§ The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinal rounds up the grueling life of the daily strip cartoonist, and looks at notorious drop-outs like Watterson, Larson and now McGruder.

§ The Detroit News updates the William Messner-Loebs story, and things seem to be going well for him for a change, which is good news.

§ You will prolly not get that much out of this link unless you speak Hip Hop, but it explains the real deal on Jay-Z and KINGDOM COME and the comics connection.

§ New Gorillaz DVD, iTunes EPs, Book And Toys Coming Soon, We said…TOYS!

Toy maker Kidrobot is teaming up with Gorillaz again to make soft vinyl figures of characters 2D, Murdoc, Noodle and Russel. They’ll come in three different colour variations, with manufacturing runs of 60,000 for the basic edition (available on October 16), 4,000 of the white edition and 1,000 of the two-tone edition (both available on November 2). They’ll be available through the Kidrobot website as well as Kidrobot stores and other select retailers. A previous line of Gorillaz toys from Kidrobot sold out within weeks.

§ We never watch Conan any more, but apparently a cartoon feature called PALE FORCE is popular enough to be turned into Webisodes:

Jim Gaffigan’s superhero satire was originally launched in Sept. 2005. The toons chronicle the misadventures of muscular Pale Man and his skinny sidekick, Conan O’Brien, as they use their paleness to fight crime.

NBC.com will host 20 new 90-second webisodes of PALE FORCE as part of its TV 360 initiative.

In addition, the toons will be made available to Sprint users for free a week before they arrive online.

Thanks to all who sent in links!