It's what on the inside?
- Mood:
curious
- 14:46 Check out the trailer for JAVA TOWN by Scott Saavedra. bit.ly/5AZY35 #
Arriving at comic shops in the nick of time for your holiday gift-giving, something for just about every interest and budget:
Conceptual Realism: In the Service of the Hypothetical by Robert Williams (Softcover Ed.) — 88 oversized pages of new artwork and writing from the lowbrow master.
The Definitive Prince Valiant Companion (Softcover Ed.) — everything we said last week when the hardcover edition came out still applies!
Gahan Wilson: Fifty Years of Playboy Cartoons (Collectors Edition) — just when you thought this collection couldn't get more deluxe! Includes an exclusive signed glow-in-the-dark letterpress print and a nifty box of facsimile Christmas cards Gahan sent to Hef, never before reprinted (not pictured).
The Great Anti-War Cartoons — A stunning collection from editor Craig Yoe. Newsarama calls its arrival "quite welcome."
Sublife Vol. 2 by John Pham — Newsarama says "do yourself a favor and check it out (and be sure to stroke the back cover)"... that's good advice!
Peruse plenty of previews at the preceding links prior to patronizing your preferred purveyor and purchasing these pretty publications. Pow!
- Location:Le mille-neuf de Bleury
- Mood:
angry - Music:Regina Spektor—On the Radio
Online Commentary & Diversions for you:
• List: FEARnet names Strange Suspense: The Steve Ditko Archives Vol. 1 one of the Top 9 Comic Books and Graphic Novels of '09: "Shunning the spotlight of fans and the press, the artist has chosen instead to let his books speak for themselves. They continue to speak loudly, and with a weird grace lacking in much of his contemporaries' work."
• List/Review: "Druggy noir vividly told, [The] Red Monkey [Double Happiness Book] is like watching Jim Rockford take a monster bong-hit before getting bashed in the jaw by some muscle of a rich guy in a bar bathroom. 'The Leaking Cello Case' and 'John Wesley Harding' are both contenders for short graphic fiction of the year, with pellucid plotting distorted by strange times and scary surprises. The artwork is like the more story-based finely crafted alternative comics of the 90s, and the sense of distorted place and identity as creative as fiction by Thomas Pynchon. If that seems lofty, start here and wait for Daly to one day unveil his Gravity's Rainbow." – Chris Estey, Three Imaginary Girls "Great Reads of 2009"
• Review: "Thank you, Fantagraphics, for compiling 15 years of the Love and Rockets comic series into 700 pages of punk rock, heartbreak, and self-discovery. Locas: The Maggie and Hopey Stories presents Jaime Hernandez's indie masterpiece in the entirety of its run between 1981 to 1996... a serious contender for the American comic canon." - Aysha Pamukcu, Plasma Pool
• Review: "OK, first, my initial impression of cartoonist Hans Rickheit’s new book The Squirrel Machine was one of amazement (a word I don’t bandy about indulgently) and bafflement. I am clear I am not grasping something — not an unpleasant feeling in this circumstance. ... As usual for Fanatagraphics, this book is well-designed and well-printed. Let me know if you figure out what it’s about, though not knowing made it no less fun for me." – Robert Birnbaum, The Morning News
• Interview: Alice Parker of Comics Alliance gets a whole lot of info out of Dash Shaw: "As for me, I like a lot of different things. I'm not a discriminating reader of comics, which is a problem, I think. I can read just about any comic, but I definitely wouldn't read any all-word book."
• Interview: And in your second Dash Shaw interview of the day, with Tim Needles of Short and Sweet NYC, some advice for aspiring artists: "The other thing is it’s probably going to be touch and go forever and you are going to have to do an absurd amount of work before you get a penny for it and even when you get that penny, it’s probably just going to be a penny. On the other hand it is really awesome to draw all the time and devote your life to it."
• Interview: Jaime Hernandez and Zak Sally's must-read chat from The Comics Journal #300 is now online at TCJ.com
• Things to see: In Gabrielle Bell's latest strip, more adventures with Kim Deitch and the search for Crumb
• Things to see: A portrait of the great Harry Dean Stanton by the great Jim Blanchard
This is me with local musician Carolina Fasalo of The Voronas. Caz dumped a load of old photos on to her Facebook account and turned this up. Last summer, I think?
I was reading this interview with David Simon the other day — he gives good interviews, see if you can find the one he did with THE BELIEVER magazine sometime — and something he said stuck with me a little bit. As it often does in Simon interviews, as he’s good with a bon mot or two. I’ve hacked some connective tissue out to present it as a complete thought:
There would be a series of planning sessions. First, at the beginning of every season, we did a sort of retreat with the main writers, the guys who were going to be on staff the whole year. We’d discuss what we were trying to say… we weren’t cynical about having been given ten, 12, 13 hours — whatever we had for any season from HBO. All of that was an incredible gift.
So goddamn it, you better have something to say. That sounds really simple, but it’s actually a conversation that I don’t think happens on a lot of serialized drama. Certainly not on American television. I think that a lot of people believe that our job as TV writers is to get the show up as a franchise and get as many viewers, as many eyeballs, as we can, and keep them.
What we were asking was, “What should we spend 12 hours of television saying?”
Which, yes, should sound blatantly obvious. But it’s easy, when working in fast and deadline-intensive serial formats, to forget that bit: to trust to the process of pulp writing and the form’s innate effect of whatever you’re really interested in leaking out into the work regardless. It’s easy to forget what you turned up for.
It’s also an interesting process note. A good 95% of longform serials, I’d guess, turn up not knowing what they want to talk about. Sometimes they don’t discover what they showed up to talk about until the third or fourth season. And I don’t mean so much the working out of what’s now called "show mythology," the actual overarcing storyline — and we can all name shows that suddenly realised they’d payed out all the rope they had and they didn’t know where the plot went next. I mean the serials where they finally open their mouths and nothing comes out. They made the show because they were allowed to make the show.
In other news, Karl Urban has apparently been signed to RED. This brings the cast up to something like the eight thousand most popular actors in the world.
Tonight I am mostly clearing the house. Not enough strength left in me for proper writing. I’d actually really like to be digging into the outline I wrote for the GRAVEL film, and fixing all the stuff in it that looks broken. I’m delivering it at the end of the second week in January, so there’s plenty of time, and it’s actually in reasonably good shape overall. But the thing about distance from a thing — and this is actually not bad advice for any new writer — is that it gives you essential and often surprising perspective once you’ve been away from it for a few days. Walking away from something for a few days or a week is sometimes the best possible thing you can do for a piece. Again, not something we always have time for in the deadline game.
I’d also like to be working on the animated series I have in development, but, like I said. Burned way the fuck out. So I’m going to content myself with clearing the house, catching up on my RSS feeds, scheming about getting a new phone out of Vodafone, and making a few notes on loose ideas. Proper writing can wait a couple of weeks, now.
(Automatically crossposted from warrenellis.com. Feel free to comment here or at my internet church at Whitechapel. If anything in this post looks weird, it's because LJ is run on steampipes and rubber bands -- please click through to the main site.)
Stuck with another ugly sweater, useless gadget, or awful CD this year? We know. Santa sucks! Get yourself the gifts you really want this weekend at Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery's storewide sale. At least 20% off on every item in stock! Two days only — Saturday and Sunday, December 26 & 27. Hundreds of titles by your favorite artists and a big batch of brand new books. 2009 was a banner year for Fantagraphics Books. Don't miss this chance to catch up on the graphics action.
For all you procrastinating shoppers, Fantagraphics Bookstore is open this week 11:30 to 8:00 PM and on Christmas Eve until 5:00 PM. Avoid the mall nuts and parking hassles. Perfect presents for everyone on your list — many priced under $20.
Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery is located at 1201 S. Vale Street (at Airport Way S.) just minutes south of downtown Seattle. Phone 206.658.0110. See you all soon.
Very nearly completing the first volume, at Bleeding Cool:
(And there’s an error in there that should read: "…crossing the four hundred miles from Berlin to Metz")
(Automatically crossposted from warrenellis.com. Feel free to comment here or at my internet church at Whitechapel. If anything in this post looks weird, it's because LJ is run on steampipes and rubber bands -- please click through to the main site.)- 08:37 Today: 5th Anniversary of marriage to @leahpeah. I love you partner. I swear I did not plan to coincide with Frank Zappa's birthday. #
The Creative Community: Monte Schulz from The Santa Barbara Channels on Vimeo.
Author Monte Schulz talks with host David Starkey about writing his newest book
At the risk of making Nate Neal uneasy, reluctant self-promoter that he is, we'd like to point out that he's made three collections of his work available as downloadable comics — each is well over 50 pages for just $3.99. There's a collection of his Mome stories to date (pictured), a collection of his stories from the Hoax anthology, and a collection of his work predating that. More info and links to purchase and preview the collections can all be found here.
- 10:55 Strongman writer Charles Soule lives out one of my dreams by appearing as a contestant on Jeopardy! is.gd/5wqjA #
- 11:35 Crashing around before the holidays on SLG Radio will air 12/23. tobtr.com/s/830562 #BlogTalkRadio #
The last time I did a credit check, a library fee showed up on my history. Which kind of surprised me, because I didn't know (until then) that libraries report you to the credit agencies. I brought this up in conversation, and continued to discuss how bad we are at returning books.
When my parents moved to their new home in early 2008, I had to go back to help "excavate" my old room. In the process of cleaning stuff out, we discovered a library book that had been checked out in 1989, for some project I was doing at the time. Naturally, being the Good Citizen (TM) that my dad is, he decided to return it to the library.
It turned out that in the last 18 years, the library had undergone some changes, including replacing the card catalogue with a digital computer system, and replacing the library cards with barcode things. See, before the age of silicon, we actually had to process credit cards and such by sliding a sheet of metal and making an impression of the data. My dad's library card was effective a hunk of metal with a number on it semi-fused onto a business card.
The library wasn't really sure how to process this, so they had to issue him a new card, and effectively create a new account so he could return the book. I think because of the bizarre circumstances, the library decided to waive the fine and simply charge him the cost of the book (which kept to the 1989 prices). He left the book with the library so another young kid could check it out.
Maybe when it gets returned next, we'll be using brain frequencies to check out books or something.
Online Commentary & Diversions are not slowing down, no sir:
• List: New York Magazine's Dan Kois names You'll Never Know, Book 1: A Good and Decent Man by C. Tyler one of the ten Best Comics of 2009
• List: The Daily Cross Hatch posts "The Best Damned Comics of the Decade Chosen by the Artists" — among the wide-ranging choices are I Killed Adolf Hitler by Jason, The Three Paradoxes by Paul Hornschemeier, Palestine and Safe Area Gorazde by Joe Sacco, The Complete Peanuts 1952-1953 (which doesn't exist, but 1950-1952 and 1953-1954 do), Ghost World and Eightball #22 (Ice Haven) & #23 by Daniel Clowes, Late Bloomer by Carol Tyler, Sammy the Mouse by Zak Sally, Locas and Locas II by Jaime Hernandez, Fear of Comics by Gilbert Hernandez, Explainers by Jules Feiffer, Jimbo in Purgatory by Gary Panter, and Schizo #4 by Ivan Brunetti
• List: At their The SF Site: Nexus Graphica column, Rick Klaw and Mark London Williams name their top 5 comics of the year. For Williams it's West Coast Blues by Tardi & Manchette at #5 ("one of the year's best crime fiction reads, at least in comics"); for Klaw it's Humbug at #4 ("The slipcased set wisely includes several insightful and interesting extras") and Tardi's West Coast Blues and You Are There tied at #3 ("one of the best crime graphic novels ever produced" and "masterfully satirizes French society and politics unlike any comic before or since" respectively)
• List: J. Caleb Mozzocco names some top 20 favorites: C. Tyler ranks his 17th favorite writer for You'll Never Know, Book 1; Johnny Ryan's Prison Pit: Book 1 sports his 4th favorite cover; and The Red Monkey Double Happiness Book by Joe Daly is his 20th favorite OGN/limited series (obviously it falls in the former category)
• List: Comic Book Resources' Brian Cronin lists his Top Ten Comics of 2009, including Michael Kupperman's Tales Designed to Thrizzle #5 in the 10th spot ("continues to be a brilliantly absurd comic book every time out") and Ganges #3 by Kevin Huizenga in 4th place ("The first story is mind-boggling... Absolute top notch sequential work")
• Guide: If you've always wondered what part of R. Crumb's enormous oeuvre was the best place to start, Robot 6's Chris Mautner takes you to "Comics College" with some solid advice
• Review: "Few cartoonists ever had as lavish a tribute as a three-volume-slipcased collection, but few are as deserving as [Gahan] Wilson. Collecting 50 years worth of his monthly single page gag cartoons from Playboy, [Gahan Wilson: Fifty Years of Playboy Cartoons] is a definitive overview of a remarkable talent and viewpoint. ... Beautifully designed and printed, the books contain cut-out pages, and the slipcase itself becomes a window for a trapped photo of Wilson. Text extras include Wilson's prose short stories and an appreciation by Neil Gaiman. If these three volumes are a bit much for one sitting, periodic dipping in will always satisfy." – Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)
• Review: "[You Are There] is an absurdist satire,... and a pretty terrific one. ... It's easy to picture it as one of those long-form fourth-season Monty Python episodes... [I]t's seriously a master class on creating a sense not just of place but of a claustrophobic, chaotic, unsustainable state of mind. ... Killer stuff, and more fun than you remember it from French class." – Sean T. Collins
• Review: "This time around, we get Strange Suspense by Steve Ditko, whom you may have heard of. ...[and] man! are these some cool comics. ... Ditko... had no restraints, and the stories show it. This is pretty wild stuff. ... We really get a sense of a master at work in this book, even though it was so early in Ditko's career. ... It's totally worth the price!" – Greg Burgas, Comic Book Resources
• Review: "...Tyler’s sensitive 'voice' remains easily recognizable in her latest book, You’ll Never Know. ... This book is to be savored slowly and on its own terms." – Ng Suat Tong, The Comics Journal
• Review: Scott Anderson of Prism Comics, examining the "rollicking compendium" Supermen! The First Wave of Comic Book Heroes 1936-1941, notes "Grisly deaths, drug addicts, crime lords, strippers, drunk molls, and morally iffy protagonists, that, ladies and gentlemen, is how they wrote comics for kids, millions of kids, in the innocent days of yesteryear." (Via Journalista)
• Review: "...[F]or a cartoonist like Dash Shaw, who revels in drawing’s fluidity and expressive imperfections, the transition between comics and animation is a natural one. His splendid four-part animated web series for IFC.com, The Unclothed Man in the 35th Century A.D., underscores what’s best about all of his work—its eclecticism and intimate drama." – Nicole Rudick, Artforum
• Plug: "The Definitive Prince Valiant Companion... is great stuff if you're a fan of the strip and those who are should add this to their last minute Christmas list right away." – Chris Mautner, Robot 6
• Plug: "The Complete Peanuts 1971-1974... This collection of the 11th and 12th volumes of a planned 25-book set, designed by Canadian cartoonist and designer Seth, shows Schulz's staggering talent in the prime of his career and even introduces Linus and Lucy's little brother, Rerun." – Jonathan Kuehlein, Toronto Star
• Interview: Big Shiny Robot! talks to Dash Shaw: "I’ve never sold a treatment and then executed something with the expectations of the publisher looming over my shoulder. ... These comics were going to exist in some form anyway. It’s all been a combination of drawing a ridiculous amount and total luck."
• Things to see: A nice gallery of Richard Sala's Christmas cards through the years
• Things to see: "Postcard from Fielder" part 3 by Kevin Huizenga
• Things to see: On the Covered blog, Robert Goodin reimagines Carl Barks's Donald Duck
• Things to see: Hans Rickheit's Ectopiary, page 3 — comment on Hans's blog (warning: gross picture)
Well, nearly. We ran into a blizzard north of Church End, east of the Gallows Green Road (love the place names up-county – Bacon End and Butcher’s Pasture are in the same area). It slicked a small, winding country lane already made treacherous by packed sheet ice. And then we hit a pothole and that was it, we were planing. Up over the kerb and headed for a low wall with a deep ditch behind it. Luckily, mounting the kerb gave us the traction we needed to pull round with a foot to spare. That was fun. Drove on, to find a car buried in a ditch at the next junction.
Oh, and the back of the kitchen flooded the other day. I’m starting to get the sense that 2009 wants to finish me off before it dies of old age. A calendrical unit yelling "I’m taking you with me, you bastard!" from its vanishing final paper bunker marked December, every spent day a room deleted from the structure until 2009 is finally huddled in one small box marked 31 and screaming obscenities in stark terror.
All of which was probably an episode of Grant’s DOOM PATROL.
This is the new issue of COILHOUSE. Delighted to see Kristamas Klousch on the cover. It goes on sale on the 22nd. This will be the link you need.
So, having lost even more time to trying to staunch an apparently endless flow of meltwater through my windows, I have to now write DO ANYTHING #026 and FREAKANGELS 0082, because Paul’s just caught up to me. And then I’m calling it Done for the year. I’ve really got nothing left in me this year. Not intending to do anything more than scribble in a notebook and write the occasional piece here until Jan 5.
(FREAKANGELS will be on a skip week this week, because Xmas Day falls on Friday. If we had any sense, we’d skip New Year’s Day too.)
Fuck you, 2009.
(Automatically crossposted from warrenellis.com. Feel free to comment here or at my internet church at Whitechapel. If anything in this post looks weird, it's because LJ is run on steampipes and rubber bands -- please click through to the main site.)
Join a bunch of Mome contributors for a party celebrating the release of the 17th volume of the anthology at Bergen Street Comics. Flyer by Derek Van Gieson. More details TBA.
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dw_cosplay :: future_tennant : It's what on the inside? [+2] - slg_news : (no subject) [+0]
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fantagraphics : New Comics Day 12/23/09 [+0] - somerled : Word Choice [+4]
- fantagraphics : Daily OCD: 12/22/09 [+0]
- warren_ellis : Midwinterish [+1]
- fantagraphics : Get your own gift! Storewide sale at Fantagraphics Bookstore! [+0]
- redhairedapache : Meh suit yourself [+0]
- warren_ellis : DO ANYTHING 025 [+0]
- ticom : Atomic Ohms... [+4]
- artlung : Today's Twitters [+0]
- fantagraphics : Monte Schulz on Santa Barbara TV [+0]
- fantagraphics : Nate Neal e-comics [+0]
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- aestetix : (no subject) [+1]
- fantagraphics : Daily OCD: 12/21/09 [+0]
- warren_ellis : Down In The Ditch [+4]
- fantagraphics : Save the date: Mome 17 launch party in Brooklyn Jan. 10 [+0]