Linkblogging is a monthly “go look” feature on Sequential State that I’m using to feature fun comic things around the internet. There is a lot of great stuff to look at on the internet. The stuff featured is just the stuff I’ve been looking at lately. If I missed your thing, send me a message!
Kickstarter:
I chronicled my concerns about Digital Manga Publishing’s (tumblr: digitalmanga) latest Tezuka Kickstarter here, but if you’re interested in the project, it’s still up and running. Still looking for about $360,000 dollars in the next ~15 days.
Blue Delliquanti’s webcomic O Human Star is up on Kickstarter, and luckily, it has already met its funding goal. I’ve just recently started reading O Human Star, and it is fantastic, full stop. The coloring and the way the story is constructed is unlike anything I’ve read on the web. You can read the comic here and pledge for the book version and other goodies of the first 3 chapters here.
If you’ve reread the latest volume of Smut Peddler a few times and you’re looking for some more sexy comics, Armorous might be up your alley. Leia Weathington’s name is attached to the project, which caught my attention. If you are interested, move quick – they need to raise about $8,000 in the next ~2 days.
Read this thing:
James Sturm, a cartoonist whose work I admire, recently had a piece called The Sponsor published on Medium.com’s The Nib. It features a young man and an older cartoonist meeting at a diner and discussing the success of a young female cartoonist, often in a “She is succeeding and because of that I am failing” kind of way. The piece could (and maybe should) be read as satire, but the comic doesn’t stick the landing. Maybe it feels too sympathetic to the male leads? Or perhaps it’s too obvious, banal. The catchphrase for the piece is “The first step is admitting you have a problem,” and I think this piece has some problems, not just the implicit sexism. It’s probably still worth reading and discussing.
Núria Tamarit’s (tumblr: ntamarit) fascinating piece on troubled sleep, alcohol, and breakups.
Witchy a webcomic (tumblr: witchy-comic) by Ariel Ries, looks really nice, and was recommended to the general internet by Toril Orlesky, one part of Strange Star Comics and author of Hotblood! – I value Toril’s opinion on comics pretty highly, so this is going on my list.
Comics about witches! Penny (tumblr: pennyloafing) from Penny Candy Studios has started up Witchlette, a comic that if memory serves was teased way earlier this year. Penny says that it’s a project that’s been in planning for some time, and I’m ready to read!
News/Reviews/Oddities:
Zainab at Comics and Cola has a really nice write up on Cul de Sac by Richard Thompson. Thompson’s work was recently featured at the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library and Museum at The Ohio State University, and I was able to see the exhibit along with an exhibit of Bill Watterson’s work.
Have you seen the alt-manga that Breakdown Press (tumblr: breakdownpress) is publishing with the help of manga scholar Ryan Holmberg? They’ve released two volumes so far, one by Seiichi Hayahsi and another Masahiko Matsumoto. This collaboration is pretty exciting, and hopefully more interesting content is going to be coming our way soon. You can grab copies at the Breakdown Press webstore.
Patreon recently announced that patrons are giving more than $1 million per month to creators on the site. I’ve compared Kickstarter to the old patronage system, but that’s far too project-based to be a completely accurate description. If anything though, Patreon is a micro-patron system, where microtransactions build up to part of a rent payment, etc. Part of me wonders if that is a complete $1 million IN, or, as it seems in the small comics microcosm of Patreon, there is a lot of money that flows between artists.
I started a Facebook page for Sequential State – if you get most of your reading material through your Facebook Feed and want to see these posts there, click that like button.
Have you read Pink from vertical-inc? I did a review last month. This is a manga I think people who aren’t necessarily into manga will still really enjoy, so if you like the sound of the book based on my review, I highly recommend it.
CAB is this weekend, and you should go. Seriously, if you can, there are going to be some great artists and publishers there, and the show is free and open to the public. The CAB tumblr comicartsbrooklyn is showing off debuts and other cool stuff from the upcoming show. Since I’m stuck in Ohio, I’m counting down the days to Genghis Con at the end of November (genghisconcleveland).