To The Eisner Awards Judging Panel
Dear esteemed panel of judges,
For the past six months, I have set myself the task of producing, on a weekly basis, the single greatest newsletter about American Direct Market comics that is currently running or that has ever run. It is not an easy task, and it is often thankless, but I do it nonetheless, because I believe it is my duty in this world absent a better offer from the comic book industry. To the best of my ability, I have informed, entertained and enlightened in equal measure, for an audience whose number I dare not check, lest it took my mind away from what has and always should be the mission: to one day be able to refuse an Eisner Award.
To make this clear: I hold you and your organization in the highest of respects. Yes, for many years critics have said that you missed the boat, that your selections, especially this year, show an almost scandalous lack of curiosity, especially when it comes to works from women and people of color; they will bemoan your bold choice to nominate Crossover, which is a bad comic, in the “Best New Series” category. Here and there, I hear them scream that “it is entirely fucked that Hickman got a nod for Decorum while Huddleston didn’t”. Some are even saying that your problems with voting last year should have led to a top-to-bottom reckoning with how your awards are run! But your biggest failure, obviously, is that you have not nominated me for an Eisner Award in the “Best Comics-Related Journalism/Periodical” category, which I would win HANDILY, and which would allow me to live out my dream of refusing an Eisner Award.
I know that an organization such as yours would try and fix this blatant oversight, and your many other faults, at the earliest possible convenience. However, I do not think it fair for the current nominees in the “Best Comics-Related Journalism/Periodical” category to add me to this year’s ballot. They deserve one last chance to refuse their Eisner Award before I refuse the next one, and every subsequent one after. I will however accept you sending me an apology for not selecting me for this year’s awards, which I will refuse. And maybe that would be better than refusing an award. I’m not sure yet. Try it out and let’s see.
You must be warned, however, that I will not be so kind when it comes to future offences against either my name or that of my newsletter. If you do not nominate me for an Eisner Award next year, my vengeance will be tenfold, and it will be tenfold more for every year I am not nominated. Do not mistake my pleasant tone for cowardice: I am capable of fury beyond even your wildest dreams, and I can put all that power towards the single goal of eliminating you.
Have a great one!
Yours, Aurélien Fontaneau, Writer/Editor of HUMBLE YOURSELF BEFORE COMICS, the world’s single greatest comics newsletter
HUMBLE YOURSELF BEFORE COMICS: BECAUSE THE GREATEST AWARD OF ALL, IS FORGIVENESS
Visually and thematically, Rorschach #9 follows in the footsteps of Rorschach #8. The location is the same, it’s that house in the middle of nowhere where Cummings and Myerson plotted the assassination of a presidential candidate. The storytelling device is almost the same, it is about using layouts and composition to put similar images in parallel and see the elucidations that get drawn out in the process. And so in that way, much like the issue previous, this is a comic about stories and their power. The differences come from the change in point of view. Where #8 was the story told as the rallying cry for a group of fanatics, #9 is about a more direct interaction with the story. It’s about getting a better idea of the context around it, and it’s about changing it.
So when the Detective arrives at the shooting range where the would-be killers practiced their would-be crime, we return to that panel from #8 with the watermelon, its painted-on smiley face, and the bags of sand it is sitting on. There’s a story there as we take stock of the damage, but the most important clue to understand the issue is on the final panel of page four, as we walk away from this staging area. Zooming out further than we ever had before, we see the shooting range as part of the reconstructed convention hall stage, its rectangular shape making it a panel within the panel. In the end, it all comes back to comic books.
And then, a clue is found, and the issue’s neat parallelism breaks hard. Past and present spill into one another, as the story of Rorschach and the Kid desperately tries fighting back against the truth that gets found. Tellingly, one of the clues is hidden behind a framed picture of the Citizen, Myerson’s comic book superhero. Fornes even surrounds it with white space so as to make the frame a full-fledged panel of its own. Because you see, it all comes back to comic books, in the end.
In the end, Rorschach #9 has it all, it’s got the conspiracy twists and thrills you’d want from the series as it approaches its endgame, it’s got fun detective work, and it can still pack a punch in the deeper analysis. That’s my idea of a good time.
At this point, Kyle Starks’ passions should be well-known. One is action movie violence, which he pays tribute to in basically all his works, from the basically-speaking-for-itself Sexcastle to the absurd heroic bloodshed of Assassin Nation. The other is the essential stuff of Americana, like in Rock Candy Mountain, his paean to the ramblers and drifters of American mythology. Tagging along with Chris Schweitzer in The Six Sidekicks of Trigger Keaton #1, he takes us to a place that is near and dear to my heart: the low-rent world of the syndicated action shows of the mid-to-late 1990s.
Schweitzer and Starks come at this incredible wealth of poorly-conceived idiocy from exactly the right place. Their love of shows as beautifully dumb as Walker Texas Ranger, Thunder in Paradise or SeaQuest DSV doesn’t get in the way of acknowledging the basic fact that Chuck Norris is a piece of shit, and in fact the whole point of the series is to examine that figure of the American Macho Fighter-Actor through the eyes of the people he has victimized. The result is a comedy that is never really all that laugh-out-loud funny, but that more than makes up for it with sheer sincerity.
Yes, it’s a book where everyone is kicking with experienced gusto. Yes, it’s a book where someone gets a “Stuntman War” declared on them. And yes, the universe of this comic has shows called “Spaceboat 3030”. It’s as charmingly goofy as it gets, and Starks can craft dumb genius verbiage like nobody’s business. But at the core of it is a heartfelt story of men having to live with getting wrecked in one way or another by masculinity. Also it’s a murder mystery! There’s a lot going on here, and I want to see more of it, is the point.
I might have had a horse in the race on account of I’m bisexual as all hell, but boy did DC Pride #1 make me feel good. It’s not just the joy of seeing so many of DC’s LGBTQ characters, most of which have been my faves in one way or another since I’ve been reading comics. It’s the breadth of the stories on display. Obviously you have your beautiful and heart-rending stories of empowerment through finding pride in oneself, told as beautifully as it could; but there’s also room in there for stories of beating up nazi vampires and cruising, coming out in the whole of your truth late in life, fighting for better material conditions for you and your community, and even standing up to despair.
That we’re at a point where all these stories can be told, and that they can be told by as accomplished a lineup of queer creators? I remember a point in my relatively short lifetime where this seemed impossible. But you know how it goes: we’re here now, we’re queer, get used to it. Makes me emotional just thinking about it. Sorry I can’t speak to it with more objectivity.
And on that note, we’re gonna say goodbye for the week! Sorry for not making fun of Nick Spencer getting hired by Substack but I wasn’t in the mood for it! Also I’m getting my second shot of Moderna next wednesday, so, it might fuck things up vis-a-vis next week’s newsletter! Sorry in advance, but that will not stop me from remaining your humble dedicated servant, so long as you do your part and HUMBLE YOURSELF BEFORE COMICS!