but he writes the best Superman this side of Grant Morrison.
From JLA/Hitman, a two-issue miniseries that came out a couple years back. Words by Ennis, art by McCrea. DC, get to trading the rest of Hitman asap and include this, thanks.
–Brendan McCarthy Spider-Man. Click or else.
-I have a hate relationship with horror movies, but this essay by Lauren Davis over on io9 about what makes great horror is excellent.
I have to confess, it’s very hard for me to watch horror movies. It’s not that I don’t enjoy the occasional scare, and it’s not that I’m worried about ghosts and monsters following home (although I will confess to a mild fear of zombies). No, it’s just that when the body count starts rising, I start feeling, well, sad. I don’t come out of the theater pumping with adrenaline; I’m too distracted thinking about the people who died and the loved ones they’ve left behind.
Absolutely a must-read.
-You know what’s more exciting than Marvel joining Disney or whatever it was that happened to DC? The Comics Journal reorganizing. Good interview at CBR:
Groth: I see this is an opportunity to create a true web version of “The Comics Journal,” to in effect combine the virtues of both the web and print as I understand them, which is to say, a single “place” where readers can come and expect a consistently intelligent, idiosyncratic, combative, and occasionally clashing conversation about comics and cartooning. Over the past few years I’ve noticed smarter critical commentary on the Net, but it’s scattered all over the place, buried in the usual mountain of frivolous, tepid, dimwitted, unreadable fanboy drivel. There’s no single website you can visit and anticipate a range of interesting sensibilities on an equal footing, so one of my goals is to distill the best criticism and journalism we can into a single site.
I’ve never actually read an issue of TCJ, though I’ve kinda always meant to. I expect to be alternately infuriated at and elated with the content they come up with. Don’t let me down, guys! (Also if you could make past issues, like TCJ 298 for example, available as PDFs for people who don’t really have room in their tiny San Francisco apartments, that’d be great. Muchas smooches.)
-Savage Critic doubleheader! Jog goes in to great effect on the art in the Greg Rucka/JH Williams III Detective Comics (and JHW3 is the coolest initials in comics since edex), and David Uzumeri drops some bombs on the writing.
My own feelings on ‘Tec are complicated. I like the art more than the story, which feels a little pat, so I don’t buy it monthly. However, once the hardcover drops? Ooowhee. I’ll be on Amazon like a shot.
-Tucker Stone looks at comics criticism and kicks some knowledge:
Comics doesn’t have Tastemakers, maybe they did once, but that time is gone. It’s always been a fractured landscape anyway–initial chunks of comics criticism doled out in fanzines or fan clubs, with the occasional academic polemic turned out for audiences in the low hundreds–and the Internet was able to finish the job of fracturing quicker than it’s been able to on music and film. We all do it, you, me, the guy at the store–reading only those who agree with us up until they say something we don’t like, we burn bridges, blog ourselves, trusting no one. After all, That Guy likes Guggenheim’s Blade series–what’s he know? That Girl’s favorite comic last week was some manga about dating–all the smart kids know it was the GI Joe/Cobra Special!
His point about controlling the critique that exists is a good’un.
-Keeping it in the family, Nina Stone has a beautiful slash brutal takedown of Gotham City Sirens.
Mr. Gag Reflex is apparently not over being dissed by Joker, and so the plot is about him taking his breakup feelings out on Harlequin, the Joker’s ex-girlfriend. I don’t know how this completely relates to the issue before, but maybe it means that the Joker and Harlequin aren’t actually over. To be honest, I don’t really care if I ever find out. It took too many pages of overwhelming art to tell this story. Let me explain.
Really, it’s good. Click thru.
-The Funnybook Babylonians want you to call in and leave obscene messages listener mail. Ask question, share an anecdote, and they might just play it on the show. Tell them I sent you.
I usually never dress up for Halloween- didn’t as a kid, had no interest in it as an adult. This year, though, I was shanghai’d into it by Ron Richards of iFanboy and James Sime of Isotope. So, you know, I put on a costume. It wasn’t my fault, they would’ve killed me.
My buddy Star St. Germain also had a pretty awesome costume. We somehow managed to see each other once the whole night, so no pics of us together.
If you got costumes, let’s see ’em.
Guess who’s back, back again… Tell your friends, will you? The rundown:
-A special introduction, courtesy of Joe, a Funnybook Babylonian. Thanks fella!
– 6th Sense’s 4a.m. Instrumental
-I explain the new and improved Bruce Banner to Esther. A little smarter, a little meaner, a little more interesting.
-We talk some about James Bond: Polestar
-The next segment was intended to be a discussion of what makes a good comic for grown-ups, but it segued and mutated and warped into just a discussion of what we like and don’t like about adult books. It’s a little rambly, but there are some gems in there, and hopefully it’ll provoke some conversation.
If you’re curious to see some crudely-drawn cartoon breasts, check out these two non-consecutive pages from the book:
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Here we go with the biggest week yet of this. Big week for Punisher and Ares, so if you like badasses with skulls on their chests, there you go. Ambush Bug was apparently an almost complete rewrite of what was supposed to be #6, so the panel in question isn’t supposed to say, “This is how funny the comic is.” It’s more, “They’re telling the truth and joking about them joking about it doesn’t stop it from being bad.”
Ambush Bug #7 (of 6)
Keith Giffen, Robert Loren Fleming, Art Baltazar and Franco
Anti-Venom: New Ways to Live #2
Zeb Wells, Paulo Siqueira and Chad Hardin
