Friday, March 22, 2024

A Power Not Seen for Thousands of Years – This Week’s Links

March 22, 2024 Philippines , Pinoy 0 Comments

A fair amount of commentary this week on Disney unilaterally foisting one of 2024’s Legends awards, posthumously, on Steve Ditko, which is what it is - corporations will as corporations do - but it does remind me of the sequence of missions from 2018’s Sony Interactive Entertainment's Marvel’s Spider-Man for the PlayStation 4 (and later PlayStation 5 and Windows PC), in which Peter Parker is tasked with web-slinging around New York helping the NYPD repair, calibrate, and then expand their city-wide surveillance system, celebrating the panopticon in a manner that could very easily be described as ‘tonally problematic’, and this coming from someone who voluntarily lives in London, however, one thing that I can comfortably say will never be misconstrued are this week’s links, below.

This week’s news.

• Starting this week’s selection in the library, as the American Library Association released their report on book challenges in 2023, last year having set another record for number of titles targeted for censorship, seeing a 65% increase from 2022’s figures.

• Balancing out the above, the Missouri Association of School Librarians announced the inaugural Denny O’Neil Graphic Novel List, recommending titles for grades K-2, 3-5, 6-8, and 9-12; and the UK’s National Literacy Trust released a report on Children and young people's engagement with comics in 2023, with 40% of the 64,000 young people (aged 8-18) surveyed saying that they read comics or graphic novels in their free time.

• Comics prizes news, and the Cartoonist Cooperative announced the winners of 2024’s Minicomics Awards, with Alex Cara’s Fancies, Sloane Hong’s Marrow, Narrenstrich’s Crossed Signals, Barbara Benas’s Bottom’s Up!, and Madeline McGrane’s The Bird Daughters all winning across this year’s categories, taking home a split of a prize pool of $3500.

• Elsewhere, the Herb Block Foundation announced that Steve Brodner is this year’s winner of the Herblock Prize, with Pedro Molina also named as 2024’s finalist, with the judges quoted as saying that “Brodner's work is unflinching, driven by a strong moral compass and imbued with a powerful sense of compassion.”

• In memoriam, remembering those the world of comics has lost, and news was shared this week of the passing of mangaka Yū Asai, who died on the 6th of March following a traffic accident, which also left Asai’s husband, fellow mangaka Motoyuki Asai, hospitalised.

• Elsewhere, news was shared of the passing of artist, character designer, and animator Mutsumi Inomata, creator of GB Bomber, who died on the 10th of March, at the age of 63.

This week’s reviews.

TCJ

• Mardou reviews the remarkable beauty of Tessa Hulls’ Feeding Ghosts - “As anyone who’s had to overcome trauma might recognize, healing is rarely a linear process. Themes, images and details come up time and again until the healing cycle begins to generate, allowing traumatic memories carried in the nervous system to be freed. Feeding Ghosts conveys this nonlinear process; it is densely rich in imagery and symbolism, as if Hulls let her subconscious guide her pen.”

• Daniel Parker reviews the masterful humour of Álvaro Ortiz’s Ashes, translated by Eva Ibarzabal - “Friendships in fiction are typically shown at the height of the relationship, or in a moment of crisis, enabling us to appreciate the bond or emotional dynamic of the gang; in contrast, Ashes shows the group long after the flame has been blown out. Generally speaking, we focus the bulk of our energy on those that impact our life emotionally in the present - though, in many cases, those people had different names, faces and personalities a decade ago.”

 

AIPT

• David Brooke reviews the gorgeous details of Erik Burnham, Mateus Santolouco, et al’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Untold Destiny Of The Foot Clan #1.

• Collier Jennings reviews the delightful construction of Ram V, Evan Cagle, et al’s Dawnrunner #1.

• Alex Schlesinger reviews the heartfelt adventuring of Pornsak Pichetshote, Jesse Lonergan, et al’s Man’s Best #1.

• Nathan Simmons reviews the gripping contemplations of Simon Spurrier, Aaron Campbell, et al’s John Constantine, Hellblazer: Dead in America #3.

 

The Beat

• Derrick Crow reviews the whimsical tone of Hidenori Yamaji’s Soara and the House of Monsters, translated by Ben Trethewey.

• François Vigneault reviews the patient approach of Taiyō Matsumoto’s Tokyo These Days, Volume 1, translated by Michael Arias.

• Joe Grunenwald reviews the simian stand-outs of DC’s Ape-Ril Special #1.

• Jordan Jennings reviews the interesting twist of Ram V, Evan Cagle, et al’s Dawnrunner #1.

• George Carmona 3rd reviews the winning finale of Eve L. Ewing, Chris Allen, et al’s Black Panther #10.

 

Broken Frontier

• Lindsay Pereira reviews the charming nostalgia of Travis Dandro’s Winnie-the-Pooh, and the exciting innovation of Freddy Carrasco’s GLEEM.

• Andy Oliver has reviews of:

- The quiet intensity of Ethan Sacks, Naomi Sacks, and Marco Lorenzana’s A Haunted Girl.

- The distinctive colouring of Wallis Eates’ Budgie Steps - Colossive Cartographies #53.

- The gripping start of Pornsak Pichetshote, Jesse Lonergan, et al’s Man’s Best #1.

- The dark ribaldry of Frisson Comics’ Blobby Horror.

- The contemporary relevance of Worm: A Cuban American Odyssey.

 

French Studies

Maaheen Ahmed reviews the exemplary scholarship of Mark McKinney’s Postcolonialism and Migration in French Comics. By Mark McKinney.

 

House to Astonish

Paul O’Brien has capsule reviews of Marvel Comics’ X-Men Unlimited Infinity Comic #130, Fall of the House of X #3, Dead X-Men #3, and Wolverine #45.

 

Multiversity Comics

• Robbie Pleasant reviews the dynamic action of Stephanie Phillips, Paolo Villanelli, et al’s Black Widow & Hawkeye #1.

• Gregory Ellner reviews the effective denouement of Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham, et al’s Fables #162.

• Eias Rosner reviews the impressive framing of Boum’s The Jellyfish, translated by Robin Lang and Helge Dascher.

• Alexander Jones reviews the uneven strands of Marvel Comics’ Web of Spider-Man #1.

• Mark Tweedale reviews the family dynamics of Marjorie Liu, Sana Takeda, et al’s The Night Eaters Book 2: Her Little Reapers.

 

New York Review of Books

Marissa Moss reviews the unique voices of Marjane Satrapi et al’s Woman, Life, Freedom, translated by Una Dimitrijevic.

 

NPR

Tahneer Oksman reviews the vibrant poignancy of Jordan Mechner’s Replay.

 

Solrad

Emily Price reviews the tasty anachronisms of H.A.’s The Chromatic Fantasy.

 

Women Write About Comics

Kayleigh Hearn reviews the radical surprises of Peach Momoko’s Ultimate X-Men #1.

This week’s interviews.

TCJ

• Jason Bergman interviews Jordan Mechner about Replay: Memoir of an Uprooted Family, the joys of MAD, the early days of computer gaming, and the choices that go into creating a graphic memoir - “I often find that real history sparks my imagination, makes me want to know more. It’s interesting that even my video games have been set in exotic places or historical periods: Karateka in medieval Japan, Prince of Persia in a Thousand and One Nights world of ancient Persia, The Last Express in early 20th century Europe. For me, part of the appeal of reading and learning about a historical episode is that it actually happened. That there are useful things we can learn from it.”

• Matt Petras interviews Alex Graham about The Devil’s Grin, readerships on ephemeral social media platforms, and reasons to move away from the endless scroll - ““Not that I care a lot what people think, but some of the reception to Dog Biscuits was people being like, ‘the story’s good but the art sucks,’” Graham said. “And I wanted to shake them and tell them, ‘I know how to draw. You guys are only seeing this because this is the most minimalistic art that I’ve ever done, and you’re judging me just based on this.’ So I guess I kinda wanted to prove to people that I can do better than that. And then once I prove it with this, I’m going back to the minimalism.””

 

AIPT

Chris Coplan talks to:

-  Alex Paknadel and Troy Little about Cult of the Lamb: The First Verse and adapting video games to the comics form.

- Tony Fleecs and Dave Wachter about Uncanny Valley and bringing cartoon characters into real-world settings.

- Chuck Austen about The Tormented and supernatural influences.

- Steve Morger about the Lake Como Comic Art Festival and keeping the focus on comics art.

 

The Beat

• Avery Kaplan speaks with Maria Scrivan on All Is Nat Lost, declarations of independence in Philadelphia, and lessons learned about the Liberty Bell.

• Diego Higuera interviews Royce Adkins about Outcasts, personal history with asthma, alternate Los Angeles, and common themes in comics projects.

• Heidi MacDonald chats with Zoop’s Jordan Plotsky about looking to equity crowdfunding for the crowdfunding platform itself, and the company’s plans for expansion.

• Rebecca Oliver Kaplan speaks with Soizick Jaffre about A Good Sport, the history of the Gay Games, being addicted to colours, and the crowdfunding campaign for the book.

 

Broken Frontier

Andy Oliver talks to buttercup about UM, the heart of magical girl stories, resistance against the criminalisation of marginalised identities, and finding your artistic style preference. 

 

The Guardian

Angelique Chrisafis interviews Marjane Satrapi about Woman, Life, Freedom, returning to comics after the success of Persepolis, and using the form to humanise Iranians in the eyes of readers in the west.

 

New York Post

Hannah Frishberg chats with Al Mullen about Public Transport Magazine, using zines to get your work to a wider audience, and the publication’s free guerilla distribution across New York. 

 

Publisher’s Weekly

Andrew Farago talks to Jay Stephens about Dwellings, the series’ origins as a pandemic-era personal project, and the influence of Kazuo Umezz.

 

Women Write About Comics

Rosie Knight speaks with Jeff Estrella and Fabian Lelay about Balikbayan, the family inspiration for the book, the personal nature of telling horror stories, and the vast nature of Filipino folklore.

This week’s features and longreads.

• Here at TCJ, Jon Holt and Teppei Fukuda present a translation of chapter 5 of Natsume Fusanosuke’s 1997 book Why Is Manga So Interesting? Its Expression and Grammar, which looks at the various line compositions to be found on a manga page through the lens of the work of mangaka Tanioka Yasuji and Sugiura Shigeru - “The line is a strange thing. There are numerous examples where artists have depicted other beings in the most abstract and simple ways with line, like the primitive peoples and their cave drawings. There are later cases too where the pictures look very real. When I say pictures are “real,” I feel that such drawings were made in general long after civilization had advanced, and there had been a kind of revolution in the techniques of artistic expression; in contrast, it is hard to tell which of the examples we have seen of earlier simple human drawings came first.”

• For The Washington Post, Michael Cavna writes on the female artists disappearing from newspapers’ comics pages, following Gannett’s move to standardise its funny pages, speaking with some of the cartoonists affected, and assessing the failings of the current business model.

• Over at ICv2, Rob Salkowitz looks at the rearing of the dual heads of NFTs and AI artwork at the Big Two, as Marvel decides that now is the time to be bullish about non-fungible tokens, and allegations that Batman artist Andrea Sorrentino has been using AI artwork abound on social media.

• Helen Chazan directs more Comics Gridlock, for Solrad, this month writing on social comics connections, and presenting thoughts on Celine Loup's Sacred Grove, Sunmi's Firebird, and Kazuo Umezz's Cat-Eyed Boy.

• Crunching the numbers, From Cover to Cover’s Mike Baxter assesses the inflation of prices for periodicals in the contemporary comics market, and the myriad reasons behind these increases, as print quality from some quarters declines.

• For Shelfdust, Chad Nevett writes on the genesis of Kid Loki, in Matt Fraction and Pasqual Ferry’s Thor run, and how the relationship between this version of Loki and the god of thunder lies at the heart of Fraction and Alan Davis’ The Mighty Thor #19.

• From the world of open-access academia, and the 6th International Conference on Education and Social Science Research, Raden Yusuf Sidiq Budiawan, Rawinda Fitrotul Mualafina, Siti Ulfiyani, and Mukhlis Mukhlis write on the implicature to be found in the digital cartoons of Komik Grontol.

• For the Journal of Interdisciplinary Science Topics, Naomi Lester uses Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata’s Death Note as a jumping off point to answer the age-old question of how one would go about meting out vigilante murder justice using potato chips.

• Mike Peterson rounds up the week’s editorial beat, for The Daily Cartoonist, as a ban on TikTok looms, while the build-up to this year’s election rumbles on, while Russia’s has closed with the expected result.

This week’s audio/visual delights.

• Tegan O’Neil and Claire Napier return with a fresh pail of Udder Madness, this episode looking back at Fiona Avery, Tippi Blevins, Romano Molenaar, et al’s Cursed, the costume game of characters, and the factual accuracy of Top Cow comics, or lack thereof.

• 2000 AD’s Thrill-Cast returns, as MOLCH-R hosts a tribute episode to artist John M. Burns, who passed away at the end of 2023, speaking with Tim Quinn, Sean Phillips, Robbie Morrison, and Paul Duncan about Burns’ life and artistic legacy.

• Comics Grinder presented a conversation with host Henry Chamberlain and cartoonist Tom Scioli about Jack Kirby: The King of Comics and I Am Stan: A Graphic Biography, as they discussed the legacies of Kirby and Lee, and the connections you make when delving into someone’s history in-depth.

• Gil Roth welcomed David Small to The Virtual Memories Show, as they spoke about The Werewolf at Dusk and Other Stories, adapting prose to the comics form and moving from longer form stories to short form tales, and embracing digital processes.

• Brian Hibbs was joined by Mike Cavallaro for the latest meeting of the Comix Experience Graphic Novel Club, as they discussed Eowulf, getting hooked on comics and deciding to pursue a career from making them, pitching comics, and editorial workflows for Scorpios.

• David Harper welcomed Kieron Gillen to this week’s episode of Off Panel, as they spoke about drawing another run on Marvel titles to a close and returning to creator-owned works, shifting the status quo for the X-Men line, and visiting comics conventions.

• Brigid Alverson joined Calvin Reid, Heidi MacDonald, and Kate Fitzsimons for Publisher’s Weekly’s More to Come, as they discussed recent coverage of the middle grade graphic novel market boom, as well as the recent passing of mangaka Akira Toriyama.

• Closing out the week with more from Cartoonist Kayfabe, as Ed Piskor and Jim Rugg look back on Peter Bagge and R. Crumb on Caffy!, Frank Miller and Dave Gibbons on Give Me Liberty, 1997’s Wizard #65, Akira Toriyama’s Dr. Slump, Barry Windsor-Smith on Iron Man #232, and Marvel Comics’ nuptials-focused X-Men #30.

That is everything for this week, but there will be more next time, of this I am adamant.

The post A Power Not Seen for Thousands of Years – This Week’s Links appeared first on The Comics Journal.


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