The New 80s Revival

I think we're starting to enter a second 80s revival in comics.

The first 80s revival manifested mainly in the proliferation of comics based on 80s comics that were based on toy properties: G.I. Joe, Transformers, Thundercats, Micronauts, etc. That seems to have pretty much run its course, although a couple of those properties are still hanging on.

This second 80s revival is rooted in some of the better, more creative works from that decade. We're seeing the emergence of new comics for Grimjack; Jon Sable, Freelance and Concrete; Frank Miller on Batman; a deluxe hardcover edition of Watchmen; even the dim hope that we'll finally see Miracleman again before the year is out.

(Of course, we're also seeing a new Crisis and a new Secret War...)

I think that this latest revival is better than the first--and I for one am thrilled to be getting new Grimjack and Concrete--but it's still a movement largely based on nostalgia. Now nostalgia has always been a huge motivator in comics, but it's also fickle and a moving target. This too shall pass, and then it's on to the next thing (nostalgia for early 90s Image-style? Shudder!)

Not much of a point to be made here, I guess; just an observation. What do you think?

Pupshaw and The Thing

Jim Woodring fans may enjoy this.

(link via Sara Ryan)

New This Week: March 23, 2005

Based on the NCRL list for this week's comics shipping from Diamond, here are a few things to look for at the local comic shop tomorrow:

The Pick of the Week is Queen & Country, vol. 7: Operation Saddlebags from Oni, the latest installment in Greg Rucka's excellent spy series, with very good art by Mike Norton. (I reviewed the main part of this collection in its original comic form here.


In other comics:

AAA Milwaukee Publishing (getting to the front of Previews with that name!) releases Essential Arsenic Lullaby, vol. 1.

Antarctic has a new issue of Fred Perry's Gold Digger (#62).

Checker has a third collection of the old Gold Key Star Trek comics.

DC starts another of Grant Morrison's Seven Soldiers series, Guardian, with Cameron Stewart on art. Nightwing #106 finishes up "Nightwing: Year One," while JLA: Classified #5 continues "I Can't Believe It's Not the Justice League," where if you wish you can just pretend that the whole IDCrisis thing never even happened. They also have new issues of 100 Bullets (#59), Authority: Revolution (#6), Hellblazer (#206), and Sleeper Season Two (#10).

Drawn & Quarterly starts reprinting Chester Brown's Ed, the Happy Clown in floppy form, instead of doing the sensible thing and releasing a trade collection.

Image has the first issue of B. Clay Moore's Expatriate, and the second issue of Pigtale.

Kenzer & Company releases issue #101 of Knights of the Dinner Table, and I've barely made a dent in reading last month's massive one hundredth issue.

Marvel has an Ultimate Spider-Man collection (volume 12: Superstars), the second issue of the second volume of Runaways, and the debut of Mike Carey's Spellbinders.

TokyoPop has the eighth volume of that Fruits Basket book that some people seem to really like.

Wizard has the first issue of New West, with pretty Phil Noto art.


No smarmy comment at the end this week; I've got to go fill up my $65 Doctor Who Dalek Cookie Jar!

Muppets

TVShowsonDVD.com has extensive information about Disney's plans to release season sets of The Muppet Show, starting with season in late 2005. It looks to be a really good DVD set, with the episodes being uncut and including the UK-only skits (the show was produced in the UK, where there are fewer commercials per half hour than in US syndication). It will also include several historic pilots and specials, and interviews with several muppeteers.

I'm Incredible!

Which Incredibles Character Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

New Library Comics

Now that the Newly Catalog Items feature is working again on the library's Website, I can easily share the list of new comics that the library is getting in for our collection.

Here is the listing of new comics & GNs added to the catalog over the past four weeks.

Assuming there's any interest, I'll probably continue to generate a list either every week or every other week.

Quick Manga Reviews

Club 9, vol. 1
by Makoto Kobayashi
Club 9 is the story of Haruo Hattori, a cute but klutzy country bumpkin who comes to Tokyo to attend college and ends up working as a ginza at Club 9, the hottest hostess bar in the city. Kobayashi imbues Haruo with a charming combination of naivete and pluckish enthusiam, making her a likable character. The ginza profession is made to seem glamourous and exciting, though one suspects that the reality is far from that, as putting up with the leering and pawing of middle-aged leches is something that most girls would do only for the money. However, Kobayashi does take advantage of the scenes in Club 9 to poke fun at manga-ka, even including an analogue of himself as a drunken lout. The art is strong--better, I think, than in Kobayashi's What's Michael--the backgrounds are well-detailed, the storytelling flows nicely, and Kobayashi knows how to draw attractive women with realistic proportions. I find his faces though to be overly cartoony; they work well in a gag strip like What's Michael, but they seem out-of-place amidst the more reliastic suroundings here. I'm also put off a bit by the translation, specifically the dialect given to Harou which reads like she is an American back-woods hick. I know the effect they were going for, but it comes off like a low-rent Daisy Duke.
Rating: 3 (of 5)


IWGP, vol. 1
by Ira Ishida & Sena Aritou
Take one part young adult drama, one part sex farce, one part detectice story and one part gang comic, mix them all together, and you may get something like IWGP. Based on a popular novel (that also spawned a Japanese television series) IWGP tells the story of a group of young adults who meet in Ikebukuro West Gate Park on New Year's Eve at the turn of the millennium, then follows them as the flirt, fall in love, have sex, and get imbroiled in the case of a serial killer who rapes and strangles escorts. There's sex, violence and melodrama, all in nearly equal amounts (at at times rather graphic), and the various elements of the story don't ever quite mesh together; it's as though there are three different types of stories being told, all vying for the limelight. Still, despite the fact that it really shouldn't work, I find myself drawn to the characters. The art is 'standard manga' style, but manages to keep the various characters delineated and tell the story clearly, even as Aritou changes his style around slightly depending on the mood of the story at a particular point. It's all a bit of an uneven package, but it's better than I thought it would be.
Rating: 2.5 (of 5)


(A review copy of IWGP was provided by the publisher.)