HAPPY HOLIDAYS. Well obviously, by the title of this blog, you can tell what my favorite holiday is. Christmas is a solid 2nd though, and although it doesn't hold much meaning for me other than a great time to spend with family and to get some annual gifts, I still recognize it as a pretty dang O.K. holiday. A bit overrated, maybe. Infinite Christmas would be cool too, maybe there's some bizarro blog out there like that, or maybe I could start a sister blog called "Infinite Christmas." Hmmm. In other news, I'm on vacation right now so i'm going to do some serious blogging and writing. I have no excuses, no school, no work, no distractions.
Oh man, I can't believe the holidays have come so quickly. I haven't updated this thing with anything original in quite some time, and at some point, i'll
probably have to cut down on the reading and start writing like a maniac. But that time wasn't during this semester. Oh no, my excuse is that I had no time, since I have two jobs and school. That excuse is kind of legit, but it's not acceptable anymore. Either way, before I get off on a tangent, I have started cutting down my summer reading queue. That's right, summer reading queue. I'm only going to to short reviews since I need to get some actual work done, and I don't think anyone out there actually cares for my reviews, it's more something I do for myself, but yeah. I finished these three graphic novels over the last month or so:
I loved this. Charles Burns is a cartoonist with an impressive pedigree. He did designs for the short lived
OK Soda, as well as for
Believer magazine, just to name some of the projects he's been attached to. His art had been familiar to me because of the Believer covers, and I've seen Black Hole in like every graphic novel section of every Barnes and Noble and Borders (R.I.P.) that i've ever been to, I just never picked it up for whatever reason. Charles Burns was vaguely on my radar though, and I've finally gotten to this thanks to a friend who lent me this. Actually, all of the graphic novels in this post were lent to me by friends. Thank you, friends! Either way, I dug pretty much everything about this. The STD-analogue was interesting and the characters didn't really stand out, except for the really deformed ones. I think that was kind of the point though. It was creepy at times, haunting, and I did gag at one panel, honestly, so that's a minor achievement in of itself. Overall, really good and has a vibe that kinda reminds me of Dazed and Confused but really dark and serious, and a bit more existential. His art style is really clean and it adds to the creepiness of the hallucination scenes, and the deformities the characters who contract "the bug" are even weirder due to his clean art style. I'd compare it to Mike Allred's. I feel like I should be listening to Led Zeppelin when I read this. RATING: pretty gnarly.
I really, really enjoyed this. I haven't read a lot of Neil Gaiman, honestly. Besides this, the only other work of his i've read is Eternals, also a Marvel comic. So I have much Neil Gaiman to catch up on. I have very much liked what i've read, so far. I know this book was criticized when it came out for not being "epic" enough, or something, but I thought it was a good little tale. Nothing too monumental or crazy, just solid characters and good storytelling. I've read that after 9/11, Gaiman wanted to do a project that didn't involve guns of explosions of any kind, and 1602 was the result. I like this interpretation of the Silver Age Marvel Heroes, the first wave created by Stan and Jack and Steve Ditko. He really gives mad respect to those guys and the universality of the characters they created. It totally works for me. It was fresh, even though i've been reading Marvel Comics since I could read. I dug that it was in England. The character of Matt Murdock/Daredevil worked so well in this world. It might be bare bones for some, but this, along with Alan Moore's earlier work, is great comic writing 101. I know there are a gazillion parallel universes and alternate timelines in Marvel (and DC, for that matter) but this one is worth a gander. Andy Kubert's art doesn't hurt either. I'll have to pick up Sandman and his novels at some point. Hopefully relatively soon. Gaiman's pretty much the man. Bravo.
FUNNY SHIT. This had me cracking up like no other recent comic. Julia Wertz is fucking hilarious and has such a refreshing worldview, it was just a treat to read this one. I need to read more "indie" stuff and Drinking At The Movies is a good reason why. The humour really makes it, but there is really some more enlightening stuff in here that I think many in my generation could benefit from. Julia Wertz is a compelling protagonist and you really care about her by the end. She's like the female version me except way funnier. For serious. There are some good life lessons in here too. It's great stuff. I give it my highest recommendation. It would make a good Adult Swim type cartoon, IMO.
There it is!
