You’re trapped on the moon and you believe that everyone on Earth is dead. Who’d have believed that was the setup for a gag manga? Cho Seok pulls it off in style with Moon You, a hilarious comic that also has heart and some tension, and, yes, a few missteps as well. Tim and Mulele discuss.
Also, what our Patrons said when we asked them what type of podcast content – critiques? superhero movie review? comics industry talk? – we’re the best at presenting.
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Considering how much Mulele talked up Katsuhiro Otomo’s Akira back in the early days of the podcast, it’s strange that it’s taken us more than 14 years to actually discuss it here. Perhaps because the story sounded heavy and off-putting to Tim — but is that a fair assessment? On the other hand, as great as it is, is it Otomo’s best work? This week Tim, Mulele, Chris, and Oscar discuss this classic manga.
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Uzumaki is a 1998 horror manga by Junji Ito, unique in its capacity to make the reader simultaneously laugh out loud at its audacity and feel profoundly disturbed. In this episode, Kumar and Dana recount some of the more bizarre stories in this book, and answer the question, “Is it a compelling read?”
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This week, Emmet, Patrick, Tim, and Chuck Coletta talk about their favorite comics of the past decade! If you’re looking for good comics that you might have missed from the 2010s — from superhero to comedy, historical to horror — we’ll give you plenty of titles to look up!
(All titles below are linked to Amazon – to help support the show, pick up any titles you’re interested in through these links!)
EMMET
Finder: Talisman HC
Love In Vain: Robert Johnson 1911-1938, The Graphic Novel
I Love This Part: Hardcover Edition
My Favorite Thing Is Monsters
Delicious in Dungeon
Gast
Giant Days
Providence
Immortal Hulk
Julio’s Day
Orc Stain Volume 1
Sally Heathcote, Suffragette
The Abaddon
The Experts
Surface Tension
Special Exits
SNARKED: Forks and Hope
Peter Cannon: Thunderbolt
Henni
PATRICK
Batman: The Jiro Kuwata Batmanga
Four Color Fear: Forgotten Horror Comics Of The 1950s
Rover Red Charlie
Dungeon Quest: Book One
The Bulletproof Coffin
My Favorite Thing is Monsters by Emil Ferris
Fatale
Southern Bastards
Richard Stark’s Parker
Hawkeye
Moon Knight
Madman In Your Face 3D Special
Hark! A Vagrant
H.P. Lovecraft’s The Hound and Other Stories
Providence by Alan Moore & Jacen Burrows
Rachel Rising
Afterlife with Archie
Harrow County
Frontier
TIM AND CHUCK
Gotham Academy by Becky Cloonan and Karl Kerschl
Daredevil
Scooby-Doo Team-Up
Saga
Life With Archie: The Married Life
Paper Girls
Seconds
The Superior Spider-Man
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For more than 40 years, Rumiko Takahashi has been one of Japan’s premiere manga creators. Many of her titles center around “yokai” – Japanese ghosts and monsters. While some are specifically modeled after mythical beings well-known to Japanese, some are original creations. Patrick I-W has been looking into Takahashi’s monsters for one of his comics-themed presentations, and he fills us in on his findings in this episode.
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Horror writer H.P. Lovecraft understood that it was more upsetting to let the reader imagine the horrific thing, than to actually show it. So, can one really do Lovecraft in comics effectively?
In volume 1 of his comics adaptation of Lovecraft’s H.P. Lovecraft’s At the Mountains of Madness Volume 1 (Manga)
Plugs
Kumar’s novel: Tanuja Ramachandran: Hunter-Seeker
Emmet’s short comics story: Something Wicked 2019
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This week, Critiquing Comics favorite Kristin Tipping talks about the background to Evil Witch Allie and A Book for Sad Pets. Why did her art style change on Evil Witch Allie, and why did volume two seem more confident than volume one? Why is the tone of A Book for Sad Pets so desperate? Plus, her experience in going to school to make comics, and more.
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In the manga world. Katsuhiro Otomo’s Akira has Watchmen-like status. But, as with Alan Moore, the work that caused a sensation overshadows the creator’s excellent previous work. In this case, that’s Domu: A Child’s Dream, originally published in Japanese in 1980-81, and (criminally) out of print in English for nearly two decades now. In this episode, Alberto Melendez (co-creator of the recently-critiqued AntFarm) joins Tim to discuss this forgotten gem.
Review by Seth T. Hanhe on goodokbad.com
Review by Evan Krell on anigamers.com
Read Domu on super-cheesy site Kissmanga (site no longer exists 4/17/24)
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Pro basketballer Johnny O’Bryant has long been a fan of manga. But he wanted to see manga-type stories showing people of other races, with characters he could more closely identify with. So he created comics publisher Noir Caesar and hired creators to make his vision happen. Tim and Mulele talk with Johnny about balancing his two careers, his story ideas, and what’s coming next. Then, we read some of the comics and find out what the fuss is about.
See the Primus 7 video trailer
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This time we look at the second anthology from Tokyo Collective, called Monogatari. The title is Japanese for “story” and is made up of words meaning “thing” and “talk about,” and the stories in this book do indeed talk about things — things that are found in Tokyo. We discuss our favorites, and others that we found less compelling.
Also: Are America’s Big Two comics companies headed for a cliff? We look at recent articles by Matt McGloin on Marvel and DC‘s business woes, and consider what it might mean if the Big Two went under.
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