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Author Archives: Comics Forum

Alan Moore’s Lost Treasures: ‘The Hasty Smear of My Smile…’ by Marc Sobel

13 Sep

‘The Hasty Smear of My Smile,’ a four-page story which ran as a backup feature in the final issue of Peter Bagge’s Hate (#30), is a miniature masterpiece. It’s a capsule version of Moore’s considerable skill and the epitome of everything that makes him fascinating as a writer. The story essentially brings personality, perspective, voice and history to the Kool-Aid man character, a ubiquitous corporate mascot used to sell swill to unsuspecting children.

The Kool-Aid Man, originally named the ‘Pitcher Man,’ was created in 1954 by Marvin Plotts, an otherwise anonymous art director for a New York City advertising agency hired by General Foods, the powdered drink’s corporate manufacturer. Plotts, who claimed that the inspiration for the character – a glass pitcher full of cherry red Kool-Aid with arms, legs, and his signature broad smile – came from watching his son draw smiley faces on a frosted window. Fairly simple in concept, Plotts could not have imagined how successful his character design would become. Within just a few years, his beaming ‘Pitcher Man’ was at the heart of a massive advertising campaign aimed at America’s schoolchildren.

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Posted by on 2012/09/13 in Guest Writers, Rummaging Around in Alan Moore's Shorts

 

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Alan Moore’s Lost Treasures: ‘The Bowing Machine’ by Marc Sobel

12 Sep

The third issue of RAW (volume two), the digest-sized final collection of Art Spiegelman’s art comix series, is possibly the best single volume of a comics anthology ever published. Included among the book’s extraordinary contents are Spiegelman’s own penultimate chapter of Maus: A Survivor’s Tale, a classic 32 page excerpt of George Herriman’s Krazy Kat (the famous ‘Tiger Tea’ sequence), an exquisite Gary Panter sketchbook, ‘Thrilling Adventure Stories,’ the first glimpse of the genius that was to come from Chris Ware, ‘Proxy,’ a highly under-appreciated collaboration between novelist Tom DeHaven and Richard Sala, and a long portion of Kim Deitch’s masterpiece, ‘The Boulevard of Broken Dreams.’ The anthology also includes strong standalone pieces from Lynda Barry, Muñoz and Sampayo, Drew Friedman, Marti, Justin Green, Kaz, and several lesser-known but equally talented European artists, not to mention a brilliantly sarcastic R. Crumb cover. With such an impressive line-up, it’s easy to see how a little story by Alan Moore got lost in the mix.

Yet ‘The Bowing Machine,’ Moore’s unlikely collaboration with Amy and Jordan creator, Mark Beyer, is among the highlights of this impressive book. Written in 1991 on the heels of the highly publicized collapse of the Big Numbers series with Bill Sienkiewicz after only two issues, and just before he began exploring alternatives to the Big Two superhero publishers, including, most notably, his 1963 limited series for Image Comics in which he re-imagined the origins of the Marvel universe, this nine-page short story appeared during a period which the author himself described as his ‘wilderness years.’ (Rose)

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Posted by on 2012/09/12 in Guest Writers, Rummaging Around in Alan Moore's Shorts

 

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Comics Forum 2012: Registration Open

10 Sep

Registration for Comics Forum 2012 is now open. The conference will take place at Leeds Central Library on the 15th and 16th of November, and is themed around ‘Multiculturalism and Representation’. We have a fantastic line up of speakers from around the world coming to speak on a huge range of topics (see below for a full list).

Tickets are priced as follows:

1 day pass (15th or 16th): £10

2 day pass (15th and 16th): £20

4 day pass (Comics Forum 2012 & a two day Thought Bubble convention pass): £30 (save £10 on the cost if bought separately)

To register, email comicsforum@hotmail.co.uk and let us know how many tickets you want. Payment will be taken in cash on the day. Booking early is strongly recommended. Ticket prices include light refreshments but not lunch.

The full list of speakers and titles is as follows (this list is subject to change):

Maaheen Ahmed: The mutability of the line and its tendency towards monstrosity: Otherness of and within comics Maria-Sabina Draga Alexandru: Narrative Exploration against Mentality Issues: Indirect Education for Multiculturalism in Tintin Anya Benson: A Door to Anywhere: The Multicultural Visions of Doraemon Jacob Birken: Set Pieces. Is eclectic imagery in Manga “Othering” or practised Polyculturalism?  Frank Bramlett: The role of culture in comics of the quotidian Michael A. Chaney: Graphic Adaptations of Black Style: Converting Zora Neal Hurston’s Narrational Dialect into Comics Corey K. Creekmur: Multiculturalism Meets the Counterculture: Racial Difference in Underground Comix Umar Ditta: Controversial representations of cultures and relations between cultures Harriet E. H. Earle: Multiculturalism Vs Melting Pot in 9/11 Charity Comics Elisabeth (Lisa) El Refaie: Shape-shifting as a metaphor for multiculturalism in Gene Luen Yang’s American Born Chinese Cameron Fletcher: Spiderman: Manhattan to Mumbai; Crossing more than timelines to make a Global Icon a Glocal Hero Michael Forbes: Truth, Baldwin, & American National Symbols William H. Foster III: The Changing Image of African American Women in Comics Lina Ghaibeh: Covering Wonder Woman’s nakedness: on the modification of comics imported to the Arab world Mel Gibson: ‘We don’t need no steenkin’ badgers!’ Talbot’s Grandville, anthropomorphism and multiculturalism Lily Glasner: Have you no manners? A Little Girl’s Gift to Her Majesty Simon Grennan: Empowerment requires power: absence, equilibrium and the capacity to influence in comics representations of cultural difference Brenna Clarke Gray & Peter Wilkins: An Innocent at Home: Scott Pilgrim and its Canadian Multicultural Context Sarah D. Harris: The Monster Within and Without: Spanish Comics, Monstrosity, Religion, and Alterity Paul Harrison: Land of Denial – Egypt in Comics Ian Horton: Colonialist Heroes and Monstrous Others: Stereotype and Narrative Form in British Adventure Comic Books Harriet Kennedy: The confused nationalisms of Bojoual: le huron-kébékois Alex Link: Negotiating Multicultural Transnationalism and Assimilative Globalization in Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis and Taiyo Matsumoto’s Tekkonkinkreet Anna Madill: Caucasian, Japanese, or What? Visual Representation of Race in Boys’ Love Manga Paul M. Malone: Multikulti Manga in Germany; or, Why Frau Merkel Should Read More Comics Andy Mason: The Presidential Penis and Other Scandalous South African Satires: Race, ethnicity and representation in South African comics and political cartooning, from the early 20th century to the present Ana Merino: The Impact of the Latino Identities on the Alternative Landscape of Comics: Thirty Years of Love and Rockets Dana Mihăilescu: Oy, Gevalt, Meydele! The Lower East Side as Mishmash of Jewish Women’s Multicultural Images in Leela Corman’s Unterzakhn Joseph North: Volti nascosti: cultural diversity in the Italian fumetto Hannah O’Connor: Sapphic Supervillains and Dynamic Dykes: Lesbian Heroism and (In)Visibility in Mainstream Graphic Literature Pre- and Post-9/11 Emma Oki: Representations of Asian Americans in Selected Works by Adrian Tomine Mihaela Precup: The Image of the Foreigner in Communist Romanian Comics Ethan Rubin: Robots are People Too: Webcomics and the Social Standing of “Everyday AI” Rebecca Scherr: Framing Subjects: the politics of representation in Joe Sacco’s Footnotes in Gaza Staci Strobl & Mary L. Tabakow: Representations of Asian Guest Workers, Expatriates, and Male/Femaie Omani Nationals in Royal Omani Police Comic Strips John G. Swogger: Palauan Storyboard: Comics and narrative context in archaeological fieldwork Marina Cavalcante Vieira: Migration and city image in light of Chicago School Sociology theories: assimilation and melting pot cities in the earlier Batman and Superman Asta Vrečko: ‘No one thinks of winter when the grass is green’ Keina Yoshida: Graphic fiction, visual narratives and international criminal justice

Comics Forum 2012 is supported by Thought Bubble, Arts Council England, the University of Chichester, Dr Mel Gibson and Molakoe Graphic Design.

 
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Posted by on 2012/09/10 in Comics Forum 2012, News, Thought Bubble

 

‘Will You Listen to That!’: (Dis)Ability in Moore/Willingham’s ‘In Blackest Night’ by José Alaniz

07 Sep

‘In Blackest Night’, a perversely clever short story by Alan Moore and Bill Willingham, featuring Katma Tui of the Green Lantern Corps, allegorizes two pillars of disability theory: the social model and accommodation.[1] Seeking to recruit a new Green Lantern in a lightless void called the Obsidian Deeps, Tui befriends the native silicone life form Rot Lap Fan and offers him membership of the Corps. But there is one big problem.

To her shock Tui discovers that, living in an abyss, Fan has no eyes – therefore the concepts of light and color hold no meaning for his species. Consequently, the translator function of Tui’s power ring utterly fails to convey the phrase ‘the Green Lantern Corps’ into Fan’s language, rendering it ‘the (untranslatable) Corps’ (3). Similarly, it turns the Green Lantern oath, with lines such as ‘brightest day’ and ‘escape my sight,’ into an incomprehensible mass of ‘(untranslatable).’ ‘Mmm,’ responds a bemused Fan to Tui’s futile efforts, ‘Perhaps it loses something’ (4, emphasis in original).

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Posted by on 2012/09/07 in Guest Writers, Rummaging Around in Alan Moore's Shorts

 

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Doctor Who and the Genesis of Alan Moore by Lance Parkin

05 Sep

Doctor Who fans encountered Alan Moore at the beginning of his career. In June 1980, when his first strip for Doctor Who Weekly, ‘Black Legacy’, appeared, Moore’s body of published professional work consisted of a handful of magazine illustrations, and regular strips in the music magazine Sounds and local newspaper the Northants Post. His Doctor Who work predates his 2000 AD debut by a month, and represents his very first published comics work – amateur or professional – solely as a writer.

Marvel UK had launched Doctor Who Weekly in October 1979 as a virtual carbon copy of their popular Star Wars Weekly. Both comics were black-and-white, aimed at a young readership, their 28 pages filled with three comic strips and a variety of text articles, interviews, a letters page, pin ups and puzzles. The key difference was that Star Wars Weekly ran mostly reprinted American material, whereas the Doctor Who strips were new, and created in Britain. There were two: one featuring new adventures for the Doctor, and a back-up strip featuring monsters from the show [1].

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Posted by on 2012/09/05 in Guest Writers, Rummaging Around in Alan Moore's Shorts

 

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