again. Unfortunately the boy’s got it bad, spying on her with high-powered binoculars, whilst his vapid, shallow parents blather on oblivious to his distressing preoccupation.

Of course spies often see things they shouldn’t and the hormone-crazed Sangbaek is devastated when his observations catch Hyeji getting distressingly intimate with some scumbag playboy in her own bedroom. The swine doesn’t even treat her decently: he’s a callous bully – but really good-lookingâ€¦

Crushed, but deciding to play it cool, the lovelorn fool pretends nothing has happened when he goes out with Hyeji next day, but his discoveries have turned his creepily innocent interest into something far more carnal. His mind aflame with licentious images, he is utterly unprepared for the next blow. His truly beloved knows about his habits and doesn’t want to see him anymore – especially as she is preparing for her new career as a movie actressâ€¦

Sangbaek is destroyed and throws himself into an alligator pit at the Zoo, but when even they reject him (being too well-fed by their conscientious keepers) he notices, just before passing out, an old man taking photos of his distress.

As Hyeji pursues her disdainful new man Sangbaek regains consciousness in the home of the old photographer and his juvenile delinquent daughter Mihee. It transpires that the guy is a movie make-up artist who was captivated by the dumped lad’s agonised expressions. Moreover he knows Hyeji’s new beau – Gobong Choi, â€œthe virgin hunterâ€ owner and producer of soft-porn studio Climax Productions. Moreover, that inveterate womaniser is looking for fresh talent as he prepares to begin making far harder filmsâ€¦

Determined to save Hyeji from the path of inevitable degradation, Sangbaek confronts the sleazebag and gets thoroughly beaten up although he does manage to rescue the drunken, unconscious girl from Gobong’s clutches. After a night of terrific temptation and sweet childhood memories whilst she gradually sobers up, she delivers the ultimate rejection…

His life shattered Sangbaek can only watch from afar as Hyeji follows her wrong path. However when the papers begin advertising for a co-star to â€œworkâ€ with the new starlet the make-up man and his daughter offer him an incredible chance to be with his degraded love once more. They can make him a new face and he can win Hyeji back. He knows it will work; after all, hasn’t the old man being running around Seoul for weeks, perfectly disguised as Sangbaek and getting off with lots of young women?

The plan set, the make-up master exacts a strange price. He will turn Sangbaek into the most handsome actor in the world, but in return he must surrender all rights to his own face and original identityâ€¦

Thought-proving, darkly funny and just a little bit scary, this is a compelling fantasy tale of love, desire and obsession that is both extremely engaging and terrifically appealing. Even if you aren’t a fan of manga or the far edgier Korean manhwa equivalent, this enticing adult romance series might just change you foreverâ€¦
Â© 1997 Youjung Lee. All Rights Reserved. English text Â© 2007 NetComics.

February 25, 2011February 24, 2011

StormWatch: Change or Die

By Warren Ellis, Oscar Jimenez, Tom Raney, & various (DC/WildStorm)
ISBN: 978-1-84023-631-6

The multinational mini-army comprised surveillance and intelligence specialists, tech support units, historians, researchers, detention facilities, combat analysts, divisions of uniquely trained troops, a squadron of state-of-the-art out-atmosphere fighter planes and a band of dedicated superheroes for front-line situations beyond the scope of mere mortals. In the pilot’s seat was incorruptible overseer Henry Bendix – â€œThe Weathermanâ€.

The title sprang from the comics revolution which saw celebrated young creators abandon major â€œwork-for-hireâ€ publishers to set up their own companies and titles – with all the benefits and drawbacks that entailed. As with most of those glossy, formulaic, style-over-content, almost actionably derivative titles, it started with honest enthusiasm but soon bogged down for lack of ideas.

Warren Ellis took over the moribund morass with issue #37 (see the previous collection StormWatch: Force of Nature) and immediately began beating life into the title. Soon â€œjust another high-priced team-bookâ€ became an edgy, unmissable treatise on practical heroism and the uses and abuses of power. Making the book unquestionably his plaything Ellis slowly evolved StormWatch out of existence, to be reborn as the no-rules-unbroken landmark The Authority.

This volume collects and concludes the comicbook’s first volume with issues #48-50 and bridges the gap to the second volume’s issues #1-3 with the extremely rare – and short – StormWatch Preview edition, all scripted by Ellis as he re-redefined the masked hero for a new millennium.

The action and suspense begins with ‘Change or Die’ (with art from Tom Raney & Randy Elliott) as the StormWatch team are targeted by a ruthless band of superhumans, led by a long dormant superman who first began fighting social injustice before World War II. After years of planning these underground wonder warriors are boldly using their powers to wipe out all the inequities of the old World Order and build a better world. Of course that means doing away with armies, politicians, all governments and any superheroes who don’t agree with themâ€¦

This more than any other is the tale which introduced The Authority – in concept at least – to the comics world, as the ambitious but completely best-intentioned team (including prototype versions of both The Doctor and The Engineer) strike on many fronts, turning deserts into gardens, brutally wiping out brutal dictatorships and revealing all those dirty little secrets to the global populaceâ€¦

In a bid to save â€œhuman civilisationâ€ Weatherman authorises all of StormWatch for a kill missionâ€¦ but even as Bendix’s true character and plans are revealed the poor suckers on the front line – and even their idealistic antagonists – discover amidst bloody, spectacular battle that the real enemy in the way of a global paradise is, always, human natureâ€¦

Following the apocalyptic events which wrapped up the first series ‘Terminal Zone’ (illustrated by Oscar Jimenez & Chuck Gibson) opens with new Weatherman Jackson King and the surviving team members going through their paces in a rather subversive public relations exercise before ‘Strange Weather’ (rendered by the mob-handed art-horde of Jimenez, Michael Ryan, Jason Gorder, Mark McKenna, Richard Friend, Eduardo Alpuente & Homage Studios) launches the new adventures as StormWatch metahumans raid a clandestine US facility illegally weaponising US troops and other lethal biological materials.

It appears that America is willfully breaking UN Resolutions restricting the creation of super-soldiers; but is this the work of militant terrorists and disaffected renegades or does the chain of command reach higher – perhaps to the White House itself?

The team is soon hip-deep in DNA horrors and official hypocrisy when they infiltrate a sleepy Alabama town and the Federal government declares war on StormWatchâ€¦

Dark, scary and rabidly political, the tension and intrigue are ramped up to overload, but as always the hip and cynical message is leavened with spectacular action, mind-blowing big science thrills and magically vulgar humour.

Mixing tradition with iconoclastic irreverence this volume cleared the way and set the scene for the landmark step-change of The Authority and although certainly not to everybody’s taste, these perfect post-modern superhero sagas definitely deliver a blast of refreshing cool air for the jaded, world weary older fan.
Â© 1997, 1998, 1999 WildStorm Productions, an imprint of DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

February 23, 2011March 5, 2011

Fuc_ __u, _ss__le: Blecky Yuckerella volume 4

By Johnny Ryan (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-415-3

Johnny Ryan is a comedian who uses comics as his medium of expression. Whether in his own Angry Youth Comix, or the many commissions for such varied clients as Nickelodeon, Hustler, Mad, LA Weekly and elsewhere, his job and mission is to make laughter. Depending on your point of view he is either a filth-obsessed pervert smut-monger or a social iconoclast using the same tactics as Lenny Bruce or Bill Hicks to assault the worst and/or most hidebound aspects of society.

His wild, loose cartoon drawing style is deceptively engrossing, and his seeming pictorial Tourette’s Syndrome of strips and gags involving such grotesque signature characters as Boobs Pooter (world’s most disgusting stand-up comedian), Loady McGee and Sinus O’Gynus will, frankly, appal many readers, but as with most questions of censorship in a Free Society, they are completely at liberty neither to buy nor read the stuff.

Ryan dubs his stinging graphic assaults on American culture ‘misanthropic comics’ and one of the most effective has been Blecky Yuckeralla. Originally running weekly in The Portland Mercury and Vice Magazine from 2003 before switching to Ryan’s own on-line site the strip was based on traditional, anodyne comics features and referenced many other popular art forms. This fourth bi-annual collection collects the last 99 four-panel pages up to and including the final episode which ran on www.johnnyryan.com on 30^th July 2010.

Blecky is an ugly, unsavoury, unsanitary and very stupid girl: a cunning reinterpretation of Ernie Bushmiller’s beloved Nancy strip, with plenty of comics, movies and media pastiches thrown in too. There’s Bucksley – a ghastly, grotesque Richie Rich-clone, nerdy â€œboyfriendâ€ Wedgie, guardian Aunt Jiggles and a host of guest-victims for the shocking puns and fouls antics of the little girl from hell â€¦or maybe it’s New Jersey.

Here you’ll find gross, vulgar and shocking gags about sex, defecation, farting, bodily functions, feminine hygiene, and even the ultimate modern whited sepulchers, TV, money, religion, politics, race and sexual abuse. There are no safe areas or taboo subjects. Blecky and Co are equally free with cute animals, presidents, film stars, assorted Holy Books and even 9-11â€¦

Depending on who you are and your social outlook this final collection is as brilliant or as appalling as the previous three so if you’re prudish, sensitive or concerned about moral standards – don’t buy this book. There’s plenty of us who willâ€¦

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