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Topics - Patrick

#1
Books & Comics / Kirkman's Outcast
10 March, 2020, 12:27:10 PM
Anybody else reading Robert Kirkman's Outcast from Image?

I read the first year or so of it before I fell out of comics for a while, and was really impressed with the art by Paul Azaceta and the colouring by Elizabeth Breitweiser. Since I got drawn back in, I've caught up with the collected editions, and I'm just as impressed with the writing -  it reads much better in longer chunks.

It's about a young guy called Kyle who's a pariah in his hometown because everybody thinks he beat his now-estranged wife and daughter. In fact, his wife was possessed by a demon-like entity and he was defending his daughter from her. His touch has the power to cast out the demons (usually involving considerably violence), but they seem to be attracted them to people close to him - his mother was possessed when he was a child and abused him. He eventually cast the demon out of her, but put her in a coma.

These possessions are on the increase, and the local pastor, Reverend John Anderson, who has an unshakeable faith in God even if he doesn't like him very much, is convinced they are actual demons from hell. Kyle doesn't believe in God, and wants to know what the demons are and what they want with him. The demons recognise him, and call him "Outcast" - either because he can cast them out, or because he's an outcast from his community, or both, or something else.

The storytelling is quite "decompressed" - it spends a lot of time on moments, which is great for building atmosphere and character, but means you don't get a lot of story per issue - that's why it reads better in collections. I haven't read much else from Kirkman - not a zombie fan, so I avoided The Walking Dead - but I'm very impressed with the slow build he's done in this series. We're close to the end - the most recent issue is 44, and Kirkman has announced that the series will end with issue 48 - and it's definitely building to a climax.

The art and colouring are fantastic - they're what drew me to the series. Paul Azaceta is a very naturalistic artist, not a million miles from David Mazzuchelli's stuff, probably heavily photo-referenced, with a heavy brush line that's full of character and gets looser as the series goes on. Elizabeth Breitweiser colours it in flat shapes with a textured, dry-brush effect, and very autumnal colours that break out into intense, bright colours in hightened moments. There's a fantastic sense of place - the small rural town it's set in is very convicingly rendered. A couple of examples from the first issue:





The covers are also awesome. My favourite is this one, from Volume 4:


#2
Books & Comics / Battle Stations, Starblazer
21 February, 2020, 09:55:57 PM
Picked up a couple of reprints of old digest comics this week - Hugo Pratt and Donne Avenell's Battle Stations, reprinted from Fleetway's War at Sea Picture Library, and DC Thomson's Starblazer Vol 1.



Battle Stations is the classier of the two, both in packaging and content. Starblazer has a pretty cool cover by Neil Roberts, but it's cool in a pretty trashy kind of way. Battle Stations looks rather artier.

I've never read any of the Fleetway war libraries, but the obvious point of comparison is Commando, which is still going. If this is anything to go by, The Fleetway Libraries are a bit better written, with a sense that the writer's been there. Donne Avenell's bio at the back of the book says he served in the Navy in WWII, and he gives the story a sense of authenticity. Also, as a lettering nerd, I appreciate the difference hand lettering makes.

But of course, the main appeal of the book is Hugo Pratt's art, which is gorgeous. This is early work, so he doesn't quite have the lightness of touch he developed on Corto Maltese, but you can see why Carlos Ezquerra called this guy one of his gods. He's the missing link between Alex Toth and Eddie Campbell, with the looseness and the insane slashes of black. I mean, just look at this:



I'll definitely be picking up future Pratt reprints.

On to Starblazer. It features two stories: "Operation Overkill" by Grant Morrison and Enrique Alcatena, and "Jaws of Death" by D. Broadbent and Mick McMahon. "Operation Overkill" is clearly very early work from both Morrison and Alcatena, because it's terrible. "Jaws of Death" is better, mostly because it's drawn by McMahon in what looks like his "Block Mania" period, but the storytelling and dialogue are also a bit less clunky.



I think DC Thomson should consider giving some of the best Commando stories the Battle Stations treatment - and if it was down to me I'd focus on the best Commando artist, Gordon Livingstone.

#3
Books & Comics / Sector 13 issue 6 is here!
20 December, 2019, 01:21:29 PM
The new issue of Sector 13 has arrived back from the printers and is available from Box of Rain!



The big news is that this issue features a nine-page fantasy strip, Horse Sense, by 2000AD artist and Game of Thrones storyboarder Will Simpson.



Also features the latest photostrip by Peter Duncan and Laurence McKenna, featuring the Sector 13 cosplay gang, as well as a spin-off strip featuring some of the photostrip characters, drawn by the marvellous Scott Twells.

Julia Round, author of Gothic for Girls, an academic study of the legendary girls' horror comic Misty, has contributed a strip in that vein called Borrowed Time, drawn by Morgan Brinksman. There are a couple of Future Shock-type shorts, Coltard the Conqueror by Glenn Matchett and Cat Byrne, and Lethal Weapons by Ed Whiting and Mike Slattery.

And (puts on self-promoting hat) there's a Strontium Dogs story, Raw Silence, written by W. D. McQuaid and drawn by me. We've created two new SD agents, Billy Camo, whose mutation gives him camouflage ability, and Hurt Box, who can redistribute sensations - basically, if you hit her, she can make you feel the pain. W. D. has already written another story featuring the same characters, which I'm about to start work on.



You know you want a copy!
#4
Books & Comics / The Cattle Raid of Cooley graphic novel
13 September, 2019, 05:59:41 PM
Sláine fans who want to go a bit deeper into the source material might be interested in the collected edition of The Cattle Raid of Cooley. It stars Cú Chulainn, the legendary Irish hero Pat Mills' barbarian is partially based on. You'll probably know a few things about the character, but you might not know much of his story. Well, The Cattle Raid of Cooley is the main event. Here, as a sixteen-year-old rookie border guard, he defends Ulster alone (other than his charioteer Láeg) against an invading army, led by queen Medb (another name you may be familiar with from Sláine) of Connacht.



It's a full-length graphic novel, 270 pages plus endnotes, and is available to buy from my website.

Also available is a new edition of Ness, a shorter story (72 pages plus notes) set a couple of generations earlier - Ness is Cú Chulainn's grandmother. Previously published at A5 size and in black and white, this new, larger edition is printed, like The Cattle Raid of Cooley, as originally drawn, in red ink. There are excerpts of both books on my website.

And if you're in Northern Ireland tomorrow, Saturday 14 September, and can make it to Omagh Comic Fest at the Strule Arts Centre, Omagh, you can buy copies from me at my table. Hope to see at some Squaxx there!
#5
General / Mike Dorey - anybody know anything about him?
07 October, 2012, 12:59:34 PM
As per the subject heading - anybody know anything about Mike Dorey? He drew easily the best Bill Savage in Invasion - while Carlos Pino and the others drew him as a standard square-jawed tough guy, Dorey's Savage was a grinning nutter who all the posh softies in the resistance were right not to trust. It's thanks to him having worked for 2000AD - on Ro-Busters and MACH Zero most memorably - that I know his name, and I can spot his unmistakable style on other comics - Hellman of Hammer Force in Action and Battle and Sergeant Rayker in Warlord come to mind. But I can't find any biographical information on him. I need to know these things, dammit.
#6
General / looking for John Wagner quote
15 September, 2012, 11:03:48 AM
Okay, so one of the symptoms of my nerdiness is writing for Wikipedia, the ultimate "someone is wrong on the internet" site. My latest effort is a complete rewrite on John Wagner, which I think, even if I say so myself, is now a pretty unassailable article. However, there's one thing I wanted to include but can't because I can't source it. I'm pretty sure I've read somewhere John saying something along the lines of "if it's not funny, it's not a comic" - hence even his grimmest stories have humour in them. Anybody have any idea where he might have said that, or if I'm imagining it?
#7
The Daily Mash, one of my favourite satire sites, reports that "Tharg, full name Tharg the Mighty" has been using his psychic abilities to tap the minds of writers to get storylines for Judge Dredd. His accusers include "Alan Moore, Grant Morrison and other very grounded individuals with little or no drugs experience".
#8
Irish Comic News, the indispensable hub site for comics from both bits of Ireland, is celebrating its first birthday this week, and today is running a competition to win an original PJ Holden Judge Dredd drawing that he hasn't finished yet!



Still open: win original Half Past Danger art by Stephen Mooney, and a Transformers sketch by Nick Roche! Get 'em while they're hot!



#9
This time it's Red Star Robinson from the 1976 Hotspur annual.

#10
The Yellowed Pages, an excellent blog of scanned old comics, has just posted the first appearance of Union Jack Jackson in the Hotspur, back when the Hotspur was still a story paper and not a comic, in 1957. The cover's not quite as polished or assured as his later work, but it's unmistakably Ron Smith!

#11
Irish Comic News, a great site that covers the comics scene on both sides of the Irish border, announces the 2011 ICN Awards and is open for nominations!

There are categories for creators and comics in the self-published, mainstream publication and web fields, as well as for websites and comic shops, and a Hall of Fame section. so if you want to nominate Garth Ennis for his US-published stuff, Davy Francis for his work on classic UK kids' comic Oink!, Anna Fitzpatrick for her gorgeous digital painting on Between Worlds, or John Robbins for his hard hitting shorts and self-published anthologies - or, indeed, for me - please feel free.

And if you're struggling to think of who to vote for, why not browse the Irish Comics Wiki for ideas? But Irish creators who have worked for Tooth and the Meg include:


  • Bob Byrne
  • Michael Carroll
  • Rufus Dayglo
  • Garth Ennis
  • Charlie Gillespie
  • PJ Holden
  • John McCrea
  • Len O'Grady
  • Kilian Plunkett
  • Dermot Power
  • Hilary Robinson
  • Will Simpson

Then there's Richmond Clements of Zarjaz, David McDonald & Co from Hibernia Press...
#12
Prog / Things to come... Savage!
25 February, 2004, 01:22:14 AM
Having read the Invasion special edition (and gained a deeper appreciation of Armoured Gideon III), I'm now eagerly awaiting what Pat Mills will do with the character in his new "Savage" series. When the master returns to his greatest creation, I predict...

The Volgan high command will turn out to be secretly the latest incarnation of the amphibious Annunaki elder-god types who created mankind, and have preserved their bloodline for millenia, manipulating world affairs from behind the scenes, and conspiring with their cold, reptilian logic to stop us all having any fun. Their queen is Rosa Volgaska, who's been keeping Big Nessie McNairn in deathless torment in her underwater lair halfway to Canada.

King Charles is also one of them, much to the horror of his son, Prince John, who's been infected by humanity after hanging out with Savage all those years ago. The king is leading a campaign for British people to love the Volgans, which everyone (especially the posh softies) goes along with, with the noble exception of our favourite hard man.

To defeat this ancient conspiracy, Savage must live up to his name, cast off the last vestiges of civilisation (which are pretty damn vestigial already, it has to be said), become the ultimate beast-man, and usher in a new golden age of free love, female treachery and male mindless violence. Oh, and king Charles will be the, er, butt of numerous hilarious jokes about taking it up the arse.

You wait and see...