Daily OCD: 5/13/09

Your Online Commentary and Diversions for the day:

• Review: "It’s great to read comics that are fun, inventive, and delighting in the medium instead of dour, 'relevant,' and procedural. Supermen is a teasing look at a truly Golden Age." – Dave Lartigue, Dave Ex Machina

• Review: "Never before reprinted, Fantagraphics recently collected Humbug, complete with new essays, interviews, and annotations, in two handsome hardback volumes. […] Jack Davis and Will Elder… elevated the comic-book parody beyond the standards of Mad and Trump. For Humbug, Davis produced some of the best work of his long career. Al Jaffee… tackled varied topics… all with equal skill and irreverence…" – Rick Klaw, San Antonio Current

• Review: "Blazing Combat… features a collection of some of the most beautiful black and white comic art you have ever seen… It also features interviews and some of the most beautiful printing I have seen. Honestly, put down those monthly comics for a week and buy something you will enjoy a lifetime. From cover to cover, this book is what keeps me in comics." – Jimmy Palmiotti, Newsarama

• Review: "Supermen! The First Wave of Comic Book Heroes 1936-1941 is the book I've been waiting for – a crazed whirlwind tour through the raw badlands of early superheroes, the best and the weirdest of the early days… Fantagraphics Books has assembled 20 of these quirky gems into a nicely designed, affordable full-color paperback. It's like a roadmap of alternative history, where you can imagine that a character like Stardust the Super Wizard became a star… It's one of the best comic collections of the year. Bring on a sequel!" – Nik Dirga, Blogcritics

• Plug: "Castle Waiting Vol. II #15: …Linda Medley’s warm, winsome fantasy series continues at its relaxed pace." – Chris Mautner, Robot 6

• Profile: The University of Cincinnati describes how faculty member C. Tyler, inspired by her graphic memoir You'll Never Know, is teaming up her students with military veterans to tell the veterans' stories in comics format, in order to help veterans talk about their experiences and share them with the civilian public to increase awareness of veterans' issues

• Things to see: Insane comics from Turkey, presented by Johnny Ryan