Tuesday, October 31, 2017

ALL STAR RECOMMENDS FOR OCTOBER 31ST


ALL STAR RECOMMENDS FOR OCTOBER 31ST
Monsters Within, Monsters Without: 10,000 Pages of Kazuo Umezu
By Cameron Ashley

Happy Halloween!

Life has wedged itself firmly in the way of the production and scheduling of this column, but here we are back on this most spooky of days. Me being busy and all, I totally botched the fact that I wouldn't back for Halloween and so a ready-to-go column was shelved and the little number below that I wrote several years back for somewhere else was dusted off and hastily reanimated for the occasion. Hardly a triumphant return to the virtual pages of All Star Recommends, but an appropriate one as it's a lengthy look at the work of an undisputed master of horror comics, the profoundly influential Kazuo Umezu.

Have a super scary day and regular service will resume shortly.

COMICS OF THE WEEK: SELECTED WORKS BY KAZUO UMEZU




It was in 2003, during a three-year stint teaching English in Japan, that I first encountered the work of Kazuo Umezu. A student of mine named Hiroko grew up worshipping Umezu’s manga and she told me, if you’ll allow me to paraphrase, of the creepiness of his stories, their suspense, the ability of their author to tap into something quite deep rooted and quintessentially Japanese. She promised to find something for me; a story titled “Snake Girl”, a personal favourite of hers, and translate it.
Several weeks later, Hiroko had tracked down a chunky, second-hand copy of something apparently called Bizareness!  that contained within its yellowing pages the multi-generational tale of a family battling a snake monster, ‘Snake Girl.’ She had translated every single caption, every word balloon, every thought bubble in pencil in the margins of the page and gutters of the panels, and did a pretty good job, lacking only in some grammar and natural expression that a professional translator would give the work. To this day it’s one of my favourite possessions.

I opened it up to find a title page featuring a little doe-eyed girl in a polka dot dress running for her life from some kimono-clad, slithering, one-eyed reptile woman.  My initial impressions were that although the image was striking, well composed, dramatically lit, it far too was stupid and cutesy to work effectively as horror. Like the work of Astro Boy creator and Manga-God Osamu Tezuka (a huge influence on Umezu) only with thicker lines and a much more dominant use of blacks and trippy, pattered backdrops. I flipped through it – more doe-eyed, schoolgirl sailor outfitted girls, eyes glimmering like a picture of the cosmos, adorably clutching their undoubtedly weighty schoolbags in front of them.

This was the Godfather of Japanese Horror comics?
Well, actually, yes.

There is no doubt Umezu’s story structures have dated. His narratives are frequently derailed by ludicrous coincidental plot twists, often in place to wrap up a short work with an “EC-style” shock, and massive amounts of exposition. However, what I discovered upon reading ‘Snake Girl,’ was that smuggled into all this cutesiness was a genuine sense of the weird and a remarkable skill for composing dramatic and seriously unsettling sequences. There is a structural theory that, in genre comics anyway, it’s not just your chapter cliff-hangers you need to worry about when creating a serialised comic book – each page should contain its own cliff-hanger, propelling both narrative and reader onward, deeper into the plot and the two-dimensional universe created on the page.  I’d put Umezu’s ability to do this up against pretty much anybody, particularly through his set up of monster reveals, impending violence/shocks or utterly outlandish plot twists.

 In the Grant Morrison: Talking With Gods documentary, Richard Metzger describes the Scottish writer’s comics as a “candy-coated bullet.” There is no analogy more fitting for Umezu’s work than this, except that it’s perhaps actually more like a candy-coated Howitzer round.  It’s Umezu’s early background in Shojo manga (essentially cute manga for girls) that I suspect is the source of the oddness. True, Osamu Tezuka drew many “mature” works as well, but never with the same surrealist flourishes or visceral gruesomeness.  In an interview with The Comics Journal, Umezu said, “I drew girls very cute, very lovely looking. Maybe people liked the stories because they liked the looks of the girls who were astonishing. I had a technique where, when you turned the page, a horrible scene would hit you. After that, I received many letters from readers saying they were afraid to go to the toilet.” (1)

 It’s not just about the “horrible scene” though, anyone can do that. It’s about the set-up to the horror and it is here that Umezu is a master. His “cute” Shojo-esque characters are seemingly designed to throw the reader off the scent. When dropped into dark, disturbing and frequently nonsensical situations, rendered with a pen that somehow inks from the collective unconscious of the ten year-old, readers may find themselves slightly ill at ease without knowing exactly why.  The best analogy I can think of is this: imagine Child-You picked up an issue of old Dan DeCarlo Archie to find its open-faced happy-go-lucky, “oh gee, which girl do I go for” characters being crucified, stabbed, stalked by hideous shadow twins from the other side of the mirror, eyed off through window-slits by cyclopean creatures with a generational grudge, stranded in far futures where adult supervision turns homicidal and witness to Jughead’s maiming and subsequent suicide attempts.  A litany of twisted psychological horrors waits beneath the pretty pictures. Umezu’s frequent use of checked and psychedelic swirling Zip-a-tone backgrounds (a technique this comics grandpa dearly misses in this age of lurid colours and computer effect motion blurs) not only heightens the oddness but provides some truly retro deliciousness. At his best, his work reads like the demented collaboration of David Cronenberg, JG Ballard in early environmental disaster mode, David Lynch and Jack Kirby. At its worst, it’s the wall-scrawling of a homicidal ten-year old, which is a pretty fascinating worst case scenario when you think about it.

A true celebrity at home, “Kazz” (as Umezu is known) was born September 3, 1936 and, from all accounts, did pretty much nothing but draw from the moment he was first able to hold a pencil. He barely eats, fronts a rock band, has a festival named after him, and it is apparently good luck to see him wandering around his western Tokyo neighbourhood (2).  He lives in a candy-striped home, matching his outfits, and has the wide, open grin of one of his young protagonists.  Clearly stricken with a Peter Pan complex, Umezu seems to revere childhood the way Michael Jackson did only without the creepiness – which is strange considering the nature of much of his work. Whilst it is true that Umezu has done much more than pure horror (notably with a stint adapting the adventures of Japanese superhero Ultraman and his gag strip featuring the “scatalogically-obsessed wild child” (3) Makoto-Chan which became a merchandising sensation), there’s no denying that horror is where he is most effective. Upon soaking up his huge body of work, the reader will find more than just snake monsters and genetically mutated, sentient chicken meat, they will find some pretty ubiquitous childhood fears splashed across the black and white pages – ugliness, deformation, alienation, rejection, vanity, sibling rivalry, generational chasms, authority figures gone mad.

Never fear though, kids, for the playful Umezu, now eighty-one years old, constantly smiling and clad in candy stripes, is still totally on your side. He loves scaring you, feels “close” to you when he does so. It’s pretty rare you can trust anyone over ten in Umezu’s world and even then our teen heroes and heroines better watch their backs.


“Snake Girl” was collected with two other tales of the terrifying reptile woman, “Scared of Mama” and its direct sequel “The Spotted Girl”, in 2000 (from stories created in the late ‘60s) and subsequently in English in 2007 by American publisher IDW. Australian-born artist Ashley Wood was chosen by IDW to provide a cover to the English edition of Reptilia and Wood’s dark and striking painting is effective, if stylistically opposed to the contents within. IDW's Reptilia is a treat, with the opening two stories being classic Umezu and trying directly into the events of “Snake Girl” (or “Reptilia” as it is known in this edition). In “Scared of Mama”, the snake woman is locked away in a hidden ward of a hospital where young Yumiko’s mother is recovering from an accident. The Snake Woman escapes from her cell and, noticing the striking resemblance to Yumiko’s mother, switches places with her and begins to assume her life. This is a frequent story trick Umezu uses – the parent as literally other from the child and as we shall see as we work our way through Umezu’s catalogue, one that never fails to be effective: what imaginative child has never once wondered if his or her parents were really their own?

Of course, Yumiko knows what’s going on here and, of course, she is the only member of her family who sees the snake woman show signs of her true self – scales appearing on a shoulder blade, mouth creeping upwards in a snake-like “smile”. Nobody believes her, naturally, and it’s up to Yumiko to expose this monster on her own. From there, Yumiko is sent to stay with her cousin Kyoko in “The Spotted Girl,” only there’s a stowaway in her suitcase – the snake woman, escaped once more from what appears to be the Tokyo equivalent of Arkham Asylum’s revolving door system. Midoro Village, Kyoko’s home, is also the home of the snake woman (who lived in a now-dilapidated shack called The Snake House), and poor Yumiko is up against it big-time here as the snake woman’s venom turns out to be a virus which turns the infected reptilian. With an entire village scared of snakes, this time the adults not only disbelieve Yumiko, they blame her for bringing the curse of the snake woman back down upon them, hunting the little girl and threatening to “capture and kill” her. Umezu’s in fine form here, ramping up the paranoia and the threats as her whole extended family is infected and out to get her.


Probably Umezu’s best-known work, the award-winning The Drifting Classroom was serialised in the manga title Weekly Shonen Sunday from 1972-1974. Despite being forty years old, the work still packs some serious impact. A Tokyo elementary school suffers a huge explosion and literally disappears without a trace, leaving nothing but a giant crater where it once stood.  While parents and authorities grieve and try to ascertain what happened, the school is somehow transported to a post-apocalyptic future Japan, where all is wasteland, pollution, natural disaster and monster.  Everything in this future is tainted – the landscape an ominous, inky mass of tumorous-looking dunes.
Umezu said of the work, “I didn’t want to express it, but behind my work I wanted to deal with pollution – exhaust gases, school boys and girls suffering from itchy eyes, etc. According to some radio shows, the cause of the itchy eyes was not because of the environment but because of the young people’s psychological problems.”  (4) Following the Fukushima disaster, the premise of the series is perhaps now even more potent than it was in the ‘70s and it will most likely be difficult for any modern reader to not consider the disaster when reading.

Spanning eleven collected volumes from publishers Viz, Umezu throws everything at his cast (led by sixth grade troublemaker Sho Takamura).  The adults, lacking the imaginative capacity to grasp this impossible circumstance, are the first to lose it – trusted teachers quickly turn homicidal and cafeteria worker, Sekiya, barricades himself in the school food storeroom, hording the food and fending off all assaults to remove him, killing adult and child alike with kitchen knives and cooking oil fires.


The kids, of course, start off the series as unified. They are imaginative and creative and, despite the panic, are able to process their bizarre circumstances far more rationally than their adult supervisors, tied to their textbook notions of time and space and the limited boundaries of the possible.
The story moves at a lightning fast pace and the kids are soon left to fend for themselves, with all the adults either dead or, in the case of Sekiya, imprisoned. Takamura quickly takes charge, the little rebel demonstrating an immediate gift of leadership, and with a democracy in place, the kids begin to both work out where they are and how they will survive. It’s of course not easy – plague, drought, flood, mutants, monsters and civil unrest all come their way. One threat appears just as the last is (barely) handled. Mistrust and misinformation spreads and the kids begin to turn on each other – paranoia leads to some terrible decision-making and mob mentality leading to, amongst other things, the crucifixion and immolation of a boy who is believed to be responsible for their circumstances.
Heavy shit for 1973.


Even though the pace is relentless, the series truly hits its stride with volume seven, where Umezu shifts the book into true body horror territory.  An odd, pimply-looking fungus sprouts everywhere the kids turn, overtaking the plants they’ve tried so hard to cultivate. To eat or not to eat, is the question, and of course several students (numbers whittled down by this point), decide to eat. The mushrooms quickly deform and mutate those who’ve partaken, leading to a showdown with weird looking posthuman mutants, the only truly intelligent life left on the planet.

The oddness continues – the kids worship a bust of Takamura’s mother (with whom he can communicate – his voice somehow echoing through time) as some sort of surrogate God-parent. Takamura’s mum has an odd arc of her own as, back in the ‘70s, she begins by  dealing with her grief, and ends up being able to communicate with her time-displaced boy and running all manner of crazy errands for him, planting packages everywhere for Sho to eventually find in the future. She even stashes a medical kit in the cadaver of a famous baseball player that the kids discover during their bizarre explorations of the terrain.

Spiralling into something like Lord of the Flies with monsters, from here the series gleefully nosedives into a parade of child-on-child horrors. Split into two camps, one for Takamura and one for his rival Otomo, a grisly battle for turf erupts and kids kill kids in a bloody war for food and shelter. Umezu never flinches away from the nastiness here – homemade axes slam into the heads of six year olds, vicious running spear-battles take place and, desperate for food, Otomo’s camp even descends into cannibalism. The sight of these once-cute, now haggard and psychotic little characters cooking each other is honestly a little hard to process. One Western reader even posted a review on Amazon saying he or she was going to quit the series at volume nine as the cruelty with which Umezu treats his characters was too much to bear. Viz should seriously use that as a blurb.

Perhaps traumatising a select group of readers further is the fact that The Drifting Classroom does not provide us with a happy ending – only a terse, resolutely Japanese decision to make the best of a bad situation and a future quite literally in the hands of our children.


The perils of vanity and the repugnance of physical deformation are another of Umezu’s obsessions.  In “The Mirror”, beautiful young Emi’s life is turned upside down when her reflection bursts free from her mirror and begins to usurp her life. In “Fear”, beautiful Momoko is terribly disfigured after an accident, and her younger sister Aiko, once ignored (Umezu loves his “Cinderellas”), now has to bring pretty classmates home whose faces Momoko intends to use as replacements for her own. Aiko, however, has her own secrets, and Umezu expertly twists the knife in this story of youth confronted by the sudden and life-altering nature of once beautiful flesh turned monstrous. The manger master says, “Fear is created when certain conditions are met. One of these is physical appearances. The more bizarre and ugly the imagery, the greater the fear.” (5)

Harbingers of doom and omens of peril also populate much of Umezu’s work, from the black butterfly beautiful young Megumi sees in the evil step-mother epic, “Butterfly Grave” (probably my personal favourite Umezu story) to Mutsumi’s paranormal ability to see a blue flame hovering above the head of those soon to die in “Blue Fire,” to Umezu’s enduring Cat-Eyed Boy, who has the misfortune to make “something frightening” happen wherever he appears.


 “Butterfly Grave” (reprinted in English by Dark Horse in Scary Book Vol.2: Insects) begins with the death of Megumi’s mother shortly after her daughter’s birth. As Megumi grows, she develops a crippling fear of butterflies that soon begin to appear to her right before death or accidents befall people around her. It’s a little like Poe mixed with Japanese schoolgirls and Kirby Krackle-like special effects with evil emanating from negative spaces. Umezu’s art is refined and surreal here, with black dappled butterflies displaying an affection for pointillism and inky smears and Megumi herself quivering in fear, ironically bug-eyed at times, her tremulousness indicated by fine twitching motion lines amid heavy black backdrops.

Of his atmospheric use of blacks, Umezu has said, “White indicates a lack of matter, while black shows an abundance. It makes you think that something is lurking just beyond, hidden in the blackness. We all know that there aren't any monsters or snake women lurking in the shadows. But the darkness creates the possibility that they might be!” (6)

Megumi senses that her new step-mother, an old flame of her father’s, is evil. This being Umezu of course, no adult believes her weird rants about “mother” being a butterfly, and she’s not – she just happens to have a hidden birthmark across her chest, exposed in the story’s climax, shaped like a blotchy butterfly that imprinted itself, in a fateful murderous moment, upon the infant Megumi’s psyche.


Then there’s poor Cat Eyed Boy. Cursed with the truly bad luck of either bringing misfortune or arriving somewhere just in time for misfortune, this little boy with the cat eyes and strange little black jumpsuit, cut off mid-thigh, is in a weird way Umezu’s Hulk – fated to wander Japan, ever looking for a home, he’s hated and feared by everybody who’s paths he crosses and blamed for every weird and horrific happenstance he’s in the slipstream of, just like poor Yukiko in the first two Reptilia stories.

Produced between 1967-1968, the near one thousand page series begins with Cat Eyed Boy in almost an EC-style narrator role as, like a cute Cryptkeeper, he emerges laughing from the shadows of an attic, seeming malevolent, but really just there to bear witness to the unfortunate story of a weird, regenerating zombie creature trying to take over a man’s family and fortune. Cat Eyed Boy ultimately solves this problem by burning down the family home. Now deprived of a place to sleep, he packs his bindle and hits the road.

Although he starts off as seemingly malevolent, or at the very least a trickster with a nasty streak, his origin reveals that he’s a forest-born cat goblin cursed with  too-human looks, leading to his expulsion from the monster community. Yep, not just humans view our protagonist with suspicion – his own kind has it in for him too. Taken in by a kindly spinster, baby Cat Eyed Boy is treated with cruelty from the start, beaten and tortured by humans, even brutally speared once paranoia over his appearance spreads.


Even though he flickers between hero and mischief-maker, Cat Eyed Boy almost inexplicably remains on humanity’s side. Throughout his travels, armed only with spit that turns poisonous when he’s angered (a trick he could use far more often, if you ask me.  I’m pretty sure Umezu, in the rush of churning out pages simply forgot about it). Cat Eyed Boy encounters, amongst others, a monster who grows as Cat Eyed Boy eats, Doctor Monster – a Moreau-esque figure fond of transplanting animal brains into human bodies, Meatball Monster – a cancer monster manifested by a family dealing with the disease, and The Band of One Hundred Monsters – deformed humans who want to recruit Cat Eyed Boy and intend to make pretty humans as ugly as their hearts.

And it’s here that we actually hit both the true heart of the series and a theme which defines much of Umezu’s work – the true ugliness of humanity, its greed, vanity and casual cruelty. Cat Eyed Boy serves as a warning to us all, like an urban legend “be good or else” story. After all, he’s constantly breaking the fourth wall, talking to the reader and suggesting that he might one day come to sleep in your attic, of course just in time to see whatever horrors you’ve brought on yourself. Cat Eyed Boy makes his way through a world filled with depressingly awful people. Why should your place show him anything different?


The character of Orochi functions in a similar fashion as Cat Eyed Boy except that she’s an attractive girl with vague supernatural powers, not a weirdly pixie-ish cat goblin boy. Of the series, only the fifth and final book, Orochi: Blood (from 1970) is available in English and, to the newcomer, the titular character’s appearance may well upset what is, up to that point, arguably Umezu’s most expertly- crafted story opening.  With Zip-a-tone psychedelic backdrops in full effect, Umezu brings us the tale of two sisters from an affluent family, one favoured by their parents, the other not and the love they have for each other despite the favouritism. It’s a mesmerising beginning, rendered in splashes and pages with only one or two panels and Orochi’s sudden appearance is, from her very first panel, a total monkey wrench in the narrative. She watches on as the sisters grow and, even as the story builds to a satisfying and twisted conclusion, I can’t help but resent the character for shoehorning herself in and derailing such a beguiling prologue. It is a visually beautiful book throughout however, with Umezu’s lines thickening in moments of horror, and a satisfyingly twisted conclusion rescues the narrative.


Between 1986-1989, Umezu worked on Right Hand of God, Left Hand of the Devil, the frequently gruesome adventures of elementary school students Sou and his elder sister Izumi. Sou, like Cat Eyed Boy, seems unable to stay away from horrific and paranormal events and his first “adventure,” “The Rusted Scissors”, is easily the most bloody and visceral thing Umezu ever created. Featuring a series of old, unsolved child murders, a pair of old rusted scissors connected to the murders and a very suspicious substitute teacher, Umezu pulls absolutely no punches here, with Sou’s visions of scissors bursting through his sister’s eyeballs, slicing through his own nose and, in flashback, the murderess snipping through her victim’s cheeks, the ink pools on the page.  “The Rusted Scissors” is also one of Umezu’s more bizarre stories (and that’s saying something by this point), with Izumi vomiting up torrents of mud, human skeletons, and children’s toys, all from the underground basement where these long-ago murders took place. From there, Sou takes on spider-women, the demonic return of a teacher he actually had a hand in killing, the murderous father of a crippled girl who details his killings in homemade picture books, and more, aided by strange powers he is able to manifest through dream.

Labelled “Fantastic Neo-Horror” on the covers with zero hyperbole, Umezu remains in good form throughout this later work, even if his art has simplified – his Zip-a-tone basically abandoned in favour of spurts of black-blood and thick motion lines. Filled with snapped, mangled limbs, decapitated heads and other such extreme physical violence, Right Hand of God, Left Hand of the Devil is packed with Umezu’s trademark violence-shock page turners, this time with the vileness turned all the way up. The sight of a father about to fillet and deep fry his naked, crippled daughter, for instance, truly does take some working through. Yet, as weird as the series gets, it is no match for Umezu’s next long form work, the mind-bendingly abnormal Fourteen.


Pound-for pound the most demented thing I’ve ever read, Umezu’s Fourteen, created between 2002-2006, is an epic of ultimate comic book weirdness. Starring Chicken George, a genetically-engineered chicken breast that grows into a genius monster chicken-man tied into a cryptic prophecy of looming disaster only fourteen years away, the series is a must for fans of truly oddball horror comics. Chicken George sees himself as a representative of the animal kingdom, dwindling after some man-made pollutant-based catastrophe, and after initially vowing to decimate the remaining human population, decides instead to gather up all the animals and, like some cosmic Noah, take them to the other end of the galaxy leaving us wretched, stupid humans behind. Nut wait, that’s not all.  American President Young co-stars, resplendent early on in a black and white checked suit, desperate to crack the secret of a rash of green-haired, plant-infected babies that are suddenly being born, of which his newborn son, named “America” is one…Oh and Chicken George, genius chicken monster, is somehow a graduate of Cambridge University…and he has a talking chicken named Chicken Lucy for a companion.

I swear I’m not making this up….

Then there’s Grand Master Rose, Master of The Economic World, obsessed with immortality, kept young only by the “Youthanizing” cream made from “live hormones” of three year old children. She lives in a giant building surrounded by the wasteland of this future Arizona, broken up only by the huge jungle, the family garden, hidden under the desert.  Chicken George needs to get off the planet, Rose, increasingly haggard, wants immortality, through his experiments, George has learned this secret. All he wants in exchange is the equivalent of two years of the global budget to build his rocket ship. When all the world plant life suddenly begins to die, the decision is made by the Government to manipulate the media on a grand scale, creating a second, fake, disaster to keep the eyes of the world glued to their screens whilst artificial greenery is created. A full Hollywood production is planned to create this drama, which is something like Stallone’s Daylight with added magma. The impossibility of creating such a production dawns on Vice President Martha, who then goes ahead and creates the disaster for real, capturing it documentary-style, in the process creating a reality TV star with whom Chicken George falls in love.


Over 260 chapters, Fourteen recreates the world and the nature of the universe, with earth’s literal heart, humans descended from dinosaurs, children rocketed into the infinite like a host of cutesy Kal-El’s from Krypton, Umezu throws everything at his readers here: mutated animals, desolate landscapes, looming apocalypses, fearsome insects, disease and genetic experimentation. Yet despite being a truly mind-warping cocktail, spiked with gloriously childish nonsense science, the story is just way too long and somehow becomes ponderous, despite its relentless pace, thanks to page after page of weeping and wailing politicians and scientists, bemoaning the selfish nature of humanity that has brought our species to the brink of extinction.
Boo-hoo indeed.

Despite my misgivings, the fact is that Fourteen is hands-down the single craziest comic book ever created and we should all be thankful that such an insane and deformed genre mash-up actually exists. I actually dare you to sit down and read the first 800 pages of the book in a single sitting – you will come out of it feeling like you’ve just been drugged. Umezu’s art lacks its former crispness and attention to detail, looking something like a lazy Rick Veitch inked by a tired David Lapham, but somehow it only serves to further heighten the childlike And then what happens? And then what happens? insanity of the piece.

An obvious extension of The Drifting Classroom, Fourteen, like all of Umezu’s horror work refuses to give its readers a happy ending. What it does offer, and this is a constant throughout the 10,000 pages of comics discussed here, is a belief that no matter the horror, the struggle or the difficulty, children can be tougher, more capable, more flexible, and better able to lead than any adult.

Ultimately, Umezu believes that there is nothing wrong with a good scare, despite the frequent depravity on display in his work. Horror is a communal experience, shared from creator to reader or viewer. All Umezu wants is to get close to you, by scaring and “astonishing” (7) you, so turn the page and let him in. He’s not only one of the most unique voices in comics, but everything he creates, he creates with unstoppable drive and utter joy. You might not ever be lucky enough to have him literally cross your path, but the Godfather of Japanese horror comics has scattered his imagination across thousands and thousands of pages (and I have just scratched the surface here), leaving a trail of highly crafted horrors for you to connect your mind with his.  And there is as much hope in these pages as there is blood and weirdness. There are the warnings of any good fable – greed and vanity chief among them – but there is strength through perseverance and the knowledge that something better is out there for all of us if we treat each other, and the planet we live on, with kindness and respect.  

NOTES:
1. The Comics Journal, #254, 2003, Fantagraphics Books, page 138
2. The Drifting Classroom vol.1, 2006, Viz Media, page 189
3. Ibid, page 189
4. The Comics Journal, op. cit, page 140
7. The Comics Journal, op. cit, page 139

Love your comics.

Sunday, October 29, 2017

New Comics For Wednesday 1st of November


HALLOWEEN COMICFEST! It may have been last Saturday but we are still celebrating with FREE COMIC Treat Bags* and the chance to win awesome Stranger Things 2 prize packs until this coming Saturday!

After that, start making that list and check it twice because our next Back Issue and Toy Fair is coming up as part of our Local Comic Shop Day event.
So much great stuff to look forward to and we ain't even gotten to the comics yet!

Did you love that Thor-some new flick? Why not check out that pretty artwork that went into making that Ragno-rocking flick with MARVELS THOR RAGNAROK ART OF MOVIE SLIPCASE HC.

One of the best duos in comics, Waid and Samnee pair again to return Steve Rogers to the mantle of Marvel's greatest hero with CAPTAIN AMERICA #695 LEG.

This loving tribute to Bernie Wrightson contains some of his beautiful work on DC Comics Mystery books and some of his turn on Swamp Thing. This beautiful BERNIE WRIGHTSON ARTIFACT ED HC also has some cheeky little bits of unseen material so pick it up.

How Deadman's death came to be has remained unsolved and now comic book royalty, Neal Adams is going to take us deep into Deadman's past to get some answers. in DEADMAN #1 (OF 6) GLOW IN THE DARK ED.

One of Hanna Barbera's most popular cartoons makes it's way to DC Comics with writer Jimmy Palmiotti. A modern take on a galactic favourites with JETSONS #1 (OF 6).

The Justice League has been twisted by the Dark Knights and have been forced into a cave in this Metal tie in JUSTICE LEAGUE #32.

From the co-creator of Deadly Class comes a tale of the end of the world filled with Vampires, Zombies and and swamp monsters. Only one group can stop the killing, the Gravediggers union. 
GRAVEDIGGERS UNION #1 from Wes Craig and Image.

Nash Huang is living the high life as part of a variety tv show, when the line between future technology, privacy and reality become extremely blurred, becoming an unwilling Reality star of her own in Image's new NO 1 WITH A BULLET #1.

Acclaimed European comics master Enrico Marini makes his American comics debut with an original, two-part graphic novel, BATMAN THE DARK PRINCE CHARMING HC BOOK 01.

School in session with new headmaster, Jubilee. As the students struggle with homework and friendships they must also battle evil threats from all around. Man being a teen sucks at times!

The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are stuck in a ghost dimension and the only ones that can save them are their Ghostbusting friends. Join these two groups on an inter-dimensional romp the likes of which have never been seen before (except for maybe the first time they crossed over) in TMNT GHOSTBUSTERS II #1.

A touching biography on one of the founders of impressionism, Monet. MONET ITINERANT OF LIGHT HC tells a beautiful story with art reminiscent of his style.

A scrawny young man gets drafted into the Vietnam war and discovers a secret he's been keeping so secretive he didn't even know bout it himself. It's all in the title!
NAMWOLF TP VOL 01 HEART OF DARKNESS.

Brrr it's cold in here. A freezing cold Western set in the Canadian North. TRENT GN VOL 01 THE DEAD MAN follows a Mountie on his frozen adventures in the North.

And there you have it. Another winner. If you've spotted something extra you are after just let us know before close Tuesday for us to get it sorted for you.
Until we see you next, stay rad and keep smiling!

*Or until stocks last.



MARVEL
ASTONISHING X-MEN #5
AVENGERS #673 LEG
BLACK BOLT #7
CAPTAIN AMERICA #695 LEG
GUARDIANS OF GALAXY #146 LEG
ICEMAN #7 LEG
INHUMANS ONCE FUTURE KINGS #4 (OF 5)
IRON FIST #74 LEG
OLD MAN LOGAN #30
PETER PARKER SPECTACULAR SPIDER-MAN #6
POWER PACK #63 LEG
SPIDER-MAN #234 LEG
STAR WARS DARTH VADER #7

DC COMICS
BANE CONQUEST #7 (OF 12)
BATMAN #34
BATMAN THE DEVASTATOR #1 (METAL)
BATMAN WHITE KNIGHT #2 (OF 8)
BLACK LIGHTNING COLD DEAD HANDS #1 (OF 6)
BOMBSHELLS UNITED #5
CYBORG #18
DASTARDLY AND MUTTLEY #3 (OF 6)
DEADMAN #1 (OF 6) GLOW IN THE DARK ED
DEATHSTROKE #25
GREEN ARROW #34
GREEN LANTERNS #34
HARLEY & IVY MEET BETTY & VERONICA #2 (OF 6)
INJUSTICE 2 #13
JETSONS #1 (OF 6)
JUSTICE LEAGUE #32 METAL
NIGHTWING #32
SUPERMAN #34

BOOM
AMORY WARS GOOD APOLLO #8 (OF 12)
GIANT DAYS #32
LAZARETTO #3 (OF 5)
OVER GARDEN WALL ONGOING #19
STEVEN UNIVERSE ONGOING #9

DARK HORSE
HALO RISE OF ATRIOX #3 (OF 5)
USAGI YOJIMBO #163

DYNAMITE
BETTIE PAGE #4
RED SONJA #10
SHADOW BATMAN #2 (OF 6)

IDW
ATOMIC ROBO SPECTRE OF TOMORROW #1
CLUE #5
MASK FIRST STRIKE #1
OPTIMUS PRIME #12
ROM #14
TMNT GHOSTBUSTERS II #1
WORMWOOD GOES TO WASHINGTON #2 (OF 3)

IMAGE
CROSSWIND #5
ELSEWHERE #4
EXTREMITY #8
GRAVEDIGGERS UNION #1
LAZARUS X PLUS 66 #4 (OF 6)
NO 1 WITH A BULLET #1
PAPER GIRLS #17
SPREAD #23
STRAY BULLETS SUNSHINE & ROSES #29
WALKING DEAD #173

MISC
AGENT 47 BIRTH OF HITMAN #1
ARCHIE #25
DISHONORED PEERESS AND THE PRICE #2
JAZZ MAYNARD #6
ROBOTECH #4
VOLTRON LEGENDARY DEFENDER VOL 2 #2
VOLTRON LEGENDARY DEFENDER VOL 2 #3

TRADES
ABS JUSTICE LEAGUE WORLDS GREATEST SUPERHEROES HC
ADV OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN MANGA CLASSICS GN
AQUAMAN THE ATLANTIS CHRONICLES DLX ED HC
AVENGERS BY BENDIS COMPLETE COLLECTION TP VOL 03
BATMAN DETECTIVE REBIRTH DLX COLL HC BOOK 01
BATMAN THE DARK PRINCE CHARMING HC BOOK 01
BERNIE WRIGHTSON ARTIFACT ED
BLACK PANTHER BY HUDLIN TP VOL 01 COMPLETE COLLECT
BLACK TP VOL 01
BLEACH GN VOL 71
BOOK OF BALLADS ORIGINAL ART ED HC
BRUTAL NATURE TP VOL 02 CONCRETE FURY
CLIVE BARKER HELLRAISER OMNIBUS TP VOL 01 (OF 2)
DEADPOOL AND X-FORCE OMNIBUS HC
DEADPOOL WORLDS GREATEST TP VOL 10 SECRET EMPIRE
DOC SAVAGE RING OF FIRE TP
DOCTOR WHO 10TH COMPLETE ED YEAR ONE HC
DOCTOR WHO 11TH COMPLETE ED YEAR ONE HC
DOCTOR WHO 11TH SAPLING HC VOL 02 ROOTS
DOCTOR WHO 9TH HC VOL 04 SIN EATERS
ET THE EXTRA TERRESTRIAL CLASSIC ILLUS STORYBOOK H
EVIL DEAD 2 DARK ONES RISING 30TH ANN ED TP
EXPANSION GN
FATALES BY RYAN HESKA HC
GENERATION X TP VOL 01 NATURAL SELECTION
HATSUNE MIKU FUTURE DELIVERY TP  01
INUYASHIKI GN VOL 08
JOJOS BIZARRE ADV 3 STARDUST CRUSADERS VOL 05
JUSTICE LEAGUE TP VOL 04 ENDLESS (REBIRTH)
MAN FROM THE GREAT NORTH HC
MARVELS THOR RAGNAROK ART OF MOVIE SLIPCASE HC
MASSIVE NINTH WAVE GN VOL 01
MAZE RUNNER DEATH CURE OFFICIAL PRELUDE
MERCENARY DEFINITIVE ED HC VOL 01
MONET ITINERANT OF LIGHT HC
MY HERO ACADEMIA GN VOL 10
NAMWOLF TP VOL 01 HEART OF DARKNESS
OH JOY SEX TOY GN VOL 04
ONCE & FUTURE QUEEN TP
POKEMON OMEGA RUBY ALPHA SAPPHIRE GN VOL 05
REVOLUTIONARIES TP VOL 02 POWER & GLORY
RICK AND MORTY HC BOOK 02
SIMPSONS COMICS EXPLOSION #4
SPIDER-MAN CLONE SAGA OMNIBUS HC VOL 02
SPOOKHOUSE TP VOL 01 (C: 0-1-0)
STEVEN UNIVERSE ORIGINAL GN VOL 02 ANTI GRAVITY
STORIES OF EDGAR ALLEN POE MANGA CLASSICS GN
SUPERMAN ACTION COMICS TP VOL 04 THE NEW WORLD
THE FOREVER WAR TP
THE SCHIZ GN
TRENT GN VOL 01 THE DEAD MAN
TWO FACE A CELEBRATION OF 75 YEARS HC
UNCANNY INHUMANS HC VOL 02
VAMPIRELLA DYNAMITE YEARS OMNIBUS TP VOL 01
VERY DC UNIVERSE REBIRTH HOLIDAY TP
WALKING DEAD OMNIBUS HC VOL 07
WITCH BOY GN VOL 01

MERCH
DCTV LEGENDS OF TOMORROW ATOM AF
DCTV LEGENDS OF TOMORROW WHITE CANARY AF
DCTV THE FLASH KID FLASH AF

JUSTICE LEAGUE MOVIE THE FLASH STATUE

Sunday, October 22, 2017

New Comics For Wednesday 25th of October


PAX IS COMING! As you get excited for the year's biggest convention, make sure not to overlook this week's awesome releases. We might even have some Halloween plans for you...

Just in time for the spooky time of year is a new superhero spooky book sure to send you hiding under the covers from aliens, ghosts and horrors beyond imagining. Check out DC HOUSE OF HORROR #1 if you can handle all the creepy spookiness....CREEPY!!!

Part 1 of 'Bats out of Hell' continues the events started in Dark Nights Metal #3. Flash is on a race to fight back against the invasion from the dark multiverse but Red Death, an evil Batman with the Flash's powers. Find out who will be the speediest in FLASH #33 METAL.

Kick off Spring with an autumn quarterly booko. This lovely book weighs in at 48 pages of pretty art and lovely stories for all your quarterly needs. BLACK CROWN QUARTERLY #1 FALL 2017.

This spooky new Ghostbusters series follows the lovable team from the 2016 film as they do what they do best. Bust ghosts with the powers of friendship and science. You should answer the phone and read GHOSTBUSTERS ANSWER THE CALL #1.

Cassie Hack is back under new writer Tini Howard. Pick up HACK SLASH RESURRECTION #1 as she once again wields her baseball bat to protect promiscuous teens.

Get ready for a pretty new art book featuring all the pretty pictures that went into making a little unknown game called Overwatch. ART OF OVERWATCH HC also comes with some lovely creator commentary and never before seen arts so get it.

Batman and his bat-friends prepare for the worst in Gotham City, but nothing can prepare them for GIANT MONSTER ATTACKS. BATMAN NIGHT OF THE MONSTER MEN TP collects the first crossover of the modern Rebirth era.

Ben Reilly, the clone of Peter Parker who doesn't have a confusing and controversial history is back. Check out BEN REILLY SCARLET SPIDER TP VOL 01 BACK IN THE HOOD for a madder than ever Scarlet Spider on the wrong side of a crime lord and her bodyguard.

Lines are drawn when an Inhuman who can predict the future is born. Heroes question whether they should act on crimes yet to be committed and heroes will take sides in CIVIL WAR II TP.

Captain America has been secretly remade with the cosmic cube to be a true believer in the cause of Hydra. Using the trust and respect he's earned through his deeds he attempts to make Hydra's ideals a reality in SECRET EMPIRE HC.

Can the Shaolin Cowboy survive in a town filled with guns, prostitutes and white supremacists, all run by the crustaceous mafia? Will it be an adventure full of friendship and kindness? Probably not but pick up SHAOLIN COWBOY HC WHOLL STOP THE REIGN to find out.

The mutant-hunting Weapon X program are back hunting mutants. This time they've also got Amadeus Cho, the Totally Awesome Hulk in their sights. Mutants and Hulk team up to deal with new threats in WEAPONS OF MUTANT DESTRUCTION TP.

Prepare your wallets for the new Batcave playset that not only comes with the Batcave, but you also get Alfred and his tea set. What more could you want?

A new Valiant series from the lovely Matt Kindt. ETERNITY #1 will take you on an expedition into the unknown. Beyond Space, beyond time, beyond reality itself!

Jughead has given way to his monstrous (yet understandable) impulses and slain Reggie. Now werewolf hunter Betty and Archie are hot on his trail. What's gonna happen in this new horrifying take on Archie and the gang in JUGHEAD THE HUNGER #1.

The first in an ongoing series of short stories from Fantagraphics with work from a whole range of great creators including Tommi Parish and Noah Van Sciver. NOW #1.

For those of us who love to talk comics this week sees an encyclopedic reference for the Jodorowsky classic The Incal with DECONSTRUCTING THE INCAL HC.

Prehistoric monsters roam the land. And murder and destruction have taken over the people. Life before the big flood is far from good. Writer Jason Aaron (Thor, Star Wars) and artist
R M Guera (Scalped) tells us a unique take on a bible epic. GODDAMNED OVERSIZED HC

The knights of Kelodia might be the best in the land but when they are up against a mighty wizard and his dragons things don't seem that easy. From writer/creator Max Landis comes

In a steampunk Victorian world one woman who happens to have mechanical arms is searching for her past. LADY MECHANIKA OVERSIZED HC VOL 01.

Laser Moose and Rabbi boy are about to discover the terrifying fact that Lasers can't fight everything. When an incident involving a pinecone, fish and disco balls pits our heroes against their arch nemesis. LASER MOOSE & RABBIT BOY DISCO FEVER GN.

A group of vampires have run the local BBQ joint in town for ages, but now people have changed their minds about trusting Vampires who survive on cow's blood.

Ever wanted to know what your dogs wagging tail means? Or why his little nose it wet? Well Science comics is here to teach you everything you ever wanted to know about mans best friend.

Plenty to read and check out, just let us know if there is anything extra we can put aside for you. Just be sure to do so before close on Tuesday so we can confirm your request!
Anyway until we see you next, have an awesome week!


MARVEL
ALL NEW WOLVERINE #26 LEG
AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #790 LEG
AMERICA #8 LEG
BEN REILLY SCARLET SPIDER #9
BLACK PANTHER #166 LEG
CAPTAIN MARVEL #125 LEG
DAREDEVIL #28
DESPICABLE DEADPOOL #288 LEG
GUARDIANS OF GALAXY TELLTALE SERIES #4 (OF 5)
JEAN GREY #8 LEG
MOON GIRL AND DEVIL DINOSAUR #24
PUNISHER #17
PUNISHER PLATOON #2 (OF 6)
SILVER SURFER #14
STAR WARS JEDI REPUBLIC MACE WINDU #3 (OF 5)
THANOS #12
THOR WHERE WALK THE FROST GIANTS #1
US AVENGERS #11 LEG
WEAPON X #10
X-MEN BLUE #14 LEG

DC COMICS
ACTION COMICS #990 (OZ EFFECT)
BATGIRL #16
BATMAN BEYOND #13
BATMAN THE MERCILESS #1 (METAL)
BLUE BEETLE #14 VAR E
DC HOUSE OF HORROR #1
DETECTIVE COMICS #967
FLASH #33  METAL
GOTHAM CITY GARAGE #2
HAL JORDAN AND THE GREEN LANTERN CORPS #31
HELLBLAZER #15
JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #17
KAMANDI CHALLENGE #10 (OF 12)
MOTHER PANIC #12
NIGHTWING THE NEW ORDER #3 (OF 6)
RUFF & REDDY SHOW #1 (OF 6)
SCOOBY DOO TEAM UP #31
SUICIDE SQUAD #28
TEEN TITANS #13
WONDER WOMAN #33

BOOM
ADVENTURE TIME COMICS #16
BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA OLD MAN JACK #2
HI-FI FIGHT CLUB #3 (OF 4)
JIM HENSON POWER OF DARK CRYSTAL #8 (OF 12)
MIGHTY MORPHIN POWER RANGERS #20
SISTERS OF SORROW #4 (OF 4)
UNSOUND #5 (OF 6)
VICTOR LAVALLE DESTROYER #6 (OF 6)
WWE #10

DARK HORSE
ANGEL SEASON 11 #10
BPRD DEVIL YOU KNOW #3
BTVS SEASON 11 #12
ELFQUEST FINAL QUEST #22
MASS EFFECT DISCOVERY #4
REBELS THESE FREE & INDEPENDENT STATES #8 (OF 8)

DYNAMITE
ASH VS AOD #4
PIERCE BROWN RED RISING #6 (OF 6)
SHADOW #3
TUROK #3

IDW
BACK TO THE FUTURE #24
BLACK CROWN QUARTERLY #1 FALL 2017
FIRST STRIKE #6
GHOSTBUSTERS ANSWER THE CALL #1
GOOSEBUMPS MONSTERS AT MIDNIGHT #1 (OF 3)
SAMURAI JACK QUANTUM JACK #2 (OF 5)
STAR TREK BOLDLY GO #13
TMNT ONGOING #75
X-FILES JFK DISCLOSURE #1 (OF 2)

IMAGE
ANGELIC #2
COPPERHEAD #15
DEADLY CLASS #31
GASOLINA #2
GLITTERBOMB FAME GAME #2
HACK SLASH RESURRECTION #1
HARD PLACE #3 (OF 5)
OUTCAST BY KIRKMAN & AZACETA #31
RENATO JONES SEASON TWO #4 (OF 5)
SAGA #48
SOUTHERN CROSS #13
SPAWN #279
UNDERWINTER FIELD OF FEATHERS #1
VIOLENT LOVE #9
WAYWARD #24

ONI
DAMNED #5
INVADER ZIM #24
KAIJUMAX SEASON 3 #4
NIGHTS DOMINION SEASON 2 #3
RICK & MORTY #31

VALIANT
BLOODSHOT SALVATION #2
ETERNITY #1
X-O MANOWAR (2017) #8

MISC
CAPTAIN KRONOS #2
CATALYST PRIME INCIDENTALS #3
DARK ARK #2
FU JITSU #2
JUGHEAD THE HUNGER #1
KIM AND KIM LOVE IS A BATTLEFIELD #4
LADY MECHANIKA CLOCKWORK ASSASSIN #3 (OF 3)
LARKS KILLER #3 (OF 7)
LOLA XOXO VOL 2 #4
STRANGE CEREBUS #1 (OF 1)
STREET FIGHTER VS DARKSTALKERS #6 (OF 8)
THE BEAUTIFUL DEATH (STATIX) #2 (OF 5)

MAGAZINES
MARVEL PREVIEWS VOL 04 #4 NOVEMBER 2017
NOW #1
PREVIEWS #350 NOVEMBER 2017

TRADES
ANNE OF GREEN GABLES GN
ANNO DRACULA TP
ART OF OVERWATCH HC
ART OF THE PULPS AN ILLUSTRATED HISTORY HC
BATMAN NIGHT OF THE MONSTER MEN TP (REBIRTH)
BEN REILLY SCARLET SPIDER TP VOL 01 BACK IN THE HO
CINEMAPS AN ATLAS OF 35 GREAT MOVIES HC
CIVIL WAR II TP
CLASSIC GI JOE TP VOL 20
DECONSTRUCTING THE INCAL HC
DIRK GENTLY SALMON OF DOUBT TP VOL 02
DOCTOR STRANGE TP VOL 03 BLOOD IN THE AETHER
FUNKO UNIVERSE TP
GODDAMNED OVERSIZED HC
GOLGOTHA TP
GREEN VALLEY HC
HASBRO AW YEAH HC
HELLBLAZER TP VOL 02 THE SMOKELESS FIRE (REBIRTH)
HOUSE OF WOMEN HC
INCREDIBLE HULK EPIC COLLECTION HULK MUST DIE TP
INJUSTICE 2 HC VOL 01
INVINCIBLE IRON MAN TP VOL 03 CIVIL WAR II
JUGHEAD TP VOL 03
JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA MIDSUMMERS NIGHMARE DLX
LADY MECHANIKA OVERSIZED HC VOL 01
LASER MOOSE & RABBIT BOY DISCO FEVER GN
LUCIFER TP VOL 03 BLOOD IN THE STREETS
METABARONS GN VOL 04 (OF 4) AGHORA & LAST METABARO
MIGHTY MORPHIN POWER RANGERS TP VOL 04
MILAN K THE TEENAGE YEARS GN
MY LITTLE PONY LEGENDS OF MAGIC TP VOL 01
NIGHTWING REBIRTH DLX COLL HC BOOK 01
RAGNAROK TP VOL 01 LAST GOD STANDING
REDNECK TP VOL 01 DEEP IN THE HEART
ROAD RAGE TP
SCIENCE COMICS DOGS GN
SECRET EMPIRE HC
SHAOLIN COWBOY HC WHOLL STOP THE REIGN
STREET ANGEL SUPERHERO FOR A DAY HC
SUPER TOKYOLAND TP
SUPERGIRL TP VOL 02 ESCAPE FROM THE PHANTOM ZONE
TANGLED THE SERIES ADVENTURE IS CALLING TP
TANK GIRL WORLD WAR TANK GIRL TP
TMNT ULTIMATE COLL TP VOL 01
TOPPU GP GN VOL 02
TRANSFORMERS LOST LIGHT TP VOL 01
UNDERWINTER TP VOL 01 SYMPHONY
UNQUOTABLE TRUMP GN
VENOM TP VOL 02 LAND BEFORE CRIME
WEAPONS OF MUTANT DESTRUCTION TP
WILDSTORM A CELEBRATION OF 25 YEARS HC

MERCH
BATMAN ANIMATED BATCAVE PLAYSET WITH ALFRED AF

TMNT SPLINTER HERO PACK

Friday, October 20, 2017

JUSTICE LEAGUE PREMIERE DOUBLE PASS GIVEAWAY!


Months after the events of Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and inspired by Superman's apparent sacrifice for humanity, Bruce Wayne and Diana Prince assemble a team of metahumans consisting of Barry Allen, Arthur Curry, and Victor Stone to face the catastrophic threat of Steppenwolf and his army of Parademons, who are on the hunt for three Mother Boxes on Earth.

Thanks to our super friends at Roadshow and Justice League In Cinemas November 16, we are giving you the chance to win 1 of 5 double passes to attend the Justice League Australian Premiere in Melbourne at Village Crown on Wednesday November 15th.

All you need to do to go into the draw is click on the link below and enter your details 

SPECIAL NOTE: 
As this prize is for a specific time and date, please only enter if you are free that evening.

Sunday, October 15, 2017

New Comics For Wednesday 18th of October


Mmm, mmm, mmm. Can you smell that? Oh, yes. It's a new week of the freshest releases around...so fresh!

After hosting his grand launch of his latest graphic novel release with a a couple of week's back, now it's our turn to get stock of local Melbourne creator Chris Gooch's BOTTLED TP.
 Jess is stuck in her suburban life while her friend Natalie moved to Japan to model. But when Natalie comes back to town for business things get complicated. Every home should have this book!

The healing factors clash in this new mini-series as smartie pants, Deadpool beats up and cranky Old Man Logan. Things are sure to get messy in
DEADPOOL VS OLD MAN LOGAN #1 (OF 5)

Amadeus Cho is doing his best to live up to Bruce Banner's "Legacy" by taking a fun filled trip to the happy Planet Hulk. What could possibly go wrong in on a Planet that is basically Mad Max Fury Road meets Thunderdome in Greg Pak's, INCREDIBLE HULK #709.

Tony Stark has gone missing! Strange because the last time we saw him, he was in a coma. Tony's friends and foes must decide who will follow in his "Legacy" and wield the power of Iron Man in INVINCIBLE IRON MAN #593.

Their time is up in the 1st issue of the Death of Thor story line, so many Thor's, which one will it be? Celebrating 700 issues with a stellar line up of outstanding artist talent, Aaron continues his epic run while preparing for the return of a fan favourite Thor villain in MIGHTY THOR #700.

Lucy Webber is a reporter for the Global Planet, who also happens to be the daughter of Black Hammer. Superstar writer Jeff Lemire takes us on an investigation as Lucy searches desperately for her father and the other lost heroes of Black Hammer by first finding what happened to one of their greatest villains,
SHERLOCK FRANKENSTEIN & LEGION OF EVIL #1 (OF 4).

A dysfunctional family decides to come together to open a hotel. A new story by Shade the Changing Man's, Peter Milligan that's a little bit Kafka and a little bit Young Frankenstein in IDW's
KID LOBOTOMY #1.

The royal family has been murdered and now Maestro's son has inherited the wizard's throne. But what will this sassy millennial do with all this power? A new modern fantasy and magic tale weaved by Steve Skroce, storyboard artist on the Matrix. In Image's MAESTROS #1.

For fans of Mignola's Amazing Screw On Head, Hellboy Dad's latest project might be too good to miss. The annual festival of the undead is almost here. As Castle Golga makes it's preparations Mr Higgins is going to keep away from the place of his wife's death. However after being inspired by some heroic men, he decides to head out on an adventure. All in the original graphic novel, MR HIGGINS COMES HOME HC.

Warren Ellis has returned to reclaim and re-invent the Wildstorm universe in a new tale featuring some forgotten favourites including Voodoo, Grifter and Jenny Sparks. A fantastic read for old and new fans alike, it's WILD STORM TP VOL 01.

It's time to go back to the 90's with a brand new comic book series of the Nickelodeon cartoon favourite written by one of the most acclaimed names in indie comics right now, Box Brown with RUGRATS #1.

Are you enjoying the new live action series of The Tick? Why not jump on the new series of this big blue, nigh invulnerable one, co-written by Cullen Bunn. TICK 2017 #1.

Mondo has a massive catalog of incredible artist collaborations behind them. From Star Wars by Olly Moss to Jaws by Laurent Durieux this art book is a selection of the best from Mondo's archives and a must have for poster art fans. 

One page comic panels, each telling a new terrifying story leaving lots of questions unanswered to keep you up at night. Perfectly timed for the upcoming horrors of Halloween.
 BEHIND YOU ONE-SHOT HORROR STORIES HC.

Enter the mind of Chris Ware, one of the most unique comic book talents in yet another grand experiment in publishing with CHRIS WARE MONOGRAPH HC PX BOOKPLATE ED.

Daisy, Susan and Esther face their second year of university filled with drunken mishaps and deadlines. Awkward turtle moments ahead in the hit, GIANT DAYS TP VOL 06.

All your favourite Harley Quinn covers, collected in a nice hard cover book to celebrate her 25th anniversary. HARLEY QUINN A ROGUES GALLERY THE DLX COVER ART.

A retired serial killer falls in love with a blow up adult doll. This new found love affair keeps his urges at bay, until a road trip into the wrong country town goes sideways. Think Silence of the Lambs meets Lars and the Real Girl, the the delightfully absurd, PLASTIC TP.

Apprentice blacksmith Greta is happy to make new friends when she returns a lost tea dragon to the local tea shop owner. From the creator of Princess Princess, Katie O'Neill, the most beautiful look book award for this week goes too...

Someone is committing murder around the most famous landmarks in Barcelona and a young woman has found herself in the middle of the investigation in the new Euro Comic release from Lion Forge, THE GHOST OF GAUDI HC.

For fans of Amanda Conner we have 2 magical statues for you to think about thisweek.
Both a hero and a villain with

Then fill up your toy cabinet or shelf with the next run of DC bombshells action figures.

They finally after all the week's reading is done sit down with a group of friends (or maybe your Ex's) and hit the table top with this new deck building game is going to be so much fun.  SCOTT PILGRIM PRECIOUS LITTLE CARD GAME

And there you go. Winners one and all. Of course if you spot something else we need to put aside for you, just be sure to let us know before close on Tuesday for us to get it sorted for you.
Until we see you next, have an awesome week!



MARVEL
ALL NEW GUARDIANS OF GALAXY #12
BLACK PANTHER PRELUDE #1 (OF 2)
CABLE #150 LEG
CHAMPIONS #13 LEG
DEADPOOL VS OLD MAN LOGAN #1 (OF 5)
DOCTOR STRANGE #26
GENERATION X #7
INCREDIBLE HULK #709 LEG
INVINCIBLE IRON MAN #593 LEG
JOURNEY SW LAST JEDI CAPT PHASMA #4 (OF 4)
LUKE CAGE #166 LEG
MIGHTY THOR #700 LEG
MONSTERS UNLEASHED #7 LEG
PETER PARKER SPECTACULAR SPIDER-MAN #5
SECRET WARRIORS #7
SPIDER-GWEN #25 LEG
STAR WARS POE DAMERON #20
VENOM #156 LEG
X-MEN GOLD #14 LEG

DC COMICS
AQUAMAN #29
BATMAN #33
BATMAN THE DROWNED #1 (METAL)
BATWOMAN #8
BOMBSHELLS UNITED #4
FLASH #32
FUTURE QUEST PRESENTS #3
GREEN ARROW #33
GREEN LANTERNS #33
HARLEY QUINN #30
INJUSTICE 2 #12
JUSTICE LEAGUE #31
MAD MAGAZINE #548
NIGHTWING #31
SUPER SONS #9
SUPERMAN #33
TEEN TITANS GO #24
TITANS #16
TRINITY #14
WILD STORM #8
WONDER WOMAN CONAN #2 (OF 6)

VERTIGO
ASTRO CITY #48

BOOM
ADVENTURE TIME 2017 SPOOOKTACULAR #1
ADVENTURE TIME REGULAR SHOW #3
BILL & TED SAVE THE UNIVERSE #5 (OF 5)
GO GO POWER RANGERS #4
KONG GODS OF SKULL ISLAND ONESHOT #1
LUMBERJANES #43
MISFIT CITY #6
RUGRATS #1

DARK HORSE
DEPT H #19
HALO RISE OF ATRIOX #3 (OF 5)
SHERLOCK FRANKENSTEIN & LEGION OF EVIL #1 (OF 4)

DYNAMITE
GAME OF THRONES CLASH OF KINGS #5
GRUMPY CAT GARFIELD #3 (OF 3)
GWAR ORGASMAGEDDON #4 (OF 4)
JAMES BOND KILL CHAIN #4 (OF 6)
JIM BUTCHER DRESDEN FILES DOG MEN #5 (OF 6)
MAGNUS #5
MIGHTY MOUSE #5 (OF 5)
SWORDQUEST #4
VAMPIRELLA #7

IDW
HALF PAST DANGER II DEAD TO REICHS #2 (OF 5)
INFINITE LOOP NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH #2 (OF 6)
JEM & THE HOLOGRAMS MISFITS INFINITE #3 (OF 3)
KID LOBOTOMY #1
MY LITTLE PONY LEGENDS OF MAGIC #7
OPTIMUS PRIME FIRST STRIKE #1
ROM FIRST STRIKE #1
ROM VS TRANSFORMERS SHINING ARMOR #4
TMNT UNIVERSE #15
TRANSFORMERS LOST LIGHT #10
UNCLE SCROOGE #31

IMAGE
BITCH PLANET TRIPLE FEATURE #5
CURSE WORDS #9
DESCENDER #25
GENERATION GONE #4
GENIUS CARTEL #3 (OF 5)
GHOST STATION ZERO #3 (OF 4)
GRRL SCOUTS MAGIC SOCKS #6 (OF 6)
HORIZON #15
INVINCIBLE #141
KILL OR BE KILLED #13
KILL THE MINOTAUR #5
MAESTROS #1
MAGE HERO DENIED #3 (OF 15)
REALM #2
SAVAGE DRAGON #227
SHIRTLESS BEAR-FIGHTER #5 (OF 5)
SPY SEAL #3
THEYRE NOT LIKE US #16

ONI
DEAD OF WINTER #3
MADE MEN #2
RICK & MORTY POCKET LIKE YOU STOLE IT #4 (OF 5)

VALIANT
FAITH AND THE FUTURE FORCE #4
WAR MOTHER #3

MISC
ANIMOSITY #10
ANIMOSITY EVOLUTION #1
CATALYST PRIME SUPERB #4
DOCTOR WHO 10TH YEAR THREE #10
DOCTOR WHO 12TH YEAR THREE #8
RIVERDALE (ONGOING) #7
TICK 2017 #1

TRADES
A STORY OF MEN HC
AMERICA TP VOL 01 LIFE & TIMES  OF AMERICA CHAVEZ
ANNA & FROGA COMPLETELY BUBU GN
ART OF MONDO HC
BALTIMORE HC VOL 08 THE RED KINGDOM
BEHIND YOU ONE-SHOT HORROR STORIES HC
BLACK PANTHER CREW TP WE ARE THE STREETS
BOTTLED TP
BRAMBLE DLX ED HC
CHRIS WARE MONOGRAPH HC PX BOOKPLATE ED
COMPLETE SCARLET TRACES TP VOL 02
CUTTER TP
DARKNESS VISIBLE TP VOL 01
DEVIATIONS BETA TP
DUCK AVENGER NEW ADVENTURES TP BOOK 02
GIANT DAYS TP VOL 06
GRAYSON THE SUPERSPY OMNIBUS HC
GUARDIANS OF GALAXY NEW GUARD TP VOL 04 GROUNDED
GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY AWESOME MIX DIGEST TP
HAP & LEONARD SAVAGE SEASON TP
HARLEY QUINN A ROGUES GALLERY THE DLX COVER ART CO
HEAD GAMES GN
I HATE FAIRYLAND TP VOL 03 GOOD GIRL
JAMES BOND BLACK BOX HC
JEAN GREY TP VOL 01 NIGHTMARE FUEL
JLA THE NAIL ANOTHER NAIL DLX ED HC
LITTLE BOOK OF KNOWLEDGE HC TATTOOS
LOW DLX HC VOL 01
MAGE TP BOOK 01 HERO DISCOVERED VOL 02
MICHAEL RECYCLE ENVIRONMENTAL ADVENTURES HC
MR HIGGINS COMES HOME HC
PELE GN
PLANTS VS ZOMBIES LAWN OF DOOM HC
PLASTIC TP
RASHOMON COMMISSIONER HEIGO KOBAYASHI CASE HC
SEBASTIAN O MYSTERY PLAY HC
SPAWN HELL ON EARTH TP
SPIDER-GWEN TP VOL 04 PREDATORS
STEVEN UNIVERSE ONGOING TP VOL 01 WARP TOUR
SUICIDE SQUAD REBIRTH DLX COLL HC BOOK 01
TEA DRAGON SOCIETY HC
TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES COLLECTABLES SC
THE GHOST OF GAUDI HC
THE SCARECROW PRINCESS GN
THOR GODS & DEVIANTS TP
THOR RAGNAROKS TP
TOMB RAIDER ARCHIVES HC VOL 03
TRANSFORMERS IDW COLL PHASE 2 HC VOL 06
WALT DISNEY DONALD DUCK HC VOL 10 SECRET HONDORICA
WARHAMMER 40000 TP VOL 02 REVELATIONS
WILD STORM TP VOL 01
WONDER WOMAN 77 BIONIC WOMAN TP

MERCH
BATMAN BLACK & WHITE BATMAN STATUE BY AMANDA CONNE
BATMAN BLACK & WHITE HARLEY QUINN STATUE BY AMANDA
DC DESIGNER SERIES BOMBSHELLS BATGIRL AF
DC DESIGNER SERIES BOMBSHELLS HAWKGIRL AF
DC DESIGNER SERIES BOMBSHELLS KATANA AF
DC DESIGNER SERIES BOMBSHELLS MERA AF
SCOTT PILGRIM PRECIOUS LITTLE CARD GAME

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