News flash from MoCCA for today, Sunday’s show; MoCCA volunteers hope to have FANS for the 7th floor.

With temperatures in New York City soaring to nearly 100 degrees, everyone was glowing at the first day of the MoCCA Art Festival. The crowd was large and enthusiastic, standing in line for Lynda Barry, Adrian Tomine, Jason, Hope Larson, Bryan Lee O’Malley and other indie comics favorites. While the AC held out on the first floor, up on the 7th floor exhibitors including Meahaus, Vertigo and the Finnish comics delegation sweltered in brutal, oppressive heat.

How hot was it? Even normally cool and collected Tim Leong of Comic Foundry magazine looked sweaty.

As mentioned, for today’s show, fans are being brought in to help air circulation on the 7th floor.

We’ll have more coverage later. For right now, we’re frankly knackered from the sudden temperature change and the non-stop yapping and chatting. We will say that buzz books include Goddess of War, Skyscrapers of the Midwest, Too Cool to be Forgotten, director Michel Gondry’s mini, and the Star Wars mini Harvest is When I Need You The Most. With only 50 copies printed, this was a quick sell-out.

A few piccies in the jump:

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2008 Lulu Awards! Taking place 8:30 - 10:00 p.m. at the Musuem of Comic and Cartoon Art (594 Broadway Suite 401, between Prince and Houston)
More here

Chris Staros tells us who will be at the Top Shelf booth:

Alex Robinson — with the debut of his (amazing) new graphic novel: TOO COOL TO BE FORGOTTEN
Liz Prince — with her new book DELAYED REPLAYS
Andy Runton (Owly)
Robert Venditti (The Surrogates)
Jeff Lemire (Essex County/Tales from the Farm & Ghost Stories)
Matt Kindt (Super Spy)
Aaron Renier — Spiral-Bound

And also JOHNNY BOO (BOOK 1) will debut there, even though James Kochalka can’t be there this year.

Okay we’re nerds, but we may just bring our copy of this. But even more important…FINALLY …GODDESS OF WAR!

PictureBox will be at the MoCCA comics festival this weekend at NYC’s Puck Building (At the corner of Lafayette and Houston). We will debut the following books and zines:

-Goddess of War by Lauren Weinstein

-Cold Heat Special 4 by Jim Rugg and Frank Santoro

-Core of Caligula by CF

-We Lost the War but Won the Battle by Michel Gondry

-Crazy Town by Paul Gondry

-Bicycle Fluids (not) by Matthew Thurber

-Faded Igloo by Jim Drain

-The Museum of Love and Mystery by Jim Woodring (a Presspop edition)

Michel Gondry, Paul Gondry, Gary Panter, Frank Santoro, Lauren Weinstein, CF and Matthew Thurber will all be in attendance.

The schedule is:

Saturday:

11-12: Frank Santoro and Lauren Weinstein
12-2: Michel Gondry, Paul Gondry and Lauren Weinstein
2-3: CF, Frank Santoro, Gary Panter
3-4: Gary Panter, CF, and Lauren Weinstein
3:45-4:55: Frank Santoro Lecture @ MoCCA!
4-5: CF, Michel Gondry, Paul Gondry
5-6: CF and Dan Nadel in Conversation @ MoCCA!
5-6: Lauren Weinstein, Michel Gondry, Paul Gondry

Sunday:

11-12: Frank Santoro & Lauren Weinstein
12-2: Michel Gondry, Paul Gondry, Lauren Weinstein
2-3: Frank Santoro, Matthew Thurber, Lauren Weinstein
3-5: Michel Gondry, Paul Gondry, Matthew Thurber

Technorati Tags: PictureBox

The annual MoCCA Art Festival is being held this weekend in New York at the historic Puck Building in lower Manhattan.

Alternative Comics has a number of exciting new books debuting at the show:

Sam Henderson will be debuting Magic Whistle #11: Body Armor For Your Dignity
Body Armor For Your Dignity

Karl Stevens will be promoting Whatever
Whatever

Scott Campbell will be selling art prints, mini-comics, t-shirts, and promoting the latest issue of Hickee
Hickee #4

Technorati Tags: puppy

Once again, The Daily Cross Hatch has a far more coherent MoCCA preview than we could manage at this point, but here’s some more who’s where with what:

Bryan Lee O’Malley with new postcards!
Hope Larson with $20 Chiggers deal! Check it out!

Dash Shaw with BodyWorld Cosplay (above)

Alex Robinson often paired with
Mike Dawson
Liz Baillie
Laura Hudson
David Heatley
Calico Comics
The Finns! (in Finnish)
Joey Weiser
Greg Ruth

Leigh Dragoon (Above) The cat isn’t actually going to be there, we don’t think.
Frank Santoro
Barry Deutsch
And more PR in the jump:

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As if two days of concentrated comix goodness wasn’t enough, tomorrow 6/6 is a full day FREE event spotlighting some of thew most brilliant minds of the day: The Post Bang symposium. Celebrate D-Day in style!

Okay here’s one of those oddball pop culture anthologies: Harvest Is When I Need You The Most:

Harvest Is When I Need You the Most, features the talent of 8 cartoonists paying homage to the original Star Wars trilogy.

The 36 page, full color book releases at MoCCA Art Fest 2008, and will available for online orders on June 14!

We don’t really need more Star Wars, but we love the cover!

Last year’s SUNDAYS anthology was one of the biggest hits of MoCCA, and they’re back:

Announcing the Sundays 2 anthology. By the folks that brought you last year’s Sundays anthology. With 60-plus B + W pages, measuring at 13” X 11” with silk-screened covers, Sundays 2 will surely delight readers of comics from all walks of life. The book will debut at the MoCCA Festival and will be available on the 7th floor in the skylight ballroom(Table # S-53). Sundays 2 will also be available at HeroesCon later in the month. With every purchase, buyers will get a free silk-screened bag to carry Sundays and other fine purchases at the shows.

On Sunday, June 8, Pantheon editor-in-chief and recent Time Magazine 100 Finalist, will be providing a sneak preview of Bat-Manga! Visit Chip’s official site to find out more about Chip’s presentation. Then, read this recent New York Magazine profile on Chip

You may already know David Heatley from his work in the New Yorker If not, you’re in for a treat: On Sunday, June 8 David will be at this year’s MoCCA festival talking about My Brain is Hanging Upside Down which will hit bookstores this fall. Check out David’s post about designing the book jacket for an early taste, and then click here for more information about David’s talk.

OOOOOKAY, begin the MoCCA news dump! Chris Mautner at Blog@ has a nice little run down and here’s SOME of what we found on the internets as far as previews go. IF we left you out shoot us an email and we’ll update.

Meathaus
Ben Rosen
Marek Bennett
Vanessa Satone
One Percent Press
Dave Roman
Lunchbox Funnies
Tom Neely
The Flight crew
Kean Soo

Jeffrey Rowland
with NEW POSTER (above.)
Raina Telgemeier
Josh Neufeld
Denis St. John
Marion Vitus
Lark Pien
David Malki
Cliff Face Comics
Daryl Ayo Brathwaite
John Green
Cat Garza
Jen Wang
Below the cut: more news and pre dumps!

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This CNN profile of singer Aimee Mann reveals yet another celebrity comics fan, but the source is an unlikely one!

Mann was approached about a year ago about doing a graphic novel, an idea she at first dismissed out of hand. “And then I ran into this guy named Joe Matt, who’s one of my favorite graphic novelists,” she recalls.

Matt, the “Peepshow” cartoonist, lives nearby and encouraged Mann to maintain a sketchbook and practice, practice, practice. So Mann has diligently worked toward that end.

“I take a sketchbook and I bring it out at dinner … and I’ve got this one friend who always says something ridiculous, so I’ll try to write it down and put it in [graphic] form, and it kind of amuses everyone at the dinner table,” she says, while saying it’s “kind of a long-term project.”

We’d like to hear Matt’s side of this story, except that it probably involves a lot of jerking off.

Oh our aching eyes. We’re desperately trying to catch up on all the MoCCA news coming this weekend, and glazing over from all the manga/Tokyopop rumors swirling, and all the other crazy stuff going on, like Jane Friedman out at Harper Collins, 274 positions cut at Borders, Barack Obama in with the Dems, and stuff we can’t even talk about.

Fortunately, we’ve received a series of packages that contain ACTUAL COMICS from Buenaventura Press, Secret Acres (a new mini-comics publishers), and Microcosm Publishing. Fo you hear me? COMICS! Cute, thoughtful, beautiful comics. So enticing, so comforting. One of these minutes we may even be able to sit down and read them. *sigh*

Archaia Studios Press had a big hit with Mouse Guard, and critical acclaim with The Lone and Level Sands and founder Mark Smylie’s Artesia, and recently announced a ton of new titles. But like many small presses, they’ve also had some problems getting books out on a timely basis, and now they’ve announced a restructuring and the departure of co-publisher Aki Liao for “personal reasons.”

It’s been a busy couple of years here at Archaia Studios Press as the company has produced a growing catalog of award-winning and critically acclaimed comic books and graphic novels. But ASP has also run into a few growing pains along the way—as does any new publishing company—and today must announce that it must take a moment to restructure following the decision of Aki Liao, ASP’s co-publisher, to step back from an ongoing role at the company for personal reasons.

“Mark and I started ASP Comics as a hobby business in classic ‘two-guys-in-a-garage’ fashion, and that hobby business has grown well beyond its initial size and scope. In fact, well beyond my expectations,” said Aki Liao. “Along the way, we’ve built up a line of comic books and graphic novels of the highest quality. It’s been an amazing ride, and I enjoyed meeting a lot of wonderful people along the way, especially the talented group of creators that I’ve had the good fortune to work with. It is with a sad heart that I depart as I’m no longer able to give the company the kind of commitment it requires and wish everyone at ASP the best for the future.”

Ken Light, an investment banker at the DAK Group specializing in small to mid-size company divestitures, sales, and acquisitions, will be assisting ASP in the search for an outside investor or strategic partner to acquire Aki’s stake in the company.

As part of the reorganization, the company will also take the opportunity to address internally the publishing delays that have plagued it of late to ensure a smooth schedule that satisfies not only its own standards but also that of its creators and the expectations of fans and retailers.

“Our growth in the last year has clearly strained our workflow capacity,” said ASP co-publisher Mark Smylie. “Lateness has historically been a problem with many creator-driven and creator-owned titles, but our own workflow issues have exacerbated the situation. We are as frustrated with our struggle to get books out on time as, I’m sure, are our readers, and we want to make sure we come out of the reorganization with a better workflow and solicitation process model. So while there will be some further delays in the release of recently solicited titles as we restructure, we also want to make sure we emerge in the next few months from our reorganization with a release schedule that we can hit on a regular basis, as guaranteed as possible. We can only ask that our many supporters, retailers and fans alike, be patient with us during this time.”

All ASP titles are available worldwide at finer comic book shops, bookstores, amazon.com, the ASP Store at Indie Press Revolution (www.indiepressrevolution.com) and electronically at DriveThruComics.com. ARTESIA is now available at WOWIO.com, with other ASP titles to follow.

A little while ago, Dave Sim’s supporters posted an online petition aimed at…well, it was a little hard to tell what it was aimed at, but gaining public support would be the most obvious guess. Sim said he would only correspond in the future with those who signed the petition. Confusion over the appropriateness of this petition led to a crisis over at the Yahoo Cerebus Group, as Sim lashed out against many of his long term supporters. Things got even more complicated with a series of faxes between Sim, fellow cartoonist Chester Brown and Sim’s webmaster Jeff Tundis becoming something of a touchstone. As near as I can make out, Sim wanted the whole thing to be published, but Tundis didn’t because he felt it would make Sim look bad. This and Sim’s rejection of some of his most faithful readers, like Margaret Liss Fisher, have caused much discussion and confusion.

While Tundis has refused to have his side of the faxes published, Rick Sharer has gone ahead
published the Brown/Sim correspondence. This one outburst from Sim seems to sum up his current mindset:

In other words you think I’m the gender equivalent of a racist. This is what I’ve come to realize: that people genuinely believe that I’m the worst imaginable thing (literally: a non-person, a sub-human) in our society. That being the case the only honorable thing is to withdraw from society completely and limit my contact with society to necessities (my rep at Diamond, people I buy food from). Would you associate with anyone who thought you were a subhuman?

Now you may have noticed that I am using the “I” pronoun which I reserve for thing of some serious note. That’s because one of the reasons I’ve read this is my name comes up in my RSS-feeds from various postings. It seems that the hounding of Dave Sim by myself and Gail Simone is being held up BY SOME as what had driven Dave to this sad state of isolation and persecution. I stress the “by some”, as others think he may have been mentally ill to begin with, and others think he had other motivations.

Some think that this is all because of the low sales on Glamourpuss, but according to the John Jackson Miller figures I just linked to, the first issue of Glamourpuss sold 16,515 copies, way more than lots of Marvel and DC books, and nothing to sneeze at for such an oddball title.

Anyway I’ll do no more here than note the above correspondence. There are certainly some notable bits to be mined from them, but the interest is drowned out by the sadness, for me anyway. It’s sad when a great artist goes into a state of self-mandated social withdrawal; the entire matter is sad.

Elizabeth Genco, whose graphic novel Blue was recently announced, does a lot of heavy lifting by surveying several indie friendly retailers to find out how on earth to get publicity for a lone indie book these days:

The fact that Blue is in Previews doesn’t mean bupkus. There are a squillion books in Previews. The fact that someone other than me is printing Blue doesn’t mean bupkus. Ordering new books is a financial risk. How do I get a harried, pressed-for-shelf-space retailer to take a chance on me, a first-timer with no track record? That’s the question I posed to four of my prospective customers, indy-friendly retailers. They are: Rory Root, owner of Comic Relief (Berkeley, CA), Alex Cox, owner of Rocketship (my home store here in Brooklyn, NY), Andrew Neal, owner of Chapel Hill Comics (Chapel Hill, NC), and Ben Trujillo, owner of Star Clipper (St. Louis, MO). Boy, have they got answers.

Among the commons sense dispensed: suggestions on marketing, packaging and important design issues, such as this from Neal:

* Bad design both from a visual standpoint and a financial one: an unreadable spine, an unattractive cover or a cover that doesn’t reflect the interiors in some way, a title or price that’s impossible to find. You need to have an ISBN on there, too, even though it’s not pretty.
* A lack of consideration for the details that add up to the overall product: bad lettering can ruin an otherwise attractive book.
* Bad (or no) editing: incorrectly spelled words and bad grammar can hurt a book, too.

You’d be surprised how may publishers violate these seeming no-brainers.

Frankly, we didn’t expect the $125 price tag on KRAMERS ERGOT #7 to create such a ruckus in the comments. To give a little more perspective, here’s the ENTIRE quote on the book from a profile of editor Sammy Harkham:

Last year, Harkham lured the reclusive artist to Los Angeles for a weeklong Kramers celebration at the UCLA Hammer Museum. “It was the first time he’d ever left New York state or flown in a plane,” he explains, eyes twinkling. While Kramers is legendary in comics circles and a staple of mainstream year-end “best-of” lists, Harkham is still hustling fiendishly, holding down a couple of part-time jobs to supplement a cartoonist’s income that isn’t rising quite fast enough to support himself, his wife, and their 14-week-old son. But he thinks big.

“You’ve seen that Little Nemo book?” he asks, hands spreading reflexively to encompass the famous, full-page scope of Winsor McKay’s early-20th-century newspaper strip. “Issue number seven is going to be like that. Big—big—16 by 21! Every artist gets three pages. That’s it. But with that assignment, an artist is going to make work that wouldn’t exist otherwise. I’m so excited.

“The Clowes strip in this? Mind-blowing! Mind-blowing! And it’ll never be shown anywhere else. It’s going to be expensive. It’ll cost around $60,000 to make and sell for $80. We’re going to go to Singapore and watch them print it. But if there isn’t a clunker in the book, it’ll be worth it. I’ve found that anything I find mysterious or exciting, anything really special? People always pick up on that.”

Paul O’Brien and The Beat had a brief discussion in the comments on whether KE#7 had any potential to expand the audience for comics. Paul wrote:

In all seriousness, though, I find it hard to believe that anyone is going to spend $125 on a high-end art book for their first comic. This is going to sell to people who already have a strong interest in lit-comics.

I think there’s a degree of wishful thinking in the idea that avant-garde experimentalism is going to “expand the audience” in any terribly meaningful way. The audience for this stuff is pretty minimal in any medium. At best, it makes the point that “comics aren’t just for kids” - but (a) everyone knows that, and (b) it makes that point by demonstrating that comics are also for the sort of people who go to arthouse cinemas, rather than by showing that comics are for adults in general.

We suggest that anything worthy of an art show at the UCLA Hammer Museum is expanding the audience for comics in some way — is it a “terribly meaningful way”? That’s where the argument lies.

KE #7 sounds like an eye popping, thought provoking, “mind blowing” work that is very likely to get much academic/art snob attention from a publisher that is already taken very seriously. We would argue that all of this attention adds up to the increased profile of comics as an art form, an entertainment form, and sometimes even the two together. We subscribe to what we would like to call the “Ben-Hur” theory. You need ALL the horses pulling the chariot, not just one or two.

The Comics Journal message board comments on the fact that KRAMERS ERGOT #7, the new issue of Sammy Harkham’s epic and influential avant garde comics anthology will cost $125 for 96 pages. You can see the Amazon listing here. K. Parille explains.

The book is more expensive than earlier volumes because it is much larger. From an interview with Sammy Harkham:
“You’ve seen that Little Nemo book?” he asks, hands spreading reflexively to encompass the famous, full-page scope of Winsor McKay’s early-20th-century newspaper strip. “Issue number seven is going to be like that. Big—big—16 by 21! Every artist gets three pages. That’s it. But with that assignment, an artist is going to make work that wouldn’t exist otherwise. I’m so excited.”

Luke Przybylski weighs options:

A few things: Prices aren’t set arbitrarily. The size and overall printing quality, not to mention the quality of the art/comics themselves may very well be amazing enough to many of us that we’d drop $125. We’ll all have a better idea when we see the thing, but if it is that amazing, we should be congratulating Sammy and everyone else involved for making a great book, for pushing things in new directions. What’s the point if they keep doing the same thing every couple of years? KE is definitely in need of something or other at this point, and going bigger and badder will be really interesting to see.

Przybylski suggests setting aside $10 or $20 a week to save up for the book. We suggest setting hammer to piggy bank if necessary. Due to our own space problems at Stately Beat Manor, we may just leaf through a friend’s copy, at least until severe jealousy sets in.

Or you can order it from Amazon for $78.75 .

Technorati Tags: Kramers Ergot

Elizabeth Genco, founding member of The Chemistry Set, sends us word of her first graphic novel, BLUE, which will be illustrated by Finnish artist Sami Makkonen and published by Desperado. It’s the tale of a young woman locked in the apartment of a long-lost boyfriend with the ghost of a young girl. “It’s a new take on Bluebeard, a fairy tale about a serial killer first written in 17th century France,” says Genco. “There are some crucial differences, of course. In the most popular version of tale, the young woman is saved at the last minute by her brothers, who ride in on thundering horses armed with big swords. Let’s just say that doesn’t happen here!”

BLUE will be published by Desperado Publishing and is featured in the May issue of PREVIEWS for a July release (order code: MAY083778). 80 pages, 6×9, full color, 9.99. News, reviews, sample pages and special extras can be found at the frequently updated BLUE blog, http://bluecomics.blogspot.com.

And here are some preview pages (click for larger versions.)

Technorati Tags: Desperado

John Layman posts his Cerebus sketchbook at Millarworld, with art from John Cassaday, Travis Charest, Gene Ha, Eric Canete and more. Above, Lee Bermejo.

Link found here.

The MoCCA Fest benefitting Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art has announced its programming, and it definitely leans towards the adventurous edge of comics, with CF, Frank Santoro, Chip Kidd, Bill Plympton and more, including Norwegian cartoons.

All of it sounds great, and we’ll be there.

Sounds like Stumptown was totally teh awesome, and we wish we could have been there. Tom Spurgeon:

Portland is also the home to dozens of cartoonists, a good sign for a city as comics folk can live practically anywhere and are drawn like flies when a comfortable and cosmopolitan city reaches that tipping point where it’s discussed on chatboards and in the blogs of early adopters. What’s interesting about Portland’s assumption of the Comics Town USA title is that it does so without offering a gigantic number of hometown opportunities the way New York, LA or even Kansas City might. There is a small set of newspaper illustration gigs and a few proud local comic book companies where one might assume proximity could be helpful in gaining their attention, but for the most part the comics outfits here in town think nationally/internationally and just live here like everyone else. Comics thrives in the Rose City because Portland fits comics people, and because the large number of working artists has given them a voice and provided their city with another identity in a time when those kinds of things are still important.

§ Rachel Edidin:

Phew–that was a lot of con. Today was more intense at the table, and I hardly had any time to wander. Now, I am entirely braindead, so again, just a handful of notes before I crash. Proper write-up and forum thread tomorrow.

§ Erik Henriksen of The Portland Mercury:

It’s been great watching the fest grow over the years, and I feel like this year, Stumptown has really hit its stride—just from the brief time I spent there today, the vibe was friendly, attendance was good, booths were plentiful, the comics were promising, and the two panels I jumped back and forth between—trying to listen to both at the same time, with, eh, mostly successful results—were a lot of fun.

§ Elijah J. Brubaker:

I got to Trade some books with folks and a little money changed hands. I got some of the new Papercutters from Greg and all the Ivy books that Sarah O has out so far but the really cool part of these kinds of shows is getting books from all the newer people. I mean, I’m still pretty new at this I suppose but I got a bunch of stuff from folks that have just put out books for the first time and that is so great it hurts. With books like Ivy or Papercutter I get to read great stuff from people with real chops but there’s something really enticing to me about seeing raw energy poured out onto the page by someone who doesn’t quite know what they’re doing yet. I’m not saying I enjoy reading a lot of stuff like that but there is a real palpable charm to people that are so excited about the possibilities of the form and the way they just let loose onto a page. I don’t know if I’m making any sense here but rest assured when I get a little sleep I’ll be writing reviews of some of this stuff.

Doubtless more reports will filter in over the next few days. In the meantime here are some Flickr sets. The above photo taken from greyaenigma.

If we could muster up the energy we’d be at Stumptown for sure. The guest list is stellar from Nicholas Gurewitch to Brian Bendis (who lest we forget was once an indie cartoonist for Image), and stops inbetween for Derek Kirk Kim, Gene Yang, Larry Marder, Craig Thompson, Tara McPherson, and the peerless Jason Shiga.

And now Portland, OR is now officially COMICS TOWN. The Mercury reports:

There
has been a distinct cultural shift in the last decade, as graphic
novels have gained a wide readership, superhero comics have been mined
for both academic and “literary” material (see: Douglas Wolk, Jonathan
Lethem, Michael Chabon), and girls weaned on Japanese entertainments
like Pokémon have gravitated en masse to manga. Put another way: Even
my mom has read Persepolis. Anyone who still has hang-ups about buying
comics need only set foot in the casually welcoming Cosmic Monkey
Comics or North Portland’s sleek Bridge City Comics to dispel all
lingering stereotypes about the Comic Book Guy. So by now everyone in
Portland knows that, to quote one of the most clichéd newspaper
headlines ever, “comics aren’t just for kids anymore.” (Kapow!) You may
not know, however, that local publishers Top Shelf, Oni Press, and Dark
Horse have all had a hand in this shift. With April’s designation as
Comics Month, as Oni Publisher Joe Nozemack puts it, “Finally, the city
is paying attention.”

PLUS: Dylan Meconis and Bill Mudron (with help from Erika Moen) show why Stumptown is cool in COMICS:

Since we have to stay at home and recuperate, send us any and all links, okay?

Were indies and lit comics squeezed out of New York Comic-Con? Josh Neufeld says yes. Discuss.

I hate to be a hater, BUT I THOUGHT THE NEW YORK COMIC-CON SUCKED! I’ve written approvingly of the con in the past, but it’s been steadily going downhill, and this past weekend was its nadir. When they started the show in 2006, they made a concerted effort to attract alternative and “literary” publishers and cartoonists, which they balanced with an understandably mostly mainstream vibe, and I appreciated the influx of potential new readers.

But then last year, the show began seriously tilting toward the same superhero/manga/gaming/merchandising thrust of the other mega-cons like San Diego and Chicago; and this year, it was full-bore. In 2007, although it was a bit of a pain squeezing through the crowds, I was still able to see friends and compatriots like Chris Staros of Top Shelf, Sheila Keenan at Scholastic, Mark Siegel at First Second, and the like; this year, I couldn’t find any of them. (I know, I know, Sheila is no longer with Scholastic, but you get the point.) Granted, I showed up with Phoebe at about 1 pm on Saturday, which was probably the craziest time, but it was a madhouse, a zoo, a freak show, a … you get the drift. I can’t say enough how unpleasant it is to be jostled, squeezed, and b.o.-bombarded by hordes of Star Wars stormtroopers, flabby people in superhero suits, and wannabe Suicide Girls!

I saw a small Fantagraphics table, but absolutely no other representatives of — or cartoonists from — the alternative industry. Even the Vertigo booth (they were kind enough to provide me a free pass due to my work on American Splendor) was so packed and chaotic, that I didn’t dare venture in there to say hi to editors Jonathan Vankin and Mark Doyle. (I did spot dangoldman, signing copies of Shooting War, and briefly spoke to man_size before he did a panel, but that was really it in terms of folks I knew.) I guess after last year, there was a general consensus by folks with non-mainstream agendas to skip this show. I wish I had gotten the memo!