Laufman makes jump to grownup themes in Crimson Fall: Lambs of God
By Dan BrownWith Crimson Fall, London graphic novelist Derek Laufman has effortlessly made the shift from all-ages comics to more mature sequential art. That said, I’ve read the books Laufman has written/drawn for younger readers, and I never felt like I was being talked down to. And I’m old.Longtime Laufman fans need not fret about Crimson Fall. It has all the fun and adventure of Bot 9, RuinWorld and Witch of Wickerson; in the Forest City creator’s words, Crimson Fall is “Hellboy meets the Witcher with a splash of Game of Thrones in there.” In other words, the 24-page offering is a dungeon adventure with swear words and one very meaty adult theme that could be lost on younger readers: the complexity of faith.Byron’s Laufman debuted the black-and-white book in April at the Toronto Comics Art Festival, a gathering of creators whose specialty is producing indie comics, which is exactly Laufman’s jam, even though he has done work for DC and Marvel – the Coke and Pepsi of the comics industry – drawing characters like Batman, Spider-Man and Luke Skywalker.Subtitled Lambs of God, it’s part of a projected series set in the same milieu, and takes readers into a shadow-filled monastery that has been pillaged by forces unknown. Father McKellen is seeking answers about how his fellow holy men died, retaining the broadsword-wielding knight Sir Duncross to handle any, er, supernatural entanglements.You can enjoy the story as a straightforward, kickass adventure tale about a pair of demon slayers doing what they do best. But if you go beneath that surface battle, paying attention to the interplay between the two men, you’ll notice a difference in their beliefs.It is Father McKellen, the man of the cloth, who – when confronted with irrefutable evidence that creatures from hell exist – asks a rational question: “How is it possible that demons walk in our world?”Sir Duncross, in between hacks of his wide blade that echo with sound effects like “Slash,” “Slice” and “Stab,” outlines his belief in an older order: He puts his faith in gods, not God. He is not impressed with monotheism. “Does your church not still seek the truth?” the fighter quizzes the cleric, revealing the disgust he feels for religious leaders who won’t be straight with their followers about the nature of evil.The foray into the monastery comes to a fiery conclusion, and in the end, each of the men makes a small symbolic move in the direction of the other.As I have with Laufman’s previous creations, I give Crimson Fall: Lambs of God an enthusiastic thumbs up. This is a fun adventure, stylishly rendered, that left me with much food for thought.Dan Brown has covered pop culture for 30 years as a journalist and also moderates L.A. Mood’s monthly graphic-novel group.
Call me impressed by Call Me Bill
By Dan BrownCall Me Bill is an intriguing graphic novel that provides one possible answer to a question posed long ago: Why would a young woman who drowned in a maritime disaster off Canada’s East Coast in 1873 be dressed up as a male sailor when her remains were recovered?It’s former Londoner and current Nova Scotia resident Lynette Richards who supplies that answer, sketching a history – bolstered by newspaper accounts from back in the day – of the S.S. Atlantic crew member who went by the name of Bill.This book transported me back to the 1870s, with its sparse lines, washed-out grey tones and accurate, period-specific dialogue.“I didn’t know Bill was a woman,” a fellow sailor tells newspaper reporters after the ship hits rocks and sinks close to shore. “He used to take his grog like all the rest and was always begging and stealing licorice. He was a good fellow and I’m shocked that he was a woman.”As a starting point, Richards – whose usual medium is stained glass – imagines a New Jersey farm girl named Maggie Armstrong whose time “playing the tomboy” is put to an end by a stern stepmother who demands she must finally “dress and behave like a lady.”Having left home, and after a series of high-seas adventures, Bill has the bad fortune to be on the deck of the Atlantic the night it sinks. The sinking was huge news at the time, but got overshadowed in the history books by the Titanic, which went down a few decades later. (Oh, and for the record, Call Me Bill would make an AMAZING movie.)How evocative is Call Me Bill? In one panel, which sets forth part of a trip Bill took to England prior to joining the crew of the Atlantic, two starving rats have the most pained looks on their faces, as vivid a portrayal of animal suffering as I’ve ever come across. Richards has an impressive ability to evoke sympathy for her characters.That kind of symbolism runs through the whole book, as when another sailor explains to Bill how seals called selkies are believed by mariners to be able to come ashore, assuming the form of humans females on dry land. “The seals gaze at me as if they know my deepest secrets,” Bill thinks, seeing their sad eyes.And early in the story, there is a moment of reflection on a trestle bridge after Bill runs away from home: “Behind me was my past, ahead my future. The river babbled like many voices.” Bill plunges ahead into an uncertain future, not knowing that doom awaits on the other side.Although it is published by Emanata, the young-adult imprint of East Coast publisher Conundrum Press, Richards never talks down to her readers in Call Me Bill.And as a stirring chapter in our country’s history of maritime disasters, I put Call Me Bill right up there with the Gordon Lightfoot song Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald. It moved me that much.Dan Brown has covered pop culture for 30 years as a journalist and also moderates L.A. Mood’s monthly graphic-novel group.
Veteran Reviewer and Unabashed Comics Lover Comes to L.A. Mood Comics & Games Website
By Dan Brown. You can call them cartoons or sequential art or graphic novels or comic books. Whatever term you prefer, I love ’em all. And I’ll be sharing my enthusiasm for this special art form on the website of L.A. Mood Comics & Games, the venerable London store that serves as the unofficial headquarters for London comic fans, every week via this column. I invite you to consider it your once-a-week chance to geek out with me. How did I get this assignment? As the tagline at the bottom of this column indicates, I’ve been covering pop culture as a journalist for the last 30 years. I’ve had staff positions at such news outlets as the National Post, CBC.ca, and the New Brunswick Telegraph-Journal. My freelance work has appeared in places like the Globe and Mail and on MSNBC.com. From 2012 to 2022 I wrote a graphic-novel column every Saturday as part of my work at the London Free Press, where I had also been a blogger, among many other duties. I have also, since 2009, been the moderator for L.A. Mood’s monthly graphic-novel club. (Shameless plug: You should check it out.) But, most important of all, I’m a card-carrying comic lover. My starting point is the Marvel Comics of the 1970s and as far as superheroes go, my fave is likely the Thing, the self-loathing, orange-coloured pile of rocks who served as the ace pilot for the Fantastic Four. I would say I have a major in Marvel and a minor in DC. Even now, DC’s heroes still strike me as emotionally constipated; I was a sucker for the overemotional heroes Jack Kirby dreamed up in collaboration with Stan Lee. By the time I was a university student in the mid 1980s, the comics world had exploded. In fact, I’m so old, I remember when the idea of comics being used to tell stories with characters other than superheroes was a revolutionary one. I would love to go back in time to when I was nine years old and tell my younger self: One day, all those comics you love will be source material for movies and TV shows. There will be so many of them, you won’t have time to watch them all. So what excites me now? The work of Southwestern Ontario’s own Jeff Lemire. The parody stylings of Bob Burden, the mad genius behind Flaming Carrot. Mimi Pond. Lynda Barry. Jillian and Mariko Tamaki. And on and on . . . This column will aspire to cover local comics first, meaning those with a connection to Southwestern Ontario and London. Then the rest of Canada. Then the world beyond. Some future columns will be straightforward reviews, others will touch on issues raised by comics. And I am guessing superhero film/TV adaptations will be an unavoidable topic. I would also love to hear from you and get a dialogue going about the comics scene here in the Forest City. One promising sign we have put the pandemic behind us was the reappearance in April of Tingfest, the downtown graphic-art festival that celebrates local creators, so I am hoping the geek calendar of events can finally resume in earnest. (Shameless plug: Have you got your tickets for Forest City Comicon on June 24?) I also want to know what comics and characters are rocking your world. You can send me an email in care of info@lamoodcomics.ca. Let’s get this party started! Dan Brown has covered pop culture for 30 years as a journalist and also moderates L.A. Mood’s monthly graphic-novel group.
Meet Comic Artist Scott Brian Woods May 13th and 14th
Scott Brian Woods has been a working artist for over 20 years. He currently calls London, ON home with his wife and 2 daughters. During the pandemic, his daughters were the inspiration for his children’s book Anywhere Can be Everywhere, the story of two young girls who use their imagination to overcome a rainy day. Scott is currently illustrating the upcoming superhero title, Equilibrium, for Comic House. Set to debut in 2023 and written by Keith Champagne, it is a 5-issue series featuring Captain Canuck, Daredevil, Freelance, and many more proud-Canadian legacy characters spanning back to the 1940s. His most recent work, a long-time coming sci-fi series, Daring the Sun, premiered at TCAF 2023. It follows astronaut Crash Daring in the distant future, who finds himself far from Earth struggling to survive on a savage, alien world. Scott continues to self-publish his swords and sorcery epic, No Rask for the Wicked. Inspired by an ongoing Dungeons & Dragons campaign played with his long-time friends, it chronicles the exploits of an unscrupulous rogue, a befuddled wizard, and a mysterious ghost. Meet Scott Saturday May 13 and Sunday May 14 atL.A. Mood Comics and Games100 Kellogg LaneSuite 5London ON N5W0B4Canada(519) 432-3987 Check out Scott Brian Woods publications today!
Guest Artists Announced for Free Comic Book Day!
Meet Two Guest Artists Saturday May 6Meet Lynette RichardsLynette Richards has been cartooning her whole life. She chose stained glass as her professional medium because it was both a trade and an art. She was fully aware, too, that stained glass windows have used sequential narration for over 1000 years, and are essentially, early graphic novels! As a Craft Nova Scotia Master Artisan, Lynette is proud to have been selected to create large public art installations for the first Pride Library in Canada (UWO London ON), and the ArQuives (formerly the Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives in Toronto). Lynette lives and works in Terence Bay Nova Scotia, where she owns and operates Rose Window StainedGlass and serves on the Board of Directors of the SS Atlantic Heritage Park and Society.In her debut graphic novel Call Me Bill, Richards shares the remarkable life story of a tenacious adventurer who took huge risks to live an authentic life that others would have had difficulty imagining. Set against the backdrop of the worst maritimedisaster before the Titanic, this story is an exploration of identity and radical imagination that echoes across generations. The story starts with the recovery of bodies from the wreck of the SS Atlantic, and one particular body, Bill, a sailor who turns out to the surprise of the survivors and shipmates, a woman. Over four years of heavy research, Richards gathered details of this story from a range of historic newspapers from all over the world, to map out and honour this life worth living.“Visually inventive and eloquently written, Call Me Bill is a dazzling story of a short life lived daringly.” —Emma Donoghue, author of Room and The Lotterys Plus One Meet local artist Eric OlcsvaryEric Olcsvary is a comic book creator working under his own label "Alls Cherry Comics". He is currently working on two series, "Wendy and the Sprite", and "Overflow", each with their own unique story about otherworldly characters on an adventure to uncover the secrets of an ancient land. “My stories and comic book label were created to bring a sense of wonder, and a crave for adventure to the reader, and to spread the love for comics/stories as an art form!”Don’t miss out! Save the date and celebrate with us.We will be open 10 am till 6 pm.There will be sales, two guest artists, prizes, and more!Come early as we will have limited comics available (while supplies last) For more details please check out www.freecomicbookday.com
Magic: The Gathering March of the Machine
Magic The Gathering March of the Machine is to be released Friday April 14th! Greetings Planeswalkers!The epic conclusion of Magic's greatest battle is upon us! Elesh Norn and her Phyrexian army have finally invaded the Multiverse, breaching countless planes. Can the remains of the Gatewatch turn the tide as the Phyrexian hordes threaten to assimilate or destroy everything in their path? The fate of all planes is at stake.It's time to join the rest of the Multiverse in this climactic battle touching every plane you've ever known and loved. Your first look at March of the Machine is here. March of the Machine is the culmination of more than a decade of Phyrexian machinations, all leading to a shift that will fundamentally change the Multiverse.
