Random Thoughts

Kafka: The Execution by Leopoldo Durañona.

Fantagraphics were publishing fellow South Americans Muñoz & Sampaya in a similar format to this (magazine size with cardboard covers) at the time (as well as anthologising Francisco Solano Lopez). I’m not familiar with Durañona’s work, but this is kinda interesting.

The artwork is a bit reminiscent of Moebius.

These are, of course, adaptations of Kafka short stories, and they’re done inventively, but respectfully, I think. It’s been so long since I’ve read these short stories that I can’t really tell how faithful adaptations they are, but they work on their own just fine.

Durañona is perhaps most famous for his work in various Warren horror magazine, but is still working in comics today, most recently doing an Indiana Jones series for Dark Horse.

This post is part of the Fantagraphics Floppies series.

The Eye of Mongombo #1-7 by Doug Gray.

Before this series, Doug Gray had a couple of appearances in Critters, I think.

The Eye of Mongombo is a pretty funny comic book about that archaeologist up there (transformed into a duck) who looks for a treasure in South America. Hijinx ensue. A lot.

I find myself without a lot to say about this book. I didn’t read it back then, so this is my first time reading it. It’s fine, I guess? It’s consistently amusing, but somehow it just didn’t quite connect with me. Perhaps the slightly basic artwork has something to do with it…

There’s a few backup stories starring the artist himself.

Hm, I’ve been meaning to mention that I kinda like these Fantagraphics house ads, and perhaps this is the right place to twaddle on about it for a bit.

I think looking at a cover of a comic book is a pretty useless way of determining whether I want to read something or not. Which is why it’s so frustrating that so many ads and shopping web sites only display the cover and none of the interiors.

I can take a half second look at a page and see whether it appeals to me; whether it’s something that will be enjoyable to spend some time with. At least on a page-by-page basis. I won’t have any idea whether the story is stupid or not.

But looking at a cover tells me nothing. Some people who do great covers do lousy storytelling and vice versa. Even people who do astounding pages (like, say, Carl Barks) can do “just good” covers (perhaps because his covers were due a lot more editorial scrutiny than his stories)?

Somebody who does this right is Spit and a Half. John Porcellino shows us a couple of pages from each book, and that makes it such a joy to shop from him. I’ll just open a gazillion tab with books from his catalogue, and *click page* *stare a millisecond* *click buy* (or not) *close tab*. It’s just perfect. And I don’t understand why other web sites don’t follow that format.

Anyway, back to Mongombo…

The Eye of Mongombo was apparently nominated for a Harvey award? It didn’t win.

This series was announced to be lasting ten issues, but no further issues were published after number seven. It didn’t mention that it was the last one.

And I think the storyline had stalled slightly. I mean, it’s a parody adventure, but having the storyline advance a bit would be nice. Instead we spend one whole issue in a hallucination, and then a lot of new characters, like this bunny narrator, are introduced.

But it seems to be a comic book that is fondly remembered: It pops up in surveys like this now and again.

Doug Gray doesn’t seem to have published any comic books after this one was cancelled, although he was writing for Duck Tales for a while. He seems to have been working mostly as an animator, which is a natural progression from Mongombo.

This post is part of the Fantagraphics Floppies series.

The Bradleys #1-6, Junior #1-5 by Peter Bagge.
Martini Baton by Dave Carrino and Peter Bagge.

These are all reprints, and since I’ve read the books these were sourced from (Neat Stuff and Weirdo), I considered skipping them. But then my CDO fired (it’s like OCD, but with the letters in the proper order), and I went ahead and bought them anyway.

They were really cheap, and I was curious as to whether the stories had been reworked in any way.

Nope. I haven’t compared the pages side by side, but the stories from Neat Stuff seem to have been plonked into the new format without any alterations. The magazine size ratio is different than the comic book size ratio, so you have these headings on the top of most of the pages to fill out some space.

But there’s bonus features. Here’s an early piece drawn by David Coulson, who Bagge planned on starting a humour magazine with (which didn’t happen).

There are also new strips on the back covers. Did Bagge forget how to draw Butch?

No, there he is as he used to look.

There are also random things included in The Bradleys that have no connection to the main series. Like this strip that Bagge did for a festival. Stuff like this would later be included in the Hate annuals instead.

A very early Bradleys strip where Butch and the father looks very much like they would later…

… while the other three don’t really. Especially Babs with her perm.

And here’s an even earlier piece that’s inexplicably printed “windowboxed”, which seems rather unnecessary, since it is in vaguely the same aspect ratio as the comic book, anyway…

After six Bradleys issues, we continue on with the Junior series. It’s less focussed than The Bradleys: It’s really “the other stuff that was in Neat Stuff, except that radio talk show guy”. It makes me wonder whether the plan was to reprint everything in Neat Stuff this way, and whether a third and final series was planned, centring on Studs Kirby…

Anyway, just like with the first series, there’s also quite a bit of pre-Neat Stuff material included, and some of it’s quite funny. There’s no new back cover strips, though.

I was rather intrigued by this art style, which is something Bagge hasn’t used a lot. And the story is perhaps autobiographical, what with Bagge being a libertarian and all…

And a rare childhood reminiscence.

Oh, it’s such a struggle to be so superior.

Wow! That’s a most excellent freak-out.

I don’t know whether the extras in these two series have been reprinted anywhere else, but I’m happy I went for it and bought these books. Reading these weird early stories has been rather pleasant.

And last we have Martini Baton, written by David Carrino:

Here’s the aforementioned Stretchpants:

The bulk of the magazine-sized book is taken up by the titular Martini Baton series (which are printed sideways).

It’s deranged and it’s funny. And it has a lot more of a coherent story line than I remembered from reading it in Weirdo.

There’s a little strip running beneath the main attraction called Jesus’ Critters, where we learn a lot about religion.

I assume that Carrino is a (lapsed) Catholic. I never knew that about the pope!

And finally we have an example of Carrino’s original strips before Bagge drew them for publication.

Martini Baton seems to be Carrino’s only published comic book work. He’s now an artist. Bagge is, of course, still Bagge.

This post is part of the Fantagraphics Floppies series.