By Yuichi Yokoyama
Translation: Ryan Holmberg

Like audiences of other popular media, comic book readers have been conditioned to expect certain storytelling conventions. This makes reading the manga of Yuichi Yokoyama a unique experience. Yokoyama is an oil painter who exhibited no interest in comics during his youth, whether native or foreign. Yet he’s gone on to create several comics that are gorgeous to look at. At first glance, they contain all the basic vocabulary of the medium: picture panels, word captions, speech balloons, speed lines, etc. But the accompanying genre elements are missing, or at least being suppressed: plot, setting, character development, dramatic conflict, have been drained of their comforting familiarity. Instead, they’re usurped by an uncompromising sensual assault that will leave the reader reeling. Other comic creators have brought their own idiosyncratic design sensibilities to their stories. But Yokoyama’s work feels like an alien lifeform imitating human behaviour.

Take the plot of Iceland. Three strange looking men (at least I think they’re men) show up in the frozen North searching for a fourth individual. They enter a seedy bar to enquire about his whereabouts. Once they find him out back, the four leave town. None of the characters exhibit an inner life. No one offers an explanation for their individual actions. Their speech patterns betray no emotion or personality. They all speak in flat tones. In the end, the reader has no more idea as what just happened in the story. The only thing that indicates any emotional content is an undercurrent of aggression with their interactions, as if every person is sizing up everyone they encounter. The taut atmosphere is a concession to the plot’s pulp influences. Only, there’s no cathartic release in the form of physical violence.

But Yokoyama’s visual aesthetic immediately distinguishes him from more traditional mangaka. Leaning on his fine art background, Yokoyama resorts to modernist figurative abstraction combined with Pop Art typography. His characters look and move as if they were part machine, and wear elaborate patterns on their oddly shaped heads and bodies which obscure recognizable facial features, like a Cubist-inspired squad of extraterrestrial superheroes. This artificiality extends to the unnatural geometry of the icy setting. There’s nothing subtle about Yokoyama’s gaudy structures and bold compositions. And the bombastic nature of the action might vaguely remind Japanese fans of classic manga aimed at young adult males, though filtered through a very different set of artistic sensibilities.


The action, as such, is most evident when the trio enters the bar. They detect a loud repeating noise (DODODODO) as they approach the building,. Once inside, they’re immediately overwhelmed with an audiovisual spectacle. A large television monitor dominates one side of the room, playing nonstop military footage: guns blazing, tanks rolling, planes dropping bombs, soldiers shooting with their firearms, explosions booming. None of the patrons are bothered by the commotion. On the contrary, they seem to thrive in it.

Yokoyama’s ability to convey the sensation of sound is most impressive. The onomatopoeia are displayed as bold, mechanically reproduced Japanese text, spread across each panel. They practically block the reader from viewing the rest of the panel. And this goes on for several pages as double page spreads. Even in a purely visual medium, the noise is deafening. And in a story where very little happens, this is weirdly the climactic scene of the story. It’s a relief (if only a temporary one) when the trio finally leaves the bar.

That is what makes Iceland puzzling even as it is energizes. The book is so loud it denies introspection for even the reader. How can one think with all the noise going on? All one can do is immerse themselves in Yokoyama’s audiovisual pleasures.

The Verge considers them the 10 best comics of 2017.

Ars Technica rates 10 excellent comics that flew under the radar in 2017.

The Beat thinks these are the Best Comics of 2017.

io9 thinks these are the Best and Worst Moments in the Comics of 2017.

PW releases their 2017 Annual Graphic Novel Critics Poll.

The Nib looks back on 2017.

Ken Partille looks back at Ghost World.

C.B. Cebulski offerred an apology about masquerading as Akira Yoshida that many would characterise as a non-apology. Asher Elbein, Charles Pulliam-Moore, Tom Spurgeon, Brian Hibbs offer analysis.

Mark Hamill responds to the fan backlash empowered by his early comments about The Last Jedi. He's also expressed some disagreement with his last minute appearance in The Force Awakens in previous interviews, before walking back his comments.

It's now one year since Carrie Fisher's passing. Here are a compilation of her best interview quotes.

Apparently, some of the audience were confused by a pivotal scene in the movie were everything goes quiet.

The ecumenism of A Charlie Brown Christmas. Here's another one.

RIP Annie Goetzinger (18 August 1951 – 20 December 2017) celebrated French comics creator.

By Box Brown

Box Brown has made a career uncovering the stories behind pop culture objects of a very specific milieu, namely early 80s Americana. He’s authored biographies about two infamous celebrities: pro wrestler André the Giant, and comedian Andy Kaufman. With last year’s Tetris: The Games People Play, Brown instead tackled a video gaming classic. The resulting graphic novel reveals that his approach to biography works just as well for talking about nonhuman subjects. After all, Tetris didn’t just emerge from the void like one of its signature puzzle pieces. Someone had to invent it, and others had to fall for its charms. Some people might be aware that the game was the brainchild of computer scientist Alexey Pajitnov, when he was still working at the Academy of Science in Moscow. Even fewer will know what measures were taken to export the game to the Western world during the final stages of the Cold War. Brown’s examination of the complex business machinations behind Tetris’ international success is very accessible because he keeps the attention centered on the personalities involved, and not on the technologies that made it possible.

Before getting into the story of Tetris, Brown lays out his thesis for the comic. His short examination of the history (and prehistory) of games leads him to conclude that they are an artistic enterprise, the creative fusion of the competitive spirit and the child’s act of playing. Games nurture analytical skills and model human behavior by connecting with the audience’s desire for diversion, whether it be the ancient board game of Senet, the 19th century Japanese card game Hanafuda, or the video game consoles manufactured by Nintendo and Atari during the early 1980s. Every games’ popularity is a reflection of their respective society. With Tetris, Alexey’s own contribution to history was to combine the pleasures of classic puzzle games with real-time problem solving made possible by video games into an endlessly iterating loop.

Alexey himself isn’t one of Brown’s more enigmatic protagonists. He’s portrayed as a Steve Wozniak type of figure who created Tetris in 1984, during his free time in order to give expression to his ideas and entertain his friends. He showed no interest in profiting from his creation. The game would soon become a viral hit in Moscow, shared through floppy discs. A version of Tetris would make its way to Hungary, where it would be discovered by Robert Stein of U.K.-based Andromeda Software.


From here, the story becomes a lot more complicated as Alexey gradually loses control of his own creation. Various American and Japanese companies would vie for the distribution rights to Tetris, and at some point had to negotiate directly with the Russian government agency named Elorg. Like many tales from the nascent personal computing and video gaming industry, many of the parties involved were stumbling over a mess of patent, copyright, and trademark issues. Tetris would be ported to virtually every popular computing platform even when the legality of its distribution was still far from settled. This confusing state of affairs would eventually culminate in a huge 1993 legal battle between Nintendo and Atari.

If Brown were appealing just to the gaming crowd, he’d get lost comparing the varieties of Tetris being produced during this time, and judging each on their technical merits. That would make for an unwieldy comic. Thankfully, he’s more interested in the various business personalities fighting for a piece of the game. His chapter breaks are structured around their involvement, each character being helpfully introduced with a formal portrait and accompanying caption, isolated on the page by inky black. His blocky cartoon style is even more minimalist than in Andre the Giant, all the better to facilitate his understated, third person narrative voice. The only thing keeping the art from becoming completely flat is Brown’s choice of vibrant yellow to add volume to his black and white forms. But Brown is first and foremost, a storyteller. The comic still proves to a page turner despite the large cast of characters and numerous plot twists.

With everything said, Brown’s sympathies lie ultimately with the humble Alexey. He sees him as a master of his craft. Alexey wanted more than anything for the world to know his beloved game. As he explained during a 2015 appearance: “If I made a big fuss about the money, they would immediately have crushed my efforts. They would have crushed Tetris. Tetris would have been left without a champion to stick up for it and guide it. We would not be here today.”

Thor: Ragnarok, which was inspired by Marvel's comics adaptations of the Norse apocalypse, and fan favourite story Planet Hulk, is the 16th film from the ongoing Marvel cinematic universe. It's as solid an entry as any of them, with a healthy dose of swashbuckling space adventure more typically associated with Guardians of the Galaxy. But as a continuation of several plot threads going all the way back to 2011, it works very much like the middle chapter to a bigger story. This hasn't hurt its box office performance or dampened enthusiasm for the MCU. If anything, people want to know how it will pan out in the end.

What does set it apart is how it ties together Thor's sordid family history into a pointed commentary on the revisionist nature of imperialism.

Abraham Riesman lists five Thor comics to read before seeing the latest film. He also recommends eight comics for November.

Justice League is the other superhero tent film of November, and has opposite concerns. The news isn't good for those hoping it would build upon the positive reception of Wonder Woman. Much like Zach Snyder's past directorial contributions to DC's cinematic universe, Justice League is overstuffed with references  that are mostly unearned. It's a half-formed world trying hard to fool the audience into believing that it's a fully developed universe. Background information is haphazardly doled out about the new characters to make them more sympathetic. But the only reason why Flash and Aquaman are at all likeable is because of the performances of Ezra Miller and Jason Momoa. Overall, Justice League is notable for the ways it sets the stage for the future cinematic universe than for its own modest merits.

The modern superhero film is today's equivalent to the classic movie musical.

Publisher's Weekly lists its best comics for 2017.

Tony Isabella interviewed about his return to the character her created in 1977, Black Lightning.

These Calvin and Hobbes strips are a nice reminder of how we love to exclude outsiders. Seems particularly relevant today.

A page of Maus is lauded for its' aesthetic qualities.

Eddie Berganza was accused of sexual misconduct in a recent Buzzfeed article. Comics professionals reacted. Then DC first suspended Berganza, only to fire him a few days later. Even more women have since come forward. Rumours about Berganza's terrible conduct are nothing new, and DC was criticized in the past for its tepid response. The difference now is that these allegations are finding new life as part of a wave of similar allegations against other powerful male figures within the larger entertainment industry, and society in general.

What's particularly upsetting is how Berganza was tolerated despite having long developed a reputation within the comics community for being a jerk:

But Berganza’s editorial skills aren’t all he’s known for in the comics industry. At best, he developed a reputation for making offensive jokes or line-crossing comments in the presence of or at the expense of women; one former staffer recalls hearing Berganza tell a female assistant that a writer needed to make a character in a book they were editing "less dykey." Asselin recalled Berganza once telling her that the reason he didn't hit on her was because he had too much respect for her spouse. But at worst, he’s alleged to have forcibly kissed and attempted to grope female coworkers. One woman said when she started at DC, she was warned about Berganza — advised to keep an eye on him, she said, and to not get drinks with him. "People were constantly warning other people away from him," said Asselin, a vocal critic of gender dynamics in the comics industry.

Berganza's reputation spread throughout the comics industry, so much so that Sophie Campbell, an established writer and artist, turned down an opportunity to work on a Supergirl comic two years ago because Berganza was the editor overseeing the project, even though she wouldn't have had to speak directly to him during the job. It would've been a cool gig, Campbell told BuzzFeed News, but it also "felt scuzzy and scary."

"I didn't like the idea of being in professional proximity with him or having his name on something I worked on," she said.

A former DC employee said Berganza’s reputation was "something that I didn't like, but I stomached it. Everybody did. It was a gross open secret."

Meanwhile, editor C.B. Cebulski replaced Alex Alonso as Marvel's Editor in Chief, in a year the publisher experienced weak print sales while making controversial statements. He then admitted on Bleeding Cool that he once masqueraded as a Japanese writer by naming himself Akira Yoshida. He found himself penning comics such as Thor: Son of Asgard, Elektra: The Hand, Wolverine: Soultaker, and Kitty Pryde: Shadow & Flame. This was done to get around Marvel's policy of not allowing staffers to write or draw any of the publisher's comic books.

I stopped writing under the pseudonym Akira Yoshida after about a year. It wasn’t transparent, but it taught me a lot about writing, communication and pressure. I was young and naïve and had a lot to learn back then. But this is all old news that has been dealt with, and now as Marvel’s new Editor-in-Chief, I’m turning a new page and am excited to start sharing all my Marvel experiences with up and coming talent around the globe.

Rewarding an employee who once lied to the world about being an Asian man. Way to go, Marvel. That the two biggest publishers in American comics can put up with the actions of a known sexual harasser, and a self-admitted fraud who brushes off his past indiscretions as acceptable for a person of his lofty position, indicates something rotten within this industry.

Sana Amanat has responded to Cebulski's confession by actually defending him. The revelations have also inspired a hashtag bringing more attention to Asian comic creators. Cebulski is part of a long line of writers creating orientalist portrayals at Marvel, and within the comics industry. Though I can't think of any industry insider who went so far as to extend the practice to fudging their race and nationality for pure economic advantage.

Jim Shooter, Marvel's legendary former Editor in Chief, interviewed  by Chris Hassan.

Nobuhiro Watsuki, best known as the creator of the manga Rurouni Kenshin, has been arrested for possession of child pornography.

By Tillie Walden

A City Inside Is a tone poem crafted with appreciable virtuosity. It begins with an unnamed young woman lying on a divan while conversing with an unseen individual. From the manner of their conversation, it becomes apparent that the woman is inside a therapist’s office and preparing to go through some form of regression therapy. She enters into the requisite dream state by being gently absorbed by the divan. The sequence works because of how it’s illustrated by Tillie Walden with beautiful minimalism. The divan’s sloping form and repeating patterns make it appear as if the woman is floating on the surface of a large body of water. And when she sinks into the divan with the assistance of the therapist, the sequence recalls the experience of baptism or of retreating into the innocence of one's childhood.

The central conflict which prompts this bout of self-examination is a personal struggle - at its most abstract it’s a choice between love and freedom. Or maybe it’s between stability and personal growth. Or reality or fantasy. The message is open to interpretation. Whatever the case, the struggle is viewed as a reverie composed of a series of phantasmagorical images. The therapist serves as the narrative voice which ties them together, since the woman remains silent once she goes under. But the overall impression of her life is of someone constantly seeking solitude. We first see the woman as a little girl growing up in a large house located in “the South.” The narrator claims that she was happy living with just her father to keep her company. But virtually every panel portrays her being alone with her thoughts, engulfed by the long shadows cast by the house and her rural environment. It doesn’t actually come as a surprise when the narrator says that she left her father when she was only 15, “trying to escape those southern ghosts.”


When we see the woman again, she’s already a young adult living contentedly in the sky. She spends her time writing stories about nonexistent places she wants to visit. Then one night, she meets another woman bicycling past her home. The two begin a romantic relationship, which brings them both back to earth. Only this earthbound existence doesn’t suit our protagonist, who begins to contemplate leaving her lover. But the uncomplicated narrative belies the artistic challenge of capturing its contrasting environments. Walden accomplishes this through her skillful use of black and white composition. Inky shadows and silhouette figures balance areas of bright white, and the resulting shapes generate a pleasing rhythm throughout the comic. Textures and patterns create subtle visual motifs which are better appreciated through repeated readings. On a more surface level, Walden’s quiet, dreamlike imagery evokes the surreal landscapes found in the work of classic cartoonists Winsor McCay and George Herriman.

The resolution to her conflict is as fantastic as it is ambiguous. As the therapist’s voice makes the woman consider her future, the surreal landscape she inhabits suddenly expands into an immense and beautiful city. Every object and structure within it embodies some part from her life. But as she wanders the empty metropolis as a much older figure, her final thoughts turn to the people she knew, cared for, and eventually left behind. It’s still a future the woman has yet to choose when she comes out of her reverie and leaves the office. And that tantalizing conclusion makes for a more appealing comic.

By Gilbert Hernandez

Gilbert Hernandez made his mark early in the alternative comics market of the 1980s with his stories centering around Palomar - a fictional village located somewhere in Latin America. For over a decade, he weaved a complex tapestry of melancholic tales about small town love and intrigue using Palomar’s unconventional inhabitants. Hernandez has more recently moved away from these longform stories to shorter, more self-contained comics. But Loverboys will feel familiar to fans of Palomar. There’s the small town setting. A varied ensemble of individuals linked to each other by who they slept with, or who they want to sleep with. Unspoken rivalries bubbling beneath the surface. Voluptuous feminine figures with a mysterious past. An enigmatic supernatural element haunting his cast and informing their actions. All this is drawn in his signature cartooning style. But at barely eighty pages, Hernandez has distilled these components down to their bare essentials. The result is a story that tamps down on its more flamboyant soap opera aspects to exhibit greater emotional restraint. Not that Hernandez isn’t already an intelligent storyteller, but this narrative seems slightly more calculated.

The restraint is somewhat surprising given that the book’s front cover captures two of its principal characters in an intimate moment. But much of the sexual activity takes place off panel. And there’s even less outright violence. So much of the storytelling in Loverboys is economical. Hernandez’s art is perhaps even more starkly minimalist, if that’s even possible. His traditional page layouts, simple perspective, and uncluttered panel compositions function as an simple stage for his cast, which are always designed to be visually eclectic. Actually, this is a huge cast for such a comparatively short comic, so not all of them can receive equal attention. But the reader can easily spot several of them in the background either casually observing or surreptitiously eavesdropping on the foregrounded characters. This all serves to reinforce the gossipy nature of a tiny community.


The minimalist visuals are complemented by the book’s spare dialogue. With the exception of the establishing pages used to introduce the fictional setting of Lágrimas, there’s very little exposition to describe the actions of the cast. Almost nothing is revealed of the inner lives of the minor characters. But the observant reader will notice some of them going through their own individual arcs. Clues are found in their actions, facial expressions, and offhand remarks. Even information about the central characters is divulged gradually: one crucial detail which helps to illuminate their motivations is delivered in a casual aside sometime past the halfway point.

At the heart of the story is the May-December romance of young lothario Rocky and his former substitute teacher Mrs. Paz, and the effect this has on Rocky’s little sister Daniela, who happens to be Mrs. Paz’s current student. The relationship and its eventual dissolution isn’t in itself all that remarkable. What is compelling is how Hernandez is able to map how it creates ripples throughout Lágrimas. As the town’s resident pretty boy, Rocky’s romantic interest in the elderly Mrs. Paz sparks a considerable amount of interest. And as their relationship begins to flounder, Mrs. Paz is suddenly eyed by a random collection of singles - from the unlovable loser who’s never dated anyone, another would-be womanizer, a pair of creepy twins, to even a lonely schoolgirl. Through separate interactions with each of them, some of them sexual, Mrs. Paz in turn either embarrasses, humiliates, or enables them. Hernandez handles these scenes with his characteristic mix of empathy for his cast’s frailties while delighting (even sometimes indulging) in human sensual pleasures. Only this time his approach is a little more compressed.

Loverboys may not contain the narrative intricacy, sustained world building, or emotional highs of his earlier work. That’s not likely. But there’s something to be said when a talent like Gilbert Hernandez tackles new formats. If this is a lesser work, it’s still more accomplished than most  comics being currently published. Or to quote one of the characters in the book, “I think it’s beautiful.”

Did you know that Wonder Woman is finally headlining a groundbreaking, not to mention hugely profitable, film? The amazing amazon has become a genuine cultural phenomenon. For the beleaguered Time-Warner, it's the only instalment from the DC Cinematic Universe to have so far garnered critical acclaim. And director Patty Jenkins will be back to helm the sequel (maybe). But there have been a few controversies, such as leading lady Gal Gadot's Israeli background and her advocacy of the IDF leading to the Lebanese government banning the film.

This is, off course, long overdue for a character usually touted as one of DC's top three superheroes (the other two being Superman and Batman) but receives only a fraction of the attention directed at her peers. What took them so long? There are a few unfortunate consequences to being part of a cinematic universe. The film's dreary visual aesthetic had already been laid down since Man of Steel. So this is partly justified by setting the story in WW I Europe. In contrast, the sun-drenched island paradise of Themyscira is a welcome sight. The inevitable and annoying slo-mo action sequences favoured by Zach Snyder are also exploited to capture Diana's perception of fired bullets as moving through the air at a snail's pace. The film just can't quite overcome the dullness of the requisite CGI-enhanced final showdown, mainly because Ares (David Thewlis) is no more interesting a villain than Ultron or Ronan.

But these films live or die on the casting of their heroic leads. Gadot is a compelling presence, which was first evident when she was the one bright spot in the abysmal Snyder showcase that was Batman V Superman. Her bemusement at the great metropolis that is jolly old London made the small moments of pleasure she found all the more endearing. Chris Pine, playing Steve Trevor, proves to be an excellent second banana. A suitably cynical foil to Diana's moral absolutism. His attempted seduction of Doctor Poison (Elena Anaya) while speaking with a German accent is an amusing highlight, and convinced me that Pine should play the honey trap more often. It takes a while before Diana reaches the front line and joins the fray. But the moment she throws aside her disguise and crosses No Man's Land under a hale of machine gun fire might be the best coming out party for a cinematic superhero in the present era (and definitely in all of the DC Cinematic Universe).

Though Hera help me, I'm still not pleased with the decision to utilise elements from the controversial New 52 reboot for Diana's origin story. The choices made have the cumulative effect of closing off her connection to the larger world of Greek mythology (and dilute the attendant feminist overtones found in the comics) which I wished remained open for future instalments. I hope the gods aren't as extinct as Diana was led to believe. And the Amazons were so badass I wouldn't mind seeing them make a return appearance. And bring back the invisible jet!

After a series of misfires, DC's cinematic universe finally has a hero worthy of their efforts. Maybe they'll even learn to build on her success and make her the heart of future instalments.

Germain Lussier has a rundown of directors who made their debut with a smaller independent film, then were signed on to direct an expensive studio blockbuster. Patty Jenkins makes the list as one of the few, and now the most successful, women offered the opportunity.

Vincent Schilling lavishes praise on Eugene Brave Rock's portrayal of supporting character Chief. In their first meeting spoken entirely in Blackfoot, he introduces himself to Diana as the trickster Napi. That would explain his easy acceptance of her as an immortal being.

Nate Jones compares the film's fictional and real German general Erich Ludendorff.

Charlie Jane Anders speaks up for Wonder Woman as hero and role model.

James Whitbrook gives his recommendations for Wonder Woman comics.

Keith DeCandido speaks in favour for Wonder Woman's last great onscreen incarnation played by Lynda Carter, and critiques the mediocre animated feature from 2009.

Hunter Harris on the David E. Kelley Wonder Woman pilot that never aired.

Willa Paskin muses on how to better review superhero movies. Needless to say, this is already a controversial point in comics.

Emily Asher-Perrin examines the evolution of Robin Wright as a heroine by comparing her role of Princess Buttercup from The Princess Bride, and General Antiope from Wonder Woman.

Gal Gadot on auditioning for the role.

Angelica Jade Bastién on Wonder Woman's convoluted history and the tendency (especially by DC) to underestimate the character's enormous appeal.

Image via Hollywood Reporter

Maggie Umber on the break up of her marriage with Raighne Hogan due to the financial stress caused by both partners running the publishing house 2dcloud.

Asher Elbein analyses the causes for Marvel's weak print sales. The Direct Market has generally done a poor job cultivating new readers. But Marvel deserves special recognition for going out of its way to alienate them:

The past decade has been a parade of singularly embarrassing behavior by Marvel writers and editors in public. The former editor Stephen Wacker has a reputation for picking fights with fans; so does the Spider-Man writer Dan Slott. The writer Peter David went on a bizarre anti-Romani rant at convention (he later apologized); the writer Mark Waid recently mused about punching a critic in the face before abandoning Twitter. The writer of Secret Empire, Nick Spencer, has managed to become a swirl of social media sturm all by himself, partially for his fascist Captain America storyline and partially for his tone-deaf handling of race and general unwillingness to deal with criticism.

Marvel’s marketing and PR must bear a hefty share of the blame as well. The company habitually places the onus for minority books’ survival on the readership, instead of promoting their product effectively. Tom Brevoort, the executive editor at Marvel, publicly urged readers to buy issues of the novelist Chelsea Cain’s canceled (and very witty) Mockingbird after the author was subjected to coordinated sexist harassment. 

The problem, however, is that the decision to cancel Mockingbird was necessarily made months in advance, due to preorder sales to retailers on the direct market. The book itself launched with only a few announcements on comics fan sites; no real attempt to reach out to a new audience was made. Marvel’s unexpected success stories, like Kelly Sue DeConnick’s Captain Marvel, are largely built on the tireless efforts of the creators themselves. (In Deconnick’s case, she paid for postcards, dog tags, and fliers for fan engagement out of her own pocket, for a character she didn’t own or have a real expectation of royalties from.)

Ben Judkins recommends his top five comics/animated works for the martial artist. I myself have reviewed Boxers & Saints and commented frequently on the Avatar the Last Airbender franchise.

By Eleanor Davis.

Libby’s Dad examines how children tackle what is for them one of life’s great mysteries, the grownups who control them. What exactly is it that drives their behaviour? Do they even share the same feelings we experience? The setting is a pool party attended by several prepubescent girls, held at the newly purchased house resided by Libby. The titular character is largely absent from the comic, but is the source of the girls’ attention once one of them passes along a piece of gossip regarding the recent divorce of Libby’s parents. They try to square this information with the hospitality they’ve experienced first hand. How could Libby’s dad be the bad guy when he allowed the girls to hold a pool party, eat cake, and even bought them delicious KFC? The vast gulf between perception and reality is only magnified by the immaturity and very limited outlook of children.

Eleanor Davis draws a brightly colored, but claustrophobic milieu. The girl’s own simplified world view represented by lineart rendered entirely in colored pencils, and figures drawn with flattened perspective. Backgrounds are minimal, with Davis eschewing conventional panel borders for strong color fields. The same visual elements which envelop the girls in comforting familiarity are flipped halfway through to become immediately terrifying when they begin to seriously reconsider the validity of the rumors. The broadly defined art’s lack of subtle gradations capturing the girls’ constant inability to comprehend the moral ambiguity of the surrounding adult world. Everything about that place just fades to white.


Off course, the comic is written from an adult’s viewpoint of children’s behaviour. Davis doesn’t bother to answer the questions raised by the girls about the true relationship between Libby’s parents. Only to show how the girls are easily misled by the different scraps of information they’re fed. They’re quickly swayed by the comforts of the house, an elegant example of sleek mid-20th century modern design. They have a child’s obsession with associating with the proper brand identity, hence the affection for the aforementioned KFC, or exemplified later in a cutting remark about the impropriety of crying into a box of fruit-themed cereal. The girls share the inability to sustain any kind of introspection, not atypical for children their age. And there’s a casual cruelty to their value judgements that reduces everything to a zero sum game, familiar to any kid caught in an argument about who has the coolest parents. It's a warped view mirrored in their grotesque features.

So there’s a lot about the comic that feels surprisingly complex and nuanced, not to mention true to life when regarding how children often fail to process much of the world around them. And it’s beautifully drawn with tools that rarely receive this level of prominence.  If there’s  one criticism I would level, it’s that Libby’s Dad ends with a bait and switch that can feel a little premature. Or maybe I’m disappointed that its young characters didn’t really acquire any real insight. I guess, every child needs their reassuring illusions.

Via Christopher Butcher

Via Comica London

Via Page 45

Fanfare/Ponent Mon catalog.

TCJ lists their best comics of 2016.

2017 marks the 25th anniversary of the Pulitzer Prize awarded to landmark comix Maus. Women Write About Comics holds a roundtable about the work. Last year's article by Michael Cavna quotes several comics creators who were influenced by Maus, including Gene Yang, Chris Ware, and Jeff Smith.

March is the best selling book on Amazon, just in time for Martin Luther King Day.

Isaac Butler compares the story of John Lewis in March and the presidency of Barack Obama.

Who would have thought Superman's red shorts would have become a hot political issue? Comics, folks.

Barack Obama on the power of fiction and storytelling.

Chris Ware, Cosey and Larcenet are three finalists for Angoulême’s Grand Prix, while Alan Moore steps aside again.

The Winter Issue of the Martial Arts Studies is available for download.

Ben Judkins on the limits of authenticity in martial arts. Who would have thought these kinds of discussions would eventually include lightsaber combat?

By Natsume Ono
Translation: Joe Yamazaki
Touch-up Art/Lettering: Gia Cam Luc
Design: Fawn Lau

La Quinta Camera was a webcomic series that established Natsume Ono as a mangaka in Japan, but was translated by Viz after her later work Ristorante Paradiso. Nonetheless, one can see a number of commonalities between the two works. Ono displays an early fascination with the Western cultural milieu, particularly Italy. And just as in Ristorante Paradiso, the manga has a thing for adult males of a certain age. Even in her first story, Ono handles the lives of her characters with a deft and light touch, devoid of any cheap melodrama.

The manga does contain a few surprises. Considering Ono’s more mature minimalist style, La Quinta Camera’s art is practically primitive by comparison. Ono’s figures are blockier and more squat, almost reminiscent of early Cubism. Her lines are more uniform, as if she only used technical pens which produced a certain line thickness. This results in characters who are more archetypal in appearance. They’re recognizable primarily through larger features like their hairstyles, or preferred items of clothing.

Ono also uses a much simpler setup to make her story work. In the first chapter, a young woman from Denmark arrives at an unnamed Italian city and immediately suffers a series of mishaps. We learn that she’s here to learn the language. But after losing her personal belongings, getting lost, interacting with a few of the locals, and finally managing to find the language school, she’s directed to an apartment building for her room and board. To her surprise, she discovers that her hosts happen to be the very locals she met earlier on the street. If this were a more conventional story, the rest of the manga would be about the fish-out-of-water misadventures of the woman and her 4 eccentric roommates.

But this isn’t the case at all. In the next chapter, the woman has already moved out of the apartment and an artist has moved into the room. We learn that the owner has arranged with the school to rent the apartment’s 5th room to the school’s foreign students, who usually stay for a short period. Each chapter introduces a different student, and their outside perspective allows us to learn a little more about the 4 permanent residents in the apartment.

While they might not be the center of attention, the students are nonetheless an important component. There’s an opportunity to further ground the setting in local color through comparisons with the customs of the students. Many of those interactions take place over a warm meal. A shy Japanese youngster comments about the differences between how Italians and Japanese celebrate the Christmas season over preparations for a big feast. On another occasion, the hosts are mortified over how one American’s love for french fries has permeated the apartment with an unwanted greasy stench.

Overall, this approach makes for an easily accessible work. The story builds through the accumulation of intimate conversations, mundane observations, and tiny revelations. We come to realize what mini tragedies brought these individuals together, and appreciate the generous spirit that compels them to open their home to a varied and ever-changing flock of strangers. The meandering narrative is like taking a casual stroll through a friendly and welcoming neighborhood where the locals wouldn’t hesitate to talk about their lives over coffee and panino.

Andrew Aydin, John Lewis and Nate Powell (via National Book Foundation)

March Book 3 is the first graphic novel to win the National Book Award.

Amazon lists the top 20 graphic novels for 2016.

Michael Cavna lists the best graphic novels of 2016.

Charlotte McDuffie on her late husband Dwayne McDuffie and the awards established in his memory.

Sacha Mardou on the female characters created by Dan Clowes.

 Zulkiflee Anwar Unlhaque aka Zunar arrested again, this time for sedition against Malaysian Prime Minister.

Alanna Bennett on the growing divide between Harry Potter fans and their beloved franchise. Perhaps the most infamous recent example was the charge of cultural appropriation over J.K. Rowling's History of Magic in North America.

But not everyone is agitating for greater inclusiveness. Angelica Jade Bastién covers the growing racist backlash from some parts of superhero fandom. Both trends could probably be connected to a larger national conversation. But I wonder what this says about how franchises are created at different points in time and how different kinds of individuals end up gravitating towards them?

Alex Vadukul on Hong Kong's first female kung fu star, Angela Mao. Most people will recognize her as Su Lin in Enter the Dragon.

Erin Gloria Ryan on the surging demand for self-defence classes since Nov 8. These types of articles are usually written when people worry about a perceived increase in violent crime or terrorism while focusing on male students and instructors. But marginalized individuals such as women, minorities, and the LGBTQ community have always had their own specific self defence needs.

Sean Kleefeld, Tyler Amato, John Seavey, myself are ready to say goodbye to 2016.

Three Marvel interpretations of Kamala Khan surround fan Meevers Desu as Ms. Marvel at the Denver Comic Con.

Mallika Rao on why Ms. Marvel Will Save You Now.

Barbara Calderón interviews Gilbert and Jaime Hernandez.

Sean T. Collins lists the greatest graphic novels of all time.

Heidi MacDonald on the contradiction that is Wonder Woman as a U.N. Honorary Ambassador.

R.I.P. Jack Chick (April 13, 1924-October 23, 2016). Tributes by Benito Cereno, Sean Kleefeld, Heidi MacDonald, Joe McCulloch,

Just a reminder: Scott Adams is nuts.

Charles Russo deciphers Bruce Lee vs. Wong Jack Man.

Lucasfilm sues New York Jedi over trademark infringement. I've been wandering when Lucas/Disney would go after any of the numerous lightsaber academies.

By Ed Piskor.

The cover for the graphic novel Wizzywig is slightly deceptive. The title is a play on the acronym WYSIWYG, which stands for the “What You See Is What You Get” feature of the modern graphic user interphase. The cover design for the Top Shelf edition (the comic originated as a serialized webcomic before being self-published in 3 volumes) evokes the case of an early model Apple Macintosh running MacPaint. But creator Ed Piskor is less interested in the birth of desktop publishing than in the world of phone phreaking, war dialing, and other activities associated with old-school computer hackers. Piskor’s art style descends from the line of satirical cartooning that began with the Underground Comix movement of the 60s and continued with the alt cartoonists of succeeding decades. So it’s well suited to drawing a clear parallel between the outsider status of cartoonists and hackers while pillorying those who persecute them.

Given its almost 300 pages of densely composed panels and scope of subject matter, the comic is not a quick read. Piskor channels the first 20-odd years of computer hacking through his main protagonist Kevin Phenicle, a composite of several famous real world hackers (namely Kevin Mitnick, Mark Abene and Kevin Poulsen, with a dash of Josef Carl Engressia, Jr). Going by the internet handle “Boingthump”, he occasionally runs into tech legends like Robert Morris or the pre-Apple Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak. The comic begins with a series of talking heads giving contradictory opinions about Kevin. As people either vilify or idolize him, an overall picture emerges of a near-mythical figure who’s nonetheless deeply misunderstood by the public. The scene quickly shifts to a radio show hosted by Kevin’s childhood friend Winston Smith (a reference to Off the Hook, a radio show hosted by Emmanuel Goldstein). Winston informs his audience that Kevin is currently being imprisoned without trial and agitates for the government giving him his proper due process. The scene shifts again to reveal a much younger Kevin being bullied by two kids while waiting for the school bus.


Piskor uses these vignettes as the basic building blocks of his narrative. While Kevin’s formative years enfold in a mostly episodic manner, the comic regularly flash forwards to adult Kevin’s incarceration. Mixed in are excerpts of Winston’s radio show, more interviews with random people on the street, television news reports, and scenes involving other more relevant characters. This structure affords Piskor the ability to easily shift forwards and backwards in time. But it’s also calculated to make the esoteric subject of computer hacking more comprehensible to the layperson. Certain sections inevitably go into detail about Kevin’s exploits, whether that be discovering a security flaw in the punch card system used by bus lines, scamming a delivery place to score some free pizza, pirating computer games, pranking members of a local BBS, or undermining the monopolistic power of Ma Bell, the act that would finally earn Kevin the unwelcome scrutiny of the Powers-that-be. Piskor’s explanations are short, not too complicated to follow, and easily digestible to the non-technical reader.

Wizzywig is a pretty good showcase of how a cartoonist maintains narrative momentum even when the characters are engaged in fairly mundane tasks. Like Chester Brown in Louis Riel, Piskor mostly sticks to the highly readable 6-panel grid layout. Characters in conversation or deep in thought are often shown walking from place to place. Or drawn in different poses and shifting perspectives if they’re merely sitting. Piskor’s eye for gritty detail is quite efficient in conveying setting and mood, but it’s his gift for caricature that stands out. No one's physical features are flattered, no matter however attractive. People often seem to possess odd proportions or carry themselves with terrible body posture. Most of them have big noses, sallow skin, shaggy hair, beady eyes. In contrast, Kevin’s impossibly poofy hair and pupiless eyes (again recalling Riel and Little Orphan Annie) suggests a potent mixture of innocence and craftiness.


At first glance, Kevin would appear to be the stereotypical nerdy kid who’s a whiz with computers, but has no friends or can’t get laid. But he’s an orphan living with a grandmother who’s incapable of providing him with enough adult supervision, or dole out the kind of practical advice on how to deal with school bullies. Kevin’s hacking doesn’t just arise from boredom or intellectual curiosity, but also from an impulse to strike back at his oppressors. Hacking becomes a non-physical form of asymmetrical warfare. The irony is that for all his social awkwardness, Kevin becomes particularly adept at what the industry calls “social engineering,” manipulating the behavior of other people to obtain information and get them to do what he wants. But his cunning also belies a deep naivete that leads to his eventual undoing. An early sign of things to come is when Kevin illegally resells gaming software, but as a joke inserts a bit of extra code into the program which will display the message “Boingthump owns your soul, sucka!” after 100 plays. Unfortunately this renders the game unplayable, and Kevin earns the ire of local gamers. More ominously, the code’s ability to infect whatever system the game’s installed into also gains media attention, and the name Boingthump becomes associated with computer viruses.

Kevin becomes a fugitive from the law around the halfway point, living a day-to-day nomadic existence. It turns out that the resourcefulness he’s displayed are particularly useful to life on the run. Much of this part of the book is still spent on educating the reader about various hacks: how to assume a false identity, find temp work, and not draw attention to oneself. Kevin runs a number of hustles just to stay alive. One particular scheme involves rigging numerous radio contests and recruiting women to claim the prize, usually taking the cash items for himself. His social engineering takes on an even more mercenary overtone, and Kevin’s portrayal becomes somewhat dehumanized as a result.


This part of the comic is where Piskor’s satire is at full force. The mainstream media’s treatment of hackers is embodied by a muckraking television journalist whose thick mustache and ludicrous combover makes him look like an older, evil version of Kevin. His reports on Kevin’s alleged crimes become increasingly sensationalized, with both the FBI and the Ma Bell only too happy to participate in the vilification process. Winston becomes the sole voice of reason in this climate of media-induced paranoia.

A side effect of this shift in tone is that Kevin becomes more a symbol of systematic injustice than a fully fleshed out individual. The earlier part of the book helped establish him as a sympathetic, if flawed human being. But his character development stalls as he becomes a fugitive, and later a prisoner. It becomes less about Kevin himself than his mistreatment at the hands of his captors. This saps the story’s intended emotional impact when Kevin’s grim experiences are connected to the wider world and latter day whistleblowers, such as Pfc. Bradley Manning and Wikileaks. It’s the most glaring weakness in a highly ambitious work which actually has something relevant to say about the present-day terrifying state of American politics.