Casanova, by the way, is a heck of a fun comic book. Ba's fluid, energetic line work provides a nice counterpoint to Matt Fraction's super-dense script. In his back-page editorial, Fraction explains that he's going for a "wall of sound" approach to the comic, a sort of re-compressed storytelling that will fit the book into its intended 16-page, $1.99 format. While I always admire a formal exercise, I think Fraction and Ba have a bit more experimentation to do before they hit the mark. I would start by paring down the narration and dialogue. Ba's art is exceptionally expressive, and it could easily shoulder more of the storytelling burden. Fraction's language is great in this book, reminiscent of his buddy Joe Casey's work in Godland, and it would be a shame to cut it. But something has to give, because there's a mildly cramped, claustrophobic feeling to the whole affair. It seems like the book was shoehorned into the wrong format.

In Fell, Warren Ellis and Ben Templesmith are trying to pull off the same trick: 16 pages for $1.99. I would argue that they're somewhat more successful in that book, largely because Ellis trims his words down to the bone and Templesmith stays away from ambitious panels. The strict nine-panel grid plays to Templesmith's strengths of straightforward compositions with moody coloring. In Casanova, on the other hand, Ba takes a much more open approach to the page. His strengths are dynamic layouts and fluid figures, but there's a bit of a clipped-wing feel because of the amount of stuff that he has to pack into every page.

I guess it sounds like I'm down on the book, and I'm really not. It was a thoroughly engaging read and the visuals were spectacular. The formatting game that the creators are playing is not an easy one, but they clearly have the ability to pull it off. I'm looking forward to watching their progress.

I wasn't expecting that to turn into a full-blown review, but there you go. Once I get back in the saddle, I'm ready to ride!

Better late then never, I'd like to direct your attention to Comics Comics, a new comics blog brought to you two of my school chums: loyal Pickytarian Tim Hodler and Comics Scholar Dan Nadel. The site is a companion to the free quarterly magazine of the same name. Look for Tim's essay about one of Carl Barks' most famous Scrooge McDuck stories, as well as Dan's look at Harry Lucey, an artist who did not make the cut in Nadel's new book about undeservedly forgotten comic artists, Art Out of Time. Note that Tim has an ornery streak of legendary proportions, so be sure to rile him up with some contrary comments. Tell them the Pickytarian sent you!

The response was great to my wife's review of Lauren Weinstein's Girl Stories. Yes, she and The Suckytarian are real people, not just me writing under a pseudonyms! Look for another review from her very soon.

In further site-related news, I have had to disable comments for the time begin. Apparently somebody figured out how to get around Movable Type's comment spam protection and went after my site with a vengeance. Hopefully I'll get it straightened out in the near future. For now, however, they've ruined it for everybody.

This interview with Scott McCloud really got my wheels turning, giving me fresh insight into my own creative process. I was mainly interested in his four-way split of the different approaches to comic art: classicist, iconoclast, formalist, and animist. His explanation that American comics, coming from a tradition of theater, usually show character from the front, while manga tries to pull the reader into the experience by showing characters from behind, was something that I had never considered before but now see everywhere. I expect that McCloud will expand on these ideas in his new book, Making Comics, and I anticipate that I'll have a lot more to say about them after I read it.

Finally, what would one of my long-delayed posts be without a plug for my eBay auctions? I'm selling some great recent comics, including complete Infinite Crisis and Batman: Year 100, all packed securely with that Pickytarian care that you've come to love. The auctions end tomorrow, and some of them are still at their bargain-basement starting price of one penny. Check 'em out!

Dear Pickytarian readers, this is Mrs. Pickytarian writing... I hope you won't mind too much that I have snuck on to the Pickytarian blog to post my own quick entry this week. I just felt a jones. Some might say you can really only have a jones for something like pizza, but shockingly I felt a hankering to write on the blog. But don't worry, your beloved Pickytarian will be back before you can say "I Love Sour Cream!"

This explosively funny, awkward and honest new comics collection by Lauren Weinstein functions like a pair of high-powered binoculars into the brightly colored, tangled mind of a teen girl (her first grittier collection of comics, Inside Vineyland was also excellent, but had more of an older audience in mind). The heroine in these combined strips is none other than our own Lauren Weinstein (aka "Vineshtein"), who begins these tales as a pre-teen girl (moving through high school) who struggles to hide and then justify her passion for Barbies and will do almost anything for a chance to eke her way further up the long social ladder of coolness. Casualties along the climb include a childhood best friend Genine, hilariously and heartbreaking painted by Weinstein as a true-blue, purple tracksuit-clad chubby with glasses. Sweet and loyal as she may be, there's no room in the fast-lane-to-cool for Genine's sidecar. Genine's very essence seems to cast a dork-like pall upon anyone she befriends, and therefore Lauren cuts her loose quite abruptly and cruelly.

Cruelty laced with humor is a prominent theme in Weinstein's book. As Lauren shows us occasional moments of meanness, scorning her less popular peers, so she too is verbally tortured by the shockingly nasty and tousled-haired school bully, Glenn. Later, after a particularly bad Glenn day, Lauren mentally retreats into a soothing dream state with her fantasy man and sensitive 80's superstar, Morrissey. In a hilarious plot to achieve the ultimate Glenn revenge, Morrissey offers to write and perform an angst-ridden 80's song about the bully, sending his humiliation straight to the top of the charts.

In comics today and past, there is an unfortunate tendency by some cartoonists (often of the male persuasion) to depict young women as hyper-stylized, one dimensional fashion plates. These beautiful cardboard phantoms exist in the pages only to illustrate the outsider role of the author/artist, and how happiness and the best things in the world are unattainable to him. In contrast, Weinstein's Lauren is anything but a one-note. Shifting, deeply complex female identities abound in Girl Stories. The heroine herself never really appears physically the same from page to page. Her portraits are more like emotional studies, illustrating complicated states of mind that morph continuously from moment to moment.

Weinstein gives us an intimate tour of an extremely complex and multi-dimensional person. And yes, Vineshtein is sometimes beautiful and styled, but she is also gawky, straggly, grotesque, tearful, enraged, bitter, wistful, sharp-witted and imaginative. She paints herself as a wiggly-lined mass of psychological play dough, displaying herself literally inside-out: twisted up in a pretzel with nerves waiting for her crush to call, bloated like a human toad at Thanksgiving dinner, dripping with ooze after a shoddy belly button piercing, a pair of eyes hiding in a dark tub of liquid mortification during a class experiment, a disgruntled lump refusing to be cheered up at Chanukah by "Latke Boy," or a scantily dressed toffee-limbed performer in her tongue-in-cheek "How to Really Get a Boyfriend" strip.

Lauren is the sum of all these experiences, and she emerges from these pages as a real bona fide "girl" - fully flawed, fully brilliant... and truly amazing.

Secondly, I am selling the following comics on eBay. Everybody loves the Pickytarian's acutions! Recent comics for pennies on the dollar, how can you go wrong? Here is the list:

X-FACTOR (2006) #1-6 : Peter David, Ryan Sook
PUNISHER VS. BULLSEYE #1-5 complete LS: Steve Dillon
DEFENDERS (2005) #1-5 cmplt: Giffen, DeMatteis, Maguire
MARVEL ZOMBIES #1-5 cmplt: Rob Kirkman, Sean Phillips
EX MACHINA #11-16: Brian K. Vaughan, Tony Harris
DESOLATION JONES #1-6: Warren Ellis, JH Williams III

That's all for now. Remember to check back around mid-day for the special guest review. See, that wasn't so painful, was it?

Sardine in Outer Space is part of the initial wave of releases from the high-profile graphic novel imprint First Second. It's a kid's graphic novel, written by Emmanuel Guibert and drawn by Joann Sfar. Brightly colored, whimsically devised, and stuffed with slapstick and goofy ideas, the book promises to have a ton of appeal for any young reader. Whether the actual execution follows through on that promise, however, is a tricky question for this childless, crusty codger to answer.

The visuals in this book are striking. Walter Pezzali's coloring combines with a bravura job by the First Second production department to bless this volume with the most brilliant color I have ever seen in a comic book. If this is the production quality can be expected from the rest of First Second's line of books, readers are definitely in for a treat.

I wish I could lavish the same love upon Sfar's drawing, but unfortunately it left me a little cold. His scratchy-lined naive style should lend warmth and intimacy to the book, but uninspired layout decisions and a tendency towards tiny figures in under-developed surroundings negate that effect. On the other hand, the character designs are attractive and imaginative: the one-eyed, afro-haired giant Paul made me laugh, and the dastardly little moustache on Supermuscleman cast him as the heavy more effectively than any of the character's actions or words.

Emmanuel Guibert's story was also long on promise, but ultimately a little short on delivery. The book is broken up into a series of 10-page, largely stand-alone chapters. The first chapter sets up the conflict: Supermuscleman and his crony, Doc Krok, have frightened children throughout the universe into dreary obedience. But their enemy, the space pirate Yellow Shoulder, has been taking children to his orphanage and teaching them to be disobedient and to have fun. The most disobedient child is the protagonist, a little girl named Sardine. That's a solid set-up, but unfortunately the first chapter is the last time the reader hears anything about the premise. Each subsequent chapter strings together a series of slapsticky gags where Sardine and Yellow Shoulder humiliate and defeat Supermuscleman. Don't get me wrong: I love slapstick as much as the next guy. The gags themselves are sometimes imaginative and clever; the idea that Sardine and her cousin Louie would play a virtual reality video game wherein they travel through a relatively boring Earth-child's life (going to the park, school, etc.) was a funny one. But without any sort of plot momentum, character arcs, or further attention to the conflict that is supposedly driving the action, the reader's attention starts to wander and each episode blends into the next.

It should be noted that the problem of no discernible motivation is not unique to Sardine in Outer Space. More than once I was reminded of Gail Simone's dreary, lifeless Villains United series, which expected the reader to accept the idea that people in their long underwear sit around and plan out ways to beat up other people in their long underwear because... well, because they're all wearing long underwear so that's what they do. That doesn't cut it in stories for adults and it shouldn't cut it in stories for kids either.

Another barrier to reader engagement in Sardine is the dialogue. Sasha Watson does a capable job of translation, but the resulting text is often stilted and devoid of character. "Omar, that nasty Paul won't be bothering you anymore. Would you like to stay here or come travel through space with me and my crew?" Would a space pirate talk like that? Maybe something was lost in the translation, or maybe the original dialogue is this flat. Either way, it adds up to a series of lost opportunities for characterization and fun.

There's a warning on the inside flap that warns: "No Grownups Allowed!" I acknowledge that it's possible, maybe even likely, that my old age and cynical Pickytarianism make me exactly the opposite of the target audience for this book. I have to wonder, though, who the audience is. It seems a little too precious and cutesy for boys, which cuts out 50% of the market. The story and jokes are a bit too simple for older kids, but I have to wonder if the obscure art and the comic format would appeal to younger readers. The naive art, the scattershot plot, and the stilted dialogue remind me of comics that were actually created by children. Does that mean it would appeal to children? I honestly don't have the answer. I know that the worst kind of children's book is one that talks down to them. My suspicion is that kids are ultimately a little more sophisticated than this book gives them credit for. But I would be the first to admit that your mileage, and, more importantly, that of your kids, may vary.

Whither indeed? It's been just over two months since I posted. In fact my last post (on February 7) begins with an apology for the lack of recent updates. Yikes!

So what happened? Well, there are a handful of logistical reasons, all centered around the new job that I started about a month ago. Handing in my notice at my previous job meant that I was suddenly plunged into weeks of training the people who would be taking over my responsibilities. This was a drastic change from my usually manageable workload, and as a result, there weren't enough hours in my work day for any in-depth looks at the coloring in Iron Man: The Inevitable. (A shame, really, because Frazier Irving is doing work in that book that's setting a new standard for digitally-assisted comic artwork.) Then I started my new job, and, lo and behold, they actually expect me to work 8 hours a day in exchange for my paycheck! Man, if anybody had told me that's how it was going to be...

You may be wondering why I couldn't just do my blogging during non-work hours like most - or at least some - bloggers out there. The reason for that I've been spending almost all waking hours of my non-work life penciling, lettering, inking, and co-writing a comic book. It's called Divison 18: The Union of Novelty Costumed Performers, and it's am epic tour de force about the class struggle in 18th century France. Well, OK, not really. It's actually about a small-time thug in a Snake costume and his witless gang of cronies. And it's about Street Haggis. And chimpanzee strippers. In fact, the first 7 pages are up for your perusal, enjoyment, and consternation right now!

My co-writer Matt and I spent the last couple weeks of February furiously trying to assemble those 7 pages into a promotional "ashcan" edition to hand out at the New York Comic-Con. Assemble it we did, and hand it out we did (after waiting in a two hour line just to get to the convention floor, but that's another story). Our labor soon bore fruit; we are currently negotiating a deal with a publisher. If that works out, you should be seeing Division 18 on your comic store racks in 2007. If that doesn't work out, we will probably go ahead with our previous plan, which was to "publish" it ourselves on the web site. I still kind of feel like that's a more cost-effective way to handle the distribution of an independent comic these days. But if somebody else is willing to take the financial risk of publishing it, I can't argue with the inner comic fan in me that would be thrilled to see an actual book of mine in the stores! Anyhow, I've probably already jinxed the deal by talking about it here, so I'll stop.

The more important matter for you, I'm sure, is the future of The Pickytarian. I'm afraid I don't have a definite answer. I could probably find a way to navigate around the logistical challenges. But there are (conceptual? moral? let's say esoteric) questions that I am having trouble answering. The main raison d'etre of this site has been a forum for my comic reviews. Now that I'm neck-deep in making my own comics, I have a deeper appreciation for how frickin' HARD it is to do! It's difficult for me to criticize creators for decisions that I know are still better than ones that I've made. It also ramps up the pressure that I put on myself to do a good job; one of my shortcomings is a little too much second-guessing and overworking. If I've spent the day dissing somebody's balance of blacks and whites on a page, I've just upped the stakes for myself to avoid the same mistake that night when I'm inking my own page.

There's also the more practical matter of biting a hand that may one day potentially feed me. I don't harbor any delusions of working full-time in comics, so my livelihood isn't at stake. All the same, if I have a stake in the success of a certain publisher, or if a certain creator has done me a professional favor or given me advice, I'm not going to go on the entrynet and talk about how bad their comics are - even if their comics are actually bad. But if I just do positive reviews, how would you, the reader, be able to trust my advice or opinions? For all you know, they could be motivated by my agenda with Division 18.

On the other hand, studying other people's work is the primary way that I've learned how to create comics. And I've always loved talking about comics, about how they work, how they're made, and whether they're effective or not. That hasn't changed in the last few months. If anything, it's become intensified. Except now I relate my reactions to comics back to my own work, and creative decisions that I make or shortcomings of my own style. Would it be tiresome for you to hear me go on about the process of making my own book? If anybody is still reading the blog, I would love to get some feedback about what I should do and what you'd like to see. Thanks for you patience and your help.

With no further ado, it's time for this week's installment of the comic blogosphere's 963rd most popular feature, "To Buy or Not To Buy!"

Batman Legends Of The Dark Knight #200 - Featuring the strangest pairing of creative talent in recent memory: writer Eddie Campbell and artist Bart Sears. In ads for his upcoming Warlord series, Sears actually seems to have reigned in his tight, hyper-muscled, thick-necked style (which was so over-the top that it was sort of appealing in its ugliness) in favor of a brushy look that's more expressive and yet more naturalistic. It will be interesting to see which way this book swings.

DMZ #4 - This weekend I had a brief exchange with Brian Wood, wherein one of my biggest fears about doing this site finally came to pass. After graciously chatting with me a couple of weeks ago in Rocketship, Wood dug up an old post of mine wherein I snidely dissed him for his work on Demo. As I explained (ie, attempted to weasel out) to him, the post in question was written mere weeks after I started this blog, back before I developed the baseline level of decorum and professionalism that I try to maintain today (quiet, those of you snickering in the back of the room). At some point I realized that more than two people might be reading this site, and as such, it was irresponsible and lazy of me to turn criticism of somebody's work into an attack on their character. Anyhow, let me take this opportunity to confirm that Brian Wood is decidedly NOT a wannabe hipster. In fact, his work in DMZ and Local has shown a marked departure from the non-reflective "coolness as a redeeming character trait" tendency that hampered my enjoyment of Demo. How's that for a qualified, backhanded compliment? Jeez, even when I try not to be a jerk...

Jonah Hex #4 - This book has beaten out Loveless as the DC western that I'm still reading. The old-school charm of these self-contained, moralistic stories is refreshing, and Luke Ross' classically realistic art fits the material perfectly.

Showcase Presents House Of Mystery Vol 1 TP - I still have about 250 pages of that Superman Showcase book to plow through, but it's hard to resist the lineup of talent in this horror comic reprint collection: The writers include Len Wein and Gerry Conway, with art by legends such as Bernie Wrightson, Neal Adams, Gil Kane, and Alex Toth! Holy cripes!

Marvel Knights 4 #27 - The only current Fantastic Four title worth your time and money, in my opinion. While it's more charming than mind-blowing, it inspires considerably less head-scratching and cringing than Ultimate FF or the flagship book.

Marvel Monsters HC - Some of the comics in this collection, especially the Duncan Fegredo, Roger Langridge, and Eric Powell contributions, were so good that I am ALMOST tempted to pony up the $20.99 for the hardcover edition. Almost.

Marvel Zombies #3 - Speaking of backhanded compliments, this is my favorite book ever by Robert Kirkman.

Powers Vol 9 Psychotic TP - I know that it didn't start until after the issues collected in this trade, but I just want to take a moment to mention how inappropriate, self-indulgent, and unwelcome Bendis' "stand-up comedian" routines have become in the pages of Powers lately. They are distracting to the point of preventing me from finishing the story. Do I want to think about the writer looking at internet porn while I'm reading about superheroes? No, not particularly. Does it add anything to the narrative? Not that I can see. Ugh.

What was I just saying about being decorous and professional? Er, ummm...

Ultimate Extinction #2 - I enjoyed issue #1, especially the depiction of the Ultimate version of Silver Surfer as a cult leader. I also enjoyed Rich Johnston's comparison of #1's script to a script that Warren Ellis submitted for a different Marvel project in 1999.

Young Avengers #10 - Ladies and gentlemen, here they are... the world's ugliest action figures!

Conan #24 Ltd Ed Nude Variant Cvr - For all the folks who'd rather perpetuate the marginalization and humiliation of the entire comic industry than buy real porn.

Action Philosophers #4: World Domination Handbook - For those who haven't read Action Philosophers, here is my review from the Buzzscope site of issue #3. In case you still aren't sure whether you should buy this book, here is the description from Evil Twin Comics' web site: "Spawn world-wide revolution with Karl Marx! Seize political power with Niccolo Machiavelli! And, best of all: command the very building blocks of reality with Moses de Leon and The Kabbalah, the Jewish mystical tradition!" If you're still unconvinced, there's a preview posted at The Pulse. Now go buy it already! Sheesh!

Tales Designed To Thrizzle #2 - While Pagus does not appear in this issue, I have it on very good authority that a return of everybody's favorite half-brother of Jesus is in the works!

JLA Classified #16 - Legendary penciller Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez returns to the Justice League in this issue and the results, inked by Klaus Janson, are nothing short of spectacular. The page layouts are some of the most dynamic and inventive that I've seen in a corporate superhero book in a long time. Garcia-Lopez shows complete disregard for the sanctity of his panel borders; on the rare occasions when the borders appear, characters break through them. Despite this chaos, the storytelling flows like gravy. At one point, a figure rises out of his spot in the bottom panel, overlapping not just the panel above but the panel above that. Thanks to strategically-placed lettering and expert page design, though, there's no question as to where the reader's eye should go when. Meanwhile, Klaus Janson proves for the umpteenth time that he's the most distinctive inker in the biz. I defy you to name 3 other finishers whose styles are as readily identifiable as Janson's loose, expressive, angular inks. Each panel is a primer in the power of line weight variation. Gail Simone's script is solid if unspectacular, touching on that old chestnut of what if the JLA started getting involved in global politics, but the real star here is the visual work by Garcia-Lopez and Janson.

(To the 90% of you who have no idea what this is about, I'm sorry. To those of you that do... I'm still sorry.)

Saturday I attended the Seth and Jaime Hernandez interview at Pratt's Manhattan Gallery. [You can see an extremely crummy photo below, taken with my cell phone camera.] The two cartoonists spoke at length about their work, discussing their approaches to telling stories, their drawing techniques, and more. One of the more interesting exchanges, at least one that stuck with me the most, was their discussion about character acting. Hernandez explained that he tries not to pose his characters; he wants them to look like they don't know there's a camera in the room. Seth added to the idea by explaining that he tries not to think of a camera at all. Instead, he imagines that the scene is being observed by a ghost floating through the scene.

Another topic that Seth spoke about at length was the idea of internal vs. external stories. He is fascinated by the idea that everybody has their own internal life, made up of their thoughts, their emotions, the dreams they have at night, etc. That's what he tries to explore in his comics, and that's why he doesn't concern himself very much with plot. That's an approach that I've seen more than one cartoonist take, but with varying degrees of success. This morning I read a comic book that blew me away, one that was focused almost entirely on the internal life of its main character: Ganges #1 by Kevin Huizenga.

Huizenga tells the story of a relatively mundane day in the life of Glenn Ganges. Glenn goes to the library to pick up some books and CDs, which he brings home and enjoys while his wife Wendy does some animation work on her computer. That doesn't sound like much of a story, and if I were to add that Ganges accompanies his humdrum activities with ruminations on the nature of time, life, and love, you might be inclined to tune me out even further. I know I would flip through a book like that and put it back on the shelf; I've done just that, in fact, with Huizenga's Or Else any number of times. I see now why that was such a big mistake. It's not just because Huizenga's insights are engaging and interesting, it's because he is such a gifted cartoonist that he can weave them into an utterly enthralling narrative that wouldn't work in any other medium.

Along with his economical, engaging cartoony drawing and his knack for beat-perfect storytelling, Huizenga engages in a fair bit of formal experimentation in this book. In the first "chapter," for example, Glenn walks to the library, pondering the passage of time. Huizenga goes crazy with the interplay of panel borders, thought balloons, and narrative captions in this sequence. It isn't always intuitive to read, but it definitely forces the reader to consider the relation of the past to the present and the way that sequential comics represent these concepts. Another notable sequence comes at the end of the book, when a caffeinated Glenn lies in bed watching his wife sleep. He considers the billions of people throughout history who have done the exact same thing, thinking the exact same thoughts. In a quiet, beautiful sequence on a black background, Huizenga lays out a series of panels showing various people (including characters from earlier passages in the book, such as Native Americans and elderly Glenn and Wendy), silently admiring their sleeping lovers. It's not showy or saccharin-sweet; it's understated and sublime.

I'm not afraid to eat crow, and it's a good thing, because I have a steaming plateful in front of me. Consider me converted. Kevin Huizenga is one of the best cartoonists working today. Ganges #1 will be in stores tomorrow; fans of the comic medium would do themselves a major disservice by overlooking it.

Seth, Jaime Hernandez, and moderator Todd Hignite speak at Pratt Manhattan Gallery on January 21, 2006. Weird compression-artifact halos courtesy of my camera phone.

Is there a better comic reviewer out there than Jog? I may have enjoyed his review of All-Star Superman #1 even more than the book itself.

Yet another chance for you to sit in the same room as The Pickytarian: I plan to attend the "informal talk" with Seth and Jaime Hernandez at the Pratt Gallery this Saturday afternoon. They will be appearing as part of Pratt's "Speak: Nine Cartoonists" exhibit, which is opening tonight. The press release on Pratt's site contains more information.

Mark your calendars for two New York-area comic events this February. On Friday, February 3, Michael Kupperman, creator of the ridiculously funny Tales Designed to Thrizzle will be signing books at Rocketship. At the end of the month, of course, is the big NY Comic-Con. Guy and Buzzscope are throwing an after-party on Saturday, February 25, with special guests Andy MacDonald and Ivan Brandon, creators of NYC Mech. Don't miss these very special opportunities to party with The Pickytarian!

All Star Superman #2 - That whole "I'm the G-D Superman" stuff? Man, I HATED that. What's Morrison doing, phoning this one in? Or having a big joke on the fanboys?

Ex Machina #17 - Something about that last two-issue story about Hundred's mother left me kind of cold. Let's hope Vaughan & Harris get back on track with this issue.

Infinite Crisis #4 - Speaking of being left cold, if anybody can explain what the heck was gong on with the multiple Lex Luthors in issue #3, I would be much obliged. The fact that Luthor was wearing the purple bandolier costume UNDER the big green armor costume cracked me up, but not because I understood the ramifications of it. I just found it funny that a character was wearing one super-costume under another one. Frankly, I just wish they would get on with the Superman vs. Superman fight. Why do I have a nagging feeling that the fight isn't going to happen at all?

Losers #31 - For all my talk about how much I love this title, I have no memory of reading the last issue. Did I miss it completely? Duh... how's that for insightful commentary?

Planetary #24 - Must... wait... for trade....

Seven Soldiers Mister Miracle #3 - I've been thoroughly underimpressed with this series so far. This issue brings us the 3rd artist in 3 issues, and to these bitter, jaded eyes, they're 0-for-2 so far. Shining Knight and The Manhattan Guardian didn't really pick up until the halfway point, though. Let's hope the same thing happens here.

Sgt. Rock: The Prophecy #1 - Somebody's doing something right when I can buy monthly comics written and drawn by a comic legend like Joe Kubert. Buzzscope has a 6-page preview.

Testament #2 - A little birdie recommended this Vertigo series to me last week, and I liked it enough to stick with it. There's something creepy about the super-young looking mother of the teenage boy and the "I'll be 18 in one month.. tee hee" sex-bomb girl, but that might be an integral part of the story. If not... yikes.

Punisher vs Bullseye #3 - Is this too much of a Garth Ennis rip-off? It's hard to judge that objectively with the Steve Dillon artwork. Either way, I'm getting a kick out of it. The final sequence in #2 was classic.

Conan #24 - It's old news at this point, but color me extremely sad that Kurt Busiek is leaving this book. The silver lining is that Mike Mignola will be scripting a couple of issues after he leaves.

Iron Man The Inevitable #2 - Pretty.

X-Statix Presents Dead Girl #1 - This comic is a bittersweet reminder of that all-too-brief, increasingly distant time when Marvel took chances and published some halfway-irreverent takes on their superheroes. The joy of reading it may be outweighed by my longing for those bygone days. That said, we did get Fantastic Four Iron Man: Big in Japan last year, and that book is twelve different kinds of crazy.

Schizo #4 - Read some of Ivan Brunetti's strips and then tell me that you don't want to pay $9.95 for this 11 x 15 collection. The only question for me is where am I going to get a bag and board big enough for it? I ask this question because I am a massive nerd.

I bring this up in case my preview of this week's new comics seems a little disjointed. I'm still a little dazed and groggy after all...

DC Universe The Stories Of Alan Moore TP - As far as I understand, this book reprints the entire contents of 2003's Across the Universe: The DC Universe Stories of Alan Moore as well as Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow? and Killing Joke. It's one of those situations where I already have some of the material but not all. Man of Tomorrow and Killing Joke are great stories, though; if you haven't read them, this collection is definitely worth a look.

Desolation Jones #5 - I was utterly convinced that this was a 6-issue miniseries, but it seems that I may have been wrong. Can anybody confirm or deny this for me? Either way it's great stuff. I love the way each issue has its own themes and pace while still advancing the over-arching story.

DMZ #3 - I'm still along for the ride. Writer Brian Wood got some flak from my fellow backseat-writers for the children's hospital scene in the last issue, but there were some clever touches, like the sniper with the long-distance scope and his love affair with the girl in New Jersey.

Seven Soldiers Of Victory Vol 1 TP - I'm thinking that I'm going to wait until the entire crossover is done before buying it in the collected format. I've missed connections left and right this entire time (thank heaven for Jog), so I'd like to re-read it in one monster session of super-hero madness.

Amazing Joy Buzzards Vol 2 #4 - This series has gotten so much more inventive and entertaining than it was in its first incarnation. This is a slow week, so why not try it out?

Small Gods #12 - No, I'm not buying this book. But I AM offering the first trade, free, to anybody who wants it. I will even pay for the shipping (US only). Be the first to send me an email or leave a comment and it's yours.

She-Hulk 2 #4 - Dan Slott's Thing series has been a little underwhelming so far, but this book is somehow becoming more and more perfect. Even Juan Bobillo's art has grown on me.

Ultimate Extinction #1 - I'm going to buy this, aren't I? Like a sucker.

A1 Bojeffries Terror Tomes #1 - Black and white reprints of offbeat horror stories from creators such as Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, Michael Zulli, David Lloyd, Brian Bolland, Warren Ellis, and Ted McKeever. The extensive preview at Newsarama looks pretty cool, and I've heard good things about the Moore/Parkhouse story.

Bacter-Area GN - Drawn & Quarterly brings you this graphic novel from artist Keith Jones, whose intricate drawings smash complex narratives into claustrophobically flat planes. I hadn't heard of this book before, but a look at some of Jones' art made me very curious about how his aesthetic would translate into sequential work.

Mike Watson, artist of the very funny and all-too-rarely-produced Gabagool!, is posting big chunks of Freddie and Me, his graphic novel about his adolescence as a Queen fan, for free on the internets. Dawson's art is developing beautifully; the shaky, lo-fi charm that he showed in Gabagool! is blossoming into confident line work, idiosyncratic forms, and dynamic compositions that bring to mind a warmer, more personal Joe Sacco. The story is equally endearing. I can't wait to see the completed volume.

I actually got a little choked up reading Gotham Central #39 on the train this morning. I hadn't realized how invested I had become in the characters, especially Allen and Montoya, over the last few years. It's a testament to the power of strong characterization; when Blue Beetle or Hawkeye bought it, the only emotion I could summon up was snark. If you gave up on this series for any reason, be it the exodus of the original creative team or its shift in a more superhero-focused direction, you're missing the powerful culmination of 3 years of character development and maybe the best arc of the series.

Comic Book Galaxy has a preview of Barry Windsor-Smith's proposed Thing graphic novel. Apparently it's not a sure thing that Marvel will publish the book, which makes it all the stranger to see excerpts on the internet. Click on over there for some outstanding black and white Windsor-Smith goodness.

My man Jason Rodriguez, AKA the busiest man in comics, is putting together a new feature at the DC Conspiracy site. He's looking for brief comic pitches and scripts to which he will lend his prodigious editing talents. It's all going to happen online as a "heavily moderated brainstorming session," with the admirable goal of everybody helping each other make better comics. If you've got a story rattling around in your head that could benefit from some feedback and polish, this sounds like a great opportunity. It's definitely a lot more helpful than Robert Kirkman's latest bit of "advice" on CBR, wherein he dispenses the useful wisdom that you suck and you should give up.

One last link for you: Paul O'Brien's year-end wrap-up of Marvel's entire X-Men line. The guy's obviously a glutton for punishment, but at least we get to enjoy the fruits of his labor. You may want to skip ahead to the end, where O'Brien gets down to the dregs of all the aborted series, one-shots, and other failed cash-in attempts. For a sample, here's his summary of the recent What If? book starring Wolverine:

It's by Daniel Way and it's crap. Basically, it's "What if Wolverine had lived during the Prohibition and had the origin of the Punisher?" The answer is "He would have been the Punisher, only during the Prohibition." Pointless beyond belief.

I got into a brief exchange in the comments on Butcher's site about judging a book by its cover - or, more specifically, its cover price. Larsen felt "let down" by the story because the price was so high. I didn't even purchase the book (though I expect that I will soon) for the same reason. Break it down and you're looking at roughly 26 cents a page for Ware's book, compared to 13.5 cents a page for your standard 22 page, $3, floppy issue.

If any creator in the world is capable of delivering twice as much satisfaction per page, it's Chris Ware. Density is the perfect word to describe his comics: physical density because of his intricate panel arrangements, and, for lack of a better term, "literary" density because of his complex, multi-layered stories and characters. Nonetheless, if I drop that much cash on a book, I'm going to have high, possibly un-attainable expectations. It's entirely possible, and if I had to bet, I would say it's likely, that Ware's work would live up to those expectations. But this is a conversation that we wouldn't be having, and this is a sale that Ware would already have made, if the book had been priced at, say, $9.95.

I can think of a couple of other recent instances of higher than usual price-to-page count ratios. Alex Di Campi and Igor Kordey's Smoke, published by the always-pricey IDW, clocked in at $24.95 for a 144-page trade, or 17 cents/pg. (The singles were similarly priced at $7.95 for 48 pages, or 18 cents/pg.) A commenter on Comics.212.net brought up Art Spiegelman's In the Shadow of No Towers, $19.95 for 42 pages or a staggering 47.5 cents/page (though it should be noted that the book's trim size was a whopping 14.6 x 9.8 inches). I bought both books and enjoyed them, but I couldn't shake that question of whether they were worth the high price. If they had been priced more in line with the standard costs, would I have enjoyed them more?

By the same token, am I more forgiving of a book like Warren Ellis and Ben Templesmith's Fell because it's priced at $1.99? That may actually be a separate discussion, because I also wonder if the strict 9-panel grid layouts of that book are unnecessarily limiting. By the same token, I've paid $1 or less for various mini-comics and enjoyed the heck out of them. I'm not sure I would be that generous if they had cost $3, even if the production quality had been more in line with that price.

I don't know if there's an easy answer to all this. I know how I feel in my penny-pinching heart, but my brain tells me commodifying art to that degree is hurting my enjoyment of otherwise-great comics. So I'd like to solicit your thoughts on the matter. How much do you consider a book's price when evaluating its merits? Is it fair to have higher expectations when a comic book is noticeably more expensive than its competition? What is your experience?

UPDATE: I just picked up ANL #16, and lo and behold, it's a hardcover book. This discovery brought up a wave of shame, as I suddenly decided that maybe it's worth the $16 after all. But should that really make a difference? Will my reading experience be any better or worse because of the package? I suppose it has more value as a pretty thing to own for a longer time than a paperback book. On the other hand, it's that much harder to read on the subway. Expectations are weird. If somebody would just start giving me all the comics that I want for free, life would be so much easier.

Looks like Brian Wood and Ryan Kelly's Local #6 will be taking place in none other than The Pickytarian's base of operations: Brooklyn's own Park Slope! I hope this doesn't mean that Megan is going to have a baby...

What better way to ring in the new year than by picking up some super-cheap comics? I have some new eBay auctions up for your perusal. Here is a list of the books that I am selling:

SECRET WARS II #1-9 complete (1985)
USAGI YOJIMBO #78-89 - Dark Horse - Stan Sakai
A Sort of Homecoming #1-3 + My Uncle Jeff
Warren Ellis lot: JACK CROSS 1-4, DOWN, SIMON SPECTOR
DETECTIVE COMICS #801-814 CITY OF CRIME complete story
JLA CLASSIFIED #10-15 - Warren Ellis, Butch Guice
DRAX THE DESTROYER #1-4 complete - Keith Giffen
TOP 10 BEYOND THE FARTHEST PRECINCT #1-5 cmplt

While I'm shamelessly plugging, here's something you may not have expected: my dad is now podcasting. What? That's right, you heard me. He is doing serialized readings of his novel Hunting Elf, and distributing the audio via podcast. Swing by his site and check it out!

In case you missed them, there have been some good discussions lately about Frank Miller and Jim Lee's All-Star Batman and Robin on various blogs. Alex Cox and Mike Sterling, two gentlemen whose opinions I very much respect, have wildly divergent takes on the title. The question of what it means to write something "tongue in cheek" is bandied about in the comments, along with the question of whether I am an "angry punker" for disliking Jim Lee's art. All this debate may force me to actually read the book!

Whew! I was going to get into this week's new releases, but all this blogging after my long vacation has worn me out. Suffice to say that I'm most looking forward to Vertigo's Exterminators #1, described as "a smart, scary, darkly comic tale of roaches, rats, raccoons and the men who kill them for a living." Check out the preview on DC's site and judge for yourself.

One more item: Over my break I was fortunate enough to meet a blogger you may have heard of: Jason Rodriguez, writer of The Moose In The Closet and editor of the critically-acclaimed comic Elk's Run. While I am only a Brooklynite in the gentrified neighborhood, Johnny-come-lately sense, Jason was born and bred in the borough of Kings and he has the crazy stories on his blog to prove it. He's going to be joining the staff as a columnist at Buzzscope - that is, PopCultureShock - in the new year, boosting that site's cliam to being the most exciting spot in the Comics InterWub (besides The Pickytarian, of course)!