Strange Eggs Jumps the Shark, that little comic strangely labeled "Kid Friendly" in Previews when it is so not kid friendly, is in stores today! It features stories by Roger Langridge, J. Marc Schmidt, Ben Towle, James Turner, Jhonen Vasquez and lots more. The premise is that a kid's show called Strange Eggs (also, coincidentally, the title of an SLG anthology) is losing ratings and the suits will do anything -- anything -- to boost them. The results are dreamed up by a variety of comics creators, and the results are gruesome, risque, and just downright abhorrent.

Strange Eggs editor Chris Reilly (whom my typing really wants to make "Christ Reilly") has been doing the interview circuit, with Jennifer Contino at Pulse, with Stefan Blitz at Forces of Geek (look for the rant Chris goes on when the interviewer innocently asks him about kids' comics), and with... Chris Reilly at Gutter Geek.

The Weirdly World of Strange Eggs by Chris Reilly, Steve Ahlquist and Jeremy Mann is reviewed at BlogCritics.org. Reviewer Lori Mortimer brings up an interesting point -- she, as an adult, wanted there to be a moment when everything in the books would "make sense" while her "seven-year-old son loved this book."

A lot of the time, it's all about audience.

The preface to Gutter Geek's review of Igor: Fixed by Frankenstein by Christopher P. Reilly and Chris Grine (you have to go to the main page to see this part of the review) describes some of the faction-like nature the different genres in comics have taken on:

I was bored, bored, bored in the comic store the other day. All the big ticket monthlies were playing out their last Events and gearing up for their next. The Serious Indies were showing off their seriousness, while the distant offspring of the underground comix were showing off their Wackiness. And zombies were everywhere (what is with all the damned zombies? And this from a man who openly aspires to one day be a zombie). Well, I didn’t want another Event, and I wasn’t in the mood for meditations on childhood traumas, so I settled for some zombies and some zaniness. ... But happily, it proved a reminder of how, just when everything is starting to seem so cookie-cutter and predictable, comics will always find a way to surprise you.

 Igor: Fixed by Frankensteins is available now at comic stores, book stores and at www.slgcomic.com.

People have been talking to artists who create comics for SLG. You don't have time to trawl all over the Internet to find this stuff, so I'm bringing it to you in one concise post. Convenience and service!

• Jen Contino at Pulse interviews J. Marc Schmidt, creator of the graphic novel Eating Steve, which SLG will be releasing in October.


• Jen also interviews Chris Reilly and Chris Grine about the graphic novel Igor: Fixed by Frankensteins. This one will also be out in October. October is a pretty packed month.


• Brian Heater has started interviewing Evan Dorkin at The Daily Crosshatch, and it seems that he is not going to stop.

Chris Reilly and Steve Ahlquist, writers of The Weirdly World of Strange Eggs, are interviewed at Sequential Tart.

The two writers talk about their process and why the book is dedicated to Roger Corman, Roald Dahl and Osamu Tezuka.

A tangent:

The Tezuka exhibit at San Francisco's Asian Art Museum is wonderful, by the way. Tezuka's line work is so smooth you would think it's vector art. There's such sureness in his brush and pen lines. However, you also get to see that many panels are pasted over with replacements or parts of them are whited out and re-drawn. It goes to show you that Tezuka thought of his art not as museum pieces, meant to look beautiful on the wall, but as work that would be reproduced and sent out into the world for as many people to enjoy as possible.

I'm continuing to catch up on Pulse articles about upcoming SLG books! Here's an interview with Chris Reilly, who edits the Strange Eggs anthology. The graphic novella The Trouble with Igor, which Chris wrote and Gus Fink drew, will be in stores on May 10. Strange Eggs Presents: Tales of the Boxing Bucket will be in stores in July.

I didn't visit the news sites much last week, so I missed a couple of interviews with SLG creators at Pulse. Fortunately, I can hop into my Way Back Machine and grab the links.

There's an interview with Scott Roberts, creator of Patty-Cake and Friends. A new, full-color Patty-Cake and Friends will be published this summer. Take a look at a few sample pages, which are posted at Pulse.

There is also an interview with Chris Reilly, writer of the upcoming The Trouble with Igor, a wordless graphic novella illustrated by Gus Fink. Someone mentions Salad Fingers in the comments. I love Salad Fingers.

Discover The Trouble with Igor in April

What is the trouble with Igor? For one, he's hideously malformed--hunch-backed and lumpy-skulled. And he's eating shoe leather to keep from starving. But a lucky penny in a penny loafer is a ticket to a new world via a wishing well... a new world with even more trouble in store. A violent reaper puppet takes possession of Igor's left hand and leads him on a journey into a nightmarish landscape.

Indeed, The Trouble with Igor, a 64-page "silent" graphic novella by Chris Reilly and Gus Fink has its roots the dreams. "I dreamt most of the scenes in Igor," said writer Reilly, "but there are a lot of story elements that wouldn't be in the book if not for Gus. I periodically asked him what he wanted to draw, and we'd work it into the book. 'Scarface the Teddy Bear' was Gus's idea."

The teddy bear is just one of many unsavory characters the well-meaning but ill-used Igor encounters, all of them unflinchingly drawn by Fink, a painter and illustrator. His pages for The Trouble with Igor maintain the horror and rawness that characterize his art, which some brand as "outsider." Together, Reilly's story, presented completely without dialogue or narration, and Fink's art create a bizarre, surreal experience. "We promise you that you have never read anything like The Trouble With Igor before," said Reilly.

The Trouble with Igor, to be released in April, will be a 64-page digest-sized graphic novella and retail for $3.95. It is available for pre-order at comic book stores. To see a preview of The Trouble with Igor, visit www.slgpublishing.com.

Established in 1986, SLG Publishing is a San Jose, CA-based publisher of comics books and graphic novels. Operating under its imprints Slave Labor Graphics and Amaze Ink, SLG Publishing has distributed the work of such notable cartoonists as Jhonen Vasquez, Evan Dorkin and Andi Watson.