COMICS FOR THE APOCALYPSE

I was the guest on Samuel George London's Comics for the Apocalypse podcast lately.

A great idea for a podcast; a kind of Desert Island Discs for comics.

Have a listen here.

SPOILERS!
Here are the comics I talked about:
The Cute Manifesto - James Kochalka; Eagle - Ian Kennedy; From Hell - Alan Moore, Eddie Campbell; Hate - Peter Bagge; The Incredible Hulk Pocketbook - Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko; Perry Bible Fellowship - Nick Gurewitch; Rosalie Lightning - Tom Hart; Star Wars Weekly #15 - Roy Thomas, Howard Chaykin.

THAT COMIC SMELL 52: 90s comics

The latest episode is online now.
From the web:

“Get ready to see some serious shit”
Well, well. We hit the 90s. What folks term as the absolute dregs of comics. The decade that killed comics, but is it that simple? Of course not. We wouldn’t have almost 2 hours worth of chat if that was the case. We go to show you that the 90s was filled with absolute gems and that, that nostalgia hit is going to come at you thick and fast.
So strap yourself in and get ready. There is going to be some blasts from the past hurtling their way towards you.
This and all the usual comics (and snacks) chat on the only comics podcast to come live from the Liefeld space ship…
That Comic Smell!
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300 (Frank Miller, Lynn Varley)
Akira (Katsuhiro Otomo)
Aliens: Hive (Jerry Prosser, Kelley Jones)
Amazing Spider-man #388 (David Michelinie, Mark Bagley)
Batman (Doug Moench, Kelley Jones)
Batman Adventures (Various)
Battle Angel Alita (Yukito Kishiro)
Bone (Jeff Smith)
Cadillacs & Dinosaurs: Time in Overdrive (Mark Schultz)
Captain America (Mark Gruenwald, Rik Levins)
Concrete (Paul Chadwick)
Daredevil: Guardian Devil (Kevin Smith, Joe Quesada)
Deadpool (Fabian Nicieza, Mark Waid, Joe Madureira, Lee Weeks)
Death Of Superman (Dan Jurgens, Jerry Ordway, Louise Simonson)
Dragon Lives (Peter Quinones, Ron Lim)
Fleener (Mary Fleener)
Frank: Real Pa (Jim Woodring)
From Hell (Alan Moore, Eddie Campbell)
Give Me Liberty (Frank Miller Dave Gibbons)
Hate (Peter Bagge)
Hellblazer (Garth Ennis, William Simpson)
Hellboy (Mike Mignola)
Hulk #474 (Joe Casey, Javier Pulido)
Hulk: Future Imperfect (Peter David, George Pérez)
Infinity Gauntlet (Jim Starlin, George Pérez, Ron Lim)
Kingdom Come (Alex Ross, Mark Waid)
Long Halloween (Jeph Loeb, Tim Sale)
Madman (Mike Allred, Laura Allred)
Manga Mania (Magazine)
Marvels (Alex Ross, Kurt Busiek)
The Mask (John Arcudi, Doug Mahnke)
Sin City (Frank Miller)
Spider-man 2099 (Peter David, Rick Leonardi)
Spider-man (Todd Macfarlane)
Spider-man: Carnage & Venom (David Mechelinie, Mark Bagley)
Star Wars: Dark Empire (Cam Kennedy, Tom Veitch)
X-Force (Rob Liefeld)
X-Men (Jim Lee, Chris Claremont)
X-men Unlimited (John Francis Moore, Paul Smith)
Yeah! (Gilbert Hernandez, Peter Bagge)"

MOORE FOUR

It’s been a good year so far regarding Alan Moore related work. Here are books and comics I’ve read concerning and/or written by Moore.

First up, I was lucky enough to be given Lance Parkin’s biography Magic Words: The Extraordinary Life of Alan Moore. It’s quite in depth and there’s loads I hadn’t seen before, including a school photo and good insight into Moore’s affiliation with and empathy for 1970s art labs. Parkin is an admirer of Moore, which came across in his previous Essential Guide, and here too. Parkin treads a delicate line between admiration and criticism though. There are many memorable passages here, because Moore seems such an uncompromising figure. For example, his continued defiantly naïve perspective on what the relationship between publisher and artist  should be, signing less than perfect deals on his ABC characters, and up to his current Top Shelf contract, which also relies on trusting that the company is made up of (by his definition) decent people.

Another good read was Eddie Campbell’s From Hell Companion. I bought this book last year, read a bit and then was inspired to finish it after the Parkin biography. It presents excerpts from the script interspersed with commentary from Campbell. There is some terrific writing from Moore here. To paraphrase Campbell, the text that usually only the artist would read. What is very striking almost right from the beginning is Campbell’s confidence in what he is doing. He is in no way slavish to Moore’s script. When Moore writes of and in his own script, “None of this rambling junk is sacred”, Campbell takes that on board. Throughout we see Campbell do different layouts than suggested by Moore, who famously gives detailed instruction to artists and says that if something “would work better another way then just go ahead and do it”. This book contains the best evidence I’ve seen of the artist doing something else. Perhaps it’s because Campbell is such a strong authorial voice in his own right, with all his autobiographical and Bacchus comics behind him. Campbell’s a great writer too, with a hilarious family table story concerning “Annie and Eddy”. This book was terrific, and gives an insight into the two talented men who made From Hell. 

The collected BoJeffries Saga has finally appeared. This started back in the 1980s as instalments in Warrior. The art by Steve Parkhouse is very good. His style is perfect for this story; it’s homely, caricaturesque, and slightly skewed and bizarre. Over thirty plus years the BoJeffries stories have been published under various houses, and Parkhouse’s convention of signing with a year attached is slightly distracting, but easily ignored. For example the first chapter is Parkhouse, 85, the second Parkhouse 82, etc. Parkhouse’s introduction is a bit sad, with his statement that “at some point in my career I had forgotten what it was like to have fun with drawing”, which is a shame for him. But certainly in these stories, possibly inspired by the fact that “the end result has always made me laugh”, his artwork is lively and full of fun.

Finally I’ve read the latest League of Extraordinary Gentlemen spin off Nemo: Roses of Berlin. Boy, It’s a delight to see these come around periodically. The fantastic cityscapes and mention of Rotwang clued me in to the fact that we are in Metropolis land here. Very exciting to see the False Maria robot as I love that movie so much (and yes, it’s the 1980s edit that I like, with the Giorgio Moroder soundtrack featuring Jon Anderson, Adam Ant, etc). I won’t comment on the ending, but suffice to say, one should not mess with Captain Nemo. A very enjoyable comic, but can we get Kevin O’Neill cloned? Because I miss Marshal Law. 

I’m now looking forward to the third Nemo comic, the fourth League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, and the sequel to Neonomicon. And I still haven’t read Fashion Beast yet!

PS. Check out Moore’s interesting history of comics from the “Occupy Comics” series. Well worth a read.