July 08, 2009

Wednesday Interview: Jeff Lemire

July 08, 2009/ Rachelle Goguen

Ontario-based cartoonist Jeff Lemire is the award-winning creator of the Essex County Trilogy (Tales From the Farm, Ghost Stories and The Country Nurse) and Lost Dogs. Essex County, Lemire's beautiful story about hockey, family, and rural Ontario life, is being collected into a hardcover edition later this year.

Despite his affinity for the Toronto Maple Leafs, Jeff Lemire is one of my favourite comic creators right now. I love his distinctive thick-lined artwork and his ability to create powerful emotions using very quiet storytelling (I have cried real tears while reading his books). Lemire was recently drafted to the big leagues, with an all-new hardcover book, The Nobody, being released by Vertigo today. He will also be writing and drawing a new ongoing series for Vertigo starting in September called Sweet Tooth. I did a little interview with Jeff to find out more.

Can you describe what The Nobody is about in your own words?

The Nobody takes the protagonist from HG Wells' The Invisible Man novel and reimagines him in a modern small fishing village. It's about paranoia and rural clausterphobia and how outsiders are drawn together.

The Essex County trilogy was, I think, an amazing accomplishment. The storytelling was beautiful, and I actually had tears in my eyes when I finished reading the second book. Is The Nobody going to be a major departure from the Essex County series, or do you think there will be elements that readers will recognize from your previous work?

After finishing with Essex County I needed to try something new. Those books were obviously deeply personal, and drew from a lot of my own life. I wanted to do something a bit darker, a bit pulpier and a bit more genre-based. So, in a way The Nobody is almost the flipside of what I was exploring in Essex County. While those books looked at what pulls rural communities together, while The Nobody looks at what can tear them apart. But, having said that it still has the same earmarks and storytelling style of EC.

A lot of your work, including your upcoming Vertigo projects, is set in small towns or rural areas. What is it about these settings that appeals to you?

I just think that 99% of movies and comics are set in New York or a New York-like big city. There are so many others stories to be told, so why not explore smaller town and bring other perspectives to the table. Also, on a visual level open fields are easier to draw than buildings. (kidding)

One of my favourite things about Essex County is how Canadian it is. I know that your upcoming series, Sweet Tooth, is set in America, but it has a Canadian look to it, if that makes sense. How important do you think it is for Canadian creators to tell Canadian stories?

Very important. This is a rich and beautiful country full of diversity and character. I love mining it for my stories. Plus, I write and draw what I see and know. And both Vertigo books are not officially set in Canada, but unofficially they are to me. Sweet Tooth starts off in Nebraska. I chose that because it looks the most like southwestern Ontario.

I am really looking forward to reading your ongoing series, Sweet Tooth. Is this the first time you have told a story in serialized issues?

Yes it is, it was a challenge to try and maintain my style and voice and still cram it into 22 page chunks, but I think I've made the transition successfully.

I am guessing, given where you are from, that you are a Maple Leafs fan. Does that make it hard to get up in the morning?

It makes it very, very hard. But I have hope, because without hope you're just a Senators fan.

July 06, 2009

Yawn For Justice

July 06, 2009/ Dave

When Justice League: Cry For Justice #1 hit the store last week, there was a brief but animated conversation amongst my fellow LBW pals about who should get to review it, since no one wanted the hassle; blame the talky, grating preview that ran in the DC books a few weeks back, and the book’s super-lame sub-title, which sounds like a made-for-TV movie about child abduction starring Joanna Kerns. Being a glutton for punishment, and as someone who’s more than willing to read just about anything with the words “justice” and “league” in the title, I volunteered for the job. After all, this series is written by James Robinson, and features nicely painted art by newcomer Mauro Cascioli (the last few issues of Trials of Shazam), so how bad could it be?

Short answer? Pretty bad. Long answer? Well…

The story goes that Hal Jordan is pissed that the Justice League of America is doing nothing to avenge the deaths of Batman and Martian Manhunter. He argues, perhaps rightly, that Libra and his Secret Society of Super-Villains have gotten away with murder, since no one is actively tracking him down. Superman and the other Leaguers wring their hands and try to calm Hal down, but he’s not having it, so he quits the team that he’s not even really on anymore to go seek sweet, sweet revenge, with old pal Green Arrow in tow. We’re then treated to a series of scenes introducing various other heroes on similar quests. Ray Palmer is mad that Prometheus killed a scientist buddy of his, and he declares to current Atom Ryan Choi that he wants…JUSTICE! But wait, there’s more. Mikaal Tomas, aka the blue alien version of Starman, learns that his ex-boyfriend was accidentally killed during a super-villain showdown with the cops. He storms out of the funeral home, hungry for…JUSTICE! Not enough? All right, then, how about Congorilla? A bunch of his simian pals, along with African superhero Freedom Beast, just got murdered by poachers or something. A situation like this calls for…JUSTICE! I’m not exaggerating here—each of these sequences ends with the hero running off to seek…JUSTICE, whether declared by themselves or the over-enthusiastic narrator. Yep, a literal Cry For Justice. It’s already annoying, and we only meet half the cast in this issue. My guess is it won’t get any less irritating with the introductions of Supergirl, Batwoman, and Freddy Freeman next month.

This comic has a lot of problems. To begin with, it’s a spin-off of a book that is bleeding readers every month, a book that’s locked into a creative tailspin as the happenings in various “event” books dictate who can appear in it, not the writers. This has already led to the high-profile dismissal of writer Dwayne McDuffie, and the announcement of new writer…wait for it…James Robinson. Does this mean that, if Robinson’s Cry For Justice is the book where heroes go out to actively seek…JUSTICE (sorry), that his Justice League of America will be the book for heroes who…I don’t know, sit around watching America’s Next Top Model or something? Back to the point, though--this is an unnecessary tie-in to a book that is in serious trouble. More attention should be paid to fixing what should be one of DC's top titles rather than trying to squeeze even more money out of its dwindling readership.

Which brings me to the larger problem—the faulty premise. What exactly does it mean that they’re going to actively go out and seek…THE J WORD? Are they going to act as judge, jury, and executioner? Probably not, as this is a DC book and not an Ultimate Marvel book or something, which begs the question—what sets it apart? What, exactly, is the big deal that makes this book stand out from the gazillion other super-team books out there? It seems to me that every few years, some writer hits on this as a selling point. “My guys don’t just sit around waiting for the Trouble Alert, they go out and they get the bad guys!” Kurt Busiek and Alan Davis introduced this idea in The Avengers about eight or nine years ago. It lasted for all of one (admittedly cool) issue, but then the book got embroiled in a fifteen-issue Kang epic that represented Busiek’s swan song on the title. More recently, Judd Winick and Tom Raney tried a similar approach in Outsiders. It was a bit more successful, but only because it was revealed that Deathstroke (I think?) was manipulating the team into taking his criminal rivals off the board. Pretty clever for a Judd Winick book, but the jig was up for the premise after that. My point is, no matter how you try to spin it, it's still just another super-team book; there's not enough that's different or exciting about it to justify its existence.

Now, the art in this book is nice enough, in a lifeless, Alex Ross-y kind of way. The real disappointment here is Robinson, who doesn’t seem to have his heart in it. His Starman is an important classic, and is rightly being celebrated in DC’s new omnibus editions, and his Superman work has been enjoyable if not excellent, but a book like this feels like a money job. He’s assembled a very weird assortment of nostalgic favourites, corporate-mandated newbies, and genuine curveballs, and come up with a yawn-inducing premise to bring them all together. At the rate this book moves, by the time the team is assembled and established, its six-issue length will be finished. But I guess by then he’ll be writing the flagship JLA title anyway. Is there no…JUSTICE?

July 04, 2009

John Grows Older, Writes Post

July 04, 2009/ Johnathan

Well, as I mentioned in my review post this week, I am just a little bit older as of this weekend. Specifically, I am have just turned thirty, thus upgrading my status from Advanced Amateur Comic Geek to Determined Professional, Uncaring of Society's Opinion. In celebration, I have looked back upon the comics that were printed with "July 1979" on the front (well aware, my pedantic friends, that most of them came out in April, while I was still peacefully gestating) in order that I might see how the world of sequential art celebrated my birth.

I see a lot of evidence of celebration. For instance:

Daredevil and Captain America went to an air show!

Dr Sivana cocked a snook at Captain Marvel, one of my favourite mad scientists deploying one of my favourite insulting gestures!

Clark Kent got so excited that he broke out in a raging case of Disco Fever:

And Black Lightning was impressed enough to want to get in on the act, no matter who his partner had to be:

Spider-Man took his interest in ripping phone books in two to its logical extension:

While Supergirl treated herself to those five face-lifts that she'd been thinking about:

And this guy got so excited that he shot Hitler!

Some people got a bit excited and sexy over the whole thing, like this friend of Supergirl:

Or Batgirl, getting oddly flirtatious with a bad dude:

Cerberus the Aardvark got a bit of an eyeful:

Hawkman and Hawkgirl showed a pigeon how things were done on Thanagar:

Warlord, meanwhile, just went hog-wild:

Some people got a little inappropriate, like Canada's own Captain Canuck:

Hal Jordan seduced the presumed-dead Guy Gardner's lady friend:

And Boston "Deadman" Brand just plain stepped over the line.

Don't worry, though. Godzilla soon made his stance on sexual harassment clear:

There was, of course, a pretty decent party:

Batman was pretty involved in the whole process, almost from the start:

He had some pretty good ideas, including a jumping castle in the shape of a giant,

Clancy, the famous Hopping Cop,

And a series of acrobats including the Human Target and his pal Snipey,

The Flying Graysons,

And then a little while later, the Flying Grayson.

Other acts included Michael Moore's comic book debut,

Superman watching his parents get married (not as fun as he claimed that it would be),

And a tumbling act!

The highlight of the evening, though, was definitely Wonder Woman, who put together an act involving rope tricks and elephant riding,

Followed by that freakiest of tricks, the beard of bees!

There were presents, too! The JLA, for instance, featured a trip to Nova Scotia, the place where I was busy being born!

Jonah Hex offered some sage advice for my formative years:

Arcade and Professor Ojo didn't quite have the right idea but by gum the thought was there:

And Mr Mind gave me a hint to the end of 52, twenty-eight years early!

Yes, it was a glorious time in comics, thirty years ago. No wonder I'm the super-Nerd that writes before you today. Just in case you want to join in the celebrations, by the way, I'll leave you with a couple of suggested gift ideas:

Vans:

Star Wars vans:

And for the nerd who has everything:

My birthday present to myself, of course, was to do a huge post with hardly any text. Thanks, Johnathan!

Images for this post were culled from Action Comics No. 497, Adventure Comics No. 464,I The Brave and the Bold No.152, Captain America No. 235, Captain Canuck No. 4, Creepy No. 109, Detective Comics No. 484, Eerie No. 102, Flash No. 275, Godzilla No. 24, Green Lantern No. 118, Jonah Hex No. 26, Justice League of America No. 168, Superman No. 337, Uncanny X-Men No. 123, Warlord No. 23, Weird War Tales No. 77, Wonder Woman No. 257, World of Krypton No. 1 and World's Finest No. 257. Also, Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes came out that week, but I couldn't figure out anything good to steal from it, bah.

Okay friends, I go now. Happy my birthday!

July 04, 2009

This Week's Haul: Canada Day Delay

July 04, 2009/ Rachelle Goguen

Batman and Robin #2

Wow. Y'know, normally if someone said "hey, there's going to be a new series where Dick Grayson is Batman and Bruce Wayne's newly introduced ten-year-old son is going to be Robin" most people would say "Great. Call me when Bruce Wayne is back." But then if you add this: "Oh, by the way, it's written by Grant Morrison and drawn by Frank Quitely" that pretty much changes the game completely.

So in a world where I am not bothering to read any of the current Batman titles (actually...I did read Detective last week...and it was awesome), the Morrison/Quitely juggernaut is creating yet another beautiful masterpiece that forces me to pay attention to this World Without Batman nonsense.

So far, this book is meeting every expectation. This issue had a lot of Dick Grayson doubting his ability to be Batman. Alfred gave him a fantastic pep talk that I just loved. And Damian is being a perfect little brat.

Quitely is only drawing one more issue, at least that we know of, but I am confident that the comic will continue to be great. I hope. Because it's awesome.

Toy Story #2

I meant to mention this when the first issue came out, but this is just a delightful comic. It's perfectly written for kids and captures the spirit of the movies and its characters really well. I think there are a ton of great short stories that can be inspired by the Toy Story universe, and a comic book is a perfect place for them.

Captain America Reborn #1

Look sharp, Marvel Universe, because Daddy is coming home!

This was a good comic the same way that Brubaker's entire run on Captain America has been good. Well, great, actually. I was mildly bothered by how much Sharon looked like a teenager, and the fact that she was wearing a halter-jacket (?!) but other than that it was great. And it looks like Captain America's return from death is being explained away using deliciously ludicrous comic book pseudo-science. Hooray!

What I am really looking forward to is The Marvels Project. I love me some WWII-based comics. And some Namor!

Uncanny X-Men

I haven't been reading Dark Avengers, and I haven't been really paying attention to what's going to be crossing over into what over at Marvel. So I was really confused when I was reading this issue. I thought I had missed one somehow. I am kind of sad that some Dodson-drawn issues are being wasted on a storyline that I really don't care about. I did really like Namor's Frank-N-Furter-style entrance, though.

Jonah Hex #45

The second issue of a six-part Jonah Hex story, and I think it's working really well. The nice thing about the longer storyline is that we get to see all of the DC western characters teaming up: Jonah Hex, El Diablo, Bat Lash and Tallulah Black. It's pretty awesome.

Marvel Divas #1

You could describe this as Sex in the City with superheroes, but that would make it sounds really bad. And it isn't! At all! I honestly was not expecting much out of this, but I really, really enjoyed it. The writing was fun, the story was interesting, and the art was great and really suited the story. I look forward to the next issue.

Exiles #4

There was a different art team on this issue, and that kinda made a big difference for me. I was not into the previous art because it had a lot of clothing that looked like this:

But I do really enjoy this fun-spirited series about a rag-tag gang of dimension-hoppers. So I hope we can keep the art a little less distracting.

The Muppet Show #4

Each issue of this series impresses me even more than the last one. I really am just blown away by haw great this comic is. It's funny, it perfectly captures the spirit of The Muppet Show, it has long poems and songs worked into it, the art is fantastic, it's touching, and each issue has a compelling main story. It's crazy how good this comic is.

Tales Designed to Thrizzle HC

I am writing a review of this book for my local weekly paper, and I will post a link to that when it's up. Lemme just say, though, that if you have not read any or all of Tales Designed to Thrizzle you are cheating yourself. This is comedic genius. There is just no other way to describe it. And not only is Michael Kupperman a comedic genius, he is an incredible artist. It's a perfect storm. This book is $24.95, collects the first four issues in FULL COLOUR(!), and looks fantastic on a shelf. You should also follow MKupperman on Twitter. Dude is hillarious.

July 04, 2009

Old Man John Buys Comics

July 04, 2009/ Johnathan

Man, I seem to have lost all of my ability to write, so brevity may be the order of the day. Also lateness, because of that durned Canada Day that we have up here.

Also, I had a birthday party last night. Rachelle gave me the Eric Powell "Smokers of the Marvel Universe" poster (edit: sorry, that should be "the Eric Powell sketchbook and the Chris Schweizer poster"), my old friend Boudreau gave me a ceramic coffee cup that looks like a paper coffee cup and girlfriend Erica got me the entire Annotated Sherlock Holmes! Because she is the best girlfriend ever!

Batman and Robin No. 2

Whew. Good, good. There was no horrific second-issue drop in quality, just the Morrison/Quitely comic fun that most of us love. All of the players are on-stage and acting true-to-character: Dick Grayson is agonizing about maybe not being able to step up as the Bat, Damian is being insufferable and violent, Alfred is making with the heart-to-heart talks and the villains are being extra Morrison-creepy. The GCPD is proving themselves a bit less brain-dead than the rest of Gotham by noticing that Batman and Robin have both lost some size (and more than a few years). My only real beef is that it's occasionally tough to figure out what's happening in some of the more action-packed panels, though the fact that the big fight is between Robin and a set of cojoined triplets probably contributes to this. Eh, no matter - even if I have to squint at a panel now and again this is such a satisfying comic.

Run! No. 3 - This chapter is entitled "Step Three: Betray Your Only Allies" and the Human Flame does not disappoint. Last issue he fell in with a group of super-lamers headed up by General Immortus and including old favourites like Condiment King, Sportsmaster and Mr. Polka Dot and newbies such as Phoney Baloney and Miss Army Knife. He gets taken in, fitted with integral flame throwers and welcomed into the fold. This issue, he does his very best to screw things up. Lots and lots of good villain dialogue, from Condiment King's running stream of battle-puns to Sportsmaster's bravado to Phoney Baloney's generically broken English. I think that at this point the question might be not *whether* the Human Flame dies at the end but *how*.

Strange Eggs Jumps the Shark

I have no idea if this is an ongoing thing or not - I've certainly never heard of it before but there seems to be some sort of basic scenario - a deliveryman named Roger Rodgers gives an egg to two kids and a creature and then something hatches out of it - that a whole slew of comic-making folks play with and subvert. Jhonen Vasquez is present, as well as James Turner.

Okay, now I see. Strange Eggs was an all-ages comic with the above plot that I totally missed out on and now it's being savaged by various folks. So there's the potential for a child to witness the horrific vision of Jhonen Vasquez! Fun! The quality is all over the place here but it's worth it for Turner's contribution, as well as the phrase "Maliki and Llama, Creationist boy detectives".

Chew No. 2 - I like this comic. I like the setup, the main character, the art. Psychic adventures in the service of the FDA, yeah! Plus, the mystery that was introduced in this issue wasn't solved by the end! Hurrah! Actual detecting in a detective comic? Plus occasional acts of cannibalism? Oh my duckies, this could be a good one. Also, this issue reveals that there are three cibopaths in the world: Tony Chu, his partner and a Russian agent who I'll bet a dollar will turn up for a fistfight sooner or later.

Greek Street No. 1

Oh, bleah. I'm going to have to disagree with Grant Morrison on this one. This is not a good comic. Hey, but at least Vertigo's new first issue pricing means that I only paid a dollar to find that out, right?

The idea behind Greek Street seems to be that stories happen over and over and hey, here are some modern retellings of the Greek myths. Now, about half an hour ago you could have gotten me pretty excited with that little summary - heck, I was a Classics minor - but then half an hour ago I hadn't read this thing. It's just so... poorly executed. Oh hey, Cassandra is a crazy Goth chick, yeah! The Furies are a gang who are big on retribution, okay! There goes a guy, sleeping with his mother! Not that I object to a little darkness in my comics, but ramp up to it a bit. Greek myths are full of murder and patri- fratri- matri- and infanticide but on the other hand they aren't generally told seven at a time. Maybe if all of the stories going on here were told individually instead of at the same time I'd like the new sping better.

No, I probably wouldn't, because the dialogue is terrible. Bah!

The Muppet Show No. 4 (of 4) - All done... So sad. Hope that there's more, because this was a great series. Highlight of the issue: Fozzie and Gonzo imitating chickens.

Irredeemable No. 4 - I'm liking this one as much as ever, though I really hope that the eventual revelation re: why the Plutonian went bad is a good one. Going from Superman-clone to these supreme levels of dickishness is going to have to have a pretty good trigger. I think that Waid can step up, probably. We'll see. Anyway, this issue is all about enjoying Qubit, the eccentric genius machine empath cheese lover. He's very enjoyable!

Rex Libris Book 2

This came out last week and I put it on my "longer than twenty pages" pile and promptly forgot to write about it. As a former and hopefully future library worker I love me some Rex Libris, and as a fan of big guys who solve problems with their fists I love him again. And then a third time because James Turner's art is great and unique and uniquely great. I've had a busier-than-usual week and so haven't gotten to finish it, but I'd have bought even if it were just a two-page pamphlet containing the scene where Rex attempts to classify the zombie that is about to attack him. Dammit, I wanted to quote the scene but I am evidently the least-organized man on Earth. Trust me, it's great.

Speaking of James Turner, the next issue of Warlord of Io, that very fun comic was supposed to come out around now but was scuttled by Diamond's brain-enraging new distribution requirements (i.e., they won't distribute anything without a certain number of pre-orders). But! Mr. Turner is planning on bringing out the full Warlord of Io story as a graphic novel some time in the future, and currently has the unreleased issue available online here.

Tales Designed to Thrizzle Volume One

This book works out very well for me, as I somehow missed this series until it hit issue five and hey! this collects issues one through four, in glorious colour! I'm about halfway through and I've already busted a gut at least twice, with one gleeful cry of "with a bitter whore!", if that tells you anything. As my compatriots pointed out at the comic shoppe yesterday, this is probably the best book in a while to give as a gift, for basically anyone with a decent sense of humour.

Far Arden - As I said, I've had a lot to read this week, so Kevin Cannon's new book hasn't even been opened since I bought it. I'm mentioning it anyway, because I read one page in the store and was sold. On this page, a man was eaten by a bear, with the sound effect HUMAN-SIZED BITE! How could I resist? HOW? I'll be reading it this week - let's see if I can muster up the neurons to remember to tell you how it is (I'm guessing that it's going to be great). Update: I read the first chapter this morning and it is great.