wolverine and the x-men #29 : ramon perez’s elegant cartooning graces this issue. one of the most fun books coming out.

regular show #1 : more absurd fun for boys & girls of all ages.

ff #7 : mike allred returns after a month off. rejoice.

the dream merchant #1 : a promising new book from image featuring a dreamy color palette and refreshing, european-flavored art style.

chogokin chogattai kingrobot mickey & friends : disney-fried voltron.

thor god of thunder #8 : jason aaron & esad ribic bring the myth and majesty to the best marvel book this side of hawkeye.

michael golden gi joe yearbook artist edition portfolio : the man who influenced arthur adams, and then arthur influenced everyone else.

copra compendium & copra #6 : michel fiffe’s exercise in monthly badassery gets collected and continues to roll on. take a look.

Just when you expect Gross & Carey’s literary-metaphysical magnum opus to start buckling down and wrapping up, it gets headier and wilder.

39. Waking Sleeping Beauty

An absolute love song to the guys who resurrected Disney’s majesty after a muddled, disappointing ’80s. The Howard Ashman stuff is inspiring and tragic.

38. Foxing Quarterly

Art directed by Jim Rugg, this might be the best-looking zine we have ever seen.

37. James Ensor

The powerful works of this turn-of-the-century Belgian expressionist can be seen at the MoMA. The combination of tiny, obsessive detail with big, broad gestures reminded us of our own David Proch.

36. TCAF

We’re headed north again as the Time Machine travels across the border. Now if we could just find our passports…

35. Print Show

Instead of featuring one particular artist, in May we’re filling the gallery with beautiful low-priced prints from our books and our friends. Our buddies sure do make some pretty pictures here…

34. IDW’s Spirit Artist’s Edition

Now that’s the spirit!

33. Nemo in Sleeplessland

I think Nemo needs a break from Slumberland. Many thanks to Caitlin McCormack.

32. Twice Upon a Time Machine

Wherein we settle upon a theme for our OUATM sequel: Greek mythology.

31. Adventures of Jodelle

Fantagraphics’ new edition of Guy Peellaert’s French spy-porn-comedy zings like Yellow Submarine on a Quaalude high.

30. Mind MGMT

Matt Kindt plays with the possibilities of sequential storytelling in this mind-fuck of a modern masterpiece.

29. Roger Ebert

We were saddened by the death of the greatest film critic of all time. The world lost a big brain, a kind soul, a sharp wit and an open heart.

28. Mad Men

Return of the Don.

27. Luminous Incal

Moebius & Jodorowski as they should be seen. At $80 this book is a steal.

26. Daygloayhole

Ben Passmore’s post-apocalyptic trip-out is sloppy and sort of incomprehensible, but it’s absolutely overflowing with sheer cartoon verve.

25. Ben Marra’s Macbeth

Marra was commissioned by the Bavarian State Opera to do this German-language adaptation of Macbeth. It’s a big world out there.

24. Cracked Actor

This movie has basically been running on an infinite loop at the shop. Bowie at the height of his coked-out genius. Brecht meets Judy Garland meets Elvis meets strip tease meets nervous breakdown.

23. Gustave Verbeek

Lock your iPad screen and flip this sucker upside down. Turn-of-the-century comic-strip alchemy, from a German mastermind.

22. Everything I Can See From Here

This gorgeous, mysterious, rapturously animated short film should be watched on the biggest screen you can find.

21. Comics Classes at Locust Moon

Locust Moon Academy begins in earnest on May 28th, with two weekly classes (for children & adults, respectively) going forward. James Comey and Mark Robinson will bust your heads open and fill them with brilliance.

20. Calyer

Eating octopus tentacles with Mr. Pope in this eclectic Brooklyn bistro was either something we did or a really weird dream.

19. Comedian

J.G. Jones & Brian Azzarello’s ramshackle origin story goes out with a literal bang. Clever, shocking, and powerful.

18. Daniel Merriam

We discovered the work of this brilliant low-brow surrealist at the Animazing Fine Art gallery in SoHo. (Along with original paintings by Dr. Seuss, drawings by Charles Schulz, and other awesomeness.)

17. Marshal Law: Deluxe Edition

DC finally collects the complete run of Pat Mills & Kevin O’Neill’s gonzo superhero freakout. Couldn’t be more of its time, yet still feels utterly relevant and vital.

16. Totto Ramen

When the world burns down, we hope that NYC’s Totto Ramen is the last restaurant standing. We will huddle in their tiny dining room, slurping noodle-bowl after noodle-bowl, happily awaiting our inevitable deaths.

15. Tampopo

Totto Ramen is so good that after we gorged ourselves we had to watch a movie about ramen noodles. Like a fever dream. Who knew live prawns could be used as sex toys?

14. Alexandra Beguez

This mistress of the silent comic will be featured in the first issue of QUARTER MOON. Check out her chimerical & elegant work here.

13. Easy Pieces

Neil Dvorak’s incredibly odd and telekinetic mini-comix form a handbook for living in this cracked, schizoid world.

12. Phantom Hand

Our buddies over at Phantom Hand are doing great things with their monthly weird-beautiful-shit shows at Jinxed.

11. Lettuce Girl

Sophie Wiedeman’s whimsical & sometimes-heartbreaking fable has sympathy for the devil and the damsel both.

10. Postland

Jeremy Baum’s wild saga of backwoods occultism will crawl into the dark corners of your mind, makes itself at home, and begin building its inexplicable temple.

9. Shaman

We prep Ben Kahan’s bounding, wild-eyed superhero saga for the pitch process. Bruno Hidalgo’s art has never looked better, not to mention the covers by Farel Dalrymple, J.G. Jones, James Comey, Rob Woods & Alice Meichi Li.

8. Marvel Covers

When did Marvel start churning out brilliant pop-art and slapping it on the covers of Spider-Man, Deadpool and X-Men books?

7. It Will All Hurt

Printed & Eisner nominated, it’s been a wild month for Farel Dalrymple’s itchy & oddly brilliant magic trick.

6. Quarter Moon

The first issue of our comics magazine will showcase silent comics, and feature Charles Fetherolf, Alexandra Beguez, Lindsey Wavrek, Steven Bradshaw, Sophia Wiedeman, Alex Eckman-Lawn & Jeremy Baum. To be released on July 17th.

5. Paul Pope

The man himself joins the Dream Army. And in discussing his potential Nemo strip, points us toward…

4. Little Ego

Giardino’s erotic parody/homage to McCay captures the tone and feel of Little Nemo perfectly, but features more sex with alligators.

3. Roger Langridge’s Little Nemo Strip

O how I wish we could really show you this one. No one channels his own vivid voice through a ventriloquated medium better than the fine Mr. Langridge. Here’s a tiny taste.

2. Free Comic Book Day

Cookies, Balloons, Little Baby’s Ice Cream, J.G. Jones, Mark Robinson, Dave Proch, Rob Woods… oh yeah, and thousands of free books. 5/4, all day. Merry comichristmas, everyone.

1. Carmine Infantino

We bid farewell to one of the true titans of comic-making, a king of the silver age, and a constant inspiration to anyone who believes that comics can and should get better and better and better.

3 new stories : dash shaw has one of the most unique voices in comics. anything new from him is cause for delight.

indestructible hulk #7 : hulk & thor smash giants, and walter simonson draws it.

hawkeye #10 : we give this book a lot of love. it loves you back.

sonic the hedgehog #248 : sonic meets mega man in one of the more lively, lighthearted books you’ll find.

the jack kirby omnibus volume #2 : even when he was trying to sell us toys, jack kirby couldn’t help but give us one more burst of raw power when he took on the SUPER POWERS mini series which, sadly, was one of the only jobs the KING ever saw royalties from. proceeds from this $40 book, along with a stipend from the check of every creator working at marvel today, should go to finally building the JACK KIRBY MUSEUM.

jack davis ec stories artist’s edition : big & bad enough to swallow small children. thank you, scott dunbier.

by this point i had been talking on the phone with peter guralnick, the writer and music historian who wrote the definitive book on sam’s life, DREAM BOOGIE, and i was deep into telling this story. i asked nate powell, for my money one of the best cartoonists alive, if he was into it. nate was, and he set off to work on the opening scene.

nate’s pencils set the tone and perfectly captured what we were going for. jason and i holed up in a crappy hotel in south jersey one weekend and laid out the structure of the book, including a perfectly realized ending. nate kept drawing, and i was set to finish up the script. then a guy i loved killed himself and i was lost for awhile, and the last thing i could do was write anything, and nate had other books to draw, and sam went on the shelf. here’s what nate did for the opening scene…

i’m proud of this scene. maybe one day we’ll get back to it. for now, this is what it is.

- chris stevens

covers aside, here’s what we’re excited about this week.

comedian #6: azarello and local legend j.g. jones literally end this story with a bang. a twisted trip into the mind of one of comics’ most impenetrable characters. i have a feeling this thing will read a lot better in the collection than it did month to month. as it is, jones’ beautiful & elegant linework carried us through a ramshackle origin story.

B.P.R.D. Vampire #2: ba & moon continue their loving homage to their spiritual forefather mr. mignola. two of comics very best young artists, working at the very tip top of their game. not to be missed.

jupiter’s legacy: not much besides set-up in this hotly anticipated debut issue, but it’s a pretty good set-up. and damn if frank quitely doesn’t draw some pretty pictures.

five ghosts #2: not much to say about this besides that it rolls along with its greasy retro-adventure energy, playing it straight and doing justice to its gloriously goofball concept. you might forget about it five minutes after you read it, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t time well spent.

foxing #2: collecting poetry, illustration, comics, fiction, and whatever other cool shit they can get their hands on, jim rugg’s quarterly is definitely the best-looking zine we’ve seen this year.

east of west #2: i’m pretty sure that jonathan hickman is using this book to found his own world religion. sign us up, wash our brains, take us away.

manhattan projects volume #2 : fresh off an eisner nomination for best new series & continuing series, the second collection of jonathan hickman and nick pitarra’s gets deeper, dirtier, vaster, and just plain crazier. i like to think if you were brainstorming ideas with a drunk nobel prize winner who’d just eaten mushrooms and wanted to make a comic that the result would look like this.

batman year 100 : this book had me breathing hard, actually worried about this future batman, a freedom fighter in a shitty world where the government knows everything about everyone and uses teams of marauding super-cops and packs of cybernetic pit-bulls to keep the peace. paul pope is just a flat-out master. he puts batman in peril with a variety of stunning shots, dizzying angles, and superb body language…this guy’s just a guy, he’s being hunted, and there’s no guarantee he’s going to make it…it’s something you don’t get out of a batman book, it goes back to when bruce wayne first started fighting crime in gotham and he was getting his ass kicked too often…immediately this batman is the underdog and you’re cheering for him. and pope, with jose villarubia, creates an ugly dystopian gotham of 2039. the government presence, the creepy and outlandish group of characters introduced here, is personalized enough that it avoids the rut of dull satire or evil cabal. i won’t spoil any moments for anyone, trust me it’s a great book.

marshal law the deluxe edition : this book was a bomb on the late 80′s comics scene, marrying post-watchmen blues with a nihilistic, absurd attitude that somehow still seemed romantic to my 13 year old self. what if frank miller’s batman ran wild through the marvel & dc universes, and he just didn’t give a fuck? brooding & mocking, intense & comical, with fine art from a pre-LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN kevin o’neill, this is a long out of print masterpiece dropped on your lap.

happy : grant morrison’s dirty cop/imaginary friend mash-up is, to use the rather salty language of the book itself, fucking nutso. we loved it, and look for blue feathers falling wherever we go.

house of secrets omnibus : a post-grunge coming of age series set firmly in the deep end of the VERTIGO pool, this was one of the more delicate & sensitive books produced by the now-failing but once mighty imprint. the series main character, rain harper, and her crew would have fit in just fine in the world of THE SANDMAN. steve seagle puts his heart into it and teddy kristiansen, in his only sustained american sequential work as far as i know, is sublime & creepy, delivering every day moments and supernatural chills in the gorgeous fashion he’s known for. highly recommended.

Locust Moon Academy. Tonight, we matriculate in hell. The illustrious Mark A. Robinson (creator of Image’s I LOVE TROUBLE) and his hydroelectric fountain of creativity will inspire children ages 8-15, starting Saturday April 27th at 3pm, and proceeding weekly after that. James Comey, that ink-guzzling breaker of bones and artist of AMERICAN MONSTER BUFFET, will begin brainwashing any and all comers 16-and-older at 6pm on Tuesday May 14th.

The revolution begins here.

36 Lessons in Self-Destruction. Rob Wood’s magnum opus is complete. Now all that’s left to do is print this sucker, and plan the most self-destructive book release party the publishing world has ever seen. To be released on October 5th. Which just happens to be the date of…

The 2nd Annual Locust Moon Comics Festival. Our first shot at this was just a dry run. This time we move into the sanctuary space at the Rotunda, where we can fit five times as many tables. The back space at the Rotunda (where the convention was held last year) will be reserved for panels, screenings, interviews, talks, maybe even a musical performance or two. This is not a comic book convention. It’s a celebration of the infinite possibilities of the medium we all hold dear.

Stumptown Awards. ONCE UPON A TIME MACHINE is nominated for Best Anthology! We are honored. Vote for us HERE.

Free Comic Book Day. Saturday, May 4th. There will be cookies. There will be balloons. There will be an exclusive new flavor from Little Baby’s Ice Cream. There will be live musical performances. There will be our own little artist’s alley, composed of J.G. Jones, Mark Robinson, Rob Woods & Dave Proch. And oh yeah: a veritable smorgasbord of free comics, from our shelves to your hot little hands. Don’t miss it.

Little Nemo. The Slumberland Express rolls on. This past month we have been joined by Mark Buckingham, Chrissie Zullo, and an aspiring young gentleman by the name of Paul Pope. We’ve seen gorgeous watercolor sketches from J.G. Jones, brilliantly composed roughs from Maria & Peter Hoey, and finished inks from our own David Proch. Sometimes it feels as though we’re building a temple, and every stone is made of love.

More to come, Moonies. Stay tuned…

the first in a series from mistress-of-puppets and all around making-cool-stuff-ninja caitlin mccormack.

gi joe: the cobra files #1 : so good it’s hard to believe it’s a g.i. joe book. mike costa & antonio fuso  do psychological espionage through the filter of the real american heroes. there’s not much difference between the heroes & villains.

will eisner’s the spirit artist’s edition : ding ding ding.

spongebob comics #19 : a particularly excellent piece of comics-making on a near-monthly basis. i’d love to see rob woods and box brown do strips in here.

mind mgmt hardcover volume #1 : a mind fuck of a modern masterpiece. i have to think it reads better in big chunks than it did month-to-month — and it was pretty stellar reading once a month. the whole package here is a winner, from material to package to price — 20 bucks for a really well-put together hardcover. highly recommended.