Gertrude is one sick, twisted, murderously-narcissistic individual. But then the odds are pretty good that you would be too if you’d tumbled into the sugar-drenched delights of Fairyland, where fauns and Giggle Giants and sentient moons and stars romp, at the age of 6 and spent 30 years trying Continue Reading
Comics
Comic book review: Giant Days
Giant Days is one of those comics you fall in love with almost instantly. To be honest, instantly. How can you not? The three main characters – Esther de Groot, Susan Ptolemy and Daisy Wooton, all first year students at the University of Sheffield when the series opens – are Continue Reading
Hamfam: A trippy porcine ride into a comic post-apocalyptic wasteland
SNAPSHOT Hamfam – a 25 page digital comic set within a dark, dangerous wasteland – following the exploits of a surreal and quirky pig! The World has ended, but the party has just begun!Hamfam is more than a pig, more than a place – it’s a way of life. Continue Reading
Archer and Scooby Doo in the same cartoon? Butch Hartman winningly marries up kids and adult cartoons
Unless you want to spend the next month answering awkward questions and/or potentially scarring dear little John, Judy or Millicent for life, you’re likely not to sit them down with you to watch Family Guy, Rick and Morty or South Park. SpongeBob SquarePants or Peanuts? Sure! Archer or The Continue Reading
Rip’d from the pages of my childhood: The Adventures of Asterix #BastilleDay
When you’re growing up, you don’t really have the insight or emotional maturity to fully understand why something matters to you or why you like it so much. But when you reacquaint yourself with a much-loved childhood book series like Asterix or The Adventures of Asterix, originally written by René Continue Reading
A slice of heaven: RIP Murray Ball, cartoonist extraordinaire
One of my fondest childhood memories is lying sprawled on the family room floor with comic books spread out before me, everything from British comics like Cheeky Weekly and Whoopee through to Peanuts, Tumbleweeds and Murray Ball’s Footrot Flats (1975-1994). It’s that last title that has particular resonance for Continue Reading
More comics reinvention: Looney Tunes meets DC Comics
Now that they have (mostly) successfully re-imagined a slew of Hanna-Barbera characters such as Scooby Doo, The Flintstones and Wacky Races, Warner Bros, through their DC Comics imprint, have decided to move on to the goofy cast of Looney Tunes. The idea, according to the press release (below) is Continue Reading
Weekend pop art: Apple’s T & Cs re-done in the style of famous cartoons and comic strips
Who actually reads Terms and Conditions (T & Cs) documents? Anyone? anyone? Bueller? Just as I thought – NO ONE. Yeah, yeah we totally should so we know if the vendor we’re signing up with is going to require our firstborn in the event of a missed bill or Continue Reading
Comics review: Future Quest (issues 1-4)
As previously reviewed modern comic book iterations of Scooby Doo, The Flintstones and Wacky Races have illustrated, reviving an old pop culture property, in the case of Future Quest, quite a number of them, comes with a unique set of challenges. Not insurmoutable challenges of course but fairly sizable Continue Reading
Book review: The Finding of Martha Lost by Caroline Wallace
Compelling though many protagonists are, and they need to be if you’re going to make it to the end of the average novel, it’s a rare thing indeed to fall headlong in love with a lead character to the extent that you do with the whimsical, trusting but ultimately Continue Reading