- All-Ages or Small-Ages #9 (Grumpy Cat - Volume 1) (Mark D.)
- The Revisionist #1 (James K.)
- Strange Attractors #1 (of 5) (James K.)
- Graphic Nonfiction: Eleri Mai Harris Monetizes the Week (Rob M.)
- All-Ages or Small-Ages #10 (Love: The Fox by Frédéric Brrémaud and Frederico Bertolucci) (Mark D.)
- Sucked Up Into His Mind- a review of Casanova: Acedia #5 (Scott C.)
- Requiem-- a review of Hellboy in Hell #10 (Scott C.)
- All-Ages or Small-Ages #11 (Plants vs. Zombies Lawnmageddon) (Mark D.)
- All-Ages or Small-Ages #12 (Adventure Time Volume 1 by Ryan North, Shelli Paroline and Braden Lamb) (Mark D.)
- Graphic Nonfiction Special: A Look at UK's EU Vote by Tom Humberstone (Rob M.)
** From the Desk of Ed Brubaker (Ed Brubaker's new newsletter)-- So, I guess that part of the news here is that Ed Brubaker has a new newsletter. Newsletters seem to be becoming the new blogs/websites for comic creators. If you're interested in such things, you can subscribe to it here.
There have been two newsletters so far but the most interesting thing in them is from the first one where Brubaker shares a preview of his upcoming new Brubaker/Phillips joint Kill or Be Killed and if you've been a fan of this team for a long time as I've been, maybe you notice something exciting about the pages in this preview.
From Kill or Be Killed (Image Comics)
The construction of the page in the new book goes back to an early collaboration of these two creators, Wildstorm's Sleeper. In that old series, Phillips constructed his pages so that there was a main, full page image and then insert panels that continued the story.
From Sleeper (DC/Wildstorm)
Now it looks like in the preview pages for Kill or Be Killed, Phillips is going back to playing with a main image in the page that really establishes the the story beat (or maybe as in the first page shown, story beats) and then moving through the story to the next story beat through the insert panels.
It's interesting to see Phillips go back to this page structure after 10 years of the very controlled and steady storytelling of Criminal, Incognito, Fatale, and The Fade Out. In Criminal, Phillips has worked mostly with a three-tiered structure where each tier could almost be separated from the page to construct a classic newspaper comic strip.
From Criminal: Lawless (Marvel/Icon)
For over 10 years, Sean Phillips has been one of the most exciting storytellers working in comics. Particularly in his partnership with Brubaker. It's not because his drawings are excellent (they are.) It's not because the stories he's drawing are fantastic (again, they are.) But it's because of his approach to storyetlling. You can look at his pages and miss so much of what he's doing because when you look at only one page at a time, it's challenging to see the greater scope of the choices he's making. But spend time with his books and look at how he develops the visual architecture of the book and the choices he makes during the story progression.
** Matt Kindt's 10 Rules (10 Rulles for Drawing Comics)-- I love the wisdom that this site dispences. Here's Panel Patter favorite Matt Kindt's rules:
3. Stop trying to perfect it. It won’t be perfect. You’ll be able to draw or write it even better ten minutes from now, tomorrow, a year from now. Forever. What you create in this moment is just an artifact of who you were at that moment in time. Don’t hate your old work because it’s bad. Love it as proof that you’re improving. You’re better now than you were then.** See you next week, everyone. Be safe out there.
