Other People's Comics

It only took three months, but I finally figured out how to seperate all the links in the right margin by title headings. I'll probably be adding and subtracting from the webcomic section as I find more stuff. I particularly like this comic from Matt Wiegle on the Top Shelf site- Destructor Comes To Croc Town. I followed the trail of Matt's links to this interesting site- Little House Comics. A lot of fun stuff to be found there.
In the world of paper and ink I just finished Harvey Pekar's The Quitter. Published by DC (after the success of the American Splendor movie), this is probably Pekar's most successful comic to date. But, much like Scorcese's Oscar winning The Departed, it's not the best work he's done. That would probably be Our Cancer Year. The Quitter examines Harvey's adolescent and teenage years as a neurotic brawler. The art by Dean Haspiel sounds like a weird choice. Dean has a bold and dynamic cartooning style. But given the action packed (by Pekar standards) subject matter, it turns out to be a good combination.
Two other recent reads that you probably already heard good things about are Fun Home, Persepolis, and Blankets. These fall under the category of comics for people who usually don't read comics.

This past year I also caught up with some recent issues of classics from the salad days of indie comics, the early 90's. Peter Bagge, Evan Dorkin, Joe Matt, and Ivan Brunetti all released a new issue of their respective books in 2006 with varying degrees of quality.

It pains me to say that this year's Hate Annual #6 from Bagge is the worst of the lot. And that's saying something because the last few issues have been coasting on fumes. I've been reading Bagge's titles since his Neat Stuff days in the 80's. I've followed his character Buddy Bradley his entire life (we're the same age, you know) from high school malcontent, to slacker poster boy, to bottom feeding suburbanite. I'll stick with him until one of us is dead. But I can not in good conscience recommend this book. The writing goes beyond mundane to just plain boring. And the art looks sparse and rushed. The whole tale has an aura of pained obligation around it, as if it were made solely to put Buddy on the cover. How else is Fantagraphics going to sell a collection of Bagge's reprints from other magazines?

Dork has been distilled to it's bare essence. Evan Dorkin's collection of strips and comics has long been the satiric reflection of hipster and fanboy mentality. Evan's trick is he manages to be cool and nerdy at the same time (which pretty much sums up the entire early 90's scene). His latest collection of larfs and gags does away with any pretense of story. No Devil Puppet tales, no Murder Family episodes, just jab after jab after jab of four panel strips and single panel gags. It's an ode to ADD that doesn't even take the time to flesh out an epic two page Milk & Cheese story. Evan has created the perfect bathroom comic book. And really, that's something to be proud of.

Joe Matt jerks off. A lot. That's the story arc that reaches it's epic conclusion in 2006's Peepshow. This is the first new issue in something like five years. The next time you hear someone give Charles Burns shit, you just mention that stat. Joe made navel gazing compelling in the 90's. Now it's all kind of creepy and gross. If I hadn't read any of his previous stuff (barring his godawful "Fair Weather" story arc), I don't know if I would be so interested in seeing him sit alone in his crummy apartment, peeing in jars and whining. But I feel personally invested in the guy, no matter how gross his porn addiction has made him. So pick it up if your a fan. If you've never seen Peepshow before, do yourself a favor and find an older trade.

Who would have thought Ivan Brunetti would live to see the new millenium? I guess Ivan's been taking his meds, because his strips of self-loathing aren't as acidic as his they were back in '95. But he's found another outlet that I wholly approve of. Honing his New Yorker style, Ivan's added comic biographies of depressed olde time artists such as Charles Schulz and Val Lewton. The latest Schizo has taken the whine out of autobiographical cartooning and looks for deeper meaning behind the connection between art and unhappiness. Take that, slacker generation!

Wow, I wrote a lot more than I originally intended. I'll try to post another comic this week. Until then, discuss!