Who is that other woman?

Image and text © Michael Chevy Castranova

 
-->

So a recap, then, at chapter 379 of “Slipped”:

Tyler Wilson — whose father was the infamous cat burglar, the Scarlet Sparrow, and who has been following in his footsteps (or paw prints, if you prefer) — and her dog, Pip, have been captured by the Rongeur officer, the Chancellor, whom Tyler believed to be dead but, clearly, is not. Instead, the serum that made him grow — and, she thought, to have made him mad — has made him even larger. And madder.

In fact, the Chancellor used that same serum to create an army of giant rats, and they’ve been dispatched to lead an invasion of western Europe.

Meanwhile, during a lightening-quick out-of-body experience, Tyler was contacted by Dargelos, another long-standing enemy, who struck a deal — he will send her help to escape if she, in turn, does something to be named later to aid him in his ongoing mission to bring chaos into the world. (And who better to do that than our hero?)

And now, arriving to their rescue at the brink of time, is Tyler’s younger sister, Mendacity Wilson. They don’t get along.

Moreover, Mendacity’s anger management issues are even less under control than Tyler’s.

Is Mendacity the “rescue” Dargelos promised? Or did she circle back to help Tyler on her own? Is this another trick orchestrated by the devil?

One thing, though — Mendacity has with her the Time Sword.

So the situation, if nothing else, is about to spin wildly out of control. As it generally does with one Wilson sibling. Imagine two, plus a weapon neither understands … and the Chancellor covets above all else.

Follow the action here!

An update

Image & text © Michael Chevy Castranova 2016

OK, so here’s what has been going on thus far:
Cartier Tour (shown above) has had a business disagreement with her employer, Delacroix, who is some kind of demon and who also is, in some way, related to Dargelois, the Scarlet Sparrow’s mortal enemy (and who’s not been seen for some time — status and whereabouts unknown).

Delacroix has indicated Cartier is not human. It’s still to be explained what he meant by that.

Pip, who’s been looking for Tyler Wilson (the Scarlet Sparrow), has decided to take sides and has attacked Delacroix.

That’s given Cartier, moving with catlike grace (that’s a hint), the opportunity to take the wildebeest by surprise. We’ll see if she then repays Pip’s aid.

Meanwhile, the Scarlet Sparrow is held captive by the Chancellor, who has somehow learned to control the genetic serum developed by the Unicorns (not real unicorns, they just wear decorative spikes on their headwear). He has grown even larger than when we last saw him, but hasn’t been driven mad — the usual outcome of the serum in such a large dose. (It makes the male Unicorns less than smart, shall we say.)

The Chancellor has taken Tyler to bear witness to the current state of his continued experiments.

All that in coming chapters of “Slipped.” Please take a look ….

Safe territory in “Slipped”?

 

Image © Michael Chevy Castranova 2015

I don’t like guns. I don’t like drawing guns in cartoons. But sometimes in an adventure comic strip set in the 1920s, between two significant wars, people have guns.

But you’ll notice, no one has died in “Slipped” from being shot by a gun. In fact, not one character seems actually to have died at all.

The guy in the first chapters — unnamed in the strip but I think he went by Etienne — was killed, but then when the Scarlet Sparrow retraced her timeline, she and her sister, Mendacity, saved him.

And while Dickie Talbot was left to be buried alive, along with the Golem, it’s in the cards for the Scarlet Sparrow to get back to them, too.

Oh, wait, I just recalled those two “Vampires” who accidentally died while attempting to do damage to part of le Metro to stop les Rongeur. Hmmm ….

It’s hard to keep track of almost eight years of continuous weekly comic strips.

In any case, next week sees the Scarlet Sparrow, Cartier Tour and Pip catapulted into their new adventure. Please stand by.

Characters development

Cartier Tour, Mendacity Wilson, Tyler Wilson images and characters © Michael Chevy Castranova 2015

One of the cool things about Chris Schweizer’s very cool 2011 “Sketchbooks,” which I picked up at the Cartoons Columbus Crossroads earlier this month, is it’s a true sketchbook.

As he notes in the introduction, lots of so-called sketchbooks in fact show finished art. His book intentionally shows works in progress. You can see how he arrived at the ideas, the characters’ looks, that he ultimately used.

Very cool.

Meanwhile, in chapter 353 of “Slipped,” the wildebeest Delacroix somehow convinces Cartier Tour, the chrono-bounty hunter, to accompany Tyler Wilson and Pip on their part of the elaborate and, frankly, dangerous mission with which he’s tasked them.

Part Star Wars, part Seven Samurai.

Take a look, please. A new adventure is about to begin for the reluctant Scarlet Sparrow.

What next?

© Michael Chevy Castranova 2015

 
I admit to being a little amazed myself that this comic strip of mine has been running for seven and a half years, week after week just about, and this chapter is up to number 350 — and all online.

“Slipped” started out as an homage of sorts to those 1930s and ’40s era newspaper comic strips of continuing adventure, with its sinister villains and wild action. And while it pays to have read every single chapter of “Slipped” since the beginning in March 2008 in terms of understanding what’s going on, I admit not everything has been explained — or at least not fully.

I like to keep a little mystery. But, yes, in my own head it all makes sense. (Any questions?Ask me.)

Now Tyler Wilson — the true heiress to the title of the Scarlet Sparrow — and her sister, Mendacity — who lately has been impersonating the Scarlet Sparrow — and Tyler’s companion, Pip, face a new challenge. A mysterious character who calls himself Delacroix is about to give them two enormous, separate and very dangerous missions — and without any clear way to fulfill those tasks.

What I’ve not decided is if, going forward, if this should turn into a superhero tale — remember, while Tyler may be the hero of this story, she has no special “powers.” She can’t even control her time travel.

But I think maybe not. I’ve always liked spy stories. Not the high-tech, blow things sky high James Bond movies. More like the low-tech, well-thought-out novels of John Le Carré such as “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy” and the brilliant movie “The Third Man.”

Though what is likely to happen is that the characters themselves will decide what’s next. The Scarlet Sparrow always has voiced pretty strong views on her appearance and her actions.

So we’ll see … .

A suivre.

A New Adventure

Have you ever taken a look at the new Phantom Lady collections, from the mid-1940s and drawn by the excellent Matt Baker? There’s a little of that influence in “Slipped,” my own comic strip that’s been running online since early 2008.
“Slipped” is an adventure strip modeled on those fun 1930s and 1940s adventure newspaper comic strip. Which means I certainly looked to “Terry and the Pirates” — by Milton Caniff — and “Buzz Sawyer” and even a little “Little Orphan Annie.”
In this week’s chapter, Tyler Wilson — aka the Scarlet Sparrow — and her sister, Mendacity — who’s been masquerading as the Scarlet Sparrow — have trapped on a Paris rooftop, where it’s revealed that … well, take a look for yourself.
It’s a new enemy, in the person of Cartier Tour, and a whole new adventure.
Here’s a link — http://slippedcomic.blogspot.com/
And here is some sample art, to tempt you to try “Slipped.” Take a look!

Slipped @ Michael Chevy Castranova, 2015

A new ally? Or a future foe?

In chapter 345, the Scarlet Sparrow, aka Tyler Wilson, and her sister Mendacity meet up with a stranger on the rooftops of Paris, in 1926. What does she want? Nothing helpful, it seems, as she’s pointing some kind of futuristic weapon at the pair.
But in “Slipped,” you never know.
Please follow along for the thrilling adventures of the Scarlet Sparrow and her pals.
Based on the newspaper adventure comic strips of the 1930s and ’40s, “Slipped” is modeling after “Terry and the Pirates,” “Wash Tubbs and Captain Easy” and so many other strips of that turbulent era — but a 21st century twist.
Take a look — http://slippedcomic.blogspot.com/

Slipped and related images © Michael Chevy Castranova, 2015

Joe Sacco’s “The Great War” review

Here’s a link to my review of Joe Sacco’s amazing, 24-foot-long book, “The Great War,” about the Battle of the Somme, as it appeared in The Gazette daily newspaper in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. http://thegazette.com/2014/03/26/the-great-war-a-great-graphic-book-for-a-terrible-day/

The Quitter

Graphic novel and comic book writer Harvey Pekar died yesterday at the age of 70. His persona probably wouldn’t have allowed him to admit much of anything good ever happened to him.

The final panel of 2005’s The Quitter, illustrated by Dean Haspiel, shows the worried author, in tight closeup and looking directly at us: “I’ve always dreamed of being able to relax and feel trouble-free for long stretches of time. I’m 65 now. Will it ever happen?”

But good things did happen.

One the most fortuitous events would have to be his becoming friends with Robert Crumb, who encouraged Pekar’s comics writing and who lent his own mastery to illustrate some of the Clevelander’s work.

Pekar’s first collection, American Splendor, won the American Book Award in 1987. A few years later the book was made into a sad, charming and intelligent movie starring Paul Giamatti, as Pekar, and Hope Davis, as his wife Joyce Brabner.

His graphic novel, Our Cancer Year, won the Harvey Award in 1994.

Add to that the large number of readers, fans and would-be comics writers he inspired.

Low Moon, Part 1

While Norwegian cartoonist Jason’s stories are unremittingly downbeat, he certainly manages to evoke sympathy with his blank-eyed (think Little Orphan Annie), stringbean-like dog and duck characters.

In Low Moon, two of his stories come straight from the movies, tales of men with their backs to the wall. “Low Moon” retells High Noon, except with a chess showdown instead of gunfire, and “Proto Film Noir,” though it starts out with cavemen … or cave-dogs, I guess … becomes The Postman Always Rings Twice — except in this case the postman rings seven times.

(Yes, I know. I’ve intentionally misunderstood the meaning of the title of James M. Cain’s novel. I did it for the joke.)

But he leavens his tales with smart asides. In the title story, a deputy and a bartender — coffee drinks only, no alcohol — pass the time by naming the stars of The Magnificent Seven. (They get stuck and the sheriff has to supply the last name, Horst Buchholz.)

More in next post ….

George Sprott 1894-1975

I'll make certain to keep this blog from turning into a Seth fan page. But his evocative stuff continues to amaze me.

For example, toward the end of his 2009 book, George Sprott 1894-1975, the biography of an Ontario television personality, amateur Arctic explorer, lecturer and overall heel, parts of which ran in The New York Times Sunday Magazine, the narrator speculates on Sprott’s afterlife. Is he now a ghost hovering near the woods where he played as a child? Out on the tundra having more adventures? By the bar, in the now-defunct Melody Grill, where he drank his dinner for years?

In the 25 tight panels containing the text for this one-page chapter, the artist shows us angles of downtown buildings at night — office windows, a large clock, awnings, a streetlamp, a full moon. But as we pull back and view the page as a whole, we realize they’re not separate images. The two dozen-plus squares form one scene, one image, of the city bathed in moonlight and adorned with a clear night’s stars.

We need to see the big picture. Just as the artist is telling us we must view George Sprott’s life, not in snippets, but as a complete story.

This also might be Sprott’s view from his own office, the white lines holding the panels representing his window panes, and where he sits alone in the dark, late at night.

Battle Angel Alita: Last Order Vol. 13, Part 1

I’m just going to say this up front and be done with it: After Viz Media made us wait eight months for this latest installment of Yukito Kishiro’s Gunnm series — a decade after its publication in Japan, according to the copyright page — the main character appears in only a handful of panels. And then only to be seen munching on a fish. (Yes, yes, the title of this edition is “Sans Angel,” so that’s a large clue she’s not going to be making much of an appearance. But still.)

But even without her, there’s still Kishiro’s skill as a storyteller (and of course as an artist). He’s told of other star-crossed lovers — notably Gally, as the series’ protagonist is known in the rest of the world, and Hugo (Yugo). But he pulls it off again, with a fatal, too-passionate-for-life twist. It’s giving little away to mention “Sans Angel’s” key actor, Homme du Feu, a genetically engineered warrior-werewolf monster directed by the military industrial complex of Kishiro’s dense worlds, is unsure if he wants to eat his Farrah Fawcett-like combat instructor or make love to her.

As with so many of the great Battle Angel Alita love stories, this one is heart-breakingly sad, absurdly funny, repulsive, tragic and ultimately noble.

More on this book. See my earlier posts on this series here (the story of volume 12), here (the art of volume 12) and here (on Viz’s agonizing release schedule).
My first post on the Battle Angel Alita: Last Order/Gunnm books can be seen here: Reading this will help explain a lot in Kirshiro’s superb, dense, unparalleled series.

In the Floyd Archives

In a college lit class a number of years ago, I got into a semi-serious debate with the instructor as to whether T.S. Eliot’s footnotes for The Waste Land should count as part of the poem. I contended as the notes were published with the work, by Eliot, they should stand as belonging to the poem.

I recalled that argument when reading New York Times reporter Sarah Boxer’s In the Floyd Archives: A Psycho-Bestiary. Her notes at the end of the book not only explain much of her characters’ dialog, their conversations make little sense without these explanations.

Boxer’s Thurber-like-roughly-sketched rabbit, wolf and rat each consult a bird psychiatrist, who doesn’t seem to understand when they speak plain English.

“I’m being chased by a wolf,” a frightened Rabbitman tells Dr. Floyd.

“So,” replies the bird, “you think you’re being ‘chased’?” After Rabbitman leaves Floyd’s office, a wolf comes in. And so on. Much of the story seems to be a series Freudian in-jokes.

The real question is whether reading the notes, too, actually makes In the Floyd Archives any more enjoyable.

Maybe that just would be wish fulfillment.

Breakdowns

Here’s a potential lesson for those of us who become discouraged after we find what we thought was a great inspiration is really not so great: Art Spiegelman in Breadowns, a reprinting of his partially autobiographical 1978 collection, tells how he got excited about a story of blacks in America depicted as mice and the Ku Klux Klan as cats. He was going to call it “Ku Klux Kats.”

He quickly realized he knew “bupkis about being black in America. Bupkis.”

Spiegelman of course later adapted the idea to Jews and Nazis, for his Pulitzer-Prize-winning work of genius, Maus.

But you have to admit, Ku Klux Kats is funny, though maybe not in the way he intended ….

Mark Crilley

Just as with studying art, when hunting for story ideas it’s best to go to the Masters, advised Mark Crilley, author of the popular graphic novel series for young people, Miki Falls and Akiko.

When he wanted to create his first book, he thought about The Wizard of Oz, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, The Chronicles of Narnia and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory — all tales of young people escaping into a fantasy land, he pointed out during his presentation this past Thursday at the Kalamazoo Public Library in Kalamazoo, Michigan.

A graduate of Kalamazoo College and a student of Caldecott winner and National Book Award and Eisner Award finalist David Small (Stitches), Crilley also emphasized “thinking long and hard about the personalities” of your characters. For Spuckler in the Akiko series, for example, he came up with four points: wild, tough, friendly and “not too smart.” To reinforce that personality, he developed a specific voice for each character — “Then you’ll know what your character will and won’t say.”

Readers, he contended, can hear that voice — and therefore the personality — in the words the characters use.

During the Q&A, Crilley discussed color (“I’m a fan of a limited color palette”), layout (“Let the story lead you”) and scale — he draws his originals only slightly larger than how they’ll appear when printed. “I want to see it as it’ll look once it’s published. (Besides), I save paper that way,” he smiled.

As for which type of paper or drawing tool to use — pencil, Micron pen, pastels, acrylic paint — Crilley advised, “It’s not the paper, it’s not the pen …. It’s your eyes.”

Good-bye to ‘Little Orphan Annie’: From Great Depression to Great Recession

“Daddy” and Asp slain! Cut down in a vicious battle!

But the mysterious giant, Punjab, finds their bodies, rescues them! He brings them back to life!

Though surely the local newspaper we received when I was a child carried Little Orphan Annie, I don’t remember it. (And I read every strip, from the top of the newspaper page to the bottom.)

What I do recall was reading Annie’s adventures from the 1940s, collected in a battered Big Little Book I discovered at grandparents’ house. (How they came by it I only can guess: My grandfather read racy crime novels, and my grandmother wrote what we’d now call romance fiction.)

The stories in that tiny book — with text on the left page and Harold Gray’s art on the facing page — certainly were more interesting than Annie’s goings-on by the 1960s, what I would have seen in the local paper. They definitely were scarier, and I don’t just mean Gray’s bleak, sinister drawings packed with deep shadows and malevolent, gloating bad guys.

Take a look through the reprinted Annie collections from the 1930s and ’40s. In one story, from 1937, the Asp throws an obviously terrified baby pig into the open jaws of an immense alligator … just to make a point to Annie to be careful. And many, many times abandoned, slip-of-a-girl Annie is separated from her dog and “Daddy” Warbucks, and is smacked and hit, tied up and trapped. The only reason people today must recall Annie as optimistic is because they’re confused with that musical. (“The sun’ll come out ta-marraw,” etc.)

Sure, Annie the protagonist hoped for the best. But as a strip from March 1936 reminds us, “she walks alone.” And “it’s just as well to keep an eye on ‘smart’ men” as our valuable possessions tend to go missing when they’re around (August 1939). And “Success is only for the few who can ignore the jeers of the mass (sic)” (April 1936).

And then there was Sandy, with the body of a wolf and the leering skull of a person. Creepy.

Doesn’t sound all that cheery, does it? But Gray was a master, in story and art, of atmosphere (even if his anti-New Deal sentiments could be jarring). Jay Maeder and Ted Slampyak’s current colorful version of Annie has tried to carry on, but the era of the adventure strip apparently has passed. Today’s newspaper readers, the few that remain, only have the attention span for a quick, faint joke, then are gone.

Or so we’re told by the newspaper editors who make the selections.

As someone who grew up in love with those adventure strips, I say that’s too bad for all of us.

Eisner/Miller, Part 3

In Eisner/Miller, Charles Brownstein’s joint interviews with Will Eisner and Frank Miller, the cartoonists note that many of their predecessors considered themselves entertainers. It wasn’t until the current generation that comic book writers and illustrators — Miller, Chris Ware, Seth, the Hernandez Brothers, et al. — started to think of themselves as artists.

As the form began to be contemplated as art, I guess, that made the practitioners artists.

Early on in the book, Eisner talks about how he did his own lettering for Contract With God — all of it — and Miller suggests that “was really a departure.”

“I was more mature” by then, Eisner replies, “and I had something to say.”

“You got to us. We started regarding ourselves as novelists. It’s as if you said ‘These’ll be permanent.’”

And thus was born the graphic novel and graphic novelists. Let there be light.

See my earlier posts on Eisner/Miller: A One-on-One Interview here and here.

Fred the Clown

Several of the chapters in Roger Langridge’s “10 Steps to Happiness,” in his 2004 Fred the Clown book, are hysterical — particularly “Alphabet,” going from Fred the Amorous to Fred the Zoophyte (Langridge loves his word play); “Where the Smart Things Ain’t,” his play on Where the Wild Things Are with giant Pogo characters in pursuit of the protagonist; and especially “The Shoulders of Giants,” with its nod to Buster Keaton, Chaplin, Laurel and Hardy, the Marx Brothers, Harold Lloyd, et al.

This last story in particular has a plot and a message rather than just another custard pie and a good gag.

Also attesting to Langridge’s talent are his variations on Peanuts, Garfield, Family Circus, The Phantom, Dreams of the Rarebit Fiend, the Yellow Kid, Krazy Kat, Blondie, the Hulk … and even Shakespeare. His brilliant essay on the Fred the Clown comic strip, by comics historian “Helvetica Darwin,” demonstrates his knowledge of newspaper strip legacy. (And it carries a laugh-out-loud final punchline.)

And I was delighted to see his inside reference to Doctor Who.

On the other hand, there’s a wide streak of truly unfunny incontinence jokes — no pun intended — that’s hard to ignore.

But maybe not all the stories are intended to play well with others. They bring a laugh, a pie in the face … and occasionally some really dumb, infantile jokes. Just like the socially troubled Fred himself.

Splat.

Mouse Guard

Also handed out on Free Comic Book Day this past Saturday was a sampling from David Petersen’s Mouse Guard Spring 1153, featuring the artist’s usual stunning and cute — yes, both stunning and cute at the same time — depiction of medieval warrior mice, rabbits and other woodland creatures.

The publication carried a promo for two upcoming Mouse Guard books — Mouse Guard: The Black Axe (starting with a September date) and Mouse Guard: Legends of the Guard (beginning in May). For the latter, it noted “Mouse Guard creator David Petersen handpicks a who’s who of artists and writers to come and play in his world, including Jeremy Bastian, Alex Sheikman, Ted Naifeh, Gene Ha, Sean Rubin, Guy Davis, Terry Moore and Mark Smylie!”

Which means Legends won’t have any of that stunning/cute art of Petersen’s. Maybe this was to give Petersen time to work on Black Axe.

But in any case, and no disrespect to the other guest illustrators, is that a good thing?

In the Studio, Part 2

I hadn’t thought of that before.

In his interview in Todd Hignite’s fascinating In the Studio: Visits With Contemporary Cartoonists, Chris Ware shows the work of Japanese cartoonist Suiho Tagawa, “my fourth-favorite cartoonist who’s no longer alive.” Tagawa in the 1930s produced big, wide-open-vista colorful pictures that depicted multiple characters in myriad scenarios — all in one image.

“This,” Ware contends, “is the course comics should’ve taken before they got sidetracked and transformed by the language of cinema in the 1930s.

“As near as I can tell, the Japanese understanding of art is almost a sort of simultaneous reading and seeing, where ours is purely seeing ….”

I hadn’t considered the notion of cartoons having been hijacked at some stage by a movie-form — i.e., a sequential form, with dramatic camera-like angles — of storytelling. (My guess is Ware would name as the chief culprit Milton Caniff, who made the most of a cinematic look with his popular Terry and the Pirates.)

And I hadn’t ever thought about that being wrong.

See my earlier post on this book here.

And you can see Ware display his Gasoline Alley collection in a video interview by Chicago NPR radio station WBEZ here. (I always meant to try to finagle a visit to Ware’s house when I also lived in Oak Park, but it never happened.)

More on In the Studio to come.