The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1040: Wednesday Comics #12, September 23, 2009

Alright, alright, let's wrap this up!

My votes for the best three features in this series are "Metamorpho," "Supergirl," and "Hawkman." Not how I would have seen things turning out when I started the series. Each does something cool or different with the format. "Metamorpho," much like its protagonist, shifts and melts and fits into the tabloid-sized page in a number of different ways. There are traditional panel arrangements followed by a two-page table of elements-as-dialogue/maze that really pushes what one is able to do, visually at least, with this kind of space. The story was okay - clever, but not really that entertaining.

"Supergirl," on the other hand, uses a very traditional technical structure, but tells a story that is just charming. It's nicely-plotted, something interesting happens in every segment - I think what I want to say about it is that it suits the medium of its publication - the newspaper strip. It wasn't trying to be deep and philosophical. It was trying to be entertaining Saturday morning breakfast comics. And it succeeds.

I have to admit that "Hawkman" was not one of the strips I'd have said I'd enjoy - he's never been my favourite character. But in this iteration, told by Kyle Baker, he's much more interesting. Add to this that somehow in the space of these 12 pages, Baker manages to tell us two really awesome, really short, superhero stories disguised as one story. It really is pretty great.

And we're done with Wednesday Comics. Not my favourite series that I've read, but overall pretty cool.

Tomorrow. Oh, tomorrow.

We'll start with early Image stuff. Oh yes.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1039: Wednesday Comics #11, September 16, 2009

Climax achieved! (Not that way - get yer mind out of the gutter!)

All that remains for each story is a brief moment of crisis, and then a denouement. I'll be in a better position to comment on the narratives tomorrow, I think, as I'll finally have all the pieces I need to see them fully. There are definitely strips that got it right, "it" being that feeling of the newspaper comic supplement strip, but there are others that were more 12-page comic stories published as 12 separate pages. There's a difference, I think.

One strip that I'm actually consistently entertained by, and that I've overlooked thus far, is Kyle Baker's "Hawkman." It's good, solid, adventure, full of terrorists, aliens, dinosaurs, and superheroes, and is actually a very interesting look at the superhero in crisis management - (SPOILER) the plane that Hawkman is rescuing crashes on an island populated by ferocious dinosaurs, and his harness is destroyed. And there's no help coming. We get to see what kind of a hero Hawkman actually is, I think. He's brutal, often to the point of savagery, and in that way resembles at his best that other famed comic book superhero survivalist, Wolverine.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1038: Wednesday Comics #10, September 9, 2009

I've figured out the perfect analogy for reading Wednesday Comics. It's like when we had really slow dial-up Internet, and you'd have to wait 20 minutes for a single image to load. You saw the image in little tiny increments, which in a lot of ways took away from the image in its entirety when it loaded. Sometimes the power of a work of art is in its immediacy.

There's another problem I've encountered, and it's one that regular newspaper comics wouldn't necessarily run into. As the series was set up as a limited run, with a finite number of issues, each creative team was aware of how many pages they had, and when the story had to end. As a result, every story in this series is hitting its climax right now. It's hard to maintain that level of emotional investment for all of the stories, and this inevitably leads to a lack of emotional investment in any of them.

And yet, I still think I like the series. Perhaps its the characters they've chosen, or just the sheer size of the art. There's something quite wonderful about Wednesday Comics, even though, as a collection of stories, I just don't think it's working that well.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1037: Wednesday Comics #9, September 2, 2009

Sort of continuing on from my post yesterday, we're seeing each story hit its high point, its climax. I teach a very simple way of understanding narrative to my classes, called "Freytag's Pyramid." It's a very basic tool for thinking through narrative, but quite effective. These newspaper strip styled comics are adhering to the pyramid quite nicely. These climactic moments are presented in a nice array of styles, from Superman's figuring out of his dilemma to the Flash's maddening skipping through time and dimensions. The climax is the highest emotional point in a story. So how is it that a story told in single pages across 12 weeks can have such a thing? Is there not something to the sense of immediacy a climax has when one is reading a novel or a short story? What if you had to read the story in chunks of predetermined length? Would that affect your enjoyment of the climax when you reached it?

I think I might be talking nonsense today. But that's fine - I've given the ol' brain a few weeks off.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1036: Wednesday Comics #8, August 26, 2009

I've been trying to figure out why it is that I just don't have a lot to say about this series. It could be that it's because I'm blogging and reading it at a very busy time - some days, I'll admit, I just don't want to write anything about the comic I'm doing. But I feel like there's been an unusual preponderance of posts for Wednesday Comics that I haven't felt like writing.

But what I think it might actually be is the format itself. A single page of a story isn't really that much to talk about. I could perhaps go on about the art, but, if we're to be honest, the art is the side of comics that I know the least about. Narrative is kind of my jam. And while the pages are pushing their respective stories ahead, each story is so short that these page-by-page installments might actually be too short to offer much insight into their respective plots. Perhaps we need just slightly more information. This might be why Ben Caldwell's "Wonder Woman" works relatively well, despite my earlier misgivings, because it manages to include so very much on one page. There's an arc to the chunk of narrative that's presented in that strip.

Perhaps. Whatever it is, I'll finish out the series, but I'm not really getting too much out of it. I'm tempted to re-read the stories in completion to see if I appreciate it more. I'll let you know how that turns out.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1035: Wednesday Comics #7, August 19, 2009

So let's do the back end of Wednesday Comics.

I seem to recall when I picked this up, it was purely out of excitement over Neil Gaiman and Mike Allred's collaboration on "Metamorpho." I've always been partial to the character, as he for some reason holds a similar resonance as the Doom Patrol, though I don't know that their adventures are really anything like one another. It's just an odd association, I guess. And while it is a pretty good strip, I have to say that the "Deadman" and "Superman" strips are knocking it out of the park. Particularly "Deadman." I've mentioned before, but it's got that DC Animated U look to it, but it's so much more visceral. Quite an interesting combination, and is making for excellent "newspaper" comics.

I'm kind of into the "Kamandi" strip as well - it's set up like a Prince Valiant-style comic, where the characters don't speak in speech bubbles, but in the text boxes that accompany each panel. It's not my favourite style of comics, but it works quite nicely in this pastiche of the old adventure strips.

To be continued.

The Earth-H Files - Spider-Man "The Champ"

From Omega the Unknown v.1 #7, March 1977

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1034: The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl v.2 #27, February 2018

I was going to read DC's Christmas with the Superheroes today, but instead of a Christmas comic, I'm going to read a comic I got for Christmas.

Have I mentioned how much I love Squirrel Girl? Hands down one of the greatest superhero comics ever. So I was super-stoked to have this be the first thing I opened up this morning, while waiting for my son to get up (19-year old's aren't quite as enthusiastic about Christmas as their parents are!). It put a smile on my face and warmth in my heart. It truly is a great comic.

And much as I love it, I can't really find a lot to say about it. Though it's not a Christmas comic, it embodies so much about how I feel about Christmas. And not just this issue, but the series as a whole. Squirrel Girl wants to help people. She forgives, she befriends. She hopes. And isn't that what it's all about?

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1033: Generation X Holiday Special #1, February 1998

I was chatting with my wife about Christmas music the other day, about the pre-fab feeling I get from it all - it's very rare that I find a Christmas song that I actually feel is being genuine. Unfortunately, the same goes for Christmas comics. I was reading up on the Community Christmas episode "Abed's Uncontrollable Christmas" today, one of my favourite televised specials. One of the critics quoted in the Wikipedia article notes that it works as a Christmas special because it remember something about this holiday that so many specials don't: this is a very personal holiday. Because it's so pervasive in Western culture, but because Christianity is rapidly ceasing to be, Christmas has become an almost secular holiday. This doesn't mean that it is shorn of it's Christian meaning, but in a lot of ways it means that the very term "Christmas" holds far more meaning than simply that of the birth of Jesus Christ. And that meaning can be very personal. It is for me - it means family and love and friendship and awesome cookies and Christmas specials and Christmas comics.

Speaking of, this one's, unfortunately, a bit disappointing. I love Generation X, and I can't wait to read through it for the project, but this issue is not up to the par the rest of the series elicits. And I think it's because of what I was just talking about - like many Christmas specials, this one tries to have a universal message about what Christmas is all about, but as the holiday is very personal, having a universal message is virtually impossible. The best Christmas comics are the ones where each character is allowed to define the season for themselves, rather than having the season defined and everyone having to get on board. Further, at least when it comes to superhero comics, there's this propensity to use Santa as another superhero, one whose powers are virtually limitless - this, to me, doesn't really work either. Santa's not a superhero - he's something else, an embodiment, perhaps. Of what? Well, that's something we all have to answer for ourselves.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1032: Ambush Bug Stocking Stuffer #1, 1986

Sooo...I'm not a huge fan of Ambush Bug - he's one of those characters who seems tailor-made for my take on superheroes, but something about him just turns me off. I appreciate the breaking of the fourth wall, the completely surreal nature of his existence, even the very, very silly costume. I think what gets me is the lack of narrative progression in anything I've ever read him in. It just seems like one bizarre panel after another, with little to link them together, sometimes. With today's comic, I do feel like there was a lot of context laid down in his mini-series, and much of the humour relied on that context. I liked the zombie dolls storyline, and the hunt for Brother Power was pretty neat and I thought that's what the comic would be about, but it wasn't...well, it sort of was, but not really?

Anyway, it was a Christmas comic that I read today. Then I had a nap.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1031: Adventures of the Outsiders #43, March 1987

I wonder if Charles Dickens knew what he was handing to the world when he composed A Christmas Carol? The story is told and retold so many times, and always, always works. Is it just that we can all relate too much to the closed off person who is reminded of his links to humanity? Grim thought for this time of year, I guess.

This was a strange comic - I'm not sure if what the Outsiders do here is at all ethical - they basically gaslight an old man into confessing secrets he knows about a mobster. It's less physically violent than an old-fashioned superheroic brawl, but it's also less honest. The team is not, as far as I could tell, doing this to help redeem a man who has spent much of his life covering up crimes but rather to arrest the crime boss he works for. The accountant who serves as the Scrooge stand-in here is incidental in many ways. They get the information they want from him, and then are surprised that, having experienced "3 spirits," the old man confesses his crimes to the police and turns himself in. It's as if the notion of the man redeeming himself never even crossed their minds. All but Halo, who says she feels bad tricking the man this way.

All in all, a strange Christmas story. It calls back to its original for sure, but doesn't quite grasp the same spirit of fellowship that Dickens was, ostensibly, looking for.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1030: Pinky and the Brain Christmas Special #1, January 1996

An admission: the Pinky and the Brain Christmas Special television show is one of the few Christmas specials that makes me cry every time. I love these little mice, and their discovery (well, The Brain's discovery) of the meaning of Christmas gets me every time.

He's not quite as open-minded in today's comic, but that's okay. Sometimes a mouse just has to take over the world.

I'm not certain what it is, but the P&B comics just don't grab me the same way that the television series did. It could be the lack of voice - so much of these characters is bound up in the voices we hear. I can't imagine someone reading this comic who has never heard the TV series - what would the Brain sound like? And Pinky? And his "Narf"s?

Perhaps one day the Brain will find a Christmas plan that doesn't involve infiltrating Santa's workshop. This is twice now it hasn't worked out for him.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1029: Man-Thing v.3 #3, February 1998

So, not quite a Christmas comic, really, but I couldn't resist that cover. Seriously. Man-ta Claus. Santa-Thing. Brilliant.

Can't say much about the story, except to say that I think this series is going to have to go to the top of my list of series to finish. The art and the writing are just wonderful. J.M. DeMatteis is a great writer, and I just haven't read enough of his work. This reads a bit like Rachel Pollack's Doom Patrol, a bit like Moore's Swamp Thing, and a whole lot like Gerber's original run on this title. So cool.

And a bit Christmas-y, I guess.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1028: Extreme Super Christmas Special #1, December 1994

What do I even say about something this ridiculous? Troll has to collect each of the groups mentioned in the song "The Twelve Days of Christmas" before Circe, of mythic fame, turns every man on the planet into a pig. It's typically silly early Image, and early Extreme/Maximum/Awesome Studios stuff - but actually sort of works a little better than most of that stuff because it's refusing to take itself seriously at all. Interestingly, what happens is that you now have a tenor that fits the vehicle, so to speak. The art has always been slightly ridiculous, but the stories have tried to be super serious and gritty. This one isn't. It's the early Image equivalent of yesterday's Archie Christmas special.

And it works really nicely.

The only thing that bothers me these days when I read this old Image stuff, and specifically the Extreme Studios stuff, is thinking about it in terms of the future presented for most of these characters in the recent Prophet series. Knowing how things turn out for Troll in the future makes today's comic a little strange. But not in a bad way.

To be continued.

The Earth-H Files - Spider-Man and "The Twinkie Takers"

From Omega the Unknown v.1 32, May 1976

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1027: Archie Giant Series Magazine #466, January 1978

Look! It's a Seventies Archie Christmas special! Good cheer to all!

Like, literally. Every story in just about every Archie Christmas special that I've ever read ends with a variation on the "Good will/cheer to all" sentiment. There's only one story in here that doesn't end with that sentiment. It just has it in the middle of the story instead.

Don't get me wrong - I actually really love the Christmas stories in Archie comics, especially the old ones. They're sappy and happy and silly, and generally pretty sweet. The gang aren't nearly as catty with one another in the Christmas specials. Which I suppose is kind of what Christmas is all about.

I was talking with my son the other day about why I love Christmas so much. I'm not a religious person (unless you count the religion of Superman, I suppose). For me, Christmas is much more about the Yuletide, that deep part of the Winter, and about keeping family and loved ones close. I think that's the thing I love the most about this season - the good will that tends to permeate the time. Christmas can definitely make me grumpy (especially since marking season precedes it), but those moments of real fellowship that the season sometimes evokes are what makes it all worth it. A quiet or not so quiet gathering with friends. Christmas morning with my wife and son is amazing.

And that's what today's comic is all about: how we feel and express fellowship. Yes, in the Seventies, it's occasionally sexist, or insultingly trying to sound "hip," but in the end it's about loving your fellow humans.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1026: Superman v.2 #165, February 2001

This is one of my favourite Christmas comics. It features Superman, whom I adore, stars what I think is the best line-up of the JLA ever, and has art from Arthur Adams and Ian Churchill, two of my favourite over-the-top superhero artists.

It's also a timely piece of reading, or perhaps would have been last Christmas too. Superman is pondering the decision of the American People to elect Lex Luthor as President. The comparison was brought up numerous times last year after the Orange Man was elected, but it rings a bit false for me. 45 is so obviously a puppet of a much more sinister manipulator, whereas Luthor is actually the brains of his own operation. I think I'd have a hard time saying which is worse, though.

This issue is a "jam" issue, in that each 3-4 page vignette is illustrated by a different artist. It demonstrates quite nicely the way that the Man of Steel can translate through a number of different styles, from Liefeld's early-Image to Wieringo's Manga-meets-Disney. And the issue also highlights an oft-forgotten side of Clark's personality - his sense of humour. Each of the presents he bestows upon the JLA are amusing in a way particular to each member. Except Wonder Woman's, which perhaps betrays Clark's deeper feelings for her than for the others.

Welcome to Christmas at the Giant Box of Comics! To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1025: Ghost Manor #20, September 1974

(We'll start Christmas stuff tomorrow?)

There's a cool little booth at my local flea market called "Snobby's." Thankfully, the proprietor is anything but. I bought a large stack of coverless Archie comics from his a few months back and got some really amazing, really old, stuff that I likely wouldn't have had the chance to read otherwise. And the other day I picked up a "15 Comics for $5" pack at his place. Today's comic was one of the random things in there.

There were actually quite a few old Charlton horror comics, and I'm really looking forward to reading them. This one had some interesting stories, and sort of seemed to be a hybrid of horror and romance. The cover story, for example, is about a couple who purposefully get themselves bitten by a vampire to keep the woman, who is dying of...something, alive. And they get married at the end. And then the story about the man and woman who meet in the wake of a UFO crash ends with him, having known her all of about 6 hours, proposing to her. It's actually really odd. But perhaps that was the schtick for this title, that it was going to attempt to bridge the gap between male and female readership by offering something that, supposedly, appealed to both sexes.

I don't know. It was entertaining.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1024: Wednesday Comics #6, August 12, 2009

Losing my interest in this series, I'm afraid. Though the Superman story continues to be pretty great, as does the Adam Strange strip, the rest aren't really blowing my mind that much. But that's okay - I'm going to take a break for the next little while and start reading Christmas comics - if I can find any that I haven't already read for the project, that is.

I will say that the Deadman strip is actually pretty cool - it's riffing on the DC Animated style (as is Wonder Woman), and it's kind of a cool take on Boston Brand. He's one of those heroes I'm not super familiar with, but whenever he shows up in a comic, I enjoy his sarcasm. Also, should you ever get the chance to read any of Kelley Jones's work on him, do it. Jones is a treasure.

So, tomorrow we'll start with some holiday cheer. I wish I had some Hanukkah comics, or anything else that celebrated the various holidays that happen this time of year. I'm sure there must be some Yuletide ones out there. And, I'm embarrassed to admit, I still don't have all of Grant Morrison's take on the early days of Santa in Klaus. Maybe I'll treat myself to an early present.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1023: Wednesday Comics #5, August 5, 2009

Not quite half way through the series, and I still think the Superman story is the best one. I really quite like the Wonder Woman strip as well, though I think that Ben Caldwell's decision to use tiny, tiny panels in the strip might have been a mistake. Sometimes I have trouble figuring out what's going on.

And that's all the brain I have today. To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1022: Wednesday Comics #4, July 29, 2009

Hopefully you'll forgive the brief reviews this week. Not only am I sick (though getting better), but I'm also deep in marking for the end of term. It leaves me with very little brain power at the end of the day.

Wednesday Comics is a pretty great read, though. What I'm curious about is whether, when it was reprinted, the stories were collected together, or the weekly page-by-page format was kept.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1021: Wednesday Comics #3, July 22, 2009

Apologies. Same situation as yesterday. Even typing hurts.
This comic was pretty cool. The Metamorpho and Superman features are definitely my faves.
To be continued.

The Earth-H Files - Josie and Fruit Pies in "The Unveiling"

From Archie's Girls Betty and Veronica #253, January 1977

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1020: Wednesday Comics #2, July 15, 2009

Really quite sick right now. I thought it was allergies.

I'll say, the "New Frontier" era Green Lantern (and perhaps Flash) stories in this series are excellent. And John Arcudi's take on Superman is really pretty great. The only dark spot is the Titans story, not for its content, but because it was written by disgraced former-editor Eddie Berganza.

Afraid that's all I've got for today. To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1019: Wednesday Comics #1, July 8, 2009

There's something to the tabloid size comic. One of the most beautiful books I own is McSweeney's Quarterly Concern volume 13, the comics issue. The entire dust jacket folds out into a tabloid-sized comic. The size opens up so many possibilities, both for larger reproduction to deliver more awareness of detail, or also for sheer size to be able to pack information into. Wednesday Comics takes advantage of the format in both of these ways. There are stories that are little more than a blown up 3/3 grid, but the amount of reproductive detail is just wonderful. And there are others that pack amazing amounts of art into the space. None of them have sucked me in yet, though I remember being a fan of the "Wonder Woman" story in here. As the series goes on, I feel that the artists were starting to experiment with the medium. Some of Mike Allred's "Metamorpho" pages are wonderful.

I'm curious to see if this series works with a shorter wait between comics. When I teach comics, I sometimes include a section about serialization and the effect it has on storytelling. This series was conceived as a weekly series. I wonder if there are things that will come up and perhaps not work when it's being read on a daily basis.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1018: Ninja High School v.2 #12, June 2000 (Ninja High School Week!)

And so we reach the end of "Ninja High School Week!" This is the last issue of the second volume of the series and, as is rapidly becoming cliche this week, I understood almost nothing. There were characters who had something to do with some of the other characters I've read about this week, and talk of destiny and stuff, but I got little of it. There were, however, a couple of North American-style superheroes in the issue, and it was interesting that, regardless of not knowing the specific characters, I recognized the story they were taking part in. It's the "superhero is taken over by villain and is eventually defeated by younger hero, possibly superhero's protege" story. I find this story to be a way of showing that the younger hero is worthy of taking on the older hero's mantle. Robin must fight a mind-controlled Batman, and in beating him demonstrates he will one day be a worth successor to Batman (which, for the record, he was in the Grant Morrison's Batman and Robin series). And, generally, this involves the younger hero not only demonstrating the skills they've learned from the mentor, but also that certain something that the older hero is somehow lacking, thus demonstrating how the protege will actually surpass the older hero in their embodiment of that hero, and of heroism.

But then, because it's comics, the younger hero almost never gets that opportunity. How long was Dick Grayson Batman? A drop in the bucket in the grand scheme of things. He is still a character that labours in the shadow of his mentor, and perhaps that is what that character requires in order to be that character, that constant ideal to live up to. Without it, why are we drawn to this character?

Sometimes, though, it does happen and it produces something wonderful. When Wally West took over as the Flash, something really great was introduced into the DC universe, a new mythic element, in a way. For my money, West really was always a better Flash than Barry Allen, which is exactly the outcome that that rarely-realized story looks toward. The younger hero surpasses the elder. Or once surpassed, I suppose. I don't really know Wally's status in the DCU these days.

What does this have to do with Ninja High School? Nothing really. I'm not sure the outcome of the superhero story. And I'm not sure where this series continues. Usually on the GCD there's a listing of where the story continues, but there's nothing for this one. I'll have to do a bit of research. In the meantime, tomorrow I'll be starting a daily re-read of DC's really neat experiment Wednesday Comics. I've only read it once, when it first came out, so it'll be interesting to read it in a more sustained way.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1017: Mangazine v.3 #5, November 1999 (Ninja High School Week!)

This anthology series is apparently a number of Antarctic Press comics all bound (and not very well) together, though I'm not 100% sure which issues of each series are included. It was a nice sampler of the AP output, and might have felt a bit more at home in my previous week looking at the publisher, but c'est la vie. From what I can tell, the Ninja High School issue in this collection comes from the second volume of the series that focusses on Ricky Feeple, the younger brother of the first volume's focal character. But, as with most of what I've read this week, I don't know what the heck is going on, or who many of the characters were. The same goes for the other comics reprinted in this issue, though the Warrior Nun story is sort of self-contained, and thus made a bit more sense.

And this is the thing, I think. Dunn and company created their series having been inspired by manga series, and manga series are inevitably not one-off stories, but actually one long story told over the course of a long period of time. Thus Ninja High School almost requires of its reader an investment in the whole series. It's virtually impossible to pick up a single issue and just enjoy it. There's a definite time and place for such storytelling, and I generally love it, but this haphazard way I've attempted to enter the series is just not working.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1016: A Science Affair #1, 1994 (Ninja High School Week!)

It turns out that my scanner does not like foil covers, but here it is anyway.

This comic was weird, but not for the usual (as I'm coming to understand them) reasons that a Ninja High School comic might be weird. Yes, there's all the strangeness that is associated with the title, mixed with the strangeness that is associated with Fred Perry's Gold Digger, but the weirdest thing about it is that there's literally no credits anywhere in the issue. I have no idea who wrote, drew, edited this comic. I know that Antarctic Press published it, but that's about it. I don't come across comics that often that neglect to credit the artists involved, especially from the small press. There's no info on the GCD (actually, this variant didn't even exist there, but I've remedied that), and the only place I could find any credits was a mycomicshop.com which list Fred Perry as both writer and artist. But even lists of Perry's own works don't list this series.

Very odd.

But then, so is the comic. There's a couple of parodies of the Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers in this issue that come into conflict with one another, an evil, magical Elvis impersonator called (one of the best villain names ever) Spellvis, as well as characters from Gold Digger (the main characters) and Ninja High School (secondary characters). I suppose the inclusion of the main cast of GD but not of NHS could support Perry's authorship, but I'd love something a little more concrete. That aside, the comic is fun, like most of the NHS comics I've looked at this week.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1015: Speed Racer featuring Ninja High School #1, August 1993 (Ninja High School Week!)

This comic was just okay. I like the idea of crossing over something like Ninja High School with a property that was obviously an inspiration, but I'm not sure it totally works. And I don't know why. It could be, I suppose, that I'm just not familiar enough with the characters for it all to gel nicely for me, or it could be that there's just too many characters. Or it could be that the comic is just sort of "meh."

It is nice to see the NHS characters in colour, which I've not seen yet. That aside, there's a whole lot of set up (a race in Quagmire that Speed and his team are attending) and not that much development. Is that asking too much in the case of a crossover, though? I'm just thinking back to the recent Crisis on Earth-X Arrowverse crossover, and there really wasn't that much character development. Even the big crossovers, like the original Crisis, feature little or no characterization. Crossovers are more about story than they are about character, and so we get the 2-dimensions of the character, rather than the full three dimensions. Speed is a race car driver, Itchy is a ninja, Asrial is an alien warrior with mech armour. That's really all that's needed here.

I've no idea what the rest of the crossover was like, but I'm sure it continued much like this issue. Perhaps one day I'll find out.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1014: Ninja High Yearbook #3, 1991 (Ninja High School Week!)

Given that this is Ben Dunn's book, I don't know that I've read too much of his actual work.

Today's comic demonstrates something that I think is somewhat unique to Ninja High School, or perhaps to Antarctic Press. This comic is full of submissions from fans of the series telling stories of their favourite characters from the main comic. And it's solicited and published by Antarctic Press. That's a level of fan-interaction I've never seen from a comics publisher before. Imagine Marvel publishing a comic full of fan-drawn and written stories starring the Avengers. Even in our ultra-connected modern day we don't see that kind of interaction, though it certainly would be very easy to do. That Mr. Dunn was open to this speaks volumes of his understanding of the relationship fans can have with a comic. We get very, very attached to characters sometimes. I can't even begin to tell you the number of Doom Patrol scripts I have locked away in my head. So to be able to tell a story about them that is published by the very people who brought you those characters, that's something special.

The stories vary, of course, in quality and tone. Some are quite dramatic, others parodic, and others romantic. Each is created by people who obviously love the characters they're dealing with, and even though the art is of less-than-professional quality sometimes, the stories achieve a level of quality simply by virtue of that love.

Fanfic comics. From adoring fans. In 1991. Neat.

To be continued.

The Earth-H Files - The Thing and "The Ultimate Weapon!"

From The Incredible Hulk v.1 #237, July 1979.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1013: Ninja High School Perfect Memory #1, 1990 (Ninja High School Week!)

Yep, I put the exclamation mark in the post title on purpose. This isn't just "Ninja High School Week." It's "Ninja High School Week!" Just so we're clear.

Comics like today's have had me a bit vexed. Much like the DC Who's Who and Marvel Official Handbook, Perfect Memory is a recap, profile, non-fiction sort of thing that's long on text and short on comics. But as an entry into the series, it actually works absolutely perfectly. There are recaps of the first 19 issues in this comic, which filled me in on exactly who the main cast are, what their relationships are, and a some of their early adventures. I wonder how much of the previous two issues of NHS I've read would make much more sense now?

There's also a cool little comic either by or about Ben Dunn and the process an issue goes through from drawing board to comic store. It's kind of cool, and happening around the same time that Scott McCloud is putting together the first of his definitive looks at the art form.

What I also get from this comic is that Ninja High School is a comic aimed at a very specific demographic. It's for the anime fan, but specifically the anime fan of the late 70s to the late 80s, stuff like Starblazers and Robotech and Battle of the Planets. This is a comic for the people who tracked down what little manga and anime found its way into the comic shops. As such, there's references that I couldn't possibly get, to old anime series and characters that are parodied/homaged. It's fascinating.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1012: Ninja High School v.1 #50, January 1996 (Antarctic Press Week)

Talk about unwittingly saving the best for last. I've read one other issue of Ninja High School for this project, and my assessment was I had no idea what was going on because it was so far into the story. This seems to be a trend with the AP comics this week. Though perhaps that speaks, as I note in the other NHS review, to the long-form narrative more than any particular artistic failings.

That said, I enjoyed the heck out of today's comic. I still wasn't quite sure what was going on, but the numerous short stories in this issue managed to tell tales that were enjoyable in and of themselves, regardless of any context for deeper understanding one might require. I did a bit of research on NHS, and I'm now intrigued by it. Apparently creator Ben Dunn wanted to put as many Manga and Anime-inspired archetypes into the comic as he could. This might partially explain how I was able to enjoy the comic without too much context for the ongoing story - I recognized the archetypes and understood, at least on a very basic level, what their various motivations might be.

So, since I've found something neat that I like in this week of Antarctic Press, I thought we'd continue on a bit, and read all of the Ninja High School-related comics I've got. Usefully, they'll take up most of the next week. I'll see how much background I need to fill in, if any, through the week, but let's see where this cool little comic takes us.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1011: Gold Digger Annual #8, September 2002 (Antarctic Press Week)

I know that there's been a few times that I've said I have no idea what happened in a particular comic. This time was the worst. I'm still not sure who I was supposed to be rooting for, who were the good guys and who the bad, and what was even remotely going on. And that didn't just hold for the main story, but for all of the back up ones that fill out the annual.

I can say the art was really quite good. It definitely seems to have been drawn by someone who was a fan of large-breasted women, but it's the comic industry, so there's that.

That aside, not much to say. It was a comic. I read it.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1010: Genus #22, January 1997 (Antarctic Press Week)

Well, at least, unlike many of the Hentai comics I've read for this project, this cover is only suggestive and thus does not need to be hidden behind a cut.

You can imagine my surprise (though given the cover, why was I surprised?) that, with my morning cup of tea today, I ended up reading about 20 pages of furry porn. I'm a pretty open-minded guy, and this really wouldn't usually be weird, but I think I'm still in the Avengers frame of mind, and so a comic about anthropomorphic animals doing it "human-style" was not quite what I was ready for.

That said, some actually pretty neat little tales in here. Pun. Intended. The only one I had issue with was "Savage Squirrel's Dating Tips!," which was a take on the old "Goofus and Gallant" strips from Highlights magazine. Well, that's what it recalled for me - I'm sure the format is not unique to that children's magazine. Things get a bit rape-y in a couple of the panels, which may have been acceptable and amusing (not really) 20 years ago, but now are simply in poor taste.

Aside from that, the Misty the Mouse strip (it's funny using that word when talking about nudie comics) is pretty great, nicely illustrated and certainly doesn't take itself seriously. I think that's something I very much look for in an erotic comic is one that accepts that the things people do that involve sex are often quite ridiculous. I'm thinking here, of course, of the wonderful XXXenophile series by Phil Foglio, which I'll have to get to reading for this project some time soon. Most of the stories in here are comedic, aside from one serialized story starring a character named The Mink that focusses on genetically-engineered "toys" that are sold into sex slavery. And I think that's what distinguishes this comic from the other adult ones I've read, both for the project and otherwise - there's a desire to delve into not just the titillating side of sexuality, but the dark side as well - a topic that is very much in the popular consciousness at the moment. While celebrating sex and sexuality (though not all kinds), the comic is also offering us the flip side of the equation and reminding us that there is as much potential for pain and damage as there is for fun and friskiness when it comes to sex.

Oh, and there's also a couple of pin-ups that are nicely-rendered.

As the weekend's here, I'll be reading a couple of longer publications from AP, and I might actually wrap things slightly shy of a week so that I can start a new theme week on Monday. Otherwise my OCD tendencies will get the better of me!

To be continued.