The Forbidden Planet International Blog Log

I attended the comics festival of Angoulême a couple of times in the past, and even though the event generally has a fairly international feel to it, it’s always been a predominantly French affair, albeit with a good contingent of guests from other lands. With the presidency of Art Spiegelman however, it would seem that Anglophones have really discovered the festival in overwhelming numbers. In the Rue Herge as well as in the different tents English seems to have become the second language of choice.

Similarly, a lot of British and American authors were present  in several booths, as French publishers strongly continue their catching up by adding all and any modern classics to their catalogues. Even Scottish artist and now Australian resident Eddie Campbell came halfway across the world to sign the French translation of his Alec collection, which is on the official selection for the best album award.

(editing RAW)

The main reason to call this the English edition of the Festival, however, are the exhibitions that President Spiegelman created for the CBDI and for the Museum. In the first, he created a very extensive, detailed and complete overview of his own work. From his very early self-published comics to the underground magazines he edited in San Francisco in the early 70s to Raw, Maus and later his work for the New Yorker. Even the Garbage Pail Kids were present in their full glory, sharing wall space with original art, vintage artifacts and prints and an immense amount of sketche and preparatory work.

(above: snap of Spiegelman’s first fanzine at the exhibition, below: The Loonies, very early work from Spiegelman)

Especially the presentation of Maus, which had a whole room dedicated to it, gave a good idea of the impressively maniacal amount of preparation and sketching Spiegelman undertakes before he ends up with his seemingly simple pages. Maus was presented in its entirety, in the form of a gigantic frieze of live sized reproductions of the pages of both books. Every other page was accompanied by preliminary tryouts, sketches, unfinished dialogue or reference material. Much of what was on display is also present in the book MetaMaus, but it still is quite different when you see it in reality.

(above: creating the cover artwork for the brilliant MetaMaus. below: pages from Maus)

In the Museum Spiegelman took on the permanent collection and added his personal touch, focusing on the authors and creators that influenced him, or which he greatly admires. As a result of this the lion’s share of the museum was dedicated to American authors, with original art by anybody from Outcault or MacManus, Milt Gross and Rube Goldberg to Chester Gould and Jack Kirby, Bill Griffith and Patrick McDonnell.

A whole row of display cases was reserved for alternative, underground and current cartooning, by Wally Wood and Bill Elder, Harvey Kurtzman and Rick Griffin, Spain and R Crumb. Many of the pieces were especially for this exhibition lent by collector extraordinaire Glen Bray, and almost all of them were accompanied by very insightful commentary by Spiegelman himself.

A separate room told the story of Raw Magazine and featured original art by Ben Katchor, Charles Burns, RK Sikoryak and many others, along with ephemera like an sketch by Jacques Tardi and a very sweet letter by Burns offering his work for consideration by the magazine.

(the great Jacques Tardi sketches for Spiegelman)

Without a doubt, this was the best show by a President that I have seen thus far in Angoulême. Spiegelman’s successor has a far from easy job waiting for him

Chloe Noonan Monster Hunter Colour Special

By Marc Ellerby

So far we’ve seen three issues (#1, #2, #3) of Ellerby’s disinterested monster hunter with the smart mouth and iffy attitude (just look at the great cover – attitude in spades!). And nothing has convinced me that I wasn’t absolutely spot on with what I said back in June 2009 when I first set eyes on her:

“Chloe Noonan, Monster Hunter is just such a fantastic idea, done so very well, that I just can’t help but think that if he gets the right bit of luck with it he’ll have a huge hit on his hands.”

or this:

“…..heaps of Scott Pilgrim style goings on; young folks, funky dialogue, bit of weirdness and smart cartooning. Chloe is a monster hunter (no, not like Buffy). She’s English, doesn’t have any special powers and frankly thinks this monster hunting lark is rather getting in the way”

That still covers it pretty much. This 24-page colour special fits in (sort of) with the events of issue 3, but Ellerby’s characters and stories are so tight by now that no real back story is necessary, you’ll soon pick it up. (And if you want to see where it all starts, we put up a 3-page preview back in November.

So far, everything in Noonan has been about Noonan just simply avoiding being the monster hunter. But for some reason, she’s it. She’s the monster hunter. But being it and being good at it are two different things.

Or as a slightly tipsy BFF Zoe puts it:

(Yep, a very bad monster hunter indeed. Chloe Noonan by Marc Ellerby)

This time round though there’s a mood shift. It’s small, but there’s definitely a move towards something a little deeper, a little more introspective and thoughtful.

Previously Noonan was all about a mix of monsters and friends, with Ellerby leaning heavily on the comedy dialogue he’s so good at. But longterm? Maybe something that would get a little same-y. The slight shift turns it from sketch show to potential long-running fantasy comedy series.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s still packed with everything that made me love the book in the first place, and still full of comedy, full of the sparkling, quick-fire dialogue, but the last third of this colour special sees Noonan forced to face up to what she does and why she does it, made to take a look at this whole monster-hunter thing from the other side.

After suffering (never in silence, not the Noonan) all the fun of the indie disco she comes face to face with a monster looking stranger like a certain Beano character.

Or, as best mate Zoe puts it again:

And once she’s chased him down, he turns her world on its head, putting both a seed of doubt in her mind about what she’s doing, and introducing the possibility that the monsters may be thinking about moving  against her.

And that points to the possibility of the comic having a denser, richer future, where Noonan has to ask herself what she’s doing… just like this…

Like I said, it’s a small shift, but it bodes well for the future. And damn it Ellerby, there better be a future. Lots of  new Noonan adventures for 2012 please.

Because it’s simply one of  the best comics I’ve read in the last few years, and you need to be reading it.

Chloe Noonan: Monster Hunter – Colour Special is available for just £4 from Ellerby’s shop

Another week rolls past as 2012 settles down and trundles along, and here is Alex Fitch to update us to the latest shows he’s involved with. As ever check the Panel Borders site for more details and links to podcasts of previous shows:

Panel Borders: Habbibi Blankets, Sunday 29th January on Resonance FM, podcast after transmission on Panel Borders

Concluding our month of shows looking at biography and autobiography in comics, Alex Fitch talks to the multiple award winning (and Grammy nominated) cartoonist Craig Thompson about his epic new graphic novel Habibi (My beloved). Alex and Craig discuss the 672 page book’s reworking of themes from One Thousand and One Nights, mixing in modern concerns about gender politics and pollution in the Middle East and how his previous autobiographical works Blankets and Carnet de Voyage, with their themes of sexual awakening, religion and travelogue, led to his latest work.

Book List: Children’s book illustration, Tuesday 31st January at 8pm on Resonance FM, podcast on Panel Borders afterwards

In an hour long show about children’s book illustration, Alex Fitch talks to three generations of illustrators: David McKee, creator of Mr Benn, King Rollo and Elmer the Patchwork Elephant; Dave McKean, artist of of young adult books by David Almond, graphic novels and picture books by Neil Gaiman and Richard Dawkins’ first science book for children The Magic of Reality; and Jim Kay, illustrator of Patrick Ness’ A Monster Calls and Toby Forward’s Flaxfield Quartet of novels about dragons.

Also includes an extract from Dave McKean’s presentation of his work from The Magic of Reality at the book launch in Foyles, September 2011.

Recent podcasts:

Panel Borders: Dotter of Her Father’s Eyes

Continuing our month of shows about biography and autobiography, guest presenter Nicola Streeten interviews Bryan and Mary Talbot about their forthcoming graphic novel, Dotter of Her Father’s Eyes, which contrasts two coming of age narratives: Lucia, daughter of James Joyce, and author Mary Talbot, daughter of the Joycean scholar James S Atherton. (Recorded and edited by Alex Fitch)

Laydeez do podcasts – Judith Vanistendael: Dance by the light of the moon

In a Q and A recorded at Bar Music Hall in East London as part of Comica Festival, 2010, Paul Gravett talks to Flemish cartoonist Judith Vanistendael about her semi-autobiographical graphic novel Dance by the light of the moon, published in the UK by Self Made Hero. (Recorded and edited by Alex Fitch, introduced by Sarah Lightman)

Dan Berry has been over in Angoulême for several days before the start of the main part of Europe’s most important comics festival and regularly tweeting and posting online about his experiences, including this year’s 24 hour comics – or we should say 24 heures de la bande dessinee, which he notes had an incredibly impressive roster of talent from France and worldwide taking part this year. Dan completed his own work despite ending up with a “drawng hand swollen like a blown up glove” and you can see his pages on here and check out the rest of the 24h BD work that’s been scanned in so far here.

Regular fave with the blog crew Sarah McIntyre was at Monday’s Comica event with the brilliant Craig Thompson in London; she has a report on it with photos up on her blog and, Sarah being Sarah, she, of course, sketched a bit of the evening too and posted the rather lovely results up:

The Bloghorn reports on the upcoming unofficial cartooning salute to the Queen to mark her Diamond Jubilee – the Cartoon Museum in London has the Her Maj: 60 Years of Unofficial Portraits of the Queen exhibition coming up, opening on Februaryl 1st and running through to April 8th. The Cartoon Museum apparently describes the upcoming royal cartooning exhibition as being “teasing, afffectionate and at times downright unflattering — unlike any other Diamond Jubilee exhibition”. Should prove an antidote to the deluge of Royal coverage we’ll be seeing this year.

(Her Maj pulling a celebratory pint, art by and (c) Trog)

Yakari Volume 9 – Yakari And The Coyote

Written by Job, art by Derib

Cinebook

“When the beavers bring Yakari a battered old canoe, the young Sioux and his friends repair it and go for a little trip—and find more adventure than they bargained for, in the person of a father coyote. Fortunately, their new friend is up to his reputation for cunning: When Buffalo Seed is cornered by an angry puma, it will take all of the coyote’s tricks, combined with Yakari’s bravery, to get the young hunter out of his predicament.”

I’d not read any Yakari before, but it’s not tough to  pick up – Yakari’s a young Sioux with the ability to talk to the animals. He hangs around with friends Rainbow and Buffalo Seed and has a loyal horse Little Thunder. Together they get into gentle scrapes and always end up okay.

It’s not deep, it”s not complicated, and it’s probably the youngest of all the books Cinebook publishes. There’s none of the clever humour and knowing themes of books like Iznogoud, Spirou, Cedric, or the Bluecoats, all-ages with that little extra. This is simple and light, innocent fun.

The story is just as simple as it needs to be, characters going from one little scene to another – getting a canoe from the beavers, fixing it up, heading out into the river.

It picks up a lot when they fall foul of father coyote, played as the original trickster character of myth and legend made real, all tied off neatly at the end for the kids with a little Coyote God myth retelling. Father Coyote tricks the gang, then conveniently makes firm friends oveer some moccasins and is on hand when they need him most after Buffalo Seed gets trpped by a determined and nasty (in a very age-appropriate way) Puma.

So yes, it’s almost impossibly gentle, and it’s a read just this side of bland in many ways, but there’s a certain charm in here. And I just have a feeling that it’s somewhat antiquated charm will appeal to those children in the school library currently burning their way through countless animal books. And that’s no bad thing.

The art is bigger in scale and uses fewer panels than other similar Euro comedy albums, really ramping up the cuteness factor nicely, all adding to the feeling that, as long as you realise this is saccharin sweet Disney-fied storytelling, you’ll enjoy it. Or rather you’ll enjoy seeing somebody much, much younger enjoy it.

Our dandy seems to have recovered his elan and  poise after his bad dreams (if they were dreams) in the Real Men storyline, and is enjoying a constitutional, but the streets of Somersault can be an odd place…

(Somersault is (c) Richard Cowdry; if you want to reproduce any part of it you should ask him first )

Bryan Talbot tells us that he will be once more tutoring at the annual Creative Writing for Graphic Novels residential course held at the well-known Arvon Foundation, along with Hannah Berry and also this year featuring Bryan’s wife and now collaborator on the new Dotter of Her Father’s Eye graphic novel, Mary Talbot, as a guest. The course this year runs from June 25th to the 30th and Bryan comments that anyone interested should think about it soon as last year’s course sold out quite quickly; there are a few grants available to help with Arvon writing courses, but as you can imagine these go pretty quickly too.

(Bryan signing in the Edinburgh FP, pic from my Flickr)

Clips from the old Peanuts animated cartoon recut and edited to go along with the eerily beautiful Vega Choir’s cover of Radiohead’s brilliant song, Creep. Somehow both funny and quite sad at the same time and it fits poor ‘ole Charlie Brown very well… (Linkage from Laughing Squid via that man Matt Staggs):

Josh Trank’s upcoming new movie Chronicle takes on of the well-known clichés of the superhero genre – the sudden granting of superpowers through contact with a strange source – but treats it a little differently than the usual spandex-fest, taking a cooler, more lo-fi approach.  When a group of high school friends find themselves developing powers from a mysterious substance they’re not sure what to do about it – what would any of us do in that situation? Without training or discipline or focus it could be too easy to cause an accident with those new powers… As they develop they begin to experiment and have fun with them, playing pranks, but as they gain confidence and experience in their new abilities they start to push the boundaries of what they will do – but with those growing powers and confidence comes a sense of impunity and immortality, which may challenge their own sense of morality and just how far they might go…

Chronicle opens in UK cinemas on February 1st and our friends behind the film are helping us celebrate the film’s opening with a very generous competition. Social media and tech features in the film, with the movie gleefully playing with the conventions of the ‘found footage’ genre, and they have given us some cracking prizes: a dual core MacBook Air and a Canon EOS 550D camera. To be in with a chance of winning one of these brilliant prizes just send us your name and contact details to joe (dot) gordon (at) forbiddenplanet (dot) co (dot) uk and tell us the name of the director of Chronicle before February 15th. Good luck!

Paragon Issue 9

Written by Dirk Van Dom, Matthew McLaughlin, Greg Meldrum, Alan Holloway

Art by Dave Candlish, Stephen Prestwood, James Corcoran, Louis Carter, David Broughton

Published by Dave Candlish

(The ninth issue of Dave Candlish’s Paragon comic – reviews of previous issues are here.)

Really liking the cover this time round – good pulp hero feel, and very fitting, as it’s featuring the new strip in Paragon 9, the pulp adventure Spencer Nero. Something of a tongue in cheek Doc Savage style thing, following an old style adventurer, always ready with a quip to take on a thrilling adventure. He travels the world, sorting out all those who need sorting, with a nod, a wink, and a never ending stream of pulp hero clichés. But I like tongue in cheek pulp hero clichés.

There’s two episodes here – Nazi Aztecs in the middle of the ocean first up and then a werehyaena in East Africa. Two artists as well, but I didn’t enjoy David Broughton’s neccessarilly cartton-ish style for The Last Laugh anywhere near as much as Dave Candlish’s more stylised moments of the Island Of The Naztecs storyline. But the art serves the stories well, and it’s not a bad intro to a character all concerned may enjoy playing around with.

(The stylised Dave Candlish art from Spencer Nero and the island of the Naztecs in Paragon #9. Written by Greg Meldrum)

And staying with the interesting stuff, at the other end book we have Icarus Dangerous, a strip on its third episode, and the page recap comes in handy. It’s beginning to lose some of the originality to be honest and here with issue 3 it’s dragging a little, as Icarus starts using the newly reworked wings, far more advanced than the famous ones provided by dad. He’s fighting the Bonemen, rescuing his rescuer Meriope, and it feels just a little like it’s all setting up future chapters rather than really moving the thing along.

Some of my frustration with it, in fact some of my frustration with Paragon as a whole is very likely due to the inevitable disjointed feel of the episodic strip format, with six months between episodes. Icarus Dangerous still has potential, and it’s a strip I really wouldn’t mind seeing collected in one storyline someplace down the line.

(Icarus Dangerous by Dirk von Dom and Stephen Prestwood)

Now onto the middle stuff, which I’ll do at speed…..

Rise of the MekkoSapiens did little for me in the two previous parts, and it’s lost me completely now. It’s perhaps a measure of how little I’m getting from it that it barely registered in my (admittedly poor) memory just minutes after reading it. New artist Louis Carter does his best, but there’s just not much here to praise. Nonplussed.

The one-off No Compromise is an entry for the Strip Magazine competition, and being kind, you can see why it didn’t make it. Old guy shows up at Captain’s Island, looks mean and moody, finds what he’s come for, shoots stuff. My main problem is using child rape as a throwaway line. I’m certainly no prude, but I just think it’s somewhat unnecessary, crude, and crass. And a lazy plot device.

(No Compromise by Alan Holloway and Dave Candlish)

Yet again, there’s an episode of Jikan, this time sending the time-travelling demon-hunter back to the time of the cavemen. It’s a nice episode and James Corcoran’s art has some really nice parts, patchy yes, but nice.

Same thing as I’ve said before though – I’ve read this before, in the Jikan Chronicles book, so yet again, seeing it here seems somewhat superfluous.

(Jikan – Cave Of Death by Matthew McLaughlin and james Corcoran)

I hate to say it here, but after six issues of Paragon, I can’t see a way editor Dave Candlish is going to make it work for me. Each issue shows a little promise, and I’m always hoping that the next issue builds upon it, but it seems stuck in rather a rut of deliver some good, but a lot of mediocre strips. And comparing it against some of the other anthology works I’ve seen just makes it seem stuck in that rut. Like I said, some of this may be the problem of running a continuing anthology, with longer storylines broken by half a year or so.

The thing is, I’ve seen enough of Candlish’s work now to say screw it, why not work up something smaller scale, use the art I’ve enjoyed, develop that, and come back with something new. Because I just can’t see Paragon moving out of the niche it’s firmly stuck in. Sorry.

I am in Boston, New England, at Arisia, a science fiction convention with over 3,000 people along, where science meets adventure, and it’s definitely great craic. It’s similar to conventions in the UK, only they embolden their membership and encourage a real sense of fun here.

The convention is fantastic, four days of continuous activities, all night video showings, real film projectors, at times over twenty activities to choose from. And they have programmed a number of stage performances, and this is what brings me to write.

The Teseracte Players of Boston performed a piece of ‘shadow theatre’ – essentially, actors, or players, perform on stage simultaneously as a film is on screen, so the songs and words are the original recordings. This is something that the group have been doing for seventeen years, and are well known for their Doctor Horrible, Buffy, Once More With Feeling and Rocky Horror Picture show performances.

(pics by James, click to see the larger version on Flickr)

It is no mean feat to shadow perform a film on stage. It is even harder when the movie selected is as popular and stylistic as Tim Burton’s Nightmare Before Christmas.  I was unsure what to expect – unsure how a group of performers would be able to portray in live action one of the most iconic pieces of animation film of the last twenty years, and one that is so popular in fan circles.

I was utterly taken by surprise. The performance exceeded my expectations. From the start the relaxed and natural emceeing of Glenn fed into what was a very imaginative set of costumes and incredibly accurate portrayals, in perfect unison with the playing of the film. I was transported to Halloweentown immediately.

(The Mayor of Halloweentwon canvasses James for his vote)

Biff, as the Mayor, was perfect, his gait and movement setting a standard. He caught the facial transition with ease which made me laugh immediately and continuously. The choreography of the players and miming was unnervingly good, so good in fact that I soon had forgotten the off stage screen. It was joyous entertainment and terrifically great fun, it gave me a sense of ‘something special’ as I viewed this new version of a well known movie, and how accurately the players brought the stage to life.

The simplicity and cleverness of the set, the lighting, and the movement of players through the audience gave the performance an intimate and polished feel.

I loved Dr. Finklestein’s position. A wheelchair was situated on a stand on one side of the stage, imitating his tower, while Lock, Shock and Barrel were ably played by Tori, Mimi and Ashley, who multi-tasked as the band, and were so much fun. AJ as Oogie Boogie no doubt benefited from the amazing costume which made him visually fantastic, yet like all the players, it was his exquisite performance made the character and brought it to full life on the stage.

Sara and Muppet as Jack and Sally were picture perfect, and played their parts beautifully. The makeup and costumes were superlative, the players really finding their pace and places perfectly and again the lighting ensured that their performance was picked out brilliantly. Both exuded confidence and professionalism while embodying the electric element required for this show.

The spirit and fun fell off the stage in waves and assaulted me, I felt these performers were enjoying what they were doing, and it showed, not only in the flow of the performance or the easy progression of the story, but also in how caught I found myself, filling me with excitement.

Of course, Zero as played by Anna, a young girl, who was a gem.

I thoroughly enjoyed this, and subsequently stayed for the next two performances, but am really very surprised, and I am sure locals will nod in a knowing way, aware of this local brilliance at how well Amy the director, brought the troupe together, and how exhilarated the players made me feel, but itv was truly surprising at how enjoyable it was. Bravo Teseracte!

One of the main reasons for going to the bande dessinee festival in Angoulême, next to bumping into some of your heroes in the street and ending up having coffee with them, are the exhibitions.  It seems the organisers are trying to crank it up a notch with every edition.

Last year Art Spiegelman won the City of Angoulême Grand Prix, and, as tradition dictates, this makes him the acting president of this year’s edition, and his work the subject of one of the major exhibitions.  The Spiegelman show will be divided into two parts.  The first will focus on Maus and how it came to be.  Not only will the show feature all the original pages that make up the entirity of Maus, it will also include no less than 700 drawings, sketches, reference photographs and other documents.  Spiegelman is well-known for how he catalogues and archives his past (just have a look at MetaMaus, one of the best books of last year), so this should be a treat.  Next to Maus the show will also tell the history of Raw magazine, with plenty of original art and artifacts.

In addition to this exhibition, Spiegelman took over the Cité Internationale (the Angoulême comics museum) and built his own Museum on the History and Accomplishments of Comics.  He’s bringing along original artwork by some of those who inspired him, such as Windsor McCay, George Herriman and Harvey Kurtzman, but also from his contemporary peers, such as Justin Green, Jacques Tardi, Chris Ware, and Lorenzo Mattotti (what a roll call of top comic talent).  The show promises to be no less than a personal tribute of a master to the medium that he has helped to make great.

Next to Spiegelman, the festival pays hommage to another great creator, who’s probably less well-known beyond France and the French-speaking countries.  With his series Philémon, Fred has created one of the true great philosophical comics, while never ceasing to experiment with narrative structure, page design and language.  The exhibition will feature original plates from books like Magic Palace Hôtel (1980), La Magique lanterne magique (1983), L’Histoire du corbac aux baskets (1993, which won the award for Best Album at the Angoulême Festival in 1994) or L’Histoire du conteur électrique (1995).

Charles Berbérian created the icon for the show L’Europe Se Dessine, in which fifty cartoonists and comic artists from all over Europe visualise what Europe stands for, its origins, strengths and future.  Contributors include Enki Bilal, Milo Manara, Ruben Pellejero, Joost Swarte, Ulli Lust, Anouk Ricard, Nix, Florence Cestac, Andi Watson, Miguelanxo Prado, Kati Kovacs, and others.

More focus on international comics in two more exhibitions, one on Spanish comics (with artwork by Prado, Guarnido, Max, Bernet and more) and one on comics from Sweden (featuring Anneli Furmark, Loka Kanarp, Joanna Hellgren (Frances, Éditions Cambourakis), Knut Larsson, and more.

And I haven’t started to mention all the smaller shows that seem to pop up all over town.  It’s going to be a very full festival, but we’re not complaining !

See Wim’s prevous post in his Countdown to – looking at the Selection – here.

Tess Martin‘s The Whale Story is a beautifully imaginative piece of animation, painted using a canvas for 16 foot high wall in Seattle’s Cal Anderson Park, telling a lovely story of a whale in distressed helped by divers and just executed in such a wonderful fashion it will leave you smiling for hours afterwards: