Category Archives: Comics

Eddy Current by Ted McKeever

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Eddy Current by Ted McKeever is a combination of Don Quixote, 24 and Batman with overt religious overtones. Eddy Current came out in 1987, around the same time as Watchmenand Dark Knight Returns, and was nominated four Eisner Awards in 1988. But it is not nearly as well known as other major works from this time frame. This is partially because Ted McKeever was a virtual unknown (Eddy Current was only his second published comic) and partially because it was released by a small publisher. But it is a major work in comics and should be read more widely.

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An Imaginary Review

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Today’s review is of a book (actually a comic book mini-series) that never existed, only a proposal was ever created. And the comic book company is doing their best to make sure no one knows it ever existed (except for the Wikipedia page and the sites they haven’t been able to shut down yet). If you ask why, there are suspicions that later mini-series might have copied some of the concepts, but those creators deny knowing about it. So why is the company trying to assert copyright on a proposal? No one knows, but at the end of the day it’s irrelevant why, but we can look and see what if not why.

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Zot: The Earth Books by Scott McCloud

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Zot by Scott McCloud (author of Understanding Comics and Reinventing Comics) was a fun superhero book in the 1980s. Zot is the nickname of Zachary T. Paleozogt, a hero from a nearby dimension which is closer to the 1950s than the 1980s. When everyone else was going grim and gritty, McCloud made a light hearted super hero stroy. There were 10 issues published and then McCloud took a break. He came back and did 26 more issues. But the ones we are focusing on here are issues 28-36, when Zot is trapped on Earth.

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Grendel: Devil’s Legacy by Matt Wagner

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Grendel: Devil’s Legacy, written by Matt Wagner with art by the Pander Brothers. Matt Wagner created Grendel in Comico Primer #2 and then did a three issues for Comico (since re-released as Grendel Archives) before it was prematurely ended. While he was working Mage, he reworked Grendel and released it as Grendel: Devil by The Deed. But, at the end of this, the protagonist (the super villain Grendel) is dead and his antagonist (the cop Argent) is confined to a wheelchair. What Matt Wagner decided to do was continue Grendel, but make the story about the Grendel spirit inhabiting other people. The first story (published in Grendel #1-12) tells the tale of Grendel’s adopted daughter’s daughter, Christine Spar, and her need for revenge. It moved Grendel for a conventional hero/villain battle to something more.

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Older Books that You Should Read – Superfolks

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Before comic writers in the 1980s re-imagined what superheroes would do, Robert Mayer laid the ideas at their feet. Superfolks was published in 1977 (brought back in print in 2005) and is an essential stopping point between Harvey Kurtzman’s Super Duper Man in the 1950s and the superheroes of the 1980s.
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Bloom County Complete Library Volume 1

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Bloom County Complete Library Volume 1 by Berkeley Breathed is like a memory bomb going off in my mind. Before Dilbert, before Calvin and Hobbes, before Far Side (but after Doonesbury) was Bloom County. Bloom County exploded onto the comics page in the early 1980s as a Doonesbury ripoff. And way to often for Gary Trudeau’s comfort, it was an extremely blatant Doonesbury ripoff. But Breathed brought his own manic personality and evolving artistic skills and became one of the most popular strips of the 1980s, earning Breathed a Pulizter Prize in 1987, before Breathed stopped the strip in 1989. The characters popped up in later Breathed strips Outland and Opus before ending (possibly for good) in 2008.
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Human Target TV review

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The comics based HumanTarget TV show starring Mark Valley as Christopher Chance (the Human Target), Chi McBride and Jackie Earle Haley (from Watchmen) is a dumb, action show with a lot of big action scenes and a little bit of plot. It’s not quite up to the level of Burn Notice, but it’s not horrible. Mark Valley and Chi McBride do a good job as a pair of guys who work to protect people that the police can’t or won’t. But the show is stolen by Jackie Earle Haley as the ex-con, ex-hacker who works for Chance.
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