"Indie" Comics: Search and...

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Destroy?!?...No way! Comics should be sealed in little plastic bags and stored in a cool dry place.

Used Indie coz I couldn't think of a better word! You know the comics produced by Fantagraphics, Drawn & Quarterly etc...

Search:
1) Quit Your Job - James Kochalka: the story of a guy who finds a magic ring, quits his job and allows his talking to cat to join teh space programme. ,br> 2) Monica's Story - Anonymous, James Kochalka, Tom Hart: the comic adaptation of the Monica Lewinsky affair. Cute and funny. Proceeds from this comic went unsurprisingly the the Comic Book Legal Defence Fund.
3) The Poor Bastard - Joe Matt: there is such a thing as too honest. This guy is severly addicted to porn, pisses in a jar, and treats his girlfriend badly. Not a role model, but hilarious.
4) Ghostworld - Daniel Clowes: Read this before you see the movie.

Also, check out the works of Debbie Drechsler and Seth.

― jel, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Breakfast After Noon. Excellent stuff.

― Pete, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I think the term most people use is comix. I never really got into this stuff when it hit the headlines alongside grunge/slackers, because I was already into comics and this stuff just wasn't my taste at the time (DC's Vertigo line, pretty much). In retrospect I may have been wrong about some of them. But they pretty much all get a lot of respect from hipsters.

Search: Daniel Clowes (Ghostworld, Like A Velvet Glove Cast In Iron, Eightball), Chester Brown (Yummy Fur, Underwater)

Destroy: Peter Bagge (yeah, I know, I'm a freak), all those goddamn autobiographical comics that went on and on and on forever about the boring lives their writer had.

If you like this stuff but wish they made it for actual grown-ups search: Anything by Will Eisner, particularly A Life Force.

― Andrew Farrell, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Destroy: STRANGERS IN PARADISE. I thought this was a really fantastic, mature, wonderful book until I realized that the entire thing was predicated on whether the frumpy female lead character was going to hop into bed with a man or a woman. YAWN.

I don't think I've read an independent comic that I've liked, actually. Including Cerebus.

― Dan Perry, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Search- Transmetropoltian, a very bitter therefore funny post apocolyptic dystopian satire

― anthony, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

If Vertigo comics count as independent, then search Transmet, 100 Bullets, assorted issues of Preacher, and Top 10 in the America's Best Comics imprint.

― Dan Perry, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Vertigo = DC Comics = Time Warner AOL = interesting definition of the word 'indie'.

Search: Schizo by Ivan Brunetti, The Acme Novelty Library by Chris Ware, Eightball by Dan Clowes, anything by R. Crumb, Peter Bagge, Jim Woodring, Chester Brown, Lynda Barry, Kim Deitch, Lewis Trondheim, Joe Matt, Debbie Dreschler, Sam Henderson, Gary Panter, Charles Burns.

Destroy: Cerebus, Strangers In Paradise, and all the other mainstream genre crap dressed up as 'alternative.' I also hate Seth's work - mister smug.

― Andrew L, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Yeah, that's why I didn't mention them in the first place.

All of the comics I really like are tied to majors: X-Force, New X- Men, Ultimate X-Men, Transmetropolitan, 100 Bullets, The Authority, and Planetary. I know I'm leaving out a title, but I can't think of what it would be. (Ultimate Spiderman is very good, too, but I don't buy it.)

― Dan Perry, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

But DeSade is printed by vintage and penguin these days. I do not care what people sat. DeSade will always be independent of the cannon. Its about content not distribtor.

― anthony, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

acme novelty library is terrible, and much more smug than seth.

― ethan, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Ethan, you are a disliker of things, aren't you?

― Nude Spock, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Los Bros Hernandez seem to be going unmentioned here…

― mark s, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Acme is spotty and Rusty Brown is a retread, but Jimmy Corrigan is all good -- and more than a bit heartbreaking. I don't get a smug feeling from that at all. If anything I sense Ware associates with JC more than sneers at him.

― scott p., Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

All the people Andrew L. mentioned are good & so's J.D. King, Dennis Eichorn (+ whoever's drawing for him, he just writes em), Julie Doucet, Pat Moriarty, Mary Fleener, Ken Weiner....I bet I left out heaps of people I like...jeez I ain't seen any new comix for ages, does this town even have a comix shop? I dunno.

― duane, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I used to really dig Al Columbia's Biologic Show. He was sinister. Also, I really liked Schizo but I can't remember the guy's name. Well, to a certain point, I liked Schizo. It gets a bit overwhelmingly depressing, but that's the point. Still, there's better things to give your attention to.

― Nude spock, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Ethan's disliking of the grand and glorious production that is the Acme Novelty Library is alas a sign that he should be killed. No offense, you understand.

Peter Bagge made perfect sense for the first half of the nineties and I see no reason to change my opinion. Daniel Clowes when on is very very on. Bob Fingerman is my absolute favorite -- Minimum Wage isn't autobiographical per se but draws on life well and to the point reminds me of exactly how people really talk, interact, think, etc. much more so than any other series. Meanwhile, Mary Fleenor is flat out godlike (or should that be goddesslike?).

More later, but those are starting points.

― Ned Raggett, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Los Bros Hernandez seem to be going unmentioned here…

Was going to mention them, then realised I hadn't actually read a new issue of Love and Rockets for nearly ten years. I mean, they're obv. ground-breaking, seminal, 'influential' etc. etc. but the increasing complexity of their 'universe'/continuity, coupled w/ a v. erratic publishing schedule, meant I kind of gave up on 'em after a while. I always thought Jamie was the true star of the partnership - a much better artist than his brother, and seemingly less in thrall to the literary values of magic realism etc. I suppose the collections are the way to go...

― Andrew L, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

no 'offense' ned, but acme novelty library is the kind of comic that only impresses slow- witted teenagers and wannabe spin editors. it's all ugly package and no content (or more accurately, trite mtv-ready content), the whole thing is just simply awful, as is anyone who was fooled by it. so really i just think you should be brutally killed regardless, ";-)".

― ethan, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

What do you guys think of the Blackhole series?...A good idea going nowhere fast?...

― jel, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Well, I could edit Spin with my hands chopped off and my eyes gouged out, so I guess I'm impressed. ;-) I found it quite moving at its best, and is very rewarding with a detailed rereading at that. It would make a great film as well, I figure.

― Ned Raggett, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Considering the Jimmy Corrigan story is easily one of the most involved and detailed narratives (in the sense of say Flaubert, rather than a Kirby Fourth World saga with its endless twists and turns), I fail to see the style vs. subtance argument. (If you're talking about the oversized "Book of Jokes"-style issues, then there's a probable argument to be made, although I fall into the camp of seeing nothing wrong with investigating the formal properties of the medium rather than telling a "story" per se.) I believe Ware to be the best artist of "his" generation (a sort of vague area between Hernandez, Clowes, et al and the new generation of Kolchaka, Ralph etc.) I'll post something more thoughtful (ha!) later on tonight when I don't have vendors breathing down my neck...

― jess, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

That should be "story is easily one of the most involved and detailed narratives" *set down in comics*...

― jess, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Re: Hernandez's

Love and Rockets is really one of those series you do have to start out at the beginning to appreciate (or hell, even follow.) So search Vol. 1 "Music For Mechanics" to start, the follow the trail to...I think they're up to 17 now? The "masterpieces" are vol. 8 "Blood Of Palomar", Vol. 11 "Wig Wam Bam", and Vol. 12 "Poison River."

― jess, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

ned, you should have just posted that in the first place instead of that 'ethan should be killed' nonsense!

― ethan, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

*You're* complaining about goofy insults now? Are you all right?

― Ned Raggett, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

;-)

― ethan, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

comics as film analogy = dud, in my opinion, for a number of reasons.

spinning off acme novelty/chris ware, um, discussion...

comics as poetry comics as (silent) music/music notation

discuss.

― jess, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Well, you couldn't perfectly translate Acme to film, even in animated form. But I honestly think that if treated as story material and also in terms of its overall pace and glazed slow-flow, something could be done. But it would have to be very understated.

― Ned Raggett, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Beto Hernandez roxor, Terry LaBan, Carol Lay, er (haven't bought a comic for some years....) What was that really obnoxo thing on fantagraphics, where an aquaintance ov thee author sent a death threat to george bush thee elder (but not smarter)in his name, and he got investigated by the FBI? IIRC, his mother told the feebs that he had probably sent it, based on his ultra-nihilistic comix (sample story - someone shoots himself - 2 pages of the same pic of bloodstained body - last frame thought bubble "my god, there really is nothing!") chester brown, matt howarth (in small doses) - er...that's all I can think of right now.

xoxo

― Norman Fay, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I like lots of the people mentioned above the _Drawn & Quarterly_ series. It's a visual and tactile treat. Also, I see someone mentioned Ivan Brunetti - I loved the Schizos, but has he done more than two or three? Occasionally he has a piece in one of our weekly free papers. Incidentally, he is the webmaster at my employer.

― Kerry, Monday, 10 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I'm surprised no one has mentioned anything about Dark Horse Comics yet, especially considering all the Buffy fans around here. They do a lot of so-so property work, like Alien/Predator and the various Buffy titles, but their "Dark Horse Presents" series was a seminal outlet for a lot of great independent artists. And they published a great series by one of my faves, Mike Mignola, called "Hellboy." That's brilliant stuff, right there.

― BrianR, Tuesday, 11 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Hey does anyone remember WEIRDO, that was boss. It's where I got into most of the ppl that went on to be my favs...who was the best WEIRDO ed? Crumb? Bagge? Aline Kominsky-Crumb (oooh forget to mench. before, hot damn hot dog she is GREAT too)? my answ: they were ALL the best! also : WEIRDO or RAW? fucken WEIRDO man!

― duane, Tuesday, 11 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Norman, think you mean 'Jizz' by Scott Russo.

― Wannabe Spin Editor, Tuesday, 11 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

i think there should be some sort of tally made of all the insults of mine that have been turned around and worn proudly, it's bizarre. does in review still have the tagline '(something) for short attention span elitists'?

― ethan, Tuesday, 11 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

ah, the ultimate 80s comics argument: raw vs. weirdo. ;)

i still go with raw.

::ducks::

(unless we're talking about the crumb stories alone.)

― jess, Tuesday, 11 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I only have 3 Schizos! I was under the impression he might have killed himself... Those issues were PACKED, though. Ivan's a webmaster, huh? That reminds me of the cartoon in which he is caught Xeroxing his drawings of decapitated kids and stuff. Funny!

― Nude Spock, Tuesday, 11 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

five months pass...

has anybody seen the "Young Jeffrey Dahmer" strip on some comic guys's website - he does a syndicated thing in some papers, and he went to school with Jeff and humg out with him in a kind of gaywad/dorkwad/psychowad alliance. (everybody who was left after all the real peergroups had been organised)

I'm going to send this message several times so it appears no the new answers board. HAAAAHaahAhAHaHaHaHaH. the power.