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Reviews and commentary by Tony Isabella
"America's Most Beloved Comic-Book Writer & Columnist"
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TONY'S ONLINE TIPS
for Monday, March 3, 2008
Weighing in at 15.6 pounds, the two-volume MAD's Greatest Artists: The Completely MAD Don Martin box set [Running Press Book Publishers; $150] was a Christmas present from my Sainted Wife Barb. It took me just over two months to read its 1200 pages, but the muscle strain from lifting it will stay with me for a lifetime. So will the laughs.
I knew Martin as "MAD's Maddest Artist," discovering him when I started reading the magazine in the mid-1960s. The only reason I didn't "meet" him sooner was that, prior to that, my parents had refused to let me buy MAD. My memory of the why of this is foggy, but I suspect some pompous columnist for The Catholic Universe Bulletin had condemned it. Begging forgiveness for the pun, my parents would religiously consult the paper before allowing me to see any movie, so it's not much of a stretch to assume the UB was responsible for their ill will towards MAD. But, at some point, I just started buying the magazine and they either ignored or never took note of my defiance. My wonderful parents never really tried to stop me from developing into my own person...much to their, I'm sure, horror.
Martin appeared in MAD from 1956 to 1988. The MAD paperbacks - except for those containing new material - never appealed to me as much as the magazine itself, so much of his earlier material was new to me. From the beginning, Martin's style and work was infused with a wondrously bizarre individuality and originality. As nearly every tribute included in these volumes proclaims, no one drew like Martin. A legion of cartoonists, professionals and kids sketching in their school notebooks, have tried, but Martin was and remains one of a kind.
Martin's early MAD contributions aren't as strong as his work in the mid-1960s. His style carried him through even the lamest of concepts and he did an amazing job drawing the magazine's "Gentle Ben" parody, but his forte, his masterpieces, were the single-page gags scattered throughout every issue. Those pieces are alive with his grotesque-yet-somehow-real "Martin People" with their strange names, hapless straight men walking through a world of odd sounds and dire fates. Martin's cartoons might be the sunniest dark humor in the history of comedy.
This two-volume set reprints every piece of art Martin did for MAD during his tenure with the magazine, a tenure that ended when he left in dispute over the non-payment of royalties when his work was reprinted in the wildly successful MAD paperbacks. Publisher Bill Gaines was a generous employer in most ways, but he preferred a paternalistic approach - for example, taking the contributors on vacation trips as if they were his children - to paying royalties or returning their original art. These had already become standard operating procedure in the comics industry by 1988, but the usually far-sighted Gaines was tragically and uncharacteristically behind the times on these matters. It cost him his "Maddest Artist" and the magazine was never quite the same afterwards.
Missing from these volumes are the non-MAD paperbacks Martin did during these years. His estate owns the rights to these books and we can only hope that they someday present them in as grand as fashion as this box set presents Martin's MAD work. I'd buy such a collection in a heartbeat.
Flaws? They are mostly minor. For pagination reasons, some of Martin's earliest contributions are reprinted out of order from how they originally appeared in MAD, causing momentary confusion at places. The tributes are a little excessive, mostly because many of them say the same things over and over again - Martin was quiet, Martin was good-looking, Martin drew feet unlike anyone else, etc. I would have preferred more material on how Martin worked with the MAD editors and writers. General gags submitted to the magazine but not immediately accepted were apparently sent to Martin for his possible use, making him something of an editor himself. I would love to learn more about that process. Still, as I said, these are minor flaws.
MAD's Greatest Artists: The Completely MAD Don Martin is a treasure, pure and simple. Discounts are readily available, but it's well worth its list price. It earns the full five out of five Tonys.
******
MANGA, MANGA, MANGA
I read three manga books last week with the best of the bunch being Machiko Sakurai's Minima!, Volume 1 [Del Rey; $10.95]. A shy schoolgirl finds a "super-cute" doll at an amusement park and they take a mutual shine to one another, so much so that the doll comes to life. This is not a unique situation; at least one other doll comes to life in this first book, but, apparently, revealing themselves to their owners is bad form.
The story is goofy sweet with the usual schoolgirl anxieties and rivalries. Ame Oikawa has to deal with those things and with the attention given to her new doll Nicori when the media gets wind of his sentience. Nicori is a feisty little guy determined to make Ame's wishes come true. The supporting characters are pretty good, though they aren't as distinctive as I would like.
What keeps Minima! from being a must-read series are my usual complaints about so many manga series. The art is the same old same old - big-eyed kids drawn in the same style as a thousand other manga series - and the storytelling, the panel-to-panel and scene-to-scene flow, is atrocious. It pains me to think about what could have been done with these characters and this concept in the hands of a better writer/artist. The variety to be found in manga can be breathtaking, but the form can also be as trite as the most derivative autobiographical or super-hero fare. I liked this well enough to give Minima! another chance, but, unless there is improvement in the drawing and storytelling, the characters/concept might not be able to hold my interest.
Minima!, Volume 1 earns three Tonys.
Less compelling is Yozakura Quartet Volume 1 [Del Rey; $10.95] by Suzuhito Yasuda, which stars three "supergirls" and the regular guy who hangs out with them. Hime is a teen super-heroine who's also the mayor of the town she patrols. Ao is a mind-reader. Kotoha is a demon with magical powers. They battle demon dogs and the like. There's something here - some nice character interaction and personal problems - but it's not any better written than most or even many American super-teen comic books...and that's setting the bar pretty darn low.
Yozakura Quartet Volume 1 earns two Tonys.
Utterly disappointing is The Manga Bible: From Genesis to Revelation [Galilee Trade; $12.95] by Siku. The artist attempted to adapt both the Old and New Testaments into 200 pages of comics. But the book's "hip" writing is tedious and its cramped artwork is uninspiring. Indeed, the notion of getting jiggy with the Bible is beyond laughable; it's downright embarrassing.
The Manga Bible gets no Tonys from me.
******
BIRTHDAY
Here's a TOT birthday shout-out to Max Allan Collins, a friend and one of my favorite writers, who was born on this date in 1948. Max has written more good stuff than I can cover in just one birthday shout-out: novels, comic books, comic strips, movies, movie and TV novelizations, historical detective novels, and much more. With artist Terry Beatty, he created the beautifully deadly Ms. Tree, easily the greatest detective heroine in comics. Any time I can read a new Collins book, I'm a happy guy.
Published last year, Deadly Beloved [Leisure; $6.99] is Collins' first Ms. Tree novel. In this retelling of her "origin," the character makes the transition from comics to prose seamlessly. It's not precisely the same origin that appeared in the comics, but it's a solid and thrilling murder mystery that holds its own with the best of the Collins/Beatty collaborations. From Beatty's fine cover painting to the surprising conclusion - though, points to me, I deduced the killer's identity fairly early on - this novel kept glued to my favorite chair and, after a half-century reading genre fiction, that's a rare thing for me.
Deadly Beloved earns the full five Tonys and my friend has my wishes for the happiest of birthdays and many more creative, joyful, and successful years to come.
Addendum. In the bookstores even as we speak is Collins' new book, Bones: Buried Deep [Pocket Star; $7.99], a novel based on the Bones TV series created by Kathy Reichs and starring Emily Deschanel and David Boreanaz.
Addendum two. You can visit the official Max Allan Collins website at:
www.maxallancollins.com
I'd also like to extend the warmest birthday greetings to my pal Dan Mishkin, whose comics creations include Amethyst: Princess of Gemworld, Blue Devil, and Creeps. Dan also wrote The Forest King: Woodlark's Shadow, a children's novel that earned four Tonys when I reviewed it here:
www.worldfamouscomics.com/tony/back20070122.shtml
Happy birthday to the revered Mishkin, who is now eligible for for full AARP membership and senior discounts. He also has his own MySpace page, which you can visit here:
www.myspace.com/danmishkin
******
COMICS IN THE COMICS
Veteran TOT readers know how much I love newspaper comics that mention characters from other strips and comic books, or otherwise indulge in self-referential humor. By odd coincidence, two recent strips from last week referred to the venerable Marmaduke, which cartoonist Brad Anderson has been drawing since 1954 and to the present day.
First up was Jim Meddick's Monty, which ran on Tuesday, February 26:
Then there was Scott Stantis' Prickly City from Friday, February 29:
Now Stantis is the last cartoonist who should be comparing any other comic strip to torture, but I still got a kick out of seeing these Marmaduke references.
Thanks to the ever-alert Tom Duffy for sending me the Monty strip...and keep watching this column for more Comics in the Comics.
******
TONY POLLS
Today's your last day to vote on last week's Tony Polls questions. To refresh your memory, they were...
It's comics awards season. How likely are you to buy/read a comic because it was nominated for a comics award?
And...
Yours truly is either exploring his options or unemployed. Which of these potential comics, non-fiction, and prose fiction projects of mine would you be most interested in reading?
You can vote on these questions here:
www.worldfamouscomics.com/tony/poll
Two weeks ago, the election for President of the United States in the wild, wacky world of the Tony Polls ended in a tie. So, starting tomorrow, we're asking you which of the two remaining candidates - Barbara Gordon or Joseph "Robbie" Robertson - you want to lead us in these dangerous years of civil wars, final crisis, secret invasions, and stories that just go on and on and on? This run-off election will run until sometime after midnight on Tuesday morning, March 11. Besides voting, you are encouraged to visit my official message board...
www.comicscommunity.com/boards/tony
...and campaign for the candidate of your choice.
******
TODAY'S COLUMN
Tony's Online Tips is a reader-supported feature, made possible by donations from those of you enjoy the column. Today's TOT was sponsored by David and Robert...and we thank them for their support. If you'd like to donate and so enable new installments of TOT to continue to appear every Monday through Friday, click on the "Tip The Tipster" link elsewhere on this page.
Thanks for spending a part of your day with me. I'll be back tomorrow with more stuff.
Tony Isabella
<< 02/29/2008 | 03/03/2008 | 03/04/2008 >>
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THE "TONY" SCALE
ZERO: Burn your money before buying any comic receiving this rating. It doesn't *necessarily* mean there's absolutely nothing of value here - though it *could* - but whatever value it might possess shrinks into insignificance before its overall awfulness.
ONE: Buy something else. Maybe I found something which wasn't completely dreadful in the item, but not enough for me to recommend it when there are better comics available. I only want what's best for you, my children.
TWO: Basic judgment call. I found some value, but not enough to recommend it. My review should give you enough info to decide if you want to take a chance on it. Are you feeling lucky today, punk? Well, are you?
THREE: This denotes something I find perfectly respectable. There are better books out there, but I wouldn't regret buying this item. Based on my review, you should be able to determine if it's of interest to you. Let the Force guide you.
FOUR: I recommend anything earning this rating. Unless you don't like the genre, subject matter, or past work of the creators, I believe you'll enjoy this item. Isn't it uncanny how I can look right into your soul that way?
FIVE: Anything getting this rating is among the best comicdom has to offer. You should buy/read this, even if the genre/subject matter doesn't appeal to you. It's for your own good. Me, I live for comics and books this good...but not in a pathetic "Comic-Book Guy" sort of way.
Please send material you would like me to review to:
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