Shiny Beasts is Here!

Alan Moore Fans, Take Heed --

Well, we did it -- Rick Veitch, Alan Moore and I signed the same pieces of paper for the first time since 1999.

The earth did not shift, the sky did not fall, all went well.

But fair warning and high-alert to Alan Moore fans: this is likely to be your one and only chance, ever, to get all three signatures in one book, in one place.

You snooze, you lose. Jump on this opportunity.

To celebrate the release of Rick Veitch's latest trade paperback collection Shiny Beasts, Panel to Panel.net offers a once-in-a-lifetime, exclusive tipped-in bookplate signed by Rick Veitch, along with collaborators Alan Moore and Stephen R. Bissette.

As I've already boasted on this very blog, this new King Hell collection of primo past Rick Veitch treasures features one of Rick's and my key collaborative efforts, "Monkey See," from Epic #2. It's a story I'm still extremely proud of, and hope you'll enjoy. Shiny Beasts also features the one-and-only Epic story Alan Moore ever scripted, "Love Doesn't Last Forever," which also sports a graphic interstellar VD diseased panel ghosted by yours truly (making it yet another Moore/Veitch/Bissette collaborative effort from our personal 'golden age').

Like "Monkey See," "Love Doesn't Last Forever" has been out of print and hence out of reach for most avid Moore fans for almost a quarter-century, and it's well worth picking up the entire collection for this single jewel alone.

But Moore fans will want to jump on this singular signed bookplate most of all. It's no secret that (a) Alan has ceased attending any comics conventions or any US event whatsoever since the late 1980s, and (b) Alan chooses not to have any relations with yours truly, making a joint signing venture ever again in this lifetime highly unlikely (the last publicly-available signing was for Tim Underwood's hardcover limited edition of Stanley Wiater's and my own Comic Book Rebels, almost 15 years ago -- long out of print and out of circulation; FYI, the last co-signing of the three of us was for the contract necessary to the somber 1999 division of the '1963' characters and concepts as a legally-shared property).

Thus, PaneltoPanel is offering something exquisitely singular and rare here -- and quantities are extremely limited (there's only about 80 signature plates), so really, don't wait a moment to order. This may be your only window of opportunity.

Of course, all of this is gravy, really. Shiny Beasts is a collection well worth owning in any case, offering a one-stop overview of all of Rick Veitch's color comics work prior to his leap into the graphic novel form with the serialized Epic sf-adventure epic Abraxas and the Earthman (also recently collected by King Hell in a single volume, and essential reading). Actually, the Shiny Beasts body of work is sandwiched between Rick's first two graphic novels -- our collaborative effort on the Heavy Metal/Simon & Schuster movie adaptation graphic novel 1941: The Illustrated Story (1979) and Rick's Abraxas and the Earthman -- Rick really is one of the unsung pioneers of the graphic novel form, plunging into the expansive format a mere year or two after Will Eisner codified it with the pioneer A Contract With God (1977/78).

But what the hell, hardsell internet commerce sometimes requires further sweetening of the proverbial pot. All right, potheads, if you need any further coaxing --

order now, and receive free shipping on any other trade paperback collection from Rick Veitch's King Hell Press (here's the list, via this link).

So c'mon, what are you waiting for?

Don't forget to check out PaneltoPanel's other great exclusive bookplates, here; there's some great cartoonists, graphic novels, and rare signatures and bookplates to be found here!

Bryan Talbot's Alice in Sunderland, Rob Walton's Ragmop (among my favorite graphic novels of all time, pictured at left -- and one of the precious few graphic novels that's also hilarious), Michael Zulli's TMNT: Soul's Winter, Mark Martin's Runaway Comics (and the ultra-rare Runaway Comics 2.1), Bob Fingerman's delightful kids'n'zombies opus Recess Pieces, Gene Colan (!!!) signed bookplate for the Doctor Strange vs. Dracula collection, two volumes of Tales of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and more Rick Veitch -- Abraxas and the Earthman and Rick's masterpiece Can't Get No -- are among the choice books and bookplates still available (others are sold out -- so don't miss out on your personal fave while it's in reach).

Now, I get nothing from all this; PaneltoPanel proprietor John Rovnak is indeed an old friend, and former owner of the late, great defunct comic shop Comics Route (the best comic shop Vermont ever had). But I love the fact that John is so engaged with promoting such quality work, and ceaselessly promoting the artists and creators whose work he loves. That's something worth supporting across the board. If we can't get more John Rovnaks in this world, let's all support the John Rovnak we've got -- and if this signature event is what initiates your making PaneltoPanel a primary online source for your comics, so be it.

But most of all, this fine Monday morning, it's important to alert those of you who are mutual fans of Alan, Rick and I to this singular opportunity to snag Shiny Beasts with this rare signed bookplate -- an artifact of happier times, for some comics fans and readers -- and to do so now.

Have a great Monday morning, one and all -- it's a beaut of a morning here in Windsor, VT, and I'm eager to get on with my day.

Bryan Talbot:
Illuminating Underground Roots

A Swamp Thing factoid known to almost all British fans of the series but almost no US fans is that Chester Williams, the benevolent, likeable hippie character Alan Moore introduced to Swamp Thing, was a nod to Bryan Talbot’s most popular 1970s UK underground character, Chester P. Hackenbush. Bryan and I will get into that matter (and the life and legacy of his Chester) in a future interview, but it seemed appropo to use the blog interview format to introduce those of you unfamiliar with Bryan’s pioneering early work and the British underground scene of the ‘70s to both.

I caught Bryan just before he began his April tour of Europe and the US, and we completed this, the third in a series of interviews we’re doing together (the first two were completed for PaneltoPanel.net; see link, below). This intro will serve to introduce all our subsequent interviews, so read on, please, and meet (as best as my own blog can provide a meeting ground) Bryan Talbot.


Spawned -- uh, born February 24th, 1952 in Wigan, Lancashire in England, Bryan Talbot is among his native country’s and the world’s premiere graphic novelists. Bryan in fact created the UK’s first modern graphic novel, The Adventures of Luther Arkwright (launched 1978, first collected into a single volume by Never Ltd. in 1982), an immediate contemporary of Raymond Briggs's celebrated When the Wind Blows.





But that was, in many ways, just a beginning (but not the beginning, as this interview will reveal to those of you who don't know otherwise).

Among Talbot’s other key and notable works are his comic strips (for Manchester Flash, Wired, Vogarth, Imagine, Knockabout, etc.) and contributions to 2000 AD (beginning in 1983, and including artwork for Judge Dredd, Nemesis the Warlock, etc.), Hellblazer, Sandman, Fables, the two-part “Mask” for the Batman series Legends of the Dark Knight, and many others. He collaborated with famed vet American underground comics author and poet Tom Veitch on The Nazz, and with Tom’s younger brother Rick Veitch on the first six issues of Teknophage, from a concept by Neil Gaiman; assuming the writing chores on his next Teknophage collaborative venture, Talbot scripted the six-issue miniseries Phage: Shadowdeath. Talbot’s ‘breakthrough’ graphic novel (for the US market, in any case) was the now-classic The Tale of One Bad Rat (1995), followed by his Luther Arkwright sequel Heart of Empire (1999, which also spawned a CD-Rom created by Talbot and his website maestro James Robertson, released the same year).

His most recent graphic novel is the marvelous Alice in Sunderland (2007), which

Bryan and I talked about at PaneltoPanel.net,

where you can also purchase Alice in Sunderland with an exclusive signed, limited edition bookplate (our second interview, on Bryan’s new book The Naked Artist, will be posted soon).

And that’s just the man’s comics work: Talbot has also illustrated and created covers for numerous comics, books and magazines, worked in advertising, created designs for British Aerospace, collaborated (with sf author Bob Shaw) on “Encounter with a Madman” for Granada TV’s anthology program Celebration (1981), produced concept art for the TV movie Above the World (based on a Ramsey Campbell story, 1994), and oh, so much more.

But it all begins somewhere.

It began for Bryan with an illustration in the Tolkien Society magazine (1969), a weekly comic strip (created with fellow UK cartoonist Bonk) for his college newspaper, and -- most vital of all -- with the British underground comix.

Just as a key component of the American underground comix of the ‘60s and early ‘70s emerged from the countercultural underground newspapers of the day, the British underground comix had their own roots in British underground papers like Oz and International Times (aka IT). Like their American counterparts, these were often rag-tag affairs brimming with radical political screeds, poetry, articles, photo collage, art and comics. The first British underground comic tabloid to emerge from this scene was Cyclops (four issues, 1970), founded by members of the IT staff helmed by Graham Keen, which reprinted choice cuts of the American comix and some new British work. The notorious Nasty Tales (1971-73) followed and was quickly squelched by the authorities and brought to trial; it, too, reprinted US comix along with new work by British cartoonists (Chris Welch, Edward Barker, Malcolm Livingstone). The same was true of the longest running of all British comix, the Cozmic Comics line, which was launched in 1972 (ostensibly as a life-support for Oz magazine) and lasted over twenty titles/issues, showcasing US comix alongside new work by Brian Bolland, Angus McKie, Dave Gibbons, Joe Petagno, Edward Barker, Mike Weller and others.

But even Cozmic Comics met its Waterloo, and by the mid-70s the scene seemed prematurely defunct -- until the arrival of Bryan Talbot and Brainstorm Comix (1975), the first British underground composed of entirely new and all-British creations -- the maturing work of one Bryan Talbot.

Brainstorm Comix was an unabashed psychedelic experience, published by Lee Harris, proprietor of the still-vital Portobello Road headshop Alchemy. Brainstorm Comix #1 also introduced the character of Chester P. Hackenbush -- and, with its third issue, Luther Arkwright, whose adventures proper were launched in Near Myths (reprinted -- in considerably revised and expanded form -- in Psssst! beginning in 1981). Bryan also serialized the adventures of one Frank Fazakerley, Space Ace Of The Future, in Ad Astra (1978) -- but we’re getting ahead of our story.

Let’s talk to Bryan about the underground comix scene overall, and we’ll get to Chester and Luther Arkwright next time around...

SB: When did the cartooning bug first bit you, Bryan?

BRYAN TALBOT: When I was around five years old and an uncle gave me some second-hand collections of the work of British newspaper cartoonist Giles. I couldn't understand the political jokes but I loved the drawings and the wealth of detail in them.

SB: What was your first published work -- and when, in your own mind, did something of yours see print that really had you thinking, "Now I'm on to something..."?

BT: I had a short prose story printed in the school annual when I was about fourteen. My first printed illustrations appeared in The British Tolkein Society magazine, when I was eighteen. I suppose that it was while working on my first underground comics a few years later that I realized that I could perhaps aspire to becoming a professional comic artist but I can't remember a specific moment of revelation.

SB: Between age 18 for you and your first underground creations, what did you do?

BT: A one-year foundation art course followed by a three-year graphic design course.

SB: The British underground scene is a rather murky period to Americans. I recall seeing my first UK undergrounds in a friend's collection, though precious few made it over here. What are you primary memories of how that scene started?

BT: The first UK undergrounds were, on the whole, very influenced by the American ones. In fact the two that lasted for more than an issue or two, Nasty Tales and Cozmic Comics, were filled with reprints of American strips. Both these comics were off-shoots of UK underground publications -- the International Times (IT) newspaper and Oz magazine, respectively. Towards the end of it's run (about eighteen issues) Cozmic Comics started to publish original British material by the likes of Chris Welch and Edward Barker.


SB: Would you care to chart the UK underground in terms of your own development and role therein?

BT: I came in on the tail end of UK undergrounds in 1975 with Brainstorm Comix #1. It had been about two years since the last Cozmic had appeared and the field was empty. Altogether, six issues were produced, mainly of my work but two were anthologies (including work by Hunt Emerson and Chris Welch). At about the same time, Hunt started producing low print run surrealist comics while he worked at the Birmingham Arts Lab. These got more ambitious over the next few years, increasing in size, circulation and contributors.

SB: The American underground expired, really, after the one-two punch of the 1973 Supreme Court Obscenity ruling and the outlawing of head shops, which quickly dismantled the distribution for comix. Arcade was the last, great gasp here. How did the UK underground scene evaporate?

BT: Head shops were never outlawed over here but Brainstorm was pretty well distributed anyway - even to news stands through the distribution company Moore Harness (which used to specialize in T&A mags). In 1978 I stopped doing undergrounds as such and began writing and drawing The Adventures of Luther Arkwright which was serialised in the independent "ground-level" adult SF comic magazine Near Myths. The Arts Lab's comics were never, strictly speaking, underground in that their subject matter wasn't the typical counter culture mix of sex, drugs and rock and roll that is usually associated with the genre. They, themselves, described their comics as "alternative" rather than underground. For example, they published the first UK feminist comic Heroine. They gradually stopped publishing comics at the end of the seventies, after Hunt Emerson left to go freelance. From the mid-seventies, Tony and Carol Bennett had been reprinting Gilbert Shelton's Freak Brothers and,in the early eighties, began Knockabout Comics and have since sporadically published underground and alternative comics and graphic novels, often by Hunt. By the way, my Brainstorm and other underground work was reprinted in one volume a few years ago by Alchemy, its original publisher, and is still in print.

SB: Two variations on the same question, Bryan, if you’ll indulge me. At the time, what was the single most influential British underground comic, story or creator within the scene? And, looking back, 20/20 hindsight, what would you consider today the single most influential comic, story or creator of the 1970s UK underground period?

BT: I don't think that I can really answer this as I think that the answer's Arkwright and myself! The UK underground scene was quite small compared to the US one. Both Dave Gibbons and Brian Bolland started in the Brit underground but I can't really say that their work there was very influential. Whereas, Arkwright had many readers who went on to become comic pros who've affirmed the influence that Arkwright had on them, including Garth Ennis, Warren Ellis -- and even Rick Veitch, Michael Zulli -- and yourself! The 1980s Italian edition of Arkwright was also very influencial, I gather, influencing a generation of young Italian SF writers.

SB: That’s true, your Arkwright work was a real influence on me -- we’ll get into that later, promise, in the Arkwright interview!

So, there’s a sort of limbo between the demise of the underground and the rise of 2000 A.D. and what Americans experienced stateside as the British Invasion, if you will, of the late 1970s and early ‘80s. That began with the import and US collections of Judge Dredd, particularly Brian Bolland's tenure on that character, and John Bolton’s new Marvel work and, in 1983, Alan Moore’s taking over the scripting of Saga of the Swamp Thing. All we saw, here, on our own newsstands were works like So Beautiful, So Dangerous serialized in Heavy Metal; horror fans, like myself, also savored the monster magazines -- Bolton, David Lloyd, etc. in Halls of/House of Hammer, which got some US distribution, Dave Gibbons popping up in The Monster Times -- and attentive comics readers caught the eruption of Warrior, which is strictly an import here. We missed Action completely, mind you, and most missed the coming of 2000 A.D. until the Titan trade paperback collections were imported.

You remained active throughout this transitional period; there were the music zines, which few saw here, and you poured yourself into Luther Arkwright, which was at last collected in book form in 1981. Could you chat about this post-underground, pre-British Invasion period, Bryan? What was it like over there, as a creator and a reader? And what, specifically, was it like for you?

BT: I was actually making money for the first time! This is the period when I went professional. As well as working on Arkwright, I did a lot of illustration work -- airbrush paintings, rock star pinups etc, as well as the
weekly strip Scumworld in Sounds. It was a pretty exciting time. Pssst!, the experimental precursor of comic magazines such as Heartbreak Hotel, Escape and Deadline was coming out and we were all waiting for Warrior, which was a year or two in preparation and promised -- and delivered -- a lot. Meanwhile, 2000 A.D. was the cutting edge of the adventure comic. I started working for it myself in 1983.

SB: What would you consider your key works from this pre-Luther Arkwright, early career period for you?

BT: The "Chester P. Hackenbush" trilogy in Brainstorm, I suppose -- and Frank Fazakerly, Space Ace of the Future! -- a monthly one page SF spoof strip in Ad Astra magazine (the UK's answer to Omni).

SB: Thanks, Bryan, I really appreciate the time you’ve given us -- let’s chat again, and soon. Good luck and happy trails on your April tour!

Here, again, is the link to our previous interview at PaneltoPanel.net,

where you can also purchase Bryan’s new graphic novel Alice in Sunderland with an exclusive signed, limited edition bookplate;

here’s PaneltoPanel’s complete one-stop shopping selection of Talbot graphic novels currently available in the US. All are well worth owning and revisiting frequently.

Here’s Bryan’s own Alice in Sunderland site home page;

but that’s just the tip of the iceberg!

For more on Bryan’s life, times and comics, check out

James Robertson’s marvelous Official Bryan Talbot Fan Page, which is also your exclusive online source for Bryan and James’s Heart of Empire CD-ROM.

To tap into the remarkable, imaginative realms of Bryan’s seminal Luther Arkwright graphic novel(s), visit this site,

and Bryan’s Luther Arkwright web comic awaits you here.

Bryan selflessly adds,

“Check out this incredible graphic novel by Véronique Tanaka,” and so you should.

This is just the first in a series of upcoming interviews, with all kinds of folks I hope you'll find of interest: cartoonists, writers, filmmakers, jacks-of-all-trades, and many more. So -- more exclusive interviews with other folks in the coming weeks -- keep your eye on this blog, folks!

Have a great Wednesday...

Back From the Grave...

You can't keep a Blog Zombie down!

Well, not for long.

Yep, thanks to the collaborative exchange of info/media/scans between my respective computer gurus Jane Wilde (of Absolute Computing Solutions in Marlboro, VT) and web cartoonist extraordinaire and early founding member of the extended & growing White River Junction/Center for Cartoon Studies cartooning community

Cayetano Garza aka 'Cat,'

thanks to whom my long-under-construction and long-overdue-for-revamping website will at last be up (gulp) this week!

Cat is now my computer guru, and you have him to thank for today's blog being up and running at last. We've got a lot planned, and will be posting info, links, and opening up the long-overdue Bissette website -- keep your eye out here, and all praise Cat! He's been making web comics since 1996, and he's a demigod in this old-timer's book.

That's a lot of back from the grave, eh?

________________

For those of you starving for Bissette comics work, there's a batch of stuff coming up and out -- but for now, suffice to note that Rick Veitch just sent me the first comp copy of his new King Hell anthology Shiny Beasts, which I previewed for ya

here

and here.

The book is gorgeous, and our collaborative Epic effort "Monkey See" never looked better (26 years out of print!), and there's also Rick and Alan Moore's long out-0f-print Epic collaboration to savor, too (including it's revelatory Bissette cosmic-VD panel) and Rick's afterword with vintage photos of his old hippy self (and Totleben and Bissette, in their younger years). A terrific package, if I may say so myself!

Rick dropped by the house last weekend to pick up the oldest Veitch & Bissette "Creative Burnouts" art in my flat files -- including our first ever collaboration, drawn up on our Kubert School drawing boards in September 1976! -- and Rick is planning an upcoming anthology featuring all our collaborative work. But that's later, folks -- Shiny Beasts is out now.

Shiny Beasts is shipping to comic shops pronto, and I'll post more on this blog once I know it's in stores and online. You might want to hold out, though, for buying the book via PaneltoPanel.net, as Rick, Alan Moore and I are currently signing signature sheets for PaneltoPanel's special promo of Shiny Beasts -- more info on that (and sales link) soon!

_________________

This-here blog has been down the entire week of the White River Indie Film festival, which is too bad -- I had scribed and was planning to post a day-by-day diary of the event, and promote the hell out of it.

Alas, bandwidth issues decided otherwise, and WRIF ends this very weekend -- today and tomorrow. My panels and such ended last night (more on that later this week, as time permits).

Still, if you're in the area, as in today and tomorrow,

WRIF's current weekend lineup boasts some of the festival's best films (scroll down to the listings and info for April 28 and 29),

including a zinger Iraq War double-feature of The War Tapes and

Iraq in Fragments (which I wrote up here),

followed by panel discussion; the gender-issue one-two punches of Freeheld and Georgie Girl, likewise followed with lively panel discussion;

Adrian Grenier's Shot in the Dark and his short film Euthanasia (which I blogged about here),

(and the lingering possibility that Grenier himself may show up, live and in person); and more.

Best of tonight's offerings, to my mind, is the African film Bamako, which I reviewed

on this very blog during our screening process (scroll down a bit to that writeup),

though I've no doubt the two most popular films of the fest may prove to be tonight's showings of Brick (reviewed in the same post as Bamako; see link, above) and The Devil and Daniel Johnston, which is one of my son Dan's favorite films.

Sunday's program offers an intense lineup of "First Person" documentaries, including a panel on the genre. There's a lot of intensive scrutiny of abuses of power in these films, too: The Forest for the Trees,

the excellent Strange Culture (which I reviewed here),

the riveting Hand of God, and the 5:15 PM show of Sacrificial Lambs, which I will be introducing, followed by a panel with filmmaker Ed Dooley, Norwich Selectwoman and farmer Suzanne Lupien, the Faillace family, and farmer Doug Flack. Now, that should be a lively session! Tomorrow's program also includes

51 Birch Street

and the evening begins with the marvelous

Absolute Wilson (Bissette review here)

and concludes with the amazing documentary Jesus Camp (my review, and some blistering fundamentalist comments, here; scroll down to the goodies).

Sorry I didn't have this venue available to promote all this past week's wonderful films and events, but c'est la vie. If you can come this weekend, see you there!

_________________________

My ol' pal Mark Martin has been posting some great vintage Mark Martin comics, art and stories on

his blog "Jabberous,"

and that's a perpetual treat.

His latest excavation has yielded a complete MM parody of Harvey Comics's venerable bowler-derbied spook Spooky,

Dooky, who's short-but-sweet adventure begins here. Then click on over to

Dooky's page the second,

Dooky's penultimate panic, and

Dooky's ass-blasting last hurrah (and more)!

Now, tell me that ain't funny. Kudos to you, Mark, and here's hoping for a complete Harvey Comics parody comic from you one day!

Everyone in comics knows about Dan Clowes's Harvey parody in Eightball, but this has been a rich vein of comics satire for ages, and it would be a corker of a book if someone would brave the legal hurdles and put them all together into one fat tome. My old XQB pal and vet Taboo contributor Tom Foxmarnick had cooked up a hilarious satire of Hot Stuff a loooong time ago, which I still fondly remember. Rick Veitch and I once roughed out a Harvey parody of our own (back in 1979) intended for Dr. Wirtham's Comix and Stories which we entitled "Li'l MicroDot," in which our version of Harvey's beloved dot-obsessed li'l girl character was tripping her brains out and finally, in desperation, grabs the phone to call for help, only to space out on -- the little holes in the receiver! As she is mesmerized by this miniature landscape of uniform holes, a clutch of tiny Art Linkletters pop out of them all, screaming "Don't jump, MicroDot! Don't jump out the window!"

Well, it was funny to us in 1979. We never drew it, though, so it remains a layout in one of my sketchbooks, which ain't funny.

____________________

What really ain't funny, and has prompted me at last to turn off the fucking news by yesterday AM, is

the utterly spineless news coverage of President Bush's latest pathological projection of blame -- it's just too infuriating for words -- isn't anyone going to call this latest GOP shell game for what it is?

Bush and Cheney and their corrupt cabal have manipulated their budgets year after year by keeping the genuine cost of the war(s) off the table, and out of their annual budget -- it's at last caught up with them. Is anyone really falling for Bush's bullshit? Cheney, per usual, is even more reprehensible in his rhetoric; I have never, ever so loathed a public figure in my life. The man is evil incarnate; typical of our times, he was keynote speaker at the Brigham Young University graduation recently. Now, there's religious values for you.

I am so aching for any coverage of this current "showdown" to confront the core issue -- the President and Vice President's false budgeting of this war, by persistently not budgeting for these war, by absolutely refusing to budget for these wars -- for what it truly is: the consequences of this President's ongoing strategic shell game.

These two bastards don't give a flying fuck for our troops -- they created this horrorshow, they have abused the military and military families every step of the way (note this week's Pentagon hearings), they created this current standoff by refusing to responsibly budget for and truly wage the war they claim our very lives depend upon, and they are the lowest slime to ever hold the highest office in our country in US history.

Have a great weekend, one and all --

Bryan In Sunderland,
Mantan the Funnyman
& Monday Misc.

[Image copyright 2007 Bryan Talbot]
"Sunderland! Thirteen hundred years ago it was the greatest centre of learning in the whole of Christendom and the very cradle of English consciousness. In the time of Lewis Carroll it was the greatest shipbuilding port in the world. To this city that gave the world the electric light bulb, the stars and stripes, the millennium, the Liberty Ships and the greatest British dragon legend came Carroll in the years preceding his most famous book, Alice in Wonderland, and here are buried the roots of his surreal masterpiece. Enter the famous Edwardian palace of varieties, The Sunderland Empire, for a unique experience: an entertaining and epic meditation on myth, history and storytelling and decide for yourself -— does Sunderland really exist?"

Morning, one and all, and a fine Monday it promises to be, too.

If you're aching to read my blather, there's a healthy weekend worth of posts awaiting you below, including mucho Cine-Ketchup for those so disposed.

Better yet, though, my interview with Bryan Talbot on his new graphic novel Alice in Sunderland is at last

online on PaneltoPanel.net, and Bryan is always worth reading!

Bryan and I are still at it, with more interviews on his recent and upcoming projects underway, which are plentiful. Few Americans are aware of the span and variety of Bryan's incredible body of work -- as cartoonist, writer, etc. -- or that his career dates back to the original British underground comix scene of the early 1970s.

We'll be covering all that and more in upcoming interviews, exclusive to PaneltoPanel.net and this blog.

In any case, be sure to give this initial installment some time today -- and be sure to order your copy of Alice in Sunderland with the signed Bryan Talbot bookplate from PaneltoPanel.net,

available exclusively here.

Tell them I sent you!

But that ain't all.

I'm always reading at least two books, and lately I've been devouring my preordered copy of Michael H. Price's brand-new book Mantan the Funnyman: The Life and Times of Mantan Moreland. I highly recommend this new tome to you, too. Michael H. is an old friend, so I'm a bit prejudiced toward any and all of his projects, mind you, but this is a real honey.

Packaged with an exclusive CD showcasing some incredible Mantan recording rarities from the 1920s to the '60s, hosted by Mike himself, Mantan the Funnyman offers a comprehensive and quite exhaustive overview of the late Mantan Moreland's extraordinary life, times and career -- and whole lot more than that.

Like almost all of Mike's books, this gem is peppered with a banquet of bon mots from Mike's own life and times, offering a multitude of narrative threads: Mantan's, Mike's (growing up in Texas with a jones for all things Mantan & musical), Mantan's daughter Marcella Moreland Young, and interviews and anecdotes from Rudy Ray Moore, Bill Cosby, Moe Howard (Mantan was almost the third stooge after Curly's death!), Aaron Thibeaux 'T-Bone' Walker, Frankie Darro and too many others to name here. There's a wealth of information lovingly culled from four decades in the newspaper biz (Michael H. has been a reporter and journalist since the late '60s) that also embraces the nooks and crannies of minstrel show and vaudeville history, the Southern "chitlin'" and black stage & music circuit, the black film industry of the '20s, '30s and '40s, the various incarnations of Amos 'n' Andy, the Charlie Chan films (which Mantan featured prominently in as Birmingham Brown), the ACLU's campaign against black actors and comedians like Mantan (which derailed the great man's career from the '40s on), and much, much more.

Michael covers so much cultural and subcultural history that the book functions as a crash-course on 20th Century civil rights issues in the entertainment industry as much as biography of its titular subject. Neatly contextualized with its foreword by Gregory Kane and intro by Josh Alan Friedman, launched with Mike (and Marcella)'s views on the savage caricature of Mantan that figured prominently in Spike Lee's akimbo agitprop feature Bamboozled,

Like Mike, I became a Mantan fan for life thanks to a late-night TV broadcast of the Monogram WW2 'walking dead for the Third Reich' opus King of the Zombies (1941). Mantan's character Jefferson 'Jeff' Jackson was, to my young eyes, clearly the most pro-active character in the movie, its true hero: yes, he runs away when common sense prevails in the face of danger (which always seemed utterly pragmatic to me), but it's Jeff who uncovers the menace to civilization (a Nazi scientist cultivating an army of zombies), insists this be dealt with, and, as Mike puts it, "laughs in the face of danger... and gives the white guys plenty of jovial back-talk in protesting his second-class citizenship" (Jeff is the valet of the film's nominal hero played by Dick Purcell). Moreland's playing subverted the film's horror element completely; once the villain succeeds in enlisting Mantan into the ranks of his walking dead (apparently via hypnosis: 1940s zombies were always ambivalent about their status in terms of living or dead), he pushes over the lanky lineup of stiffs with the line, "Move over, boys -- I'm one of the gang, now," which cracked me up enough to prompt my dad to stir from my parent's bedroom and insist I watch my movie quietly -- no laughing out loud.

That proved difficult, but not as difficult as it proved to see more Mantan; I fell for Mantan's brand of comedy that evening, and always kept an eye out for his films thereafter. This was a tough task in the era of succinct TV Guide movie listings, no articles on Mantan, and no internet. Still, I lucked into a few, and was constantly surprised at the unusual (and sadly usually fleeting) Mantan appearances, right on up to his murder-victim cameo in Jack Hill's delirious Spider Baby, or the Maddest Story Ever Told (1964), which I didn't see until the video explosion of the 1980s (and a taped-off-broadcast vhs copy my late amigo Bill Kelley sent me).

FYI, my other fave Mantan movie line that's zombie-specific remains "If there's anything I wouldn't want to be twice, zombies is both of 'em!" Michael H. spices his new book with an abundance of Mantanisms, many imminently quotable, but to quote 'em, you gotta read 'em.

Visit the Midnight Marquee book site and scroll down to order your copy of Mantan the Funnyman now -- it's now in print, I received my copy the last week in February, so don't hesitate!

There's also Michael H. and John Wooley's latest installment in the extraordinary book series Michael launched with the late, great George Turner back in the 1980s, Forgotten Horrors.

The first edition of the first volume, as I recall, was a full-size trade paperback published, oddly enough, by Eclipse Comics, an aberration in the Eclipse lineup to be sure, but a grand and glorious revelation for die-hard horror movie buffs like moi. Micheal H. and George later prepared at least two revised editions, and Michael H. has since considerably expanded, revised and extended that pioneer effort into a series of books with various partners (co-authors and publishers, natch). I've got 'em all in my library, proud to say, though they're still in boxes just now... the move is over, but the unpacking has yet to begin in terms of my library. Sigh.

This latest installment covers the years 1948-49, and I can't wait to see what lost treasures, curios and obscurities Mike and John have brought to light -- and also can't help salivating over what awaits us once they get to the 1950s!

Forgotten Horrors 4: Dreams That Money Can Buy is

likewise on sale at the Midnight Marquee book site, and well worth ordering ASAP.

And that's that this Monday AM, have a great one!

Monday Monkey See, Monkey Do:

Creative Burnouts go Fishing,
Reading Tyrant Aloud to Eli,
Panel to Panel Update,
Trees & Hills,
Blair's Music Blaring,
Mario Bava and More!

Why I Love Mario Bava Fig. 1: The Three Faces of Fear, Indeed!
Intergenerational bonding in Black Sabbath (1963)

A lot of ground to cover this AM, so heeeeeeere goes:
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Colin Tedford, co-founder (with Dan Barlow) of the Vermont/New Hampshire/Massachusetts/New England comics creative collective the Trees & Hills Group, just sent me their February update:

* Tuesday, 2/6: Creator's Group gathering and Comics Schmooze, one after the other in Northampton, MA.

* Saturday, 2/17: Trees & Hills Drawing Social in Keene, NH.

Plus: * Tim Hulsizer is running a comic art auction for charity.
* Keene Free Comics is reviving in honor of TV Turnoff week and calling for submissions no later than 3/18.
* New comics online!
* Brattleboro Commons seeks local political cartoonist (and others - scroll down a few entries for this one & be sure to read the comments).

All this and more awaits you

here, on their site.

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I've been posting a lot of Center for Cartoon Studies student websites of late, but also should keep you abreast of fellow CCSer Blair Sterrett's activities online. Chief among those, archivist of the unusual that Blair is, be his online music posts on WFMU's 365 Days 2007 Project:

His most recent post I know of is 365 Days #27 - General Electric - Go Fly A Kite (mp3s)

365 Days #20 - American Standard - Today We Bought A Home (mp3s)

is, according to Blair, "a mini product musical by American-Standard." It sports artwork by Suzanne Baumann, who Blair met "in person during the small press comic convention last fall. Strangely she recognized me in the crowd from photos of my old radio show... Start off by listening to track 3." BTW, Suzanne's comics website can be found

here; enjoy.

More of Blair's postings as he posts about his posts for us folks.

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This just in from James Kochalka, concerning the ongoing

Fine Toon (here's the link)

Vermont Cartoonists exhibition at the Helen Day Art Gallery in Stowe, VT (catch it twixt now and the end of March, it's a terrific showcase!):

"Eva the Deadbeat interviewed me for her awesome video blog (Stuck in Vermont). She cornered me at Fine Toon: The Art of Vermont Cartoonists opening at the Helen Day Art Center in Stowe Vermont, which was a smashing success:

Here's the YouTube clip!

I like the part where me and Eli are reading a page from Steve Bissette's Tyrant.

I provided most of the music too, except for the theme song at the beginning by Burlington band The Smittens."

Thanks, James, and it was great to see you and your family at the opening night gala!

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BTW, at that gallery exhibition, you'll not only see Kochalka originals (including paintings by the grand fellow) and Tyrant original art, but also originals from Rick Veitch's and my first full-color jam creation, "Monkey See" (from Epic #2, circa 1979).

The double-page spread that sold the story: Bissette & Veitch, 1978-79

But don't go scrambling for back issues of Epic via online auctions: Rick is reprinting "Monkey See," along with all his solo creations from the late '70s and early '80s for zines like Epic, in his latest trade paperback collection Shiny Beasts, currently listed in the April Diamond catalogue.

Rick and I have a long-standing agreement to allow one another to anthologize our collaborative work -- particularly our 'Creative Burnouts' creations from the '70s and early '80s -- and Rick's first up to the plate via his ongoing King Hell Press collections of Veitch's out-of-print creations. Shiny Beasts will also include his long-sought-after Epic collaboration with Alan Moore, a tale of love, sex and interstellar venereal disease that also features an eye-popping panel Rick called me in for. You want alien VD imagery to die for, just call Bissette!

Shiny Beasts collects, for the first time anywhere, Rick's key post-Kubert School years, pre-graphic novel period of development, much of which was executed under the steady editorial guidance of the late, great Archie Goodwin. Though Marvel's Epic magazine was initiated by editor Rick Marschall, it was Archie who helmed that publishing experiment (Marvel's short-lived retort to Heavy Metal's unexpected newsstand success) to fruition, and Rick was in every issue of Epic from its debut (wherein he colored John Buscema's art for a one-shot Silver Surfer story). It was the color spread I've posted above that landed Rick and I our foot-in-the-door at Epic, on the heels of our offering the piece to Heavy Metal's beloved art director John Workman; John wanted it, but as a stand-alone illustration, whereas Rick and I were hoping to sell a story using the painting as a springboard.

Now, I'd worked for editor Rick Marschall doing two stories for the black-and-white Marvel comics zines (including Bizarre Adventures, a sort-of precursor to Epic). Rick Marschall was still in the editorial chair when I showed up in his and (then) assistant editor Ralph Macchio's office waaaaay back in 1978. Rick M. liked the piece and immediately requested Veitch and I expand it into a story. We made a couple of attempts, first proposing a fantasy coming-of-age story concept (with roughs) Rick M. shot down. Back to the drawing board we went, and Veitch and I then concocted "Monkey See," which we jammed on as we did everything at that time, literally passing the pages (and bowls) back and forth until we had pulled something together we liked well enough to put to the brush. Thus, we shared all tasks: the scripting, pencils, inks, and colors, though it was Rick who was the airbrush maestro, pulling everything together with his painstaking use of that venerable commercial art tool. Rick was among the first wave of cartoonists to embrace the airbrush after Richard Corben's seminal early '70s underground and Warren creations, and it indeed opened many doors for Rick (and me: Rick graced a number of my first pro jobs with his airbrush tones) at the time. Rick Marschall accepted our revamp of "Monkey See," but by the time we delivered the job, Rick M. had been unceremoniously booted from his Marvel editorial position and Archie Goodwin was the man in the hotseat.

Archie graciously honored Rick M.'s commitment to publish "Monkey See," and thus was Rick Veitch's run of impressive Epic stories initiated (I only did one other, "Kultz," with co-writer Steve Perry, for Epic #6). Rick learned much from his subsequent efforts under Archie's steady editorial hand, culminating in

his first serialized graphic novel for Epic, Abrasax and the Earthman (now available, with a stunning signed and limited print by Veitch and Al Williamson, at PaneltoPanel.net!)

It's all those extraordinary Epic self-standing stories (and more!) that comprise Shiny Beasts; not to be missed!

I'll be posting Shiny Beasts preorder info, and more on "Monkey See" (including a peek at a few more pages) here later in February. Given Rick's ongoing solid relations with PaneltoPanel.net, I'd personally recommend waiting to preorder via PaneltoPanel -- there will no doubt be a limited edition print of some kind to savor! -- and I'll post that link here as soon as P2P guru John Rovnak sends me the specs.

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And speaking of John Rovnak and

PaneltoPanel.net,

I'm deep in work prepping another batch of online reviews for John's site; I'll post those links once the reviews are in John's hands and up for reading (I had two book introductions to get off my desk first, amid the moving and house buying-and-selling and all; as of this past Friday, those deadlines have been met and intros accepted by their respective publishers).

However, that's not the big news. Dig, for a limited time John is promoting his marvelous online comic retail site with the following "catch it while you can!" February promotion:

Join Panel to Panel.Net's comic book subscription service during the month of February, and receive two titles FREE for one year!

Simply order a copy of a PREVIEWS catalog

here,

and then email us back with your desired titles and books. Now you're buying books with Panel to Panel's excellent subscription service; and if your monthly orders are at a minimum $35.00 each month, you'll receive two titles (of your choice) for an entire year absolutely FREE!!

Titles to choose from include:

USAGI YOJIMBO (Dark Horse Comics)
THE SPIRIT (DC Comics)
ARMY @ LOVE (DC/Vertigo)
[Note: This is Rick Veitch's upcoming series, and it looks fantastic from the pencils Rick has shown me.]
GODLAND (Image Comics)
MIGHTY AVENGERS (Marvel Comics)
RUNAWAYS (Marvel Comics)
ELEPHANTMEN (Image Comics)
TALES OF THE TMNT (Mirage Studios)
BRAVE & THE BOLD (DC Comics)
SHONEN JUMP * (Viz Media)
LOVE & ROCKETS (Fantagraphics)

*counts as two titles

Plus, as a subscriber, you'll also receive 10% off all items ordered; and you'll receive the best customer service around, which has kept our subscribers happy for years.

I'm among John's long-time subscribers and customers -- here's my plug, along with one from compadre and fellow cartoonist Mitch Waxman:

"I've been using Panel To Panel's comics subscription service for over a decade and have been overjoyed with every aspect of it: the service, the attention to my interests and needs, and best of all the occasional bringing to my attention something I otherwise wouldn't have known existed. It's my one-stop comics and graphic novel shopping center!" - Stephen R. Bissette (Swamp Thing, Tyrant, Taboo)

"Panel To Panel knows exactly what kind of comics, artists and writers that I like, and makes great suggestions for new ones. They're knowledgeable, approachable and a great comics resource. Panel To Panel's subscription service is invaluable; I get the comics I want, without being overwhelmed in the comic shop (if I can find one near me). Panel To Panel has been sending me a monthly box of goodies for 8 years, making them king of comics convenience years before Netflix or Fresh Direct delivered their first movie or bread stick." - Mitch Waxman (www.weirdass.net)

Give us a try, and make us your online comics resource; We'd love to earn your business.
More information about subscribing with us is available

here!

February is a short month, so don't dawdle! Take advantage of this invite now. There's nothing in this for me, but plenty in it for you. Give John and PaneltoPanel.net a shot; he'll be a resource for my own past and coming work in the comics field for years and years to come.
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Did I say coming work? Why, yes I did.

2007 will be the year of my return to the medium (not the US industry) of comics, and there's much to share -- as and when the time comes. I've been busy, not only scripting but also working my pencil and slinging the inks, thanks entirely to my son Daniel, the folks at CCS, and a few tempting invites from friends.

Keep your eyes on this blog, the announcements will be forthcoming as winter gives way to spring!
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Why I Love Bava Fig. 2: The spectral Melissa at the window in Operazione Paura/ Kill, Baby, Kill!/Curse of the Living Dead (1966), a drive-in fave of my teenage years under any title.

Other excitement for 2007 that's got me wound up of late is the coming wave of Mario Bava DVD releases and re-releases, which my long-time amigo Tim Lucas (who happens also to be the Bava biographer of choice and the venerable creator/editor/copublisher of Video Watchdog, with his lovely Oz-collecting wife Donna) has been touting of late on blog (links below).

As many of you may know, Mario Bava's films were absolutely central to my own growing up. I savored some long discussion board debates about Bava's films on the old Swamp boards (in The Kingdom; alas, all gone and now longer archived online), but you must understand how vital Bava's films were and are to me. I was traumatized as a Catholic youth by Black Sunday; however, Bava's films were forever elusive, often hiding under retitlings and even sans Bava's name in the credits. I thereafter scoured the pages of Castle of Frankenstein and haunted the TV Guide listings, studied the 16mm rental catalogues (in high school, I ran the student film program and snuck Danger: Diabolik onto the programming, much to the outrage of a particular French teacher at Harwood Union High School; at Johnson State College, I booked a then-complete retrospective of Bava's films for the Sunday afternoon "Bentley B-Flicks" matinees) and (once I had my driver's license) the drive-ins and grindhouses for any and all Bava creations.

As I got into underground comics, I became convinced Bava's films were influencing other cartoonists of that generation and my own: consider, for a moment, Richard Corben's color horror comics, which seemed the first overt eruption of Bava's color aesthetic into the medium. I've never had that particular conversation with Corben, but I'm willing to bet Bava was as formative an influence on his Kansas City upbringing as Bava was on my backwoods Vermont adolescence and teenage years.

It was our mutual obsessive devotion and love for Bava's films that brought Tim Lucas and I together, via a letter I mailed to Fangoria in response to their publication of Tim's first article on Bava, and we've been friends ever since. It's sometimes hard to believe that almost every single film Bava made has been released on DVD, but there's more to come, and soon!

Why I love Bava Fig. 3: Another indelible gothic image from Kill, Baby, Kill!

First up, there's the coming

Dark Sky DVD release of a digitally-remastered and restored edition of Bava's Operazione Paura/Kill, Baby, Kill!

Tim's got my appetite up, and given Dark Sky's track record to date (I have nearly all their genre releases on my shelves, and in my head) and the promise of David Gregory's bonus feature, visiting all the key locations Bava used for his gothic gem, this promises to be the definitive release (at last!) of this minor masterpiece.

But there's more!

In his February 3rd post on the Video Watchblog, Tim reveals what's in store in Anchor Bay's upcoming boxed set Mario Bava Collection Volume 1,

and you'll have to excuse me, but I think I just came in my pants. This boxed set provides the best intro to Bava's work to date, and for the uninitiated among you, this is the investment to go for.

Jeez, I better go change my shorts.

_______________

Have a great week!

I don't know if I'll be able to post daily this week, as it's a busy one for me: I'm speaking to two classes at Brattleboro's Center for Digital Art tomorrow, so I'll be on the road early. My daughter Maia is coming up to visit this week (and work on our comic project together; her bro' Dan has already completed his jam with his Pop, namely yours truly) and we have two guest artists at CCS this week --

Tom Hart

and

Leela Corman

-- which will keep us all preoccupied and happy.

Still, I'll be popping up here, too, as time permits.