CWR WEEKEND BLOG EXTRA: MINI-COMICS

Ahh… mini-comics. Comics in their purest, rawest form. Good or bad, minis are always interesting, even if just for the spirit or energy put into making them. And when I go to a con, one of the first things I look for are interesting mini-comics to buy and bring home.

ATOMIC MONSTER TEA PARTY #1 is written and by Corwin Gibson and published through Luchadork Studios. This mini has two stories; one wherein those giant monsters do have a lovely sit-down and a spot of tea, and one that features the U.S. military using dinosaurs as weaponry in World War 2. Both stories have decent conceptual starts, though the Monster piece devolves into a sad punchline at the end. I’d have liked to see Gibson actually expand and really use the idea of the dino story, rather than using the idea as a two-page trailer. The art is, politely, rough, but there’s enough there to suggest that Gibson could find an artist and maybe produce something with a bit more substance and length.

Next we have three books from Welsh El Dorado Press. The first, SYMPATHIZERS (written by Justin Robinson and drawn by Aneurin Wright), serves as a prelude to an upcoming series to appear this fall in a series called SPACE DOUBLES. This sci-fi piece focuses on humanity taking in the victims of an alien civil war and then turning on them when the winning side shows up to try and finish the job. With internment camps and other odious reminders of poor human behavior, much of SYMPATHIZERS rings resonant with our modern times. Robinson’s script is solid, and Wright adapts his style to the material nicely. Worth keeping an eye on when it goes to series.

Chip Mosher writes, and Wright draws, LEFT ON MISSION AND REVENGE, a spy thriller. Again, this is a clever use of the mini-comic format; Mosher and Wright are looking for a publisher for the full 170-page graphic novel, so they’ve put together a trailer to try and entice some interest. I had some qualms about the pace of the storytelling; if this is 170 pages overall, and we’re seeing only 20 pages in this mini… well, this material feels way too decompressed. I could see they were aiming for a cinematic look and feel, but it put a grind into the story’s forward movement. Still, Wright again impresses, as MISSION looks zero like SYMPATHIZERS, and it’s nice to see an artist genuinely spread their wings and do something different.

We close with CARNET D’UN SAUVAGE, Wright’s homage to Craig Thompson’s CARNET DE VOYAGE. Wright took a lengthy trip to Europe and chronicled it in his sketchbook, reproducing some of the material in this quiet little mini. As I mentioned above, Wright is a very fine artist, so the material looks terrific. There’s some disjointedness in the way Wright skips ahead at some points, and you find yourself wishing he’d have included more of the material about the people he was with versus the stuff more focused on the environment, but that’s a minor quibble. I can always appreciate an intriguing travelogue, and this one qualifies.

That’s it for this weekend. See you here during the week for site updates, and back here next weekend for a new Weekend Blog Extra!

/Mason