Comic Book Comics

This was loaned to me when I worked at OK comics. They're up to issue 5 now but I'm hoping to wait it out until a possible tradeback becomes available before I buy it myself. (Cheap skate, I know. But I'd rather have it for a reference text than lost in the horror that is my collection of long boxes.)

COMIC BOOK COMICS is the follow-up project that Fred Van Lente and Ryan Dunlavey are doing now that they have completed Action Philosophers. This is the cover to the first issue, which came out March 2008.

"You only THINK you know comics history! The epic -- and insane! -- story of comic books, manga, and graphic novels, told as a comic, in the inimitable, irreverent, and award-winning Action Philosophers style, begins here! In this hilarious first issue: Before there could be comics, there had to be newspaper strips, animated cartoons, and pulp magazines. Thrill to publishing giants William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer duking it out over The Yellow Kid! Tremble at the war between Walt Disney and Max Fleischer for animation domination! Follow the bizarre trail of Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster's first superhero from sci-fi pulp to comic strip to the birth of a new medium! Plus: The early years of Jack Kirby, Will Eisner, Winsor McCay and Joe Simon!"

I was silly enough to forget not to photograph the first 3 issues when I had them, so you'll have to do with some watermarked (and some not) images I pulled from the google.

Women In Refrigerators. Truer words have never been spoken.

(Oh dissertation, you come back to haunt me I see)

What I find great about this series is that it doesn't take it self too seriously. It knows how silly the feuds are and how ridiculous (but awesome) men look in tights.

This is route I want to go with my design context book in a sense. Using narraive to pose questions and explore history. A perfect example (and a great read if you ever get the chance to buy it.)