Dreaming with Little Nemo

One of the things I hoped to do from the beginning with this blog is to offer the occasional interview with writers, artists, creators, editors and publishers of interest. I’m happy to kick off this occasional feature (which will be archived on the website, once that’s up and running) with publisher Peter Maresca, who brought to market one of the greatest surprises of 2005.

Peter Maresca has published one of the most exquisite books I’ve ever laid eyes or hands upon. Winsor McCay’s Little Nemo in Slumberland: So Many Splendid Sundays! is a wellspring of wonder, a roadmap of revelations, and as generous and eye/mind/heart-expanding a collection of McCay art as can be imagined. In an era in which comics and graphic novels have expanded the parameters of this remarkable (and still relatively fresh) artform, it’s even more astounding to steep oneself in all that Winsor McCay accomplished in the medium a full century ago. McCay was a prolific prodigy, a visionary worthy of the term -- and Peter Maresca has resurrected McCay’s most celebrated creation in a format worthy of its imaginative scope and expansive canvas.

I’ve praised the book here before, but it seemed timely to offer an interview with Peter, if only to prompt a few more of you to seek out a copy for yourselves (or for those deserving of such a glorious Christmas gift). There aren’t many books worth a $100+ price tag, but rest assured that Peter’s collected Little Nemo tome is one of that select number. Peter is humble as ever about his part in this production, but he is deserving of all due attention.

Without further ado, here’s Peter:
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The Little Nemo book is a revelation, on many levels. Let’s talk about it a bit -- what led to your bringing this full-sized collection to print?

It was something I had thought about for years (others had as well, I am sure), but the 100th anniversary felt like a time to make it happen. Given the fragility of aging newsprint, it will soon be impossible to see these masterpieces in their original form, so it's important to have a reasonable facsimile. I had the collection, and some time, so I started shopping the idea around to publishers. When they were too cautious to take it on, I found some money to invest and, thanks to support and assistance from others, I took on the task of self-publishing.

I doubt if anyone has spent the time with, or given the attention to, McCay’s art on the level you must have. What did you discover about the work itself in the process -- and I must ask, did it impact upon your dreams?

I've always had pretty wild dreams, a condition that gave me a connection with Nemo from the first time I saw the strip. Once diving into the project, the reality was far more insane (and frightening) than my dreams. I would urge anyone who is planning their first book to do something small.

You mentioned to me the fragility of the collection -- you wrote it “was dissolving almost before my eyes” -- and I can’t imagine how you would handle such material for the production process. What kind of precautions did you take, and was sort of restoration process was necessary?

I had to construct a scanning station that made for a gentle transition from storage to scans and back again. Many pages received fresh tears as part of the process and minor repairs to the pages themselves were a part of the reproduction. Once I had the digital images, tears and holes could be cleaned up in Photoshop. In a few cases, pieces of the art or text were missing or stained so badly that I had to "play McCay" and redraw parts of backgrounds or words.

The reproductions are state-of-the-art and staggering; the books themselves are hand-bound; what is the physical printing and binding process this Little Nemo collection requires?

Although I was at the plant for the press check -- to adjust and approve the colors of the book pages, I didn't get a chance to witness the binding process. Part of the punching and stitching can be done by machines, but there were no machines to complete the binding, and this had to be done by hand. With careful comparison, you can see that each book is just a bit different in how the pages fit together, but it's remarkable that in the 5,000 copies, I have only come across a handful with any obvious binding
flaws.

What has the reaction been to the Little Nemo book -- response from buyers and readers, and sales-wise?

The response has been overwhelming one of gratitude, often before ever seeing the book. Apparently there has been an ongoing desire on the part of the thousands of Nemo fans to be able to see these pages full size. Even with the steady stream of superlatives about the appearance artwork, for which I am given more credit than I deserve relative to the work itself, the overwhelming response has been: Thank you. Thank you for doing this. The sales have been a surprise, to say the least. Not that we were able to sell all the books, but that it would happen so quickly.

Is there a second Little Nemo collection in the offing, or another comparable future project you care to mention?

I'm not sure about a second Nemo book. Most of the best ones have already been printed here. Of course, with McCay, you're talking about the fantastic, superb artwork vs. the merely terrific and great, so there may be another book's worth to be printed. My immediate project involves reprinting other great comics from the first two decades of the art form.

You mentioned to me your work with Dan Nadel on his upcoming book, The Underground That Wasn't: An Anthology of Unknown Comic Visionaries, 1900-1970 (due from Harry N. Abrams in 2006). You said you helped Dan “tracking down examples of some of the lost comic strips.” Did this include excavating material on unknown cartoonists like Frank Johnson, or was your focus elsewhere?

Dan's book features both comic strips and comic books, and it's not so much the "lost" material, but the unsung heroes, those who had a style and innovation that's been under-appreciated over the years. Artists like Verbeek (Upside Downs), Forbell (Naughty Pete), Garret Price (White Boy) and others.

Your article on the early “lost” strips of 1900-1915 in Comic Art Magazine was fascinating. How expansive is your strip collection, and what are among the greatest unsung treasures of the medium, in your mind?

I find the pre-Krazy Kat work of [George] Herriman fascinating, you can see bits of his genius even as he was mimicking other strip artists, his own style evolving in the first decade of the last century. It's also interesting to see the comics work of those who went on to other careers as animators or illustrators, like Dan Smith, or T.E. Powers or F.M. Follett. Some of the real treasures are the full-page, custom-drawn promotional pieces announcing the coming of new comic strips. It was a much bigger deal back then, but of course, it was a major form of mass culture.
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You can reach Peter Maresca directly at:

SUNDAY PRESS BOOKS
450 Monroe Drive
Palo Alto, CA 94306
fax: (650) 941-7988

You can buy the astounding Little Nemo book direct from Peter at

Sunday Press Books

Peter says, “The simplest way to order is through the website with a credit card... a check can be mailed with a form on the Web site. Those who feel better about using Amazon.com can buy it there,” but note amazon’s stock of the first edition is limited; Peter has ensured Sunday Press Books should have sufficient stock to service Christmas season orders. But don’t be dragging your feet! Peter adds the second printing is already in production, but the “second printing won't be here until March, so get them now while you can. First printings will likely be more valuable (for those who care about such things).”

If you can afford to add the Nemo book to your private collection or as a gift for a loved one this season, I urge you to do so now. This is among the top books of the year, and a real treasure for anyone who loves comics, fantasy -- or simply losing oneself in one of the most eye-popping book treats of this or any lifetime.
____

(As in the case of all interviews posted here, there's nothing in this for me -- I don't get any direct benefits, there's no kickback for me, not even a free book. I bought my copy. This is an honest-to-goodness from-the-heart recommendation, no strings attached! This interview, as with all material on this blog, is copyright 2005 Stephen R. Bissette; feel free to link to it, but please do not copy it and post it as your own.)

Over the past few weeks, it's been a hoot to see the results of a number of projects I've worked either reach completion or a critical stage of completion. This is always a pleasure: to at last see the results only imagined before, and one's work shine in the greater context of that work by other hands/minds.
However, I find myself in the rather odd position of doing work, and seeing the results of work I completed earlier this year, that I can't write about here -- not yet, anyway.

In all but one case, I've got to give time for the parties involved to "roll out" the completed work (of which my efforts are only one component) in their own good time. They also have to launch their own promotional plans first; tempting as it may be to spill the beans/break the news here, that wouldn't serve their interests, so I will lay low for the time being.

The sole exception is a huge body of work not intended for publication of any kind, on behalf of a venture that may never enter the public radar -- someday, I'll tell the tale, but the project must play itself out in an arena most likely invisible forever to all but those directly involved.

Weird, huh? Such is the life of a freelancer. Having survived various promotional debacles of the past (announced projects that never reached fruition: the planned graphic novel adaptations of Rawhead Rex and Night of the Living Dead, for instance), I've learned to just do my work and button my lip unless there's a reason to do otherwise.

Still, it's been a hoot for me to see 2005 has indeed been a productive year in a number of ways.

Come 2006, these surprises will bring pleasure to many of you -- and I will be able to write about the behind-the-scenes fun and work here, when the time is right.

Taking Stock

Morning, all, and good gravy, it's the weekend.

I've been up since about 5:30 AM taking stock -- literally -- and moving portions of it from the garage storage areas into the new studio/office/library space. While constructing the heavy-duty shelving units for the new work area, Olivier designed them with an uppermost shelf flat intended for the rarest backstock in the SpiderBaby archives, including the remaining backstock of Taboo. I won't have a final tally until next week sometime, but I'm far enough along to see 2006 will at last drain much of my backstock to nothing.

For instance, my stash of the 1963 comicbook series is down to almost zip, save for those issues (1963 #2 featuring The Fury, for instance) I stocked heavily on twelve years ago. After the next couple of orders, I will no longer be offering full sets of 1963 for sale -- it will be completely out-of-stock.

About two years ago, Rick Veitch and I got together and shrink-wrapped the final stock we collectively had on hand into the Shameless 1963 Six-Pack, and via King Hell Press we sold those out through Diamond. That process cleaned Rick out of his entire stock and left me with what little there was, beyond the overstock on #2 I'd socked away. The shrink-wrapped sets are long gone, though I've still been able to fill individual orders until today.

So, Alan Moore and retro-superhero fans take note: I'll no longer be able to fill complete set orders on that historic series. With no reprint edition planned (despite our best efforts in 2002-2003), this will be it on 1963 unless fortunes change.

Heads up to Taboo fans or potential buyers: Taboo backstock is low, and as of the next two orders for full sets, I won't be able to fill orders for full sets of Taboo any longer. Looks like Taboo 6 is the first to go, with Taboo 7 not far behind.

There's still plenty of backstock on select individual issues of Taboo, and I have abundant backstock on Tyrant and SpiderBaby Comix for the time being.

As work continues on the new website, a current catalogue of SpiderBaby Grafix material will be posted with PayPal payment option in place -- but just seemed fair to give any last-minute shoppers this info now.

For years now, I've been the only one-stop reliable source for Taboo, and have had to turn away many disappointed buyers seeking copies of items once available online from yours truly (primary among those the From Hell: The Compleat Scripts Vol. 1 signed & limited hardcover and paperback editions -- long gone, sold out in 1999). I've always given fair warning online prior to sellouts; here's the latest.

For easy peeks or info for the curious, the current links (and, for this week only, the still-valid prices) for Taboo and the 1963 series are still posted on the otherwise now-defunct

comicon.com SpiderBaby Comix site

-- just scroll down and click on the vertical menu bar on the left, under The Goods, for Taboo and/or N-Man, The Fury, and The Hypernaut.

I'll post a final end-of-2005 inventory warning by next weekend, once it's all tallied up and in place.

For those of you who could care less about all this, ah, well, sorry to bore you today. I'll have something of greater general interest here in the coming days, promise.

See ya on Sunday (probably posting late in the day), and until then have a great Saturday and fantastic weekend...

Morning, all,

Well, we got our first real snow cover yesterday, and all our Thanksgiving guests still made it here, had a great time, ate tons of food, and then got home safe and sound, though we're told it was "a white-knuckle ride" by one of 'em.

Hey, Mark Martin isn't awake yet. He has a new blog. Run over to

his new blog

and post a comment there before he reads this.

C'mon, it'll be really funny. Let's see how many we can rack up before Mark "stupid ol' blog" Martin next posts anything there.

Quote for the day, from Charles Krauthammer at The Washington Post (compliments of Daniel Barlow):

""What could be more elegant, more simple, more brilliant,
more economical, more creative, indeed more divine than a planet with millions of life forms, distinct and yet interactive, all ultimately derived from accumulated variations in a single double-stranded molecule, pliable and fecund enough to give us mollusks and mice, Newton and Einstein? Even if it did give us the Kansas State Board of Education, too."

It's all here.

OK, that's it. I'm off to watch the new King Kong DVD -- what a way to start the day.

More later --

HAPPY TURKEY DAY: The Woodchuck Turkey Fest

My serious Thanksgiving Day morning posts are below (check 'em out), but here's my Turkey Day gift to you:

Excerpted from the ms. for the upcoming Black Coat Press book S.R. Bissette's Blur, my Thanksgiving of 1999 weekly newspaper video review column (November 23, 1999), which might give a few of you viewing ideas to counter the sports and TV parades. Per usual, please remember this was written for a family newspaper readership, not for die-hard movie buffs like most of you, so I couldn't assume the readership had ever heard of Ed Wood or any of the films following. Specifically, this was scribed for a Vermont newspaper audience, hence the "woodchuck" (local slang for, uh, locals) moniker and orientation.

So, dis-orient yourself accordingly, and read on.

Eat Hearty, me maties!:
__

Gobble! Gobble! Gobble! The Woodchuck Video Turkey Feast

You know, I reckon I like turkey as much as all the rest of you do, but come Thanksgiving weekend, I like other kinds of turkeys, too.

I’m talking turkey movies, and I don’t mean movies about turkeys. I mean turkeys, gobblers, braindead movies like Robot Monster that you might have caught on the late show when you were a kid, and they were so awful you thought you might have dreamt them, only you knew you hadn’t. Movies our parents used to dump us off at the matinee to see, back when theaters had matinees like Santa Claus Conquers the Martians and Little Red Riding Hood Versus the Monsters (being a woodchuck, I saw ‘em at the Strong and the Flynn up in Burlington), or once we had our licenses we drove ourselves to by the carload back when drive-ins were real drive-ins (ah, the Twin City drive-in on the Barre-Montpelier road!), showing double features like I Drink Your Blood and I Eat Your Skin (which reminds me about Marj’s favorite part of the table turkey, but never mind). I’m even talking about movies like Ishtar, Showgirls, and Hudson Hawk that cost more than every one of our whole lifetime’s incomes combined would equal, and still gobbled. Movies where you wonder if anyone on the set was awake enough to say, “Hey, this is really bad! Why are we making it?”

I’m talking Turkeys with a capital ‘T’. Movies so stupid, they’d stand there in the rain with their heads tipped up and fool mouths open till they drowned, if they actually were turkeys.

Here’s my list for this year’s Woodchuck Turkey Feast, specially cooked up for this weekend. Mind you, these are just my favorites -- no doubt, you’ve got a couple of gobblers near and dear to your own heart you can substitute as you wish. I reckon you could cobble together your own gobbler-fest in no time. Well, clear the table. Here’s they are, in no particular order:

* Fave-o-rite Woodchuck Butterball Turkey Classic: Ed Wood’s Plan 9 From Outer Space (1958) is the King Turkey, so bad it’s almost a religious experience. Plan 9 lives down to its reputation, if you know what I mean, and I think you do. If you’re wondering about ol’ Ed, check out Tim Burton’s bio-pic Ed Wood for the behind-the-scenes poop on this cheapjack wonder.

* Fave-o-rite Woodchuck Fast-Food Family Turkey: My neighbors used to go to McDonald’s for Thanksgiving, and this movie was made for them. Ronald McDonald liked Steven Spielberg’s E.T. so much, he ran out and made his own version, Mac and Me (1988). Only instead of one E.T., or just one product placement for Reesee’s Pieces, McDonald’s added a whole ding-dang family of cute li’l E.T. knock-offs, named the main one after a burger, and sent the li’l yippers zipping around about 90 minutes worth of product placements, including (of course) McDonald’s. It’s the definitive family product-placement movie, and it even leaves you choking on that little clump of snot you get in the back of your throat every time you eat a real Big Mac.

* Fave-o-rite Woodchuck Turkey All-Animal Epic: There’s only one true contender for this category, America’s first all-avian feature-length film, Bill and Coo (1947). The entire movie starred only birds -- parakeets, parrots, lovebirds, canaries, and their feathered friends, hopping and chirping around a whole teeny-tiny little bird town. Striking a blow for racial harmony everywhere, the villains were crows, which they refered to as “the Black Menace” throughout. This little slice of heaven won a special Academy Award for, um, being special, and it was written and directed by Dean Riesner, who went on to script Dirty Harry for Clint Eastwood, which proves, uh, I dunno, it’s a good thing they didn’t carry Magnums in the 1940s. The second all-avian feature-length film was, of course, Jonathan Livingston Seagull (1973), which you might think a possible contender to this perch, but truth be told, it’s nary a pinfeather compared to Bill and Coo.

* Fave-o-rite Woodchuck Western Turkey: An all-bird cast is something to see, you betcha, but you haven’t lived until you’ve experienced the world’s one and only all-midget western, The Terror of Tiny Town (1938). It’s pretty standard oater fare, ‘cept all the cowboys and cowgirls and saddle-bums are midgets and dwarves who strut under saloon doors and ride the range on Shetland ponies, and they all sing songs, kinda like Gene Autry and Roy Rogers used to. Except, you know, with higher voices. And not as good. Gosh, I get misty-eyed just thinkin’ about it, and wish I could go to Texas -- until I think of the next film on the list:

* Fave-o-rite Woodchuck Vacation Turkey: Seeing as “manos” is Spanish for “hands,” Manos, the Hands of Fate (1966) actually means Hands, the Hands of Fate, which kinda makes you think, don’t it? A Texan manure-mogul made this movie about a couple and their daughter waylaid by a satanic backyard barbeque cult and Torgo, a stuttering idiot with big floppy knees. It’s just like a real vacation. First, they drive around for a long, long time, and then they drive around some more, and then they drive more, and they drive around again for a while, and not a damned thing happens. Then they find a claptrap fleapit in the middle of nowhere, and a weird little guy (Torgo) checks ‘em in. Then they lose their daughter while standing around in their hotel room arguing and she just up and steps out the door and damn, what d’ya know, she’s gone, they can’t find her. It’s real scarey, like Torgo’s knees or a bad plate of pulled pork.

* Fave-o-rite Woodchuck Flatlander Vacation Turkey: Alan Alda starred in, wrote, and directed The Four Seasons (1981), which everybody chuckled over back when it came out, though I didn’t care for it then, and like a crappy bottle of Boone’s Farm wine left in the cupboard, my attitude toward it has just turned to vinegar over the years. I hate it when Alan and his muckamuck friends from New Yawk show up in Stowe and proceed to do all kinds of bone-headed flatlander things, like wear embarrassing winter clothing and offend the waiters at restaurants and drive their four-wheeler out onto the ice, which of course breaks through and sucks the fool vehicle down. I was going to Johnson State College at the time, and the best jazz musicians in the school scored a cameo as bad jazz musicians playing at a Stowe club, which I thought demonstrated Alda’s contempt for all things Vermontian, save our skiing and scenery. Like I said, flatlander. Almost as bad as the time the makers of that Chevy Chase movie Funny Farm up and killed all the trees in the Townshend Green when they painted the summer leaves fall foliage colors.

* Fave-o-rite Woodchuck Turkey Musical Mashed-Potato Extravaganza: There’s lots of contenders for the top spud (Lost Horizon? Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band? The Apple?? Xanadu???), but I save my sour cream and butter for that disco-era ‘tater tot Can’t Stop the Music (1980). I was always afraid of New York City until I saw this movie, and realized that, well, people are people everywhere, even if they sing and dance like spring peepers frying on an electric fence. The Village People were the big musical act here, Olympic Decathalon champ Bruce Jenner was the big star, and it was directed by visionary feminist filmmaker Nancy Walker -- y’know, Rosie, the lady who used to hustle Bounty paper towels on TV (“it’s the quicker picker-upper”). She musta been on some of them thar “picker-uppers” when she made this, and I ain’t talkin’ paper towels. NASA should fire this into space for other intelligent beings to observe and pass judgement on all mankind.

* Fave-o-rite Woodchuck 200-Ton Turkey Monster Movie: Speaking of firing things into space and intelligent beings, the Japanese bred a few contenders for this category, like the two-legged TV-antennaed semi-poultry monster The X from Outer Space, but I’ll forever keep a little light on in my soul for The Giant Claw (1957). This big turkey buzzard from outer space gobbles up trains, airplanes, and, in one unforgettable shot, little fellers wearing parachutes. Come Thanksgiving, I like a big bird, but this one makes you think twice. It’s supposed to be scary, but it looks like a refugee from a Dr. Seuss book and it’s a puppet -- you can see the strings and everything! In one stirring flash of political insight, the turkey monster pecks away a hunk of the United Nations building, which, come to think of it, may be why our country still hasn’t paid its U.N. dues. The movie itself is vintage Grade-A USA turkey, but the giant muppet turkey was actually made in Mexico, anticipating the great benefits the NAFTA treaty brought our way and the blessedly cheap slave labor corporate America has come to depend on.

* Fave-o-rite Woodchuck 200-Pound Turkey Monster Movie: None of you have ever heard of it, I’m sure, which proves that God does exist, but Blood Freak (1972) was filmed in Florida, which is the strongest argument I can possibly offer for my decision to never, ever move to Florida, even though my parents and sister did. I’ll take the snow, thank ye. Anyhoot, Blood Freak really is a turkey monster movie, in that the monster is a turkey, or a turkey-man. You see, he’s a screwed-up biker who wants to do right and quit dope and he falls for a born-again Jesus-preachin’ woman, but a Food-and-Drug researcher slips him a dose of something that, well, turns him into a big turkey, or rather a guy with a big fake turkey head over his own, which makes him kill, though I don’t know why. My friend Muskie raises turkeys up around Chester, and his turkeys never do anything but eat and crap and gobble and peck at each other, but this turkey is just plain mean. He needs junkie’s blood, which they just don’t sell at the feed store. The film’s narrator chain-smokes throughout and coughs his fool brains out. This is an important film, really, being the only anti-FDA-anti-drug-anti-smoking-pro-Christian-biker-splatter-turkey-monster movie ever made. Ever. And that surely counts for something.

* Woodchuck-Pick-of-the-Litter Holiday-Musical Turkey: Santa Claus Conquers the Martians (1964). The title really says it all -- I mean, Santa really does conquer the Martians, who, being Grinch-colored, try to steal Xmas -- though I should also warn you that li’l Pia Zadora made her debut in green-face as one of the martian rugrats here, and the lame-o song “Hooray for Santa Claus!” will forever blight your Xmas memories. Why do we know or care about Pia, anyway? She never could act or sing -- I mean, how did she ever become a pseudo-celebrity?

Pardon me, I gotta go take a Pia.
See ya around Christmas time.

Oh, and I'll add this to my Thanksgiving greeting to you all this morning (below) -- this is a Thanksgiving Day Message from His Holiness the Dalai Lama, compliments of my amigo in Jamiaca, VT, HomeyM:

We are all here on this planet, as it were, as tourists. None of us can live here forever. The longest we might live is a hundred years. So whiile we are here we should try to have a good heart and to make something positive and useful of our lives.

   Whether we live just a few years or a whole century, it would be truly regrettable and sad if were were to spend that time aggravating the problems that afflict other people, animals, and the environment. The most important thing is to be a good human being.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING, one and all ...

I may or may not be posting in the next few hours, so here's my best wishes to all of you today.

Much to be thankful for -- personally, the fact that both my now-adult children, Maia and Daniel, will be joining Marj and I and our friends and family this afternoon for the holiday meal is a blessing I could not have imagined possible last year at this time. This makes it a particularly special Thanksgiving for me, and a blessing for which I am deeply thankful.

May you all have the best possible Thanksgiving, and may you have many of your own blessings for which to celebrate the day.

Drive carefully, eat hearty, enjoy the gathering (however mighty or meager), and sleep well.

The Birds Is Coming...

The trip to CCS yesterday was more eventful than the ride home -- despite the harsh weather warnings, heading south from White River Junction at about 7:30 PM amid a light icy rain and some sketchy snow proved to be a sweet drive after I was south of the Claremont NH exit on 91. The skies cleared, the road cleared, and the road was open and dry all the way to Brattleboro.

I left, however, amid what indeed was a winter storm. Hitting the road at 1:30 or so, it was snowing heavily here in Marlboro: that heavy, wet snow we usually get first couple of storms. Since the drive twixt my home and Interstate 91 in Brattleboro is a winding road hustling with trucks, I decided to stick to the back roads, taking the dirt Ames Hill Road from Marlboro into West Brattleboro. It's always a fairly solo ride, as there's usually little or no traffic. The first stretch was slippery and treacherous, requiring easy going (even with my snow tires), but once the road dipped below the higher elevation it gave way to slush, to ice, then to a wet road. By the time I was dipping into the flats, it was genuinely pleasurable driving.

As I drove by one of the open pasture areas before the final extension into Brat, I glanced to my left and put on the brakes.

There, peppering the field from one tree-lined edge to the upper end of the facing hill's treeline, was the largest gathering of wild turkeys I have ever seen in my life.

I love seeing turkeys in the wild: it's the closest I'll ever come to seeing live dinosaurs, y'see. Their manner and movements, their ungainly heads and long necks leading their barrel bodies, their strut deliberate and calm until they're rattled (easily done) -- but this group was enormous!

Counting 37 in all, I idled by the side of Ames Hill Road as long as I could, just drinking in the spectacle. Amazing. As I drove off, I glanced back: they were still foraging, not at all concerned about either my coming or going.

And that, my friends, certainly prompts a final well wish to one and all for a Happy Thanksgiving tomorrow. We're having our annual gathering of friends and some family, and looking forward to it greatly.

Have a great Turkey Day -- in a way, I had mine yesterday!

If It's Tuesday, It Must Be Snowing...

Off to CCS later today for this week's lecture (more on the early graphic novel, 1950-1970, and coverage of the early underground comix years). It'll be rain, slush, snow and ice up and back, according to this morning's weather. Oh BOY!

Drive careful, y'all, and I'll do the same...

Monday Reading Assignment: Richard Clarke's "Ten Years Later..."

Hey, I may be out of circulation today as far as aggressively blogging is concerned, but I can passively blog. My dear friend Jean-Marc Lofficier sent me the link to this fascinating piece of speculative political sf by none other than Richard A. Clarke, former national coordinator for security and counterterrorism for Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.

It was published January of this year in The Atlantic Monthly, and is even more timely today -- give "Ten Years Later" a read, unless you have an aversion to heavily footnoted science fiction.

Hmmm, I hereby nominate John Milius to script and direct the movie. Do I hear a second?

Here ya go:

"Ten Years After" by Richard A. Clarke

Of Cannibals and Cartoon Studies: Monday on a Sunday Night

Looks like I'm going to be swamped with work twixt now and Wednesday morning, soooooo -- just in case, here's some meat & potatoes I intended to get to in the next two days.

* Holy smokes, we're hammering out my spring schedule with James Sturm at the Center for Cartoon Studies. I reckon December is just around the corner, and the wrap-up of this first-ever semester is nigh, so James is hardly jumping the gun. Though I was originally scheduled to be teaching only this first semester's "Survey of the Drawn Story" class, I reckon I've pleased the powers that be (I'm as high-performance, low-maintenance as I can be: I arrive prepared, deliver the most ass-kicking two-and-a-half hour session I can to the students, and turn in my mileage form -- then I'm out of their hair, except for the Tuesday night movie I provide free-of-charge for the students who have the time and inclination to soak that up). Yep, I'll be back in January, teaching drawing this time around. James, Michelle Ollie, and I are still dancing around which day of the week will be my time to tango with this amazing group of students (and I do mean amazing), but it's all coming together. More news once it's fit to print!

* The big news that is fit to print is: my long-awaited book project We Are Going to Eat You!: The Definitive Edition at last has a publisher -- and what a publisher!

This past week, Harvey Fenton of FAB Press and I signed and sealed the contract for a revised, expanded, abundantly illustrated and absolutely definitive edition of my exhaustive overview of Third World cannibal movies from the 1890s to present. We've scheduled our efforts for a Summer 2007 release of finished product, and we've some real surprises in store (that I'll keep as surprises until we're further along).

The UK-based FAB Press is one of the best genre film publishers in the world, and I'm honored to be under their umbrella. Harvey has already published (and, in some cases, edited and/or co-authored) some of the most handsome, lavishly-produced, and beautifully packaged books of substance on all things cinematic, horrific and unusual. Among the many feathers in Harvey's cap -- from many authors, mind you -- are mind-and-table bending books like the brand-new Book of the Dead: The Complete History of Zombie Cinema, which joins the ranks of Ten Years of Terror: British Horror Films of the 1970s, Fear Without Frontiers: Horror Cinema Across the Globe, Shock! Horror! Astounding Artwork from the Video Nasty Era, Profondo Argento, Agitator: The Cinema of Takashi Miike, Iron Man: The Cinema of Shinya Tsukamoto, Art of Darkness: The Cinema of Dario Argento, Beyond Terror: The Films of Lucio Fulci, Abel Ferrera: The Moral Vision, Beasts in the Cellar: The Exploitation Film Career of Tony Tenser, Making Mischief: The Cult Films of Pete Walker, Unruly Pleasures: The Cult Film and Its Critics, Wes Craven's Last House on the Left: The Making of a Cult Classic (two editions), Making Friday the 13th: The Legend of Camp Blood, DVD Delirium volumes 1 and 2, Eyeball Compendium, Flesh & Blood Compendium, and -- appropriately enough, providing a rich precursor for my own book in the FAB lineage -- Cannibal Holocaust and the Savage Cinema of Ruggero Deodato, among others!

Oddly enough, though I wasn't aware of it until Harvey presented me with a copy, my art previously appeared in one of FAB Press's oddest tomes, AntiCristo: The Bible of Nasty Nun Sinema & Culture -- turns out I did a sketch of a nasty nun for author Steve Fentone at the London comics convention UKAK back in 1991, and there she is, spitting up all over herself at the bottom of page 239.

Anyhoot, all these marvelous books and more (including Motion Picture Purgatory, a collection of Montreal cartoonist extraordinaire Rick Trembles amazing comics movie reviews, which I most highly recommend) are waiting for you over at

FAB Press.

Come 2007, my gruesome cannibal movie tome will be among their number, and I can't dream of a happier home for my mutant offspring.

Perhaps a short history of my humble project is in order: the original We Are Going to Eat You!: The Third World Cannibal Movies and the Inside Story of the Goona-Goona Films was completed in 1990, but I could not find a publisher at that time. It was a heady bit of research, completed looong before the era of in-depth books on such bizarre genres, loooooong before DVD (laserdisc was still in its early years), and looooooooooooong before any books at all existed on the subject (there have since been a couple worthy books on cannibal films, including Mikita Brottman's Meat is Murder! from Creation Books, 1997, though none are definitive). I was breaking new ground at the time, laboring to excavate all I could on this curious subject, with essential research input from folks like Craig Ledbetter, Tim Lucas, Michael H. Price, Chas Balun, Tim Caldwell, Douglas Winter, the late Bill Kelley and others.

A considerably truncated version of this original text was published in Chas Balun's historic The Deep Red Horror Handbook (FantaCo Enterprises, 1989), though I must add Chas did an extraordinary job paring my massive scribblings down to a comprehensive read. A few photocopies of my complete ms. were circulating in the ensuing decade. The complete, unexpurgated version wasn't published until February of 2003, when I self-published an "Archival SpiderBaby Edition" of the complete 1990 manuscript.

That curio clocked in at 336 pages, sporting a cover by yours truly for the squarebound photocopied tome (black and white; glue binding; protective plastic covers). Every copy was signed and personalized, available exclusively from SpiderBaby Grafix (and the couple of book dealers who picked it up for retail in the US and UK). The unadorned ms. was over 250 pages in length; the archival bound edition was a rough and ready affair, spiced with almost 100 pages of illustrations, including some of my own cannibal film and zombie artwork amid an eye-popping array (culled from the SpiderBaby archives) of super-rare movie pressbooks, clippings, ad mats, etc. from around the world, dating back to the 1890s. As I wrote in the publication announcement, "This is an archival reproduction of the original 1990 manuscript -- not typeset, but photocopied from the old Atari printer ms. -- which was completed before the release of key mainstream cannibal epics like Alive!, Silence of the Lambs and Fried Green Tomotoes, the influx of Asian horrors, before the true-life horrors of Jeffrey Dahmer."

Continuing the ballyhoo for the now out-of-print archival edition:
___

"What's important is what it DOES have:

*Analysis, insights, and behind-the-scenes stories of those bloody Italian cannibal gems like MAN FROM DEEP RIVER, THE LAST SURVIVOR/JUNGLE HOLOCAUST, TRAP THEM AND KILL THEM, MOUNTAIN OF THE CANNIBAL GOD, CANNIBAL APOCALYPSE/INVASION OF THE FLESH HUNTERS, EATEN ALIVE/THE EMERALD JUNGLE, DR. BUTCHER M.D./ZOMBIE HOLOCAUST, and CANNIBAL FEROX/MAKE THEM DIE SLOWLY.

* Cannibal cinema rarities like CANNIBALS OF THE SOUTH SEAS, A SCREAM IN THE NIGHT, WHAT'S BUZZING BUZZARD (Tex Avery's cannibal classic cartoon!), GOONA GOONA, FIVE CAME BACK, BACK TO ETERNITY, CANNIBAL ISLAND, SPIDER BABY, TERROR IN THE JUNGLE, AFRICA ADDIO/AFRICA BLOOD AND GUTS, the Mondo movies, THE WILD EYE, THE VALLEY (OBSCURED BY CLOUDS), HOW TASTY WAS MY LITTLE FRENCHMAN, MACUNAIMA, SURVIVE!, MONDO CANNIBALE, THE MAN HUNTER, CANNIBAL TERROR, CUT AND RUN, WHITE SLAVE, CANNIBAL TOURS, and more!

* Genre masterpieces including NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, SOYLENT GREEN, THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE, CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST, and others!

* Mainstream off-genre essentials like SUDDENLY, LAST SUMMER!, THE SKY ABOVE THE MUD BELOW, THE NAKED PREY, WEEKEND, A MAN CALLED HORSE, WALKABOUT, AGUIRRE THE WRATH OF GOD, THE LAST MOVIE, QUEST FOR FIRE, THE EMERALD FOREST, THE MISSION, and other surprisingly key titles you wouldn't associate with the cannibal films you know and love.

Though much has happened to the cannibal genre in the decade+ since this was written, WE ARE GOING TO EAT YOU! remains a comprehensive overview of the cannibal film genre to that point in time, including coverage of many key films that remain ignored in the lavish full-color books that have been published since. This was a major undertaking, completed (but sadly unpublished) long before the contemporary explosion of cannibal coffee-table tomes.

From Martin and Osa Johnson's silent cannibal travelogues to GOONA GOONA and the Mondo films, from DR. X to CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST and beyond, it's all here, researched and dissected with the usual Bissettian obsessive intensity."
___

Harvey and I are already prepping the thousands of illustrations for the book -- it will be an eye-popping feast, in more ways than one. I'll be painting the cover art and providing numerous interior illustrations to accompany the array of archival illustrative materials. I've got months of work ahead of me revising the already expansive text, with much from the past 15 years to cover (and much from the previous century at last in reach and in need of coverage), and literally two file cabinets filled with notes and clippings to sort through and weave into the book.

So keep your eyes in their sockets for now and your cranium capped and we'll keep you posted on the coming developments as they congeal.
___

* BTW, the electricity is now on in the new studio/library/workspace, thanks to my stepson Mike and his fiance Mary, who completely juiced and lit the room before heading home around 6 PM tonight. Bless 'em! I've started schlepping the books onto the shelves, though the heavy engagement with the process will have to wait until after my CCS Tuesday -- and, sigh, the carpeting. One more major hurdle to go, then I'll be writing and drawing in the new digs.
___

Well, that's my Sunday evening Monday & Tuesday morning entry. If you're checking this blog after 9:55 PM on Sunday night, be sure to scroll down to this morning's post, too -- this is my second of the day, anticipating a couple of days of no posts ahead.

See you all on Wednesday, unless I'm able to steal some time to get back to the keyboard between then and now...

Off the Newsstand --

A couple of recent newsstand purchases worth seeking out:

* The annual Bongo Comics' Bart Simpson's Treehouse of Horror special is thankfully still malingering on some newsstands, though Halloween has come and gone. Rush out and snag a copy, quick! My friend Dan Barlow luckily pushed me just in time, and I found it last night on one of the few comic spinner racks still left in Brattleboro, VT (thanks, Dan!), though it had just been pulled from some locations, like, yesterday. Per usual, the parodies of known genre chestnuts are knowing and amusing, with an equal quotient of inspired concepts and dialogue and groaners. This year's bumper crop promises more than it delivers, though, by lining up a stellar lineup of guest vet horror/sf cartoonists -- Berni(e) Wrightson, Gene Colan, Mark Schultz, Al Williamson, John Severin, Angelo Torres -- whose work (with the very notable exception of Colan's inspired pencils) is barely recognizable as their work! Pros all, and the stories themselves are perfectly told, but the Groening/Morrison covers (particularly the EC riff) are truer mergers of the Simpsons universe with traditional horror comics stylings.

No insult intended to the artists -- but it's a puzzlement: did editor Bill Morrison and/or Bongo Comics insist upon the artists submerging their styles so completely in the Simpsons template as to smother their distinctive styles? Did the artists assume they were to subsume their work to fit the template?

Whatever the case, it's a disappointment to find Len Wein and Wrightson's satire of their own classic House of Secrets origin of Swamp Thing so neatly revamp that 1970 gem to the world of Homer (transmuted into Squish Thing by failed attempts to create a new flavor mixing Squishies and beer and the fateful intrusion of a time bomb set by Moe, who covets Marge), only to find Wrightson's pastiche of his own past persona reduced to vague stylistic variations (primarily, use of side-lighting to render forms) sans flavor, authenticity or finesse. A few panels are lovely -- page 19's fourth panel (I know it looks inconsequential, but that panel works: there's flow, grace, and weight to the figures, Bart's legs look both "right" and "Wrightson") and final 'collision' panel (ditto); page 20's first two panels (particularly Homer strangling Bart), and best of all the fateful explosion and hilarious "Ow ow ow ow ow [etc.]" immediately following, etc. -- but weakest of all are the "money shots," if you will, Squish Thing's appearances primary amongst those. It looks like a lesser artist's attempt to cop the basics of Wrightson's 1970s work, sans the richness and supple brushwork Berni brought to his stylish "big foot" work on Captain Sternn, the Howard the Duck Presidential campaign poster, or his occasional National Lampoon efforts. In fact, prior year's Treehouse of Horrors stories sported more distinctive Wrightsonesque stylings -- particularly from Hilary Barta, one of this generation's great humorists and all-around cartoonists -- and that leaves me simply befuddled. Still, it's a hoot to find Len and Bernie goofing on their own historic moment in comics history (just one of many, I hasten to add), and we'll take what we can get of such rare rematches when and as they emerge.

The same is true of the Severin, Torres and Mark Schultz/Al Williamson stories: if you held a revolver to my temple, I wouldn't have guessed they had personally executed these gigs (save for the tell-tale Severin portrait of some of his old EC compatriots in the "Shock! Suspense! Simpsons!" splash panel, the only component of the two Severin stories that unmistakably radiates Severin's distinctive style). The Schultz/Williamson story hinges on recreations of the famous EC sf "Squa Tront? Spa Fon!" panels and pages, featuring Al's thick-lipped lizard humanoid aliens rendered as they were in 1953. It looks like someone other than Mark Schultz and Al Williamson clumsily copping Williamson's EC classic: only a few of the backgrounds carry the illusion.

Again, I intend no slight to the artists, all of whom are not just incredible artists but great guys -- I'm just wondering what happened here. Maybe the deadlines were inordinately tight, but one would think that would bring instinctive stylistic approaches to the fore. The fact that all but one of the teamups seem to have been smothered by some sort of 'house template' leads me to think this was an imposition from Bongo, but one can never assume such things: it may actually be that the veterans assumed they were to work as closely as possible to the Simpsons style, and thus avoided their own instincts to meet that perceived job spec. Had I been in the editor's shoes, though, I'd have insisted otherwise: I mean, you don't hire this amazing cosmic aligning-of-the-stars and ask them to not work in their own styles -- or do you?

(One other caveat, and one I have to chalk up to editor Bill Morrison: the Schultz/Williamson EC sf parody "Blast from the Future Past!" at one point hinges on the conceit of Bart and Lisa reading the comic we're reading, culminating in what should have been a great "Turn the page!" gag -- but damn it, the real page layouts don't match those in the 'comic inside the comic,' the page doesn't turn over to the revelatory page, and this sadly blows the joke completely! "D'oh!")

To pull together no less than a half-dozen of horror and sf comics greatest stylists to draw satires of their iconic works -- in effect, "recreate" their own styles -- only to end up with this half-hearted showcase is a disappointment. As Harvey Kurtzman and his Mad stable of artists knew (particularly Wally Wood and Will Elder), and National Lampoon understood and proved time-and-time-again in their 1970s heyday, the best comic parodies sing when they are almost indistinguishable from their sources. In this case, it's hard to fathom how adopting not only the styles of the wellsprings, but hiring the original cartoonists themselves who drew the seminal EC and Swamp Thing stories being satirized, ended up looking like such pallid imitations of the real McCoys.

For that matter, only John Costanza's lettering (on the Tomb of Dracula and Swamp Thing parodies) "plays ball" here. Once more, no slight intended to letterer Karen Bates, but the faux-"Leroy lettering" for the entirity of "Two Tickets to Heck!" and its component quintet of EC pastiche stories doesn't sufficiently emulate the emblematic look and feel of the true EC house lettering style. Like the art, it's all a dim, shallow echo. One can see what was intended, but it rings hollow from stem to stern.

Only Gene Colan comes through in spades: his triumphant, distinctively Colanesque fusion of his eye-popping "straight-no-chaser" Tomb of Dracula visuals with the Simpsons universe is the one absolutely on-the-money wedding of concept and creators in the book, sweetened all the more by the reuniting of Colan with his ol' Tomb of Dracula writer/editor Marv Wolfman. Colan also stays true to his own remarkable sense of page design, panel flow, and action (note page 11's layout in particular), and this lends the story a kinetic charge nothing else in the comic has. It works as beautifully as The Simpsons TV Halloween episode in which Homer entered the three-dimensional world (via inspired CGI renditions of a three-dimensional Homer). The jolting incongruity of seeing the familiar Simpsons characters rendered in Colan's style (reproduced directly from his energetic, atmospheric pencils) is part and parcel of 'the joke,' lending invigorating energy and startling life to Wolfman's confectionary script. The fun both creators bring to the job is contagious, and as with the best of prior year's Treehouse of Horrors tricks-and-treats, the shoehorning of Simpsons stars into classic horror roles (e.g., Smithers as Renfield, Homer, Bart and Lisa as the Van Helsing clan of Tomb of Dracula, etc.) works like a charm. Kudos to Marv and Gene, and I hope there was some sweet retribution in "reclaiming" Blade via this parody!

If only the rest of this annual event had been as inspired.

For the third time, I stress that these are not personalized comments or meant as attacks on any of the creators involved or the Bongo staff -- I'm just flummoxed as a reader who loves the work of all involved, loves the concept of wedding these artists and writers with parodies of their own work, and then wonders upon eye contact with the published work, "Wha' happened?"
_____

* BTW, Berni(e) Wrightson fans take note: This is the weekend the Showtime Network's current Masters of Horror anthology series is broadcasting Dario Argento's adaptation of the classic Bruce Jones/Berni Wrightson Warren horror comics tale "Jenifer". The original comics story remains among Bernie's greatest comics accomplishments, and among Bruce Jones's finest hours as a writer, a high-water mark for horror comics as a genre, and a classic of the genre in any medium. Here's hoping Argento does it justice; it certainly seems like an ideal match of filmmaker and source material.

Note, too, this is arguably the second adaptation of one of Bruce Jones's marvelously heartfelt fusions of horror and romance that so elevated the Warren zines (Creepy, Eerie, Vampirella) they appeared in. Last year's celebrated "you are there" shark movie, Chris Kentis and Laura Lau's Open Water,
essentially lifted its premise and some particulars from Jones and Richard Corben's full-color (with black-and-white framing pages) "In Deep". In fact, harrowing as Open Water was, it emulated only the first half of Jones/Corben's truly horrific and heartbreaking story, which pushed the situation to nigh-on-unbearable extremes (I've written a full article comparing the comic tale to the unauthorized/unacknowledged film "adaptation," which will see print in 2006 in one of the Gooseflesh volumes.)

Jones went on write for television, including The Hitchhiker TV anthology series, but his best work to my mind remains his horror/love scripts for Warren -- prominent among those the shattering "Jenifer".

I don't get Showtime, so alas, it'll be a while until I see it, but my amigo and vet Video Watchdog writer/editor/co-publisher Tim Lucas has been highly complimentary of the series thus far. His Saturday, November 19th "Video Watchblog" posting on "Jenifer" is heartening, and with a click and a scroll-down to Tim's November 19th posting, you can find it

here.

____

* The latest issue of Filmfax Plus is on the stands -- #108 -- and it's as usual a grand jam-packed read.

Prominent among this issue's delights (from various retrospective War of the Worlds articles to the usual great mix of interviews and articles with/on everyone from Richard Dix to Tiny Tim) is Part Two of Dan Johnson's marvelous interview with William Stout, this time focusing on Stout's early years working in Hollywood. They cover a lot of ground, from his poster artist work (e.g., Wizards, etc.) to his production design work (on Conan the Barbarian, Return of the Living Dead, Invaders from Mars, etc.), which no doubt continues into the upcoming third installment. Dan and Bill carry the conversation into turf Stout has never before gotten into -- including how he stumbled on his first production design gig, a confessional moment Stout selflessly offers up as "a lesson for someone else out there" -- which shines light into previously unexposed connective corners between Stout's incredibly multi-faceted career. This is essential reading, and per usual Filmfax sweetens the interview with a stunning array of the interview subject's work -- in this case, everything from Stout's seminal bootleg record cover art to never-before-seen storyboard and production design work (including Conan boards that were, at director John Milius's insistence, drawn as full comic pages). Highly recommended!

By the way, I urge you to get your hands on some of Stout's self-published sketchbooks and collections, and pronto! The two comics collections, Mickey at 60: Volume Two and Motor Mania! -- the latter collecting, for the first time anywhere, Stout's comics for CARtoons magazine, which counts as some of his first comics work -- are particularly recommended. These are just $15 each (plus only $6 total shipping), as are all of Bill's sketchbooks -- with the single exception of his splendid Tribute to Ray Harryhausen, which is a fat 70 pages featuring every one of Ray's stop-motion creations rendered in Stout's distinctive style!

No, you can't order online -- you gotta write a letter, write a check, and mail it snail-mail to:

William Stout, Inc.
1466 Loma Vista Street
Pasadena, CA 91104-4709

As a matter of fact, I'm going to check the checklist out (on page 27 of Filmfax Plus #108) against my stash of Stout books, and rush a check out to Bill in the AM for the ones I'm missing. A Merry Christmas gift to myself -- why don't you do the same for yourself?

Besides, it'll sweeten Bill's Christmas, too!

Swimming in Oatmeal for Satan!

Though I can by no means afford 'em all, I've been a long-time fan of Mike Vraney and his bountiful Something Weird Video output. Mike was inevitably my favorite table at the Chillercon of yore (I haven't been for years), and most often reaped the bulk of my $$$ during those twice-a-year sojourns to the Meadowlands of New Jersey.

Since the arrival of DVD and Mike's innovative deal with Image to springboard Something Weird into the mass market, he's detoured even more of my $$$ into the SW stable. It's to the point where I'll purchase a SW DVD out of idle curiosity, since even the "least" of the catalogue on DVD offers a bounty of extras I've never heard of -- and believe you me, I've been scouring for these films since childhood, in whatever venue presented itself, from 8mm cutdowns from Castle and Ken Films to our contemporary DVD overload.

Among my recent SW late-night viewings was the Asylum of Satan package. This is one I picked up on impulse and a whim, having always been a fan of director William B. Girdler's films (e.g., Death Curse of Tartu, Sting of Death, Day of the Animals, Stanley, Grizzly, The Manitou, etc.) and curious about Asylum for its grotesque newspaper ads (featuring a Haxan-like demonic visage that seemed to be made of clay). The lead feature lived down to my utter lack of expectations -- it's among Girdler's least entertaining efforts, though still fun for a Girdlerphile like moi -- but its surprise made-in-Florida co-feature Satan's Children was the real delight. I was completely unprepared for the lunacy of this 1973 opus from "who's this?" director Joe Wiezycki -- this was apparenty his first and last film -- helming a generation-gap psychodrama shot in and about Tampa Bay by a local TV station crew expanding their horizons.

It's a genre mix of post-Manson JD/counterculture/biker/satanist fear-mongering, in which a callow teen youth who hates his spoiled older stepsister and his home life (they make him -- gasp! -- mow the lawn) bolts away to immediately fall into the clutches of a biker who offers him a place to crash. That night, said biker and his gang gang-sodomize the kid for laughs and dump him in a ditch. He's found and "rescued" by a nomadic pack of flower-children who turn out to be (cue music) Satan's Children! Typical of the post-Manson cinematic landscape, these hippie space-cadets are depicted as a free-wheeling, torture-lovin' pack of misfits, only our rescued protagonist becomes the favorite squeeze of the coven matriarch while its patriarch is away. Of course, when head honcho warlock returns, things go south: the protective coven matriarch is buried in sand up to her neck and left for the ants (after her head is covered in syrup to allure the insects) and our young hero flees with the coven in pursuit. Some drown in an oatmeal-like pit of "quicksand," others are fried on a fence, and junior jail-bait indeed makes his way back home -- and then the film really slides off the deep end. The finale is a corker, even if its most transgressive act (incestuous rape) is kept off-screen.

For its era, the paths this low-budget youth-gone-astray flick pursues are pretty out-to-lunch, from the homosexual gangbang to the patricide-fueled excess (including the revenge-rape and crucifixion of sis) of the final act. Sodomy was a big-screen no-no in the 1970s, though I suppose Straw Dogs and Deliverance broke that cinematic ass-cherry. Still, among rural drive-ins, biker pederasts ass-reaming a long-haired teen boy would have driven most redneck yokels into a homophobic rage and out of the drive-ins all together. The climactic melee might have prompted salutary honking-of-horns from those who stayed the course (though our androgynous hero's method of murder -- smashing bottles over Dad's head until he croaks -- is hilarious, and as badly staged as the rest of the homicidal "action"), but those would have been either the heartiest souls, those who were distracted from the first act, or those incapable of driving themselves home earlier.

The story is told with that seamy, impoverished flat-footedness of similar first-time-out 1970s drive-in era fare, defined by its maladroit acting, clumsy staging of mayhem, and lack of any real energy. For me, though, the clash between Wiezycki's flaccid direction, the cast's high-school-theater theatrics, and the lethal ire of the film's narrative content proved strangely intoxicating. If you view it in the context of That '70s Show, it's even more disorienting: view it as "Eric's Big Night Out," ending with Eric's murder of Red and rape & crucifixion of Laurie (hey, is that Tommy Chong as the coven leader?), and you'll see what I mean.

By any yardstick, this is a pretty weird flick, and it's all the more delightful for having been essentially a lost film until SW rescued it from oblivion.

Coincidentally, my friend Steve Twiss (who had no idea I had this DVD, and likewise had never heard of the film) sent me the link to a website for

Big 13 WTVT Channel 13

of Tampa Bay, that area's CBS affiliate from the year of my birth (1955) to 1994.

There's a multi-page overview of WTVT's "Shock Theater" horror host,

'Shock Armstrong,' The All-American Ghoul

Better yet, though -- lo and behold! -- the site also features a complete diary of the making of Satan's Children by assistant cinematographer Marc Wielage, dishing the dirt amid the behind-the-scenes story of the film's production! It's all waiting for you at

Satan's Children: The True Story!

There's a fully-illustrated synopsis of the film, in case you feel the need to know more before tracking this DVD down for yourself, but best of all are the details behind the film's inception and production. This gem was shot in part on short ends leftover from The Sting, which is as close as this curio ever got to an Academy Award.

And to think it all happened in Gibsontown and Lutz, Florida. Someone should write the definitive tome on Florida filmmaking, as it's peppered with masterpieces like this among the stratos-fear of Herschell Gordon Lewis's splatter classics, Girdler's pantheon, one-offs from The Mermaids of Tiburon to Zaat!... and countless others.

My favorite revelation: according to Marc Wielage -- who oughta know 'cuz he was there -- that was indeed oatmeal those satanist suckers are floundering in. "$178 worth of oatmeal," to be exact, and that's 1973 dollars-worth-of-Quaker-Oats.

See, it pays to study special effects from a tender age -- and eat Maypo.

Anyhoot, Marj and I are off to see Harry Potter tonight -- but I can't see where it'll hold a candle to Satan's Children.

Sometimes, less is more. Waaaaaaaaaaay more.

Ah, at last --

At about 4 PM, our favorite carpenter/contractor Olivier Flagollet of Rise Up Builders wrapped up work on the office/studio/library.

The shelves are all in, and they are mighty and plentiful; the new wall-mounted computer work station/desk is in, and it's a beaut and large enough for my needs; the drawing table will tuck neatly by the doorway, with room for a pegboard above (and a two-shelf unit just above that is already in place).

I'll be preoccupied for the next couple of days -- I have wall touch up and painting to do, and some other odds and ends. The carpet measurements are being taken tomorrow, and Sunday my stepson Mike Bleier (without whom this project would never have approached completion as yet) will be in to install the lights and electrical fixtures.

The space is about the size of my old 1940s trailor studio, wherein I worked in the late '80s to 1993. That's where Taboo, Aliens: Tribes, We Are Going to Eat You, the 24 Hour Comic, and portions of 1963 (primarily the Hypernaut) and the initial pages of Tyrant (some of which saw print in Tyrant #3) were created.

This new space feels marvelous: it smells of wood, which I love.

The sole window in the room faces out onto our side lawn, right where a black bear occasionally passes. I've found deer tracks out there, too, though I've never seen the deer themselves; they no doubt pass in the night.

Here, much new work will take shape.

Here, many long-in-the-works projects will be completed.

Here, things I can't as yet imagine will emerge.

Wish me luck!

"Because It's Moooooooooving Day, Mooooooooving Day --"

"-- rip up the carpets off the floor/get on your overcoat/you're out the door/because it's mooooooooving day--"

The process that began in March 2004 and should have been done November of 2004 is finally wrapping up this weekend, with crucial but relatively quick labor (final installation of carpet, heating baseboard, electric and lighting fixtures) to soon follow. The completion of the studio/office/library is in reach at last, and I couldn't be readier for the move. Despite the work left to be done, once the shelving is in place and my cleanup/touchup/painting touchup chores are done before I fall down this evening, I'm beginning the momentous task of organizing and moving a vast portion of my library and collection into place, while setting up the computer and writing work area and a long-needed corner for drawing and art production.

Shambling about through 30 years of accumulated material -- art, books, files, papers, etc. -- has been one of the great obstacles week-to-week, though I've managed to do so with enough effectiveness to complete a multitude of projects. Pitiful attempts to lend some order to all this since Marj and I moved into our present abode (the first I've owned rather than rented) in March of 2002 have been sporadic at best: whenever the next feat of construction or renovation was necessary, I'd have to shuffle it all about anew, and it's pretty hopeless at this point. Some of these projects have been research-intensive, leaving heaps of discards and relevent materials in various corners once a given project is done and on its way. It's a process any writer or artist dependent on access to research fully understands, and laypersons can only shake their heads at.

I've managed to wade through some staggering tasks amid all this chaos, and have had pretty solid luck finding all I've needed when I've needed it. Still, much of what I sometimes need is still boxed and sealed and stored in the second floor of our garage (like my entire paleontology book collection), and I've turned down some attractive work offers for lack of anywhere to execute such gigs. For those I have taken on and completed, the void of a dedicated organized workspace has been crippling at times, and the chore of shifting and sifting through the increasingly discumbobulated collection to complete research has become since September a weekly ordeal as I prep my CCS sessions (the average lecture incorporates over 200 images, scanned from various comics, books, and documents scattered -- and I do mean scattered -- over three floors of our home).

Soon, that will all be behind me, and I'm eager to claim the new space and use its abundance of storage, shelving, and work space to reorient literally two floors of my debris and spread-like-a-madwoman's-shit chaos.

That all this is coming together in our little corner of Vermont within a week or two of displaced Hurricane Katrina receiving their December 1st eviction notices from various FEMA-financed shelters (hotel rooms, etc.) leaves me mortified at how much fucking space I fill with my accumulated career/collection shit. I'm feeling criminal, claiming all this turf -- but still, Marj and I worked hard for it, we've ended up paying through the nose for it (no thanks to the original contractor who effectively stiffed us when he abandoned the job), and I'll nevertheless savor the process of moving at last.

We've Got Mail!

Write again with confidence, we'll reply with the same!

Thanks to the great grand & glorious Mark Martin, our Yahoo email account is up and working perfectly now. Thanks to all who wrote with advice (and even invites to open new email -- thanks, Mitch, Andrew), but Mark was first to provide the needed technical recommendation -- which should have been waiting in my mailbox from Yahoo the morning of their system revamp. As Mark said to me, "They added that 'feature' to 'enhance' your experience. It's just like you suspected - something you did not ask for, don't want, etc - but god dammit you are gonna get it!!!" Ya, just like Alan Goldstein used to "enhance" the only computer at First Run Video I depended upon -- "enhancing" later-necessary files out of existence. Anyhoot, thank you, Mark -- it was an elegantly simple operation, but one I neither Marj or I would have thought of or inadvertantly stumbled upon in weeks of Sundays.
___

Awoke this morning (via Marj's radio alarm) to the dulcimer tones of our lying sack-of-shit Vice President Dick Cheney honking off at those pesky Democrats who apparently found the roadmap to one of their testicles this past week or two and are finally aggressively criticizing this Administration's rush to war in 2003.

Lying sack of shit, I say. This isn't a matter of opinion about Cheney: it's a fact. Lest you've forgotten, Cheney proved himself a complete sociopath before the nation in the very first words out of his piehole during the Vice-Presidential debates when he claimed to have never met Senator Edwards before, much less ever seen him on the Senate floor. This first-volley dirt-cheap shot at his debate opponent was countered within hours with news footage of Cheney himself magnanimously introducing Edwards and his wife before some event on the Senate floor. Cheney neither apologized nor was shamed. He is clearly incapable of the latter, and has steadfastly refused to do the former however callous his behavior or blatant his deceptions.

Cheney was the most visible Administration official to maintain the deceitful, non-existent link between the 9/11 attacks on the US and Saddam Hussein, hours after President Bush had admitted publicly none existed. Cheney, our first cyborg Vice, will demonstratably say or do anything with arrogant bravado and unshakable confidence to support whatever lie he chooses to tell or debunk whatever lie he pretends he didn't tell, and his bold bullying of the past days does nothing to counter the rational and long-overdue debate over the deceptive manner in which Bush, Cheney, and their cronies "sold the war" (their own term, mind you) to a gullible American public.

That they -- Bush and Cheney -- are so publicly tag-teaming in the current campaign to (a) legalize their torture state while (b) lying before the entire world (from foreign soil no less, moving from Bush's stand-by "America does not believe in torture" to the emphatic "America does not torture") is the latest one-two punch from men so intoxicated with power that they can't see or don't care about the basic incompatibility of these two synonymous positions. They apparently believe, given how "we" as a country continue to apparently support their rogue corrupt state, that "we" stupidly won't notice. This lethal pathology is growing more blatant and transparent, and one no longer knows how to react when (for instance) Bush lectures China on the principles of democracy (from a podium in Japan, mind you: given the centuries of animosity between China and Japan, Bush just topped his President Pop's faux pas of vomiting into a Japanese diplomat's lap: with a single speech, he humiliated both Japan and China, his host and the very country he is visiting next -- and remains oblivious to having humiliated both parties).

Just last week in England, Tony Blair couldn't get a bill passed extending detention of terrorist suspects from 14 to 90 days; in the US, "detainees" are still being imprisoned without charges for years on end. As of November 17th, AP reports we now have "detained more than 83,000 foreigners in the four years of the war on terror, enough to nearly fill the NFL's largest stadium" ("83,000 Foreigners Have Been Detained in War on Terror: Prisoners in Custody in Iraq Hit a High of Nearly 13,900 on November 1" by Katherine Shrader and Robert Burns, 11/17/05). These are our contemporary concentration camps, which "we" emphatically maintain "we" have a right to maintain indefinitely as our President and Vice-President campaign to extend such abuses of power into the realm of legalized torture even as "we" are and continue to torture without such "legal" sanctions (from the same AP story, just to summarize the situation: "...On Capitol Hill, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., is leading a campaign to ban cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment of prisoners in U.S. custody. The administration says the legislation could tie the president's hands. Vice President Dick Cheney has pressed lawmakers to exempt the CIA..."). If you personally don't believe we're torturing detainees, take a moment to read Amy Goodman's sobering interview with American soldier (former U.S. Army interrogator Specialist) Tony Lagouranis

here.

We clearly are out of control. We are behaving like a rogue state, a rogue superpower, led by an American rogue's gallery like none in living memory.

Of course, this is only further eroding whatever shred of credibility or illusion of decency left to our nation.

This morning's radio-broadcast spectacle of mock indignation and no-doubt genuine outrage from the man who told Senator Leahy on the Senate floor to "go fuck yourself" and thereafter expressed his glee with having said it is just further evidence of the shameless guile, bile, and deceit this motherfucker revels in. It isn't swagger, it's his fundamental behavior pattern.

I can't recall any Vice President since Spiro Agnew who has been so destructive to our country or the basic principles of democracy. Agnew was a piker next to Cheney, who 20 years ago would have seemed too incredible a character in the context of the most asinine of Charles Bronson or Chuck Norris thrillers -- and yet here we are, in the 21st Century, with this mind-boggling villain speaking (literally out of the side of his mouth) on behalf of our country time and time again, pretending to speak for our shared values, demonstrating the utter bankruptcy of our sham pretense to civility, decency, and democracy.

He clearly has no shame.

Have we no shame?

Yes, We Have No Email Today...

Notice to friends and associates:

With some sorely-needed sleep, the cool light of reason and a new morning, it's now evident that the overnight change in systems at Yahoo's email functions is indeed non-functional at the Bissette household, on any and all of our three computers. Switching, per Yahoo's suggestion, to Safari or Mozilla's "lastest" (typo on Yahoo's instructional banner) system only immediately shuts down our internet connection. We can now only read, but not reply to, all incoming email.

So, if you're reading this blog, and have emailed me in the past two days, you now know why there's been no reply.

There may not be, either. We're unsure what we're going to do, but either a change in email service/address or a decision to simply abandon all email until this can be resolved may be forthcoming in the very near future.

This is rather symptomatic of my ongoing interaction with computers: as soon as I gain a level of interactive competence with current systems, some dramatic overnight overhaul of systems renders my ability to interact with systems moot and obsolete. This then requires further expenditures of time, money, and effort into forced reeducation, all of which seems to me an increasingly fruitless waste of said time, money, and effort. Still, I soldier on, though I do resent at times the capitalizing on my time this vicious cycle requires. (Wouldn't you all rather I be writing or drawing in any case?)

In this matter -- and I do hope I'm wrong about this -- it may be the internet/email systems are simply no longer serving those of us still limited exclusively by geographic issues beyond our control to 'dial' phoneline access. Marj and I live in a region of Vermont where no rapid-alternatives are available (no cable, no satellite access). Hopefully, I am dead wrong -- but if so, this may prove to be one of those turning points where we say "ah, fuck it."

(The impending, long-promised Federally imposed High Definition television changeover promises to be another such turning point -- we're not going to blow $1000+ for HD monitors and the technology upgrade necessary to access television we no longer watch in any case. TV is no longer part of our active lives, and hasn't been for some time, so it'll be easy to bail out when the TV simply no longer functions with broadcast signals of any kind.)

Mind you, this is not a willful abandonment of computers and the internet -- that's become a staple of our day-to-day lives -- but if communication in one-way as our email now is, it serves little useful purpose.

So, email -- we'll see.

But at present, if you're writing me, I can read your email -- I can't respond.

Sorry. Will keep you posted here, one way or the other.

___

(BTW -- apologies to the rest of you -- quick replies to pending emails to folks I know read this blog: Thanks, Heath, but that's not a Hamilton's Invader insect, whatever the auction site says; many thanks for the effort, though -- Salvo, got your email, all is well; don't despair, snail-mail is slow twixt the US and Italy -- Oh, no, Implosia, be careful, and pleasepleaseplease, don't fucking do that! You'll never be able to replace/supplant that organ!
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And speaking of regionalized constrictions on access to interaction with the rest of the world:

Re: "Intelligent Design"

As the current regional democracy of school boards shapes our national dialogue on this topic (note the tight swing vote in the current Kansas school situation, and that last week's election locally ousted the Pennsylvania school board members who had voted for "Intelligent Design" being taught in their school), keep in mind that choosing to pay attention to science may be determined by such democratic process, but the scientific principles at stake will not be deterred. Ignorance may impose local-government-sanctioned ignorance on the next generation, but the rest of the world marches on. The consequences will eventually become so real that ignoring them becomes impossible.

In the 21st Century, an American determinative refusal to engage with science as the rest of the world does will simply place the burden upon our country, culture and children of a self-imposed exile from reality. We pursue this path to the detriment of our own assumed future role in the global community. If faith-based redefinitions of the sciences continue to gain momentum, we'll drift back to the illusory succor of a new Dark Age while Europe and Asia usurp our positions in evolving (yes, evolving) technologies and sciences. Willful stupidity is no excuse.

With the summer boost President Bush's input fully acknowledged herein (further evidence of his disdain and fundamental refusal to engage with science on any level beyond that which sanctions his dangerously narrow "What, Me Worry?" worldview), I humbly add the following to my earlier posts on the topic:

First off, author John Rennie provides some insightful retorts to fifteen key points in the current ID dogma in

Scientific American responds to ID

Give it a read. There will be a test in 2007.

Bringing to the table his mastery of the language (he is, after all, linguistics professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as well as an activist writer), Noam Chomsky reorients the discussion. He suggests we adopt new terminology, proposing the moniker "Malignant Design". Hmmmm, it does explain a good deal, doesn't it? The November 14th Toronto Star article includes the following bon mots:

President George W. Bush favors teaching both evolution and "intelligent design" in schools, "so people can know what the debate is about." To proponents, intelligent design is the notion that the universe is too complex to have developed without a nudge from a higher power than evolution or natural selection. To detractors, intelligent design is creationism -- the literal interpretation of the Book of Genesis -- in a thin guise, or simply vacuous, about as interesting as "I don't understand"...

So far, however, the curriculum has not encompassed one obvious point of view: malignant design. Unlike intelligent design, for which the evidence is zero, malignant design has tons of empirical evidence, much more than Darwinian evolution, by some criteria: the world's cruelty.

Intelligent design raises the question of whether it is intelligent to disregard scientific evidence about matters of supreme importance to the nation and the world -- like global warming. An old-fashioned conservative would believe in the value of Enlightenment ideals -- rationality, critical analysis, freedom of speech, freedom of inquiry -- and would try to adapt them to a modern society.

America's Founding Fathers, children of the Enlightenment, championed those ideals and took pains to create a constitution that espoused religious freedom yet separated church and state.

The United States, despite the occasional messianism of its leaders, isn't a theocracy. In our time, Bush administration hostility to scientific inquiry puts the world at risk. Environmental catastrophe, whether you think the world has been developing only since Genesis or for eons, is far too serious to ignore.

Perhaps only the word "malignant" could describe a failure to acknowledge, much less address, the all-too-scientific issue of climate change. Thus, the "moral clarity" of the Bush administration extends to its cavalier attitude toward the fate of our grandchildren."

(Special thanks to 'Artemis' aka Ashley and to HomeyM for their always generous input.)

Taking my own advice to heart, you'll of course excuse me now while I try to reorient myself to the rather sudden and completely unexpected evolution in my email system.

Are those feathers sprouting on my keyboard, or am I evolving a third eye?

Woe to Those Behind the Eight-Ball of Technology...

Brief post today, cuz I'm fried. I was up until about an hour or so before dawn working -- I used to be able to pull the occasional all-nighter, but that's a thing of the past.

As a youth in my twenties, it was hey -- no sweat! I caught up on sleep later. After hitting 35 or so, the toll was harsher on the ol' bod: still, I miss the magic hours twixt dusk and dawn for creative work, especially after midnight when the phone won't ring and the night stretches in directions one forgot was possible.

Point being, I'm toast this morn.

Sleeping four fitful daylight hours doesn't suffice, and with a long drive to and from the Center for Cartoon Studies ahead of me before and after teaching, I'm dreading the drive home tonight (one word: "cof-fee," which will keep me up upon my return home and further disorient). I'll make it, but I'm prepping for a fall-down all day tomorrow as I pay the piper for working into the wee hours this morn.

Anyhoot, the point is, I opened the Yahoo email this morning on my old steam-powered iMac and -- I can't reply to any email! The beast has altered itself in fundamental and no-longer-functional ways. What the -- ??

Overnight, Yahoo has magically "upgraded" the email reply function in such a manner that all sorts of ginchy bells and whistles now appear in a colorful bar atop the reply window -- two of which the little 'warning' boxes on my screen alert me to this iMac's inability to load -- and I can't write a reply to anyone! Nada! Nothing is working as it had for years until 9 AM this morning! YYYYYYyyyyyyyyaaaaaaaaaaaaaggghhhhhhhh!

A "heads up" notice or instructional email or just a fucking option to engage or disengage would be nice, but nooooooooo, computer geeks never ever think that way. A choice would have been nice.

I loathe "upgrades," particularly unannounced ones on my low-tech, functional old 'puter. They always require hours and sometimes days of additional labor and time I haven't got to pour into this box, all to arrive at roughly the place I was comfortably at before.

Too exhausted to fuck with such frivolities this morn, my apologies to all I would normally have communicated with by this hour, and ta-ta for now.

The Luddite is leaving the room.

Monday Morning, No Blues...

Ya, I know -- "Speak for yourself, Bissette!" Well, this Monday morn finds me applying the final coats of poly to the massive new computer desktop that'll be installed into my studio this week (with just enough poly left to slap one coat on the wall-mounted floor-to-ceiling shelving unit), and it's warm outside and I'm prepping for tomorrow's CCS class all day, so it's all good from here.

Some links, updates, and news:

Meet David Paleo: If Taboo still existed, he'd be there!

Thanks to an October email out of the blue from Argentina, and a followup from Mark Martin, whose email to me prompted contact with one David Paleo and a little connect-the-dots to the earlier October email I referred to, it's my great pleasure to introduce you to a cartoonist you've likely not heard of -- or much of, unless you're familiar with his appearances in The Comics Journal oversize specials, or saw his work in Satan's Three-Ring Circus. Meet David Paleo, whose art would be a fixture of Taboo were I still editing/co-publishing that verboten anthology. He's the first cartoonist I've seen whose work echoes and expands upon that of my old amigo Rick Grimes, though I've no idea if David has ever seen Grimes's work. David's work has its own distinctive intensity, and an eye for detail closer to the more Basil Wolverton-inspired underground comix maestros of yore, but don't take my word for it. You'll see what I mean if you check out these single-page illustrations:

Niamis

Suaz

Vvovil

Mark also sent me a link to one of David's stories, and it's mesmerizing, hilarious, perverse, and downright anus-puckering in the extreme. WARNING! Be sure you've finished breakfast/lunch/dinner before clicking to this one! You have been cautioned! If you've the belly for it, check out the scatalogical three-page story

"Mengeloid!"

__

Where Oh Where is Horrible Hamilton?

ALERT! ALERT! Aging cartoonist seeking alien artifact from his youth! Does anyone out there know where I can get my hands on a Horrible Hamilton? I would so love to see my old buddy again.

Last night I caught the first fifteen minutes of the new WB show Supernatural, which left me cold and indifferent, despite the bug attacks peppering every closing for a commercial break. Yawn.

Now, I remember when bugs were big, I mean, BIG. And I remember when they invaded the pages of the beloved Sears Christmas Catalog back in '62 or '63, via the unexpected appearance of outsized, green, bug-eyed, blood-veined sac bristling, jaws-agape invertebrate extraterrestrials who presented themselves as -- Hamilton's Invaders!

That Christmas, these objects of compulsive fascination indeed invaded our Christmas, and they were great monster toys. There was no explanation for who or what Hamilton might be, so I assumed he was the main bug, the BIG bug -- Horrible Hamilton -- and here he is, in all his glory:

Horrible Hamilton and his Beetle Battle-buster!

Both insects moved -- Horrible Hamilton by a rotation of that quartet of legs, activated by pulling a string out of his ass, the beetle by a little motor and wheels in his carapace underbelly -- and if you pried their jaws open, they would automatically close upon contact with, say, a plastic soldier, or one of the futuristic army grunts featured with the following:

Weapons of Mass Destruction to Halt Horrible Hamilton's Invaders!

Hamilton's Invaders Helmet!

I had them all -- and as a matter of fact, that final item -- the helmet, still in its (beat up) box -- is in the Henderson State University/HUIE Library collection of my weird shit, in case any of you doubt my wistful memories here. Lea Ann, quick, display the helmet! Better yet, wear it! It may be all that saves you from... Hamilton's Invaders!

I gave up my helmet to the greater good of the Stephen R. Bissette collection at HUIE, but I'd sure love to find a real, semi-live Horrible Hamilton. If anyone has any leads, let me know, please!

These colorful online pix come to you and me courtesy of the marvelous