This Friday, October 2, will be the 4th annual Star Clipper St. Louis Munny Show. I’ve participated in the last two Munny Shows and thought I had learned an essential lesson last year: start your munny before you only have a week left to finish it. Well, I didn’t learn my lesson. So like the first year, when I was painting Ghost Rider Munny’s flames at 2 am and finishing stitching the miniature leather jacket with my cousin Maria just hours before the show, I’m probably going to be right down to the wire with finishing this years Munny. Maybe it’s because I always try to come up with a gimmick that makes my Munny stand out from everyone else, but these vinyl canvases always get me revved up.
The first year I thought my gimmick would be 100% original. My buddy Keith and I rigged a light inside Ghost Rider Munny’s skull and his flaming head lit up. Of Course, that year at least 3 other people’s Munnys had light up heads, and they made theirs more functional than mine using wires instead of batteries. So in my second year to up the ante, I came up with my next “100%” original gimmick of using water in my Munny. I based my Munny on the 1980’s Mad Ball toy called Bash Brain and placed a fountain piece through the body and out the exposed brain. I dyed the water red, turned the fountain on, and old Bash Brain Munny looked like his brain was constantly bleeding. It worked until the fountain recirculated water to far and got to the battery and short circuited the wires. Okay, batteries failed me again, so no batteries this year. Regardless, the Munny next to Bash Brain also used a water gimmick and was fully submerged in an aquarium. What do I have to do, make a laser light show Munny?
This year I think I got it though. My gimmick is sure to wow you, but I’m not going to tell you what it is. However, I’ll give you a hint. It’s a male. It carries babies. It always looks like it’s floating stationary, and it’s pretty psychedelic. To find out what the Munny is you will just have to come to the Munny Show on Friday, and I better hope that my girlfriend and co-creator Chrissy and I get it done on time.
By the way, we are going to extend the deadline for Munny Show applicants from September 27 to the new date of Thursday, October 1st. If you are a procrastinator on your Munny like me, you better get cracking.
If you’ve been to the store often enough then you’ve probably seen some of our stuff from Tokidoki like the Cactus Pups, Moofia figures, and the cuts-ey Sabre-tooth cat figures that we have for sale. They do well with the whole cute meets fierce thing. And I’m sure by now that you all know what Marvel comics is all about.
Worlds collide when Tokidoki and Marvel team up to produce apparel that takes Marvel characters done in the distinctly sugary style of Tokidoki. I absolutely love the shirt and hoodie featuring Iron Man being pelted with smiling bullets, and who can deny the hilarity of super-deformed Spidey being attacked by Cactus Pup Bastardino like the Coppertone Girl? My favorite by far has to be the image of the Might Thor in cartoony style petting a smiley unicorn (also featuring a mighty Mjojnir with a happy smile on it.) Also, when the Hulk is rendered as a Tokidoki, character, he looks less like the embodiment of rage, and more like someone who just needs a hug.
Marvel and Tokidoki: Two very different flavors that taste great together.
WTF. I think that is the only way I can sum up Giant-Size Wolverine Old Man Logan, the long awaited conclusion to the Old Man Logan story-line. Since the beginning, I’ve gone back and fourth on what I’ve thought about the series, but seriously- WTF. In this issue it is revealed that in the future Hulk mates with She-Hulk, Bruce Banner’s first cousin Jennifer Walters, because she is the only one “who could take the damn pace!” They have a veritable army of idiotic inbred gamma-radiated children who kill Wolverine’s family for game. Then Wolverine spends the whole issue killing everything in sight, including a completely innocent cow, to avenge his slaughtered kin. When he finally takes on Bruce Banner he gets eaten alive and later bursts out of his stomach (à la Alien) to finish the kill. Finally, garbed in a cowboy hat, Wolverine takes Banner’s last radiated infant (à la Lone Wolf and Cub) and rides off into the sunset to end the reign of the super-villains. I feel like I just read a plot from Real Ultimate Power.
I don’t really know what I was expecting from the series. I was trying not to take it too seriously. By the halfway point of Old Man Logan, I even decided writer Mark Millar was basically making a glorified What If? story. So I tried to take the whole thing at face value and enjoy it for all its gore-filled symbiotic alien dinosaur goodness. However, since this outlandish story is suppose to tie into actually Marvel continuity, I say WTF.
How on earth does this fit into Marvel continuity?! For Wolverine to have killed off all of the X-Men, which is the reason he has taken a pacifist lifestyle in Old Man Logan, that would erase all the events of House of M, Civil War and all the following events in the Marvel universe. Throughout the rest of the series, it’s filled with editorial changes that work only for this specific story. For instance, apparently Bruce Banner has the strength of the Hulk even when he is in his normal human form. When did this change happen?! Yeah, it looks cool when Steve McNiven draws crazy old Banner bash Wolverine 50-feet, but that’s about it.
Now I’m getting all worked up and I promised myself I wouldn’t. If you want to read Old Man Logan approach it like an abrasively violent What If? story and nothing more. Otherwise, you’re going to be yelling WTF the whole time. Well, actually, you’ll probably be yelling WTF either way.
I’ve never been a big reader of Simpson’s comics. I absolutely love the show and have been a fan for the 20 years they’ve been around, and having lived in a town called Springfield (where there is indeed an Evergreen Terrace, and a Shelbyville isn’t too far away) there’s an added affection. The comic books are just as hilarious as the TV show, with a who’s who of artists having contributed to the series.
The latest instalment of the Treehouse of Horror issue features an army of indie artists including Jeffrey Brown, but a majority of the artists are from the mound city, the gateway to the west, the drinking city with a baseball problem, that’s right; St. Louis! Master print maker Dan Zettwoch does the cover and is accompanied by other local indie stars as Ted May writing and coloring a story about Moe the bartender in a chapter titled Mo’ Bodies Moe Problems. Kevin Huizenga tackles a very Simpson’s take on the Cthulu mythos in the Call of Vegulu.
Kudos to these guys for landing such a prestigious gig and making such a quality funny book. The Star Clipper crew is very proud of them for putting St. Louis on the map as a center of indie comic creativity.
The successful and long running Archie franchise has adhered to a formula that has worked well since the 1940’s. The way it works is this: Archie Andrews can’t decide between going steady with either Betty, the girl next door type, or Veronica, the rich and spoiled girl. He has a faithful but goofy sidekick with an unhealthy obsession for hamburgers named Jughead (who even today sports that crown hat thing.) Theres also the cast of high school archetypes like Reggie the preppie, and Moose the dumb jock.
Lately, Riverdale has been shaken up by the big news that I’m sure everyone has heard about by now, Archie’s proposal of marriage to Veronica. That’s right, after 60-some years, the kids are finally graduating from high school (your grades have to be pretty bad to be held back that much) and marrying off. The buzz around the store is that Archie picked the wrong bride and that he should be marrying Betty, because to quote a lot of folks around the store, “Veronica’s a b!*#@!”
I can’t say that I’ve been reading these wedding issues, but I have had enough interest to skim through just to know what’s going on. I flipped through Archie 601 to see how this is all progressing, and (SPOILER ALERT) Veronica is pregnant! Yeah, there will be another little buck-toothed red-headed kid running around soon, unless my theory is correct: That this is all a dream Dallas-style, and that things will continue to be the same around Riverdale for another 60 years.
So let me tell you about a guy named Michael Harvey. He’s an interesting man with fairly simple needs. If you ever met him, he’d come across as just a decent guy. So that doesn’t really seem too special, he just seems like your fairly Average Joe who’s just walking around, the kind of guy you see every day, right? Well… That’s where I’ve lead you astray. Mike Harvey (I call him that because I’m too lazy to say Michael) is one of the more creative people that I’ve had the pleasure to meet. The stories and ideas that he comes up with are just fantastic. So then, you might be asking me, “Fleet, if this Mike Harvey guy is so special, why haven’t I heard about him?” My reply to that is, “I don’t know.” But, this is the opportunity to hear about him now and make your own opinion. So let’s get right to the point. I’m here to tell you about his first printed comic; Knuckle Buster.
Here’s the deal. Knuckle Buster follows the adventures of young Superheroin named Ami. Her name doesn’t stem from some sort of Anime influence, the character is actually named after one of Mike’s friends… Anyways, the first issue follows her on her first day at her new job at Buster HQ. Before I go on, there’s a lot of “Buster” featured in this book.The city is named Buster City, and the primary hero of said city is named Gold Buster… Back to Ami… She ends up meeting her idol, Gold Buster, at Buster HQ, seeing as Buster HQ is like the equivalent of Stark Towers for Iron Man, or the Baxter Building for the Fantastic Four. As she goes about her day, Ami eventually comes across Gold Buster’s armory and finds an old power suit. So after that, Buster City has TWO heroes. Now, that’s a simple enough origin story, nothing long winded or too fantastic. So what we’re left with is a nice lighthearted tale about a girl who wanted to be more, and she got what she wished for. However, that isn’t to say that everyone is happy about there being another hero in town… Which brings us to the real fun.
Knuckle Buster, the story, was designed to be a contained story, meaning that it wont be an indefinite ongoing tale. It has a set ending. And the way Mr. Harvey has set up his story, you can expect something great to unfold in the coming issues. Which brings us to the actual issues. Currently, there are 3 issues of Knuckle Buster available to pick up right now at Star Clipper, however, if you find that we’re sold out of an issue that ruins your set or doesn’t allow you to begin with #1, don’t worry, a trade collecting issues 1-3 is coming out soon. If everything is on schedule, you should expect that by the end of September. But I’m getting ahead of myself… While the comic is Black & White in format, it’s still very easy to get an understanding of how the characters look and where they are in the panel without it looking like garbage. That tends to be a major issue with a lot of independent B&W books, but here, with Knuckle Buster, it’s not an issue. And as I understand it, starting with issue 4, Mike is reworking how he draws each page, promising to include more detail in his art without sacrificing clarity.
So, this brings us to the end of this blog… I just want to state that Knuckle Buster is a fun comic, and it’s loaded with great characters. In fact, we meet all of the villains at the end of issue 3 and we get a great glimpse of their personalities, which should make for a great time once the story advances enough to focus on this characters. Now, I’m not sure if this is set in stone or not, but as I understand it, Mike’s gonna be doing a Book Signing here at Star Clipper on Wednesday, September 30th… (2009) From 6 PM to 8 PM. I believe that he’ll have a nice stock of single issues there, as well as his first collection book. So come on out, support this local artist, and as a result check out the rest of our independent section. There’s a lot of great ideas just sitting around on our shelves waiting to be discovered… Until next time.
The Walking Dead keeps getting more and more messed up. I feel like I say that every issue with this series, but it’s true. The current arc “Fear The Hunters” has taken another original new direction for a zombie series, one where Rick Grimes and his fellow survivors must escape being hunted not by zombies but by their fellow humans. This “cannibalism arc” is really simple but also ingenious for the Zombie genre. By this point in the zombie apocalypse food rations are near impossible to come by and even Rick’s group is suffering from the constant scavenging for food. Unfortunately, on their quest to Washington DC, Rick and the gang get ambushed by a group that his resorted to cannibalism to survive. The result: Dale gets his legs eaten by the starving humans. In retaliation, Rick orders a counter strike on the hunters, and the group takes a much darker and more aggressive approach to survival.
There has been a lot I’ve liked about the “Fear The Hunters” story, and I think it will hold up with the best Walking Dead stories like the Prison year and the Governor story, but the grittier more aggressive Rick could make the series a lot harder to relate to. Thus far, Rick has been a character that always tried to look out for the greater good of the group and humanity in general. Yet, in recent issues all the characters are hellbent on survival, which has manifested itself in Rick’s once innocent son Carl secretly murdering to help the group survive. At this rate, it is becoming harder and harder to establish the heroic actions in the series from the shocking acts of desperation.
If I had one complaint about the current issue it’s that Charlie Adlard art looks rushed. Some of the eagle-eye view panels and other different perceptive panels look ill conceived and don’t play to the artist’s strengths. He still does a fantastic job with the splash pages and the action sequences, but overall it seems like he has to fit to much dialogue into one single issue.
The next issue will provide the conclusion of “Hunters,” and as of right now it could result in Rick merely gaining a strategic advantage and morale boost for his group, or result in the cast resorting to cannibalism themselves. Walking Dead is so good right now that I really don’t have a clue which way it will go, and I don’t really care. Just as long as it stays so darn interesting I’ll keep reading.
> Hey! Wait! Activision I’ve got a new complaint. What have you done to my teen idol Kurt Cobain. In the newly released Guitar Hero 5 you can unlock Nirvana singer/guitarist Kurt Cobain as a playable character. Sounds cool at first. Maybe the punker will smash his guitar or play a song that is not programed on the set list. However, what horrified fans about the avatar was when they found out the game makers allowed players to use Cobain not only on the Nirvana songs, but on any song on the set list. In the above video you can watch Cobain dance like a freakin’ hippy, preform karaoke to Nirvana-posers Bush, and rock out like Bon Jovi. Gasp! Where you really have to draw the line though is when Cobain poses like Flavor Flav and proclaims, “Yeeeaaahhh Boooyyyeee!” Flavor Flav might be the equivalent of hip hop cartoon character but Cobain never was, and he definitely never wanted his career to be remembered as such.
Though this is something we normally don’t blog about on the Star Clipper Blog, this travesty had particular relevance in my life and I felt it necessary to vent. Kurt and Nirvana was the first band that got me interested in music, and their career decisions and artistic integrity have been hugely influence on my life. To see one of my favorite artist be relegated to a dopey posturing video game clod is insulting to his fans and his legacy.
What’s really disheartening about the whole fiasco is that Kurt would have never allowed his image to be used this way. So who’s responsible? Well, the surviving members of Nirvana, Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic, have no control over the use of Cobain’s image but issued a statement to Guitar Hero creators Activision pleading with the company to re-lock the Cobain avatar. Courtney Love, Cobain’s widow and heir to his estate, also issued a statement via twitter stating “I did not approve Kurt’s avatar” and followed that with a treat to sue Activision. Yet, according to Activision CEO Dan Rosenweig not only did Activision acquire the rights for the Cobain character but the check for his likeness (issued to the Cobain estate i.e. Courtney Love) has been cashed. Though Courtney denies this, it wouldn’t be surprising to see her cash in on Cobain’s legacy again. This is the person who published her dead husband private journals and made them into a New York Times best seller.
Now that the Cobain avatar is out there what can you do? If you are just as distraught about this as I am, I suggest simply not playing Guitar Hero 5. I’ve been I fan of the video game since the first installment, but this is one thing I’m just not going to support. I never read the personal journals and I will never play the character in Guitar Hero 5.
When it comes to villainy in the Marvel U, no one can match MODOK… okay maybe that’s not entirely true. But, when it comes to a mixture of goofy and creepy, then MODOK (Mobile Organism Designed Only for Killing) definitely wins that prize. For those not familiar, MODOK is a creation of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby who is essentially a giant head in a hover suit with tiny little arms and legs, and weapon of AIM (fond of acronyms aren’t they?) He’s fought such illustrious heroes as Captain America and Iron Man, failing pretty miserably each time.
Well, MODOK is back with a…uh… vengeance in MODOK: Reign Delay, where we find said giant hovering head trying to get into the Cabal formed by Norman Osborn and get his own city to protect, or rule over depending on how you look at it. With a heavy sigh, Osborn assigns MODOK to Eerie Pennsylvania, his home town where MODOK and his minions set up headquarters at his parent’s house, and refers to his mom as “minion designate Mom” He ends up at his high school reunion where the bullies that tormented him 10 years ago, still like nothing more than to terrorize MODOK, despite his famously feared “mind blasts!” MODOK also has to contend with his minions demanding health insurance, and to not be referred to as “minions” but by their names. This is of course met with a swift MIND BLAST!
MODOK is capable of holding his own title, but what would this comic be without a cameo guest appearance by everyone’s favorite Canadian mutant… you know… Box. I think he was in Alpha Flight or something. At the end of the issue, writer and artist Ryan Dunlavey issues his love letter to the character by declaring MODOK as awesome, creepy, and hilarious all at the same time. If you enjoyed Strange Tales, I highly recommend you pick up Reign Delay.
It seems like every other month a new rock musician has decided to write a comic book. This time it’s Dandy Warhols muse Courtney Taylor working with Street Angel artist Jim Rugg for a new graphic novel One Model Nation. As both a fan of the Dandy Warhols’ music and the graphic novel Street Angel, I’m pretty excited about this project.
One Model Nation is set in Germany in the year 1977. However, it is in an alternate timeline. In this world, Germany is still ravaged by war and a youth revolution is on the brink of beginning. Soon a well-dressed music act name Das Model because the voice of the youthful angst and lead a revolt against the repressed nation. After the rebellion, little is heard from Das Model. The mystery lies in what happen to act and how they effected the uprising.
Here are some of the beautiful sample pages illustrated by Rugg:
The premise seems like something you would get from a rock star. One Model Nation sounds interesting and certainly looks great. I hope Courtney Taylor will have the same success that Gerard Way had with Umbrella Academy. Maybe it will set a new precedent for musician writers. One Model Nation will be released this October from Image Comics.
One of my favorite bookstores in St. Louis. Star Clipper offers not only the best selection of comic books and graphic novels in the city, but also a cornucopia of art, design and pop-culture related books and magazines. 
