Comics Syllabus

Small Press Saturday's feature is Kevin Budnik's 'Handbook', available at http://kevinbudnik.storenvy.com/products/16825002-handbook Budnik was nominated for an Ignatz as Promising New Talent, and TwoPlai explores his diary comic about recovery from eating disorders. If the vulnerability of self-disclosure makes you wince, you might skip this one. Otherwise, you're welcome to the circle as we look at Budnik's book. Let's dig deep. (CORRECTION: I previously listed 'Handbook' as published by One Percent Press, which was an error-- 'Handbook' was self-published and Patreon-supported. One Percent Press IS publishing Kevin Budnik's forthcoming work though!)

Family Comics Friday features 'Sunny Side Up' by Jennifer L. Holm and Matthew Holm, colored by Lark Pien, from Graphix/Scholastic (2016), a charming and gentle story of Sunny Lewin's summer in Florida with her grandfather and whole mounds of free time to roam and wander around a retirement community. @TwoPlai meanders a little himself about childhoods, unsupervised time, and the importance of artifacts of imagination (like comics) in helping us cope and process with the harsher things in life. You can always find accompanying pictures at thepaullist.tumblr.com and reach out with feedback or rate and review us on the podcatcher of your choice. Thanks for listening!

Thursday's Throwback celebrates Jack Kirby with the 'New Gods Artist Edition' from IDW, as TwoPlai relies on Charles Hatfields 'Hand of Fire' and Mark Evanier's 'Kirby: King of Comics' to inform his awe of the ink blots and raw energy of these reproductions of Kirby's original art. There's discussion of Kirby's life and career, the two inkers represented in this work, and the experience of looking at this Artist Edition. Let's dig deep!

A note for regular listeners of the podcast.

Wednesday's Webcomic (in this case) is 'Demon' by Jason Shiga, on shigabooks.com and soon to be collected by First Second. @TwoPlai talks about the fascinating character that is Mr. Shiga and his intriguing and slightly disturbing story of a man who cannot stay dead, and the mathematical possibilities of such a story. But first, we review TwoPlai's pull list for New Comic Book Day and set the schedule for the next week of Paul List episodes. Thanks for listening!

Trade Paperback Tuesday puts Pretty Deadly volume 2: "The Bear" before @TwoPlai, who tries to cram too many thoughts into too short a time to do them (and the book) justice! Kelly Sue DeConnick, Emma Rios, Jordie Bellaire and Clayton Cowles take their time to tell a story with grace and ferocity, while TwoPlai trips over his own words rushing to describe the "ecological" thematics of the work. Thanks for bearing with the roughly prepared and produced endeavor that is this daily comics analysis podcast...

The Marvel Monday issue is Nighthawk 4 by David Walker, Ramon Villalobos, and Tamra Bonvillain, where @TwoPlai talks about how comics have always been involved in political and racial discourse, offers thoughts about how Nighthawk has done so, and Villalobos' mesmerizing art style.

Action Comics 962 is our Sunday Superfriend (released a day early), as @TwoPlai thinks about this ending of the first Superman arc of Rebirth, placing it in the context of the arc's storyline, the entire Rebirth project, and the "neobaroque" macrotext described by Arnaudo's 'Myth of the Superhero' (2013, Johns Hopkins U Press). TwoPlai doesn't quite string it all together before the bell rings this time, but at least lays down some pieces of his thoughts about these stories and their value. This issue written by Dan Jurgens, penciled by Stephen Segovia, and inked by Art Thibert(apologies for not spending enough time on the artists' work).

On Smaller Press Saturday, we look at 'Our Mother' by Luke Howard, just out from Retrofit. @TwoPlai considers its various abstract narratives that ultimately deal with a child's coping with a mother's depression and anxiety, sometimes comically, but ultimately both heartbreaking and sentimental. If only we could stay forever Jung.

For Family Friday, @TwoPlai goes back to 2008's 'Billy Batson and the Magic of Shazam' by Mike Kunkel for DC Comics. Kunkel's charming rendition of the classic superhero gives TwoPlai reason to think about kids, superhero mythology, and the attraction of Shazam. CORRECTION: TwoPlai incorrectly stated in the recording that this title ended at issue 12. 'BB and the Magic of Shazam' continued until issue 21 in 2010. Sorry.

We missed Wednesday, but for the World Comics episode, @TwoPlai looks at the Art of Charlie Chan Hock Chye by Sonny Liew, culminating our four-episode focus on Liew's work. Pantheon published AoCCHC this March and TwoPlai argues it's one of the most significant comics works of recent memory, synthesizing dreamed-up comics history with the cultural and political milieu of Liew's Singaporean context, but significant to all of us as participants in a global comics culture. Also, TwoPlai highlights New Comic Book Day and stuff around the internet picks, starting around 42 minutes. Let's dig deep!

@TwoPlai continues a week (ok, actually a few days) of focusing on Sonny Liew, today taking the Tuesday Trade a little out of the routine to discuss 2014's 'The Shadow Hero' written by Gene Luen Yang and drawn and colored by Liew. @TwoPlai flies his Chinese-American flag high in this once-again overlong episode. Thanks for listening, and let's dig deep.

A little out of the norm, @TwoPlai uses the Monday Marvel to go back to 2010's 'Sense and Sensibility,' the Austen novel adapted by Nancy Butler and this week's focus creator Sonny Liew. @TwoPlai describes the challenges of adapted Austen to comics, and how Liew's art style is specially suited for that tough task.

Warning: if you're looking for analysis of story and formal qualities of the wonderful Doctor Fate series written by Paul Levitz and drawn by Sonny Liew, which is worthwhile for that kind of study, you're going to be disappointed. Instead, @TwoPlai burns up his 30 minutes (haha... more like 50) on a high horse about the appeal of alternatives to DC's house style, his own tastes and Pierre Bourdieu's 'Distinction,' and Tom King and David Finch's 'Batman,' failing to give Doctor Fate itself its due... again. But @TwoPlai will work throughout the whole week to pay tribute to Sonny Liew's art style, which he calls "cosmopolitan," and hopes to one day elaborate on why the Doctor Fate story is such a great marker of the future directions of DC superhero comics. Or maybe he'll never touch on that, and instead, you can chime in with your your opinions to TwoPlai on twitter or email. Either way, thanks for listening, and let's dig deep!

For today's Smaller Press Saturday, @TwoPlai discusses Rachael Smith's 'Artificial Flowers' published earlier this year by Avery Hill. 'Artificial Flowers' tells an earnest and appealing story of Siobhan, a young artist trying to get noticed in the London art scene, whose pyromaniac brother suddenly becomes both her responsibility and her ticket to respectability. @TwoPlai talks about artistic expression as an individual's culmination of others' voices and presences in their life. Let's dig deep!

Our Family-Friendly Comics Friday is a discussion of Raina Telgemeier's adaptations of four books of 'The Baby-Sitters Club' originally written by Ann M. Martin, published and recently reprinted in color by Graphix, an imprint of Scholastic. @TwoPlai talks about reading the books with her daughter and the impact they had on her literacy and social development, and how comics teach subtly different things than a lot of narration in prose.

@TwoPlai revisits his ten year old self and its fandom of Todd McFarlane and the epithet-less Spider-Man by McFarlane Omnibus that Marvel just released. He tries to articulate what was so attractive about McFarlane's artistic style during this run, and speculates wildly about what is unique to McFarlane and those times. Once more, the audio podcast medium fails to adequately serve the visuals of the comics medium, but TwoPlai sure takes his time trying to swim uphill against that, ruminating on the McFarlane detailed webbing, contorted figure, and big Spidey eyes.

@TwoPlai is still playing catch up, so rather than a real analysis, today is his rundown of this Wednesday's New Comic Book Day picks, and the books he's anticipating discussing in the coming days. Have some feedback about that? Reach out at Twoplai on twitter, gmail, or carrier pigeon.

Mostly, @TwoPlai tries to articulate why he's back and continuing the Paul List, a daily comics analysis podcast, but also touches on Ms. Marvel's fanfic issue in All New All Different Avengers Annual #1, with contributions from various but especially a framing story by G. Willow Wilson and Mahmud Asrar and company, as well as a contribution from Mark Waid and Chip Zdarsky. Along the way, TwoPlai shouts out really lovely people who encouraged him during the break to continue the podcast, contemplates the whole idea of comics podcasting and the participatory cultural production surrounding comics, and revels in what it means to have voices like Ms. Marvel-- while stumping for a different priority than mere "representation" in some of its forms. This one goes long, but @TwoPlai's just glad to be back and thankful you're listening.

On the last podcast before hiatus, on this Family Graphic Novel Friday, @TwoPlai takes on March Book 3 by Rep John Lewis, Andrew Aydin, and Nate Powell, from Top Shelf/IDW. This one's long because it means so much to TwoPlai personally, and because there's so much worth talking about. Warning, there's a small swear in this non-explicit podcast as @TwoPlai quotes a member of the movement from a history text, but hopefully that doesn't keep you from hearing his thoughts on why March is so significant for comics specifically and for society in general. Let's dig deep!