http://www.achewood.com/index.php?date=07052007
I don’t know who I was ‘discussing’ this with the other day, but thank you Achewood for clarifying the argument so thoroughly.
– Chris
Some of the content WAS pretty questionable, actually…
(Warning: Rambly)
An Appreciation of Questionable Content
Do you know what I did Saturday? If you do, that’s actually a little creepy. But I’ll tell you anyway: I read all 900+ pages of the webcomic Questionable Content by Jeph Jacques, freely available online at http://questionablecontent.net/. It’s a four-panel “gag” comic with a heavy daily continuity, making the each strip essential for hardcore fans, but making the comic as a whole fairly accessible for folks just jumping in, espescially if they ‘get’ that days’ joke.
I’m bad at webcomics, only reading (with a few small exceptions) the strips that my friends do. Luckily, I’m friends with R. Stevens of Diesel Sweeties, Ryan North of Dinosaur Comics, and Ramon and Rob over at Butternut Squash, so I’ve got most of the best and most popular webcomics covered. But every once in a while, I’ll be introduced to like, Jeffrey Rowland (of WIGU and OVERCOMPENSATING), or Jonathan Rosenberg (of GOATS) or my dear sweet Dr. McNinja Chris hastings, and I’ll be all “Oh, you do a webcomic? Really? I’ve never heard of it…” and make a total asshole of myself.
So at the Paradise show a few weekends back when I picked up a bunch of the shirts from QC, I figured that maybe I could avoid making an ass of myself IN FUTURE by… you know… reading the comics. Plus I think Mal told me that I should at one point. Anyway, it’s all a very good idea, and a time-consuming one, but what better use for 7 hours could I possibly have had?
Right off the bat: If I didn’t have a vested interest in finishing this series, I would have given up in both anger and frustration about half way through. The sexual politics of the first few hundred strips are, to put it bluntly, completely fucked up, and so aggressively wrong-headed that I actually considered stopping at strip 400 to write this post with a WHAT DO PEOPLE SEE IN THIS? HOW IS EVERYONE NOT KILLING THEMSELVES? sort of a vibe going on, which probably wouldn’t have been the best or most productive review. Thankfully at strip 500 the author decides that enough is enough and that a beloved lead character really oughtta stop emotionally and physically abusing the rest of the cast, and does, and that character has been working to redeem themselves ever since. Since this thread of emotional and physical abuse is kind-of the emotional core of the entire comic and the springboard for much of the plot, that it is so completely fucked up will likely turn off… many? Most? of the people I would normally send over to read it, if I didn’t specifically qualify the early strips with: Don’t worry, it’ll turn out okay in the end. The horrible attitudes towards sex and intimacy disappear about half way through, and from then on the strip really blossoms into something excellent. So, yeah. Either start at strip #500, or just grit your teeth like I did.
The strip is excellent though. Even through the occasionally torturous first half, there’s a humour, levity, and real heart to the series. Questionable Content is about a group of young adults in their early-to-mid 20s, working crappy jobs and hanging out and commenting on popular culture. Relationship-oriented drama and humour, through a Pitchfork Media sort of lense (but ironically). It’s a sitcomic…Â kind of like a gritty, lo-fi Friends with concessions to genuine whimsy and innovation vis-a-vis the occasional talking robot, magical creature, and wrong-headed superhero. Man, if ragging on the sexual politics didn’t piss people off, comparing this to Friends probably will… But seriously, millions of people watched Friends, what’s the big deal? It was a popular show that made you laugh once! Admit it!
(Look! They’ve even got a couch!)
Anyway… As I was mentioning I did really enjoy my experience, and have made visiting the site to see the newest strips part of my daily routine as of Monday morning. I guess what I really liked about it, especially reading it all at once, is seeing where the author’s eye tends to land, and seeing how the strip is shaped because of it. The afformentioned popular culture references usually take the form of band and music genre references, and it’s interesting to me because from 2003-2007, the time that the strip has been running, the authors musical interests have taken a similar path to my own musical interests and experiences. Music has a huge role in the strip, with characters being defined by the music they listen to, their romantic compatibility presaged by their musical compatibility. Sayeth the character Marten in regards to a potential relationship: “Man I hope that doesn’t become an issue with Dora. What if she can’t stand my musical taste? I mean, I know she likes the Flaming Lips, but we don’t really have a lot in common musically.” It’s just one of the many moments where music defines the various characters and situations, and it really works to give the strip a cohesion that a lot of comics lack.
But the real payoff is in seeing the characters that are introduced and ‘don’t make it’. What if everyone decided that they didn’t like Joey after the first season, and they made Mark and Carol permanent cast members instead? Wouldn’t that be weird? Heh. I love seeing the author’s process and development on the page (and just an aside here: the art undergoes a fairly substantial upgrade from start-to-finish as well, with the most recent strips looking fairly slick and cartoony, and the early strips… Well, there’s a charm to them for sure, but…) and seeing the realisation that the uptight coffee barista wasn’t going to work out, or that the first iteration of a character was a bit… shallow… and needed to be overhauled. It’s great. Author Jeph Jaques even manages to do that rare thing in almost any kind of long-form serialised comics: have the characters grow and change, and have it feel natural. The plot develops out of the characters’ attitudes and behaviour, it’s what good storytelling in this genre of comics is all about.
Actually, one of the things I was going back and forth on with this series was the constant external thought process of all the characters. I can’t tell if I find it refreshing or annoying. No one seems to have an inner monologue, or a thought that doesn’t go unspoken. It might be why I found the early going so difficult as well, because the behaviour of some of the characters was really aggrivating, but hearing their constant justifications for that behaviour was just waaaay too much. It does work really well for the humour though, and even seeing characters fumble through social interaction and dating is fun when they can’t stop babbling to themselves. But if one more character utters “I have issues!” unselfconciously… I dunno. It will probably spark The Rapture or something. Not the band The Rapture either, but the Jimmy Swaggart Rapture. The Charleton Heston Rapture. (Both of those would be good band names).
Anyhow, if you’re looking for another enjoyable, subtantial comic strip to add to your webcomics browsing, I can definitely recommend Questionable Content. Even their shirts are very good. I mean, She Blinded Me With Library Science? That’s gold, Jerry, gold! Wait, that’s a Seinfeld reference, not a Friends reference. So much for my strong closing remark. Ah well.
Sorry.
– Christopher
Quick addendum to last post, RE: Distribution
From Spurgeon:
* Marvel Editor Tom Brevoort’s use of old sales figures at his blog has proved intriguing for a lot of folks, particularly when it comes to making comparisons to the market back then, at the height of a flush period that included a lot of back-issue collectibles speculation, and now, when things are better than they were five years earlier but are nowhere near the raw figures of 15-17 years ago. In other words, “Why can’t we sell 8,000,000 copies of Spider-Man anymore?”
One thing I think worth noting is that while speculation was a huge force at the time Brevoort’s charts represent, particularly for boosting the three or four titles at the absolute top of such lists, it should be noted that the overall delivery system allowed for that much product to be moved. It also sustained way more titles over 100,000 copies. In other words, the notion of blockbuster comics as it existed in the early ’90s exploited a system that was obviously better suited to delivering a higher number of superhero comics overall. One of the things I try to track about today’s comics is the effects when the same sort of top-title mentality is unleashed on an underlying market that isn’t as healthy top to bottom.
Emphasis mine.
Here’s the thing, the current, physical delivery system we have? It couldn’t even allow for CIVIL WAR type numbers at 200-300k. Civil War #6 didn’t make it to the Los Angeles Diamond warehouse in time for distribution to west coast accounts, meaning a quarter of the country was without copies. Why can’t we sell eight-million Spider-Men? Our sole distributor wouldn’t have anywhere to put them, for starters… When I obliquely say things like ‘comics distribution is BROKEN’ this is the type of thing I’m getting at.
– Christopher
P.S.: This is an easily illustrated example, but 4 out of 4-5 weeks a month, there is ‘split shipping’ between warehouses on at least one comic/book that we order more than 10 copies of, to say nothing of allocations and just-plain-lost orders. Diamond does a good job for being the only outlet for a lot of this stuff available, but… 4 out of 4-5 weeks a month, it wouldn’t hurt to have a few failsafes.
P.P.S: And our stupid comics are being delayed a day again this week for no reason. 😛
The Only Thing Worse Than Being Talked About: Retail Theory
Over at his blog, Alan David Doane picked up on the fact that The Beguiling doesn’t participate in the “First Look” program for Marvel or DC, where for a fixed cost you receive preview-copies of their books a week in advance. Tom Spurgeon notices Alan noticing, and then Alan responds. So, uh, here’s what’s really going down:
For a time, we fine folks at The Beguiling were subscribed to both Marvel and DC’s “First Look” program, where for roughly $6 (or $6 plus shipping, where Marvel was involved) we’d get a selection of next-weeks books a week early, to peruse and theoretically to inform us and/or get us excited about the books. We dropped out of the Marvel program early, because it was costing us a little more than $15 a week for the books, which had to be UPS’d to us with a separate shipping charge. $15+ a week for like $12 retail worth of comics? I don’t know about you, but the ‘usefulness’ of the information contained therin just wasn’t justified by the cost. I’ve got no problem spending $60 a month to significantly increase our sales (spend money to make money, etc.), but the cost/benefit ratio never worked out for us.
DC Comics, on the other hand, completely discontinued theirs a few months back, when they moved to the FOC (or adjust your orders 3 weeks before the books come out) system. Apparently, they didn’t think they could do both… Marvel can, it just costs us $15 in UPS fees. In all honesty we liked the DC First Looks well-enough, although any book that might have enough ‘hot’ stuff in it as to actually adjust our orders was often left out of the package for fear of spoilers. If you start to think about this very hard at all, you’ll realise this makes the whole endeavour more-or-less pointless, and perhaps that led to DC discontinuing it. DC have always been powerfully, powerfully anal about their ‘secrets’ being ‘spoiled’ even one iota of time before they were ready for them to be out there, and so if they weren’t prepared to release important information, then they were defacto releasing unimportant information, charging us $6 for the priviledge, and probably losing money on it…
I think the key assertion with Alan’s piece, that we didn’t participate in The First looks because we were concerned with other publishers, it has the ring of truth but it doesn’t hold up. Frankly, we are more concerned with other publishers than with DC or espescially Marvel. Those books sell themselves very well to the dedicated hardcore, and despite some tweaking here or there we stock the books, maintain our selection, and make intelligent recommendations based on existing purchases–it’s easy. Something like the truly-excellent Rutu Modan’s EXIT WOUNDS does require more attention from us, because, despite it being better than anything in the Marvel or DC universes that graced our shelves last week, it’s by an unknown author, it’s her first graphic novel, on a ‘difficult’ subject, and it’s art style and storytelling ‘give good hand’, meaning that the book can be easily recommended once a customer is looking at it. We gotta put more work in on that one, but it’s totally rewarded and makes our days happy and wonderful when we sell lots of them.
But, that doesn’t mean we won’t take every advantage that’s offered to us, from every publisher. The DC First looks worked for us because for $6 a week, we averaged $12-$15 worth of books, meaning that even if not one iota of useful information was gleaned from the books, we got saleable product out of the deal at a good discount, so it’s at best a wash. If Marvel could manage to get their first-look costs down, and could manage to get us the books in salable condition (seriously, those UPS envelopes looked like they’d been stuck in the spokes of someone’s bike wheels to make that “thwap-thwap-thwap” noise), we’d probably sign back up for the program. And I’d know what the big spooky deal is about this week’s EVERYONE IS SAD ABOUT CAPTAIN AMERICA: IRON MAN WEEPS FOR 22 PAGES. My guess is Skrulls, but enh? If we sell out, there’ll be a second printing. If we don’t, then it won’t have mattered what the big deal is. Win-win!
…I should also note that recently Image Comics has started offering a First Look program–For Free!–that makes the most sense out of anyone’s. Chances are that the majority of comic stores are at least ordering one copy of everything DC and Marvel publish, but the same can’t be said of the books published by the fine folks at Image Comics. So Image sends one of more-or-less everything out, for free, to every Diamond account, on the off chance someone who isn’t ordering CASANOVA or FELL or GIRLS or whatever will take a look at an issue and like it enough to try ordering it… or throw it on the rack and sell it, and maybe make a few bucks and increase their opinion of Image a little. It’s a great idea, kudos to whoever come up with it. (Of course, we’re ordering at least one copy of every Image book, but I do appreciate the opportunity to read THE WALKING DEAD a week early when I can).
Anyway, in my ever-humble opinion, smart retailers take every advantage, and determine whether every offer is advantageous or not to their own establishment. So, in that way Alan was definitely correct, we’ll source every book we carry from two or three different distributors and see who offers up the best deal, the best shipping, the timeliest turnaround. We wanna get the books in first and carry them the longest, and get you the best price on them. Putting all of our eggs into the Diamond basket, certainly not the way to do that right now. But if Diamond does step up (and they do, every once in a while) then we’re happy to work with them.
That’s today’s boring retail theory. Sorry.
– Christopher
Are ya comin’?
Headed to the Toronto Comic Arts Festival in scenic Toronto Canada this August 18-19? Why not stop by our Facebook Event Page and confirm your attendence?
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=2423397996
TCAF: It’s gonna be pretty cool.
– Chris
La Muse Summer Re-Runs Begin Today
…so I’m a day late and a dollar short on writing a nice little appreciation of Adi Tantimedh & Hugo Petrus’s superhero story, LA MUSE, currently running online at http://www.bigheadpress.com/lamuse/. I probably put it out there that I’m not that big of a superhero fan, but that’s not entirely true. I’m not a ‘fan’ of any particular genre, I’d say, but I like good books more-or-less regardless of their genre (or lack thereof). So when I cane across my friend Adi’s new story, about a superhero that’s going to follow through on the promise of really changing the world, I made sure to open up to it and remind myself that I really enjoyed Adi’s last superhero outting: JLA: AGE OF WONDER, a sadly uncollected Elseworlds from a few years back.
LA MUSE is great! The thing that I really like is that it takes the promise of something like THE ULTIMATES and follows it through to its natural conclusion, unconcerned about ‘continuity’ or ‘trademarks’ or… whatever. You never know what’s going to happen from week to week, how the myriad of plot points will be resolved… or when… It’s really just a hell of a fun read, and (particularly thanks to the weekly reminder e-mail I get…) I’ve been checking it out every Monday morning for months now, which is more regular than most of the rest of my life.
Anyway, the series has gone on hiatus for the next month, and is instead starting over from the beginning, releasing 10-15 pages a week for your reading pleasure. The first installment of the “Summer Re-Runs” are up now, at http://www.bigheadpress.com/lamuse?page=69. If you want something good…and free… to read, you could do a hell of a lot worse. Go check it out!
– Christopher
Happy Canada Day!
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Yes, Canada Day, because we’re pretty straight-forward up here.
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I hope you get a chance to celebrate this most glorious of days in true Canadian fashion, with some Poutine (french fries with cheese curds, with gravy poured over top so everything melts), smoked meat (I have no idea what animal smoked meat is from, actually), and a good Canadian beer or two. Also, as good as Labatt’s Blue and Molson Export are as compared to, say, most American beers (from big breweries that is), I implore you to consider that most people under the age of 30 drink those beers ironically, if at all.
So, Happy Canada Day! Whether you’re a Canadian or just wish you were (and you’re welcome to come up!) this is the one day a year where we can be rowdy about how awesome we are. Tomorrow we’ll just nod and smile politely.
– Chris
(Giants of the North image by Seth, for the Doug Wright Awards. Pixel-Canada image by R.Stevens, from Diesel Sweeties.)
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ANNOUNCE: TEKKON KINKREET: BLACK & WHITE ALL IN ONE EDITION
The good folks at Viz have provided me with the details of their forthcoming release of TEKKON KINKREET: BLACK & WHITE ALL IN ONE EDITION, the all new edition of Taiyo Matsumoto’s fantastic manga. Previously released in English under the Pulp banner as BLACK & WHITE, the three-volume series was a little-seen gem from one of Japan’s most talented and innovative manga-ka. Now, in conjunction with the forthcoming animated adaptation of the story from Sony Pictures, Viz are re-releasing the entire series in one mammoth volume, in a format that even surpasses the Japanese edition of this book.
The book will be a softcover with dustjacket, similar in to Viz’s release of Matsumoto’s (unfinished) series NO.5. The above image is the front cover of the dustjacket featuring one of the series’ young protagonists, Black. The back cover (which I can’t show you, sorry!) will feature the other protagonist, White. Purists may note that this image is not the same as the Japanese cover for this edition, but fret not! Underneath the dust-jacket, the physical book will have a close approximation of the Japanese cover, shown here.
What else is in store for this edition, that will make it an absolutely essential purchase, even for people who bought it the first time? Here are the official stats on the collection:
Official title: TEKKONKINKREET: Black & White
Price: $29.95
Release date: September
Official Movie Site: http://www.sonypictures.com/homevideo/tekkonkinkreet/index.html
Size: 7 1/8″ x 10 1/8″, the same size as the recent re-release of Nausicaa
Orientation: Western Style, L-to-R
Bonus Material:
– Poster Insert, Measuring 7 1/8″ x 20 1/4″, in full colour
– Approximately 12 full colour manga pages. In colour for the first time in North America, and even the Japanese All-in-One edition did not feature these pages in colour!
– Foreword Q&A with TEKKON KINKREET movie director Michael Arias and screenwriter Anthony Weintraub.
This is just-about the best presentation of this material that I can think of, and the material itself is among my favourite manga ever (if not my favourite stuff). I’ve posted about Matsumoto and BLACK & WHITE before, and this September you’re going to to get your opportunity to pick it up for yourself and find out what all the fuss is about. Make sure you do!
The TEKKON KINKREET: ALL IN ONE EDITION is in Previews NOW! (the Booster Gold Cover, not the Black Canary Wedding Cover). Reserve a copy with your local comic book store owner before this Tuesday when their orders are due! Unless you shop at The Beguiling, because we’re ordering like 150 of these.
– Christopher
Shipping Thursday July 5th, 2007
Hi there folks. Here are a few of the more interesting comics that are scheduled to ship to The Beguiling Books & Art in Toronto, Canada this week. These books may not show up at all retailers at the same time, but if you see a title here it’s probably at least worth asking your local retailer about.
…big news for Matsumoto fans, posted here tonight at 9PM. See you then! For now, here’s a few books I think are worth your time this week, which is a day later because of Canada Day and Independence Day. Not much in the way of commentary right now because I’m swamped…
APR070173 ALL STAR SUPERMAN #8 2.99 – Yay!
APR073978 DRAGON HEAD VOL 7 GN (OF 10) (MR) (C: 1-0-0) 9.99 – Double Yay!
MAY070228 FAKER #1 (OF 6) (MR) 2.99 – Looking forward to checking out this strange-sounding new Vertigo series.
MAR072058 FALLEN SON DEATH OF CAPTAIN AMERICA IRON MAN 2.99 – Marvel sent out a threatening note about this one, ordering us not to ruin the ending if we got this in our first-look packs. Sadly, we don’t subscribe to that program.
APR073963 KINGDOM HEARTS II VOL 1 GN (OF 5) 9.99 – $$$
MAR078185 NARUTO VOL 15 TP (C: 1-0-2) (PP #765) 7.95 – $$$ Also!
APR072328 RUNAWAYS #27 2.99 – Whedon!
MAR070262 SILVERFISH HC (MR) 24.99 – New David Lapham OGN!
MAY073718 SYNCOPATED COMICS VOL 3 (MR) 15.00 – New from my buddy Brendan Buford…
APR074036 TEZUKAS BUDDHA VOL 8 JETAVANA SC (C: 0-1-2) 14.95 – Did Diamond ship volume 7?
Full list after the cut:
3 Quick Yaoi Reviews from 801 Media
Earlier this spring 801 Media, Inc., sister company to DMP Books (and publisher of lots of yaoi under the JUNE MANGA imprint) began to release their books. Comprised of seemingly more raunchy yaoi action and with a higher price-per-book to make you pay dearly for your filthy, filth porn, I honestly haven’t heard much about the line as a whole. I decided to take matters into my own hands (heh) and so I present to you three short reviews of 801 Media’s first wave of books:
AFFAIR, by Shioku Kano. 200 pages, $15.95, ISBN: 9781934129050
AFFAIR has the dubious honour of provoking the following question from me, 20 pages in: “Is this translation just incredibly bad, or is it nearly-unreadable in the original with excellent translation?” A collection of various yaoi cliches, the dialogue is punctuated with a series of statements that border on non-sequitors through each story. A convoluted mess, saved from the trash by some thoroughly dirty artwork. It can’t be good if I have to force myself to finish the pornography.
BOND(Z), by Toko Kawai. 192 pages, $15.95, ISBN: 9781934129005
The first story in this single-creator anthology, about two straight best friends who end up fucking in a restroom while their girlfriends are back at the table in a restaurant, is both surprisingly hot and really well drawn. BOND(Z) is actually a collection of short stories so it isn’t JUST straight dudes in a washroom (they like to fuck lots of places), but that is the lead (and longest) story, and it’s really, really well put together. The other shorts are surprisingly strong as well, and if you like the yaoi for either the dirty bits or the romance, this one is an essential purchase. Bonus: Surprisingly strong depiction of homosexual desire.
ICHIGENME VOL 1: The First Class Is Civil Law…, by Fumi Yoshinaga. 240 pages, $15.95, ISBN: 9781934129012
I’d really been looking forward to this one, another “dirty” yaoi title from 801 Media but created by ANTIQUE BAKERY’s Fumi Yoshinaga. I really loved Bakery, which isn’t yaoi (or even dirty for that matter), and the idea of Yoshinaga doing something more ‘explicitly’ gay was really appealing. My expectations were surpassed by the deft handling of this ‘coming out’ story, set in a Japanese law school. The art and storytelling remain as strong as ever, though part of the charm of Bakery is the maniacal attention to detail in the depiction of the food, something the author is robbed of doing in this story. But I actually came away feeling like I’d learned something about Japanese law school, showing that Yoshinaga knows just how much information to include to keep the setting feeling real, while not obscuring the characters at all. These reluctant lovers, following their dreams and denying their urges… It’s a great little romance novel. There’s nothing particularly graphic though, at least nothing that you wouldn’t see in much tamer yaoi releases, I can only assume it heats up in later volumes. Fans of Bakery and FAKE will enjoy the will-they, won’t-they relationship. I’m looking forward to volume two.
—
Just for fairness’ sake, I’ll try and review some filthy hentai for Simon Jones soon too. Although “Wow, she really fucked her brother good this time around!” is probably going to bring the wrong sort of hits to my site.
– Christopher