Comics commentary – Page 48 – Deconstructing Comics

#371 “Nana”: Don’t hate it because it’s shojo

“What?!” I hear you say. “Deconstructing Comics doing a whole show on a girls’ manga?” Ye of little faith! Have we ever steered you wrong? It may look like nothing but a sappy romance comic, but Ai Yazawa’s Nana features realistic, conflicted characters who deal with romance, infidelity, coming of age, fame, and rock & roll from all angles. It also boasts some fantastic storytelling techniques, so there’s plenty here for comics fans of all stripes to enjoy. Tim and Kory discuss.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS | More

#370 Greeks bearing comics: “Falling for Lionheart” and “Amala’s Blade”

Greek comics creators are taking the English-speaking world by storm! … well, OK, maybe not. But Eugenia in Athens has pointed out there are at least two recent examples of comics by Greeks that have been released by American publishers. This week she talks with Tim about two of them: Falling for Lionheart by Ilias Kyriazis, and Amala’s Blade by Steve Horton and Michael Dialynas.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS | More

#369 “Krazy Kat”: Show me the bricks

Krazy Kat

One of the most highly-regarded English-language strips of all time is George Herriman’s “Krazy Kat,” featuring the odd love/hate triangle of Krazy, Ignatz, and Officer Pupp. Why was Krazy so gender-ambiguous? How did Herriman’s (somewhat mysterious) racial background influence the strip? Tim and Kumar discuss this and much more.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS | More

#368 Sweating the details with “Cursed Pirate Girl”

Waaay back in episode 250, Tim talked to Thomas Negovan about the Kickstarter project for a comic called Cursed Pirate Girl. Negovan was the publisher of the single issues of the series, and was handling media inquiries while the comic’s creator, Jeremy Bastian, put all his time into the comic’s insanely detailed art.

The first three issues are now out in a fancy hardcover from Archaia, and this time Jeremy himself comes on the show to talk to Tim about what’s happened since the successful 2010 Kickstarter project, and what to expect from here.

Plus, Tim and Brandon review the book!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS | More

Urasawa’s classic “Monster” to return to print

By Kory Cerjak

Title: Monster
Author: Naoki Urasawa
Publisher: Viz Media

Naoki Urasawa is one of the most prolific mangaka in Japan and his manga have won two Eisner Awards (specifically “Best US Edition of International Material – Asia” in 2011 and 2013 for 20th Century Boys). The award puts him alongside greats such as Kazuo Koike/Goseki Kojima, Katsuhiro Otomo, Shigeru Mizuki, and Osamu Tezuka. And the accolades for Monster aren’t just from the west. Monster has won the Excellence Prize in the Japan Media Arts Festival in 1997, the Grand Prize of the Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize, and won the General category in the 46th Shogakukan Manga Award. But the manga stands on its own and hardly needs accolades to prove to anyone of how good it is.

Unfortunately, the manga and anime haven’t done any groundbreaking numbers here in the US and the anime’s license has lapsed (which was stated by Viz’s own Charlene Ingram on ANNCast on July 17). Fortunately, rumors of a new HBO series helmed by Pacific Rim and Pan’s Labyrinth director Guillermo del Toro (comic book fans may know him as the director for Blade II and the Hellboy franchise) have kickstarted the Continue reading Urasawa’s classic “Monster” to return to print

Critiquing Comics #049: “Utopiates”

A near-future scenario where contractor-employed soldiers are administered a certain drug before going into battle… Tim and Mulele take on Utopiates by Josh Finney and Kat Rocha. Will they get addicted, or have a bad trip?

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS | More

#367 Cartooning! Or, is it “Comics Drawing”?

It’s a 15-week comics course in 78 pages! Ivan Brunetti’s Cartooning: Philosophy and Practice is about comics creation, but it’s less about technique or how-to than about shoving aside any preconceived notions and looking at the very basic pieces of sequential storytelling – or even boiling down an entire novel into a non-sequential single panel. Tim and his brother Paul use the book as a launching pad for discussing various comics-philosophy ideas, like: is there a difference between a “cartoonist” and a “comics artist”? What can you learn from a “bad” artist? Is it valuable to learn comics creation, or anything else, the old, low-tech way before digging into the modern, digital way?

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS | More

“Happy Ending” fun but often forgettable

By Kory Cerjak

Title: Start With A Happy Ending
Author: Risa Motoyama
Publisher: Digital Manga Publishing

Start With A Happy Ending is a bit of a strange book. It’s put out by Digital Manga Publishing, which obviously publishes almost exclusively digital comics. But I’m pretty glad they put out a physical copy of this book. The comic is written by Risa Motoyama, but I’m unable to find much of any information on her. The website is in Japanese (which I don’t know) and the Google Translate version is, of course, hilarious and not very helpful. From what I can garner, she’s simply a cartoonist and, according to Anime News Network, she’s done no other manga aside from Start With A Happy Ending.

Originally published in Monthly Manga Time Jumbo by Houbunsha, the comic is a series of one-off stories about people who are reincarnated as cats, but only for one week. You Continue reading “Happy Ending” fun but often forgettable

#366 “Paying For It”

Kumar and Dana get together — in the same room! — to discuss Paying For It, Chester Brown’s chronicle of his decision to punt “love relationships” and hire, er, escorts instead. What does the book have to say about relationships? Is love simply a social construct? Is Brown persuasive in his arguments for decriminalizing prostitution?

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS | More

#365 Expanding Comics’ Audience pt 4: Digital

Sales of digital comics have grown by leaps and bounds the past couple of years. Interestingly, this hasn’t hurt sales of paper comics, and may even have helped it. But is buying these comics really “buying” them? What considerations go into the pricing of them? What other issues, such as digital rights, still remain to be sorted out? Tim talks with cartoonist and writer Shaenon Garrity about all this and more.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS | More