Comics

Via PR a story that touches the current comics business on so many levels. In short, Scott Kurtz is taking his print PvP collections of his very popular webcomic PvP and returning to self-publishing via his Toonhound Studios imprint. PVP has been published by Image since 2003, and Image will continue to sell his existing collections. However future print editions of the comic will be sold online. According to the release, Kurtz won't be selling them through Diamond at all, although he'll work directly with retailers who want to carry his books.

It would have pleased Harvey Pekar, I think, that his passing yesterday was noted in every media outlet from the New Yorker to EW, and not just because they made a movie about him, but as a literary figure of worth and stature. Harvey's life's work was in showing that the ordinary was important, and a working class existence was not a prison but a journey through the profound and beautiful that anyone could experience if they took the time. He found that beauty in simple, quotidian things and experiences that others might have found trivial or mundane, but in the end his message was that what else is there? Life as it is lived is the most precious gift of all.

Indie publisher AdHouse has announced AdDistro, a new distribution site for small press books. PR below:

Via PR, Dynamite has announced that Kurt Busiek will be the writer of the Jack Kirby/Alex Ross project they've been teasing. Based on some...

The Cleveland Plains Dealer is reporting that underground comics legend Harvey Pekar died last night. Pekar's wife, Joyce Brabner found him dead at about 1 am. Pekar had battled lymphoma previously, as chronicled in Our Cancer Year, but the cause of death is awaiting an autopsy. Pekar was best known as author of American Splendor, an autobiographical comic that adapted Pekar's lowly life as a filing clerk at the Cleveland VA into a journey of humor, drama and insight as memorable as any fictional hero, hiring artist friends such as R. Crumb, Gary Dumm, Frank Stack and others to illustrate his stories. American Splendor was an early self-publishing success story of sorts -- while its acclaim gained Pekar enough notoriety for him to become a semi-regular on the David Letterman Show (until erratic on-air behavior got him banned) he still had to work at the VA to rely on getting a pension and continuing to make a living -- indie comics was not a cash cow.

Kevin Mutch's story is just getting going, but thing around the orphans Max and Molly are sure getting strange.

As the SD10 schedule drifts out, the big movie panels are shaping up, and one of the biggest comic book movies at this year's...

We don't often have occasion to link to the comic strip musings at The Comics Curmudgeon but it happened to come up in our...

Did you know there is an award-=winning short film based on Jim Rugg and Brian Maruca's awesome STREET ANGEL comic? Short version: what if Hit Girl was Kick-Ass? The film will be screened on Thursday at this year's Comic-Con, as part of the indie film festival. The film already won Best International Film, Best Director and Best Actress at the Phoenix Comic-Con and was made in Australia.

The tall, taciturn Norwegian comics giant Jason has a blog, which, characteristically, is mostly sketches.

If you're not friends with artist Jeffrey Catherine Jones on Facebook, you are missing out on lots of art, like this gorgeous sketch which Jones gave us permission to post here in honor of Cat Blogging Friday.

Have you ever wanted to see the seldom-screened VAN VON HUNTER movie? Soon you can watch it and other Toykopop-produced material such as their Manga Motion comics on their new Hulu site. Currently showing, Spring and Chaos (Kenji no Haru) is the animated biography of poet Kenji Miyazawa.