Hurtling towards September at a rate of knots, in this week’s links, below, which means we’re heading into autumn’s comics festival and awards season, and then it’s basically a hop, skip, and a jump into the festive period’s end-of-year lists and planning ahead for January’s New Year’s resolutions — start playing the Oscars music, it’s time for the 2026 retail year to begin moving to leave the stage.
This week’s news.
• Beginning this week’s selection in Japan, as Nippon.com reports on the ongoing decline of sales of print editions of shōnen magazines, with readers moving to digital copies of the publications, the market for which is also contracting, as the Japanese government continues to support the economic soft power export of manga and anime overseas, while aggressively pursuing anti-piracy campaigns to maximise the profits gleaned from this.
• More manga news, out of Europe this time, as the French government announced a Saudi Arabia-backed plan to build a €6 billion manga-focused theme park, bankrolled by the Saudi Public Investment Fund, currently chaired by Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who has been accused of involvement in multiple human rights violations, including the murder and dismemberment of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
• Manga prizes news, as the winners of this year’s edition of the American Manga Awards were announced, with Naoki Urasawa and Takashi Nagasaki’s Billy Bat named as Best New Manga, Mokumokuren’s The Summer Hikaru Died named as Best Continuing Manga Series, and Machiko Kyō’s Cocoonnamed as Best One-Shot Manga – Anime News Networkhas a round-up of all this year’s winners here.
• Cartoonists United announced that MB Carvalho is the 2026 recipient of the organisation’s Digital Comics Residency, which offers creators a $1,000 grant and the hosting of a digital canvas for publication of digital comics.
• In memoriam,remembering those the world of comics has lost, as news was shared of the passing of comics letterer, and former design director of CrossGen, Dave Lanphear, who has died at the age of 58.
Cable. 6mm Pilot parallel pen with Platinum Carbon ink and Daniel Smith watercolors on Strathmore 500 series multimedia board.
This week’s reviews.
• Ian Thomas reviews the nuanced arguments of Lefteris “Boban” Papathanasis, Mauro Vanetti, and Vangelis Zikos’The Spectre— “As comics go, The Spectre—a collaboration between Greek and Italian creators—offers a more swaggering and hopeful conception of an ascendant and effective Left than its North American counterparts. Left comics emanating from North America tend to focus, probably correctly, on the systems that immiserate and oppress people within its borders and throughout its empire. Racism is North America’s Original Sin.”
•Marc Sobel reviews the elegant minimalism of Dash Shaw’s Like Swimmers – “In the end, it’s clear that Shaw is less interested in solving a murder than in questioning whether people, like works of art, can be reduced to a single identity. Just as the same image in Lichtenstein’s painting acquires different meanings depending on who is looking at it, so do the people in our lives. By the end of her investigation, Kenzie realizes, too late, that “there are at least two sides to every person,” and that there was much more to Howie than she, from her limited perspective as his older sister, ever knew.”
• Collier Jennings reviews the satanic bloodshed of Patrick Horvath, Tyler Crook, et al’s Archie in Hell #1.
• Kevin Clark reviews the rushed adventuring of Marguerite Bennett, Laura Braga, et al’s Witchblade/Vampirella #1.
• Crooker reviews the nostalgic refresh of Robert Kirkman, Lorenzo de Felici, et al’s ROM Special #1.
• Colin Moon reviews the satisfying symbiosis of Frank Tieri, Stefano Raffaele, et al’s Alien vs. Captain America.
• Robert Reed reviews the flawed fun of Ashley Allen Sumit Kumar, et al’s What if…? X-Men #1.
• Jonathan Waugh reviews the thrilling heroics of Ryan North, Gavin Guidry, et al’s The Flash #36.
• Diane Darcy reviews the emotional depth of Che Grayson, Scott Snyder, Bengal, et al’s Absolute Catwoman #3.
•Piper Whitaker reviews the singular experience of Raquelle Jac’s Bimbo Agitprop.
• Gianni Palumbo reviews the intriguing start of Rick Remender, Steve Epting, et al’s Hammerfist #1.
• Clyde Hall reviews the living world of Jimmy Palmiotti, Justin Gray, Pier Brito, et al’s Denver #1.
• Matt Ledger reviews the crossover celebrations of Matt Fraction, G. Willow Wilson, Giueseppe Camuncoli, Cliff Rathburn, et al’s Batman: Bad Seeds – Sunset #1.
• Tim Rooney reviews the lacking contrasts of Ashley Allen, Domenico Carbone, et al’s Tomb of Apocalypse #1.
• E.B. Hutchins reviews the blossoming narrative of Kendra Wells’ Real Hero Shit: Harder Than It Looks.
• Lydia Turner has reviews of:
- The gradual unfolding of Katie Skelly’sHeaven.
- The extraordinary visuals of Wojtek Wawszczyk and Tomasz Lew Leśniak’sFungae.
• Andy Oliver has reviews of:
- The distinctive subversions of Kayla E.’sPrecious Rubbish.
- The gorgeous restoration of Fantagraphics’Lost Marvels No. 4: The Gil Kane Rarities, Volume 1.
- The accessible visuals of Rachel Branham’s adaptation of Gloria Ladson-Billings’The Dreamkeepers: Successful Teachers of African American Children.
Kent Conrad reviews the unique wavelength of Jim Woodring’s Quacky.
Paul O’Brien hascapsule reviewsof Marvel Comics’Uncanny X-Men #34, Inglorious X-Force #8,andBishop #3.
Eddie Harrison reviews the nimble tact of Bart Simpson’s documentaryThe Mad World of Harvey Kurtzman.
Jason Sacks reviews the rich layers of Noah Van Sciver’sThe Mess.
Naja Beck reviews the fluffy cuteness of Toako’sI Fell for a Fujoshi, Volume 1, translated by M. Skeels.
dear god please give me ten thousand dollars
This week’s interviews.
• Sacha Mardou interviews Nick Abadzis and Angela Watson about My Beloved Other, emigration stateside, structuring the memoir’s narrative, and racist tropes in brand iconography — “[Angela Watson:] Yeah, comics. Comics is not my world. Even though it’s part of my world, because I’m married to Nick, it’s not the same as being in the world of comic book publishing. I couldn’t ever see myself being part of that world, not directly, but now I am. It was quite overwhelming, at first, when we began putting it together, because I am a private person. Having to be vulnerable, to be that open, was challenging.”
• Robert Aman interviews Anton Kannemeyer about Bitterkomix, the historical and sociopolitical context of the magazine in South Africa, and working pseudonymously — “I am very interested in history, and what happened in Nazi Germany is particularly instructive to me because I see parallels with the South Africa in which I grew up. It is very easy to sit in, say, Holland or Sweden and point a finger and say, “You were a bad white person, you shouldn’t have elected that leader, you should have done this or that.” But people are indoctrinated; they behave in ways they believe are right. And then, later, you learn something else.”
David Brooke speaks withBenjamin Percy and Phillip Kennedy Johnsonabout Marvel Comics’ Midnight Universe, flavours of superhero horror, and building shared universes.
• François Vigneault talks to Frederick Noland about Major Taylor: The World’s Fastest Man, the long gestation of the book, and the importance of bicycles to transport infrastructure.
• AJ Frost interviews Aron Nels Steinke about Mr. Wolf’s Class: The New Student, classroom dynamics, and pushing back against book bans.
Lydia Turner chats with Katie Skelly about Heaven, depicting camaraderie between working women, and determining the colour palette for the story.
Barbra Dillon speaks withRun and Guillaume SingelinaboutLoba Locaand spinning things off fromMFKZ, and withEduardo MedeirosaboutBattle in the Flower Gardensand basing work on childhood memories.
Rob Salkowitz interviewsRoberta GregoryaboutBitchy: The Exasperating Existence of Midge McCracken, narrative surprises from collecting the strips chronologically, and the real-life inspirations for the comic.
- James Asmus and Jim FestanteaboutSurvival Street: The Radical Leftand getting the gang back together.
- Stephen MooneyaboutThunderCatsand scriptwriting for yourself and other artists.
- Amanda DeibertaboutDarkwing Duckand balancing nostalgia and accessibility.
- Cecilia Lim and Waverly LimaboutThe Mask of Haliyaand research into Filipino mythology.
- Fred Van LenteaboutThe Future is ******and cyberpunk influences.
- Simon CurtisaboutThe Witches of Silverlakeand supernatural inspirations.
- Seth Green and Hugh SterbakovaboutFreshmenand the comic’s 20th birthday.
Milton Griepp interviews Tokyopop’sStuLevyabout manga market health in the U.S. and Europe, digital retail models, and profits and losses.
• Christian Holub chats with Alex Ross and Charles Kochman about Marvel Dimensions, jerry-rigging ideas together, and pushing back against superhero retcons.
• Tobias Carroll talks to Stephen Weiner, Dan Mazur, Tom Scioli, and Bill Griffith about their works telling the stories of Will Eisner, Stan Lee, and Ernie Bushmiller.
JK Parkin speaks with Magnetic Press’Mike Kennedyabout publishingLoba Locaand picking projects to bring to the U.S., and withDarryl CunninghamaboutJohn of the Nightand moving away from the constraints of non-fiction storytelling.
Matthew Peddle talks toAndre FrattinoaboutWe Are Pan, the story’s place between historical fiction and nonfiction, and the importance of telling the stories of the real-life Pedro Pans.
𝚂𝙿𝙾𝚁𝙴 𝙻𝙾𝚁𝙳
This week’s features and longreads.
• Here at TCJ, Alex Dueben reports from the recent “Rewriting the World: Isidore Isou and the Lettrist Book” exhibition at Manhattan’s Center for Book Arts, curated by Bill Kartalopoulos and Frédéric Acquaviva, charting the history of the movement and its links to (and away from) the comics form — “Lemaître, Jacques Spacagna, and Roberto Altmann all made fascinating work, and their section of the exhibit is recognizably comics. Having said that, I can’t help but think that they were all in different ways trying to make work that did not look or act like other comics. The form and the idea of comics may have caught their interest, but they didn’t want to simply utilize them anymore than they wanted to use prose, it required some rethinking and reconsideration.”
• Also for TCJ, continuing the Journal’s 50th anniversary celebration series, Rebuttals and Regrets, Shaenon Garrity writes on the impact of Viz Media’s 90s collections of classic shōjo and josei manga, and the work of translator Rachel Thorn to bring the stories to print in English-language format — “It was a big deal for me. I readA, A’in college, as I was discovering the possibilities of comics and falling in love with the medium that will break your heart. A month after graduation, I moved across the country and started work at Viz.”
• Finally for TCJ this week, Kaoru Kumi writes on the changing roles of manga editors in the current transitory period between traditional print media and contemporary digital platforms, examining how the changes currently being implemented in these now-contrasting roles allowed recent scandals concerning Shogakukan’s hiring and protection of sexual abusers, found to be working on manga titles pseudonymously, to occur, and the economic pressures driving decision-making at the big manga publishing houses — “Where the weekly magazine once stood as the unquestioned center of the brand, the digital platform operates according to a somewhat different logic. Serialization schedules are more flexible, reader responses appear almost immediately through comments and online metrics, and international readership has become far more visible as digital distribution enables near-simultaneous global consumption.”
• For Prism, Avik Jain Chatlani writes on the life and work of Marjane Satrapi, and interrogates the criticisms leveled at Satrapi and Persepolis, as well as the problems to be found in Satrapi’s work and public statements, and the inherent conflict and connection between an artist as an ever-changing person and their past body of work.
• Over at Shelfdust, Chad Nevett joins The Steves in their Spawn de Replay analysis of Grant Morrison and Greg Capullo’s issues of Spawn, and examination of what happens when the unstoppable force (writers) meets the immovable object (Todd McFarlane’s Spawn).
• Autobiographix’sAmaris Ketcham and Nora Hickey provide an intro lesson on poetry comics, giving a brief outline of the history of the form, and providing key examples for modern practitioners.
• From the world of open-access academia, in Endeavour, Zyg Furmaniuk writes on the collaboration-that-never-was between Marvel Comics and renowned scientist and author Stephen Jay Gould, and the comics connections to Gould’s career in science.
• A comics-focused edition of the weekly Mindless Ones newsletter, as mind(less)-t0-mind(less) contact is entered into to convey thoughts regarding Zara Slattery’s Coma, Pat Mills and Simon Bisley’s The Horned God, Daniel Clowes’ Monica, and (prose inclusion, boo, hiss, chiz chiz, etc) Alan Moore’s I Hear a New World.
• Paul O’Brien’s census of the villains of Daredevilcontinues, for House to Astonish, as the Bengal’s awkward debut doesn’t preclude further appearances throughout the Marvel Comics line.
• Mike Peterson rounds up the week’s editorial beat, over at The Daily Cartoonist, as pondering the existence of NatalieHarp gave way to Canadianparrying and the passing of Dolly Parton.
did bluesky hear about Miss Teen Indiana’s Garfield costume
No more links this week, for we are instead just hacking up clods of dirt, after breathing dust in for 8 hours straight, in the service of seeing Deftones during an historic drought last weekend.
I love this picture. I had to paint him
