Carnival of souls

* I’m very excited to direct you to a lengthy interview with artist/musician/fanboy Brian Chippendale about his new book If ‘n Oof, which I conducted for Robot 6. It’s a terrific comic and Chippendale’s an all-time great talker. (I’ve spoken with him before and it was a pleasure both times.)

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* Related: CBR’s Tim Callahan raves about If ‘n Oof and its labelmate, CF’s Powr Mastrs 3.

* Robot 666, Robot 6’s horror-themed Halloween-week special, rolls on. Keep your eyes on that tag for lots of fun creepy stuff. To wit:

* Robert Kirkman and Charlie Adlard (and Tony Moore)’s The Walking Dead is going to be re-released in comic book form on a weekly basis starting with issue #1 in January. That seems like a wonderful idea to me, and the complaints you see about it in the comments seem totally wrongheaded, like saying the networks shouldn’t syndicate series because it’d cannibalize DVD sales.

* The Walking Dead is also getting its own app through ComiXology. And don’t forget, it’s going to simultaneous print and digital release, too.

* Also from Robot 666: Don’t miss Doppelganger from Tom Neely;

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* In space no one can hear you giggle at Axe Cop‘s Halloween special;

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* Dan Zettwoch takes you behind the scenes of one of those Christian haunted houses in his comic “Crossfader”;

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* and a first look at a new Mike Mignola Hellboy cover is a joy forever.

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* The Tea Party: a sneaker stamping on a human face–for ever.

* This looks like a pretty interesting week for comics, with some major, unusual releases and some sturdy genre faves. Tom Spurgeon and Joe “Jog” McCulloch handicap the slate. Bonus points to Jog for some writing on the comics of Carol Swain for good measure.

* Paul Cornell will write a fill-in arc for Batman & Robin as the main creative team’s run is delayed by three months. The comments get pretty heated–about Cornell, about the artist he’s working with, about the team he’s filling in for, about the Batman line’s scheduling problems in general.

* Got dang, if The New York City Outlaws weren’t a real series (and an anthology series at that!), Benjamin Marra would have been forced to invent it.

* Gary Numan is absolutely right: Replicas > The Pleasure Principle.

* Behold: “Derezzed” by Daft Punk, from Tron: Legacy. It sounds pretty good. It also sounds like “Juke Joint Jezebel” by KMFDM, which I suppose is another way of saying “it sounds pretty good.” That said, I’m having a really, really hard time getting worked up for this completely conventional-looking Hollywood sci-fi blockbuster, with its unimaginative orange-and-blue color palette and the world’s least convincing CGI de-aged Jeff Bridges. But hey, at least it features Daft Punk as themselves. Also, between this and the Twilight movies, Michael Sheen clearly cannot get enough of playing sinister, scenery-chewing dandies; I can’t get enough of him playing sinister, scenery-chewing dandies either, so there’s that. (Via Rob Bricken.)

* I guess that Battlestar Galactica prequel thing set in the First Cylon War is now a series. Like everyone else in the world, I’m finding it hard to get all that fired up about Caprica, so the thought of another BSG prequel series doesn’t light my world on fire. Then again, unlike everyone else in the world, I am over the moon for the BSG finale, so I’m certainly open to getting excited about that universe again, in theory.

* Tom Spurgeon reviews Aidan Koch’s The Whale, echoing many of the things I said about it in my review, which of course means it’s brilliant.

* Wait, Paul Hornschemeier wrote a Man-Thing story drawn by Mark Texieira? Well don’t that beat all.

* Charles Burns draws Elvis.

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* Real Life Horror: Andrew Sullivan on the Omar Khadr case:

I don’t know how anyone who cares about the integrity and moral standing of the United States can absorb the full details of this case and not be profoundly ashamed. To prosecute a child soldier, already nearly killed in battle, tortured and abused in custody, and to imprison him for this length of time and even now, convict him of charges for which there is next to no proof but his own coerced confessions…well, words fail.

And just in case they don’t, the extremely graphic and disturbing picture that accompanies the piece is worth at least a thousand words anyway.

* New Girl Talk album on the way, hooray hooray. I get major relisten value on Feed the Animals; it’s better than Night Ripper.

* Lolita, Rear Window, Sunset Boulevard? Yep, sounds like a David Lynch-curated film festival to me. (Via The House Next Door.)

* Saving this for when I have an hour to kill: Jaime Hernandez and Gary Groth in conversation at SPX.

SPX 2010 – Spotlight – Jaime Hernandez from Small Press Expo on Vimeo.

* Finally, if you can spare the scratch, please go buy some comics from Alan David Doane so he can pay his rent. He’s offering some nice-looking sets for really reasonable prices.