New This Week: October 31, 2007

Hey, it's Halloween. Instead of going out for tricks or treats, you're going to your local comics store for new comics day. What treats await you there?


Do you like dinosaurs? Do you like animals? Do you like manga? If you answered yes to any one of those questions, you should pick up Gon vol. 2 by Masashi Tanaka (from CMX). It's the most entertaining six bucks you'll spend all week. (Don't worry if you missed volume one--each installment of Gon can be read and enjoyed on its own.)

Dark Horse publish the "already-best-selling-on-Amazon" collection of Nicholas Gurewitch's Webstrip The Perry Bible Fellowship.

Ready for some mind-blowing so-square-it's-hip-again Bob Haney madness? Then hook yourself up with the second Showcase Presents Teen Titans volume!

For some Halloween scares, you can pick up Osamu Tezuka's horror manga MW, the latest in Vertical's noble effort to bring the "Godfather of Manga"'s work into translation.

In floppy-land, there's the first issue of Greg Rucka's Crime Bible (starring Batwoman and The Question); the debut of Kyle Baker's war satire Special Forces; Gary Frank's debut on Action Comics (#858) with the old-school Legion of Super-Heroes; and the third issue of Josh Howard's The Lost Books of Eve.


After getting your comics, hurry home to hand out candy (or better yet, comics!) to all the neighborhood little goblins.

Hey DC, Where's My Love Syndicate?

Over at Gad Sir, Comics!, Steve Flanagan reminds us of the Love Syndicate of Dreamworld, an alternate version of the JLA featured briefly in an issue of Grant Morrison's Animal Man. Little is known of the Love Syndicate, except that is featured heroes such as Sunshine Superman, Speed Freak, and Magic Lantern. In other words, a world with a 'hippie' JLA.

At least one Internet denizen has attempted to extrapolate a history of Dreamworld (confusingly interspersed with a history of an 'Earth-17') which adds in forgotten DC properties Brother Power the Geek, President Prez Rickard, and the 'Emma Peel' version of Wonder Woman to the mix.

So somewhere amongst the 52 worlds of the New Multiverse I'd like to think that Dreamworld is one of them. If looks like we won't be getting a Countdown Presents the Love Syndicate mini, even though I would totally buy such a thing. But with Morrison writing Final Crisis, we can hope that maybe Sunshine Superman and his pals will be making an appearance.

New Library Comics: Week of October 22, 2007

Here's a list of the comics we added to our library collection last week:


Gallagher, Fred (Fred M.), 1968- Megatokyo = [Megatōkyō] / Milwaukie, OR : Dark Horse Comics, 2004- vol. 3

Howarth, Matt, 1954- Konny and Czu / San Antonio, Texas : Antarctic Press, 1994- nos. 1, 3-4

Howarth, Matt, 1954- WRAB Pirate Television : the graphic novel / Langhorne, PA : Howski Studios, 1985

Kolossal. Roma : Lancio, [1973]- nos. 407, 420

Lancio color. Roma : Lancio, [1978]- no. 339

Lanciostory. Roma : Eura, [1975]- v. 31 no. 39

Raiti, Ashly. Mark of the succubus / Los Angeles, CA : Tokyopop, Inc., 2005- vol. 1


This listing is now available as an RSS Feed!

Monkey Covers

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

Detective Chimp is on the case on the cover of this week's Shadowpact #18 by Tom Derenick & Wayne Faucher.

(Standard disclaimer about magnifying glass-using chimpanzees not really being monkeys applies.)

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

Review: Old Boy vol. 1

Old Boy vol. 1
by Garon Tsuchiya & Nobuaki Minegishi
Dark Horse, $12.95

Old Boy is pretty much what I'm looking for in a seinen manga. The story is straighforward: an unnamed man, having been held captive for ten years, is released onto the streets of Tokyo. Not knowing why he was a captive or who arranged his captivity, he starts to put a life together with the aim of the one thing he has left: revenge. There's not much of the 'revenge' component yet, as this first volume is mostly set-up; but this is obviously a slow build story and the revenge will surely be that much sweeter when it arrives.

While I hold out to see if Tsuchiya's story will pay off, I can definitely recommend the art by Minegishi. In layout and pacing it compares favorably to Goseki Ikegami; he is able to use an eleven-panel page to give a simultaneous sense of timelessness and time passing, or break out a two-page spread at the moment of maximum impact. The backgrounds are often detailed to the point of gorgeousness and the figures are expressive without veering into cartoonishness.

If future volumes can hold up the level of quality and move the story forward, Old Boy should make for a worthwhile ride over its eight volumes.

Rating: 3.5 (of 5).

NaGraNoWriMo?

Last year I participated in NaNoWriMo--kinda--by starting NaGraNoWriMo (National Graphic Novel Writing Month). The concept was to write the script for a 175-page graphic novel during the month of November. Four people participated, but I believe only one of us was successful (not me--I only got about 30 pages of script written).

I'm considering trying again, though I haven't decided yet. I have a concept in mind, it's just whether or not I'll have the time. But since November is just a week away, I guess I'll have to make up my mind soon...

Anyway, if you're interested in giving it a go, let me know and I'll add you to the group blog so that you can share in the joy.

New This Week: October 24, 2007

What looks good at the comic shop this week?


The first collection of Buffy season 8, The Long Way Home, was supposed to hit stores last week, but looks like it'll be arriving this week instead. I'm sure all hardcore Buffy fans already picked up the floppies, but you'll surely want a sturdy trade collection to put on your shelf and loan to all your friends, right?

(What did arrive last week, and I missed it in the NTW write-up, was Jason Shiga's Bookhunter, which so far is my favorite graphic novel of the year. It's a procedural set in a library in a slightly alternate 70s. If you've read anything by Shiga before you know you'll want to read it; if you've never read anything of his, Bookhunter is a great place to start.)

She-Hulk fans get a double dose this week, with the fifth trade collection, World Without a Hulk, collecting the end of Dan Slott's run as writer, and issue #22 featuring Peter David's debut.

Also in trade collection this week is the second Jack of Fables volume; IIRC it features more of the sexy evil librarians, which makes it worth picking up right there.

Floppy-wise you might enjoy the Gold Digger Halloween Special 2007, a new issue of Casanova (#10), the second issue of Andi Watson's Glister, or a new issue of X-Men First Class (#5). (And you might overlook Velocity: Pilot Season #1, but it has art by Kevin Maguire so that's likely worth a look.)


Enjoy your new comics!