It was as recently as two or three years ago that I was astonished by the discipline of friends of mine in comics that started "waiting for the trade," eschewing monthly floppy comics in favor of their sturdier, often more handsome collected...

Diamond's latest attempt at making sure everything they distribute has Wolverine in it has now claimed two titles popular with critics and artcomix aficionados. Crickets by Sammy Harkham has been the most traditional "comic book" of the...

The latest mini-comic from L. Nichols comes as a refreshing reminder that whatever the state of the economy, or whatever Diamond Distributors tries to do to limit the market to junk superhero funnybooks, artists compelled to make great comics will continue...

Perhaps the most extraordinary thing about The Essential Dykes to Watch Out For is the manner in which cartoonist Alison Bechdel presents dozens of sexually and racially diverse characters as nothing special at all, just everyday average people. And among...

The Justice League as a concept was worn out and creatively bankrupt at the time Grant Morrison and Howard Porter came along and reinvigorated the series, starting with a new #1 and the simple idea of bringing back the original seven team members, which...

"I've tried to pare down my collection to just the essentials," says Seymour, an obsessive record collector clearly failing at his goals, in Terry Zwigoff and Dan Clowes's film adaptation of Clowes's graphic novel Ghost World . One...

As I was putting together my 2009 preview of most-anticipated graphic novels , I wondered what was up with the delayed publication of the Fantagraphics history Comics As Art: We Told You So , written by Tom Spurgeon. The book has been on my most-anticipated...

I read a lot of really good comics last year, and as always the past decade or so, I remain amazed at the diversity of the artform and by all the little surprises that pop up during the year ( Solanin , for a recent example) in addition to the expected...

Something that increasingly sticks in my craw is the provincial attitude the Direct Market of superhero convenience stores and a majority of its customers has toward comics from other countries, especially the Japanese comics known as Manga. Many DM stores...

The three issues comprising "The Black Glove" storyline by Grant Morrison and JH Williams are three of the best issues of Batman since, at least, Frank Miller and David Mazzucchelli cranked out Batman: Year One fifteen or twenty years ago. Over...

"Every band has its story, I suppose." So says Meiko Inoue, the lead character in Inio Asano's Solanin . Substitute "family" or "group of friends" for "band" in that quote, and you begin to see how universal...

On the day that I found out my mother had died, I remember shedding a tear or two in disbelieving sadness that came nowhere near touching the center of my being. Months later, lying in bed at night with my wife, we were debating the pros and cons of moving...

Bittorrent is mostly known as the successor to Napster and the main method of downloading music MP3s, movies and TV shows, but if you look around long enough you will find sites that provide .cbz and .cbr files of almost every new comic book released,...

Newly released in trade paperback, JLA/Avengers creators Kurt Busiek and George Perez seem to start off on auto-pilot but get more passionate and interested in their story as they go along. This was a project some superhero fans -- and artist Perez --...

I can think of few cartoonists whose work has generated as much psychological sp eculation as Eightball 's Dan Clowes ha s. Not speculation about himself, necessarily, but about his characters and their true motivations, perceptions, and even, in...

I think the first Wallace Wood art I ever saw was in a 1976 issue of All-Star Comics , where his inking totally dominated young pencilers like Ric Estrada and Kieth Giffen, in service to mind-bending stories reviving the Justice Society of America on...

Graphic novels make a great holiday gift for anyone that loves comics, or for the more adventurous non-comics reader in your life. Here's my list of can't miss gifts that they'll thank you for this holiday season. The Education of Hopey Glass...

My choice for Graphic Novel of 2008 is The Education of Hopey Glass . There's probably not a more perfect comics reading experience than immersing yourself in a Love and Rockets collection; they're all representative of the very best that comics...

There's a difference between critics and reviewers, although the two overlap quite a bit, especially when it comes to comics commentary. But when trying to discern the difference between the two, one rule of thumb is how visually adept the writer...

Comics this year were spectacular . Not Marvel and DC, which I have pretty much abandoned. Sure, Marvel/Icon has Criminal to boast of, but that is it . The only other floppies I can think of off the top of my head that are worth my time and money are...

In 1999, while working for an Albany, New York radio station, I contacted Barry Windsor-Smith 's studio to inquire about possibly interviewing the artist about his then-new hardcover art book Opus . I had been amazed by the quality of the book, and...

Warren Ellis once said "People dislike [Quitely's] art because he draws people as they are, not as we want them to be." Just so; Quitely's people, for the most part, are lumpen masses of cells. Even his superheroes fit that description,...

Here's ten things to be thankful for in comics, on this day after Thanksgiving. Hopefully you have the day off and can kick back and think about all the great things there are to love about comics and graphic novels... #10. Daredevil by Frank Miller...

As DC Comics Guide to Penciling Comics author Klaus Janson notes at one point, inking represents a division of labor in the creation of comic book art that primarily benefits the publishers to the detriment of the penciler's artistic intent. Few pencilers...

I know a lot of people thiink of Spider-Man, Batman or Iron Man when they here the word "comics." Well, Jeffrey Brown's Unlikely is published by Top Shelf Productions and subtitled "How I lost my virginity," so you already know...