Deconstructing Comics Podcast, published every Monday, features comics creator discussion and comics reviews.
The Comics Code, while not much more than a memory today, had a huge effect on the direction of American comics for half a decade. David Hajdu’s book The Ten-Cent Plague looks at the events that led up to the code, following the development of comics — and the protests against them — through the first half of the twentieth century. Why were comics scapegoated for social ills? Tim and Paul discuss the book.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Jake lives near a bog along a lake, and the bog makes him uncomfortable. On Halloween night, he finds a little girl in a witch costume stuck in the bog and he rescues her. Is she really a witch? What’s going on a Jake’s neighbors’ house? Tim and Mulele are reading Evil Witch Allie, by Kristin Tipping, to find out!
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Why read a biography of a fictional comics artist? What if it’s also a history of Singapore — done in a style that apes more than a dozen seminal 20th century comics creators? Tim and Kumar take a look at the awe-inspiring (yet sometimes puzzling) Sonny Liew graphic novel The Art of Charlie Chan Hock Chye.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Peter Bagge is known for the manic comic series “Hate”. But his recent work has gone a different direction: profiling women who made a difference in early 20th century America. Why the change in topic and tone? In this interview, recorded with Koom in a spotlight discussion at Toronto Comicon, Bagge discusses what drew him to making comics bios of Margaret Sanger (Woman Rebel) and Zora Neale Hurston (Fire!!).
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
A couple years back we critiqued the first chapter of a Web comic called The Non-Seen, by John Allie. It’s a slightly creepy story about a mysterious book, and the protagonists are kids. Now chapter two is completed, and we’ve been invited to take a look at it. Is the promise of chapter one paying off? Has he changed anything that we found lacking the first time?
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
At last month’s Toronto Comicon, Koom got a chance to sit down with Gerhard, most famous for drawing backgrounds and environments for (and NOT inking!) Dave Sim’s Cerebus. Koom talks with him about working with Dave Sim and navigating some of Sim’s more controversial moments; the ergonomics of comics creation; working with Grant Morrison on “Smile of the Absent Cat” in Heavy Metal; and more.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Jeff Smith wanted to do a newspaper comic strip, but he couldn’t sell his idea, so he ended up self-publishing it. Bone eventually caught on, and now it has a color edition from GRAPHIX and it might become a movie!
Jeff Smith joins Tim in this episode to talk about how he got started with self-publishing, why he decided to have Grandma Ben raise cows, why Bone became less funny in the later volumes, and more; plus, answers to some lingering questions from our review of his book RASL!
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Completing our look at Irrational Comics’ “PITCH” page, this time Tim and Mulele discuss Michael Norwitz’s “absurdist feminist heroine” Turtle Girl and Andre Mateus’ post-apocalyptic vampire story Wanderer!
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
This week we cross over with Shortbox Showcase, of the Relatively Geeky podcast network! Professor Alan and daughter Emily join Tim to fill us in on their comics-reading and podcast-making background, and then to discuss Power Man and Iron Fist v.1 by David Walker, Sanford Greene, and Flaviano — with digressions into differences between Marvel and DC, how society surely must work in the Marvel Universe, and more!
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Most people don’t equate the ancient city of Kyoto, Japan, with comics, but that happens to be the location of a museum and reading library of comics from Japan and around the world. Tim visited The Kyoto International Manga Museum recently, and this week he discusses it with Kobe-based comics creator Graeme McNee.
Also, a stopoff in Nagoya to chat with Adam Pasion, head of Big Ugly Robot Press, and co-organizer of the Comic Art Tokyo event.
Continue reading #541 Kyoto Manga Museum
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
