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Let’s talk about your schooling. Why did you flunk out in 10th grade?

I think it was pure boredom. I loved girls [smiling]. I loved comic books. And for reasons I don’t understand, I was pretty lazy.

Incidentally, I don’t think I’m going to do very many more of these, except on the rare occasion that I come across something particularly interesting and/or surprising.

I don’t want to get too “Up With Comics” or anything, you know? And that was becoming a distinct and imminent danger.

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Today Tom Spurgeon offers an excellent explanation of the appeal of Wally Wood. I remain fascinated by the late work of Wood. His and Ogden Whitney’s work have occupied my brain for the better part of a year now. Both create such odd, tactile visual spaces and both, in some ways, are under-appreciated. The recent biography of Wood, Wally’s World, by Steve Starger and J. David Spurlock does little to remedy that. It’s a slapdash affair that at times borders on incoherence. There’s a great book to be written on Wood–it just doesn’t exist yet. In the meantime, check out Tom’s succinct take on a unique artist.

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Sickness unfortunately prevented a full interview, but Dan was able to call in for an all-too-brief fifteen minute conversation at the end of last week’s Inkstuds podcast.

In other news, I have nothing to say about comics at the moment. But if you were intrigued by the Dick Ayers piece in Comics Comics #1, and live in the New York area, Ayers is making an appearance at the Big Apple convention tomorrow, and will doubtless be selling copies of his three-volume autobiography in comics.

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I know a lot of Comics Comics readers have already seen Marc Singer’s recent part-right, part-way-off-base review of MOME, because I recognize the names of a lot of the commenters there, but if you haven’t seen it yet, the post itself and the comments that follow are pretty interesting.

Via Jog — who, by the way, somewhat recently wrote one of the more insightful reviews of Cold Heat (drawn, as you probably know, by CC editor-at-large Frank Santoro) I’ve yet seen.

Speaking of Frank, judging by their Website, Copacetic has only a few copies of his ’90s masterpiece Storeyville left, and I believe they’re the only place where you can still purchase it. So this may be your last chance if you want to get your hands on Storeyville in its original format.

Finally, and via Tom Spurgeon, a Steve Gerber anecdote from Marvel’s Tom Brevoort. [UPDATE: Gerber has responded.]

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I started reading comic books that were published in the 1980s, when I was about 20 years old, and they all dealt with repression in Franco’s Spain. These were comic books that were published in Spain. At the time, they were sort of the equivalent of the underground comics in the Sixties in America. They were very anarchic, very against the system, against the establishment, and a lot of them dealt with the situation of postwar Spain. There was one in particular that influenced The Devil’s Backbone more than Pan’s Labyrinth that dealt with an orphanage in postwar Spain; that was called Paracuellos [by Carlos Giménez, 1981].

This one is too easy, I know, but this series needs to live on as more than just a cheap ploy to lure unsuspecting readers from a barely related (at best) “blog-a-thon”—if only so I can sleep at night. Sometimes you have to go to blog with the post you have, not the post you want to have.

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Well, my fave comics of ’06 list caused a little tizzy in web-land. And Dirk got kind of annoyed. All because of my flippant remark about Fun Home. My remark was just that: flippant; and not really meant as a substantive criticism (obviously), but rather as an example of a disagreement with the PW list. That said, I don’t really have much to add: I found the narrative devices in Fun Home to be rather forced and the cartooning too often stiff and inexpressive. Most of all, it just seemed overstuffed and not really in control of the medium. Mostly, it just doesn’t interest me enough as a book to write any further about it. It’s not a terrible book, just kinda mediocre.

I don’t agree with Dirk that my not liking it represents some kind of comics-elitist (something I’m certainly not–though I’d like to see a list of qualifications) reaction against mass popularity. I totally understand why it has wider appeal than Kim Deitch’s work (which is vastly more successful as art)–ummmm, that’s the way world works. I’m not surprised at all, nor do I expend any energy being annoyed at it. Culture is what it is and the most we can do is to work for and promote and write about the things we believe in and hope for the best.

And further, contra-Dirk I don’t make my aesthetic judgments based on the relative popularity of a work or what “scene” it emerges from. Who cares about that stuff? I might have at age 14 but certainly not now. I judge things based on their relative successes as art, and that’s it. So that’s pretty much my response. I didn’t like the book that much, but anything else–scenes, cred, popularity and all that other foolishness is besides the point.

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NOTE: As the second issue of Comics Comics is just now being distributed to many comics stores for the first time, this is a special encore presentation of an earlier post.

Consider this an errata slip to Comics Comics #2. Unfortunately, two footnotes were left out of the printed copy of my essay on Steve Gerber in the story, so I decided to reprint them here. They will not make sense without the essay, so please feel free to skip this post if you don’t have it.

Footnote 1 — This should have been attached to the third paragraph of Section II: The Duck:

This reviewer is not old enough to have read these comics when they came out, so their funniness at publication is impossible to determine fairly. It may be worth noting, though, that in 2002, Marvel published a new Howard the Duck mini-series written by Steve Gerber, and the topical humor there ranges from the obvious and forced (a boy band literally manufactured in a laboratory by an evil corporation) to the fairly sharp and pointed (there’s a pretty devastating satire of Warren Ellis’s Transmetropolitan and that title’s futuristic Hunter S. Thompson-clone protagonist, whose book collection prominently features copies of The Bluffer’s Guide to Cyberpunk and Egotism Without Charisma). A mixed bag, basically, but one entertaining enough to be worth reading, if you’re so inclined.

Footnote 2 — This should have been attached to the sixth paragraph of Section III: The Unknown:

See, for example, this Gerber quote from Gary Groth’s 1978 interview with the writer: “Glance through a typical Marvel or DC book, you’ll find that, regardless of which character the magazine features, the material will be arranged in roughly the following way: a three-page fight or chase scene to open; about two pages of the character in his secret identity; three more pages of the character back in costume, either engaged in a second fight with the villain or swinging around the city looking for the villain and encountering other little obstacles along the way; a couple more pages of the alter ego; and then the big fight scene at the end. That’s the formula… All of it reads alike.”

That’s it. I hope this is helpful, and apologize for the mistake.

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I’m going to Minnesota for the holidays, so there won’t be any posting from me for a week or so. Dan may pop in now and again, but just in case events intrude, please accept these Christmas reading recommendations to hold you over ’til Yuletide’s done.

Merry Christmas!

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Yes, I forgot a book that was very important to me on a personal level, coming at a time when I needed a distraction or three. As a result of being tied into a bit of a black hole of a time, I left it off the list. Renee French’s The Ticking is a deeply profound and loving book about self-acceptance and artistry. Her artwork hit a new peak, the soft pencil forms evoking such powerful emotions in every panel. I can’t recommend it highly enough…put at whatever number you like.

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I know that you abandoned Ronny Rocket… If you’re not going [to] make it into a film, perhaps a graphic novel–?

Are you a psychic?!

Wha… you’re doing that?

I’m doing that. It’s in the early, early stages.

To me, comic books are the closest thing to creating a film without actually making the film.

You’re a very sharp guy. That’s exactly what’s happening. It’s almost helpful to the film to realize that in another form and maybe see some things that may help you later.

The original Ronnie Rocket film script

Of course, Lynch has tried his hand at cartooning, with decidedly mixed results.

Case closed!: Movies aren’t comics, and comics aren’t movies.