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Rereading the Locas Stories
Over the last several weeks, in preparation for this roundtable, I’ve been rereading the Locas material I have in my library. This is volumes 1 through 11 of the original Complete Love and Rockets...
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The Eras of Crumb
Cover illustration for The East Village Other (1968) The work of Robert Crumb has its challenges for critics and scholars. He’s been both a restless and prolific artist, and a fairly consistent one in...
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Tolstoy’s Hero: On Hadji Murád
After finishing Hadji Murád, Leo Tolstoy’s final novel, I was reminded of a quote from him in Maxim Gorky’s Reminiscences of Tolstoy: “Heroes—that’s a lie and invention; there are simply people,...
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Reverse Projections: Jean-Luc Godard’s Alphaville
In general, I’m not sympathetic to the auteurist film aesthetic. I think films tend to be better when the director treats the screenplay as a foundation instead of a springboard. But when a director...
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Reverse Projections: Jean-Luc Godard’s Made in U. S. A.
Jean-Luc Godard’s twelfth feature, Made in U. S. A. (1966), had its North American premiere at the 1967 New York Film Festival. It wasn’t available for viewing again in the United States until 2009....
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The Superman Case, and Best Outcomes for Writers on Comics
Readers of my comics criticism know that I’m a strong advocate for thinking outside the box of the comics subculture. I ask for comics to be examined from a more culturally rounded perspective, and I...
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Non-Fiction Review: Sean Howe, Marvel Comics: The Untold Story
Sean Howe’s Marvel Comics: The Untold Story is an extremely enjoyable addition to the warts-and-all, behind-the-scenes genre of pop historical writing. It’s not an academic-style history; although...
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Jim Shooter–A Second Opinion, Part One: The Best Job He Can
[Jim Shooter] does the best job he can, takes great pride in his work, and is genuinely dedicated to publishing the highest-quality Marvel Comics ever. –Gary Groth, The Comics Journal 60, p. 56 Jim...
View Article“I prefer him as a cartoonist”
The talk of many in the comics community this past week has been Eddie Campbell’s essay “The Literaries,” which was posted at tcj.com on February 6. The main target was Ng Suat Tong and his essay...
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Audio: Pauline Kael on the Auteur Theory
Pauline Kael Andrew Sarris In the recent discussions of issues raised by the Eddie Campbell essay “The Literaries,” the subject of the auteur theory of film has come up. I thought it would be of...
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Jim Shooter–A Second Opinion, Part Two: Romper Room on Crystal Meth...
First off, my apologies for the long delay since the first part of this series on Jim Shooter’s tenure as Marvel editor-in-chief. For those interested in reading the first part, click here. We’re...
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Running Hot and Mostly Cold on Blue Is the Warmest Color
The small Vancouver publisher Arsenal Pulp Press had a happy surprise this spring. At the Frankfurt International Book Fair last October, they finalized the contract to publish the English translation...
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The Howard the Duck Documents
This post contains photocopies of the primary source documents referred to in “All Quacked Up: Steve Gerber, Marvel Comics, and Howard the Duck.” Click here for the main article. The documents included...
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All Quacked Up: Steve Gerber, Marvel Comics, and Howard the Duck
Howard the Duck. Art by Brian Bolland. This article is a history of the editorial and business relationship between Marvel Comics, their representatives, and the late writer Steve Gerber (1947-2008)....
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Comics by the Date: May 1946 to August 1946
This is the 14th entry in this weekly series. (For an index of the series’ other published posts, click here.) The purpose is to provide a detailed chronology of the history of North American...
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Comics by the Date: September 1946 to December 1946
This is the 15th entry in this weekly series. (For an index of the series’ other published posts, click here.) The purpose is to provide a detailed chronology of the history of North American...
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Comics by the Date: January 1947 to April 1947
This is the 16th entry in this weekly series. (For an index of the series’ other published posts, click here.) The purpose is to provide a detailed chronology of the history of North American...
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Comics by the Date: May 1947 to July 1947
This is the 17th entry in this weekly series. (For an index of the series’ other published posts, click here.) The purpose is to provide a detailed chronology of the history of North American...
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Comics by the Date: August 1947 to December 1947
This is the 18th entry in this weekly series. (For an index of the series’ other published posts, click here.) The purpose is to provide a detailed chronology of the history of North American...
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Comics by the Date: January 1948 to April 1948
This is the 19th entry in this weekly series. (For an index of the series’ other published posts, click here.) The purpose is to provide a detailed chronology of the history of North American...
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