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I'm pretty sure we've posted some of Eric Haven's creepy cool Mancat comics before. But not it's all being collected by AdHouse, in UR. The publisher describes these comics as "Dark, absurdist, and deadpan, these stories reflect the apocalyptic undercurrent of the modern era. Also included is Haven's long-running comic strip "Race Murdock" which appeared in The Believer magazine." Haven is among those cartoonist's whose work is just inherently spooky. In the past his work has appeared in various anthologies, but when he isn't cartooning he's producing the TV Show Mythbusters. A real hyphenate for the season.

There was a time not too long ago when you could fit all the "women in comics" at a big table in a coffee shop. Now there re more than 300 women who just work in comics shops. That's the membership of The Valkyries, a private organization for female comics retail employees. and it turns out the group has been instrumental in promoting a coupld of books that have had great success this year, namely Saga and Lumberjanes. Janelle Asselin interviews group founder Kate Leth for all the details:

Who is Marie Duval? While not a household name in comics circles she's actually one of the most important Victorian cartoonists, artist on Ally Sloper, one of the early cartoon sensations. The tale of a no good lazeabout that ran from 1857 on, it was created by Duval's husband, Charles Ross, but gained its greatest fame after Duval took over in 1859. The Guardian has a tribute to her.

Marvel Studios is holding a press conference at 2 pm edt/11pdt today and you can follow along at the Marvel live blog, or Twitter or smokesignals, or whatever method you prefer. While most guess it could be about the 'Batch being cast as Doctor Strange, it could also be about other mystery slots in the movie schedule, or it could be the Age of Ultron trailer that was supposed to officially debut tonight, or about Katee Sackhoff starring as lady Captain Marvel in Avengers 3.

by Zachary Clemente STRAY BULLETS: SUNSHINE & ROSES A NEW PATH OF VIOLENCE The cult classic begins a new story arc about love and bad decisions Award-winning creator David...

Without question, “Gotham” is one of the most successful television series to hit the fall season. The show debuted with a strong 8 million...

English artist INJ Culbard has become the resident HP Lovecraft expert at SelfMadeHero with several of his adaptations of Lovecraft (The Case of Charles Dexter Ward, The Shadow Out of Time and The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath) turning into bestsellers for the Brit Literary Comics house. Well, it seems his next book is one that greatly influenced Lovecraft—and Stephen King, and Marion Zimmer Bradley, and Raymond Chandler and True Detective—namely The King in Yellow by Robert W. Chambers. The 1895 short story collection centers around a sinister play called "The King in Yellow" and this title character, as well as Carcosa were used in Season 1 of True Detective, and gave the cult book a new life.

By Matt O'Keefe For years there’s been the complaint that comics aren’t for kids anymore. I say that comic shops aren’t (necessarily) for kids anymore....

Did I get tricked into running this somewhat non-slick infographic because The Beat is ranked #8 in a list of the top 100 comics blogs? You bet. But I did like that The Nib is #1. I think the chart went by Alexa rankings and it includes webcomics among the blogs, which doesn't really make any sense. But anyway, talking points.

Marvel collected editions are already available on iVerse, and some other digital platforms, and now, Kobo, the Canadian-based device that also offers apps for Mac, Android, and desktop. Marvel periodicals continues to be exclusive at Comixology and their own Marvel Unlimited All-you-can-ead service, but the GNs are everywhere. What did we tell you about attempts to diversify digital distribution?

Housekeeping: The Beat was down a bit over the weekend when my web host moved it to a faster, more up to date server. I also got one of those new fangled Time Warner modems that offers five times faster internet speed. So we're TURBO here! At the same time, the mouse I've been using for about five years went belly up. The coffee spill that happened a few weeks ago may have contributed but the autopsy results aren't in yet. I immediately went to Staples and bought a $10 mouse as a stopgap, and upon getting it home it did not work. PERIOD. MELONFARMER. NEVER BUY CHEAP TECH. However, luckily later in the day I was walking by a pile of discarded computer equipment and was able to obtain a Mighty Mouse from the pile.

The other day we reported on DMP's new Kickstarter which hopes to publish some untranslated works by Osamu Tezuka but as a pretty hefty price: $360,000 to put out 20 books, and stretch goals that go all the way up to $589,000 for all 31 volumes. Understandably, a lot of manga observers have questioned this amount and the reward tiers— for instance, when this all started the lowest amount you could pledge to actually get a book was $150!