Somewhere in West Virginia, a nondescript 30-something walks towards his mailbox.

“It’s… it’s the shôjo issue! But… it’s the Wizard shôjo issue.”

The cover: I certainly never needed to see Michael Turner’s rendering of Tohru from Fruits Basket. What the hell happened to her ribs? And her feet?

Page 13: “Grrrl Power!” A “roundtable” of “hot industry headliners” talks about “the shôjo phenom.” Oddly enough the roundtable consists of Brian Bendis, Mark Millar, Geoff Johns, and Frank Miller. It starts off well enough, with everyone using words and phrases like “exciting” and “new markets” and “crossover.” Eventually, though, references to “ungrateful little brats” pepper the discourse, as do calls for protectionist trade measures that would not be out of place in one of those “Buy American” commercials that featured Vicki Lawrence as “Mama.”

Page 28: “Women in Uniform!” In this pictorial, readers see a variety of shôjo school uniforms as re-imagined by Greg Horn. I almost lose consciousness, but before the blackout, I picture a resort developer in Las Vegas having a “Eureka!” moment as he finally pinpoints just the right look for the cocktail waitresses who work the casino floor.

Page 48: “Who’d Win? Special Magic Girl Edition!” Okay, Alice Seno doesn’t carry a wakizashi, Sailor Venus has never crumpled anyone’s windpipe with a bo, and Sakura does not, to my knowledge, fling Clow Cards like shuriken, rending the flesh of her enemies. And what does Wolverine have to do with any of this? Of course he’d be able to kill them.

Page 65: “Cartoonist Sympathizers.” This is an extraordinarily uncomfortable interview with some of the creators working on OEL manga. Even after repeated, almost pleading inquiries, it still seems clear that they “wouldn’t really rather be drawing X-Men.”

Page 79: “Domestic or Imported?” An interesting compare-and-contrast piece on the relative merits of up-skirt fanservice visuals and Spider-Woman’s persistent camel toe. A little something for the regular subscribers, I guess.

Before I could go any further, I woke to find one of my dogs swatting at me with alarm. I’d obviously been thrashing around and screaming in my sleep. It had all just been a horrible, haunting nightmare.

But… what had been in that empty, magazine-shaped envelope sitting on the kitchen counter?
(Edited to add a quick note for anyone finding this via The Comics Journal Message Board: I will be doing a review of the actual TCJ Shojo issue for my Comics World News column, Flipped. It should appear Monday, July 25. Short preview: TCJ 269 was just astonishing in its scope and depth.)

I’ve loved the Defenders at various points in their checkered, sporadic history, but I’ve never had much interest in their Big Four (Dr. Strange, the Hulk, Namor, and Silver Surfer) as a unit. It’s the same with the Avengers’ Big Three (Captain America, Iron Man, and Thor). They’re too iconic and static, and my attention always wanders to the B-list characters who fill in the gaps (Hawkeye, Scarlet Witch, and the Vision in Avengers; Hellcat, Nighthawk, and Valkyrie in Defenders).

I’m looking forward to this week’s Defenders 1 (Marvel), though, because the comic approach by Keith Giffen, J.M. DeMatteis, and Kevin Maguire fits best with my own perception of the characters. If there was ever a group of characters that needed some deflation, it’s this one. I’ve always thought their blustering, short-tempered seriousness was ridiculous, and I like the idea of a creative team playing it for intentional laughs. (There’s an interview with Giffen at Comic Book Resources and some preview pages at Mile High Comics.)

***

The week’s manga highlight will likely be the second volume of Yotsuba&! (AD Vision). It was nice to hear (from Comics Reporter) that this was one of the buzz-generating titles at Nerd Vegas. I liked the first volume a lot, and I’m eager to see what new mysteries are unraveled by this weird little green-haired girl.

***

Scott Chantler’s visuals were one of the highlights of Oni’s Scandalous, and I’ve been looking forward to his Northwest Passage from the same publisher. The phrase “two-fisted” isn’t one that usually fills me with enthusiasm, but the premise is really interesting to me. There are lots of attractive preview pages at Comic Book Resources.)

***

The sheer number of this week’s Marvel offerings with “House of M” in them is enough to boggle the mind. House of M 4, House of M Director’s Cut 1, House of M Peterson Variant Cover 4, Secrets of the House of M, Spider-Man House of M 2… it reads kind of like a parody of a solicitation list. (It’s also hilarious that an arc from a spin-off title of the last big event — The Pulse Vol 2 Secret War TPB – gets collected before the actual mini-series is finished and halfway through the same writer’s next big event.)

***

It’s a good week for DC, with what seems to be a Huntress-centric issue of Birds of Prey (84) and another issue of Manhunter (12). Why do I suspect that this horrible cover will spur more sales?

(I’m never quite certain what constitutes a spoiler. It’s one of those lines that moves back and forth from reader to reader. And I’ve noticed that some parts of the Harry Potter audience are understandably sensitive the anything that even resembles a spoiler. So, while I won’t be giving away any specific plot developments and my comments will be fairly generic, be warned that some of the following remarks might cross your Personal Spoiler Threshold.)

Like many, many other people, I spent much of the weekend locked in a room with Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. It was probably the most predictable book in the series so far, but that didn’t keep it from being compulsively readable.

There were some interviews with younger readers on Morning Edition today, and they approached it the same way I did: sit down and don’t stop reading until the book is finished. One of the interviewees nicely summed up the what-happens-next urgency of J.K. Rowling’s prose, and I really agree with her. Even when I’m fairly certain I know what’s going to happen next, the urgency is still there.

Take the big death in the book. If anything, I’m impressed that Rowling has managed to hold it off as long as she has. The event’s inevitability doesn’t diminish its impact, though. As loyal as Rowling is to the formula she’s established over six novels (and the tropes she’s appropriated from other fantasy classics), she keeps giving that formula so much detail and punch. The craft alone is startling.

One thing I did notice this time around is that Rowling seems to have largely abandoned the idea that anyone reading Book 6 might not have read Books 1-5. That’s a sensible approach, and there was much less exposition this time around. (I actually found that I kind of missed it, to be honest. While Book 6 was more streamlined, I’ve never really objected to being reminded of previous events and adventures.)

I’m always suspect when people say they couldn’t put a book down, but that was pretty much the theme of my weekend.

***

The down side of all of this is that this week’s Flipped is kind of a mixed bag. I’m sure trusty editor Shawn Hoke managed to remove all of the inexplicable references to Luna Lovegood that were in my first draft, though.

“I like to eat! Naptime smiles on Go-Go chest!”

I can’t be expected to resist a comic that has dialogue like that, can I?

The line is from Banana Sunday 1 (Oni), by Root Nibot and Colleen Coover, an all-ages comedy that looks like it will be an awful lot of fun.

Kirby Steinberg has transferred for Forest Edge High School, and she hasn’t come alone. At the behest of her primate researcher father, she’s brought three talking primates along with her to help them learn more about human society. Whether human society is ready for them is another question.

Chuck is an immensely intelligent orangutan, and in the tradition of immensely intelligent comic characters, he’s condescending. Chimpanzee Knobby is a smooth-talking ladies man. Kirby claims he learned English from romance comics, but he seems more like a crooner from the 1940s to me. Then there’s Go-Go, the gorilla. Go-Go isn’t quite as advanced as his comrades. When he speaks, it’s generally in reference to bananas (and his ownership of same) or napping (which he does often and without warning). I’m a little in awe of Go-Go, to be honest.

With these three underfoot, Kirby’s first day at Forest Edge (heh) has its ups and downs. She makes a friend in Nickels, the star reporter for the school paper, and has an embarrassing encounter with Martin, a photographer for the paper who seems to think he’s charmingly obnoxious. (So far, he’s only half right, but it’s early yet.) Nickels thinks there’s more to the apes than Kirby is saying, and she’s determined to dig up the real story.

You learn a lot about the characters because they have a tendency to declare themselves. (“Yep, that’s me! Heroic and adorable!” “It’s who I am! I burn with curiosity!”) It could get grating, but Nibot gives these pronouncements energy and charm. It fits with the straightforward approach of the storytelling. If the script isn’t particularly sophisticated, it’s got sweetness and sincerity to spare.

The biggest attraction here is the cartooning of Colleen Coover. The apes are adorable, particularly beetle-browed Go-Go. Coover packs the pages with small, funny touches, like the sequence where Kirby and company get ready for school. She has a way with sight gags, too, making excellent use of all of the discarded banana peels. There’s a good use of screen effects and shading to give the visuals more depth. (I would love to see it in color.)

Banana Sunday has a lot going for it, particularly in Coover’s work. It’s got a cute premise and real visual flair. It’s a welcome addition to the growing roster of accomplished, engaging comics for kids.

I don’t think I’ve seen this mentioned yet, but the Hollywood Reporter announced Josh Olson has been signed to adapt Naoki Urasawa’s Monster for a film version by New Line Cinema. A translation of Monster is being published by Viz and is listed in this month’s Previews.

I read the piece quickly but not well, and I thought David Cronenberg was directing, which would have been delightful if it had been true. Also, I’m stupid. (Thanks for pointing out my error and tactfully neglecting to mention my stupidity, David.)

Not me, that’s for sure.

***

A few years ago, DC made a big deal about announcing new creative teams for all of its Superman books, talking about how distinct each title would be and claiming that each would focus on a different aspect of the Man of Steel’s life. Since I liked some of the creators involved, I gave a couple of the titles a try. Almost immediately, the books started indulging in crossovers among all four Superman books, and I decided that it just wasn’t worth the aggravation to cherry pick the issues that stood alone.

Three issues into Gail Simone and John Byrne’s promising run on Action Comics, I find myself reading the second part of a crossover with other Superman books (none of which I read or am inclined to read) that also ties into The Omac Project (which I’m not reading either). There’s no indication as to where the story (“Sacrifice”) started, which seems sloppy. And the comic itself is very much the second chapter of a story where you need to have read the first for it to make much sense. Irritation with this sort of thing prevents me from caring how it started or being curious about how it will end.

***

Hi, I’m Vicki Vale. You, lucky readers of All-Star Batman and Robin 1, get a peek-a-boo into the working life of the professional journalist, watching me wander around my glamorous apartment in my underwear and high heels as I dictate my next column. God, do I hope it’s just a draft, because I make Candace Bushnell sound like Pauline Kael. Those poor bastards who read it in the paper won’t even be able to see my ass.

But you can all see my ass, can’t you? And my tits? Oopsie, I got some booze on my finger. I’d better lick it off. Is that a quarter on the floor? I’d better bend over and check. Buzzers are loud! But sometimes they mean that there are men waiting for me. Cool.

She gets slapped around by cops later. Puke, puke, puke, puke, puke.

I know it doesn’t matter that I think this comic is awful, and it’s probably already made a ton of money by the time I write this. But I do think it’s awful. Jim Lee’s art and Frank Miller’s script go together about as well as cotton candy and motor oil, and it isn’t like either is that great to start. The disconnect between the visual and the verbal is about the only thing the book’s got going for it, because it’s weird enough to distract readers from the clunky, two-fisted, noir-by-numbers dialogue.

After last week’s manga inferno, it’s nice to see a shipping list that’s a little more sedate. There’s plenty of good stuff, though.

I’m really enjoying the current arc of Fables. As much as I’ve liked Boy Blue’s trip to the Homelands, though, it’ll be nice to catch up with events in Fabletown. And that cover for #39 is breathtaking, as usual.

Not all big summer events are to be avoided like medical waste on a public beach. DC’s Seven Soldiers titles have been a lot of fun. I think it puts me in the minority, but my favorite has been the Guardian mini (with Klarion a close second). Guardian 3 shows up Wendesday.

The shôjo issue of The Comics Journal (#269) arrives, which should make for lots of good reading. (I would say that even if it didn’t include a review that I’d written. I’m actually saying it in spite of that, to be honest.)

The third issue of Lackluster World hits the shelves courtesy of Gen: Eric. I really enjoyed the first two, though I came across them after the pre-order window for this issue had closed. I’m sure I’ll be able to track a copy down sooner or later.

The first issue of Marvel’s Gravity mini-series was good enough to make me pick up the second. I’m a big fan of Sean McKeever’s writing, and the story seems to have a lot of potential.

Lots of comics fans seem to like super-intelligent non-human primates. Lots of comics fans seem to enjoy all-ages titles featuring off-kilter comedy. Will those powerful demographics combine to make Oni’s Banana Sunday 1 a blockbuster? Why are you asking me? I just think it looks cute!

And, in a strange turn of events, neither Tokyopop nor Viz seem to want to hold me upside-down and shake me until the last of my pocket change falls to the ground. I’m sure they’re plotting something, though.

Once again, I’ve shamelessly abused the power of the manga columnist by going on and on and on about how much I love Sgt. Frog. And you know what? I’d do it again. Well, I won’t do it again, at least not in Flipped, because that would be lazy. But anyone who’s read this blog for any length of time must certainly expect regular outbursts of “Gero! Gero! Gero!”

In other Comic World News… um… news, Graeme McMillan provides a frank appraisal of the run so far of New Avengers. Unfettered by seething hatred of Avengers: Disassembled and everything it did to a beloved (if admittedly creaky) franchise, Graeme finds the bold new direction kind of… meh:

“It achieves its aim, definitely, which seems to be purely to sell very well; certainly, there’s nothing within the content of the series that suggests that the all-star line-up of Captain America, Iron Man, Spider-Man and Wolverine have any reason to team up to fight crime, making it seem all the more obvious that the book’s core cast were decided as cynical sales grab as much as anything else.”

I glanced through the most recent issue at the shop, and I thought Iron Man’s argument in favor of Wolverine’s presence was the most ridiculous, contrived, meta bit of super-hero writing in many a moon. It almost sank to the level of Green Arrow’s puffed-up narration in Identity Crisis.

On another Marvel front, Paul O’Brian looks at the House of M in this week’s X-Axis:

“Anyway, we’re now three issues into the book, and I’m starting to get the sinking feeling that Marvel has rather misjudged things. We’re repeatedly told that this story is, in some way, hugely important and will have lasting effects. It’s good of Marvel to point this out, because god knows you’d never guess from the actual comic.”

To which I say, “More money for manga.”

Dear Hollywood,

Please come up with a way to add emotional urgency to disaster/horror movies that doesn’t involve a crappy, indifferent father reconnecting with his children in the midst of a cataclysm. It’s been done to death.

Dear movie critics,

Please stop talking about how Hollywood cleverly casts Tom Cruise in roles that turn his limitations as an actor (which are legion, in my opinion) into advantages. It simply isn’t true.

Tersely,

David

Yes, we saw War of the Worlds this afternoon. As is usually the case in evil bug movies, I ended up kind of rooting for the aliens, at least in their desire to eliminate Tom Cruise’s character. Cruise is horribly miscast as a human. Those early scenes where he’s leaving his job at the dock were laughable, and Cruise looked like he was working the red carpet. In spite of some very exciting destruction porn, there were dozens of scenes where the audience was invited to remember that Tom Cruise is a big, blandly handsome movie star, plopped square in the middle of the frame, standing on a box, and looking every bit like an oil painting of himself.

If it hadn’t been for the spookily composed Dakota Fanning, the film wouldn’t have had any personal urgency at all. (It might have worked much better if Tim Robbins had played Cruise’s role. Okay, I’ll amend that to wish that anyone had played Cruise’s role, even Cruise.) But Fanning was great, the only actor on the screen who managed to convey the gravity and horror of the situation. She acted rings around Cruise, and at times she even seemed exasperated with him, which worked nicely for their characters’ dynamic.

The highlight of the moviegoing experience was the preview of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, which is one of the few summer movies I’m tempted to see on its opening weekend. My partner wondered if they specifically made Johnny Depp’s Willy Wonka look like Michael Jackson. It seems like the kind of perversely funny thing director Tim Burton would do.

I wondered why anyone would open a family film on the same weekend that many children will probably be spending long hours inside with a copy of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. My partner pointed out that smart kids would probably talk their parents into hitting the movie, then stopping at the bookstore after.

Chris Butcher shares some interesting information on the decision to hold off on publishing Naoki Urasawa’s 20th Century Boys:

“[Urasawa] felt that his art had developed so much between the end of Monster and the beginning of 2CB that it would be something of a disservice to his work to have them not be released in chronological order.”

I can certainly understand that. One of the pleasures of longtime comic reading is watching a creator’s style evolve over time.

It makes me wonder if Viz shouldn’t have done the same thing with Miki Aihara’s work. Held up against Hot Gimmick (published earlier in the U.S. though still in serialization in Japan, I think), Aihara’s earlier Tokyo Boys and Girls looks a bit weak. (It might not have been such a great idea to have both books come out on the same day.)

***

“If zombies are the new pirates who were the new ninjas, what comes next?” wonders Johanna Draper Carlson. “And can it come quickly, please?”

After a quick, muttered, “Testify, sister,” I started wondering about the question. It’s unlikely that it will actually happen, but I’d love it if the next wave put librarians in the spotlight. Sure, there have been librarians in notable supporting roles, and some fine adventures have begun in libraries, but I still think the profession is underrepresented.

And think how many different kinds of stories can take place in libraries! Mystery, romance, science fiction, comedy, fantasy… and, if my memories of college are correct, yaoi.

***

At Love Manga, Immelda Alty gives a wonderful summary of her and David Taylor’s trip to Anime Expo. Pata also hits the highlights at Irresponsible Pictures.

Edited yet again to note: Jake Forbes has some very nice post-AX interviews with various publisher reps and the aforementioned Mr. Taylor at The Pulse.)

***

They’re training a new clerk at one of the comic shops in town, and she won me over immediately. First, she was eating carrot cake when I came in to the store. Second, she shares my love of Sgt. Frog.

There was another factor giving her the edge. The clerk at the other shop in town tried to convince me that House of M 3 was “really cool,” in part because it built on story elements from Avengers: Disassembled. No cake. No gero-gero. Just Bendis.

And that, in a nutshell, is the difference between the two shops in town.

***

Edited to wonder: Did Dead Boy Detectives ship anywhere else? It didn’t seem to make it to my humble mountain village this week.