It’s come the time that Fantagraphics Bookstore curator Larry Reid selects his favorite comix of the year. If this list seems somehow less cohesive than in the past, it’s testament to the creative and cultural diversity in current contemporary comix. That’s a good thing. These wonderful books, and many more amazing new titles that I absentmindedly overlooked here, can be found at Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery, located at 1201 S. Vale Street in the heart of Seattle’s historic Georgetown arts community. Open daily 11:30 to 8:00 PM, Sundays until 5:00 PM. Phone 206-557-4910. 20. Book of Weirdo. This oral history…
Re/Read: Four Color Fear
Re/Read in a recurring column by Fantagraphics Bookstore curator Larry Reid that examines backlist titles you may have missed or are worthy of another look. This time we’ll feature Four Color Fear: Forgotten Horror Comics of the 1950s. The sensational success of EC horror comics in midcentury America gave rise to a multitude of imitators. Four Color Fear collects the most compelling of these much-maligned comics. The book includes acknowledged masters of the medium, including Jack Cole, Basil Wolverton, Al Williamson, Wallace Wood, Reed Crandall, and Joe Kubert, but it’s the back bench artists and anonymous writers that make this anthology…
The Wolverton Bible – Foreword: “A Shot in the Liver, A Shot to the Soul” by Grant Geissman
{mosimage}{product_snapshot:id=1552,true,false,true,right} here are legions of fans of the work of Basil Wolverton, stretching across many generations. There are admirers of his earliest work in the comic books, including “Spacehawk” (which began to appear in 1940 in Target Comics) and “Powerhouse Pepper,” the wacky, off-the-wall humor feature Wolverton created in 1942 for Stan Lee’s Timely Comics. {mosimage} There are fans of “Lena the Hyena, the ugliest woman in Lower Slobovia,” the crazily hideous image that was Wolverton’s winning entry in the 1946 contest United Features sponsored on behalf of Al Capp’s “Li’l Abner” strip. There are enthusiasts of Wolverton’s numerous 1940s…
The Wolverton Bible – Introduction: “Wolverton and Armstrong” by Monte Wolverton
{mosimage}{product_snapshot:id=1552,true,false,true,right} asil Wolverton, my father (who I will respectfully refer to as Wolverton throughout this book), was a unique cartoonist and illustrator, known for his extreme, otherworldly creatures, spaghetti-like hair, smoothly sculpted faces and figures and insanely detailed pen-and-ink work. Born in Oregon in 1909, Wolverton pitched his first comic strip to a syndicate at the age of 16. But it was 13 years later before he would sell his first comic features to the new media of comic books. “Disk-Eyes the Detective” and “Spacehawks” were published in 1938 in Circus Comics. in 1940, “Spacehawk” (a different and improved feature)…
