Minicomics Round-Up: Guerra/Diaz, Taylor, Sikoryak, Alvarez, Purins

Rotland Dreadfuls #10: Sadistic Comics, by R.Sikoryak. Sikoryak is the greatest of all style mimics, and his mash-ups of classic literature and comics never fail to amuse. This comic from Ryan Standfest's Rotland Press is a mash-up of The Marquis de Sade's Justine and William Moulton Marston/Harry Peter's Wonder Woman. Using the covers inspired by the 1940s comics, Sikoryak hilariously skims the plot of Justine, transplanting the many terrors she faced into the type of S&M follies that Wonder Woman fell into. Considering That Marston was fascinated by S&M and bondage in particular (hence Wonder Woman constantly getting tied up), this pairing was low-hanging fruit as far as Sikoryak's mash-ups go. That said, it was the details that made it so funny, down to the chicken on "Just Justine's" bodice (symbolic of France) rather than the American eagle, as well as fleur-de-lis instead of stars on her costume. It would have been nice to have seen this in glorious color, but Sikoryak nails so many other details (his ability to match lettering styles in particular has always astounded me) that it scarcely matters.

Berries, by Whit Taylor.This is a lovely and weird encounter between the legendary Jersey Devil and a ruined stockbroker out to lose himself out in the woods. While the usual caveats apply to Taylor's art (the backgrounds in particular are rough), this is still quite a moving comic because of her focus on facial expressions. Even though one of the faces is that of a monstrous, dragon-like creature, Taylor makes sure that to let the reader know that it's a sad, lonely creature who could express kindness and experience camaraderie if only given a chance--especially since it speaks perfect English. This story is really a mutual expression and expression of despair and how breaking out of isolation is one of the few ways to get through it. The genre trappings really only add to that sense of despair, as the ridiculousness of the Devil's story is given a counterbalance of poignancy by the end of the comic. This is a little gem of a comic.

Two Toms, by Pablo Guerra and Henry Diaz. This mini was the only English-language release at the Revista Larva table at SPX 2015. The Colombian cartoonists had a fascinating anthology, and this mini contained the first four chapters of an upcoming book by Guerra (the writer) and Diaz (the artist). Diaz' work reminds me a lot of Brandon Graham: lots of sumptuously curvy lines influenced by graffiti art and perhaps even some of Graham's primary influence, Vaughn Bode. This is a science-fiction story that banks heavily on the nature of gender and sexuality, as a female researcher mistakenly (at least at first) has sex with an alien who resembled a missing crew member, which leads to all sorts of complications with her higher-ups. It's an enormously appealing and intriguing story, with just a touch of a blue wash to give the comic a bit more flavor. I'll be curious to see the finished version.

The Co-Dependent Tree and Hypno-Spiral Comics #2, by M.Jacob Alvarez. Alvarez is a relentless gag writer whose punchlines often rely on genre conventions. He also picks his share of comedic low-hanging fruit, like the titular "Co-Dependent Tree" being a send-up of Shel Silverstein's The Giving Tree. Alvarez's visuals are difficult to process thanks to the thick line and little variance in line weight that is present in nearly all of his work. A gag about comparing hipsters to bees is difficult to parse because it was impossible to figure out what was going on without the words, and even then that amount of labor killed the joke. Alvarez is at his best when he keeps things simple and direct, like the various "Tattoos I Don't Have The Balls To Get" and "You Got Your Shit Together Charlie Brown". When he returns to that thick and stiff line (to which he often inexplicably adds hatching, making it even harder to quickly process), there's an extra second that divides the gag's visuals and its text. That disconnect lasts just long enough to disrupt a number of genuinely funny lines. My favorite of his stories was the genuinely weird "Chambara Punk", about a samurai-movie loving punk who gets in a convenience-store fight with a lacrosse-playing, knuckle-dragging jock. Here, the thick line seems to make sense with regard to the exaggerated nature of the story's sheer loudness. Alvarez is a funny writer who's trying to find his way as an illustrator and isn't quite there yet.

Zombre #3, by Ansis Purins. This beautiful, oversized comic has all of the standard features of a Purins comic: visceral, disgusting horror; hilarious gags; bigfoot drawing; a highly skilled and controlled line in the service of pure silliness; and over-the-top satire. Visually, this is an exciting book to behold, as the color scheme changes from a blue wash to a green wash to full color and keeps changing from there. Purins makes extensive use of zip-a-tone, which both adds density to each page and gives them a more cartoony quality. That fusion of styles reminds me a bit of Chris Cilla or Mark Newgarden, where old-style and flat cartooning is juxtaposed against weird angles and weirder story ideas that are nonetheless treated with an entirely straight face. There's also a quite coherent storyline here as well, demented as it is. Purins starts all over the place: a lost dog, a benevolent zombie, a hippie park ranger who's terrified of losing his job but still is mostly shiftless, his hard ass boss who is some kind of mystic being, a giant spider and its attendants, and some redneck hunters all enter the same forest. As Purins starts to pull together the threads of his narrative, the story gets crazier and at times terrifying, before resolving into a happy ending. Purins is a longtime cartoonist and is doing his best work to date.

Autobio Minis: MariNaomi, Whitney Taylor, Margo Dabaie

Here's a trio of autobio comics, done in different styles.

The Evil, by MariNaomi. This is a short, punchy comic that sees the artist experimenting with a new approach. Instead of her standard four panel grid, she's now using a single image per page. Some of those images are naturalistic, while others are rendered in her new, ultra-minimalist style. This allows her to pull in and zoom out of extreme emotional states. The story follows a stay in a hotel as she hears a couple arguing very loudly in the room next door. What follows is a mix of the bizzarely comedic and emotionally triggering, as an aged security guard slowly ambles his way into her room and then down the hall, while Mari herself is weeping. She's weeping because she's being chased by the ghosts of boyfriends past, in the sense that she was on the opposite end of this scenario when younger--being threatened by abusive boyfriends. It's a pointed story about what responsibilities we have toward our fellow people weighed against the concerns of privacy, mixed with alternating chords of guilt and anger that no one called the cops on her behalf in the past. It's a typically nuanced, powerful and funny take on a troubling subject by an artist who's really on a roll.

Adult Time, by Whitney Taylor. Taylor is in the unenviable position of desperately wanting to be a full-time cartoonist but finding herself shackled to a completely unrelated career. Now that she's completed grad school and is yoked to that job full time, Taylor seems to have taken on a new commitment to comics, and her work has slowly matured and started to take shape as she finds her own personal style. This comic is devoted to the scary idea of being an adult and suddenly, magically shifting one's focus from the interests of youth to the realities of being a professional. I like the fact that she drew many of these comics at her cubicle; it's where many an inspired idea has been scribbled. Taylor shows off her sense of humor in this mini in strips about going to a wine tasting that include ridiculing the jargon of tasting ("like a garlicky fettucine alfredo with an asphalt mouthfeel") that ends with a surprisingly dirty joke at the end. Her "Field Guide To Adult Time" is an a to z primer that's both heartfelt & funny; it also features some of her best drawing. Taylor's self-deprecatory nature serves her well in strips about going to weddings and accidentally friending her ex-boyfriend's girlfriend on Facebook. Taylor's voice as a storyteller is starting to emerge as an especially sharp and funny one, and her art is starting to better match what she's trying to accomplish on the page. My sense is that 2013 will be a year of important growth for her as an artist.

He Also Has Drills For Hands V2, by Marguerite Dabaie. Dabaie's devotion to drawing a daily strip is such that she managed to do it during graduate school. These strips are a departure from her more intricate, detailed comics, with a sketchy and cartoony line being deployed. Debaie is a good enough draftsman to not worry about getting too fussy with her drawings; instead, she's after a punchline or getting across a basic idea. Dabaie goes from the silly (a dirty joke done on a calculator) to the quotidian (making stew) to the anecdotal (accounts of movies being made in her neighborhood) to the intellectual (pondering differences in languages). There's an easy charm to her work that makes reading these a pleasure, even if it's fairly disposable, breezy work compared to her other projects. Still, it's interesting to see an artist's process in forcing herself to draw and clearly find ways to enjoy that experience.