ALL NEW ALL STAR RECOMMENDS #2
MAY 2021
Cameron Ashley
Ahhhh, here we
are locked down again. I hope you’re doing as well as you can.
I had this
whole obituary planned for this space, looking at the lives and work of Kentaro
Miura and John Paul Leon, both of whom sadly passed away recently. Two more
different, yet equally incredible artists you probably will not find and to
lose one of them is awful let alone both. I think it’s best not to dwell on
that here, however, given the current circumstances Melbourne finds itself in,
so if you find the time, check out their comics and celebrate the work of two
of the best.
We’re going to
have some fun with some recent Outlaw Comics instead. Twisted escapism for all!
There’s a few of them, so I’m going to jump right in. You take care of
yourselves.
FEATURED
COMICS:
RED ROOM:
THE ANTISOCIAL NETWORK #1
Ed Piskor
Fantagraphics
SLOW DEATH
ZERO
Various
Last Gasp
APOCALYPSE
5,000
Ken Landgraf
& Bob Huszar
Floating
World Comics
1. What
Exactly Is Going On?
In the past few
weeks, not one, not two, but three comics arrived that have been perfectly
popped out of the Underground Comix/Outlaw Comics mould. Two of them even
proudly bear an “Outlaw Comics” stamp and the other is a revival of a legendary
anthology from underground survivors Last Gasp that comes stamped as “Adults
Only.”
It’s almost
surreal. Comics with this kind of aesthetic have a habit of trickling in from
publishers, the odd Ben Marra and Alexis Zirrit book here and there, and are
instead largely DIY jams self-published by various artists. To get three of
them - all very different, all very accomplished in many ways - shipped in such
a short spurt is downright weird. Not only that, but other recent releases
sitting outside of this Underground/Outlaw bubble but surely on the same Venn
diagram include NYRCs amazing re-release of Gary Panter’s punk rock, arthouse
classic Jimbo: Adventures in Paradise and Shary Flenniken’s deceptively
innocent but ultra-subversive Trots & Bonnie strips. Fantagraphics is also
halfway through a library of Spain Rodriquez comics, and there’s even a
feature-length Spain documentary on the way also. Something’s in the water.
2. A Very
Quick, Extremely Reductive, Overly Personal History Of Outlaw & Underground
Comics
The original
Underground Comix movement (R. Crumb, Spain Rodriguez, S. Clay Wilson and
friends) of the ‘60s was spawned from the artists’ collective love of the EC
Comics of the ‘50s. The original Outlaw Comics (a term coined by Glen Hammonds,
founder of Raw Comics, a publisher/distributor, in the ‘90s - not to be
confused with Raw Magazine edited by Art Spiegelman and Francoise Mouly) were
the bastard step-child of the Underground and blew up in the black and white
boom of the nineties. Crumb and crew produced transgressive, psychedelic works
that tapped into the booming countercultural movement of the time. The Outlaw
Comics glut of the ‘80s-‘90s took that transgressive part and jettisoned much
of the rest in favour of pure sex and violence, testosterone amped up to
injectable levels. To be as offensive and politically incorrect as possible was
frequently part of the manifesto. Yet, for every Naked Justice there was The
Crow, for example. Just like with every fad - there are the stand-outs and the
shlock.
I grew up
during this time and I did what everyone else my age around the world reading
these things did. I read them. I hid them. I was a teen dealing with a whole
lot of stuff, grief I didn’t really know how to process and, as weird as it
sounds, books like Tim Vigil and David Quinn’s Faust provided a weird sort of
bloody catharsis. I think that’s how it was for a lot of us - fucked up kids
reading fucked up comics and burying them under piles of Spider-Man. Most of
these comics were juvenile and stupid. Just like their readers, myself
included. But their illicitness was alluring, it had to be said, another of
those ultimately pretty innocuous Things You Should Not Do, like watching Evil
Dead 2 once your parents had gone to sleep, smoking behind the gym, sinking
warm tinnies nicked from someone’s dad. Baaaad Things.
All of this is
to say, clearly your reviewer is sympathetic to this kind of material. Aside
from the possibly toxic sentimentality stirred up by these things (and for the
record, I certainly do not miss those days), the romantic in me sees this
slight resurgence as hopefully a crack in the dam that will widen - an angry
rebellion against the garish colouring, photoshop effects, glossy, crinkly
paper, computer lettering and increasing disposability of much of the
mainstream. It’s probably not. It’s probably going to end up being just a few
artistic folks scratching a dirty itch, but let the old timer dream a bit, eh?
3. Okay, The
Comics I’m Supposed To Be Reviewing
Generally, I
like to roughly follow that ol’ post modern tenet: The Author Is Dead. Outside
of historical context or anything relevant, I think the best criticism/readings
focuses on the work itself rather than those who created it and what they may
or may not have intended. I break this all the time, I know. In my defence, I’m
not a very good critic so I’m just going to go ahead and totally smash that
rule here because there’s absolutely no way to talk about Ed Piskor’s Red Room,
particularly some of the reaction to the comic, without discussing the author
himself.
If there does
turn out to be something equivalent to an Outlaw Comics outbreak, Piskor is
patient zero. To an ever-increasing audience, Piskor and co-host and fellow
cartoonist Jim Rugg have dug through their own comics boxes and quarter bins in
shops everywhere for Cartoonist Kayfabe and have exhumed a number of Outlaw
Classics: the aforementioned Faust, Tim Truman’s excellent Dragon Chiang
amongst them. They’ve fetishised old school techniques - duotone and zipatone -
with Piskor going so far as to just “colour in” sheets of old duotone, scan
them, and use them as his own personal rustic digital tonal effect (with great
success). Red Room seems borne directly from Kayfabe, as the boys increasing boredom
with recapping old Wizard magazines transformed into them giggling over the
activated chemical effects of old tonal boards and the joys of sourcing
original pages of Joe Vigil’s Dog.
Much of the
criticism of Red Room, outside from an understandable distaste for the
material, is aimed at Piskor himself: what’s considered to be a very carefully
curated public image, the endless shilling, a belief that he’s little more than
a cynical opportunist, that he’s an unskilled creator capable of little more than
“Wikipedia Comics.” Granted, Piskor’s relentless self-promotion can be grating.
There’s also a kind of breezy arrogance that I personally don’t like too much.
“You’ll like having an actual cool monthly comic to look forward to,” he writes
in Red Room #1’s afterword, “It’s been a while I know.” Ugh. Piskor’s open
distain for comics speculators and slabbed, graded comics also seems to have
evaporated when it comes to his own new work and the stack of Red Room #1
copies some of his more ardent fans have amassed. Curious, that.
The thing is,
as anyone engaged in any creative medium knows, if you do not promote yourself
nobody will. Big publishers barely have publicity departments, let alone indie
comics companies. I’d argue most writers and artists of any sort trying to
maintain any commercial success would turn their backs on social media in a
heartbeat if it was not such a necessary evil. Piskor’s work ethic is
relentless, his hustle (as grating as it can be) admirable and, with Red Room,
any slur thrown at his actual cartooning skill has been annihilated. There’s
less cynicism in Red Room than there is in any Mark Millar comic of the last
decade or any number of those movie-pitch high concept comics or endless “new
takes” on superheroes or “adapted screenplays” of films that never were and
never will be. Piskor loves comics. All kinds of comics. He not only talks
about them for approximately 500 hours a week on YouTube, he also somehow finds
the time to *make* them. Lots of them. And the hype has worked. Red Room #1 is
Fantagraphics biggest selling comic in decades.
Red Room is
Piskor’s Outlaw Comics revival. It’s grimy, violent, over-the-top, goofy,
darkly funny and has moments of actually brilliant cartooning. Funded by
cryptocurrency and streamed on the dark web for ultra-perverts everywhere are
the Red Rooms - torture dens where costumed psychopaths murder their victims in
increasingly creative ways for an audience thirsty for death. The violence is
relentless and depicted unflinchingly, but it’s so ridiculous and cartoonish I
can’t really understand how anyone could be offended by it. Nothing here seems
“dangerous.”
There was a
movie released in 2010, titled A Serbian Film, about a retired porn star lured
into one more film for a final payday that sees him forced to perform
increasingly shocking acts. It became notorious for how extreme it was.
Personally, I found it absurd and hilarious; shock for shock’s sake, so stupid
and trying so very hard to offend and to actually BE controversial I’m not sure
how it actually ended up being anything more than a pretentious, hollow and
boring joke. Piskor’s reliance on gore and viscera throughout could have gone
this route, becoming tediously dull in its attempts to frequently shock.
Thankfully though, there’s actual meat on the bones of this story and this web
of a plot, along with Piskor’s promise to vary his storytelling and visual
techniques throughout the series, will hopefully stave off any encroaching
“Serbian Film effect.”
Structurally,
Red Room is similar to a very different comic that Piskor admires, Stray
Bullets - David Lapham’s tremendous crime comic - building an interconnected
world through single, self-contained issues focussing on different characters
whilst slowly revealing their overlap. Having said that, there’s a great deal
of world-building and plot in Red Room’s debut. The prospect of different
factions vying to control the Red Room market is an enticing one. The aspect of
commerce and the structure of these factions will hopefully be as important to
the story as the unending bloodshed. There’s more plot here than in any number
of splatterpunk novels Piskor pored over while conceptualising this or any
torture porn movies such as the pretty unimaginative Hostel series (I have no
idea how those films became so big).
Wearing its
splatterpunk and Outlaw Comics influences on it’s haemoglobin-stained sleeve,
Red Room #1 introduces us to the Thelema Clan, a suitably Occultish name, led
by Mistress Pentagram. Imagine the Sawyer family from Texas Chainsaw Massacre
going all high tech and cosplaying as perverted X-Men and you’d be close.
There’s nods to Clive Barker here as well, all creating a kind of horror pot
pourri that’s consistently visually interesting. Whatever legitimate business
the Thelemas are involved in, they are industrial polluters on a grand scale.
Unfortunately for a pair of environmentalists keen to make the Thelema Family’s
environmental neglect public, they are captured, interrogated and tortured by
Mistress Pentagram and the equally sadistic…uh…torture dwarf, Horus. This is
good set-up by Piskor, as he gets to showcase his enthusiastic gore renderings
and drop plot hints at things to come that may well unravel the Thelema Family
in a manner completely seperate from any discovery of the Red Rooms by
authorities.
Alongside the
introduction of the Thelemas, we also meet Davis Mayfield, a grotesquely obese
court clerk whose wife and child are killed in a car crash. He and surviving
daughter Brianna struggle with the loss of the rest of the family and its these
early Davis segments that are the weakest part of the debut issue. The death of
Mayfield’s wife and child, and their ensuing effect on Davis himself is an
integral part of the story. The moments here are rushed and forced and, sure we
all all nudge-nudge-wink-wink splatterpunking along here somewhat ironically,
but some extra depth and detail, the time to explore the hurt, would really
make the issue’s great conclusion resonate more deeply. It’s here that Piskor’s
choice of self-contained issues may bite him somewhat in failing to totally
explore the emotional moments that another seeming influence on Red Room,
Preacher, would maximise the emotional impact of. Red Room is a series that
will chew through characters and that’s fine, it should, but having Davis’
descent play out over several issues would have strengthened his story greatly.
That’s a sacrifice Piskor is clearly willing to make to keep the story humming
though, and fair enough. There’s plates spinning all over the place here and
the deficiencies in this part of the story are made up for elsewhere.
While the
emotional weight might be lacking, where there are no corners cut is with the
art. Thankfully freed from the constraints of the fairly rigid Hip Hop Family
Tree/X-Men Grand Design format/structure, Piskor’s spilling ink everywhere
here. Clearly enjoying himself, this is as good as he’s ever been as an artist
and the tones, as mentioned above, are terrific. The layouts and panel borders
are playful and ever-shifting - characters are framed by clouds of pot smoke or
the mocking laughter of others off-panel, backgrounds are richly detailed and
impressively, thoroughly imagined throughout, the shot choices and visual
storytelling flow perfectly throughout the majority of the book. The choice to
print Red Room on glossy paper is a strange one and does harm the overall
aesthetic of the comic in my opinion, but there’s no doubt it does make
Piskor’s panels pop.
Ultimately,
you’ll know whether or not Red Room is for you by reading a synopsis. It
certainly comes as advertised but I think it has, with this debut at least,
proven it has way more going for it than just a simple treat for gorehounds.
There’s a Free Comic Book Day issue comic up, with Piskor restraining himself
somewhat (at least on the violence). If you’re curious, this might be the one
to try. If Piskor’s limiting the gore for FCBD we’ll see just how creative he
can get with this very flexible story engine he’s made for himself.
Slow Death’s
debut issue, way back in 1970, was created as a benefit book for a San
Franciscan Ecological Centre. Conceived as an eco-horror anthology, Slow Death
continued to be published by Ron Turner’s Last Gasp sporadically over the
decades, and its pages were populated by a who’s-who of cartoonists, from Crumb
to Corben, spinning largely post apocalyptic yarns about ruined earths and
greedy capitalists. Cancer specials, Energy specials, Greenpeace Specials and
more appeared haphazardly until 1992.
Fifty years after issue #1 debuted, Slow Death has returned with Slow
Death Zero, a chunky, beautifully produced special hosting cartoonists old and
young, spinning tales ranging from a comics history of Antarctica to a family
of peanut farmers toiling away on their barren soil hitting the town for a
well-deserved night out.
Slow Death Zero
is a very strong anthology. Including work by Richard Corben, Robert Crumb,
William Stout, Rick Veitch, Mike Diana, Bryan Talbot, Peter Bagge, Rick
Altergott, Pat Moriarty and many more, this is a pretty killer line-up of
underground artists young and old. The old timers really bring it too - Talbot’s
“Memento” is a stunner, a kind of grindhouse Moebius comic featuring a nameless
protagonist battling his way through a disturbing urban dystopia to bring a
dying man a final gift. Rick Veitch (while getting a little too digital
focussed for my liking) explores the narcotic effects of technology to great
effect in “Tiny Dancer.” The late
Corben, along with frequent collaborator Bruce Jones, turns in an effective EC
style shocker with “Garbage Man” about a husband and wife living amongst tonnes
of plastic waste. “How many trees had to be cut down for this comic book?,” R.
Crumb cheekily muses in “Smogville Blues.” Good question, actually. The fine
print indicates Slow Death Zero is printed on Woodfree Paper which is,
apparently from my quick research, uh, still made from wood.
Anyway, this is
a cracking anthology, headlined by some genuinely big names and fizzing with
underground and outlaw comics energy. The range of material here is remarkable,
from the aforementioned tales to “The Collection” by Mike Diana (the ultimate
Comics Outlaw), the story of a psychotic bug collector who finds himself at the
mercy of giant insectoid monsters intent on starting collections of their own,
to “A Garden in Ghouta” by M Rafa and Kellie Strom - a true story of chemical
attacks in rural Syria, Editors Ron Turner and Jon B. Cooke have assembled
quite the package with Slow Death Zero, merging the Underground with the Outlaw
and the Literary and the assembled talent makes the most of the opportunity
presented to them.
And now that
your tolerance is suitably built up, here’s a hit of the pure stuff. Ken
Landgraff’s Apocalypse 5,000 was originally printed as a back-up feature in his
New York City Outlaws comic in 1984.
It’s been recollected (although annoyingly incomplete) by the marvellous crew
at Floating World Comics. Landgraf was described by Jim Rugg on a Cartoonist Kayfabe episode as “The King of ‘80s self-publishing and black and white comics,”
and his work is notable for the way he merges a grimy Outlaw Comics aesthetic
for what’s clearly a love of classic Bronze Age superhero books. Apocalypse
5,000 feels more like Marvel’s old Killraven books than anything like Faust,
for example. Landgraf draws like he has a stack of old Gil Kane comics by his
side for reference and he’s down to his last few remaining sheets of zipatone.
This is not meant as a knock; there’s immense charm (an adjective rarely used
in relation to Outlaw books, I’m sure) packed in here, powered by what’s surely
true Bronze Age authenticity mixed with a dash of Outsider Art.
Far from being merely some hack, Landgraf (born
1950) was an assistant to Gil Kane at one point in his career, so the glimpses
of classic square-jawed Kane characters and some distinct Kane posing during
action sequences is to be expected and, in fact, welcomed. He was an assistant
to Wally Wood also and there’s glimpses of Wood here too. Langraf worked for Marvel and DC, he
worked as a storyboard artist for television, he became a self-publisher - he’s
as grizzled and hardscrabble and authentic as comics artists get.
Apocalypse 5,000 presents yet another
post-apocalyptic comics calamity, where the remnants of humanity are enslaved
by the evil Droids to build giant “computer pyramids” amongst other strange
architectural projects our droid overlords desire constructed. There does
remain a glimmer of hope for humanity - Eric Firedancer and his band of freedom
fighters, who have risen up to try and reclaim earth.
Old School in the best sense, Apocalypse 5,000
reads like an early Outlaw book precisely because it is one. “But the man has
discovered the scent of his own beast…and it howls in his blood far louder than
any wolf,” reads one glorious narrative caption by scripter Bob Huszar during
Firedancer’s battle with a pack of…wait for it…Radar Wolves. Yes, this comic
has Radar Wolves, who “track with the cunning of beasts and the precision of
computers.” Beat that, Piskor.
Apocalypse 5,000 really is great fun. It’s such
a shame that only the original three chapters are included in Floating World’s
new edition and the story remains incomplete. Never fear though, as Floating
World are teasing the return of New York City Outlaws in 2022, in hopefully a
fat collected edition of all five issues. It’s about time, really.
WHAT MADNESS IS THIS: STRANGE THINGS FROM
THE SHELF
ULTRA HEAVEN
Keiichi Koike
Beam Comix
Created between 2001-2009, Keiichi Koike’s
Ultra Heaven looks like Katsuhiro Otomo and Frank Quitely had a psychedelic
comics baby that you’ve probably, sadly, never seen.
Set in a near future where drugs have been
legalised, Kabu, a dealer and junkie himself, chases the ultimate
hallucinogenic trip. He can’t find it anywhere; his regular drug Peter Pan
isn’t cutting it and so visits a “pump bar,” think drug-pubs, and ends up
taking something called Nova Express which simulates the death experience. Next
up, he is given something in the park by a random drug dealer that turns
nightmarish and the experience is so real, he’s now trapped in this drug-realm
and only *more* Ultra Heaven will help him elude those who chase him.
Most of that synopsis comes from Wikipedia as
my Japanese is poor and I cannot read my original tankobon collections. There’s
some whisperings, however, that Last Gasp might be coming to the table this
year with long overdue English collections of what I can tell you first hand is
a mind-glowingly drawn and laid out comic book.
UPCOMING UNDER THE RADAR
DOPE RIDER: A FISTFUL OF DELIRIUM
Paul Kirchner
Editions Tanibus
Due June
Originally created by Paul Kirchner in the ‘70s
for High Times magazine, Dope Rider is the sumptuously drawn, super-stoner,
single page adventures of the titular character ( a perpetually high skeleton
in a cowboy outfit). A psychedelic classic, most of the original Dope Rider
strips were collected a few years back in Editions Tanibus’ beautifully
produced Awaiting The Collapse, a collection of Kirchner’s strips including
those done for Heavy Metal.
This June, Dope Rider returns in Fistful of
Delirium, collecting Kirchner’s uncollected strips from 2015-2020. Kirchner,
who’s never been high in his life, remains in peak form and these latter era
strips maintain the level of detail familiar to longtime readers (his ability
to warp perspectives is pretty stunning). Dope Rider endures, “still smoking
his ever-present joint, getting high and chasing metaphysical dragons through
whimsical realities in meticulously illustrated and colorful one-page
adventures,” Kirchner tells us.
Seriously, don’t muck around, get an order in
for this - Editions Tanibus is a French publisher (printing both French and
English language versions) and these books don’t hang around forever.
NEXT TIME
I’ll be back in August to take the annual
(well, okay, not last year) Free Comic Book Day/Stay Away Comic Book Day challenge. Yep, every single issue All Star will have in there selection will be previewed right here with customary unflinching honesty
before the big day.
The great, the good, the tepid, the bad and the horrid. I
will read ‘em all.
See you soon. Read Indie.
