Monday, March 26, 2012

Boys Don't Cry (Special Edition) by Rumer

Out June 5.

Comics About Cartoonists

Out Sept. 11.
What's cooler than comics about cartoonist? NOTHING! This is mind-blowing, full-color hardback book collects rare comics about real and fictional cartoonists - created by the greatest cartoonists in the world! Read comics about cartoonists by the top illustrators and creators in the field: Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko, Jack Cole, Dick Briefer, Winsor McCay, Chester Gould, Sheldon Mayer, Milton Caniff, Ernie Bushmiller, Basil Wolverton, Siegel and Shuster, Will Eisner, Elzie Segar, and Harvey Kurtzman! Plus, more by Charles Schulz, George Herriman, and a 1940s comic about Walt Disney! It's a veritable "Who's Who" of great cartoonists, drawing superhero, horror, funny animal, funny people, war and romance comics... about cartoonists!

Kamandi, The Last Boy On Earth Omnibus Vol. 2

Out Dec. 18.

Friday, March 23, 2012

"'Taint The Meat...It's The Humanity!" and Other Stories (The EC Comics Library) featuring Jack Davis

Out. Jan. 9, 2013
Tales From the Crypt was the quintessential American horror comic book, and Jack Davis the quintessential Tales From the Crypt artist: A brilliant virtuoso whose long-limbed, cartoony-but-hyperdetailed slapstick both cut against and amplified the weird and nauseating grotesqueries that spilled from the EC Comics writers’ fevered minds, including — as seen in this volume — “’Taint the Meat... It’s the Humanity,” an evil-butcher horror story that ends pretty much like you’d expect any evil-butcher horror story to end. Presenting the classic EC material in reader-friendly, artist-and-genre-centric packages for the first time, ’Taint the Meat collects every one of Davis’s 24 Crypt stories in one convenient, gore-drenched package. Mostly written by EC editor Al Feldstein, these stories run the gamut from pure supernatural horror (the werewolf story “Upon Reflection” and the vampire story “Fare Tonight, Followed by Increasing Clottyness…”) to science gone horribly wrong (“Bats in My Belfry!”), as well as the classic “disbeliever gets his comeuppance” story (“Grounds… For Horror!”) to EC’s bread and butter, the ridiculously grisly revenge-of-the-abused tale (“The Trophy!” and “Well-Cooked Hams!”)… seasoned with buckets of blood and some of the most godawful punning titles ever committed to newsprint. Tales From the Crypt was the inspiration for the no-holds-barred pop-culture horror revolution of the 1970s and later, be it Stephen King, Tobe (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre) Hooper, zombiemeister George A. Romero, or the current generation of extreme-horror practitioners like Eli (Hostel) Roth. Yet try as they may, no one has been able to capture the combination of technical virtuosity, tongue-in-cheek grisliness, and sheer naughty desire to provoke and appall that these classics managed to pull off again and again. ’Taint the Meat… will also include extensive story notes by EC experts from around the world.

"50 Girls 50" and Other Stories (The EC Comics Library) - featuring Al Williamson

Out Jan. 13, 2013
Barely old enough to drink when he joined the EC Comics stable, Al Williamson may have been the new kid on the block, but a lifetime of studying such classic adventure cartoonists as Alex Raymond (Flash Gordon) and Hal Foster (Prince Valiant) had made him a kid to reckon with — as he proved again and again in the stories he created for EC’s legendary “New Trend” comics, in particular Weird Science and Weird Fantasy. As a result of Williamson’s focus, it’s possible to compile all of Williamson’s “New Trend” EC work into one book — which Fantagraphics is finally doing here. Sci-fi aficionados should note that although most of the stories were written by Al Feldstein, 50 Girls 50 features three of EC’s legendary Ray Bradbury adaptations, including “I, Rocket” and “A Sound of Thunder” — and a unique curiosity, a strip adapted from a short story submitted by a teenage Harlan Ellison. Williamson ran with a gang of like-minded young Turks dubbed the “Fleagle Gang,” who would help one another out on assignments. Thus this book includes three stories upon which Williamson was joined by the legendary Frank Frazetta, and one story (“Food for Thought”) where Roy Krenkel provided his exquisite alien landscapes, to make it one of the most gorgeous EC stories ever printed. As a supplementary bonus, 50 Girls 50 includes three stories drawn by Fleagles sans Williamson: Frazetta’s Shock SuspenStories short “Squeeze Play”; Krenkel’s meticulous “Time to Leave”; and Angelo Torres’s “An Eye for an Eye,” an EC story that famously fell prey to censorship and was not released until the 1970s. As with other Fantagraphics EC titles, 50 Girls 50 will also include extensive story notes by EC experts.

Showcase Presents: The Flash Vol. 4

Out Oct. 30

Showcase Presents: World's Finest Vol. 4

Out Nov. 27

Monday, March 12, 2012

The Sarah Jane Adventures: The Complete Fifth Season

Out June 12.

The Creativity of Steve Ditko

Out July 24.

Steve Ditko's most creative comics are lovingly reproduced in a beautiful large format hardback book, The Creativity of Steve Ditko, a companion to Craig Yoe's previous The Art of Ditko. Featuring a Foreword by Paul Levitz with revealing essays by Mike Gold, Jack Harris, Mikal Banta, and Amber Stanton, The Creativity of Steve Ditko showcases a plethora of unpublished art, sketches, and many never previously printed photos of Ditko.

Heroic Tales (Vol. 2) (The Bill Everett Archives)

Out Nov. 21
This second volume includes some of the Sub-Mariner creator’s work in the superhero and romance comics genres.
Creating the Sub-Mariner for the first issue of Marvel Comics in 1939 assures writer/artist Bill Everett a place in history. Co-creating Daredevil, the Man Without Fear, for Marvel Comics in 1964 gave Everett a link to one of the most popular superheroes of the past 50 years. And producing over 400 additional pages of superhero-related work in the very early days of the Golden Age of Comics (1938-42) makes Bill Everett a legend. Heroic Comics: The Bill Everett Archives Vol. 2 collects over 200 pages of never-before-reprinted work from such titles as Amazing Mystery Funnies (1938), Amazing-Man Comics (1939), Target Comics (1940), Heroic Comics (1940), and Blue Bolt Comics (1940). These titles feature an endless array of vintage Everett characters such Amazing-Man, Hydroman, Skyrocket Steele, The Chameleon and many more, all produced by Everett’s shop Funnies, Inc. for such clients as Centaur, Novelty Press, and Eastern Color. This book also features, reprinted for the first time, the rarest of Everett material, his romance work from the early 1950s for Eastern Color on titles such as New Heroic Comics (1950/51) and Personal Love (1953). All of the stories within display Everett’s brilliant cartooning and energetic storytelling growing by leaps and bounds. Edited by best-selling author and comic-book historian Blake Bell (Strange and Stranger: The World of Steve Ditko), Heroic Comics: The Bill Everett Archives Volume 2 is a stunning companion piece to Bell’s 2010 critically acclaimed Everett biography and art book, Fire and Water: Bill Everett, The Sub-Mariner and the Birth of Marvel Comics. This volume follows the format of Bell’s Steve Ditko Archives series: never-before-reprinted, beautifully restored, full-color stories from one of comic books’ greatest visionaries and accomplished artists. This book also includes an introduction about the man, his art, the history of the era, and his relationship with Marvel Comics.

Thursday, March 8, 2012

Weird Horrors & Daring Adventures (Vol. 1) (The Joe Kubert Archives)

Out Sept. 19.

 Joe Kubert sealed his reputation as one of the greatest American comic-book cartoonists of all time with the four-color adventures of Sgt. Rock of Easy Company, Enemy Ace, and Tarzan, all done for DC Comics during the 1960s and 1970s (themselves already the subject of archival editions)... but he had been working in comics since the 1940s. In fact, young Kubert produced an exciting, significant body of work as a freelance artist for a variety of comic book publishers in the postwar era, in a glorious variety of non-super hero genres: horror, crime, science fiction, western, romance, humor, and more. For the first time, 33 of the best of these stories have been collected in one full-color volume, with a special emphasis on horror and crime. The Kubert work in this book is that of a burgeoning talent attacking the work with tremendous panache, and in the process, developing a style that became one of the most distinctive in the medium. Since these stories were written and drawn in the pre-Comics Code era, they are more thrilling, violent and sexy (by contemporary standards) than much of his later, Code-constrained work. And just the titles of the comic books from which these stories are taken are wonderfully evocative of a bygone era of four-color fun: Cowpuncher, Abbott and Costello Comics, Three Stooges, Eerie, Planet Comics, Meet Miss Pepper, Strange Terrors, Green Hornet Comics, Whack, Jesse James, Out of This World, Crime Does Not Pay, Weird Thrillers, Police Lineup, and Hollywood Confessions. As with Fantagraphics’ acclaimed Steve Ditko and Bill Everett Archives series, Weird Horrors and Daring Adventures boasts state-of-the-art restoration and retouching, and an extensive set of historical notes and an essay by the book’s editor Bill Schelly, author of the Art of Joe Kubert art book and Man of Rock Kubert biography.

Pogo: Bona Fide Balderdash (Vol. 2)

Out Sept. 19.

 In November of 2011, Fantagraphics released the first volume of its much-anticipated, long-promised series reprinting in its entirety the syndicated run of Walt Kelly’s classic newspaper strip, Pogo. Pogo: Through the Wild Blue Wonder immediately became the company’s best-selling book of the last five years. Exactly one year later, the second volume, Pogo: Bona Fide Balderdash, will be released, featuring all the strips from 1951 and 1952. With sources found for the more elusive strips (in the past, our scheduling downfall), we’re confident that these collections will become an annual affair. Even though Pogo had been in syndication for less than two years as this volume begins, Kelly’s long professional experience (including seven years creating Pogo stories for comic books) had him at the peak of his powers, and this book features page after page of gorgeously drawn, hilarious vaudevillian dialogue and action among the swamp denizens, as well as Kelly’s increasingly sharp-tongued political satire — especially on display during the 1952 election season. Kelly was famous for his prolific creation of recurring characters, and by the end of this second volume, the count will already have topped over one hundred. New arrivals include Tammanany the Tiger, the voluble P.T. Bridgeport, the sinister Sarcophagus MacAbre (with his funereal speech balloons), Uncle Antler the bull moose... and Bewitched, Bothered, and Bemildred, the adorable trio of bats. The two years of daily strips in this volume have been collected before but in now long-out-of print books; and even there they were not as meticulously restored and reproduced as in this new series. Bona Fide Balderdash also reprints, literally for the first time ever in full color, the two full years of Sunday pages, also carefully restored and color-corrected, shot from the finest copies available. This second volume is once again edited and designed by the cartoonist’s daughter, Carolyn Kelly, who is also handling much of the restoration work. It includes a new introduction by the legendary author, recording artist, and satirist Stan Freberg, who was not only a friend of Kelly’s but the voice of Albert the Alligator in the I Go Pogo: Pogo for President movie. There will also be more extensive annotations by comic strip historian and expert R.C. Harvey, as well as additional historical information from writer Mark Evanier.

The Love and Rockets Companion: 30 Years (and Counting)

Out Sept. 19.

 The Love and Rockets Companion: 30 Years (and Counting) contains three incredibly in-depth and candid interviews with creators Gilbert, Jaime and Mario Hernandez: one conducted by writer Neil Gaiman (Coraline); one conducted some six years into the comic’s run by longtime L&R publisher Gary Groth; and one conducted by the book’s author, spanning Gilbert’s, Jaime’s and Mario’s careers, and looking to the future of the ongoing series, with a follow-up conversation with Groth. This book has foldout family trees for both Gilbert’s Palomar and Jaime’s Locas storylines; unpublished art; a character glossary (which is handy, considering that Gilbert alone has created 50+ characters!); highlights from the original series’ anarchic letters columns; timelines; and the most wide-ranging Hernandez Brothers bibliography ever compiled, including album and DVD covers, posters and more. The obsessive-yet-accessible detail and high production values make it a must-have for comics collectors, scholars, libraries and old and new fans alike: for those new to the series, it will make jumping in seem less daunting. For longtime fans, it clears up confusion that even those devoted to the groundbreaking alternative comic over its 30-year run can experience, given the sheer amount of material and sophisticated storytelling techniques (such as flashbacks, flash forwards, elliptical narrative and magical realism).

Prince Valiant: 1947-1948 (Vol. 6)

Out Oct. 17.


Hal Foster’s masterpiece of adventure enters its second decade as Valiant and Aleta journey to “The New World,” a 16-month epic that allows Foster to draw some of his spectacular native Canadian backgrounds, and during which Aleta gives birth to Arn and acquires her Indian nurse, Tillicum. Most of the rest of the book is taken up with the action-packed five-month sequence “The Mad King,” during which Val, back at Camelot, confronts the evil, fat little King Tourien of Cornwall. This volume will be rounded off with an essay by Foster scholar Brian M. Kane (The Prince Valiant Companion) discussing Foster’s depiction of “Indians” as it relates to other interpretations of the times, accompanied by various graphic goodies such as a previously unpublished camping cartoon by Foster from circa 1915, some of Foster’s Mountie paintings, Foster’s own map of Val’s voyage to/from the New World, and more rare photos and art.

Walt Disney's Mickey Mouse Vol. 4: "House Of The Seven Haunts!" (Vol. 4)

Out Oct. 24.

Who says dead men tell no tales? When grim grinning ghosts come out to socialize, they’ll find fearless Mickey all ready to rumble — as soon as he’s done fighting gangsters, bandits, and international men of mystery, that is! From Africa to Eastern Europe, our favorite big cheese is in for terrifying thrills — and he’s bringing Goofy, Donald Duck, and that big palooka Pegleg Pete along for the ride! When Mickey sets out to eject “The Seven Ghosts” from Bassett Manor, he finds more than just specters providing the scares! Next, moving smoothly from horror to science fiction, our hero discovers an awesome “Island in the Sky”— and meets its maker, the powerful atomic scientist Dr. Einmug! Lovingly restored from Disney’s original negatives and proof sheets, House of the Seven Haunts! also includes more than 50 pages of spooky supplementary features! You’ll enjoy rare behind-the-scenes art, vintage publicity material, and fascinating commentary by a haunted houseful of Disney scholars.

Walt Disney's Donald Duck Vol. 2: "A Christmas For Shacktown" (Vol. 2)

Out Nov. 7

This volume of Fantagraphics’ reprinting of Carl Barks’s classic Donald Duck and Uncle Scrooge work focuses on the early 1950s, universally considered one of Barks’s very peak periods. Originally published in 1951, “A Christmas for Shacktown” is one of Barks’s masterpieces: A rare 32-pager that stays within the confines of Duckburg, featuring a storyline in which the Duck family works hard to raise money to throw a Christmas party for the poor children of the city’s slums (depicted by Barks with surprisingly Dickensian grittiness), and climaxing in one of the most memorable images Barks ever created, the terrifying bottomless pit that swallows up all of Scrooge’s money. But there’s lots more gold to be found in this volume (literally), which features both the “The Golden Helmet” (a quest off the coast of Labrador for a relic that might grant the finder ownership of America, reducing more than one cast member to a state of Gollum-like covetousness) while “The Gilded Man” features a hunt for a rare stamp in South America—two more of Barks’s thrilling full-length adventure stories. But that’s less than half the volume! This volume also features ten of Barks’s smart and funny 10-pagers, including a double whammy of yarns co-starring Donald’s insufferable cousin (“Gladstone’s Usual Very Good Year” and “Gladstone’s Terrible Secret”), as well as another nine of Barks’s rarely seen one-page Duck gags… all painstakingly recolored to match the original coloring as exactly as possible, and supplemented with an extensive series of notes and behind-the-scenes essays by the foremost Duck experts in the world.

Nancy Likes Christmas: Complete Dailies 1946-1948 (Vol. 2)

Out Nov. 21

Thursday, March 1, 2012

Essential Black Panther - Volume 1

Out May 23.

Embark on an expedition into the heart of Marvel's dark continent! Join T'Challa, King of Wakanda - AKA the Black Panther - as he fights to uphold peace and justice in both his own African kingdom and the urban jungle of New York City. Experience the thrills as one of the Marvel Universe's noblest knights-errant takes on everything from hate mongering heels to futuristic frog time machines, as brought to you by the inimitable imaginations of some of comicdom's most sensational scribes.

COLLECTING: Jungle Action (1972) 6-22, 24; Black Panther (1977) 1-10

Secret Society of Supervillains Vol. 2

Out May 25.

Why Does Batman Carry Shark Repellent?: And Other Amazing Comic Book Trivia!

Out May 29.


Outrageous, fascinating and bizarre facts from every corner of the comic book universe
What comic book artist was the recipient of an on-stage thank you from Paul McCartney and an on-air apology from Johnny Carson? What superhero got his powers by being bitten by a mongoose? What popular NPR host was forever immortalized as a "bad boyfriend" in a notable comic book? In Why Does Batman Carry Shark Repellent?, author Brian Cronin will answer those questions and more by revealing the most obscure, wacky and surprising facts about comics—from the characters and creators, to the TV shows, movies and merch. Cronin has teamed up with some of the top comic book writers and artists of today to present 100 trivia lists, including:
·        Nine Celebrities That Guest-Starred in Comic Books…without Their Permission
·        Seven Bands That Got Their Names from Comics
·        Ten Crazy Items Found on Batman’s Utility Belt
·        Five Comic Book Inventions That Eventually Became Real
·        Five Stupidest Superhero Origins
·        And much, much more!
From Batman to Spiderman, Aquaman to the X-Men, each list in Why Does Batman Carry Shark Repellent? will entertain and inform whether you’re a hardcore geek or a casual fan.

Marvel Masterworks: Atlas Era Journey Into Mystery - Volume 4

Out May 30
The Marvel Masterworks are once again going back to the days when horror ruled the racks. Yes, it's time to take a journey into mystery! And this volume offers a very special treat-Steve Ditko's very first story for Marvel. In 1956, at the beginning of his career, Ditko drew a handful of stories for Stan Lee and you'll get not just one, but two of them here. Also providing heaping helpings of suspense, scares and twist endings are 1950s comics luminaries like Wally Wood, Al Wiliamson, Bernie Krigstein, Gene Colans and so many, many more.
COLLECTING: Journey Into Mystery 31-40

Avengers: The Trial of Yellowjacket

Out Aug. 15.

Marvel Masterworks: The Defenders - Volume 3

Out Aug. 22
Hulk, Dr. Strange, Sub-Mariner, Valkyrie and Nighthawk join up with Luke Cage, Daredevil and Son of Satan to take on the likes of the Wrecking Crew, Satannish and Asmodeus. Then, spinning out of a storyline in Marvel Two-In-One, comes Steve Gerber! Deconstructing genre conventions and adding a healthy dose of absurdity, Gerber's innovative run turned the expectations of readers on their heads, so suitably we're including the original Atlas Era appearances of the Headmen-Gorilla Man, Jerold Morgan and Chondu the Mystic!
COLLECTING: DEFENDERS 17-21, GIANT-SIZE DEFENDERS 2-4, MARVEL TWO-IN-ONE 6-7

Essential Warlock Vol. 1