Via Superitch, an example of Canada’s WWII comics efforts, in the shape of a complete Johnny Canuck story. This red-blooded adventurer was created by artist Leo Bachle when he was only 15, so cut the kid some slack.

We would give a lot to have a larger image of this cover, but alas, the internet has failed us. THAT’S how special Johnny Canuck is.

Be glad I didn't use an image from the inside of this comic

So Darwyn Cooke got caught on video saying that superhero comics should “…stop catering to the perverted needs of forty-five-year-old men.” He called out rape, children being forced to eat rats, explicit sex, foul language, and a lack of new characters. And now some people are getting upset. Oh come on, like you’ve never thought any of that.

Unfortunately the whole thing got derailed by his swipe at turning Batwoman into a lesbian, which came off as rather homophobic to some. Personally, I have to admit, I read it more as the character continuity issue of a man who likes his Bronze and Silver Age comics, which is somewhat humorous, given that he’s complaining about comics being ruled by the whims of forty-somethings, but he is large, he contains multitudes. (To which I say, Darwyn, it wasn’t “overnight”. She may have been around since 1956, but she hadn’t made any significant appearances since Crisis on Infinite Earths which basically changed everything. SEE? I can be as big of a geek as you are.)

So let’s break this down from the point of view of someone who is not forty five or male — me.

Perverted needs

I'm sorry, what?

Let’s be honest. The disturbing scenarios described by Cooke don’t disgust twenty and thirty-somethings — not to mention the sick little teenage boys we all went to school with — any more than they do forty-five-year-olds so much as they repel new readers of any age.

I’m going to come right out and say it — when you don’t know if a heretofore demure superhero title is going to dissolve into an orgy of rape and disembowelment in the next issue, it makes it that much harder to recommend to a new reader.

There’s definitely room for darker titles. I don’t think that anyone gets too up in arms when Hellblazer features yet another unlucky magician getting eaten by demons, but when you’re reading a JLA title and unexpectedly a hero gets dismembered and his preschooler gets murdered, it is all rather “What next, the moon turns to blood?”

While I’m not suggesting a return to the days of the Comic Code Authority, frankly, I think it would help matters immensely if readers knew, even unofficially, whether a particular comic title would be more likely to be shocking in the sense of “I had no idea the Batcave would explode!” or “On panel rape, graphic murder, more rape.” Having the stomach to handle prurient atrocities should not be a necessary skill for reading superheroes aimed at a post-grade school audience. If you really want a larger and more varied audience, keeping some of your titles and characters definitively away from the ultraviolence and disturbing content would be a good place to start. After all, did we really need to see evil dominatrix Mary Marvel?

No wonder many non-comics fans imagine us to be unwashed, socially inappropriate goons.

Forty-five-year-old

But yes, let’s get back to the question of whether or not comics cater to older fans in a way that makes for bad comics and excludes younger readers. Do they? Yeah, sometimes.

More than one comics professional has expressed the idea that all superhero comics are fueled almost entirely by nostalgia, and I have to say, I think that’s a very dangerous position to take. In my own experience, this isn’t true, at least not any more. How many adults under 30 even have fabled halcyon days as an eight-year-old at the supermarket spinner rack to want to recapture anymore? Most of us couldn’t get our hands on real comic books until we were in our teens, and when we did, we were probably more interested in the exciting stories or colorful characters than getting in touch with some lost era. Trying to get a new reader to recall the Silver Age or even Bronze Age of comics with a tear in the eye is a self-evidently ludicrous proposition.

Mainstream and superhero comics have a lot more going for them than simply a long history and great name recognition. Superhero comics aren’t really some sort of bizarre cult worshiping the desecrated remains of the 1930’s. They’re entertainment, and they’re fun. Forget this at your peril.

If Marvel decides to bring back Loxy the Dancing Bagel, they’d better have a very clear idea in mind of why somone who has never heard of Loxy would also enjoy and follow that book. The individual stories have to have some entertainment value of their own beyond simply being the next bit of paper with the character’s name printed on it. Otherwise, by issue 14, “Loxy and the Sinister Spread Scenario”, even the hardcore Loxy fanclub will start to tail off buying it, and good luck recruiting new readers!

Part of the power of the long-running superhero universes is that you can fall in love with a character and follow his or her exploits for years, watching the character change and grow in fascinating and unexpected directions in the hands of one creative team or another. The DC and Marvel Universes are one of the most fascinating and multi-faceted experiments in collaborative storytelling ever to see print, and that’s nothing to sneeze at. But precisely because they are so large and complex, it’s short-sighted to expect all of your readers to have to remember a ten-year-old plot point in order to get the story. A well-written story ought to work for longtime fans as well as new readers.  Yes, I know, that’s hard to pull off. But at the very least, it should be a priority to try.

If I had a dollar for every time I’ve heard something like “I want to read X-men / JSA / Marvel Comics / superhero comics, but where do you even start?” I would be able to buy several deluxe edition hardcovers, that’s all I’m saying.

Men

Dear comic book artists,

Stop tracing porn for your mainstream superhero comics.

Love,

Me

Look, there’s nothing wrong with eye candy. But when the storytelling takes an obvious back seat to illustrating your sexual fantasies, don’t be surprised when girls and women are turned off by it. That doesn’t mean that superhero comics aren’t for women, or that women don’t like or read superheroes

So do young people read superheroes?

Give me a break. Of course we do! There’s a lot to love about superhero comics. Walk into any comic book store today that isn’t a den of ’70s carpeting and stultifying testosterone and I would be willing to wager that at least 60 percent of the customers are under 40. The kids at my local library are continually checking out superhero books — they always seem to have the ones I want when I’m trying to find one.

Many, many superhero comics are having wonderful runs right now. Personally, I’m enjoying Justice League: Generation Lost, Prince of Power, Booster Gold, Gotham City Sirens and Young Allies at the moment and I can hardly wait for Batwoman to return this fall. There’s absolutely no question that there are good books out there, or that there are younger people reading them.

But don’t expect a twenty-three year old with fond memories of Wally West and Bart Allen to give a damn that Barry Allen got brought back from the dead or be cool with the fact that you sidelined his heroes to do it. He was a year old when the “real” Flash died.
Kate Fitzsimons writes for Publishers Weekly, Publishers Weekly Comics Week, and her personal comics and geek culture blog geekiferous.com.

Mark Waid has reconstructed his controversial Harvey night speech and made what he was getting at much clearer:

“Yes, Professor Waid, you hippie freak, sharing is all well and good, but how does that pay my bills?”

I know. I know. We all still should be financially compensated for hard work so we can keep doing this and make a decent living. No argument. And that brings us back around to filesharing. If you’re genuinely morally indignant about this issue, I understand and respect that. But I worry that a lot of the moral indignation I hear over filesharing is just a way of trying to mask our panic over how our ability to make a living with our art is quickly eroding under the current business models. And I understand that fear. I really, truly do.

Look, if you are in comics just to make money, I can respect that. Honestly, no sarcasm. But if you are here to create a sustainable living for yourself while at the same time finding some way to give back to the world, then filesharing is not a problem…it’s an opportunity.

Like it or not, downloading is here. Torrents and filesharing are here. That’s not going away. I’m not here to attack it or defend it–I’m not going to change anyone’s mind either way, and everyone in America at this point has anecdotal evidence “proving” how it hurts or helps the medium–but I am here to say it isn’t going away–and fear of it, fear of filesharing, fear of illegal downloading, fear of how the internet changes publishing in the 21st century, that’s a legitimate fear, because we’re all worried about putting food on the table and leaving a legacy for our children, but we’re using our energy on something we can’t stop, because filesharing is not going away.

Much more in the link. Perhaps if Waid had said all this on Saturday, there wouldn’t have been any confrontations, just nodding.

See also David Brothers’ essay on digital comics today on Comics Alliance: Please, Just Kiss Digital Comics On The Mouth Already.:

Here’s the problem with that: Digital comics are not there to support retailers. They are a competitor. They are the new gunslinger in town to blow the head off the old gunslinger. They’re the person trying to break up your marriage. Netflix doesn’t hold back on content, let publishers set ridiculous prices, or send customers to Blockbuster, so why should digital comics do the same?

It’s a common talking point precisely because digital comics are a huge threat to retailers, and since the Direct Market depends on retailers to sell comics, they don’t want to anger their biggest business partners. That’s totally fair; you don’t want to bite the hand that feeds you, and you don’t want to count your digital distribution eggs before they hatch. But at the same time, (and to continue the increasingly ill-advised New Girl In the Building comparison): if you keep holding back and selling yourself short, you’ll eventually be left with nothing. If the digital effort continues to be a half-effort, the failure of digital comics will be a self-fulfilling prophecy. At some point, you need to either make your move or give up.

In the meantime, comics creators were still feeling vaguely uneasy about the entire landscape of comics selling, as writer Chris Gage showed in a few twitters earlier today:

Man, I just looked at the July comics sales numbers and they’re depressing. The economy is a huge part of that but piracy has to be too… I don’t wanna get into a big debate about illegally downloading comics, don’t have the time or energy, but I’ll say this: if you illegally download a comic, especially a low or mid seller, you are voting for it to END. That’s all. Back to work.

With comics sales back to the same levels as the dark days of 1999, it’s fair to ask if piracy is to blame — even though comics were being scanned and downloaded 11 years ago, it probably wasn’t as widespread or socially accepted as it is now.

Developing…

Where to take the Fantastic Four, now?

In his “Emanata” column at Techland, Douglas Wolk looks at the promotional efforts for an upcoming Marvel story by Jonathan Hickman, singling out Fantastic Four as a series that particularly finds itself in the shadow of its creators:

“As Lee and Kirby established the FF, their premises are inflexible: they’re a family. They’re explorers. They have adventures together. […] If you stick to those axioms, you’re not just making a Fantastic Four story, you’re making one in the Lee/Kirby tradition […]. If you ignore any of those axioms, then it’s not really the Fantastic Four any more, and the question becomes how, and how quickly, it’s going to get back to being the ‘real’ Fantastic Four.”

Now, there’s Doctor Strange, granted, who has never quite transcended those early Lee/Ditko stories in style or subject matter in a sustained way, and certainly not for lack of trying. And, as much as I want to agree with Wolk on Captain America (Bucky rawks), I don’t expect that Brubaker will have altered, or expanded upon, the Simon/Kirby/Lee roots of the concept in any significant fashion when he’s done, any more than Steve Englehart or Mark Gruenwald did—and lord, they tried.

But, other than that, when it comes to Marvel’s big franchises, it’s hard to argue the point.

The Lee/Ditko issues may still be Spider-Man’s most “defining” run, but the goal posts of the character’s world have moved in significant and lasting ways since: when John Romita replaced Ditko; when Gerry Conway and Gil Kane killed Gwen Stacy; when Harry Osborn became the Goblin; when Peter went to college; when the clones and alien costumes and marriages became a fixture. And, more importantly, it’s been proven over the last 10 years that the basic ingredients of the Spider-Man mythos that Lee and Ditko invented and put in place can be easily modified and translated for modern audiences. Some of the most popular comics creators of their times have tried to do this with the Fantastic Four and failed: Jim Lee, Brian Michael Bendis, Mark Millar, Warren Ellis.

Or the Hulk. If there’s been any “definitive” version of the Hulk, Herb Trimpe probably has dibs for putting a face on the one that most people would most immediately recognize. Then again, the live-action and animated TV shows of the 1970s and 1980s probably did more to cement the idea of “the Hulk’” in people’s minds than anything from a comic. (Yes, Peter David had a long, well-remembered run. But it’s long and well-remembered because David kept coming up with smart ways to deviate from the “Hulk Smash!” formula, then return to it; none of his deviations replaced that formula. The David run may be a satisfying stretch of periodical fiction, but it did little to redefine the Hulk.)

In Thor’s case, as Wolk says, Walter Simonson’s rediscovery of the character through the lens of the Norse myths that had always nominally informed it managed to leave an impression that’s up there with the melodramatic Lee/Kirby stuff from the 1960s. Something similar happened with Iron Man, who keeps snapping back to David Michelinie and Bob Layton’s struggling alcoholic as much as the Stan Lee/Don Heck version. The Avengers, as a formula, didn’t really crystallize into something that people keep coming back to until the end of the Roy Thomas run. The X-Men and Daredevil didn’t come into their own until the late 1970s and early 1980s, even, when Wein, Cockrum, Claremont, Byrne, Miller and Janson reshaped them into something that stuck, that finally resonated with the audience.

And DC’s big guns, compared to their Marvel cousins, are conceptual Frankensteins, made up and defined by patches collected over decades from dozens of different interpretations, rather than one or two particularly dominant ones. If it feels like there’s a new Superman origin with all-new, all-different sensibilities and emphasis every two years, then that’s because there is. The DC characters—Superman and Batman, certainly, but also Wonder Woman, the Flash and Green Lantern and a lot of the less major ones—are not so much solid institutions as tugs-of-war given conceptual form, composit constructs whose aspects are constantly at odds with each other and vying for dominance.

But with the Fantastic Four, literally everything that ever “stuck” comes from Lee and Kirby. John Byrne and Mark Waid’s runs are long and fondly remembered, but, as Wolk points out, they moved well within the established boundaries. There’s nothing in them that Lee and Kirby didn’t do first, in some way. In the 2000s, Grant Morrison and Joe Casey (and James Sturm, but I’m not brave enough to let him out of the parentheses)—neither of them known for creative modesty—all had their go at the Fantastic Four, but their efforts were marginal, uncharacteristically reverential oddities.

So, is it even possible to revamp and re-interpret the Fantastic Four and keep them relevant in the way it’s happened to Spider-Man, the X-Men or Daredevil? Or is it a concept that’s outlived itself and is best left in the 1960s?

Well, there is one particular Fantastic Four story that sticks to all the “axioms” Wolk identifies and still takes the concept in a new direction that’s at least as far removed from Lee and Kirby as Simonson’s Thor was. Incidentally, it deals with ideas like relevance, innovation and the caretaking of things we’ve come to love for nostalgic reasons. It’s called Planetary.

Where to take the Fantastic Four, now? I don’t know, but it would seem that there are ways, at least.

o “Comfort Through the Doors”

Out now: Punisher Max: Happy Ending #1, a one-shot special by Irish writer Peter Milligan and Spanish artist Juan Jose Ryp.

Peter Milligan is a bit baffling to me; half the time, his work is brilliant, the other half it’s… less so. I think I’ve read a few bland comics by him, too, but those were X-Men spinoffs that came out in the 1990s, so it’s not surprising. Generally speaking, when he’s good, he’s really good.

And he knows how to do the kind of short story that a Punisher one-shot calls for, as he’s demonstrated with Moon Knight: Silent Knight a couple of years ago. Ryp usually draws gory stuff for Avatar, and as the preview images show, he’s up to the task.

o “Knock It All to Hell”

Out today: Stumptown #4, written by Greg Rucka and drawn by Matthew Southworth. It’s the conclusion to the first arc of the series, titled, “The Case of the Girl Who Took Her Shampoo But Left Her Mini.”

It’s also the conclusion of the series, period, according to Diamond. Which sucks, because it’s the best crime comic I’ve read lately. It stars a down-but-not-out female private investigator named Dex Parios, who combines the familiar toughness and ambiguity of Rucka heroines like Tara Chace and Carrie Stetko with an unhealthy dose of Jim Rockford’s charm and bad luck. Here’s my review of the first issue.

—–

Marc-Oliver Frisch writes about comics at his weblog and at Comicgate. You can also follow him on Twitter.

In this dimension, Woodring’s plans for the giant pen are equally noble:

The dip pen is a bit of fetish item for me (as it is for many pen users). The pen is extremely difficult to master but ultimately allows for an extraordinary degree of expression. The well-constructed pen and ink drawing is a monument to perseverance, requiring tremendous patience and control. I am thrilled by the challenge of creating such drawings in public and introducing new audiences to the allure of the medium. The pen (nib) itself will be approximately 16 inches long, made of steel and fully functional. The holder will be six feet long and made of wood with a metal sleeve insert to hold the pen. Nib and holder will resemble as closely as possible the actual implements on which they are based.

Once the pen and penholder are built I will train myself to ink with it; and once I’ve done that, I will arrange at least two public performances in which I will use the pen to ink large graphite drawings on 3′ x 5′ sheets of bristol.

The deadline for raising the funds is tomorrow. We have only a few precious hours left in which to save the world and make this pen happen. Will you tell your grandchildren you did not support the construction of a giant steel pen? Think about it!

It was mostly pep talk, partly an entreaty “not to be afraid of the future when we can still affect it.” On that part, it was hard to find fault.

But at least one other attendee, namely Sergio Aragones, a cartoonist whose name is regularly preceded by the word “legendary,” took issue with Waid’s idea that ideas should be free. After the speech, according to witnesses, Aragones went over to Waid and the two had a heated exchange. While we heard several reports of various folks storming out and slamming doors, we also heard that after all was said and done, Aragones and Waid literally hugged and made up.

We had a chance to talk to Sergio later on — it was an off the cuff conversation in the middle of a rather chaotic night (the Hyatt bar was shut down early and everyone was in a tizzy). Paraphrasing here a bit, but Sergio was advocating more for the idea that the spread of free content has devalued content, making it harder for people to make a living at it. He said a couple of things that I tried to jot down, one that (I’m paraphrasing) “quality has to be considered again” and the one I tweeted “If you give everything away for free, you have ruined everything.”

This wasn’t a real hard and fast pronouncement, but rather a reflection, I think, of the devalued media world of content farms, user-generated content and “doing it for the exposure,” — anti-income-generating measures that leave many of the creative types I know scrambling for 20 different ways to make a living.

Which isn’t to say it’s bad. It just is. Aragones and Waid are both right. It’s part of a conversation I’ve been having with many people this weekend, and most people seem to think that we’re living in a world where IP is the only sure currency — the Waidian view, as it were. The Aragonesian Principle is more that you have to be aggressive about valuing your IP – and getting paid for SOMETHING.

Dirk Deppey and Lea Hernandez, among others, got into a late night discussion of the Aragones quote, which, given the out of left field context it was presented in, was more of a webcomics-centric argument. Deppey wrote:

I’d go so far as to say that, right now, giving it wawy and selling merchandise at the back end…..is the de facto method for self-supporting, self-published cartoonists in ANY medium.

….true as far as it goes. But we live in a world where popular, loved cartoonists can’t make a living just selling comics for people to read. It may be SOP for all creative people, but it’s infinitely more complex than Jack Kirby’s world: Make a good comic, get it seen by a movie company or ad agency or whatever and get them to pay you a lot of money to do something, go back and do another free comics, rinse and repeat.

More later.

Continuing the epic THB tale, Comic from Mars #2 is/was a Baltimore Comic*Con Exclusive. The comic contains 6.5 stories that take you further into the world of HR Watson and all the androids, Martians and cartoon characters that populate the red planet. Still larger than life and just as sweet.
Details:
4+1C cover
32 1C pages
7″ x 10″ saddle stitched
$4.95 US funds
Shipping in August 2010
An AdHouse Books Exclusive

Pope’s original sci-fi epic, THB comics, are loooong out of print (although First Second has a collection announced), as is the #1 one-off AdHouse produced for San Diego 2007. Our advice? Get one while it’s hot!

Episode nine ended with some bloody messes to clean up. Franklin’s entrails were all over the Merlotte’s parking lot, Calvin’s face looked like he’d just gotten back from a Gathering of the Juggalos, and Russell pretty much destroyed any hope of the VRA passing when he ripped out that newscaster’s spine on live TV .  But episode ten didn’t start off with cleaning up.  Instead the writers chose to open with a close up of Sookie getting in the wry quip, “I’m a fairy? How fucking lame is that?” and set the stage for an hour that moved fast but was chock full of smart, believable character development.

I'm a fairy? How fucking lame is that? (Photo: HBO)

Take Sookie, for instance.  Bill not only tells her she’s a fucking fairy, he also fills her in on some fae history –like how they were wiped out of existence by vampires.  That was all very interesting but I couldn’t get out of my head something noted comics thinker and consummate TV watcher, Robin McConnell, said over IM the other night:

Whenever I hear “Sookie,” I can’t help it, I think of “Snookie” from Jersey Shore.  

Has anyone else thought that?  I hadn’t but now I can’t stop comparing Sookie to Snookie. I did it the whole episode. Thanks a lot, dude. 

One thing’s for sure though, like Snookie, Sookie’s got herself a major situation here .  And she’s saying fuck a lot this season.  I choose to think that’s another nice detail of the rich character development the writers are laying down (as Sookie’s got a lot to say fuck about) but it could also be argued that it’s a Stackhouse family trait.  After the credits roll, Jason’s all, “Fuck me,” Re: blowing Franklin to gory bits.  He also flashes back to killing tragic vampire, Eddie Gauthier, who Jason and his dead ex used as a blood bank for a large part of season one.  Lucky for him, Tara’s getting pretty experienced dealing with acute PTSD. She pulls it together fast, ordering Jason to scrape up the rest of Franklin’s guts.  They throw what’s left of him in the back of Jason’s pick up and peel out.  One mess down, two to go.

Sam’s a mess too but in a different way.  He’s on a post violent outburst bender, all wasted and maudlin, remembering bad things.  Who woulda thunk that back in 2008, Sam was a slick jewel thief!  He was a glamorous grifter like Sawyer from Lost!  Except not really, because it turns out his hot blonde girlfriend at the time was actually the grifter.  Her and her crook boyfriend scammed Sam hardcore.  They took his jewel heist haul and left him broken hearted in an empty hotel room.  You can’t trust nobody.

Sookie’s still not sure if she can trust Bill.  “Do you just want me for my delicious blood?” she asks after he tells her fairy blood is delectable to vampires.  Bill protests.  Sookie brings up the whole rape and feed in the back of the van incident.  Bill’s defense amounts to: Baby! I was hungry!  Then, because he’s good and noble and trying to fight the lesser parts of his nature, he forswears to never feed on her again if that’s what it’ll take to prove his love.  Then their treacly music starts playing and the power of love wins again. Oh, those two.

Eric’s not about to let petty human concerns like love or sentiment slow him down.  He’s TCB-ing it over at Fangtasia, drafting his will so sassafras progeny, Pam, will be taken care of.  He’s leaving everything to her.  But she doesn’t want everything. She just wants her daddy.  And Yvetta wants some of what he’s got too.  Daddy, however, is the boss. He makes that real clear when he signs Yvetta’s name for her as witness to the will.  Being the boss isn’t easy though. He manages to make both ladies mad enough to walk out on him.

Calvin Norris hasn’t got it easy either.  Sam nearly killed him so bad that Lafayette has to pull over and dose him with V. They’re not going to make it to the ER in time and he’s sure to die. That fixes Calvin right up but he’s hardly grateful.  He calls Lafayette and Jesus fags for their trouble and runs off.  Crystal goes after him and Lafayette remarks that, “them fuckers is a whole new dimension of trash.”  As usual, he’s right!  When Crystal catches up to Calvin, they have a disturbing as all get out conversation about Crystal’s duty to mate with Felton.  Ew! All that Jason Stackhouse sex is banging some sense into her though and she bails at the thought of having to do it with Felton again.

Nan Flanigan’s making some crazy weird sense herself.  Bill’s watching her save political face for the VLA on the TV over at Sookie’s. She wisely frames Russell as a rogue terrorist and, in a savvy PR maneuver, compares him to Jeffrey Dahmer.  But it’s the wrong night for Bill to catch up on the news.  Eric’s outside.  He and Bill go for a little stroll and, as usual, they bicker. Eric tells Bill he knows what Sookie is, then asks if it’s “true Sookie’s blood will let you walk in the sunlight.”  Bill says no but let’s slip that it’s pretty awesome nonetheless.  Eric tells Bill he killed Talbot and that Russell will come again for Sookie.  As usual, Bill’s got nothing but contempt for Eric.  This time for jeopardizing vampires politically and for the position he’s put Sookie in.  Why are you even here? He asks.  He’s here to save Sookie. And he wants Bill to tell her the truth.  Just then, Sookie comes out and tells Eric she already knows the truth. She also knows what Eric wants from her and tells him he’ll never get it. He wishes her the best anyways then zips off into the night.

The next scene opened up with the characters watching TV while being on TV. No, seriously. I really liked how the characters reacted to watching TV news pundits this episode. It made for some well scripted plot development.  And it helped that the pundit in question this time was the Reverend Steve Newlin.  Yay!  LOVE HIM (and the actor who plays him, Mike McMillan, who’s currently writing an odd and uneven but smart and intriguing comics miniseries for Archaia).  Arlene’s maybe starting to love him a little too much herself as the TV blares his vampire hating rhetoric at the start of the Merlotte’s day shift. Newlin’s message is getting to her (as is the itsy bitsy serial killer fetus kicking around her womb).  She goes off about the vampire menace. Until Jessica attacks!  When she backs off, Arlene runs out screaming, “I ain’t evil! And once evil, always evil!”  All this gives Tommy major wood but when he tells Jessica this she shines him.  She’s still way into Hoyt. But he’s too good for her. Tommy says she’ll never have to worry about him being too good for her, proving he’s even more shameless than Jason Stackhouse when it comes tapping ass.

DO NOT mess with the Jessica (Photo: HBO)

Speaking of Hoyt, him and Summer are getting close to getting it on in his truck. But it’s not a mutual thang.  She’s throwing herself at him to bridge the distance between them. Sookie and Bill are trying to put some distance between her and the army of V drinking werewolves and the 3000+ year old vampire coming for her.  They show up at Jason’s looking for a place to hide.  Tara’s there and she’s not pleased Bill’s with her.  She wants all vampires dead. Plus Bill didn’t lift a finger to help her when Franklin was holding her captive.  Bill takes her disses as an opportune time to find some nearby ground to sleep in, and gives Jason some werewolf killing tips on the way out.

Jesus is no skuzzy werewolf but he does have one thing in common with the pack we’ve come to know and love to hate this season.  He’s finding it hard to resist the allure of V after seeing how it healed Calvin.  “It’s magic,” he says, then tells Lafayette, “I wanna do it with you.” At first Lafayette resists but only for the millisecond it takes him to flash on how rad it would be bone Jesus on a V. Jesus says it’ll be a truly “shamanic” but, come on, people, we know this isn’t going to end well.

Things definitely won’t end well for Russell now that he’s a fugitive, crazy with grief over losing the love of his life.  The TV at Merlotte’s informs viewers the Missisippi manse has been totally cleaned out. Russell’s on the run.  Sam comes in mid-broadcast, hungover as fuck, to a very well behaved staff.  They’re all rightfully worried he’s going to lose his mind and they’ll be on the receiving end of it next time.  Sam tells them to relax.  Calvin’s not dead, he’s cool, it’s all good. Holly, along with the rest of the Merlotte’s workforce, is dubious. She offers Sam a bag of herbs that he mistakes for weed.  But it’s not weed, it’s a Wiccan Herbal Remedy (which kind of sounds like weed actually). Sam bans the substance from the bar, saying there’s two rules at Merlotte’s, “No dancing, no religion.” Good rule. Little shifter brother? Not so good and super immature. He tells Sam he finally respects him for almost killing Calvin the funny smelling, gay bashing meth cook.

Sam - totally drunk for most of the episode (Photo: HBO)

The other big development on the day shift was Arlene confessing to Terry that the baby she’s carrying isn’t his. It’s the evil spawn of a serial killer and she wants to get rid of it. But Terry’s prepared to marry her and raise the child as his own.  The confessions continue over at Jason’s.  Jason tells Sookie he killed Franklin, then, in a surprise move, confesses to killing Eggs.  Straight shooter Sookie says Tara has to know.  Jason points out that it was exactly that kind of straightforwardness that got Eggs all fucked up with crippling guilt.

Lafayette and Jesus aren’t fucked up like Eggs was but they’re still fucked up beyond belief on V (and sadly not naked).  Their trip takes them on a colorful distressed video voyage to discover the secrets of their ancestors.  Lafayette’s great great great great Grandma May was a “conjurer” and Jesus’ grandfather was a sorcerer who practiced black arts.  After they see him, their trip goes bad; foreshadowing what looks like some witchy poo shit in store for these two.

Sookie’s in no way having a bad trip. She’s having one of her Northman sexy time dreams. He knows she has feelings for him.  He kisses her.  He also warns her again that she can’t trust Bill and that it’s her survival instinct telling her that, not him.  She wakes up as Jason’s bringing Tara some food in the other room.  She thanks him for saving her life and taking care of her.  She can count on him and she can’t count on much.  Jason consoles her.  Then they start mackin!  Didn’t see that one coming!  More predictable is when Tara backs off, afraid of herself plus anyone with a penis.  Also behaving predictably is Jason, who we must never forget is basically an idiot. He decides this is the perfect moment to tell Tara he shot Eggs.  She leaves.  When he runs after her, he finds Sookie gone too. At least she left a cryptic note.

Someone’s left a message on the front lawn of Compton Manor too.  But this one’s in the form of a burning cross. Vampire hate crimes are running ampant nationwide post Russell’s spine rippage. Jessica wants to go after the haters but Bill insists they take the high road.  Sam’s having nothing whatsoever to do with the high road.  He’s getting wasted again which brings on a follow up flashback to the one he had before about the great jewel heist of ‘08. Back in the day he used his shifting powers to sneak up on the grifters in the woods and held them at gunpoint to get his goods back. But when he robbed them back, they provoked him and called him a freak.  This sent Sam into the same blind rage he let loose on Norris. He beat the shit out of him, then accidentally killed his ex, once again bringing home the theme of this season – your true nature is a bitch that will bring you to your knees and make you suffer, try as you might to change or hide it.

Sookie’s never gonna change Eric and she knows it.  Yet, she shows up Fangtasia and forces her way into his office anyways.  Eric tells her once again she can’t trust Bill.  Then he tells her he has to kiss her just once before he meets the True Death.  They kiss. It’s HOTT! It’s so hott Sookie almost forgets about Bill. I sure did.  Then she snaps out of the power of the Northman make out sesh and asks why she can’t trust Bill.  Before Eric can answer Pam comes in with a, “Blah blah, Vampire Emergency, Blah.”  Eric leaves Sookie in his office and follows Pam. She implores him to use Sookie to get Russell. Eric refuses.  Then Pam pulls the how-could-you-choose-a-human-over-me card which seems to get to Eric.  As it would turn out, Russell’s inclined towards a different kind of bait.  He’s in a dark alley cruising a piece of rough trade who looks a lot like Talbot and agrees to being bitten for a nominal fee.

Back at Merlotte’s, Arlene approaches Holly about witchy alternatives to abortion while Hoyt approaches Jessica with his heart on his sleeve.  He loves her just as she is.  He broke up with Summer. There’s no reason they shouldn’t be together.  Sadly, Jessica’s resigned to her nature.  She’s done so many bad things.  She can’t.  Hoyt runs out only to be taunted by Tommy the bratty shifter in the parking lot.  Tommy gets his though. Hoyt clocks him. Then Hoyt gets it right back from Tommy who shifts into a pit bull and attacks him.  Thank goodness Jessica decides to give true love a chance. When she runs after Hoyt she sees Pit Bull Tommy gnawing him to death. She rips him off and throws him in the bushes.  Then she tells Hoyt she loves him and rips open her wrist so he can suck up some nurturing V.  Awww…

Things aren’t nearly as touchy feely over at Jason’s place.  Bill shows up looking for Sookie and is he ever pissed when Jason tells him she bailed.  When Bill starts railing on him, Jason rescinds his home invitation to Bill. Bill’s magically propelled out of the house and that’s really too bad because there’s a panther in Jason’s bedroom.  It’s OK though because the panther turns out to be Crystal.   So the Hot Shot meth heads are inbreeding big kitty shifters.  I like it!  All the strands that felt loose early in the season are now seamlessly coming together.

Another thing I like is how Russell’s still in the picture and becoming more and more unhinged (and after last week’s spinaldectomy that’s the way I like him!).  He’s back at the rent boy’s house being the freakiest trick ever, calling him Talbot and whispering creepy shit to him like, “you saved me from the world, from myself,” then he stakes him. It’s his way of being with Talbot for “the True Death” and it was touching in a pathologically bittersweet way. 

Eric locking Sookie in his office is also pathological but not so touching, especially when he takes it to the next level and chains her up in the basement.  Apparently he’s taking Pam’s counsel to use her to get Russell. How they’re going to use her is anybody’s guess but I’m sure it’s going to involve a whole lotta sexy Northman dungeon master scenes.  There’s only two episodes left, people, and the way things are going, anything could happen.  What do you think it’ll be?

Cartoonists Ted Rall, Matt Bors, and photographer Steven Cloud are in Afghanistan to tell “the people’s story” and send back cartoons. They’ve been uploading them as often as possible using satellite phones.

While Iraq is now at peace, Afghanistan is not such a safe place to be am American these days, as the cartoons sometimes show. Here’s a photo by Cloud of Rall and Bors in local garb. You can follow along on Twitter or on their blogs, here and here.

Jordan Crane’s great storage room of comics, WHAT THINGS DO, posts What Am I Doing Here? by Abner Dean, a lovely mid-century comics collection. Not quite work safe, although it’s debatable.