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

Catch up with Slipped: The adventure comic strip

Take a look at the latest chapter in Slipped, my online-only 1930s-style adventure comic strip, by following the link below.
The comic strip/graphic novel — part Terry and the Pirates, part Corto Maltese and a little bit Star Crash — has been running for more than seven years, and if you’re just tuning in, here’s what’s happening:
After many daring adventures in time and even to the moon, Tyler Wilson, aka the Scarlet Sparrow, has returned to Paris in 1926 to confront her younger sister, Mendacity, who has assumed the Scarlet Sparrow guise as a cat burglar. After a brief rooftop struggle, which Tyler wins, Mendacity says she’s up to something far more complex than simple thefts.
So here is your chance to catch up with their battles with each other, the forces of fascism and even the devil himself ….

And if you want a recap of all seven-plus years, start here.

From chapter 344 of Slipped. Slipped is © 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/

Woman Rebel review

And here’s a link to my review of Peter Bagge’s new book: http://thegazette.com/2013/10/13/in-woman-rebel-the-margaret-sanger-story-cartoonist-offers-take-on-birth-control-pioneer/

Peter Bagge interview

Here is a link to my interview with Peter Bagge, who will be in Iowa City this coming Friday to talk about his new book on Margaret Sanger. http://thegazette.com/2013/10/13/bagge-on-birth-control-in-sangers-life-graphic-novelist-saw-a-comic-book/
There’s also a review of his book at this site.

Little Orphan Annie

Here's a link to my review in The Gazette of the most collections: http://thegazette.com/2012/10/28/little-orphan-annie-still-a-rousing-adventure/

The Mammoth Book of Best Crime Comics

In one panel, Secret Agent X-9 holds a gun in his left hand, aiming out it of frame. In the very next panel, the gun is now in his steely right hand and his left hand is extended, like a tightrope walker, to balance the picture.

As with many sequences in this great 1934 newspaper comic strip, this makes no sense visually. But that’s OK because it all looks great.

Every panel, in fact, of the dapper X-9, the sultry Grace Powers, the feckless Evelyn or even the evil master criminal the Top looks as if plucked from an old posed, black-and-white movie poster. Even when X-9 leaps through a window, he looks pretty darned elegant.

No surprise as the art is by Alex Raymond, the painterly genius behind Flash Gordon and Rip Kirby. And the slam-bam, non-stop action plot? By Dashiell Hammett, creator of The Thin Man and The Continental Op. Speaking of dashing and elegant.

I was delighted to find this and a wealth of other incredibly cool stories in The Mammoth Book of Best Crime Comics, edited by Paul Gravett.

I tend to avoid collections, figuring that for the few dynamic storylines or splendid images the book will be over-packed with contrivances and weak drawing.

So imagine my surprise to find in this one book not only Hammett and Raymond’s tremendous Secret Agent X-9, but also work by one of my favorite cartoonist storytellers, Jacques Tardi, illustrating a story by his wife, Dominique Grange.

If that weren’t enough, this fat, 2008 book also features noir-ish work by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby, Alan Moore, Charles Burns (starring his cigarette-smoking, overweight wrestler-detective El Borbah), Neil Gaiman, Jodi Bernet, Mickey Spillane (remember paperback detective Mike Hammer?), Alex Toth, Ed McBain, Max Allen Collins and Terry Beatty’s Ms. Tree, and Bernie Krigstein, before his EC Comics’s art.

And on top of that, Will Eisner’s The Spirit makes an appearance.

Mix in with this impressive bunch a good number of cartoonists and writers I’d not seen before but wished I had.

A “mammoth” book it is.