Critiquing Comics #025: “Ugli Studios Presents” #1

Ugli Studios Presents” #1 gives us two stories: One about a cat (well, much more than a cat) who supports her “consort”, The Necromancer, in battle — “and my God, that artwork is epic!” — followed by a science fiction story with a twist ending. Tim and Mulele critique.

Critiquing Comics #024: “Dreamkeepers”

Dreamkeepers is an epic teen-furry-fantasy-adventure comic, clearly influenced by anime and/or Disney. Those are both its strong and weak points. Tim and Mulele examine examine volume 1 (and a bit of volume 2) of this tale by David Lillie, Liz Thomas, and David Higgenbotham, and ask the question: how does one differentiate between unwarranted publisher meddling with one’s project, and useful advice that should be heeded? (Available on Graphicly, but the first volume can be read online for free!)

Critiquing Comics #023: “A Little World Made Cunningly”

A Little World Made CunninglyIf you’re looking for something new and different in comics, this week’s critiqued book definitely delivers: Scott D. Finch‘s “A Little World Made Cunningly” explores the author’s “fascination” with Gnosticism. Now, if we only understood it… Tim and Mulele discuss.

This book is available on Graphicly.com!

Critiquing Comics 021: “War Within” and “Zombie Headhunter”

Critiquing Comics returZombie Headhunterns! Along with it, the work of Guy LeMay (“Z-Blade XX”) also returns, as he gives us a look at his more recent work. Listen to find out how Tim and Mulele evaluate “War Within” (written by Marcus Jones) and “Zombie Headhunter” (written by Guy and Tamey LeMay), both released under Guy’s Strong Guy Comics imprint!

#045 “99 Ways” and Character Design

99 WaysEarthFLASHBACK! Discussion of Matt Madden’s 99 Ways to Tell a Story and Tim’s character design process for the Boogie Knights! (Originally published October 16, 2006)

Boogie Knights sketches

The finished page

Critiquing Comics 019: “Black Snow” and “Electric 1937”

Tim and Mulele are back with two comics, submitted for critique by their creators:

I'm Famous/Black SnowMichael Balestreri & Alex Siquig have several comics at blacksnowcomic.com, all of them centering around a group of superheroes. We tap our feet on the non-existent floor, and invoke Chris Schweizer’s “Guide to Spotting Tangents.” (Chris appeared in Deconstructing Comics Episode 157!)

Electric 1937Michael Liggett’s “Electric 1937” is set in a fantastically imaginative alternate reality. The comic just needs to tell us about it a bit sooner.

Critiquing Comics 018: “Windmills”

WindmillsA submission from the Philippines! Josel Nicolas sent us four issues of his Windmills series. While Tim and Mulele have some fairly harsh words for it, at the same time, we can see definite issue-to-issue improvement.

See sample pages of Windmills

Available as an e-book from Amazon or FlipReads.

Josel Nicolas on Tumblr

Critiquing Comics 017: Yang Young-Soon

Yang Young-SoonMulele stumbled across a wacky, partially translated Korean comic. We’re not sure of the title (if it has one), but the creator’s name is Yang Young-Soon. Tim and Mulele discuss.

Critiquing Comics 016: “Sick”

SickWe’ve talked about Gabby Schultz’s (a.k.a. Ken Dahl’s) work before, when we discussed his books “Monsters” and “Welcome to the Dahl House”. He’s currently gradually publishing a comic on his Web site, called “Sick,” which moves from Gabby’s particularly hellish illness into his impressions of a seemingly hellish existence. Tim and Mulele discuss.

Sick, chapters 1-10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Critiquing Comics 015: Time-Travelling

Time-TravellingA short but mind-bending scientific/philosophical comic: “Time-Travelling” by Kevin Huizinga, who does some amazing things with the comics medium to make his points. We pull it up on the “What things do” site and discuss.