My Current Comix World

I should be doing things right now.  I should be drawing comix or cleaning my house or cooking or going to yoga or...anything, really.  Instead, I find myself sitting here, hoping my Air Conditioner cools the house off enough to make my place inhabitable.  So let's talk comics.  The year is (already) half over, so let's talk about the only thing that gets me up in the morning.  Comics.  Or, more specifically, what's Rocking my Comics World.

1)  DC Continues to Impress-  So, the whole New 52 thing has been going on for almost a year, and you can see some slow down happening.  I've dropped some books and tried some books (and One Major Awesome Comic got cancelled on me), but, surprisingly, I'm not only still reading a lot of books from the line, I'm getting Absolutely Floored by many of those books.  "Animal Man" and "Swamp Thing" have managed to not only step out of the shadows of their legendary forefathers (no small feat in its own right), but these two books are standing tall on their own, creating an amazing new mythology that excites me every month.  "Wonder Woman" is exciting and interesting for the first time since the 1930s (think about that one for, like, a minute).  Oh, and "Frankenstien: Agent of SHADE" is just awesome.  Last issue.  Just awesome.

2)  Marvel Continues to Bore-  Sigh.  I really wanna like Marvel again.  Too bad they can't produce a book I wanna read.  Sigh.

3)  BPRD: The Long Death was like a TORC Press book if I had talent, money, and time.  Unbelievable, brilliant comics wonderfullness.

4)  The Bulletproof Coffin is back, and I am Happy-  So, I wasn't sure what to expect the sequel to "The Bulletproof Coffin" entitled "Disinterred" popped up.  The first two issues were great and Issue three was awesome.  Then along comes Issue 4.  The CUT UP Issue.  A William S. Burroughs inspired work of pure mind-bombage, my pathetic little meat-mind can barely handle the sheer exploding insanity of this work.  I am glad this comic exists.

5)  Damn, Saga is good-  What else can I say?  I had no intention of buying this series, but then some friends recommended it to me, so I picked it up.  Glad I did.  This beautiful, strange, dark, sexy, wild, epic, and endlessly expansive series knocked me on my ass and hasn't given me the chance to get back up.

5.5)  The Extreme Relaunch has got me all embarrassed-  So, I have a confession to make.  I never hated Rob Liefeld for the same reasons as everyone else.  I didn't hate him because he was a bad artist or a bad writer or he couldn't draw feet.  I hated him because he always promised to produce comics and then the comics wouldn't show up.  I got sick of getting excited about a new Liefeld book only to wait a year and then the damn book never showed up.  So, now we're relaunching the Extreme Universe, and I find myself...strangely excited by it all.  Perhaps a lot of it has to do with Liefeld's "Hands Off" approach (Liefeld is off writing/plotting/drawing THREE books for DC right now).  With other people producing the books, there's a better chance they'll actually come out.  But a lot of it has to do with the fact that these comics are (to steal the title from Rob's failed company) Awesome.  "Prophet" is incredible.  Wild, surreal, bizarre, dark, and completely unpredictable.  The art on "Glory" is phenomenal, and the story's pretty good too.  "Bloodstrike" is all about the Vi-o-lence.  I'm intrigued by Erik Larsen's take on "Supreme".  Heck, even the most traditional "Old School Extreme" book, "Youngblood" has been pretty good.  I'm sure in a couple of months, Liefeld or someone else will pull the plug on the project, and I'll feel ripped off again.  But for now, I'm really digging this relaunch.  And feeling moderately embarrassed about it at the same time...

6)  American Barbarian in Hardcover and Final Frontier in Digital-  Tom Scioli is brilliant.  I loved American Barbarian online, and I picked up the fat, handsome, and economically priced Hardcover at SPACE.  Reread it.  Loved it some more.  In the meantime, Scioli continues to knock the ball out of the park with his new online strip "Final Frontier".  The Fantastic Four reinvisioned as the Beetles of Superheroes, every time the strip is updated I find myself thrilling to whatever strange new idea, concept, or image that pops up.  It's just brilliant.

7)  For some reason, I am obsessed with Brian Chippendale-  After reading some strong reviews for Brian Chippendale's "If n' Oof" last year, I picked up a copy.  I loved it.  The ugly yet beautiful, primitive yet obsessively detail oriented Comic finally brought me around on the whole Gary Panter Influenced Alt-Comics thingie.  Although I've been reading a lot of these guys lately, including the aforementioned Gary Panter, CF, Matt Brinkman, and Michael DeForge, but it's Chippendale's work that I've gravitated to the most.  I find myself scouring the internet, trying to find any strange little comic I can get my hands on.  It's a little obsessive, honestly.  In the meantime, I check the Picturebox website weekly to see if Chippendale's bizarre online strip "Puke Force" has updated.  Yep.

So, halfway through 2012, that's my Comics World.