Welcome to 2024. Is it just me or did that last year feel like more than a couple millennia? I assume you’re all still alive and subscribed, or that we’ve all merged into a kind of post-earthly miasma of AI-helmed fused intelligences.
Either way, we/you thank you for your subscription. Please consider upgrading to paid, or just spamming your friends and loved ones. Tell them it’s a comic about life after death. Or that your new year’s resolution is to further support independent arts. I’m sure they’ll thank you.
Today I’d like to highlight a coupe comics I spent all my xmas Visa gift cards on (thanks auntie Petunia!) Even if you’ve never read a comic in your life (other than Skingirl of course), why not head to your local comic shop (I will always recommend Cape and Cowl) and ask the pros. I guarantee you will be a better person for it. Or at least a more problematic and confusing dinner invite…
Up first, Swan Song…
If you’ve read Ice Cream Man (and I highly recommend you do), then you already know. W. Maxwell Prince has got to be one of the most surprising and unique writers working in comics today. He’s a huge inspiration and I’ll pick up just about anything he writes on. Filipe Andrade is a new find for me. I first saw his work with Ram V. on The Many Deaths of Laila Starr, and more recently on Rare Flavors. Glad to see he’s doing more work outside of the Marvel pulp mill.
Next up, Creepshow…
To no one’s surprise, this anthology series is one of my tippidy-tops. Dan Watters is another name I will always look for. He really knows how to turn the screw…
I love it when a writer let’s you see it coming from panel one, then takes their sweet time getting there. Watters definitely goes there, but he builds the tension up to a boiling point. By this page, you can practically feel the cacophony bouncing off your ear drums.
If you’ve got the spine, and enjoy dark fantasy/fairy tales, I’d recommend Watters’ work Coffinbound. He’s got a great way of dancing on top of metaphor without taking his foot off the narrative pedal. I also just saw that Watters put out The Incal: Dying Star last year, with Jon Davis-Hunt, who worked on 2000AD. Definitely going on my list. I wonder if there’s a chance Auntie Petunia is handing out checks for Groundhog Day.
It’s a bird! It’s a plane! No, it’s a PAYWALL!
Never fear, free subscriber, you’ll still get a chance to see page 7 in a few weeks, along with a new edition of UNSKIND for all you process nerds. (I also hear some rustling in the distance…could that be…Cowboy Chris?)
If you can’t wait, please consider becoming a paid subscriber to UNSKIND.
And now, a sneaky peeky at Skingirl page 7…
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