Previews-o-Rama part 2: The Middle

We continue now with the second half of our monthly stroll through the lastest Previews for items scheduled to come out in June (loosely defined...):


So, say your name is "Dave Sims" (note the 's' on the end). What better way to sow confusion in the marketplace to your advantage than to name your small press comic publishing enterprise "Aardwolf"?

Nat Gertler and friends have a second issue of Licensable Bear from About Comics.

Nice 'Comix Lover' cover from Terry Moore on Strangers in Paradise #74. (Abstract Studios)

Active Images has a collection of Glenn Dankin's Temptation strip and Solstice, an OGN from Steven T. Seagle & Justin Norman.

ADV has the second volume of Eiji Nonaka's rather funny Cromartie High School.

AiT/PlanetLAR debuts Larry Young & Jon Proctor's Black Diamond On Ramp, which looks to be near-future high-octane action. Looks interesting, but I'm actually more excited about the six-page preview of Smoke and Guns with art by Fabio Moon.

Alias Enterprises continues to risk over-extension as they debut two more new series, XIII & The Devil's Keeper (both at just 75¢), plus two more mini series: Tad Williams' The Burning Man and David: The Shepherd's Song (based on the First Book of Samuel). They also have another one-shot, OZF5, one of those Oz reinventions that are once again back in vogue. Don't miss T. Campbell & Gisele Legace's Penny & Aggie #2 though.

Kochalka fans will undoubtedly be all goo-goo over his new Cute Manifesto from Alternative Comics.

Amaze ink debut Steve Emond's new series Emo Boy, plus they have a collection of Jim Rugg & Brian Maruca's wonderful Street Angel. If for some reason you didn't buy the individual issues, by all means get the trade!

Hey look, it's another Oz reinvention! This time it's Antarctic Press, bringing us David Hutchison's Oz: The Manga. They also have a fourth color digest collection of Rob Espinosa's wonderful Neotopia.

Avatar has Stargate SG-1: Daniel's Song #1 - Art Nouveau Editions: a sixteen-page reprint comic with five different covers for $5.99 each. Who buys this stuff?

Becket Comics has a collection of The Ballad of Sleeping Beauty, featuring a cover gallery by That Pepsi Girl's dad.

D.E.'s Red Sonja #1 has five different covers. Five! Such naked marketing for a nearly-naked S&S title! They also release a collection of Doug Moench & Paul Gulacy's classic Six from Sirius, an old Epic title ffrom back in the days when Marvel was actually interested in publishing things other than super-hero comics.

Devil's Due reboots G.I. Joe with a 25¢ #0 issue. Hasn't anyone told these guys that 80s-toy-comic nostalgia is on its way out? They also start up a Dungeons & Dragons license, because all the other companies who have licensed D&D in the past have had such spectacular success with them.

Digital Manga Publishing start up a couple of new yaoi titles which I'm sure will be of interest to somebody (Antique Bakery at least looks to have an interesting premise), but I'm really interested in Atsushi Kaneko's Bambi and Her Pink Gun which looks to have a unique visual style that pulls just as much from American indy books as it does from traditional manga.

ComicsOne DR Masters has the thirteenth volume of Iron Wok Jan.

Dynamic Forces is offering a pre-slabbed version of House of M #1, so that you don't have to go to all the bother of actually reading your comic before putting it away forever in a plastic lock-box.

Evil Twin Comics brings us the Action Philosophers All-Sex Special, and it's an all-ages title! Thomas Jefferson, St. Augustine & Ayn Rand star.

Fantagraphics have an all-new volume of Richard Sala's Peculia, Peculia and the Groon Grove Vampires. Yay! They also debut Mome, a 136-page quarterly anthology of alt-comix.

Yes, Hell, Michigan really is a town here in the mitten state. It's also the title of a new comic by Dan Joley & Clint Hillinski from FC9 Publishing.

Gemstone collects Don Rosa's classic The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck.

Rick Spears and Rob G., of Teenagers from Mars fame, have a new OGN from Gigantic: Dead West.

Headless Shakespeare Press debuts Craig McKenney & Rick Geary's Xeric Award-winning The Brontës: Infernal Angira that involves the famous literary sisters in an otherworldly fantasy.

iBooks has the first volume of Jean-Claude Mezieres & Pierre Christin's Valerian, which apparently was th inspiraion for The Fifth Element.

IDW debuts Angel: The Curse by Jeff Mariotte & David Messina, with a story set after the series-ending cliffhanger--I really really really want the Igor Kordey puppet cover! They also have the final issue of Grimjack: Killer Instinct and a second volume of The Complete Jon Sable, Freelance.

Keenspot has John Allison's Heavy Metal Hearts & Flowers, an all-new Scary Go Round story.

Kyle Baker Publishing has not one but two new Kyle Baker comics: The Bakers, a domestic comedy; and Nat Turner, abiographical comic about the man who led the famous slave revolt. I expect that both will be worthy of our money.

A new issue of Carla Speed McNeil's Finder from Lightspeed Press. Buy it!

Oni debut's Northwest Passage, a western frontier comic from Scott Chantler that looks lie it could be quite good.

Pantheon looks to to continue their success publishing artsy graphic novels with Dan Clowes' Ice Haven OGN.

Look at the size of that TokyoPop section! Of the new titles, BECK: Mongolian Chop Squad looks the most promising with its rock-and-roll story. There are also new volumes of Princess Ai, Fruits Basket, The Kindaichi Case Files, and Remote.

Shanda Fantasy Arts has a new Shanda-related one-shot, Quinn the Racoon Special.

Top Shelf has AEIOU, the concluding volume of Jeffrey Brown's "Girlfriend Trilogy."

Vertical has an affordable paperback edition of the second Buddha volume from Osamu Tezuka.

Viz debuts their massive Shojo Beat monthly anthology as well as their Shojo Beat GN line. Lots and lots of comics for teen girls (but don't worry boys, they haven't forgotten you either!)

And lastly, W. W. Norton kicks off their Will Eisner line with Eisner's final OGN The Plot: The Secret Story of "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion", an examination of the famous anti-Semetic hoax.


There we have it. Something for just about every comic taste, I should think!

The Biggest Badass Alternate Cover Ever

We give you now the alternate cover to the January 1993 issue of Malibu's The Protectors (#5):



You may have a hard time seeing it in the small picture, so click on the image to see a larger version in its full glory.

That's right: there's a 3/8 inch hole drilled right through the entire comic, reprenting a bullet hole through the bloody chest of the hero on the cover (drawn by Thomas Derenick & Mike S. Miller). The cover was also cardstock and embossed.

The hero in question in the young Night Mask, son of the original Night Mask and member of The Protectors. The cover commemorates the story inside (written by R. A. Jones and drawn by Thomas Derenick & Mike Deodato) that featured the brutal killing of Night Mask by the group's main villain, the diabolical Mr. Monday. (Of course, in the story Night Mask was never actually shot in the chest, but never let the contents of a story get in the way of a gimick cover!)

You may think that your alternate comics covers today are badass, with their red backgrounds or incomplete sketches or whatever, but you have a long ways to go until you reach the ultimate stage of cover baddassness of The Protectors #5.

Previews-o-Rama part 1: The Front

It's time to go through the latest Previews to discover the good, the bad, and the strange:


Dark Horse

Hellboy returns in an all-new 2-issue mini-series, The Island, from creator Mike Mignola.

Ian Edginton & D'Israeli have a new mini-serires, Scarlet Traces: The Great Game. The solicit copy proclaims that it "picks up where the critically acclaimed hardcover left off," but I don't remember anything about a hardcover.

Grendel: Red, White & Black is finally collected into a trade.

Concrete, vol. 1: Depths starts a series of comprehensive reprints of early Concrete material.


DC Comics

I haven't read Legends of the Dark Knight in ages, but issue #192 starts a five-part Mr. Freeze origin written by J. H. Williams & D. Cartis Johnson and drawn by Seth Fisher.

You can relive the story that featured the beating and torture--including with a drill--of a sixteen-year-old girl in Batman: War Games Act Two. Hey, it was all code-approved, so it must be good, wholesome comics reading, right? Pass on this. Please.

Kano takes over as regular artist (with Stefano Gaudiano switching over to inks) with Gotham Central #32.

Jeph Loeb & Tim Sale's Catwoman: When in Rome comes to a belated conclusion.

Will Pfeifer & Pete Woods come on board as the creative team on Catwoman with issue #44.

The Godawful Superman: Godfall story gets a trade collection.

Batzarro. Heh.

Matt Wagner's Batman/Superman/Wonder Woman: Trinity gets a trade collection.

DC Special: The Return of Donna Troy is written by Phil Jimenez, penciled by Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez and inked by Geroge Perez. I am so there.

There's also a trade paperback, New Teen Titans: Who Is Donna Troy?, that includes two of Wolfan & Perez's best New Teen Titans stories ever, "Who is Donna Troy?" from issue #38 (actually, this is one of the best Robin/Nightwing stories ever), and the wedding issue (#50).

JLA Classified has two issues this month, concluding the "I Can't Believe It's Not the Justice League" story. All of you people complaining about the events of DC Countdown to Infinite Crisis are picking up this alternate take on the heroes, right?

The much ignored Justice League Elite maxi-series comes to an end, and shrugs are heard for miles around.

Darwyn Cooke tales over Solo for issue #5.

Son of Vulcan #1. Because revamps of old third-string characters by mid-list creators have been doing so well for DC lately...

DC finally gets around to exploiting its large backlog of WB animation properties with digest-sized collections of Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck.

After a false start, Kurt Busiek's Astro City: The Dark Age looks to be finally coming out.

Remember when J. Scott Campbell as a hot young artist whose name could sell oodles of comcis? Then he disappeared to, oh, I dunno, play videogames or something. Now he's back with the misspelled Wildsiderz, but will anyone even rememebr who he is anymore?

Alan Moore & Ian Gibson's wonderful The Ballad of Halo Jones gets a collection.

Speaking of Alan Moore, the old British comics revamp Albion comes out, though Alan is only plotting.

Mike Carey & Glenn Fabry are adapting Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere to comics. Read the book instead. Trust me. (It'll be cheaper too...)

We3 gets collected into a trade. Buy this. It's the most visually interesting comic of the millennium.

Hmmm, let's see. Krypto the Superdog is a new cartoon series aimed at the 5-7-year-old set. There's no inexpensive Krypto comic to be found for the kiddies to buy, but there is a $150 Krypto & Friends Animated Series Maquette Set from DC Direct. See anything wrong with this picture?


Image

I miss Jimmie Robinson's Cyberzone and Amanda & Gunn, but I'll content myself with his doing art on Avigon: Gods and Demons.

Joe Casey & Tom Scioli go all Kirby on us with Gødland #1.

Strange Girl, set in a demon-infested post-Rapture world, looks like it coul dbe interesting.

Age of Bronze returns with issue #20, but I'm going to trades-only with this one.


Marvel

House of M: it only sounds like the title for a bad 'erotica' novel.

But the real big debut from Marvel this month is Sean McKeever & Mike Norton's Gravity, which I'm sure will be a wonderful antidote.

Last Hero Standing is one of those weekly minis from Marvel that the retailers love so much.

The unruly titled X-Men: Kitty Pryde - Shadow & Flame is yet another X-mMen mini, but it has art by Paul Smith. Must. Resist. Buying. Floppies. Wait. For. Trade...

Y'know, I'm not even going to bother counting how much Fantastic Four stuff is coming out in June; I don't have that many fingers and toes! Boy, Marvel better hope that this is more Spider-Man than Elektra.

Okay, who was it that asked for a new New Warriors mini? What? You, over there? Get out!

Jae Lee draws Incredible Hulk #82. Yay!

Hey, did you realize that Marvel Nemesis: The Imperfects is based on a sure-to-be crappy video game? I wonder why Marvel aren't toting that in their copy?

Joss Whedon & John Cassaday's first year of Astonishign X-Men comes to an end. Don't stay away too long guys!

Hey look: a new issue of Kabuki!

JMS & Mike Deodato take an Amazing Spider-Break and trip on over to the Icon imprint with Dream Police. Its Sandman meets Dragnet high concept is good for a one-shot apparently.

This month sees an extra-length Powers #50; or rather it would be #50 if they hadn't started renumbering when they switched over to Marvel/Icon. So instead you get a big celebration for issue #12.

Other Marvel titles possibly worth your while include Ultimate Spider-Man #78, Mary Jane: Homecoming #4, G.L.A. #3, Machine Teen #2, New Thunderbolts #9, Spellbinders #4, Power Pack #4, Runaways #5, Supreme Power #17, and The Punisher #22.

Trades of interest include Ultimate Fantastic Four, vol. 3, Fantastic Four Visionaries: George Perez, vol. 1, a digest of Dan Slott & Ty Templeton's Spider-man/Human Torch, and Loeb & Sale's Hulk: Gray. There's also finally a trade collection of Neil Gaiman's 1602.

X-Men/Fantastic Four & X-Men: Phoenix - Endsong are inexplicably worthy of hardcover collections.


That's it for Part 1. Part 2 will appear later this week.

New This Week: April 6, 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 Seven Soldiers: Zatanna #1, with words by Grant Morrison & art by Ryan Sook (with Mick Gray). This is the Seven Soliders title that I've been looking forward to the most since the project was announced, and looking at the preview pages has only fueled my anticipation.

In other comics:

Abstract & Terry Moore have a new issue issue of Strangers in Paradise (#72).

Dark Horse has the sixth & seventh volumes of Sin City, just in time for the opening of the movie...

DC have Vertigo First Taste an inexpensive trade sampler featuring opening chapters from several of their GN series. They also have the second DC: The New Frontier trade; a trade collection of Garth Ennis's Authority: Kev; new issues of Detective Comics (#805), The Intimates (#6), The Losers (#22) and Y, the Last Man (#32); the final issue of The Witching (#10); and long-delayed new issues of Green Lantern: Rebirth (#5) and Superman/Batman (#18). Strange that DC's most-delayed titles are also their best-selling titles...

El Capitán have the 10th Anniversary Edition of the first Stray Bullets collection.

Evil Twin Comics have the first issue of Action Philosophers, which looks like it could be a lot of fun.

Image have the fourth Invincible collection and a new issue of The Walking Dead (#17).

New publisher Kandora have the first issue of their first comic, Barbarosa and the Lost Corsairs

Marvel have the first issues of the new Power Pack and GLA mini-series, as well as new issues of Incredible Hulk (#80), The Punisher (#19), and Ultimate Spider-Man (#75).

Shanda Fantasy Arts have the second issue of the latest volume of the long-running anthropomorphic sci-fi series Albedo.

TokyoPop have the eleventh volume of Kindaichi Case Files.

Viz have the debut volume of Doubt, as well as new second edition (i.e. backwards and smaller) volumes of Banana Fish (vol. 7) and Maison Ikkoku (vol. 10).


An finally, haven't you always wanted a Justice League Mini Paperweight? Well, for just $9.99 (or $10.99), one can finally be yours! Choose from: Batman, Flash, Green Lantern, Hawkgirl, Lex Luthor (Luthor? Isn't he a bad guy?), Martian Manhunter, Superman, or Wonder Woman.

Monday Linkage

Johanna has the skinny on the 2004 Squiddy Awards.

The folks at Comic Monsters are having drawings for horror comic stuff each Saturday in April to those who register (free) at their Website.

And the much-smarter-than-I Neil Cohn has a new comic-related theory paper up on his Website: "Initial Refiner Projection: Movement and Binding in Visual Language". From the abstract:

"Refiners" are a type of modifier in visual language that hones the information found in another panel. While these "zooms" are fairly straightforward when found next to their modifying panels, interesting phenomena arise when separated from them. This paper looks at the constraints placed on these conditions to show that similar processes occur in visual language as in the sequential structure of other forms of language.

Review: Shonen Jump GNs

The Prince of Tennis, vol. 2
by Takeshi Konomi
Viz $7.95

Hikaru-no Go, vol. 2
by yumi Hotta & Takeshi Obata
Viz $7.95


There's a certain dynamic to a martial arts comic: mad skils, ritualized combat, secret moves, rivalries, etc. Of course, reading only about martial arts in comics would be boring in the long run (something akin, say, to only reading super-hero comics).

In boys' manga, it seems that everything is a martial art, even tennis and Go!

Having already introduced the main characters and situations in their respoective first volumes, these second volumes of two popular Shonen Jump titles continue on their paths.

Both of these titles make use of what is a very standard plot: a youngster, talented beyind his years in a certain competitive endeavor, must constantly prove his worth to those who are older and dismissive of his perceived abilities.

The bulk of the second volume of The Prince of Tennis involves Ryoma's attempt to earn a place on his school's tennis team, even though he os only a first year student. He dispatches one opponent after the other, making use of advanced moves and skills that are supposedly beyond the ability of one so young. Konomi choreographs the tennis matches like martial arts battles.

Hikaru-no-Go is a bit more subtle and nuanced than Tennis. The main character from the first volume, the titular Hikaru, is still 'haunted' by the spirit of Sai, the ancient Go master. In one sense this is a bit of a cheat, as the mad skills that Hikaru seems to possess aren't really his, but Sai's. But to both Hikaru and the story's credit, Hikaru now wants to be able to play Go on his own, and succeed on his own merits. The story thus appears to be moving towards the more intellectually honest pursuit of Hikaru learning from a Go master.

Hikaru-no Go provides another narrative twist: halfway through this volume the focus splits into two, with one thread of the story following Akira, Hikaru's competitive nemesis. Like Ryoma in The Prince of Tennis, Akira is the son of a champion in his chosen pursuit. His story seems to be mirroring almost exactly that of Ryoma's, but in Hikaru-no Go it serves as a counter to Hikaru's story, wherein Hikaru is trying to help start a Go club at his school from the ground up.

The art in both titles is strong; there are few if any of the annoying manga shortcuts in evidence, and it is apprent that care has been taken to represent both the charcaters and their environments. Obata has the more difficult task, in that he has to make the playing of a board game visually exciting, and he pulls it off well.

The Prince of Tennis is not a bad manga by any stretch, but it suffers slightly from telling an overly familiar story (albiet in a new mileau). While the story in Hikaru-no Go is familiar as well, it mixes up those conventions and brings a potential for greater character growth.

Ratings: The Prince of Tennis, vol. 2: 2.5 (of 5); Hikaru-no-Go, vol. 2: 3.5 (of 5)

Monkey Covers

Sunday is Monkey Covers day here at YACB. Because there's nothing better than a comic with a monkey on the cover.

From 1962, Jack Kirby & Dick Ayers give us "I Am the Gorilla-Man" on the cover of Tales to Astonish #28.

(standard disclaimer about gorillas not really being monkeys applies)

Image is courtesy of the GCD. Click on the image for a larger version.