Comicsgirl

Remake Buy on Amazon.com

There are so many things to love about Lamar Abrams‘ Remake (AdHouse Books, 2009).

First of all, I think AdHouse should sell subscriptions. I am biased (because Richmond!) but AdHouse is without a doubt one of the most interesting comic publishers out there. It’s a delightfully discriminating publisher, and one that doesn’t really have a particular aesthetic (except for “good”). I am still really sad I never quite got it together to buy Project: Superior.

Part of what I love about AdHouse is how the design of the books suits the content. Remake is a fun, compact little book that evokes manga digests.

And Remake itself also evokes manga. Max Guy, our robot protagonist, recalls Mega Man and Astroboy. The overall aesthetic is pretty immature — there’s a few gross-out jokes — but it’s still all pretty innocent and charming.

Max Guy fights various supervillians, although he’s pretty bad at it, and is mostly interested in playing video games and eating sugary cereal. He’s pretty much self-centered, but in a childlike way. His roommate, Cardigan, puts up with him for some reason, as does the waitress at his favorite restaurant.

Abrams has a good understanding for the language of comics as well as video games. Much of the humor here is slapsticky and ridiculous, but it’s all pretty delightful. There is a silliness to this book as if Abrams is just making it up as he goes. For instance, Max Guy’s battle with Cy-Baby transitions into them getting ice cream together. And then the cat that Max Guy creates after vomiting from eating a reasonable amount of Marshmallow Kitties (yes, it’s that kind of comic) resists attempts to learn tricks but ends up frying Max Guy some eggs.

Abrams’ art is obviously fueled by a lot of giant robot anime series and episodes of Power Rangers and late ’80s to early ’90s video games. It’s playful, animated and goofy.

While I’m currently without Cartoon Network, I think a series of this would find a happy home there (and be better than a lot of what is on there now). I am thrilled to see that there will be the Remake Special from AdHouse in a few months.

(Full disclosure: Lamar Abrams is local — and I do love that he slipped in the Adams Morgan neighborhood of DC into this comic — and I have met him a couple of times. His comic is still awesome, though, and I’d think so even if I hadn’t met him.)

You read Part 1 yesterday, so here’s Part 2, as promised.

Astronaut Elementary – Lessons 5-6-7: Dave Roman
Astronaut Elementary is going to be released by First Second (but retitled as Astronaut Academy) which is definitely “YAY!” but since it’s also not going to be out until Summer 2011, it’s also a little bit of a “BOO!” because I want it now. Yes, I know I can read it online, but it’s not the same, OK? I like books.

This is adorably hilarious and all-ages in the best way (as in, everyone from children to adults will enjoy it equally) and Roman lets himself have all kinds of freedom in his storytelling. He has pandas as faculty members, a school secretary named Mrs. Cupcake and the school sport is called Fireball, which is played with huge spiky scythes that look like weapons out of fighting video games.

Probably the centerpiece story here is about the cyborg, Cybert, and his tireless mission to eliminate Hakata Soy. However, he is thwarted by a mirror-visored, bee-obsessed guidance chancellor

Roman’s art has a very animated style and the whole effect is loose and playful. I mean, seriously, I want the book and I want it now. Am I really supposed to wait a year?

Remake (2010 SPX): Lamar Abrams
I’m not sure what the actual title of this is, so I’m just kind of going by what’s on the back. Max Guy is kind of a cross between Astroboy, Mega Man and every immature guy you’ve met. The other characters, including the no-nonsense Sybil, come across as much smarter and more together than our alleged hero. I have not read Remake (I’ve meant to, OK?) but even though I didn’t know what was going on, I enjoyed this. Lamar has a fabulous sense of design and framing of scenes and while this mostly revolves around a couple of jokes about poop, it also feels pretty innocent.

Geraniums and Bacon 1 & 2: Cathy Leamy
I really enjoyed Leamy’s Green Blooded, but that was more informative pamphlet than comic. These autobiographical comics deal with crises of faith, weird dreams and other every-day occurrences. Leamy’s obviously having a lot of fun (I love her “Writer’s Embellishment” bits) and her art is airy and constantly lovely. There’s a wonderful sense that she didn’t deliberate too long over these drawings but they don’t feel rushed. It’s almost as if she was just drawing a lot of this for her own amusement and that feels really free and great. I am glad she shared, however.

Sticky Rice: A Travelogue Through Bangkok, Thailand: Jeremy Nguyen
Styled like a Moleskine notebook, this short travel journal evokes Craig Thompson’s Carnet De Voyage (which Nguyen does namecheck). It’s fairly short and sometimes lacking in details, but I did like Nguyen’s ability to capture the world around him in his sketches. The portions of the journal he styles as comics (with dialogue in word balloons) come across as more interesting than his text descriptions. It’s maybe a little slight, but in some ways, I’m kind of happy Nguyen was probably enjoying his trip instead of focusing on his travel journal.

Missing Pieces: A Terka Story: Andrea Tsurumi
Tsurumi e-mailed me before SPX and told me to check out her work. I looked at her website, liked what I saw, and definitely knew this was something I wanted to pick up. Tsurumi’s drawings are ambitiously detailed and her aesthetic evokes Tim Burton’s morbidity and sometimes European comic artists like Moebius (and that’s not faint praise). The story is about a girl named Terka who lives in a land of monsters and it may feel incomplete in some ways — it’s obviously the beginning of a longer story — but Tsurumi seems to have all the pieces in place. I am going to look forward to where this story goes and what she does next.

Comics from Mars #2: Paul Pope
A collection of short stories, Pope’s work has a crazy sort of freedom. His style is always gorgeous and complex, and there’s a delightful sense that he’s making all of this up as he goes along. He seems to wear his influences — Jack Kirby, Heavy Metal magazine — on his sleeve, but he does it fearlessly. (And this further proves to me that you can basically buy everything from AdHouse Books sight unseen and not be disappointed.)

I clearly love Small Press Expo and have nothing at all bad to say about it (seriously). But in some ways before I go, I have a moment of “What if it’s not as much fun this year? What if it’s not as good?”

But every year is better than the last. This year was no exception. I probably had too much fun (I did mention the drink tickets, didn’t I?).

I was delighted to see all kinds of new faces and new comics out on the floor. You know, when you travel to enough of these things up and down the East Coast, you do begin to see the same comics again and again. Sadly, I didn’t have much money to spend (and most of my budget went to Adam Hines’ Duncan the Wonder Dog published by the always-reliable AdHouse. I have no regrets about that, though, because I think this book is going to sell out quickly. I did pick up plenty of minicomics, too (and my boyfriend left his here for me) so I do have a lot to read.

All the exhibitors I heard from (whether in person or on Twitter) seemed to have done really well, and it was clearly packed both days. That’s a great sign. It makes me happy that so many people have enthusiasm for this art form.

And while show itself is undoubtedly and deservedly the focus, to me, what makes SPX special is this tangible sense of community. Creators, publishers and fans all come to be a part of something really wonderful. It feels like a celebration more than anything else.

I’ve often said that it seems like a lot of people — exhibitors included — come to SPX primarily to hang out. And to me, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that (I am, more or less, becoming one of those people). It feels very relaxed and everyone’s approachable. Other than a tiny number of exceptions, everyone I’ve met at SPX — volunteers, attendees, exhibitors — have been incredible people who I feel honored to know.

Maybe the scene isn’t quite everyone’s thing (after all, if you’re a fan of superhero comics, this may not be the show for you. Although I gave these silly little wallets made of old Marvel trading cards to Rusty and Joe and they reported that everyone loved them, so who knows?) but I think most people will be won over in the end. I am, of course, already looking forward to next year.

(I didn’t take photos because I was lazy, so I’m just using this year’s poster again. But that’s OK because I think it’s my favorite of all the SPX posters. That’s another thing — every year I think “No, I think that poster is my favorite.” This one, though, may have some staying power.)

Any discussion of any sort of “scene” in the Washington, D.C. area tends to come down to a sort of “Yeah, but …” kind of attitude. I think we’re always on the defensive when it comes to trying to prove that we really are cool.

When it comes to comics, no, D.C. is not New York (we’re not even Brooklyn). Or Portland. Or the Bay Area. But the D.C. area actually has a pretty impressive wealth of comic-book talent lurking around. (And if you want to be a little liberal with your definition of what the D.C. area is, there are plenty of great creators to the north in Baltimore, to the south, we have the Richmond-based AdHouse Books.)

Also, it’s important to note that we have Small Press Expo, which is older than Stumptown, MoCCA Festival and the same age as Alternative Press Expo. Obviously, there is plenty of interest and excitement when it comes to comics in the D.C. area.

Moderated by Mike Rhode (left in the photo above) and featuring Andrew Cohen, Evan Keeling of DC Conspiracy, Ben Claassen (who lives in Baltimore now, but we like to pretend he’s ours), Shannon Gallant and Matt Wuerker, Graphic Content helped showcase the creators living in the D.C. area. It was organized through Northwest One Neighborhood Library in D.C., just a few blocks from where the annual American Library Association conference is currently occurring.

Rhode started the panel off with the question about how each began creating comics. Cohen said he liked the formality of it, but also that it was cheap. Keeling said that comics attracted him because he likes the linear and storytelling nature of them. Claassen mostly said he liked making people laugh and Gallant came into comics through cartoons (which is appropriate, since he’s now doing G.I. Joe for IDW). Wuerker, as a political cartoonist, was kind of the outlier of the group, but said he likes reacting to news events.

The rest of the questions mostly came back to the issue of what it’s like to be a comic creator right now. Even though Wuerker has a desk at Politico, he likened making comics to being a poet — lots of people want to do it and most of them are happy to do it for free. There’s no money in it. While Gallant is doing comics full-time, he said his wife is the breadwinner. Claassen has a few jobs and at this point, is giving his comic Dirt Farm to the Washington City Paper for free (I had kind of guessed that because I knew WCP had cut their entire comics budget). Cohen said he sees doing comics as an avocation — and he actually prefers it that way because he can just do the projects he’s interested in and doesn’t have to worry if they’re going to make money.

Gallant brought up that he feels like to really make a living doing comics, you basically have to be at DC or Marvel. He said he still gets royalty checks for some work he did and while it’s not a ton of money, it’s money. Everyone also talked about selling original art, whether pages or in Claassen’s case, paintings, to supplement their incomes.

There was a sense in order to succeed, comic creators kind of need to stick together. Cohen said one of the points of the DC Conspiracy is to not only provide collaborators or feedback but to give people a way to pool resources — it’s much easier for a group to buy tables at a con than it is for an individual, and while someone may not remember a specific creator, they’ll probably remember a group. And while Gallant said he was never an official member of Gaijin Studios, he did learn a lot from the members while he was in college in Atlanta.

The last question dealt with where everyone though the future of comics was going to be. There was much discussion of the iPad and the digital age. Wuerker was optimistic and thinks someone’s going to figure out how to get money into the pockets of creators, but Gallant wonders if he’ll still be working 10 years from now. Claassen says he does hope there will be a new “golden age” of comics, but isn’t entirely sure. He does like the immediacy that the Internet can provide, though — he can make a comic, post it and get almost instant feedback. Cohen thinks that as much potential as the Internet has in terms of comics, people still want a print product.

There were a few questions from the audience, but probably the most relevant one to me was from a woman pointing out that you know, everyone on the panel was white and male and how diverse they felt comics were. And yes, I did notice the whiteness and maleness of the panelists (but I do want to not that while there wasn’t a large turnout, it was mostly women. I think that probably had something to with the ALA conference, but it was still a cool thing to see). Wuerker said there’s not a lot of female political cartoonists, but both Cohen and Keeling said that DC Conspiracy does have a few women and is fairly ethnically diverse. Most talked about how when they were first starting out, it was much less diverse than it is now (Gallant, I believe, brought up The Comic Book Guy from The Simpsons).

It’s a change I’ve, of course, noticed — not only do we have many more female comic creators getting attention, we have more women and girls showing up to cons and shows. I do think comics are becoming more and more open and that’s always a good thing.

It was definitely a great panel and showed off some of the talent we have in this area. I think it goes a long way to proving that we’re a pretty cool place when it comes to people making comics.

But then, I’m obviously biased.

(Thanks to Rhode & D.C. Public Libraries for putting this on.)

On Sunday night, I attended the Graphic Details event, featuring Hope Larson, Anders Nilsen, Gabrielle Bell and Kim Deitch, which was moderated by Chris Pitzer of Richmond-based AdHouse Books at the University of Richmond. It was sort of a preamble to the Robert Crumb event which is going on as I type this (more or less).

I realized when I took my seat the only other time I’d been in that particular theater was to see a harp concert with one of my friends when we were teenagers (more or less — I think we may have been in college at that point. And yes, we went for fun. We were — and are — rather odd people). I liked that this theater — and the University of Richmond — was playing host to these sorts of indie comic-book types. You see, there are two Richmonds — there is the “old money” Richmond, full of Southern society types that go to the University of Richmond (which is a good school, don’t get me wrong, but it’s private and full of money) and then there’s the Richmond that gave us GWAR.

I’d say the theater was probably less than half full for this event (I didn’t count so I’m not going to give estimates, but there were plenty of empty seats) and that made me sad. Yes, I know it was a Sunday night in a sort of out-of-the-way place, but to me, these people are famous. I’m guessing much of the audience was U of R students, but I did see some that seemed to have sought out this event, including a few older people. I thought that was pretty cool.

This was probably one of the best panels I’ve attended. Yes, there was some awkwardness, but comic book people are awkward. I mean that with the utmost love — after all, if these sort of people were outgoing, they probably wouldn’t be making comics but be actors or rock stars instead. It took a while for everyone to settle in. Deitch, who is considerably older than the other three, was really the one to break the ice, and I liked his perspective. He’s pretty much seen and done it all.

One of the first questions focused on each creator’s creative process. both Deitch and Nilsen tend to write and draw simultaneously, while Bell and Larson write their scripts first, then begin drawing. Larson probably had the most methodical process — she said she definitely finalizes her scripts first before drawing (and she mentioned she hasn’t drawn anything since March, I believe, since she’s working on some super-secret adaptation right now. Sadly, she wasn’t allowed to announce what it was — she said “people will either love me or hate me for it” — but I have some of my own “wishful thinking” ideas of what it might be).

Everyone had pretty harsh words for the term “graphic novel.” Deitch said it’s “just another name for comic book” and Bell said she felt there’s now too much pressure on young creators to create longer works that they may not be ready to do. Nilsen said he knows that publishers want books but he thinks the comic format lends itself better to shorts. Pitzer, a publisher himself, admitted he does make money off books rather than single issues or shorts.

Likewise, while everyone had appeared in anthologies (or Pitzer’s case, published them), no one really seemed to like doing them. Larson said that while she contributed to Comic Book Tattoo, she’s not really a Tori Amos fan. Bell said that they helped her develop her skills but she kind of resents them. No one really knew how much people actually read anthologies.

I am probably a different case, but I love anthologies. I buy them quite a bit and enjoy them. I find them a great way to discover new creators. But I guess I can see how they may not be the best entry point for people who usually don’t read comics.

At the end, Pitzer asked where everyone felt the comic industry was going. Deitch mentioned that there are now editors specifically for graphic novels. Bell says that it’s gone more to a “book” market and away from the floppies. Everyone basically agreed that most still hesitate when it comes to reading comics and that it’s a learned skill. There is a way to go before people accept comics as legitimate form of media.

I didn’t stick around for the signing since I had to drive back to Arlington that night, but I will now track down works by both Deitch and Nilsen. Everyone was lovely and awesome and I’m so glad I got to go.