ICYMI -- Small Press Comics Criticism and Whatnot for 3/25/19 to 3/29/19

Highlighting some great small press comics criticism being published, as well as other random things that have caught my eye over the past week.

COMICS CRITICISM

* Edwin Turner reviews KINGDOM by Jon McNaught (Nobrow Press), writing "What does happen though is difficult to pin down here in language though---which is fitting, as one of Kingdom's themes is the failure of articulated language to effectively communicate. What McNaught gives us in Kingdom is a feeling fraught with ambiguity---restless tranquility, joyful melancholy, pleasant waves of boredom."

* Alex Hoffman on PIERO by Edmond Baudoin (New York Review Comics), "a love letter, both to Baudoin’s brother, and to artmaking. It is an intimate vision of [Baudoin's] childhood, and an introduction to the artist he would become."

* Hoffman also writes about THE SEA by Rikke Villadsen (Fantagraphics), writing "In her strange and lilting world, Villadsen uses the fisherman as a stand-in for a toxic masculinity seen all too often across the globe. The events of The Sea lay bare that toxicity and show its inherent worthlessness. Pride and boasting cannot steer a ship, and no amount of tattoos or pipe smoking can make a man a sailor. In this symbolism, Villadsen exposes the fraudulent nature of toxic masculinity. More precisely, not only is the fisherman a fraud, but his fraudulence leads to his demise.

* Robert Kirby reviews BLOSSOMS IN AUTUMN (SelfMadeHero) by Zidrou and Aimée de Jongh which "captures the poetry of human relationships along with the belief that life might hold a few surprises in store, should we allow ourselves to welcome them."

* Kevin Bramer talks about DODO COMICS #5 by Grant Thomas.

WHATNOT

* No offense to Justin F. Martin (or maybe ALL the offense), but sweet holy hell THIS is not ...  you know ... good.

* Sara L. Jewell interviews CARTA MONIR for The MNT.

* Hillary Brown interviews BOX BROWN about his new book Cannabis: The Illegalization of Weed in America.

* Mark Newgarden interviews BILL GRIFFITH about his new book Nobody's Fool.

* Jonathan Dyck has a comic up on Popula called LENT.

* Trying to figure out exactly WHAT the Futures of Comics is...

* Three Poems by Marshall Mallicoat.