COOL SHIT 7-18-13

BROTHER LONO #2:  I can’t tell you how awesome it is to be back in Lono’s world.  After the events at the end of 100 BULLETS, he is most definitely a changed man.  In this issue, we learn how he wound up at the mission, but more importantly, we learn how he handles himself these days in the face of violence.  For a guy who used to be an absolute lunatic, he has learned to rein himself in.  He gets a gun shoved in his face in one scene, and all he can say, very quietly and calmly, is “sorry.”  But it is clearly not easy for him.  Eduardo Risso is very good at showing the wavering, flowing violence just crawling beneath Lono’s skin.  There is no way Brian Azzarello is going to let him make it to the end of this mini-series without cracking some skulls.  I can’t wait to see where this is going!

ARSENIC LULLABY:  THE BIG STALL:  Not too long ago, writer and artist Douglas Paszkiewicz was ready to just give up on his long-running indie book, THE ARSENIC LULLABY.  And then, someone told him about Kickstarter, so he decided to give it a shot as a last ditch effort to keep the book alive.  I jumped on this motherfucker as soon as I heard about it, and so did a lot of other people.  Now, THE BIG STALL is finally out, and it’s awesome as all hell.  A lot of it is a collection of strips he did for MAD, but they decided they were too harsh for their readership.  And yeah, they were probably right.  Of course, Paszkiewicz is a harsh bastard, as we all know, and it’s perfect for HIS readership.  There are also a few bigger stories in here, like “Baron Von Donut Ruins Xmas” and my personal favorite, “Sympathy for Cthulhu,” in which Cthulhu goes to a newspaper office and tries to figure out a way he could get people to panic in his name.  He goes to great fuckin’ depths to achieve this, some Machiavellian shit, but the funniest part is how mundane his real plan is.  One of my favorite lines is when Cthulhu says, “All the decent ‘joiner’ types get into the KKK or Satan worshipping.  All I get are disgruntled English lit students.”  You’ll also find a lot of WIZARD OF OZ humor, a few Nazi laughs, a few jokes at the expense of tsunami-flattened cities, and a Rabbi who circumcises babies by throwing knives at them.  Only those with a nasty sense of humor need apply.  (And hey!  Look at that!  There’s my name on the Special Thanks page!)

C2E2 2013: THE WILDSTORM PRESENTS CHRONICLES #1: MEETING AMANDA CONNER

I’ll be honest, I’ve not come across much of Amanda Conner’s work.  The extent that I’m familiar with is her work on BEFORE WATCHMEN:  SILK SPECTRE and a small bit that she did for WILDSTORM PRESENTS.  The main reason I wanted to meet her was because I was trying to get as many BEFORE WATCHMEN people as I could.

Her line was one of the longer ones I waited in at this convention, and by the time I got to meet her, I could see why.  She’s done some pretty good work with Supergirl and a few other superhero titles.  Not my thing, but I can definitely recognize amazing artwork.

She was incredibly nice and engaging.  She was glad to see my issues of SILK SPECTRE, and as she signed these, I broke out one of my big guns:  a collection called WILDSTORM PRESENTS.  I’d initially bought it because I saw Brian Azzarello’s name on it, but when I found out who else was in it, I was impressed.  Georges Jeanty, Paul Jenkins, Ed Brubaker, Judd Winick, Doug Mahnke, Richard Corben, Jill Thompson, and shocker of all shockers, Patton fuckin’ Oswalt.

Since many of them were going to be at the convention, I thought I’d get as many signatures as I could.

When I set it down in front of Conner, she looked puzzled.  “I’m not in here.”  I reassured her she was, indeed, in there, and pointed out which story.  Then, recognition blazed on her face.  “Oh yeah, I remember this!  I’ve never seen it, though.  Very cool.”  And she signed it for me.

Much to my surprise, this scenario would recur several more times during the convention.

She marveled at it for a while, flipping through the pages, excited to see her some of her work that she hadn’t seen since she put the finishing touches on it and sending it to Wildstorm.  She asked me how long I’d had it, and I said a couple of years.  She said she was wondering if it had just been printed.

I moved on then, because she was sitting next to Jimmy Palmiotti, and I hoped to get him to sign a few things.  Then, as I waited at the back of the incredibly short line, unpacking my things for Palmiotti, I noticed something.  I’d brought TRANSMETROPOLITAN:  I HATE IT HERE because I’d been working on getting all the artists in there to sign it.  I was hoping to get Palmiotti and Tony Harris to join the ranks of Rodney Ramos, John McCrea, Warren Ellis, Eduardo Risso, Tim Bradstreet, Dave Johnson, David Mack, and Cliff Chiang in signing this thing.

In that moment I realized that AMANDA CONNER IS IN THIS BOOK, TOO.  Fuck.  I turned around and saw that Conner’s line was just as long as it had been when I’d first gotten into it.  I just resigned myself to getting back in it when I’d finished up with Palmiotti.

Suffering through that line a second time was a drag, but fuck me for being so stupid.  When I got up to her table again, she laughed, surprised to see me again.  I apologized for being a fool and presented her with her page from the book.  Chuckling, she signed it and said, “Why am I always drawing people on the toilet?”

Why, indeed?

EAR THIS! SPACEMAN IS OKEE. BRAIN BIG. A review of SPACEMAN #1

It all starts with a game of rock, paper, scissors to decide which astronaut will go on a suicide mission to save the greenhouse on Mars. This being a Brian Azzarello joint, the middle finger wins out.



It seems that Azzarello is tired of working the same ol’ noir beat he’s been walking for many years. Of late, he’s been trying different paths. Perhaps it started with his run on HELLBLAZER, but it definitely came to the forefront with taking the reins on the relaunch of WONDER WOMAN. Here, with SPACEMAN, he takes a trip down the SF path with a tale of men created to be able to withstand the environment on Mars and what happened after the mission failed.


The most startling thing about the book is the language. While those in the media and the upper class speak regular English, those on the fringe, like Orson, the spaceman in question, speak a strange, dumbed down version of the language. Even though one can make perfect sense of the words, it’s kind of hard to get into. The rhythm is so off it hurts. In other words, it portrays the fringe perfectly, where everything sucks and there is no hope. It’s almost like a Robert F. Young story, but without the melancholy tone.

No, Orson’s world is too hard for sadness; bitterness reigns over all. One merely needs to read the exchange about the existence of God to see that. When Rico, another of those who live on the fringe, says, “But olee God can make life. So spaceman equals no God,” he is castigated for being mean. Orson takes it like it is: “That’s not mean, Liz. I was created by man—just like God was.”

But this isn’t just Orson’s story. In this grim future, there is a reality show where a couple of celebrities gather a bunch of orphans together and make them compete against each other to see who will be adopted by the famous. One orphan is kidnapped, and Wade and Cass are the police officers assigned to solve the case. But they run into problems when they have to talk with the couple’s lawyer, an angry Moe lookalike who demands that the police are fingerprinted before they get to talk to the couple. The lawyer has a contract of terms and conditions, and the fact that the celebrities can do this is mindboggling. But think about where our reality show culture is headed, and maybe Azzarello’s not that far off. There’s a lot of social commentary in this masterfully told tale of a future gone bad. A future that has not delivered on its promises. A future that hurts.


And as usual, he’s not alone with his vision. It seems like he was made to work with artist Eduardo Risso. They make the perfect team, like Ennis and Dillon. Risso makes the future look dank and dirty, and he makes Orson look like a strange cross between a muscle-bound human and a monkey. Yet there’s still enough to make the world look futuristic in much the same way that 1950’s movies tried, except the darkness shows everything for the filth it really is.


SPACEMAN is going to be around for nine issues, and get this: the first one is only A BUCK. That’s right, one stinkin’ dollar. What do you have to lose? Give it a shot.


SPACEMAN #1
Written by Brian Azzarello
Illustrated by Eduardo Risso
Published by DC Vertigo
25 pages
$1.00