Feeling A Little Woozy Here — This Week’s Links

We’re slowly getting closure on some of the big, ongoing comics news stories that will be the defining part of this mid-section of the current decade — settlements being reached in the Diamond bankruptcy saga, and the moving on of the Angoulême festival to organizational pastures new — however, that does not mean that there is ever time for complacency in this week’s links, below, because the tying up of loose ends just means that we’re then waiting for the other shoe to drop regarding this industry we call comics. So, if it’s quiet, then it likely really is too quiet.

apothecary

— driftingsea RL200 (@driftingsea.bsky.social) 2026-10-13T08:37:41.616Z

This week’s news.

• Beginning this week’s selection on the continent, as a judge in Angoulême dismissed claims for damages and contract annulment brought by the Association Festival international de la bande dessinée d'Angoulême and (now (again)) former service provider 9e Art+ against l’Association pour le développement de la bande dessinée d’Angoulême and new service provider Groupe Morgane, clearing the path for a new era of the Angoulême festival to take place this winter, following the tumultuous recent period the festival has experienced at the hands of 9e Art+, which resulted in boycotts and event cancellations — more details of which can be found here, from TCJ’s reporting back in December of last year.

• Elsewhere, as the reporting structure and physical locations of the Big Two offices become increasingly labyrinthine, in this era of tech-capitalist accelerationism, it was announced last week that DC Comics is now part of Skydance’s Products & Publishing Division, following the merger of Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery, lead by president of global products and publishing, Josh Silverman.

• In comics prizes news, the winners of this year’s Harvey Awards were announced, as part of this year’s New York Comic Con, with Scott Snyder and Nick Dragotta’s Absolute Batman: The Zoo named Best Book, Naoki Urasawa and Takashi Nagasaki’s Billy Bat named as Best Manga, and Laura Perez’s Nocturnos named as Best International Book - The Beat has a full round-up of the winners and nominees here.

• Here at TCJ, the announcement of the launch of the Brooklyn Organization Dedicated to the Endurance of the Graphic Arts Comic Arts Trophy Awards, or BODEGA CAT Awards, was shared, with voting open now for the list of nominees, and winners to be announced on Nov. 14 as part of the Brooklyn Expo of Comics.

• In memoriam, remembering those the world of comics has lost, as news was shared of the passing of illustrator and mangaka Masako Watanabe, creator of Hakuba no Shōjo and Glass no Shiro, amongst others, who has died at the age of 97.

• News was also shared of the passing of cartoonist P.C. Vey, prolific contributor to The New Yorker, MAD Magazine, and National Lampoon, who died last month at the age of 70.

Crazy friday night

— Pam Wishbow (@pamwishbow.bsky.social) 2026-10-03T03:59:42.269Z

This week’s reviews.

TCJ

• Jim Falcone reviews the narrative balance of Derf Backderf’s The Dissidents: Autocrats! Vigilantes! Communists! …And Cartoonists! — “The irony throughout the book is how the country wasn’t just waging a war on Prussia, it was fighting against its own citizens as well. Striking workers were being shot by police, white mobs attacked and burned black neighborhoods, and suffragettes were beaten and imprisoned for protesting.”

• William Schwartz reviews the messy relationships of Yeong-shin Ma’s Hodo: A Life in Two Acts, translated by Janet Hong — “Shin-ma's simple art style forces a coherence to the cruelty and abuse that comes remarkably close to achieving the disaffected tone necessary to demonstrate how Un Kyoung copes. Un Kyoung's own influence as a painter on Shin-ma is also noteworthy, as Hodo is filled with artistic flourishes and displaced temporality that feel more in place in an abstract work of art than a graphic novel narrative.”

 

AIPT

• Alex Schlesinger reviews the gorgeous fun of Jesse Moynihan’s Forming.

• Lily Abreu reviews the narrative strengths of Victor LaValle, Stefano Nesi, et al’s Black Panther: Intergalactic.

• Christopher Franey reviews the hanging threads of Morgan Hampton, Juan Jose Ryp, et al’s Green Lantern Corps #21.

• Diane Darcy reviews the tonal disruption of Mark Waid, Chris Samnee, et al’s Batman and Robin: Year One: Dynamic Duos #3.

• Jonathan Waugh reviews heartfelt weirdness of Darcy Van Poelgeest and Nico Henrichson’s Doom Patrol #2.

• Kevin Clark reviews the balanced approach of Torunn Grønbekk, Nataliia Rerekina, et al’s Magic The Gathering: Untold Stories - Liliana #1.

• David Brooke reviews the riveting conclusion of James Tynion IV, Álvaro Martínez Bueno, et al’s The Nice House by the Sea #12.

• Crooker reviews the sloppy characterisation of Robert Kirkman, Kyle Kerschl, et al’s Transformers #37.

• Collier Jennings reviews the successful crossover of Rory McConville, Steven Butler, Lily Butler, et al’s Archie vs. The Terminator #1.

 

The Arts STL

Sarah Boslaugh reviews the heart-wrenching stories of Chris Hedges and Joe Sacco’s Requiem for Gaza.

 

The Beat

• Diego Higuera reviews the accessible appeal of Kyle Higgins, Daniele Di Nicuolo, et al’s Teen Titans #2.

• Tim Rooney reviews the visual feast of Dan Panosian et al’s Wolverine: Paradise #1.

• Jordan Jennings reviews the self-aware horror of Ed Brisson, Damian Coucerio, et al’s Hammer Head #1.

• Steve Baxi reviews the fascinating details of Leah Hayes’ Identical.

 

BoingBoing

Ruben Bolling reviews the illuminating visuals of R. Sikoryak’s Declaration Illustrated and Emancipation Illustrated.

 

Broken Frontier

Lindsay Pereira reviews the universal truths of Yeong-shin Ma’s Hodo: A Life in Two Acts, translated by Janet Hong.

 

Gismodo

Isaiah Colbert reviews the gravitational pull of Linnea Sterte’s A Garden of Spheres.

 

House to Astonish

Paul O’Brien reviews the intriguing setup of Jonathan Hickman, Matteo Della Fonte, et al’s Midnight X-Men #1. 

 

NPR

Maureen Corrigan reviews the seamless humour of Roz Chast and Jason Adam Katzenstein’s The Two Saddest Kitchens.

 

Publisher’s Weekly

Have capsule reviews of:

• The rousing testament of Paco Roca and Rodrigo Terrasa’s The Abyss of Oblivion, translated by Andrea Rosenberg.
• The rollicking riffs of Lisa Hanawalt’s I Can’t Stop Thinking About Horses and Sex.
• The empathetic snapshot of Keum Suk Gendry-Kim’s My Friend Kim Jong Un, translated by Janet Hong.
• The evocative visuals of Donald Clabrese’s Coady.
• The underscoring urgency of Camila Kerwin’s Soft Targets: Guns in America and the Kids Caught in the Crossfire.
• • The searing sensuality of Akane Torikai’s Wandering Cat’s Cage, translated by Jocelyne Allen.

 

Yatta-tachi

Alex Henderson reviews the weak writing of Kanko Nakamura’s Yuri Yuri Panic: A Case of Extreme Cuteness Has Occurred!, translated by Megan Turner.

We’re excited to reveal BEC’s 1st poster, created by David Sandlin!We will have a screenprinted version of the poster available for purchase at our main event later this year, stay tuned for more details...

— Brooklyn Expo of Comics (@bkexpocomics.bsky.social) 2026-09-03T19:17:19.833Z

This week’s interviews.

TCJ

Jean Marc Ah-Sen interviews Jenn Woodall about She Must Be Ugly! and WorryWart, pathways to comicsmaking, marrying activism and art, and the trickiness of graphic medicine memoirs — “I’m really grateful I came to comics through self-publishing because it did teach me so much. I already had discipline as someone who toiled in film, but the discipline to finish a comic is very different. You have to sit at that desk everyday until that comic is finished, and it can be really boring and frustrating. Self-publishing really forces you to learn a lot because you are a one-person production studio.”

 

AIPT

• Andrew Isidoro speaks with Sarah Myer about TMNT: Saturday Morning Adventures, bringing the series to a close, and character differences between the four turtles.

• Chris Hassan talks to Paul Jenkins about Wolverine: Origin III — The Dark Age, the history of the Origin titles, and reader reactions to continuity changes.

 

Anime News Network

Wonhee Cho chats with Dong-geun Joo about All of Us Are Dead, the joys of zombie stories, the webtoon’s live-action adaptation, and undead inspirations.

 

Armenian Weekly

Rosie (Toumanian) Nisanyan interviews Dana Mashoian Walrath about The Book of Genocides, selecting the genocides depicted in the book, and the importance of reparations.

 

Calgary Herald

Eric Volmers talks to Arizona O’Neill about Opioids & Organoids, the labour of love to bring the book to print, and the message about organ donation the book is seeking to impart.

 

Connecticut Public

Daniela Doncel interviews West Haven Public Library’s Kym Powe about the importance of graphic novels to younger readers, and how they can help build a love of reading.

 

Dying Scene

Forrest Gaddis chats with Nate Powell about Diana, analog workflows, the book's origins in underground creative communities, and personal memories threaded through the story.

 

Fanbase Press

Barbra Dillon talks to Dan Bennett about Caroto: Fallout, the book’s Australian attitude, deciding when to invoke chaos, and not waiting for permission to make art.

 

Freak Sugar

Jed W. Keith speaks with Robert Venditti about The Many Lives of Hawkman and Freedom Fighters and thoughts behind reinterpreting these characters back in 2018.

 

Gothamist

Jessica Gould talks to the Civics for All Comics Group’s Joe Schmidt about the work of the group and the education department’s comic book publishing endeavours.

 

Graphic Memoir

Jonathan Sandler chats with Joe D’Esposito about The Outsider and telling the story of Bernie Krigstein’s life, and with Dean Haspiel and Doug Latino about Real Life Comix — Only in New York! and what makes a New York story.

 

Hyphen

Weronika Strzyżyńska talks to Huda Fahmy about Huda F Would Love You?, developing artistic skills, and making funny books about personal identity to push back against the Islamophobia and xenophobia that saturates society.

 

ICv2

Brigid Alverson shares conversation from last week’s New York Comic Con, as Heidi MacDonald spoke with Marvel Comics’ Dan Buckley about the diversifying comics ecosystem, and Milton Griepp spoke with Jim Killen and Kurt Hassler about Manga Spot and the retail market.

 

Lo Spazio Bianco

Emilio Cirri interviews Kasia Nie about Mockingbird and Man-Eaters, working in the US comics market, and class solidarity when it comes to eating the rich.

In case you haven't heard the news, our list of MICE Exhibitors is now live on our site. So many familiar faces coming back to hang, and so many new faces to join! Go visit MICEXPO.org/exhibitor-list-2026 for more information!

— Massachusetts Independent Comics Expo (@massmice.bsky.social) 2026-10-15T00:37:27.253Z

This week’s features and longreads.

• Here at TCJ, Hagai Palevsky writes on the Joe Matt to be found in the pages of Joe Matt’s Peepshow, and the shifting, ugly honesty to be found therein — “Most notably, though, Joe no longer looks as solid or as realistic as he did in The Poor Bastard. Gone are the lips, the rendered eyes; now he is as smooth and clean and cartoony as the rest of his world. If there was a note of success to The Poor Bastard, it was in Matt’s portrayal of himself as an ill fit, with all that that entails; for him to blend into the rest of the world, then, is an admission of defeat.”

• For The Mainichi, Hideyuki Tanabe writes on the success of Hosei University Press’ publication of Osamu Tezuka’s Nagai Ana, previously omitted from collections of Tezuka’s works, the manga’s depictions of discrimination against Korean residents in Japan, and the commentary presented in the story’s new edition.

• Over at The New York Times, Jason Zinoman writes on A Morning With Ernie Bushmiller, a new play written by and starring comedy writer Tom Gammill, speaking with various comedy alumni about the sometimes polarising popularity of Nancy across American culture.

• Some recent reading round-ups, as From Cover to Cover’s Scott Cederlund shares thoughts on Howard Chaykin’s Time^2; Mike Mignola, Cyrille Pomés, et al’s Hellboy In Hell: Nothing But Blood; Phillip Kennedy Johnson, Scietronc, et al’s Midnight Spider-Man #1; Michael Walsh, Toni-Marie Griffin, et al’s Jonah Hex and the Shadow of Death #1, and Derf Backderf’s The Dissidents.

• Elsewhere, at the Financial Times, Lucy Scholes shares recommendations of Paul B. Rainey’s Murder School, Eleanor Crewes’ Ghosts in My House, Mary M. Talbot and Bryan Talbot’s Lo! An Amazon! The Interesting Narrative of The Life of Mary Wollstonecraft, Lisa Hanawalt’s I Can’t Stop Thinking About Horses and Sex, Matt Haig’s The Midnight Library, and Ross Murphy’s Bedford Street.

• From the world of open-access academia, in Literacy, Stephanie F. Reid and Mengying Xue present a study on student authored anti-censorship comics in the U.S. midwest, with figure 2 in the study especially containing a great third panel punchline.

• Time marches ever onwards and entropy brings with it both chaos and a new Mindless Ones newsletter, as Grant Morrison and Chas Truog’s Animal Man is the latest comic to be Suggested for Mature Readers, and consideration of Pat Mills and Simon Bisley’s Sláine: The Horned God warps through and across time to Mills and Carlos Ezquerra’s work on Third World War.

• Paul O’Brien’s survey of the villains of Daredevil continues, for House to Astonish, as DG Chichester arrives on the scene, joining Lee Weeks and Ron Garney to usher in some generic ninjas and the slightly less generic Izanami.

• Mike Peterson rounds up the editorial beat, over at The Daily Cartoonist, as it was time to check in with the many misadventures of Peter Brian Hegseth, assess the seeming abandonment of Ukraine by the U.S., and gawk at the preparations for now mooted plans to bring public executions back to the U.S. carceral state.

Coupe Nuu

— Bhanu pratap (@bhanupratap.bsky.social) 2026-09-25T14:49:35.506Z

This week’s audio/visual delights.

• The New York Comics and Picture-Story Symposium’s autumnal programming continued, as Bill Kartalopoulos moderated a talk from writer, editor, and broadcaster Bronwyn Carlton (aka Bronwyn Taggart) on a storied career in comics across genres and markets; and Ben Katchor hosted a presentation by scholar and author Jeff Ravel on the history and evolution of playing card iconography during the French Revolution in the 1790s.

• Henry Chamberlain welcomed Karl Stevens to Comics Grinder, as they spoke about new book Pepper, the realities of life as an artist in the modern world, art history taste development, and relative levels of Hollywood seduction amongst cartoonists.

• A return to The Virtual Memories Show, as Gil Roth was joined by Nate Powell to discuss Diana, the act of writing characters younger than yourself as you get older, artmaking origins, and yearly visits to Bethesda for the Small Press Expo.

• Print’s Steven Heller shares a selection of the eartoons of cartoonist Peter Blegvad, the original iterations of which were broadcast by BBC Radio 3 as "Static in the Attic."

• Brian Hibbs reconvened the Comix Experience Graphic Novel Club, as Lazlow and Chris Anderson about the first collected volume of American Caper, the European attention on the book, and the Wyoming setting for the book.

• Closing out the week by catching up with recent Off Panel broadcasts, as David Harper spoke with Rob Williams about returning to Judge Dredd and Mega-City One, Felix Lu about the contemporary original art market, Beetle Moses about collecting viral webcomics for print, and Patrick Horvath about Beneath the Trees Where Nobody Sees and plans for the book and its world.

Pile and Ren

— Michael DeForge (@michaeldeforge.bsky.social) 2026-10-14T20:56:30.656Z

No more time for links, the leaves are turning crunchy, so it’s hiking season, baby!

Always here for good Tortoise news!

— carlydraws (@carlydraws.bsky.social) 2026-10-09T22:14:07.257Z

The post Feeling A Little Woozy Here — This Week’s Links appeared first on The Comics Journal.