#225 Wizards of Oz… and “Toto” too!

L. Frank Baum’s classic children’s story The Wonderful Wizard of Oz was published 109 years ago and still inspires attempts to adapt it to other media. While the 1939 MGM movie tends to define the story in the minds of many, subsequent adaptations do stick closer to the original book than to the movie, including the two we discuss this week: a French version adapted by David Chauvel and Enrique Fernandez (published in English by Image), and Marvel’s recent version, adapted by Eric Shanower and Skottie Young.

Rashad Doucet, a published children’s book author in his own right, joins Tim in comparing the two adaptations, as well as discussing Yuko Osada‘s “Toto: The Wonderful Adventure” and, uh, “sexy Dorothys“.

Kumar’s Link Regurg-a-thon #2!

I like the art of Adam Hughes very much, but this statue is bad:

http://www.comicsalliance.com/2010/03/24/batgirl-statue-adam-hughes/

Not comics, but this seems to be the season for Leiji Matsumoto movies:

CG Captain Harlock — http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2010-03-24/captain-harlock-new-cg-pilot-images-staff-revealed

Live Action Uchu Senkan Yamato (a.k.a. Star Blazers in the US) — http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jExoH_JjMZg

Galaxy Express 999 is one of my all-time favorite manga. Some day we are going to cover it on the podcast, I swear.

When you are not listening to Deconstructing Comics, I highly recommend you check out Gary Groth’s interview with Todd McFarlane from the early days of Image. Hilariously and  predictably, within months of this interview McFarlane began engaging in various business practices which contradicted much of what he states here. He did, however, stand firm by his word that there was no point in him trying to improve as an artist:

http://www.tcj.com/multimedia

Finally, Fantagraphics has a preview up of their new CAPATIN EASY book, one of my all-time favorite newspaper strips:

http://www.fantagraphics.com/index.php?option=com_myblog&show=Captain-Easy-Soldier-of-Fortune-Vol.-1-by-Roy-Crane—Previews-Pre-Order.html&Itemid=113

KS

#224 Our Notes on “Death Note”

A bored, punk-dressing god of death and a genius high school boy are the main characters in Death Note, written by Tsugumi Ohba and drawn by Takeshi Obata. The boy, Light Yagami, receives from the god a notebook with which he can kill people simply by writing their names in it. A plot with many twists and turns ensues. Tim and Kumar review — first without spoilers, and then, 38 minutes in, totally and utterly with spoilers.

#223 Electronic Comics

Comics are increasingly read as bits and bytes, on PCs and handheld devices.

Blank creators Brothers of the Silence are publishing the comic in Flash on their site, and as image files on Facebook and several other sites. “Brothers” Ian LeWinter and Don Richmond talk about creating the comic and promoting it via social media sites.

Dale Wilson of DWAP Productions, making his second appearance on this podcast, discusses the ways his company is getting its traditional paper product out in handheld device formats.

Remember “Yon Kuma”? Tim and Mulele reviewed it a year ago. It’s now called “Bear Beater Bunyan,” and it’s an iPhone app. Artist Jorge Munoz talks about the path he and writer Josh Hechinger followed in making the comic available for handhelds.

“Bear Beater Bunyan” is just one of many comics available from Robotcomics.net. Robot Comics Deputy Director Dave Baxter fills us in on the state of the growing comics market for handhelds and how Robot does what it does.

Finally, Tim and Mulele review some of Robot’s output.

#222 Canadian Web Comics

Tim and Mulele review two Web comics that have little in common besides the nationality of their creators! Amya, a recently-started, manga- an fantasy-influenced comic; and Hark, a Vagrant, featuring contemporary, humorous takes on historical events.

Then Mulele critiques Tim’s recent artwork, and discussion of how to draw facial expressions ensues (view full post to see pictures below).

Continue reading #222 Canadian Web Comics

#221 Johnny Cash: We See a Brightness

Though Asterios Polyp made the point that comics and (written) music are similar, doing a comic about music is not such an easy task. But Reinhard Kleist beautifully presents the music, and life, of a country music legend in Johnny Cash: I See a Darkness, recently released in English. How does it compare with the Cash biopic Walk the Line? Tim and Paul review.

Kumar’s Link Regurg-a-thon #1!

For the past few weeks, every time I stumble across any interesting links in my comics website lurking, I’ve been emailing them on to Tim and Mulele (I’m guessing they don’t visit the same news websites I do). Tim has been encouraging me to post these on the Deconstructing Comics site, but I have been reluctant because I would just be regurgitating links I stole from other people’s lists of links. So, I’ve finally conceded, and in a flagrant abuse of administrative power will post a link to a video completely unrelated to comics in any way, and stolen from Tom Spurgeon’s www.comicsreporter.com

Star Trek Convention 1975. If you love Star Trek in any way, this will take your breath away:

And now for some real links —

Ditko compositions: http://abstractcomics.blogspot.com/2010/02/ditkos-spider-man-part-1-aka-hey-look.html

Balak’s digital comics: http://balak01.deviantart.com/art/about-DIGITAL-COMICS-111966969

The many faces of Lum (Urusei Yatsura): http://www.tcj.com/manga/so-many-lums

Basement collection: http://www.seriejournalen.dk/blogs.asp?blogid=18&id=478#artikel478

More Ditko: http://comicscomicsmag.blogspot.com/2010/01/rom-64.html

Traditional Comics: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YeXCsvUlzSc

KS