Amazon Top 50

Here are the Top 50 Graphic Novels on Amazon this morning. All the previous caveats apply.


1 (-). Diary of a Wimpy Kid 5: The Ugly Truth
2 (+1). The Walking Dead Compendium Volume 1
3 (+20). Dork Diaries (Kindle edition)
4 (+25). Dork Diaries 2 (Kindle edition)
5 (+11). Walking Dead Volume 13
6 (-2). Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days
7 (-5). Dilbert: 2011 Day-to-Day Calendar
8 (-1). Scott Pilgrim, Vol. 1: Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life
9 (+5). Odd Is on Our Side (Kindle edition)
10 (-). Scott Pilgrim, Vol. 2: Scott Pilgrim Versus The World
11 (-3). Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Boxset
12 (+5). The Complete Calvin and Hobbes
13 (-2). Scott Pilgrim, Vol. 3: Scott Pilgrim & the Infinite Sadness
14 (-1). Scott Pilgrim Volume 6: Scott Pilgrim's Finest Hour
15 (-). Scott Pilgrim Volume 5: Scott Pilgrim vs The Universe
16 (-7). Serenity: The Shepherd's Tale
17 (-5). Scott Pilgrim, Vol. 4: Scott Pilgrim Gets It Together
18 (+16). Walking Dead Volume 12
19 (+2). Fables Vol. 14: Witches
20 (-14). Diary of a Wimpy Kid Box of Books
21 (-16). 40: A Doonesbury Retrospective
22 (+16). The Walking Dead Volume 11: Fear The Hunters
23 (+24). The Walking Dead, Vol. 10: What We Become
24 (+18). The Walking Dead Book 5
25 (+18). The Walking Dead, Vol. 9: Here We Remain
26 (+5). The Walking Dead, Book 6
27 (+13). Maus I: A Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History
28 (+4). Batman: The Dark Knight Returns
29 (-2). The Walking Dead Book 2
30 (N). Dilbert: 2011 Wall Calendar
31 (-9). Superman: Earth One
32 (R). Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood
33 (+6). Big Nate: From the Top
34 (+2). Odd Is on Our Side
35 (-). Tron: Betrayal
36 (R). Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic
37 (R). Maus II: A Survivor's Tale: And Here My Troubles Began
38 (N). Star Wars: Legacy Volume 10 - Extremes
39 (-20). The Walking Dead, Book 1
40 (R). Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art
41 (-4). Watchmen
42 (-17). V for Vendetta
43 (+1). The Walking Dead Book 3
44 (R). Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight Volume 7: Twilight
45 (R). Batman: Arkham Asylum (15th Anniversary Edition)
46 (-13). Serenity, Vol. 2: Better Days
47 (R). Blackest Night
48 (-20). Superman: Secret Origin
49 (R). Green Lantern: Blackest Night
50 (-30). Dork Diaries 2: Tales from a Not-So-Popular Party Girl


Items with asterisks (*) are pre-order items.

N = New listing appearing on list for first time
R = Item returning to the list after having been off for 1 or more weeks


Commentary:

* The Wimpy Kid slips again this week on the overall chart--down to #19, but of course that's still plenty good enough to stay at #1 on the overall chart. Number two on the comics chart, the Walking Dead Compendium, is at #138 overall.

* The big news is the sudden surge of Kindle editions of The Dork Diaries up to #3 & #4. The Kindle edition of Odd Is on Our Side also cracks the top ten at #9. No other kindle comics make the list though, which speaks to either a lack of available comics on the Kindle and/or poor categorization by Amazon.

* The other big story from the chart is the wild swings, both up and down, for many items, led by The Walking Dead.

* Dead Watch: Despite the surge up for some collections, there are only ten Walking Dead books on the chart this week, as a few fell down to just below the cut-off point (They would be #51, 52 & 54).

* Only two new items this week, the Dilbert Wall Calendar and a Star Wars: Legacy collection.

* The bottom of the comics list this week is #1,808 overall.

Four for Fun

Bizarro is brought to you today by Ghostbusters, 33 A.D.

What are your plans for New Year's Eve? My plans include food, drink and my sofa. Leaving the house on NYE in NYC is as attractive to me as trying to tie a bonnet on the head of a wild gorilla. It might make for some good pictures but it isn't worth the risk.

Here are four cartoons from last week's Bizarros as they appeared in newspapers. I got a few emails from readers who enjoyed the "outside the box" gag, but none from anyone who objected to it. When I do funeral gags, I often get mail from someone who had recently attended a funeral and that consequently found my cartoon a painful reminder. I sympathize, but dark humor always carries that risk and I believe that laughing at tragedy is a valuable part of the human psyche, so I soldier on.

My editors and I worried that I might get some negative feedback from the "Family Outing" cartoon, especially since it ran right before Christmas. Most of my readers enjoy this kind of irreverence but some are offended by anything that might cause them to have to explain something to their children that they find uncomfortable. (If you are one of these kinds of parents, drop me an email, I'd be happy to tell you how to deal with these things. The technique is called "The Simple Truth," and you'd be surprised how easy it is and how well it works.)

Still others are only sensitive about controversial issues during holidays, which mystifies me beyond my comprehension. I could go crazy trying to predict all of those points of view so I just print the ones I think are funny when I think of them and put on my comedy helmet to deflect the potential poo storm.

"Check/Background Check" is a dating gag. Nothing new to report about this one except that it is a good idea to run a background check on anyone you intend to date more than once. Especially my cousin Keith, who is a complete tool and will destroy your credit, ladies.

My "Gettysburg Tweet" cartoon got lots of positive response and I am grateful, for I, too, really like it. One reader told me I got the quote wrong, however. Apparently the correct verbage is "fathers," not "forefathers." Before I drew this one, I looked it up to get it right but then threw "forefathers" into it somehow. Maybe my brain was regurgitating part of one of the Tea Baggers favorite catch phrases. Or maybe I just slept through my 7th grade history classes too often. At the time, I couldn't imagine why a big famous rock star was going to need that info so I just blew it off.

Let this be a lesson to you kids in school: you'll probably never succeed at anything, certainly not at what you think you will, so study hard in school so you won't be both a failure and an idiot. You'll thank me later for this advice.

Until next time, enjoy your day, study hard, and if you learn nothing else in this life, learn to recognize sarcasm.


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Winter Covers - December 30

The Flash races through snow and ice on the cover to The Flash #2 (2010) by Francis Manapul.

Christmas may be over, but we're filling out December with winter-themed comics covers!

(2009: The Simpsons Winter Wing Ding #1)

Winter Covers - December 29

The 90s boy band goes skiing on the cover of New Kids on the Block Digest #5 (1992).

Christmas may be over, but we're filling out December with winter-themed comics covers!

(2009: Tommy og Tigern #13)

Holiday Gone

(click the image for LARGERNESS)

Bizarro is brought to you today by Glad It's Over.

I had a dandy holiday weekend, hope you did too. CHNW and I went up to Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary to hang out with a small group of our best friends, ate, drank, napped, hiked, watched movies, regretted having eaten and drank so much, then ate and drank more. On the way home on Sunday, we were nearly trapped in the blizzard that hit the Northeast Coast and only barely made it home.

Thinking back to Hurricane Katrina and the number of wingnuts who claimed that god hit New Orleans with that storm to punish the gays, I can't help but believe that this year god chose to hit one of the most populated areas in the world on one of the busiest travel days of the year to punish those of us who celebrate Christmas. Following that logic, I'd have to say that it is not a Christian god that is in charge of weather. Where are the wingnuts now?

The cartoon above has three puns donated by readers. If you think you've got an original pun that might work nicely in a future Bizarro Sunday Punnies, leave it in the comments section of one of my posts. I don't publish these suggestions, whether good or bad, so don't be alarmed if you don't see your suggestion in the comments section later.

Semi-interesting note about the cartoon above: I send in each cartoon in several different sizes and formats for the various uses that my various clients use variously. In one of them, the one used for the Interwebs, I mistakenly put "Lone" Ranger, instead of the punnier, "Loan". So if you saw the one that says "Lone Ranger" on the web somewhere, that's why. I told you it was only semi-interesting.

Got to get back to removing snow from my various orifices. Hope to be seen by you here tomorrow!


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Winter Covers - December 28

Daffy Duck turns a hot water bottle into a sled on the cover of Daffy #12 (1960).

Christmas may be over, but we're filling out December with winter-themed comics covers!

(2009: DC Universe Holiday Special '09)

In Honor of the Big Blizzard

WOW... There was a blizzard in Mythfits land. All the little mushrooms are freezing. Poo has become a white-frosted pile of caca... and suddenly innocent marshmallows everywhere are screaming into the night as they're toasted over campfires. On a happier note, Unicorn and Robot got out of their cozy little trailerhome, went out into the snow, and sculpted a family of snowmen anxiously awaiting the new year. I hope you're enjoying Winter!