May 8, 2008
· Filed under comics, miscellaneous, movies
1.today’s eye irritant? gravel chunks! well, gravel chunks and other detritus coming from road construction along 7th street. i so love asphalt in my cornea.
2. a note from a reader:
you know why batman is cool? he’s cool because if he shows that if you completely overprepare for something, you can overcome any pain from the past.
my response? I’VE BEEN TRYING THAT FOR YEARS, AND IT HASN’T WORKED YET.
and you know what? it hasn’t worked for batman either. sure, he might be able to defeat a supervillian, but that’s not going to bring back his long-dead parents. c’mon. he’s the dark knight! still carrying around deep psychic wounds! your theory will be validated when batman appears on oprah to announce that he’s become the sunshine knight. until that time, i prefer my pained superheroes to have an actual superpower, thank you very much. so bring on the wolverine spinoff!
3. you know what to do when nothing feels good? listen to the promise ring’s nothing feels good.hot damn, their music is catchy. every three months or so, i go through a couple of days where i obsessively listen to the promise ring. you are all hereby put on notice – if they ever have a reunion show, you NEED to TELL ME so i can run out and go see them.
that is all for now.
May 7, 2008
· Filed under comics, movies
i wish iron man had come out in august, because it’s likely going to be the best popcorn movie of the summer, and i’m now going to see everythign else and say, “meh! it’s no iron man!”
let’s put it this way – casting robert downey jr – not the guy who springs to mind when one says ’superhero’ – was a stroke of genius. he’s sarcastic, he’s funny, he’s got beautiful eyelashes, and he’s surprisingly cut. plus, he manages to take an essential jerk of a character and make him likeable.
i’m going to take a geeky side note here for a second – i have problems with batman, because he’s just a rich guy who buys fancy gadgets. he doesn’t have a superpower per se, aside from a superplatinum credit card. for that same reason, i should dislike tony stark. although one might argue that the electromagnetic gadget implanted in his chest is pretty much the same as having a superpower, i would disagree – in essence, he’s just a brash rich guy who managed to invent a medical device that’s better than carrying around a car battery. but even though he has no superpowers, i still like him better than batman since he seems to earn his status. whereas batman just sits around and broods and gets his butler to do stuff for him, ironman is actually creating his own amazing gadgets with which to fight evil.
and this brings me to the problem with the film – the evil that tony stark is fighting is terrifyingly real. i adore the banter and glamor of the iron man’s life in the united states, but as soon as he flies back to afghanistan to battle the bad guys, the movie turns a little too real. i appreciate the filmmaker’s attempt at relevance, but i want escapist fare in my summer popcorn movies, not a sudden reminder of the completely fucked up situation in which far too many soldiers and innocent civilians have died.
thankfully, jeff bridges and his scary beard save the day. and kudos should go to gwyneth paltrow for taking a tiny throwaway part and making it lots of fun to watch.
so go see iron man already. and stay through the end of the credits. apparently, something happens, and i missed what it was. you can email me to let me know!
April 1, 2008
· Filed under comics
at the new herman the manatee comic by jay viola. you’ll need to read three or four in a row. check it out here.
March 31, 2008
· Filed under comics
first of all, jeffrey brown produces comic books more quickly than anyone i know. i didn’t even know he had done a kitty-themed book, and now i’ve got to go and try and find it.
but this weekend, i unexpectedly ran across little things, his latest book, and devoured it on a bus ride.
i had actually purchased some portions of it (like the andrew bird story) as part of his minicomics, but there was plenty of new material, including some touching pieces about car accidents, a few painful relationship pieces (of course) and then, at the end, a very nice piece about his partner’s pregnancy and son.
i wish i could describe it better, but describing jeffrey brown comics is like trying to describe one’s own life – there are incidents and situations and conversations and somehow, jeffrey brown makes the whole thing compulsively readable. he translates mundane moments – at his slightest, the work sparks glimmers of recognition, and at his best, it allows us to recognize the universal connections among people.
yeah. i’m glad i didn’t wait until spx to buy it, and you should go out and purchase it stat!
November 26, 2007
· Filed under comics
has been obtained.
and it is very satisfactory.
i read it while in bed with a horrible stomach ailment following thanksgiving.
and it cheered me up immensely.
so go buy it already. why? because they are SEX BOB-OMB!
October 17, 2007
· Filed under comics
okay, after picking stuff up from spx, here’s a quick rundown of what i’ve managed to read so far:
teen boat, which just makes me crack up every time i think about the concept. the stories are well-paced, with spot on teen angst, and i love the overwrought foreshadowing.
top shelf is calling jeffrey brown’s incredible change-botsall-ages friendly, but i think that’s because the deadpan humor may go over the heads of many. this books is the perfect antidote to transformers hoopla.
joey weiser did a engaging, family-friendly books called the ride home, available through adhouse books. i very much liked the whole concept of living in a van, and the incidental characters in this (like all those who work under the dragon boss of the sewers) were very well captured.
and now i have to get back to work. it provides money for comics, but sucks up so much sweet reading time!
October 16, 2007
· Filed under comics
holy crap.
that was the best spx EVER.
here’s the haul:
as you can imagine, i haven’t even started to put a dent in it.
and i feel like i’m racing through everything i’m reading just to get through as much of it as possible so that i can go back and savor the best stuff.
and despite all that, i still don’t feel like i got even a good idea of what was at the show. as i read through spx recaps, i’m finding out about all this stuff that i missed. grrrr. (and as you can see from the copy of la primavera on the top of the haul, i’m still catching up from last year.)
at any rate, it was an awesome weekend, and i will post reviews of the comics as i pore through them.
my spx photos – including some ignatz and multiple karaoke photos – are over at my flickr account. of course, i totally forgot to bring the camera on to the floor.
October 13, 2007
· Filed under comics
oh my goodness. such excitement!
took in an enormous haul last night, some of which i devoured on the long metro ride home.
here’s some of the highlights:
i loved the joe lambert minicomic turtle keep it steady, a wry retelling of the tortoise and the hare myth that had me grinning on the subway.
chris schweitzer is at the fest with a variety of fun goodies. i couldn’t resist the whimsically packaged giovanni potatoe, a 300-page comic in a package no larger than an ipod mini. plus, got some good-humored mini comics like this one which just make me giggle.
the indie spinner rack awesome! anthology is finally out, and hot damn, it’s great so far. it’s got tons of mr. wiggles, which makes me feel guilty whenever i read it.
the center for cartoon studies students are out in full force, and i am super excited to get to the sundays anthology. it looks AMAZING, and it comes with its own giant bag because the book was so big.
also?
jeffrey brown! emily flake! anders nilsen! clutch mcbastard!
okay. i’m off to finish folding zines before heading up. i’m SOOOOO late!
October 1, 2007
· Filed under comics
earlier this weekend, i headed to the national book festival on the mall to hear gene luen yang talk about americna born chinese, a national book award finalist earlier this year. this award nomination marked the very first time that a graphic novel had been nominated for a national book award.
yang was funny and engaging, giving a good talk where he encouraged kids not to go into comics because:
1. they take FOREVER (at least two years to complete a graphic novel)
2. there’s no money in them (he teaches computer science as his full-time job)
3. they’re not sexy (as he said, try to pick someone up saying “i’m a novelist” rather than “i’m a graphic novelist.”)
he was also really funny in explaining the way in which his family accepted his decision to become a cartoonist/teacher. yang made a deal with his father -if he majored in computer science, he would be able to do whatever he wanted after that. but after working as a programmer for two years, then quitting it to go into comics, yang began to get letters from his dad featuring newspaper articles – stories about how programmers were raking in the cash, clippings from the want ads for high-paid coding jobs – but then yang got nominated for a national book award. and after an article about this appeared in the chinese-language world journal, the letters suddenly stopped.
September 24, 2007
· Filed under comics
you know, i like to leave the comics snarking to the professionals, but as i was reading the comics section from today’s washington post, judge parker caught my eye.
bustin’ loose
heck, it would have caught anyone’s eye. and probably poked it out as well.
listen, eduardo barreto, i love your art. you’ve managed to make abbey’s mullet almost normal, as well as making neddy look less like a beady-eyed spinster, and more like the teenager that she is.
but if you’re going to keep drawing like this, can we just get it over with and call the strip “juggs parker”?
because once it’s out in the open, i won’t be worried about what’s going to happen if the buttons on red’s shirt keep popping off like that.
p.s. one last favor – bring back raju!
