Archive for the ‘Comic News’ Category

Welcome back kiddies.

For this month’s column.  I’ve decided to try a little change of pace.  I thought it might be a good idea,  Instead of whining about Dark Horse’s Creepy, to  talk about something else.  But be not afraid for the next entry will be about Creepy.  Unless it’s about the new Lenore; I haven’t decided yet.

Today’s episode is about the latest issue of Fangoria.  How I could have written this blog for more than two years… three years?  I don’t even know how long I’ve been writing this blog, but it’s a long time.  It’s almost incomprehensible that I have never thought of reviewing Fangoria before.  Well I’m here to fix all that this very day.  So here goes.

The issue that I have right now is number 301.  First, in the off-chance that you never heard of it,  Fangoria is a magazine published monthly about horror stuff.  Similar to this blog, except in magazine form.(And they tend not to ever use the word “fuck” in the magazine).

They review, horror movies, and have interviews with directors, writers and other people involved in the horror genre.  There’s a lovely article in the current issue about the movie “Bereavement.”  This includes an interview with the director/producer/editor/music guy(all one guy).

I only really mention this because my daughter and I recently went to a preview showing of this very film.  It was mostly for the press and to get people to write reviews about it.  So coming up very soon on this very blog, you’re going to be hearing (reading) my review of this film.

But back to  Fangoria.  If you’ve never seen it I would recommend that you rush out and buy whatever issue is currently available wherever you are.  This particular issue, which is the March 2011 issue has an interview with Richard Matheson.  And illustrates yet another glaring omission from this blog.  I worship, Richard Matheson openly as a personal god, and I can’t believe that I’ve never mentioned him before on this blog.  If you haven’t read them.  You must.  But this post isn’t about him; I’ll do a separate one about him.

The point is, the magazine is always good and often exceptional.  I absolutely recommend you get it.  I would tell you where to get it but I don’t need to if you live anywhere near a Barnes & Noble or Borders or Waldenbooks or any other bookstore with a newsstand. It should be there.  In fact, I recently saw it in Wegmans, which is a grocery store chain.

But I digress…

Other things in the magazine include profiles of people from the genre authors, filmmakers and directors.  Even actors sometimes.  This month’s issue has an interview with Linnea Quigley (who many of you may remember as running around naked in many horror films, her most legendary performance being the tombstone-top dance in “Return of the Living Dead.”  Which also reminds me that I’ve never written about Dan O’Bannon.  I must do that too.(he Directed ROTLD)

Yes, I understand this entry is a bit rambling and you may come away from it with nothing more than the concept that there is a magazine called Fangoria and I recommend it.  If you do, then I have succeeded.  I can be proud of myself and eat my dog biscuit with a clear conscience.  It’s been sitting on my nose all day.

So long for this month, kiddies.

PS-The picture is not the issue I am reviewing, but was chosen as generally representational of the magazine.  (and because I was too lazy to scan the one I have)

The Walking Dead is a long running horror comic series. Image Comics has recently released a $1.00 special issue to entice new readers to the story. It’s called Image Firsts The Walking Dead. It worked. I’m enticed.

Often I only have a cover in the post but I wanted you to see some of the innards of this one. It is black and white, and fairly “comicy” styled, but the pacing and flow of the images rivals anything I’ve seen in the “new” Creepy. Plus it has ZOMBIES! (YAY!)

I am not a big fan of people ripping off the cliched “standards”, such as zombies and vampires, simply because they are selling. I consider it to be a whore-like and lazy substitute for creativity. It took all my strength not to bitch about the vampire comic I just wrote about yesterday.

Vampires have been done to death. (hee hee)

And the saddest part is that vampires have now been mutated from cold, ancient, horrid, life-sucking, degenerate unearthly abominations, to young cool nifty wonderful things that girls want to have as boyfriends. And what annoys me most is instead of them bursting into flames and dying horribly in the sun, they “sparkle”. Blecch!

Ok, so zombies are cliche. But if you’re going to do them, do them right.  Look at that inside shot. That is a great illustration. And anyone who can get away with WHUMP! and OOF!, both with exclamation points and both in the SAME PANEL certainly deserves my money.  The guys who wrote and drew this thing definitely did it right. (That would be Robert Kirkman and Tony Moore, by the way.)

I would love for you to buy the dollar special, but it’s kinda’ sold out.  My link points to a page that has the TP collections on it (at a discount of course). And back ordering the $1.00 one (for $.80) is possible. Or you could wait till it becomes in stock again.

You could also wait till I get one of the collections then review it. That may take a while but I will get around to it eventually.

That’s all for today, now I have to get back down to the cellar before my thing rips its chains out of the floor…

again.

PS-Whump!  Oof!   …I love it

Hellboy in Mexico is the latest issue of some incarnation of the Hellboy comic book series. In today’s post I will be telling you what I think about it and where to get it cheap.

Hello and welcome to Monday. I usually never mention the day in the post. This is because I  write these posts, one day and edit them a different day and by the time they get up on the blog it might be several weeks. But today, in light of my new shorter, more frequent posting policy and the fact that I’m putting all my time into the newsletter instead of the blog, I can crank this thing out and post it in a short time.

I have never read Hellboy. I didn’t see the first movie. And I have yet to see the second movie. I want to see it, but haven’t.  So I came to this comic, knowing nothing about this character. Not counting the few details that I may have gleaned by watching the trailers for the movies.

So why, you may ask, did I suddenly haul-off and buy a Hellboy comic? Especially one as bizarre and specialized as Hellboy in Mexico (which by the way is subtitled “or, a drunken blur“).?

I have only one excuse. One of the credits on the cover is Richard Corben. As many of you may know, I am an ancient fan of Richard Corben.

I first discovered Corben’s work in the pages of the now defunct Eerie and/or Creepy published in the 70′s by Warren Publishing. (yes this is the Creepy Dark Horse’s new publication is supposed to be a resurrection of, or remake, or continuation, or whatever you call it when they re-do a comic) So, when I was in my early teens, Corben comprised half of my favorite artists. The other half being Bernie Wrightson.

Interesting story here. I didn’t know that one of my favorite artists was Bernie until much later.  I remembered seeing Corben stuff here and there and his name in the magazines Creepy/Eerie. It wasn’t until more recently, when I decided to revisit them that I realized the art that I really loved the most was Bernie Wrightson. (okay, maybe it’s not that interesting).

Other people may remember Richard Corbin as the creator and artist responsible for Den, a long running storyline in the old  Heavy Metal magazine. It even made it into the Heavy Metal Movie as one of the animated stories.  He was very prolific in Heavy Metal magazine, back when it was still good. ( Again the 70s and 80s.) (Interesting note…Bernie Wrightson’s work also made it into that same movie. ) Richard Corben painted the cover art for the Meatloaf album Bat Out of Hell . (And not too surprisingly, he was  enlisted to paint the cover for Bat Out of Hell II.)

But I digress…

The point to all this is I’ve read the comic. I have no idea how the story compares to other Hellboy stories. But the art is very nice, of course. It has humor, and I will be keeping an eye out for other Hellboy titles. In the meantime, I would certainly suggest you buy it or if you know someone that has it, steal it from them.

As is my new policy, you can get to a place to buy these comics by clicking on any mention of comics in my posts.  Oh!  If you buy through the vendor  I link to, you get a discount off the cover price of these things.  For example, I got my copy from the local comic shop.  I paid $3.50 plus tax.  But through my links you’re connected to a vendor from whom you can buy these things for 20% off. Which makes this $2.80.  There is also a variant cover which lists for $5.00, but you can get it for $4.00 through my link.

That’s it for today, come back soon for the next exciting installment, I have absolutely no idea what I’m going to be talking about.  I’ll probably just pick something at random out of a pile I have laying here.