Market Spotlight on: Usagi Yojimbo TPBs

Usagi Yojimbo is an odd little success story. Stan Sakai scripts and draws the adventures of a samurai rabbit, faithfully set somewhere in the Edo period of Japan. He's a bunny rabbit.

Ordinarily when the Ugly American starts in with talk of bunnies, well, there isn't much nice to say. Not so here. Here, Sakai creates a unique blend of historical reference, funny animal art, and modern pop culture. It's part biography of Miyamoto Musashi, part homage to Sonny Chiba, all by way of Walt Disney.

On paper, that formula is probably too precious to work. And it's in black-and-white, which usually doesn't help. In reality, Stan Sakai has made it his life's work and essentially willed it into viability with love and sweat. I can't think of a single source that read the book and didn't have glowing praise for its quality.

I can't speak to the contents of the book myself. Period pieces are generally not my thing. That has not kept me from selling boatloads of the Usagi Yojimbo trade paperbacks from Dark Horse at profits ranging from excellent to obscene.

Usagi Yojimbo is in a weird spot right now. Sakai stopped producing the book in early 2012 to divert attention to the 47 Ronin with MIke Richardson. The promise was that Sakai would pick up where he left off with Usagi when 47 was complete. Well, that hasn't happened yet, and 47 Ronin wrapped up about a year ago.

Editor's Note: Stan Sakai’s wife, Sharon, is currently recovering from a debilitating illness. She is currently convalescing at home after a lengthy hospital stay. She requires 24 hour care and expensive medicine, neither of which the family's insurance covers. This explains the lack of new Usagi content. If you would like to help the Sakai family, you can visit this link. It has also come to my attention that Ryan Lee himself has donated some of his sales of these books to the Sakai family. Good on you, Ryan.

That's both good and bad for the secondary market value of the Usagi Yojimbo trades. Because the comics are not being published monthly, there's little reason for Dark Horse to focus on keeping the material in print. As the supply continues to dwindle, prices go up.

The lack of serialization cuts the other way, though. Without a regular comic to inspire interest in the character and stories, the demand for the product will eventually dwindle, and that will suppress prices.

As I type this, however, I can confirm that it is fairly easy to command multiples of cover on several of the Usagi Yojimbo trades, particularly if they are in nice condition. Nearly a third of the series is profitable, even paying full retail. Return of the Black Soul, Grasscutter 2, Duel at Kitanoji, they all make money. The best books tend to cycle as things go in and out of print. The three Usagi books that currently fetch the best prices are:

Book Three: Wanderer's Road
Book Eleven: Seasons
Book Twenty One: Mother of Mountains

You Amazon minimum prices on these books in new condition start at around $80 and go up from there. Is it realistic to expect to sell your book at those rates? The short answer is; probably.

Actually, let's talk about pricing and risk management for a bit. Today I bought 4 Usagi trades from one of my local establishments, and the jewel of the pack was a very nice copy of Mother of Mountains. That book is in a very solid NM (9.4) condition.

The particular grade won't really matter to my customer, except that it allows me to safely sell my book in the "New" category. When my buyer receives their book, he or she will be pleased with the condition. It's important not to overgrade your product if you want to sell long term. Bad reviews do catch up with you.

When I get to Amazon to sell my book, I'm quite pleased to find that the current minimum prices for Usagi Book 21 are $178 for both new and used copies. That's pretty crazy. You don't get mins like that unless the book is seriously scarce, in serious demand, or both. So now the question is - what do I list my copy for?

The amateur surveys those prices and does one of two things. Either A) they undercut the lowest offer by a penny and try to get $177.99 for the book or B) they jump the price to around $200, figuring that their divine glow should attract customers even if they aren't being perfectly competitive on price.

I listed my lovely new copy for $79.99...how did I arrive at that figure?

Experience is my guide there. I've sold many Usagi trades, so I've got a pretty good handle on what I can get for the books based upon previous sales. Frankly, I think it far more likely that I'm going to get about $60 for that book, not $80.

Some may ask - why not try for the $179? What's the harm? To be fair, it's actually not a horrible thing to reach for the golden ticket. I have sold a copy of Usagi Book 11 for $100, so it's not completely out of the question. If you can actually sell the book for $180, it would be silly to leave that $100 on the table, of course. And if you're on top of things enough to pay attention and adjust the price on your stock regularly, there really isn't much harm in chasing the huge score... for a very brief period.

There is a definite downside to chasing pies in the sky, though. The biggest issue? Dark Horse goes back to press on the book, and instantly your $180 treasure is now the "old crappy edition" of a book that is readily available for $10. And then you don't feel so smart for trying to wait out the big fish.

I bought that copy of Mother of Mountains for $16, and if I can flip that for $80 this week, I'm ecstatic. After Amazon takes their 20% cut, I'm left with about $48 in profit - profit that I can then pump into another book that I can (hopefully) quickly churn into yet more profit.

If I chase the $180, who knows? I might just get it. But it's very likely to take a year or more to line up that buyer, and the longer I wait the less likely the market is to cooperate with those inflated values. Even if I get the $180, if it takes me a year to do so how much more could I have earned churning books that actually sell instead of watching this monster collect dust? The risk/reward just isn't there for me to chase insane dollar values.

I don't know...there are risks either way. Given the choice, I like to err on the side of flipping things quickly and moving on to the next opportunity.

Speculation on: Felicity Smoak

If you read the Ugly American's review of Arrow a few weeks ago, you know that where there is Smoak, there's fire. In my pants.

I love pretty much everything about Felicity Smoak as portrayed by Emily Bett Rickards,
and I just can't be alone. She makes for an adorable cult favorite, and that often means back issue interest. So the question is - where did Felicity Smoak make her first comics appearance? Ultimately, that's what the collectors are going to be most interested in.

The answer is...it depends on how you look at it.

The first time a character named Felicity Smoak hit the comics scene was in Fury of Firestorm # 23, published in 1984. That character bears little resemblance to the Arrow series character, though. Fans of the Arrow series will not recognize that character, either by appearance or temperament.

That iteration of Felicity Smoak was a dark haired woman, and a bit of a battle axe. She's similar in that she was into computers, but after that the comparison fails. That character has essentially no connection to Green Arrow, and in fact wound up becoming Ronny Raymond's mother-in-law.

The hardest of the hard core collectors will tend to gravitate toward this issue, even though the character depicted in the book doesn't "feel" like the Rickards persona the world at large is actually attracted to. First matters most on these issues, generally.

As I type this, there is no detectable spike in value on Firestorm # 23. That's a good thing. That just means you can still get in cheap. Listen, it took collectors more than 25 years to figure out that Nightwing's first appearance in Tales of the Teen Titans # 44 was significant. Sometimes it takes the world a little while to catch up. Again, that's a good thing.

I've been buying copies of the book in VF-NM for $2 each. Even if I'm wrong about the future value of this comic, it won't cost you much to play. If you're into Felicity Smoak, there's no reason not to chase down this affordable little gem for your collection.

This is part of what makes collecting fun, and there's really nothing wrong with it, regardless of what the pundits will tell you about back issues and the horror of speculation. I really like that character, so what's wrong with adding that piece of her "history" into my collection, particularly when it costs less than a cup of coffee? It makes me happy, and it makes the retailers happy, too. Win-win.

The thing is, for some collectors, the old Pre-Crisis Felicity Smoak just won't be good enough. She doesn't walk, talk, or act like the girl they're in love with. So where does the Arrow version of Felicity first appear in comics?

Well, her first comics appearance actually began in cyber-space. The Arrow comics series begins as a digital-only comic before it hits the stands in print. You can't bag and board the digital Arrow chapter 20 and stuff that in your long box, though. For print purposes the Arrow version of Felicity first appeared in Arrow # 7.

If you can find it in your LCS, I'm sure it's sitting there at its original $4 price tag. It's hard to find, though, in my experience. Do I expect to eventually see a surge in interest for that comic? Yes, I do.

Traditionally, it's Firestorm # 23 that would see the bulk of the back issue interest, The game is changing, though. Nobody (outside of myself, it seems) wants to recognize how much of the market is actually driven by women.

I think that there a ton of women interested in Felicity Smoak, and I don't think most of them care a lick about the old Firestorm character. I think they're interested in the blonde with her hair in a ponytail and her foot in her mouth. I predict that group is going to be far more attracted to Arrow # 7, and there will be enough of them chasing that book to create a significant price increase.

Incidentally, in my travels I've been finding it far easier to find that 27 year old Firestorm comic than to locate the Arrow book that just came out over the summer. This is why I just shake my head and grin when the Wise Elders of comics try to tell me that modern books aren't scarce or suitable for collecting. You keep thinking that. I'll keep making money.

Happy Hunting!

Ugly American: Market Spotlight Edition!

It's been awhile since we've stooped to worrying about profit around here. I start to feel wrong if we don't sully ourselves with greed from time to time, so here goes.

I'm typing this on Cyber Monday, which isn't really a thing, it's just something we're told is a thing, so we bend over and make it a thing rather than "miss out" on something. Mostly we miss out on things that actually are things (i.e dignity, self respect) with that kind of neurotic mental gymnastics. But on the plus side, I made 8 sales on Amazon today, which is pretty robust even by the Ugly American's lofty standards.

I even sold a book to James Tynion IV this week. I won't tell you what it was, because you never know who reads this damn column, and for all I know the book was a gift. So we're going to keep that info on the down low. Tynion writes Talon for DC Comics, if you didn't know.

So that's my brush with fame this week. Not nearly as impressive as attempting to boot Tom Fowler out of the Foggy Goggle because you're having an art event... but that's pretty good for me.

I've been upping my game, folks, gearing up for the Christmas selling season. I recently went on a research rampage, complete with a Rocky theme-laced montage in my head. Did you know that Ebay refuses to show more than 10,000 auction results on a search? I was unjustifiably proud of that little feat. Did you beat testicular cancer? Pffft. I did enough research that an auction site turned off the faucet on me. How am I still single? A world wonders.

Point being, I have a lot of market info banging around in my brain right now, and will now share a few bytes of it. Why? Because I care about you. You know another comics blog that's going to help you earn some money for your insane Christmas shopping this year? Didn't think so.

Preacher

Word on the street is that AMC is feeling the loss of Breaking Bad and looking for a real ass kicker to pick up the slack.

Enter Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon's Preacher. Now, we've heard this song and dance before, as far back as 1998. The difference this time is that shadowy sources are claiming that AMC have ordered a pilot. When people start spending money, you know they're serious. It's certainly no guarantee. Global Frequency actually got their pilot made, it was good, and the show still got scrapped. But this is looking like it might actually happen.

Collectors are noticing. This summer, you were able to grab copies of Preacher # 1 in stated NM for $25-$50, and a CGC 9.8 was in the $200-$225 range. As of this week, raw copies in NM have been selling for between $200 and a staggering $385! I also watched a Preacher # 1 in CGC 9.8 achieve a $649.99 closing price.

A few years ago DC produced some $1.00 comics in conjunction with the Watchmen film release. They were supposed to function as cheap gateways into other DC material for folks who liked the Watchmen movie so much they just had to find other comics.

I'm not sure that ever happened, but I do know that I just watched the $1.00 Preacher: Special Edition comic sell for $17.00 last week. Not sure how replicable that is, it looks like an outlier. On the other hand, it's only going to cost you a buck to stash that away and see if the AMC show really takes off. There is precedence for this underdog reprint kind of thing working. Remember when Walking Dead Weekly # 1 came out and you just laughed at it? That's an easy sell at $25, and often goes much higher.

I'm pleasantly surprised to hear the AMC pilot news. The Walking Dead contains violence and some dark/mature themes...but there's nothing incendiary built into the concept. The 21st Century loves its false piety, political correctitude, and heaping piles of bullshit. Preacher is NONE of those things. If they build the show with the comic's foundation, (and why option the property unless you want the foundation?) there will be angry letters. Oh yes, there will be letters. I will be very curious to see what happens then. Other than me clapping and jumping like a six-year-old at his birthday party, that is.

New 52 Hardcovers

Have you noticed how hard it is to find most of the Volume 1 New 52 books in hardcover? They're gone, baby, gone. DC is lagging on going back to press on these, and the results are surging prices in the secondary market. Here's some current Amazon mins for HCs in new condition:

Justice League Vol 1: Origin $60+
Aquaman Vol 1: Trench $60+
Wonder Woman Vol 1: Blood $50+

Batman & Robin: Born to Kill looks poised to be the next big winner, and the Detective Comics Vol 1 seems legitimately scarce and simmering as well. Batman books in particular have a habit of becoming solid earners in the secondary market - it will pay to keep an eye on those books.

There's always a danger that DC could go back to press at any minute, and that instantly smashes the profit potential, at least for new material like this. It's pretty weird to me that DC wouldn't have scads and scads of the Justice League HCs available. Your creative team on that book is Geoff Johns and Jim Lee. They are running the publishing firm. How in the world do they let their own work lapse out of print? Very weird.

Journey Into Mystery TPBs

Here's a bulletin for you - the ladies love Loki. Tom Hiddleston does more moisturizing in one hour than aloe vera does all year. If you have a uterus, you looooooove Loki. As you should. I'm right with you.

Now, the ladies don't necessarily love all Lokis equally. What they really love is Hiddleston, of course. There isn't really a direct Hiddleston corollary in the comics, but the Keiron Gillen young Loki is in the heart-throbby ballpark, and certainly seems to be sufficing. That's where the Journey Into Mystery stuff comes in.

So young Loki shows up in Journey into Mystery # 622. That might be one to have. Did you know that Marvel produced a variant of that issue with Tom Hiddleston on the cover? Huh. If you like money, I might look into that one. Seems like it might have a future.

In the here and now, though...some of the Journey Into Mystery trades are rather scorching. It's the even numbered volumes you're looking for:

Journey Into Mystery Vol 2: Fear Itself Fallout
Journey Into Mystery Vol 4: Manchester Gods

I sell a lot of books, and you kind of get a feel for how desperately hot certain books get by how long it takes to sell them. I've had three copies of Manchester Gods now, and when I price them competiively, (within 5% of the current min) they don't make it more than an hour or two. That is a RABID fan base, and I attribute it largely to women.

Women are a powerful force in the comics economics landscape. You won't hear that from any comics creator or the pundit sites, because nobody claps when you speak truths like "women actually do haves some agency within the medium". You only get to hear clapping when you say "women are oppressed and sad creatures, and we should all be sad for them."

Here's some truth for you - The Harley Quinn Phenomenon is exceeded only by Batman and Spider-Man, in my opinion. That's women that are driving the Harley Quinn bus. There are men on it, but the women are driving it. About 38% of them are applying eye shadow while driving said bus, and I'm not into that. But they're doing it, and I'm making money on it, and yay!

Long story longer, JIM Vol 2 is a $50 sale in nice condition, and JIM Vol 4 is a super easy $60+ sale. These books could be sitting in your local comic shop right now! Go and conquer!

Ugly American: IMAGINE Agents Review!

IMAGINE Agents
Boom! Studios 4 issue mini-series

Scripts: Brian Joines
Art: Bachan

A few weeks ago some guy you might be familiar with named Mike reviewed some comics on the Where Monsters Dwell radio program and recommended a Boom! title called IMAGINE Agents. I had seen the solicitation copy and cover images for the book, and it looked like a forgettable little cartoony fluff piece that wouldn't interest me. Mike seemed so pleasantly surprised with it...I just had to see for myself.

After reading the first two issues, count the Ugly American as also heartily endorsing IMAGINE Agents.

You had an imaginary friend as a child, right? Well, the IMAGINE Agents are tasked with keeping these "notional entities" in line. Think "Men in Black", with a more specific jurisdiction.

Agent Dave Slatern (the grizzled, jaded vet) and rookie Terry Snowgoose (hapless comedic relief) are drowning in cases. Seems a a wayward notion named Dapple has a revolution in mind, and he's recruiting other rowdies with an eye toward interacting more directly with the tangible world. Caught in the crosshairs of all this mayhem are a host of colorful notions and regular folks like little Elliot and his mother Rebecca.

This is an all-ages book in the truest sense. You can hand this to just about anybody, and they'll find something to grab hold of. The reason to do a book like this is to dismantle the governor on a creator's imagination and just let it rip. IMAGINE Agents does not disappoint on that front. The main Notional is Furdlegurr, who looks like a fat teddy bear, and there are plenty of other cutesy creatures if you're into that sort of thing.

Blounder is a pink blob who really takes an emotional beating in this comic and steals every scene he's in. The visuals run the gamut - some of the Notions are ill-conceived amalgamations (their forms are influenced by the undeveloped minds of children) that lean toward the creepy and bizarre. My favorite is Jupert,
the "wild west" tyrannosaurs acting as deputy sherrif of the district where the diaspora go when their children can't see them any more. I don't know what a "Bachan" is, but they're doing a bang-up job selling interesting looking characters.

What draws me to IMAGINE Agents is that it's deeper than it's cartoon exterior. Agent Slatern (who clearly has a checkered emotional history with his own childhood Notion) forces Blounder to confront the idea that his unnaturally sweet relationship with Molly might cripple her ability to form relationships in the real world.

Not all the Notions have that syrupy bond with children, however. Pono got saddled with a kid who quickly got bored with him, tossed him in the corner and promptly forgot him. Joines has a very solid structure in place for the Notional world and the rules it plays by. Notions take a form that is chosen for them. What a drag, even if you found the box you were placed in aesthetically pleasing! It's a narrative demonstration of how part of what we are is
constructed by other's perceptions.

Pono being stuck inside that weird plant sells the idea of societal influence more powerfully and with more subtlety than 99% of the comics on the rack today, who think jamming propaganda down your throat with a dirty plunger is storytelling.

It works in IMAGINE Agents because it's built into the story organically, and serves the story in terms of motive. Some of the Notions are just destructive people who enjoy breaking things. But many of the Notions find Dapple's plan attractive simply because they've grown attached emotionally to the "real world" and want to be a part of it. How would you feel if everything in your life was stripped away from you because the person you cared about most happened to turn 8 years old? That's the life of an imaginary friend.

So there's a lot to like about this comic. It looks fantastic, it has heart, and it's extremely tightly plotted. There is exactly zero fat in Joines script - every word and image serves a purpose, and the pace is quite brisk. I honestly wouldn't mind if the script were allowed to meander a little more, because the character moments are so strong. I think it's smart, though, especially in today's market to err on the side of less decompression and more story density.

Not for nothing, but Elliot's mom Rebecca also has the highest MILF quotient in comics. That's important.

And hey, for you Market Spotlight folks...I would say that IMAGINE Agents has higher-than-average investment potential, because this property is absolutely begging to be made into an animated feature.

Now, the "movie option" game is a bit played out, and the windows for that game are getting incredibly short. This is different, though. Not everything that gets optioned is actually good. If exposed to a larger audience, IMAGINE Agents will really grab hold of some hearts and stick. It deserves a shot in your reading pile, for sure.

PS: the imaginary friend bit is an inspired hook, I would say. Most of us have experience, yes? Or am I the weird one?

As a child, I had two imaginary friends running simultaneously: Mark and Guggees. Guggees rhymes with "juggies", only with a "guh" sound at the beginning, if you're curious. Mark was a bit of a bad seed. If I threw a Hot Wheels car at the dog.....that was probably because Mark thought it was a good idea, not because I was a little asshole. He was sort of like the devil on my shoulder.

Some people have a little angel on their other shoulder to balance things out. Not me. I had Guggees. He was an impulsive but hilarious lunatic. So if Mom laid out my clothes for an exciting day at kindergarten, I might switch things up and wear two different colored socks to school. That would be the Guggees Factor.

Everyone, please try to contain your shock that my two formative phantom influences were a sociopath and a certifiable nut bag. I think Mark and Guggees had pretty much left by the third grade, so I think the 8 year rule feels about right to me. Now it's all me. If I throw a Hot Wheels car at your dog? I'll own that. The point is, keep your dog in line and nobody gets hurt.

Next up: I think we'll start tackling the 2013 year in review!

Ugly American: Attack of the 50 Foot Froofy Comic….and Other Tales of Horror!

Froofy comics are just not my thing. I suppose I should define “froofy”, as not everybody has listened to Chronic Insomnia, and therefore can’t properly translate Ugly Americanese.

To be froofy is to engage in haughty pretense, false airs, and an undeserved sense of superiority. You know the kind, because they’re absolutely everywhere. Nobody actually liked Echo & the Bunnymen, OK? A lot of people like the idea of being the kind of person that liked Echo & the Bunnymen. A lot of people were desperate for you to believe that they liked Echo & the Bunnymen, so they could prove how cool they were. Some people pretended to like Echo & the Bunnymen so they could get in the pants of the chick in The Cure t-shirt
with way too much eye makeup. That I understand.

But mostly people actually liked Duran Duran and just didn’t want to admit it.

In the comics medium, froofery is alive, well, and rampant. If you want to see what it looks like, just go ahead and observe pretty much anything published by Fantagraphics, and the people that read them. Of course the absolute pinnacle of froofosity is Chris Ware’s Acme Novelty Library. Now, a lot of different people claim that Acme is quality, so I’m not specifically saying that it isn’t. I’m told that you’ll probably want to kill yourself after reading anything by Ware, and the Ugly American is fully behind that concept.

I’ve read bits and pieces of Acme Novelty…and what I saw just wasn’t all that fantastic. Give me any issue of Secret Six instead, please. If Acme is an indictment of everything supposedly broken with the oppressive superhero genre, I sincerely hope the comics industry stays broken. But it isn’t even the comics themselves, really. It’s the fetid stench of attitude wafting off the clique that swears by them.

If you want to get a flavor of that attitude, I recommend stuffing an open pack of bologna under your friend’s car seat and then checking back with his or her vehicle in about a week. To get the full effect, your friend’s vehicle should be parked in a lot of direct sunlight in a scorching hot environment. That’s the froofy attitude in olfactory form. If you want it in audio, go catch an episode of the Inkstuds. Warning: the Ugly American recommends you have one of those airline vomit bags handy in case you try either.

My attitude regarding Froofy comics is equivalent to my attitude toward unscheduled butt sex. I’m not into it at all, generally. But every now and again you have to pull a Risky Business and say “what the fuck?” You get it over with, you deal with it, and then you don’t speak of it again outside of the safety bubble of your therapist.

And that’s how I approached Adrian Tomine and the latest issue of Optic Nerve, a paragon of froofervescence if ever there were.


Optic Nerve # 13 – Drawn & Quarterly
Scripts: Adrian Tomine
Art: Adrian Tomine

The first thing that will grab your attention is the cover, which is cut so that it appears to be missing 40% of its width. I’m sure that’s clever on some planet. Tomine seems to have pulled the same trick for the cover of Optic Nerve # 12, so that might be his new thing. Well, it’s sort of new. Looks like the last issue of Optic Nerve shipped in late 2007. He must have been busy or something, because Nate Simpson thinks that’s slow.

The cover mostly obscures a one page joke. (I think it’s intended to be funny?) Apparently Tomine is something of a Luddite, pining for the days of yesteryear without Facebook, tweeting, and Cintiqs. I sympathize with that bit, actually. I have successfully avoided Twitter, and have said my final farewell to Facebook….but it got me for a bit. I still spend too much time staring at my phone, and I recognize it as a problem. Generation FW stands no chance. So I get it, but the bit comes off more smug than endearing. I hope you’re all sitting down for that bombshell.

The issue is comprised of two stories. The first is an exceptionally powerful story titled “Go Owls”. The best way to read that story is to do like I did, with no framework to guide your expectations. I think the tale works no matter what, but you will certainly get a richer experience if you just fall down the rabbit hole without preparing yourself. What I suggest is that you stop reading this review right here and don’t come back to it until you’ve had a chance to get properly bush-whacked by “Go Owls”. If you’re going to read that story, I suggest you skip ahead in this column to the lovely picture of undead Archie characters by Andrew Pepoy.

So…. now that I’ve warned folks not to get spoiled, is everybody else ready?

Good.

One of the most perplexing things in life is watching otherwise intelligent, capable women chase abusive relationships, and then compound the problem by sticking with them. Why do people date losers who hit them? What kind of sorcery chains a person to a situation that is obviously dysfunctional?

“Go Owls” is the most authentic and most chilling exploration of that concept I’ve ever seen. Part of the reason it works so well is that the seeds of doom are planted so subtly in the reader’s mind, and this mirrors the problems that the abuse victim has.

The tale begins when a woman who remains nameless meets a dead beat named Barry
at some kind of a 12-step event. She’s in need of some mentoring, and Barry has some charm, and of course that’s the problem. He’s a charming loser, almost in equal doses. At least at first.

Having no preconceptions, it took me some time to find my footing in the story. Is this a story about addiction? Is this a “love conquers all” romance? Is this an examination of slacker downfall? What the hell is happening?

What’s happening to the reader is the same thing happening to the woman – this mildly charismatic degenerate is pulling you closer and closer to the black hole, and by the time you figure out the stakes involved it’s almost impossible to pull out.

Go Owls is an incredibly dark mind-jammer that lands so hard because it feels so much like life. There is a monster there, yes. But the monster also offers hope, and guilt, and humor, and affection, and weed in irregular cycles. Your standard after-school special or Lifetime Channel movie disguises the real power of the monster, because they usually make him a moustache twirler that swindles the woman with lies.

That situation does happen, of course. This story is more nuanced, and I think more true to life. Tomine paces the developing monster perfectly, and peppers the tale with genuine human moments - funny moments that demonstrate why it can be difficult to cut the monster loose. Those scenes don’t diminish Barry’s sins. They make for a far more powerful cautionary tale, though.

The ending is…problematic, but not a deal-breaker. I give Tomine points for staying outside the box. None of “Go Owls” plays to expectations. It felt a little cheap to me, because it was the first item introduced in the story that didn’t feel real. If such scenarios actually exist in the realm of law enforcement, I might feel differently about it.

Again, not a deal-breaker. “Go Owls” is a story worth your time. Is it worth the $5.95 admission price? Tough to say. Maybe. It doesn’t help that the last 10-11 pages are some kind of not-story translated from some Japanese source. I don’t even know how to categorize it other than “waste of time and effort”. Standing next to Owls, this collection of limp memories about waiting in airports and driving to diners feels exceptionally hollow. Not good.

So that was my dalliance at the Hotel Froof. I survived it fairly intact, and was actually impressed with the main feature. Still not sure it was worth $6, and still not sure if I feel tainted by it or not.

My strong impulse is to send this thing to CGC and get it graded. You know that would drive Froofites absolutely bananas. Someday I’m going to show Adrian Tomine my CGC 9.8 copy of Optic Nerve # 13 and sell it to somebody for $150 right in front of him, strictly for vengeance. Oh, sweet justice!


Afterlife With Archie

I wanted to talk briefly about Afterlife With Archie, because I think it’s an interesting beast that is flying a bit under the radar.

Just in time for October and Halloween, Archie comics is going to section off one of their titles into the direct market only and flood Riverdale with the walking dead. I know, I know, it sounds kinda lame, and way too late to the zombie ball, and all of that stuff.

Stick with me, though.

This is not a half-assed stunt or a campy throw-away. This is not Archie Meets the Punisher. This is an ongoing series, or at least as ongoing as anything is. If Uncanny X-men has to re-boot every other year, I don’t know how long this is really going to last. Point is, they are planning on publishing it as long as people will buy it.

There are some quality people handling the creative chores, too. Scripts are by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa. No, he’s not Alan Moore. But he’s not chopped liver, and he’s an industry vet. His work on Nightcrawler a few years back tells me that he’s not a bad fit. Pencils are by Francesco Fracavilla, and that is phenomenal news! He’s perfect, absolutely perfect.

The thing that generates the most interest from my end is the fact that they are playing the horror straight. Archie makes a very nice living selling to kids in the retail market at grocery stores and such. Afterlife with Archie is not that kind of book. Apparently, Sabrina the Teenage Witch
is going to have a spell go sideways, and then these kids are going to start eating each other! They don’t want that in the hands of kids, and they aren’t distributing it to the retail chains. Comic book stores in the direct market only!

In just about every obvious way, this feels wrong. Why in the world would anybody try and shove raw horror into plastic, ever-bright Riverdale? Who could take any of this seriously when there’s a dude with a goddamn crown on his head involved?

The whole concept plays so aggressively against type I just can’t help but be fascinated. It might end up being a total train wreck. If so, Afterlife with Archie still has my blessing. I’m of the mind that I’d rather see an adventurous flop than a re-tread success. And part of me thinks they might actually pull this off, and it makes for the most entertaining read you never knew you wanted.

And hey, for you Market Spotlight fans out there – these might be the scarcest Archie comics ever. I can definitely see some hard-core niche appeal from the Archie crowd and the horror crowd. If you’re at all interested, final order cutoff hasn’t elapsed for Afterlife with Archie # 1. Your local shop can still order you some if you ask. I would look into it, because I predict the book is massively under-ordered and sells out quickly.