#comic book guide

[spite-and-waffles]

I'm putting together various storyline chronologies for my own reference, and just finished the Batfamily one. It's not the most elegant, but it might help anyone who wants to know the order. Alt text included.

See this reblog for further info about No Man's Land.

The Complete Knightfall

Not included: character backstories like Long Halloween, the Year One series or Red Hood: Lost Days. Will do a separate post for them.

See also:

Complete list of Batman Vol. 1 issues (1986–2011)

Complete list of pre-reboot Detective Comics (1986–2011) issues

Complete list of Shadow of the Bat Vol. 1 (1992–2000) issues

Legends of the Dark Knight Vol. 1 (1989–2006) collections

Complete list of Legends of the Dark Knight Vol. 1 issues

Complete list of Gotham Knights Vol. 1 (2000–2006)

Complete List of Batman Mini-series (1986–2011)

Complete List of Streets of Gotham Vol. 1 issues (2009–2011)

Complete List of Batman Elseworlds stories

Complete List of The Batman Chronicles Vol. 1 (1995–2001)

[jenthegeek]

I made some videos that hopefully will help beginners get into comics! Check them out!

https://youtu.be/jGBoWe_dz5M

https://youtu.be/S8W2OYacDqI

[thepsychicracoon]

A “Kinda” Simple Guide On How To Read The X-Men

This is from my TikTok but since that whole app might get put down like a dog I’m just throwing all my comic reading guides here. That’s why it looks like this lol

[paintedpigeon1]

Asexuality in science fiction

A resource guide

Hello! So a while ago, I mentioned a resource guide for asexuality in science fiction. It includes resources for information about asexuality, asexual creators, non-fiction, fiction databases, fiction, writing asexuality, and writing sci-fi. There's a decent amount of aromantic resources included too bc a lot of resources included both. Also, there's a wide variety of types of resources:

Come and check it out! Both high and lower quality versions included:

(Tagging a couple of people who said they were interested, sorry if you didn't want to be tagged: @snowshinobi @studyofwhump)

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Bowen McCurdy and Jordan Morris’s “Youth Group”

NEXT SATURDAY (July 20), I'm appearing in CHICAGO at Exile in Bookville.

Youth Group is Bowen McCurdy and Jordan Morris's new and delightful graphic novel from Firstsecond. It's a charming tale of 1990s ennui, cringe Sunday School – and demon hunting.

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250789235/youthgroup

Kay is a bitter, cynical teenager who's doing her best to help her mother cope with an ugly divorce that has seen her dad check out on his former family. Mom is going back to church, and she talks Kay into coming along with her to attend the church youth group.

This is set in the 1990s, and the word "cringe" hasn't yet entered our lexicon as an adjective, but boy is the youth group cringe. The pastor is a guitar-strumming bearded dad who demonstrates how down he is with the kids by singing top 40 songs rewritten with evangelical lyrics (think Weird Al meets the 700 Club). Kay gamely struggles through a session and even makes a friend or two, and agrees to keep attending in deference to her mother's pleas.

But this is no ordinary youth group. Kay's ultra-boring suburban hometown is actually infested with demons who routinely possess the townspeople, and that baseline of demonic activity has suddenly gone critical, with a new wave of possessions. Suddenly, the possessed are everywhere – even Kay's shitty dad ends up with a demon inside of him.

That's when Kay discovers that the youth group and its corny pastor are also demon hunters par excellence. Their rec-rooms sport secret cubbies filled with holy weapons, and the words of exorcism come as readily to them as any embarrassing rewritten devotional pop song. Kay's discovery of this secret world convinces her that youth group isn't so bad after all, and soon she is initiated into its mysteries, including the existence of rival demon-hunting kids from the local synagogue, Catholic church, and Wiccan coven.

As the nature of the new demonic incursion becomes clearer, it falls on Kay and her pals to overcome these sectarian divisions over the protests of their guitar-strumming, magic-wielding leader. That takes on a special urgency when Kay learns why the demons are interested in her, personally, and a handful of other kids in town who all share a secret trait.

I confess that as someone who lived through the 1990s as a young man, there is something disorienting about experiencing the decade of my young adulthood through the kind of retro lens I associate with the 1950s or 1960s. But while the experience is disorienting, it's not unpleasant. McCurdy's artwork and Morris's snappy dialog conjure up that bygone decade in a way that is simultaneously affectionate and critical, exposing the hollowness of its performative ennui and the brave face that performance represented even as the world was being swept up in corporate gigantism.

McCurdy and Morris are really onto something here, implicitly asking us why the 1990s gave us Buffy and Sabrina (and The Coven, etc etc) – what was it about that decade in which Reaganomics and globalism consolidated the gains of the 1980s, where the climate emergency took on its undeniable urgency, where media monopolies mastered the art of commodifying counterculture faster than it could mutate into new forms?

Morris's writing really shines here. If you enjoyed Bubble, his earlier outing based on the post-apocalyptic comedy podcast of the same name, you will love this one:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/08/21/podcasting-as-a-visual-medium/#huntr

Morris is also half of Jordan, Jesse Go!, the long-running podcast where he and Jesse Thorn do a weekly ha-ha-only-serious goofball schtick that never fails to smuggle in really clever and insightful ideas amidst the poop jokes.

https://maximumfun.org/podcasts/jordan-jesse-go/

John Hodgman calls nostalgia a "toxic impulse." Church Group deftly avoids nostalgia's trap, managing to be a period piece without falling prey to the Happy Days pathology of ignoring the many flaws and problems of its era. And of course, it's a hoot and a blast.

Support me this summer on the Clarion Write-A-Thon and help raise money for the Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers' Workshop!

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/16/blight/#the-dream-of-the-nineties

[stormingfrost]

Kinda obsessed with the historical context of Rise of the Guardians. Pitch wanting the Dark Ages to come back, which historically was the decline of culture and records. The Guardians rose at the same time as the Renaissance with the rise of culture, knowledge, and science. (Tooth in particular mentions that she hasn’t been out in the field for 440 years, give or take, which would put that smack dab in the middle of the Renaissance) 

The way Pitch doesn’t want the world to change, the way the Guardians change in tune with the world. The way Jack, who lived in has a human in the 17th or 18th century, who lived in the time after the Renaissance and lived witnessing the world all the way to the modern era, is there to show the Guardians how much they missed and how they can further change and improve for the more modern world. These characters are immortal beings who have so much power over the world, it makes so much sense that when they fall and rise in power it impacts the world that they want to influence, for better or for worse. 

[beartitled]

Fellas

It is finally done

👉Portfolio👈

Go explore and click on interactive books✨

It’s best viewed from PC/laptop, bc some interactive parts may not load

If it’s the case for you, don’t worry 🫵 you won’t miss out on fun ❤️🫵

Here’s the compilation of interactive stuff you can view separately 👇

💛Barry - mini visual novel

🔍Bears mega drawing (that you can view under the magnifying glass 🔍)

🔍Undertale x TSP

🔍TSP ice cream chain

✏️Character design: Art blocked

✏️Character design: Purpose

[horse-surgeon-barbie]

if no one else got me, I know the Rick and Morty Character Guide (2020) got me

[geekupdated]

This handy visual lists the first comic book appearances of 101 Marvel characters.

Each character comes with a three factors:

– Alignment (hero, villain, anti-hero) – Species (for instance: fairy, atlantean, titan, deity) – Powers (for instance: psychic, born with powers, enhanced, accidental or mutant powers, etc.) Each character comes with a three factors:

(via A cool guide to Marvel character comic book debuts (infographic))

[rxttenfish]

this is perhaps unexpected from someone who notoriously LOVES and is fascinated by the deep sea and constantly wants to write and talk and learn about it

but i fucking HATE how so often people refuse to treat deep sea organisms as actual organisms, and always insist on them being uniquely scary or dangerous or hyper-evolved into some awesomebro predator. and you see this all the time in basically all acts of creature design when its for a deep-sea animal, where its used as a shorthand for "monster" and is able to abruptly kick everything elses collective asses because its So Cool And Awesome And Dangerous And Ultra Predator.

like, these people just categorically refuse to view the deep sea as just another habitat, the animals that live there being just another way for animals to live. it has to be Hell, or the Place Where Nightmares Are Born, and it cant just be an ecosystem that deserves consideration and conservation as much as any other.

even moreso i feel like it doesnt let people actually engage with marine biology focused around the deep sea, because then people are either too scared to or they think the real thing is "less cool" compared to the fantasy theyve created in their heads, which is even worse when, yeah, deep sea ecosystems ARE under threat. its like another version of the shark thing, where people react with hatred towards a bunch of animals who categorically do not pose a threat to human life, and dont care or do anything to protect those animals when they are by far more threatened by human activity.

[spite-and-waffles]

The Complete Nightwing (Pre-52)

Google Drive link and Complete List of Nightwing Issues and Extras under the cut.

(Please let me know if you want me to upload anything else)

Link to Google Drive

Other references: Post-Crisis Dick Grayson timeline by @bitimdrake

Other Google Drive Links:

New Teen Titans

Titans Vol. 1

Outsiders Vol. 3

Titans Vol. 2

See also (lists only, drive not yet uploaded):

Complete Chronological List of Pre-52 Batman storylines and collected editions

Complete list of Batman Vol. 1 issues (1986–2011)

Complete list of Pre-52 Detective Comics (1986–2011)

Complete list of Shadow of the Bat Vol. 1 (1992–2000)

Complete list of Legends of the Dark Knight Vol. 1 issues & issue collections

Complete list of Gotham Knights Vol. 1 (2000–2006)

Complete list of Batman Mini-series (1986–2011)

Complete List of Batman One-Shots

Complete list of Streets of Gotham Vol. 1 issues (2009–2011)

Complete List of The Batman Chronicles Vol. 1 (1995–2001)

Complete List of Batman Elseworlds stories

Complete List of Pre-52 Batgirl issues

[studiolemonboy]

Mutants of Cherry Creek (pt 2)

Some MORE mutated critters from my YA lovecraftian horror comic set in 90s New England.

Mutagenic ooze is seeping into the town of Cherry Creek and mutating normal New England wildlife into terrifying monsters. The Cherry Creek Middle School Paranormal Investigation Club sets out to discover, catalogue, and tame all of the mutated cryptids and hopefully find the source of the toxic ooze before it permanently infects everything (and everyone) in town.

Northern Short Tailed Shrew — one of only a few venomous mammals

Brown and Black Bears - walk on two legs, climb trees, intelligent

Eastern Crayfish - present in the fossil record for at least 300 million years Eastern

Moose - huge but stealthy

Eastern Newt (Red Eft) — can secrete a strong smelling chemical from glands in its skin

At first, the animals just seem weird, strange, a little “off”. Over time, exposure to the ooze causes these creatures to get bigger, meaner, and much more dangerous. (all the beginning stage creatures shown here are newly mutated, their final stages are after only a few weeks of exposure)

I also love folklore and cryptids and I really love the idea of this club of dorky middle school cryptid hunters assigning names like “bigfoot”, “mothman”, and “hodag” to these monsters so can try and contextualize something they don’t really understand. Soon the club realizes these aren’t fun isolated critters but symptoms much larger impending ecological disaster!

I picture it like pokemon evolution, going from a cute water turtle to a kaiju which is a lot for a ten year old to handle.

Which is your favorite? What cryptid would you wanna see? What animal should I “Cryptify” next? lmk what you think!

[woundjob]

look what just got announced!! this is my debut into the comics world, unless you count some equally amazing anthologies, and i've been working on it for ages!! i'm so happy and excited and aaaaa!!! this is the book i've worked so hard on!!! and its real!!! aaaaa!!!!

[leslaras-art]

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Emil Ferris’s long-awaited “My Favorite Thing Is Monsters Book Two”

NEXT WEEKEND (June 7–9), I'm in AMHERST, NEW YORK to keynote the 25th Annual Media Ecology Association Convention and accept the Neil Postman Award for Career Achievement in Public Intellectual Activity.

Seven years ago, I was absolutely floored by My Favorite Thing Is Monsters, a wildly original, stunningly gorgeous, haunting and brilliant debut graphic novel from Emil Ferris. Every single thing about this book was amazing:

https://memex.craphound.com/2017/06/20/my-favorite-thing-is-monsters-a-haunting-diary-of-a-young-girl-as-a-dazzling-graphic-novel/

The more I found out about the book, the more amazed I became. I met Ferris at that summer's San Diego Comic Con, where I learned that she had drawn it over a while recovering from paralysis of her right – dominant – hand after a West Nile Virus infection. Each meticulously drawn and cross-hatched page had taken days of work with a pen duct-taped to her hand, a project of seven years.

The wild backstory of the book's creation was matched with a wild production story: first, Ferris's initial publisher bailed on her because the book was too long; then her new publisher's first shipment of the book was seized by the South Korean state bank, from the Panama Canal, when the shipper went bankrupt and its creditors held all its cargo to ransom.

My Favorite Thing Is Monsters told the story of Karen Reyes, a 10 year old, monster-obsessed queer girl in 1968 Chicago who lives with her working-class single mother and her older brother, Deeze, in an apartment house full of mysterious, haunted adults. There's the landlord – a gangster and his girlfriend – the one-eyed ventriloquist, and the beautiful Holocaust survivor and her jazz-drummer husband.

Karen narrates and draws the story, depicting herself as a werewolf in a detective's trenchcoat and fedora, as she tries to unravel the secrets kept by the grownups around her. Karen's life is filled with mysteries, from the identity of her father (her brother, a talented illustrator, has removed him from all the family photos and redrawn him as the Invisible Man) to the purpose of a mysterious locked door in the building's cellar.

But the most pressing mystery of all is the death of her upstairs neighbor, the beautiful Annika Silverberg, a troubled Holocaust survivor whose alleged suicide just doesn't add up, and Karen – who loved and worshiped Annika – is determined to get to the bottom of it.

Karen is tormented by the adults in her life keeping too much from her – and by their failure to shield her from life's hardest truths. The flip side of Karen's frustration with adult secrecy is her exposure to adult activity she's too young to understand. From Annika's cassette-taped oral history of her girlhood in an Weimar brothel and her escape from a Nazi concentration camp, to the sex workers she sees turning tricks in cars and alleys in her neighborhood, to the horrors of the Vietnam war, Karen's struggle to understand is characterized by too much information, and too little.

Ferris's storytelling style is dazzling, and it's matched and exceeded by her illustration style, which is grounded in the classic horror comics of the 1950s and 1960s. Characters in Karen's life – including Karen herself – are sometimes depicted in the EC horror style, and that same sinister darkness crowds around the edges of her depictions of real-world Chicago.

These monster-comic throwbacks are absolute catnip for me. I, too, was a monster-obsessed kid, and spent endless hours watching, drawing, and dreaming about this kind of monster.

But Ferris isn't just a monster-obsessive; she's also a formally trained fine artist, and she infuses her love of great painters into Deeze, Karen's womanizing petty criminal of an older brother. Deeze and Karen's visits to the Art Institute of Chicago are commemorated with loving recreations of famous paintings, which are skillfully connected to pulp monster art with a combination of Deeze's commentary and Ferris's meticulous pen-strokes.

Seven years ago, Book One of My Favorite Thing Is Monsters absolutely floored me, and I early anticipated Book Two, which was meant to conclude the story, picking up from Book One's cliff-hanger ending. Originally, that second volume was scheduled for just a few months after Book One's publication (the original manuscript for Book One ran to 700 pages, and the book had been chopped down for publication, with the intention of concluding the story in another volume).

But the book was mysteriously delayed, and then delayed again. Months stretched into years. Stranger rumors swirled about the second volume's status, compounded by the bizarre misfortunes that had befallen book one. Last winter, Bleeding Cool's Rich Johnston published an article detailing a messy lawsuit between Ferris and her publishers, Fantagraphics:

https://bleedingcool.com/comics/fantagraphics-sued-emil-ferris-over-my-favorite-thing-is-monsters/

The filings in that case go some ways toward resolve the mystery of Book Two's delay, though the contradictory claims from Ferris and her publisher are harder to sort through than the mysteries at the heart of Monsters. The one sure thing is that writer and publisher eventually settled, paving the way for the publication of the very long-awaited Book Two:

https://www.fantagraphics.com/products/my-favorite-thing-is-monsters-book-two

Book Two picks up from Book One's cliffhanger and then rockets forward. Everything brilliant about One is even better in Two – the illustrations more lush, the fine art analysis more pointed and brilliant, the storytelling more assured and propulsive, the shocks and violence more outrageous, the characters more lovable, complex and grotesque.

Everything about Two is more. The background radiation of the Vietnam War in One takes center stage with Deeze's machinations to beat the draft, and Deeze and Karen being ensnared in the Chicago Police Riots of '68. The allegories, analysis and reproductions of classical art get more pointed, grotesque and lavish. Annika's Nazi concentration camp horrors are more explicit and more explicitly connected to Karen's life. The queerness of the story takes center stage, both through Karen's first love and the introduction of a queer nightclub. The characters are more vivid, as is the racial injustice and the corruption of the adult world.

I've been staring at the spine of My Favorite Thing Is Monsters Book One on my bookshelf for seven years. Partly, that's because the book is such a gorgeous thing, truly one of the great publishing packages of the century. But mostly, it's because I couldn't let go of Ferris's story, her characters, and her stupendous art.

After seven years, it would have been hard for Book Two to live up to all that anticipation, but goddammit if Ferris didn't manage to meet and exceed everything I could have hoped for in a conclusion.

There's a lot of people on my Christmas list who'll be getting both volumes of Monsters this year – and that number will only go up if Fantagraphics does some kind of slipcased two-volume set.

In the meantime, we've got more Ferris to look forward to. Last April, she announced that she had sold a prequel to Monsters and a new standalone two-volume noir murder series to Pantheon Books:

https://twitter.com/likaluca/status/1648364225855733769

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/01/the-druid/#oh-my-papa