Help bring Sam Glanzman’s ‘Battle for Britain’ back into print

It’s Alive! launches a new Kickstarter to reprint another World War II story from ‘Combat.’

It’s Alive! has launched a Kickstarter to bring another of Sam Glanzman’s classic World War II tales back into print.

Battle for Britain tells the story of the Royal Air Force defense of the United Kingdom against large-scale attacks by Nazi Germany’s air force, the Luftwaffe — one of the first major campaigns fought by air forces. The original story was published in 1961 in an issue of Combat.

Along with a fully restored main story, this new edition will feature a four-page back-up story titled The Puny, Little Yank, along with black and white photos from WWII, a new essay about Glanzman, an essay about the Doolittle Raiders, vintage ads that were in the original issues, the original cover art by Glanzman, a new standard cover by Glanzman and a new variant cover by John McCrea.

Check out the two new covers below, and visit the Kickstarter page for more information.

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Comics Lowdown: Mark Waid’s attorney asks for dismissal of Richard C. Meyer’s lawsuit

BOOM! Studios cancels ‘Husband and Husband’ collection after plagiarism charges! Image stops selling DRM-free digital comics directly! Chicago Sun-Times drops two pages of comics! Plus: Chip Zdarsky, NaNoWriMo, best of 2018 lists and more!

Mark Waid’s legal representative has asked the U.S. District Court for the Western district of Texas to dismiss the lawsuit filed against him by Richard C. Meyer. The civil lawsuit was filed in September and claims “tortious interference with contract and defamation.” You can read the motion on Newsarama.

“[Meyer] asserts claims against Mr. Waid for tortious interference with contract and defamation. These claims are completely meritless. But the problem at the outset, and which is proper to address, is that this Court lacks personal jurisdiction over Mr. Waid,” reads the motion. “Plaintiff’s Complaint fails to identify any allegations or facts establishing any connection between Mr. Waid and Texas. Instead, Plaintiff merely alleges a single phone call between Mr. Waid, who was in California at the time, and a San Antonio publishing company. That is far short of the necessary substantial connection with Texas to justify personal jurisdiction.”

Mark Waid and Richard Meyer have GoFundMe campaigns going to pay for their legal fees, both of which have reached their goals.

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Smash Pages Q&A: Jamila Rowser

The co-founder of Geek Girl Brunch and former Girl Gone Geek blogger discusses two comic projects, ‘Wash Day’ and ‘Wobbledy 3000.’

Jamila Rowser is familiar to a lot of people in the comics community because she created Straight Outta Gotham, co-founded Geek Girl Brunch and launched the blog Girl Gone Geek. This fall though she’s doing something different, turning her attention to writing comics.

Wash Day is a comic drawn by Robyn Smith which was kickstarted earlier this year and is out now. In addition to an English language edition, there’s a Spanish language edition of the comic, Dia de Lavado, which is also available. Rowser is following that up with her second comic, Wobbledy 3000, which is drawn by Sabii Borno and is out this month as a digital comic from Black Josei Press.

The comics are very different, made with different artists and approaches, but both of them demonstrate Rowser’s skill at dialogue, her subtle talent of characterization and, through this, a very nuanced and lovely consideration of friendship. One book may be realistic and set in the here and now, and the other is science fantasy, but they are both an effort to tell slice of life narratives, and explore the lives of characters who are rarely explored in comics. Taken together, the comics show Rowser is very interested in finding ways to use the medium to convey and explore personal experience, to both break new ground and be a part of the medium and its traditions. I caught Rowser in between shows, and she was kind enough to answer a few questions.

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Comics Lowdown: Olivia Jaimes to appear at CXC

Plus: Kazu Kibuishi, Katie Green, Zunar and more!

Olivia Jaimes, the pseudonymous artist who has revitalized the comic strip Nancy, will be a guest at the Cartoon Crossroads Columbus comics festival in Columbus, Ohio, next weekend. There has been considerable speculation about Jaimes’s real identity, and CXC will be asking the 40 or so lucky attendees at her panel to check their phones at the door to protect her privacy.

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Smash Pages Q&A: Jordan Ellis on ‘The Sartorial Geek’

The founder of the clothing line Jordandené discusses the crowdfunding campaign for the quarterly “geeky lifestyle magazine.”

Jordan Ellis is the founder of the clothing line Jordandené, a geeky chic clothing line that’s handmade and sweat-shop free. Based in Brooklyn, the company has had a presence at shows across the country, and this year they launched The Sartorial Geek, a quarterly magazine that Ellis co-edits.

With articles that range from Sally Bowles to gatekeeping, Jane Eyre to cosplay to conversations with artists and designers, the magazine doesn’t read like anything else out there right now. Currently they’re running a Kickstarter before sending the third issue out. I reached out to Ellis to ask why anyone would launch a print magazine in this environment and trying to do something no one else is doing.

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‘Pass Me By’ is a beautifully illustrated queer Canadian tragedy on Kickstarter

The risograph-printed series follows an Alberta man dealing with dementia and revisiting his past life with a glam rock band

Although there are only two days left to this Kickstarter project, this gorgeous new comic series is one worth checking out! Newcomer Kyle Simmers dove head first into comic self-publishing. The writer and illustrator, known for their larger than life murals across the city of Calgary, is teaming up with visual artist Ryan Danny Owen, to put out this little gem in Kickstarter called Pass Me By.  The series is an inverted coming of age story about understanding queer identity and what happens to the stories you never tell.

The first book, Pass Me By: Gone Fishin’ is currently available for pledges by backers. The video to promote the Kickstarter is incredibly well constructed. In this eye-catching campaign video, Simmers selectively animated certain panels to bring the story alive.

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Smash Pages Q&A: Ben Truman on ‘Scout: Marauder’

Truman discusses working with his father on the next chapter of ‘Scout,’ which you can help bring to life on Kickstarter.

Ben Truman is a writer and game designer, but comics fans might know him best for co-writing A Man Named Hawken with his father, the great Timothy Truman. He’s written or co-written other comics over the years for Creepy, Conan, FUBAR and elsewhere, but he and his father have just launched a Kickstarter for their biggest project to date, Scout: Marauder.

For people who don’t know, Scout and its sequel Scout: War Shaman were two books written and drawn by Tim Truman in the 1980s and early 90s about Emmanuel Santana, an Apache ex-Army Ranger in a collapsed United States in the distant future of 1999. At the end of the series, Scout was killed leaving his two sons behind. The new book opens years later, the two boys having been separated since. At a time when the idea of an environmentally ravaged United States that collapsed due to infighting no longer seems insane or absurd, it is perhaps a good time for Scout to return.

The Kickstarter recently launched and Ben Truman answered a few questions about the book and working with his father on it.

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Smash Pages Q&A: Jason McNamara on ‘Sucker’

McNamara discusses his latest collaboration with artist Tony Talbert, an original graphic novel about vampires, the pharmaceutical industry and immortality.

A vampire stockbroker from the 1980s reemerges in the present day to find that a pharmaceutical industry wants to sink their teeth into him — and steal his immortality. Writer Jason McNamara (The Rattler) teams with longtime collaborator Tony Talbert (Continuity, First Moon, Less Than Hero) to bring this “mature readers” adventure to life. They’re joined by inker John Heebink and colorist Paul Little.

Using Kickstarter, the team hopes you’ll help them see their vision become a reality. We ran a preview of the new book last week, and I caught up with Jason to learn more about the new book, Kickstarter and more.

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Sink your teeth into a preview of ‘Sucker’

Jason McNamara and Tony Talbert team up to kickstart a new ‘grind house vampire adventure.’

The Rattler co-creator Jason McNamara has returned to Kickstarter with his longtime collaborator Tony Talbert for a new vampire tale called Sucker.

McNamara and Talbert have worked together on several projects in the past, including Continuity, First Moon and Less Than Hero. This time around they’re creating “a grind house vampire adventure” geared toward mature readers. John Heebink and Paul Little round out the creative team.

And we’ve got a 10-page preview you can check out below.

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‘Voracious’ unleashes an ‘Appetite for Destruction’ on Kickstarter

Markisan Naso and Jason Muhr wrap up their time-travel/foodie mash-up with a new miniseries later this year.

Voracious by Markisan Naso and Jason Muhr was an unexpected surprise back in 2016, as the interesting concept — a chef travels back in time to obtain dinosaur meat for his restaurant — turned into an even more interesting story about family, love, alternate dimensions and talking dinosaurs. The first miniseries, published by Action Lab Entertainment, spawned a sequel, and now the creators are turning to Kickstarter to bring a third one to life.

“With ‘Appetite for Destruction,’ Markisan and I finally get to complete Nate and company’s story,” Muhr said in a press release. “‘Destruction’ is our craziest arc yet. Readers have no idea where it’s all heading, and I’m having a blast working on some truly insane visuals. Fair warning: there will be blood!”

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Smash Pages Q&A: Zack Soto kickstarts ‘The Secret Voice’

‘This is me pouring all my love of adventure and fantasy narratives, artcomics, manga, and eurocomics into one misshapen container.’

Zack Soto has been making and publishing comics for years. People might know him best as the Editor in Chief and Publisher of Study Group Comics, which has published great comics and minicomics from Farel Dalrymple, Aidan Koch, Sam Alden, Jennifer Parks and others. Soto was also one of the co-founders of Linework NW, the comics festival in Portland that ended in 2016.

Soto has also been making his own comics like Power Button, but perhaps his best known work is The Secret Voice. The comic is epic fantasy, but it takes the rough outline of that genre and incorporates elements of superhero and art comics, martial arts, mysticism and psychedelia. The result is both epic fantasy and part of an unclassifiable genre that is familiar to readers of Farel Dalrymple, Michel Fiffe and many other comics creators.

Soto has just launched a Kickstarter campaign to publish a collection of the first volume of The Secret Voice, and I reached out to ask him about the book and his work.

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Help kickstart a classic comic book spinner rack

Jim Demonakos looks to bring a piece of comics nostalgia back to life in a new Kickstarter campaign.

If you’ve ever wanted to own a classic-looking comic book spinner rack, you can either keep an eye on eBay and hope for the best, or support a new Kickstarter that’s looking “to create something that evoked nostalgia while also being functional and cool.”

The project is the brainstorm of Jim Demonakos of nerd rock band Kirby Krackle and Emerald City Comic Con fame. He’s looking to design two different models — one black, one white — that look like they came right out of a 1980s 7-Eleven.

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