You know that expression, “fish or cut bait”? Last week I cut bait. Expect more blogging. I’m certainly expecting it from myself.

In one of his two MoCCA semi-recaps, Chris Butcher (who I’m pretty sure I almost met at one point, when someone named “Christopher” came up to talk to Jeffrey Brown when I was talking to him at one point–belated hi, Chris!) points out accurately that there was a breakout book at the con, and that book was Sam Hiti‘s End Times. This seems to be the book that has the people who’ve bought it talking. Keep an eye out.

Also on the altcomix beat is Alan David Doane, who more or less pans Fantagraphics’ new young-cartoonist anthology Blood Orange. I came pretty close to buying it myself, but without a unifying theme that I’m interested in or long-form work from an artist I like, it’s tough to justify buying anthologies when you’re on a budget. Unsurprisingly, ADD says the best stuff comes from Marc Bell and John Hankiewicz, though I’d be interested to see Ron Rege’s contribution as well. (His McSweeney’s Israel/Palestine minicomic was as strong formally as its political point of emphasis was problematic, though his ghoulish depiction of Hamas’s eminences grises was a daring and powerful choice.) Generally, it’s just good to see Alan back in action.

Special for Johnny Bacardi, whose frequent Bendis true-believer posts are a welcome, articulate, passionate, and (oh yeah) hilarious anecdote to the rote Bendis-bashing that’s become common in the blogosphere: Bendis talks at great length (as does Joe Quesada) about his controversial upcoming run on The Avengers at both Newsarama and The Pulse. This guy starts thinking about superheroes at a level where most writers leave off. I’ll be buying it. (Links courtesy of Graeme McMillan.)

Dave G. reviews The Dark Knight Strikes Again and Planet of the Capes, praising the former and burying the latter. I think they’re up to different things–DK2 is a celebration, PotC is a lynching–and I think they’re at different levels–PotC is good, DK2 is a fucking brilliant landmark–but I don’t see why you can’t like both of ’em. (Link courtesy of John Jakala.)

Eve Tushnet reviews Gyo (she doesn’t like it) and Planetes (she likes it a lot). I disagree with her about Gyo–I think the “what’s the point?”ness of it is the point, and the sheer randomness of the concept is part and parcel of that; to be fair, decay and physical corruption are things that really do freak me out, so maybe that’s part of my admiration for the series. On the other hand, I couldn’t agree more with her assessment of Planetes, which is maybe the best regularly-published series of any kind on the racks these days. You know how people occasionally go nuts about certain titles and try to sell the shit out of them to their readers–Sleeper, Street Angel, Demo, that sort of thing? Folks, Planetes does that for me. There is literally no reason why you shouldn’t like this book. It’s intelligent and beautiful and at 240+ pages for ten bucks, it’s a great buy to boot.

Finally, John Jakala was right: Discount Comic Book Service is amazing. I’ll reserve final judgement for once I receive my books, I guess, but for now: Go ye and shop!

Guy Leshinski mulls over an issue I’ve talked about many times: Alternative cartoonists’ worrisome tendency to make their comics into objets d’art, regardless of the impact their design decisions make on readability and shelvability.

Don’t get me wrong: I love the fact that Chris Ware crams comics onto every available square inch of the books he releases–the world needs as many Chris Ware comics as he can get. And I love the fact that comics is still enough of a Wild West medium that, when it comes to format and design, nearly anything goes. On the other hand, I also feel that there’s a desire, conscious or not, on the part of some alternative cartoonists to have their work be seen as part of the high art tradition. As a result, the books get more and more precious, to the point where you’re practically afraid to open them and read them; they also get bigger and bigger (like Quimby the Mouse or Jimbo in Purgatory), making them both difficult to read without a place to rest them and difficult to store without putting them on their side and having them jut out a foot and a half from your bookshelf. On the small-press side, you get die-cut silk-screened multi-part productions like NON #5, which are lovely to look at but hard to read and next to impossible to produce in sufficient quantities to meet demand. Indeed, I sometimes wonder if that’s not the point as well–“Look, see, comics aren’t mindless mass entertainment product!” I also remember the reaction from some segments of the Comics Journal board toward my proposal that certain altcomics be released in manga digest format–this was viewed less as a potentially lucrative business decision and more as a moral failure, perhaps because it would make the books more appealing to a large audience, rather than less. (Not coincidentally, the then-unrelased McSweeney’s that inspired Guy’s essay was held up as the “right” direction for comics to go.)

To quote Paul Pope, “Man, that’s just not the battle for me.”