The Panthers are back in The Lair, with a lengthy discussion about drawing political satire cartoons. Plus, we run down the list of 2012′s upcoming Nerd Movie Releases, and talk about what looks exciting and what doesn’t. The Hunger Games? Seriously, it’s a movie about kids fighting each other to the death, and people can’t wait for it to arrive? And what about that Hobbit. Plus: Mike went to see Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked, and got into an altercation with a livery cab driver. And lots more!!

Comments welcome!

This week’s illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Andy Finkle! Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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Another recent drawing I drew.

Also: I posted a new TCJ Talkies podcast over at The Comics Journal, featuring La Mano’s Zak Sally. I really enjoyed chatting with Zak – check it out.

I like drawing maps. Here’s one of central and northern New Jersey, which accompanies the comic I’ve been working on. Note: Pinewood Forest (setting for Troop 142) is technically over the border in New York state.

The Holidays are behind us, so Alex and Mike creep groggily back into The Lair to catch up and discuss the things that happened over Hannukah, Christmas and New Years. Warning: the first ten minutes or so are particularly rusty, as the Panthers shake off all the egg-nog and candy-canes and struggle to get their heads back into the game. Hear about Alex’s Ukelele, Mike’s Cello and Superior Singing Voice, and an account of a visit to the Metropolitan Opera. Also: a listener call is answered, and Alex poses an ethical conundrum for us to ponder. Happy 2012 everyone!

Comments welcome!

This week’s illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Aaron F. Gonzalez! Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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Troop 142 got a nice shout-out on an NPR Best of 2011 blog yesterday, which did actually translate into some book sales, I believe. I don’t know what amazon sales rankings really mean, but I know that I jumped into the top 100 for Graphic Novels for the first time ever. Again, I don’t know what these numbers really mean, but it was all very exciting nonetheless.

(I actually suspect a lot of sales came from friends who’d forgotten that I’d recently published a book until I posted about the NPR list on Facebook. A couple folks responded that “ah, yes, they really oughta finally buy that thing off of amazon…”)

In other news, I’m not sure that I’m going to be posting anything new on this blog for the remainder of 2011, as there’ll be no The Ink Panthers Show! episode next week, and then before you know it, it’ll be 2012 already.

Also, I am not sure yet when I’m going to resume posting actual comics up on this blog again. I have to admit, keeping the work offline for the past couple months has probably been creatively beneficial. I’m happy to report that I’m knee-deep in a new story and I’m feeling generally very positive about it. A couple days “staycation” this past week, where I just holed myself away and just drew and drew, really did wonders for my feelings of momentum and progress. I’m excited about the work, and am thinking maybe I’ll have something I feel good about showing sometime soon.

Here’s a video of me lettering a word-balloon, to tide everyone over.

Next year, I don’t have a ton planned. I’m going to be attending the big Angouleme Festival in France at the end of January, and will be doing some signings in Paris following that. My wife will come join me out there after all the comics business is done, and we’ll have a little mini-vacation to celebrate ten-years of being together.

In terms of other conventions, I am not sure what I’m attending or not. I imagine I’ll still make it down to SPX in the Fall, and am hoping that TCAF in Toronto is a possibility.

Nothing is changing with The Ink Panthers Show! I think this past year was really great for the show. We had some wonderful guests, and I think really had some strong episodes with just The Panthers (Tony “The Desert Panther” Consiglio is included in that. We should change his name to The Honorary Panther). TIPS is continually a work-in-progress, and Alex and I are always trying to figure out what is the best balance of solo-Panthers shows vs. Special Guest episodes. I think it’s probably best we keep aiming for that pleasant mix of both.

TCJ Talkies will return in January. It’s probable that those are going to be coming out at a slightly slower pace. The biweekly schedule really began to catch up to me at the end of this year, and listeners may have noticed a bit of a slowdown. My plan is to roll them out at a more relaxed rate, but we’ll see. I’ve found that I feel worn out before I record an episode, but once it’s done I get all excited and motivated again. I think I just really like talking about comics!

Happy New Year everyone!!

It’s the final Ink Panthers of the year, and iFanboy’s Josh Flanagan joins us in The Lair to give us the rundown on the best movie, tv show, book, comic, music, and Death of a Major Evil Foe of America, of the year! It’s quite a list, so have a pen ready – lots of recommendations coming your way. Plus: some followup on the recent discussion about The World’s Most Famous Little Person Actor, The Falkland Islands War, Stephen King’s On Writing, and lots and lots of Holiday Cheer.

Comments welcome!

This week’s illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Nathan Bulmer! Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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Back by popular demand, The Desert Panther, Tony Consiglio invades The Lair to tell us all about his recent studies of animal behavior. We talk about How to Escape a Pit-Bull Attack, What Kinds of Animals at the Zoo are the Best, Which Immense Creatures trigger our Lizard Brain Fight or Flight Mechanisms, and a lengthy discussion about Cattle Breeding, which also explores the differences between a Cow, a Bull, and a Steer. Also in this episode, Second Life, and Christmas Card round-robins that spark outrage.

Comments welcome!

This week’s illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Shawn Brook Williams! Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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An explosive episode! The Ticking and H Day creator, cartoonist Renee French creeps into the Lair for a very mature conversation about some important things. Such as, how everything would be better if instead of twitter, we had I Am Legend zombies swarming the planet. Yes, the zombies are unpleasant, but at least they aren’t barraging you with minutiae about mundane things all day and night. They are nice and quiet, and don’t feel the need to overshare. Then some grown-up discussion about bodily fluids, and then some even more grown-up discussion about man-nipples, and then probably some even more conversation about bodily fluids again. We can’t get enough of it!

Comments welcome!

This week’s illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Peter D’Retalia! Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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Sarah Glidden joins me in the Talkie Hutt for a chat. Sarah is perhaps best known for her 2010 debut memoir, How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less, which was published by Vertigo. Since writing that book, Sarah has become more interested in comics journalism, and roughly a year ago successfully Kickstarted the funds to travel to Syria and northern Iraq tailing a group of journalists to write about the work they were doing.

Despite it currently being her most well known work, we don’t discuss How to Understand… too much in this interview. I really liked the book, and would have been happy to talk about it, but my sense is that it’s become one of those things where the author is starting to feel like The Israel Cartoonist (much in the same way I was once personally terrified about being known at The Queen Guy). I saw a particularly amusing interaction on a social network a while back where Sarah was soliciting ideas for superheroes she could paint pictures and sell prints of at conventions, and a ton of people suggested Sabra, as well as The Thing, and Shadowcat, and so on and so on. Y’know, because they’re Jewish.

Anyway, Sarah probably would have been happy to talk more about How to Understand…, but we just ended up getting onto other topics, which I found quite enlightening. Sarah’s process is incredibly different from what I do, and what I think a lot of other cartoonists do, so it was very interesting to hear her talk about how she’s making comics at the moment.

The Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Festival happened this past weekend, and with it, my little Troop 142 mini-tour also came to an end. Sad. Oh well, it was a good show to end on. A ton of great stuff there, and even better, it’s just a subway ride away.

Here’s a photo I took on the subway of someone reading RAW.

My assumption was that they were headed to the con, but in fact, they were not. They got off the train well before we made it to Williamsburg. It still feels strange to see people reading art comics in public. I see people on the subway reading X-Men all the time. It’s much more rare to see a comic like this.

I’m very much looking forward to being at the Brooklyn Comics and Graphics Festival in Williamsburg, this weekend. This is the third year of the show, and the first time I’ve been sitting behind a table, which is nice. I’ll be at the Secret Acres Corral, between The Koyama Press Pavillion and the Drawn & Quarterly MegaDome. Lots of other Secret Acres artists are going to be at the show too, including, I believe, John Brodowski, who is debuting a new book. I loved his first graphic novel, Curio Cabinet, so am really interested to see his new work.

This episode is either super-fun or super-irritating, depending on your familiarity with all of the worst songs of the 1980′s and 1990′s and your patience for Mike and Alex’s poor recall of pop-culture facts. First up a discussion about the recent passing of one of the last surviving Munchkins from The Wizard of Oz, and some questions about how casually famous people have extended stays at one another’s houses. Then, we make our way through the Worst Songs list, and decide which picks are fair (The Macarena), and which are not (“What’s Going On” by 4 Non-Blondes. C’mon! Leave 4 Non-Blondes alone!!!). Also, buried at the back of the episode is a small item where Mike mentions telling his daughter that the full name of Ariel from The Little Mermaid is “Ariel Brownwater”, and her Dad is called “Triton Brownwater”. It would be appreciated if all parents of pre-schoolers who listen to the show could help propagate this piece of misinformation.

Comments welcome!

This week’s illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Ian Anderson! Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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Mike and Alex are alone in The Lair and they have a number of important things to discuss. First up, a revisit to Mike’s failed and now-it-turns-out backfiring raw food diet. He should just stick to his regular diet of locally produced cheeses and salted breads. Then, does anyone want to be told that they are a bad driver? Is it just one of those things that everyone just assumes that they are good at? After that, Alex has a spirited defense of our nation’s 39th President, Jimmy Carter. This one’s got it all!

Comments welcome!

This week’s illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Rio Aubry Taylor! Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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This is something fun. I was a guest on The Inkstuds Comic Book and Cartoon Power Hour this past week. Thanks to podcast rival Robin McConnell for inviting me on his show. I really enjoyed the conversation.

It actually was pretty great to talk to another comics-podcaster. I am hesitant to listen back to the audio, because I am pretty sure I am guilty of hijacking some of the interview and turning it around on Robin. I am not sure it’s something I can help at this point – I’m finding that hosting my own podcasts week in and week out is making me a compulsive interrogator.

But, in a way, I think that the fact that we’re putting each other in the hot-seat, probably makes for a pretty interesting discussion. We talk a lot about the reasons why we’re making podcasts, and how doing all the research and thinking about comics in terms of discussing them publicly is having an effect on our abilities to continue to enjoy reading them personally. This is something I wonder about a lot. At the moment I’ve really focused on guests for TCJ Talkies whose work I was already very familiar with and a fan of. I have not yet tried bringing someone on whose work I hadn’t already read. I am not sure how that would change my enjoyment of their work – if I needed to cram and read the material to prepare to talk to them. Robin on the other hand (who has interviewed a ton of people) is in a completely different boat – reading comics to get ready for shows. He even talks about reading Troop 142 the day before our conversation, while sitting on a bus going to work.

Also, if you want to hear the audio of my first appearance on Inkstuds, back in 2009, I’ve got the link here.

Reliable cartoonist, David King, (Lemon Styles, Danny Dutch) calls into the Lair from his home in San Diego to talk “stud tails” and Ugg Boots. Mike tells everyone about his visit to the Occupy Wall Street protests, and smugly points out that he is a cyclist, thus putting himself in a higher category of human being than Alex and David. Alex discusses provocative in-your-face Fine Art, and then it’s time for a Public Service Announcement from the Ink Panthers about the dangers of sitting on one piece of furniture for too long.

Comments welcome!

This week’s illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Sam Henderson! Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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On November 5th and 6th I attended the Minneapolis Indie Xpo, and while I was there I moderated a live TCJ Talkies panel, spotlighting two cartoonists: MariNaomi and Noah Van Sciver. It was interesting to interview two cartoonists at the same time, especially in this case, as their comics are quite dissimilar. I tried to talk about areas where their work overlapped as well as places where they approached things differently. It was a lot of fun, and I think the sound quality is quite good for this kind of thing, thanks to the expertise of the A/V guy running the panels at the show, who had the good sense to actually plug my MP3 recorder into his sound board to get the recording directly. (Usually, I just sit the recorder on the table somewhere and hope for the best.)

The MIX show itself was an great experience for me. Here is Tom Spurgeon’s collection of blog reports and photos filed by the various attendees after the fact, including my own. I liked visiting a new city and getting a feeling for its cartooning community. When I’m at a conventions, I always wonder what exactly is the point of going to them. If the point of going to a con is to spend time talking to and hanging out with like-minded people, and getting inspired and motivated to make comics, then MIX was a raging success. In that sense, most of the conventions I attend are successful. It’s only when the whole “making-money” factor is added to the equation that some shows seem better than others. In that regard, MIX was fine, but I just get so tired of sitting at the table and worrying about money. Can’t I just enjoy the social parts? Do I really have to use up all that mental energy worrying about covering the cost of my plane ticket? Can’t I just hang out and have fun and not be thinking about whether I’m talking too much or not enough to a potential customer? Do I really have to worry about how I’m arranging my facial expression, so as to appear friendly and engaged but not so friendly that I look desperate and needy? Ugh. Who wants to think about this stuff?

This Friday, November 18, 6:30-7:30 PM
Midtown Comics Downtown
64 Fulton St
New York, New York

More information here.

Hope to see you!

It’s a very masculine musky Lair the Panthers are creeping back into after a week off. Mike is worried about turning into a straight-laced, uptight Dad, so does his best to make the conversation “raw”. This means mostly talking about “grundles” and other man-things. Other Slush Pile topics include: Having the same name as an unpopular video game protagonist, impressing strangers on a subway by bragging about your regenerative powers, getting people fired by lacing their food with drugs, and a Ruling on Twitter-Spoiler-ering. Then, we slow things WAAAAAAYYY down with a dry discussion/debate about the causes of World War II and the Holocaust, but don’t worry, we pick things back up again by the end when we determine whether we would or would not go back in time and brutally murder Infant Hitler.

Comments welcome!

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I’m back from the Minneapolis Indie Xpo, and in keeping with tradition here at Mike Dawson Comics, I have almost no pictures to show for it. I’m going to post what little I’ve got, and assume that some of the other cartoonists who were there this weekend will pick up some of the slack.

I’m thinking about one event in particular, where a group of us all went over to Zak Sally’s studio to see his printing press. That woulda’ been a good time to take out my iPhone. But, I never got it together. I saw other folks snapping photos though, so I’m sure the event will get covered elsewhere.

Here’s what I have!

This is a photo taken from my point of view at the airport gate in New York with a box of Troop 142′s sitting in my lap. See, another thing I never get on the ball about is shipping my books to the show ahead of time. So, my solution is to always stuff a large suitcase with as many books as possible, and just bring the bare minimum’s worth of other items, such as say, clothes and toothpaste and that sort of stuff.

With MIX and also APE, my suitcase weighed about 80lbs. Different airlines have different rules about baggage. I flew Virgin America out to APE, and the nice lady at the check-in desk gave me a break on my heavy bags, and just charged me a $25 additional bag fee. I flew Delta to MIX this past weekend, and their approach to luggage is to charge you 25 bucks just to bring anything at all. When I heaved my suitcase onto the scales at Delta, they basically said I could pay $100 in a heavy-baggage fine, or lighten up the suitcase. Thus, the photo of me sitting with a box of Troop 142 graphic novels on my lap, treating it as a carry-on item.

I guess truthfully, once I was on the plane it wasn’t so bad, because I just shoved it in the overhead, but it was definitely a pain as I waited in the loooooong security line…

The above three pictures were taken at the Friday night show pre-party. In picture one, that’s Jim Rugg and Dustin Harbin, in picture two we have AdHouse head-honcho Chris Pitzer and his lovely wife, and in picture three we see Grimalkin Press publisher, Jordan Shiveley, and rival comics podcaster and cartoonist, Rina Ayuyang. Well composed photos, one and all.

I never really sell full pages of original art, but this year I’ve been bringing a little Apple-Jacks binder filled with small images and scraps from comics. You can see, there are panels from my Ace-Face book there, as well as odds and ends from Troop 142. I think a couple of those visible there are panels that did not actually make it into the book.

Anyway, it’s nice to have a little something for people to pick through, and a way for me to make a few extra dollars, but my word of advice is to not use an Apple-Jacks binder to display such stuff, but rather to invest in an actual real-binder thing with plastic sleeves that can be turned and easily flipped through. It’s just tough for people to pick through the pile when it’s all stacked all higgedly-piggedly like I have it here. It might be a passive-aggressive I-don’t-really-want-to-sell-original-art thing on my part, because not selling much of it is surely the outcome!

Julia Wertz gave me an elephant cookie! That is some heavily applied frosting right there…

View from my Table 1: That’s Top Shelf’s own Brett Warnock talking with cartoonist and upstart publisher, Tom Kaczynski.

View from my Table 2: Tom is giving Kevin Huizenga the hard sell.

Tom K. is a Minneapolis native, and generously allowed me, Kevin, and fellow Secret Acres artist Eamon Espey (not pictured) to crash at his place. There were a number of other groups of cartooning friends also staying nearby, so the evenings were these great gatherings of funny, interesting people. I think one of my favorite things about MIX being a smaller show, was that it was easy to talk to all the people you wanted to talk to, and actually feel like you had a good amount of time together, as opposed to a show like SPX or MoCCA, where it feels like you barely spend four or five minutes in conversation with people you really enjoy talking to, and even then realize after the fact that there were a ton of people you didn’t even say “hello” to at all. MIX was a much better pace, socially. I mean, that’s from my point of view. Maybe all those other cartoonists are going to write con-reports that say stuff like “one downside to MIX being so small is that it was impossible to get away from notorious comics-chatterbox, Mike Dawson”. We’ll see.

I ate some of the cookie! Yes, that sure is some generously applied frosting, indeed.

This food truck outside had the most delicious vegetarian curry, which I ate for lunch both days. It was pretty much the perfect savory food to eat after consuming ten pounds of sugary elephant cookie frosting…

And finally, here’s a photo of the live TCJ Talkies podcast I recorded on Sunday morning. It was a spotlight on cartoonists Noah Van Sciver and MariNaomi. I think it went well. I listened back to the audio recording, and I think a combination of my nerves and the chilliness of the Soap Factory at 10AM (note the woolly Jets cap atop my head) made me a little manic, so we moved through an hour’s worth of questions at a clip which kept the panel under 45 minutes, but I think that was alright. There were a lot of laughs, and I think some interesting back and forth between Noah and Mari. I think it went well, and will of course eventually post the audio recording.

So, that’s really all I have. It was a great weekend. I sold a lot of comics, and came away from it amped up to get back to work, which is always the best outcome you can ask for. Here’s hoping MIX comes back in 2012!

I haven’t posted any new pictures in forever, and I’m not sure how I’m going to handle putting comics online for my new story… but, here’s a recent panel I drew. “Reservoir” is a word I consistently have trouble spelling (see also, “restaurant”), so putting it on the poster in the background of this scene was very helpful to me.

Hope to see some of you at MIX!

I’ll be manning the Secret Acres table with Eamon (Wormdye) Espey, and we’ll have all those good books for sale. Come find us! Just like at APE, Secret Acres trusted me with their special custom convention flag, so we should be easy enough to spot.

Also: On Sunday morning, at 10:15AM, I’ll be hosting a TCJ Talkies LIVE panel, with guests MariNaomi and Noah Van Sciver. I’ll talk about their respective work, and also plan on asking questions about format – working on full length graphic novels versus serializing comics as floppies or minicomics. Mari has been posting comics online at The Rumpus recently, so I’ll ask what it’s like working for the web. Come listen to us yak, won’t you?

In addition to Troop 142, I’ll be bringing a handful of Freddie & Me’s & Gabagool!s, as well as my Apple Jacks binder filled with cheap original art.

See you there!

Julia Wertz is my guest in the Talkie Hutt this week. Julia is the author of The Fart Party, two volumes of which have been published by Atomic Books, and Drinking at the Movies, published by Random House. On the show, we talk about her early minicomics and webcomics, her feelings about interacting with an online audience, and the creation of Drinking at the Movies, as well as the subsequent ambivalence she feels towards that book for a number of different reasons.

This interview may also be kind of amusing for revealing how difficult it is for me to talk frankly with someone about “taboo” subjects such as alcoholism and addiction. I hem and haw and skirt around the edges of the topic for most of the first half of the show, before I finally take a deep breath and talk properly about the things Julia clearly wants to discuss. I can’t help it! It’s my English heritage. It makes me all uptight and reluctant to talk openly about tough topics in mixed company. So, in a way, this episode was a breakthrough for me. I am really happy with the results.

Feeding Ground’s own Mike Lapinski joins us in The Panther’s Crypt for a frightfully frightful episode! We’ll discuss the rules of Lycanthropy versus the rules of Draculas. Ghost tours, costumes, and Gentlemen Frankensteins. Twilight and The Amityville Horror. It’s a GHOULish good time, only slightly brought down in the middle when the topic of our nation’s shameful 300-year history of slavery is discussed at length.

Comments welcome!

This week’s illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Alexander Robinson! Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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A couple of nice bits of press have come in recently. One is this funny interview up at the F*cked in Park Slope blog (or FIPS), which I am really excited about, since I assume it will mean that people will recognize me when I walk into the Pavillion movie theater or go to Union Market from now on. Also, I love that they used that adorable photo of me and Orli. It was taken in Scotland, not Park Slope, but it was just too lovely not to repurpose, I imagine.

This interview came about because of the short Park Slope Vampire Mom story I posted a little while back, which can be read online here.

Also, some nice reviews for Troop 142 that I believe I have not yet linked to:

There are a lot of interpretations to Troop 142, an original graphic novel concerning Boy Scouts and adult chaperones up at a summer camp. It’s a credit to the creator, Mike Dawson, that the book is so rich with genuine-feeling human interaction and characterization that it merits discussion as literature rather than pop entertainment. Under the Radar

Applying the same level of merciless scrutiny used by Anton Chekhov, Dawson rips away the naive Norman Rockwell facade of one of the few rites of passage left to young American males, and replaces it with something complex and uncomfortable. Foreword Reviews

The Slinkiest Panther, John “The Wiggly Reader” Kerschbaum pads his way back into The Panther’s Lair to make his triumphant return to the show. We talk about a number of important topics, such as A Citizen’s Duty to Take Jury Duty Seriously, because plainly a Trial by Jury is a better system than the Medieval Trial by Ordeal, and clearly those are the only two choices. Plus: Mike gets RAW. And a weak stomach. And, of course, our Third Annual Halloween Episode is just around the corner, so the Dads talk at length about the costumes they are making for their daughters, which is just plain adorable.

Comments welcome!

This week’s illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Michael Jonathan! Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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I’m back in the Talkie Hutt, speaking with long-time MOME contributor, Kurt Wolfgang! Check it out.

(side note: Eagle-eared listeners may notice that if you pay real close attention to the first ten minutes or so of this chat, you’ll hear a child screaming in the background. That’s my daughter, putting up a fight about going to bed. I did my best to remain engaged with the conversation while that was going on, but I gotta admit, it can be hard to stay focused… “Oh, what’s that, they cancelled MOME? Oh wait a minute, did my daughter just fall out of her crib? No? OK, go back to what you were saying…”)

It’s a special episode this week, as Mike finds himself on the PRO T.I.P.S. couch, talking to Alex about his new graphic novel, Troop 142. After Mike overcomes some initial un-comfortableness about answering questions, the Panthers settle into a rhythm, and have a pretty good chat about the origins of the book, Boy Scouts, drug use, autobiography, and male friendship. And remember, Troop 142 ships to finer comic stores everywhere on Wednesday, so keep an eye out for it, won’t you?

Comments welcome!

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Mike is back from APE, the Alternative Press Expo, and has all the updates you’d expect. What was it like renting someone else’s apartment for the weekend? Was he able to sleep there alone? Then, Alex has some complaining to do about Public Displays of Affection (PDA), and Mike talks about the most extreme example he can remember seeing. THEN, The Desert Panther, Tony Consiglio creeps into The Lair to tell us a story about how he bought a new mattress. That sounds boring, yes. But trust us, this is a good one.

Comments welcome!

This week’s illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by David King! Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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I am back from the big Alternative Press Expo in sunny (yet unexpectedly chilly) San Francisco, and in keeping with tradition, I didn’t take pictures of anything, despite seeing plenty.

A few notes:

I really liked flying Virgin America. The plane felt new and safe, and they have these purple lights and a dimly lit cabin that make you feel like you’re just chilling at a particularly cramped nightclub, rather than hurtling through the air at 600 mph, in defiance of God and nature. I used to be a terrible on planes, but have gotten better in recent years. I tense up during take-off, but have finally learned to relax during the rest of the flight.

My one concern was the fact that also on my flight out there, was the incredibly talented and popular cartoonist, Kate Beaton. I always get a little concerned when flying with other cartoonists, because I worry about how the inevitable Beat headline would be written should our plane go down. With Kate on the plane, it would be no contest: Cartooning Superstar Perishes in Fiery Plane Crash! Aspiring Comics Podcaster also rumored to have been on board. Thank goodness we made it there in one piece.

On Saturday I was one of four guests slated to appear on the Comix Claptrap LIVE panel. I was up first, and participated in some mostly friendly, but pretty-well borderline insulting-to-me banter with the hosts, and then my 10 minutes were up and I was asked to slide down “the couch” while they called up guest number two. Here’s a photo I took of Scott Campbell getting the Claptrap Treatment.

It was a lot like being at a long table at a restaurant, with the feeling that all the good conversation was happening at the other end.

I didn’t really pack enough clothes (I think because I was too preoccupied with packing heavy boxes of books), so on Day One I bought a t-shirt from someone at the con. On Day Two, I wore it to the show. Here I am in it. I am pretty sure some of the aliens on the shirt have testicles visible, which I didn’t notice when I purchased it. I don’t think this will stop me from wearing the shirt again, but it will probably always be known to me as my Alien Balls shirt from now on.

Finally, what did I pick up at the show? I will probably post a photo of my “haul” at a later date – but I can tell you I got some great comics from Adrian Tomine, MariNaomi, Noah Van Sciver, Tessa Brunton, Ethan Rilly, Susie Cagle, Joey Allison Sayers, Levon Jihanian, and a bunch more.

However, my favorite thing that I bought might be this:

People say that APE is a show with more support for Arts & Crafts than other conventions, and I think this is true. A lot of tables have artists selling only prints, or posters, or handmade t-shirts, or toys. Buttons, postcards, paintings, and drawings. I think a show like SPX is a little more exclusively comics-focused, where at APE the lines are a little looser. I don’t really mind this at all, because one of my favorite things to pick up at conventions are strange little hand-made things that I can get for cheap and put up on the wall. I love this little mounted Yeti head. The only thing I have to decide now is if it’s better placed in my daughter’s room, or can this be something for the living room. Decisions, decisions…

Thanks to David King for the sweet animated gif at the top of the post.

Things have been real busy with me since returning from the Small Press Expo earlier this month, as I set off on a whirlwind tour of my ancestral homeland (Scotland) with my family, which had me “off the grid” for quite some time. The pic above was taken on the Isle of Skye. See how healthy and not-chained-to-the-internet my daughter and I look. You can practically smell the crisp air and savory outdoors-ness. It was seriously great.

I didn’t do any drawing or writing or anything while I was gone, but that was OK, as I think I needed to just recharge my batteries a bit anyhow. I am not sure if they’re totally back at full power yet – I still haven’t had a chance to sit down at the drawing table since my return – so we’ll see. I have a pretty good idea of what I want to do next (I think) and I’m starting to feel amped once again.

But enough chit-chat, on with the announcements: This weekend I will be at the Alternative Press Expo in San Francisco. I’ll be representing Secret Acres, and will have all their fine books on hand, as well as copies of Troop 142 and old Heroclix figurines, of course. Here’s what the floor plan looks like:

On Saturday I’ll be appearing on this panel:

2:00 The Comix Claptrap . . . LIVE! – Co-hosts Rina Ayuyang and Thien Pham record an episode of their enlightening, riotous, and controversial podcast, The Comix Claptrap LIVE at APE! For four seasons, Rina and Thien have interviewed comics artists in the indie comics scene about their work, creative processes, and experiences in the industry. Each show has included New Comics Wednesday beat reportage from fellow cartoonist Josh Frankel, and new favorite segment, The Comix Cranktrap, where they crank-call a well-known cartoonist listed in their Rolodex. Also featured on the panel: Mike Dawson, Scott Campbell, Levon Jihanian, and Esther Pearl Watson. This panel promises to be total mayhem!

I’m looking forward to this. As everyone knows, I am a generally nice fellow, considered quite genial by many. However, for some reason this upstart podcast called The Comix Claptrap has historically been (what some might consider) unfriendly towards me and my own podcasts. In their most recent episode they call the incredibly talented Laura Park to task for the offense of appearing on The Ink Panthers instead of their show, as if TIPS wasn’t up-to-snuff enough for her to come on. Not nice guys, not nice at all…

So, perhaps some of that will come up, but hopefully we’ll talk about Troop 142 as well.

Anyway, hope to see some of you there!

Mike returns from his tour of Scotland to fill Alex in on all the news. First up: what is the ruling on regaling friends on all of the pleasant things that happened on a perfectly nice vacation? Yea or Nay? Also: Mike saw the movie CARS, and is outraged. Speaking of outrage, Alex is feeling it himself at New York 1′s lousy coverage of the Occupy Wall Street protests, and seriously considers heading downtown himself to throw some support to those kids in their Phish t-shirts with their hacky-sacks and Idealism.

One note: anyone in the San Francisco area this weekend should come see Mike at the Alternative Press Expo and get themselves a signed copy of Troop 142. Mike will also be appearing on a live recording of rival comics podcast, The Comix Claptrap. Come say hello, won’t you?

Comments welcome!

This week’s illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Matt Emery! Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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A brand new TCJ Talkies episode! Well, not entirely brand new… not to anyone who came to see it happen live at the Small Press Expo this past weekend, but new to the rest of us! I sit down and TCJ Talk with my Ink Panthers co-host Alex Robinson, all about the creation of his very popular series and later collection, Box Office Poison. I think it’s interesting to discuss the different approaches to writing long-form comics – moving from the serialized floppy to the all-in-one-go Graphic Novel, and how that affects you creatively, as well as practically.

Also, a few thoughts on Dylan Williams, the cartoonist and publisher who passed away unexpectedly over the weekend. Frankly, I am shocked at how sad it has made me, as we weren’t personally close. But, Dylan was someone I liked and admired, and I feel terrible for his friends and family and their loss.

Anyway, here’s what I got:

The Secret Acres gang, from left to right: Leon Avelino, Gabby Schulz, and Barry Matthews.

The Fantagraphics table across the way.

Oustanding Artist Ignatz Winner Joe Lambert.

A Spiderman Heroclix sitting on top of my books.

I sat next to Craig Thompson and Chester Brown at The Ignatzes. Craig was telling Chester he really should listen to The Ink Panthers Show podcast. I hope he doesn’t listen to the one where we talked about Paying For It.

Darryl Ayo accepts his Promise Brick*, as this year’s Promising New Talent Ignatz recipient.

Leon accepts the Best Graphic Novel Ignatz on behalf of Edie Fake. A great moment.

Dinner on Sunday night with Ethan Rilly and Lamar Abrams (Chris Pitzer was there too, just off-camera).

And, no joke, I didn’t pack enough clothes with me, so on Monday morning I had to don my Ink Panthers maxi-print t-shirt that the Secret Acres guys had gotten me. I wish the eyes were slighly lower, so they’d look like orange glowing fiery nipples.

*This joke copyright 2011 John Martz, who made it in his presentation speech. I hope it catches on.

No real episode this week, as the Panthers are just back from the Small Press Expo, and Mike is scrambling to get ready to leave again, this time for Sunny Scotland. But, because we didn’t want to post absolutely nothing, here’s a mini SPX recap, and a couple other things. T.I.P.S! will be back sometime during the week of September 27th, and don’t forget if you’re in The Bay Area, you can come see Mike at the Alternative Press Expo on October 1st and 2nd, and get him to sign your copy of Troop 142.

Talk to you soon!

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The release party is over, which means Troop 142 is essentially out now. I believe amazon orders will start shipping now, and hopefully the book will start making it’s way into finer comic stores within the next few weeks. Be on the lookout!

A couple of reviews of the book have started trickling out onto the internet. Here’s one by Greg McElhatton, and here’s one posted at Paste Magazine.

This weekend, September 10th and 11th, I will be appearing at the Small Press Expo in Bethesda (Rockville?), Maryland. I’ll be curled up at the Secret Acres booth pretty much the whole time, so it shouldn’t be too hard to find me. There’ll be plenty of books.

I am also participating in two panels over the weekend:

On Saturday, at 4:30PM, in the Brookside Conference room, I’ll be moderating Alex Robinson: Ten Years of Box Office Poison

Over the last several years, Alex Robinson has produced Tricked, A Kidnapped Santa Claus, and Too Cool to Be Forgotten, among other books, but his first major work was the 600 page graphic novel Box Office Poison, originally serialized in comic book format and collected in 2001. To celebrate the tenth anniversary of his debut book, Robinson will discuss his career with his Ink Panthers podcast co-host, cartoonist Mike Dawson.

On Sunday, at 1:30PM, in the same room, I’ll be appearing as one of the panelists in this discussion: Navigating the Contemporary Publishing Landscape

In the early 2000s, corporate publishers nearly raced to acquire graphic novels. Now, as the mainstream publishing industry faces severe contractions and as online media assumes many traditional functions of publishing, cartoonists face a rapidly changing publishing landscape, one that includes a resurgent small press. Johanna Draper Carlson will speak with Domitille Collardey, Mike Dawson, Meredith Gran, Roger Langridge and Julia Wertz about publishing options today.

I plan on bringing my little shiny pink MP3 recorder to both panels, so if you miss them, they may appear online at some point down the line. But don’t miss them! Come on out. I am sure they’ll both be better live and in person.

Speaking of me speaking about myself, please take a half-hour to read through this in-depth interview with me over at The Comics Journal. Thanks to Rob Clough for doing it with me. I don’t think I’ve ever publicly discussed a lot of things in there, especially about the early part of my career. It was really great to be able to talk about all of that, and just incredible to be interviewed by TCJ at all. I think if you read the interview, you’ll understand just how long I’ve been a comics fan, and what a big deal it is for me to get the spotlight treatment here.

I think that’s all. I hope to see you all this weekend!

A drawing of @DRUNKHULK, a very funny and popular twitter feed created by my friend Christian Dumais.

Christian is someone who I mainly know through the internet, though we’ve met in real life once or twice. I also frequented the SlushFactory message boards mentioned in the UGO interview, for many years.

I really kinda miss message boards. I love twitter and the like, but one thing that felt nice to me about message boards was the relative anonymity we had. I didn’t need to always post under my real name, because most of the board regulars knew who each other was even with handles. That was kind of a nice thing. It felt more comfortable getting into heated comic-book, political, and social-issues type debates. Nothing ever got resolved, but there sure were some epic flame wars. There was a little bit more freedom to say whatever dumb thing came into your head, without worrying how it would read to the outside world, or if it would stick with you on your Permanent Internet Record. I tried starting up new message boards, most recently on The Ink Panthers site, but there’s just no momentum for them anymore. Ah well.

Here are the pics that were taken with my phone camera:

Lots of great stuff in this episode: Alex returns from a trip to Las Vegas with a veritable ton of topics, thanks to all the oxygen they pump into the casinos and non-stop five-hour energy drinks. He’s on fire! A Beach Boy concert, vomit-bags on airplanes, celebrity-sightings, this trip had it all, and we discuss it at length.

And, a reminder: Alex and Mike will both be at the Small Press Expo in Maryland this coming weekend. Mike will be debuting his new book, and Alex will be headlining a spotlight panel. Come say hello, won’t you?

Comments welcome!

This week’s illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Danno Klonowski! Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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I created this trailer for Troop 142. The song I found cracked me up to no end.

Final reminder: The book release party is tomorrow night, from 8-11PM at Bergen Street Comics in Park Slope. I’m getting excited for it. There’ll be copies of the book, bubbly refreshments, and (I have decided) me, but not in my Boy Scout uniform. Let’s have some self-respect people! This is a serious book, about serious things.

Here’s that party flyer again, showing Tony holding a carved wooden dildo.

Tom Kaczynski is my guest in the TCJ Talkie Hutt this week. Tom is well known for the excellent run of short stories he created for the MOME anthology, while that was still a going concern. I hear he has a story in issue 22, which I’ve yet to see, so I am looking forward to that. Tom’s comics have also appeared in The Drama and The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2009.

I had a lot of fun with this chat, but I may have broken a few cardinal rules of interviewing people with this one. 1) I kind of glossed over a lot of the biographical background and Tom’s early interest in comics, though I did my best to get back to it later on in the conversation. I think I was just too excited to talk about communism, so I kind of dived right on into it. And 2) I referred quite heavily to pages and quotes from Tom’s minicomics, “The Trans Series”. These comics are fascinating reads, full of any number of interesting ideas, each of which could lead to a conversation or a debate. But, unfortunately, as is the nature of minicomics, this stuff isn’t widely available in stores (though they can be purchased online here). So, I worry there may be many listeners who aren’t intimately familiar with the work.

If it’s some small consolation, I clipped a couple of jpegs from the minis, which you can see at the TCJ post. These are some of the pages we talk about in the conversation. I do urge everyone to pick them up if they can, or hold out for a collected edition, which I am sure is somewhere along the pipeline.

Mike and Alex crawled into The Panther’s Lair late Sunday evening, shortly after Hurricane Irene made her slow interminable crawl across New York City, and after two or three days of anxiety ridden anticipation, the Panthers were tired! But, ever reliable, they do their best to rally and get it up for a good show. And there’s lots to discuss: Natural Disasters, The Small Press Expo, Book Release Parties and Spotlight Panels. Mike and Alex reveal that they will be presenting one of the awards at the Prestigious Ignatz Gala at SPX, and brainstorm some ideas for comedic content.

Then! Just as the Panthers start to fall asleep, they welcome Gaz “Gary” Gretsky back into The Lair to settle some business. Astute listeners may recall last episode, where Mike confessed that he’d promised to ink a comic for his friend Gary, and had never followed through on that. Gary gets the opportunity to discuss the matter from his point of view. Plus: what is the worst Beatles song of all time, (Answer: Octopus’s Garden) and would you ever eat a bug? And not some halfway palatable bug, like a grasshopper, but some really nasty thing like a house “Eyebrow”.

Then things devolve into an argument about Novelty song, but the Panthers should be excused. We had two natural disasters in New York City last week!

Comments welcome!

This week’s illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Noah Van Sciver! Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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A brand new comic posted this morning: a short story about a working mother who has a secret. Read the full thing here.

And, a reminder: The Troop 142 book release party is going to be held this Friday, September 2nd at Bergen Street Comics in Park Slope, from 8-11PM. The event is open to the public, so please come on out. There’ll be drinks, good times, and advance copies of the book. Troop 142 officially debuts at the Small Press Expo in Bethseda, Maryland, on September 10th which I will be attending.

Click to make bigger

Alex and Mike creep into The Lair to discuss a number of things. There’s a whole lot of comics talk up at the front of the show: SPX, The Ignatzes, Alex’s spotlight panel, and Mike’s upcoming Book Release Party. But, once all that’s finally out of the way, the Panthers talk about more regular everyday life-type things, such as strip clubs and pole dancing, and the likelihood that civilization will eventually collapse not through weapons built by man, but by microscopic germs that will give us all Super-Colds, and we’ll just sneeze and look clammy until we all eventually die.

Comments welcome!

Illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Tim Hamilton. Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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Reminder: The Troop 142 book release party is going to be held on Friday, September 2nd at Bergen Street Comics in Park Slope, from 8-11PM. The event is open to the public, so please come on out. There’ll be drinks and good times.

Also, I should note, the book won’t be available in stores until sometime later in the month. It officially debuts at SPX on September 10th, so the release party is a good opportunity to get a copy early. I’ll also be signing and sketching in them. I’ve got this idea for special book-plate sketches, which I’ll post about later this week.

Lisa Hanawalt joins me in the Talkie Hutt for a chat for a very entertaining discussion about her career.

I love Lisa’s comics. They are laugh out loud funny. I was interested to hear she has aspirations towards performance. She posits that many cartoonists wish they could be stand-up comedians. I am not sure what the numbers are, but I’ve talked on The Ink Panthers Show about how maybe it would be nice to do stand-up as a “fall-back” career, if cartooning doesn’t pan out. It’s funny, I get very nervous before I do any public speaking. I even get nervous before I record podcasts with cartoonists I don’t know very well (such as Lisa). But, I feel so good afterwards, in both situations – it’s why I keep doing it. Anytime I’ve ever done a live reading or podcast, and felt like it went well, it’s been like a natural high afterwards. Lisa seems to be able to relate. Have a listen.

We’re joined by incredibly talented MOME contributor and cartoonist Laura Park this week, and she tells us all about her recent trip to Wizard World Chicago. Hear about the celebrities spotted and the cosplay witnessed. Laura also lets us know about The Civil War, and comes down hard on the choice between Underwater and Outer Space. Additionally, the Panthers spend a good ten minutes or so in the beginning of the episode ranting about recent online discussions about Kickstarter. Sure to cause controversy!

Comments welcome!

Illustration of Inky the Domesticated Panther supplied by Rio Aubry Taylor. Submit your own illustration of Inky to inkpanthers@gmail.com

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Expect some drum-beating around this for the next couple of weeks. The book officially debuts at SPX, but will be available a week early at Bergen Street Comics, on Friday September 2nd. Bergen Street is located in Park Slope Brooklyn, it’s a fantastic comic book store, which has hosted a couple of comics and Ink Panthers events with me in the past. Please, come on out!

This week it’s just Alex and Mike in The Panther’s Lair, discussing that new Rise of the Planet of the Apes movie (or, RotPotA) and how great it is. This leads us back into a familiar discussion about Animal Rights, and how all animals have them (except scallops). Then, a conversation about Parents and Comics, some interesting new announcements, and Alex calls out an cartoonist who Has Wronged Him, and asks for advice.

Accompanying illustration of Alex and Mike riding Inky, the domesticated Panther, by Daniel Spottswood.

Comments welcome!

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Just so’s it doesn’t seem so much like I’m not posting drawings anymore, here’s a recent pic. I’m also still working on my Ain’t No Power comics, but taking a minute to step back and think about it some more. There’s something nice about diving straight into a new full-length story, but there’s also something appealing about catching my breath for a minute and taking some time to let the story develop.

It’s interesting – creating Troop 142 was such a rush. I’d gotten the story thought out enough in my head, that I was able to just power on through, writing and drawing the whole thing in a relatively short period of time. It’s made me realize how precious that sort of momentum is. It’s not easy to create. I don’t think it’s possible for me to operate at that level on a constant basis.

So, I’m figuring, Troop 142 is about to drop, maybe I should pause and try a couple of different things for a few months. I’m going to be doing a ton of traveling in the Fall, going to all sorts of cons. Maybe I should just enjoy the downtime.

Nick Abadzis joins me in the Talkie Hutt for a chat about his lengthy career with a wide variety of comics publishers.

Also, being that both Nick and I hail from the United Kingdom, we also talk a bit about British comics. I personally, always wonder about British comics and their early influence on me. It’s a smaller industry, that I think has historically been taken less seriously than comics in other countries. You just have to look across the English Channel to see a country with a long thriving history of comics. It may just be a distance of 20-something miles or so between Britain and France, but the comics industries are worlds-apart.