Fantagraphics Blog

I've seen a few bloggers link to my comicon post yesterday and say it's a huge red flag for the future of indie comics at the con. Re-reading my post, it probably sounds more dire than it could have. We actually had a pretty successful show. Not our best ever, but a solid one. I think last year was our most successful ever, and you simply can't repeat that every year. I had been steeling myself in advance for a major downturn this year given the economy and it simply didn't happen. We saw a minor dip, and although the economy likely played a…

Another big Fanta week at comic shops! Look for the following titles on the shelves of your preferred emporium: The Complete Peanuts 1973-1974 (Vol. 12) by Charles M. Schulz The Complete Peanuts 1971-1974 Box Set by Charles M. Schulz The Complete Crumb Comics Vol. 9 by Robert Crumb Mome Vol. 15 – Summer 2009 Skin Deep (New Softcover Edition) by Charles Burns We always recommend contacting your local shop to confirm availability, and hit our handy links up there to get more info on each title. Happy Wednesday hunting.

More Online Commentary & Diversions from yesterday, today and last week — and thus we are caught up: • Review: Comicdom reviews Tales Designed to Thrizzle Vol. 1 by Michael Kupperman in Greek; Google attempts to translate • Plug: Certain Fantagraphics employees will be excited to learn that Noel Fielding of The Mighty Boosh is a fan of Daniel Clowes and Eightball, as revealed in Brian Heater's interview at The Daily Cross Hatch • Plug: "You Shall Die by Your Own Evil Creation!, the second and final collection of Fletcher Hanks’ Golden Age superhero and adventure comics work, …is a…

Ace Hal Foster biographer Brian M. Kane (author of the forthcoming Definitive Prince Valiant Companion from Fantagraphics) just pointed out a fascinating fact to us: The Syndicate color proofs that we are using for the first time for our brand new edition of Prince Valiant have yielded at least one instance of a page that was originally toned down (presumably by the Syndicate) and has, in the 71 years since then, never been printed in Foster's original, unexpurgated, slightly more bloodthirsty version! Compare and contrast these two versions of page 50: While panel 3 is essentially the same in terms…

Every year when much of the staff heads down to San Diego, there are always a few poor souls who have to stay behind and (theoretically) hold down the fort, answer phones, get books out the door to printers, etc. But how much work really gets done? This year we installed hidden cameras and decided to monitor the emails of those who stuck around. It's not pretty: If you see a sudden surge in sloppily produced books from Fanta in about three months, you'll know it was because the entire art dept (including Adam Grano, above) worked drunk during Comicon…

Between Mike Baehr's excellent tweeting all weekend, and Mike and Jason Miles' most excellent collection of photos from the weekend (which I'm sure you'll be seeing as the week unfolds), I don't feel compelled to write a proper con "report" but I do have a few observations. Although we had a good show and I personally had a pretty good time, this was the first year I felt the weight of Hollywood's cult of celebrity encroaching not only on the exhibit hall but also the sales of at least the independent publisher area we inhabited. The pre-show hype of advance…

Oh boy, let's start our post-Comic-Con Online Commentary & Diversions catch-up: • Comic-Con: Coverage of our con announcements and happenings from Douglas Wolk for Rolling Stone, Paul Constant at The Stranger, and Chris Mautner of Robot 6 • Review: "…Jason elevates his skewering of filmic genres to a whole new level in his latest collection, Low Moon, which sees his unique takes on film noir, westerns and screwball comedy.  All of the tales are informed by his signature clean lines, bright colors, sparse dialogue and taste for a particularly brutal brand of slapstick humor and occasional moments of dark, incisive…

No, not the one you might first think of; rather, Chicago journalist and friend of Paul Hornschemeier, who co-stars in the video (via Paul's blog):

Word comes to us that La educación de Hopey Glass, the Spanish edition of The Education of Hopey Glass by Jaime Hernandez, has been awarded another Spanish festival prize, being named Best Foreign Work at the Comic Festival of Benalmádena (Málaga). Congratulations Jaime!

While we were at Comic-Con, where Irwin Chusid's brother coincidentally works and stopped by to say hi, Irwin sent the following announcement about a new Jim Flora fine art print: Jim Flora Art has released a limited edition fine art print of a 1960 tempera titled BIG EVENING. The hyperactive tableau depicts a cavalcade of misshapen, multi-eyed mutants with bonus body parts. People just like you!  Only 25 prints were produced for this edition. Details: http://tinyurl.com/big-evening Previous prints: http://jimflora.com/fineartworks.html