Fantagraphics Blog Mike Baehr

Today's Online Commentary & Diversions: • Interview: At The Believer's blog, part 3 of Ross Simonini's 2008 chat with Jim Woodring: "[Frank]’s an agent representing my interests, my perspective. The world is never a settled matter to him. He’s always trying to discover what is really going on, and when he does find out, he gets a terrible jolt. Sometimes he is driven beyond the limits of sanity. As William Burroughs said: a schizophrenic is a guy who has just discovered what is really going on. That’s a paraphrase." • Review: "The Peanuts of 1981 was an utterly professional entertainment…

It's a big, big week for Young Romance: The Best of Simon & Kirby's Romance Comics editor Michel Gagne: not only does his labor-of-love book come out this week after years in development, he's also won the highly prestigious 2011 International Animated Film Society Annie Award ("Animation's Highest Honor") for Best Animated Video Game for his creation Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet! Congratulations Michel! (And hey, Eric Reynolds won for his work on that new Planet of the Apes movie! I didn't know you were moonlightin' in Hollywood, Eric… Oh, a different Eric Reynolds? Never mind.)

Today's Online Commentary & Diversions: • Review: "While other colleagues have seen their short stories and graphic novels draw serious attention in literary circles, Griffith remains the 'Are we having fun yet?' guy to many. Perhaps the long-overdue collection Lost and Found: Comics 1969-2003 will change that. Leaning heavily on the stories Griffith drew in the early ’70s for undergrounds like Young Lust, Short Order Comix, and the revolutionary Arcade, Lost and Found shows off more facets of Griffith, putting his obsessions with Hollywood, suburbia, and a certain type of corporate cockiness into a larger context." – Noel Murray, The…

We are overjoyed to welcome two prodigal sons back to the Fantagraphics fold: Mike Catron (pictured), who co-founded Fantagraphics with Gary Groth in 1976, rejoins us as an editor, and O.G. staffer Preston White returns to our art department. The Comics Reporter's Tom Spurgeon has all the scoop, and he also talked with Mike about what his new position entails and what he's been up to in the meantime: "So all of a sudden, the original four of us are together again, like the fabled Musketeers. (Everyone does know there were four, right?) The stars, after all these years, finally…

Today's Online Commentary & Diversions (none yesterday): • Review: "If Spielberg shed the skin of Hergé’s style in an effort to get to the heart of his stories, the compelling work of Dutch cartoonist Joost Swarte performs the procedure in reverse…. Swarte, equally inspired by the underground comix that emerged from the American counterculture of the 1960s and ’70s, adapted the clear line and reanimated it with subversive content unlike the perennially chipper Boy Scoutism of Hergé’s Tintin. …Is That All There Is?, collecting the bulk of his comics oeuvre to date (excluding a body of children’s comics), provides an…

Running a little thin this week — our only exclusive update is Nicolas Mahler's Angelman — but we've got the usual links to strips from around the web: — Angelman by Nicolas Mahler (view at original size): And elsewhere: The All-New Cartoon Boy Adventure Hour by John Kerschbaum at ACT-I-VATE: Amazing Facts… and Beyond! with Leon Beyond by Kevin Huizenga: Belligerent Piano by Tim Lane: Forming by Jesse Moynihan: Humblug by Arnold Roth (two new updates): Maakies by Tony Millionaire (and anonymous photographers): The Pain — When Will It End? (plus answers to last week's "Ghandi or Batman?") by Tim…

Woo, great big Drew Friedman illustration in today's The Wall Street Journal! Stepping in the dip is a party foul, Madonna.

It's still over 8 months away but the Alternative Press Expo folks are wasting no time in announcing their first batch of special guests, including 3 Hernandez Brothers (Gilbert, Jaime & Mario), continuing their Love and Rockets 30th Anniversary U.S. Domination Tour (not the actual name of the tour), and the one and only Jim Woodring, debuting (knock on wood) his new book Problematic: Selected Sketchbook Drawings 2004-2011! Mark your calendars for October 13-14 at the Concourse in San Francisco, and stay tuned for future news and updates!

It's true: in a couple of weeks Gary Groth hops a plane to New Delhi and meets up with Robert Crumb for the 2nd Annual Indian Comics Convention at Dilli Haat! On Saturday February 18th, Gary gives a special talk about the evolution of alternative comics in America and the history of Fantagraphics. And on Sunday February 19th, Gary leads a live conversation with special guest of honor Robert Crumb for what promises to be an illuminating and entertaining look at the life and work of one of comics' all-time greats. Will there be photos of Gary, Crumb and Drawn…