Purveyor of sheer awesomeness.
Joshua Hale Fialkov is the Harvey, Eisner, and Emmy Award nominated writer of graphic novels, animation, video games, film, and television, including:
THE LIFE AFTER, THE BUNKER, PUNKS, ELK'S RUN, TUMOR, ECHOES, KING, PACIFIC RIM, THE ULTIMATES, I, VAMPIRE, and JEFF STEINBERG CHAMPION OF EARTH. He's also written television including MAX’s YOUNG JUSTICE, NBC's CHICAGO MED and NETFLIX’s AVATAR: THE LAST AIRBENDER.
But we did make the top 25 of New York Magazine's Best comics of 2007.http://www.dankois.com/2007/12/best-comics-of-year-supplement.html
Thanks to each of you for helping to make 2007 the year my dreams of Elk's Run came true.
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The Who - Concert Vault - Where Live Music Lives,Streaming Free Music, Live Concert Downloads Wolfgang's Vault, which offers free streams of a crap load of King Biscuit Flower Hour recordings and various slightly more authorized 'bootlegs' of concert than you'd find at your local indie record shop, just put a famous (and presumed lost) recording of the Who on their Quadrophenia tour.
There's a rather lengthy explanation on the site as to why it's so legendary, but, for any Who-philes (interesting isn't it, that I'm both an obsessive fan of Doctor Who and The Who...) it's like listening to crack cocaine with louder guitars.
The tour was their first to use a copious amount of 'special effects' (a.k.a. tape loops), and it took nearly the entire tour for them to get used to them. This is the 2nd to last concert, so they're tighter than hell. I think that this tour probably contributed pretty strongly to them tightening their sound for their mid 70's stuff like Who By Numbers and Who Are You, which really are their two last great albums as far as I'm concerned.
On a side note, I recently found The Endless Wire, which came out last year or the year before, and popped it back in. While the new stuff is positively wretched (save for Mike Post Theme, which gets kudos for mentioning one of the best TV theme writers of all time and rightfully giving his music a place in the emotional history of our culture...) the DVD and CD of them live is actually pretty rocking. Although, Pete and Roger both look like a hundred and five years old, and the shorts that Daltrey wears are pretty embarrassing. See picture below.
PUNKS: THE COMIC – Summer Special #1
Punks: The Comic – Summer Special #1 finally lands after several months of anticipation, an early recommendation by Warren Ellis, and much praise lavished on Kody Chamberlain’s unique collage art. It tells a loosely constructed story of four roommates – Fist, Skull, Abe, and Dog – who thwart an alien invasion in between fighting amongst themselves. Chamberlain depicts the entire story in collage, with a stark visual style influenced by punk rock fliers and album covers. Joshua Fialkov’s story crackles with sight gags and absurdist humor.
Comic Pants » Blog Archive » Down the Line: December releases
Punks the Comic Christacular Special Digital Webbing: Dan: The Punks Summer Special was a mind-blowing bit of comics joy, so I can only imagine what the Christmas special is going to be like. According to the solicits, the four weird-headed bastards are searching for the true meaning of Christmas, leprosy, and friendship, so its gotta be good. There are some awesome looking Punks shirts with the Summer Special cover on ‘em for sale too, but they aren’t big enough for me, so I have to pass. page 284
PUNKS THE COMIC: SUMMER SPECIAL #1 Writer: Joshua Fialkov Artist: Kody Chamberlain Publisher: Digital Webbing Reviewed by Humphrey LeePUNKS THE COMIC is what would happen if NEXTWAVE was actually a Sunday night cartoon on Adult Swim. That is to say, it's awesome. Just awesome. PUNKS features such characters as a humanoid body with a fist for a head that uses signs to talk, a character named Dog that has a bulldog face (well duh!), and Abe Lincoln. Yes, Abe Lincoln. And Abe Lincoln is the best new character of the year, yes he is.Now, what's this book about, you're asking, with its cast of crazy characters and dead historical figures? Fucked if I know and shame on you for asking! Come on, does any of that sound like there's some sort of coherent storyline going on? Of course not, but just like any (good) episode of, say, “Aqua Teen Hunger Force”, it doesn't have to make sense, it just has to be hilarious. And PUNKS is all sorts of hilarious. Between Morrissey cracks, ethnic stereotypes, alien invaders in a station wagon, and a mid-issue "interview" with Rick Remender Out of Fucking Nowhere! this comic cannot help but be hilarious just like a midget in leather chaps couldn't help but be the same.
As if the comic itself couldn't be crazy enough, the "clip art" that Kody Chamerlain uses here in PUNKS helps enhance the oddball experience. What I mean by "clip art" is that PUNKS uses panels made up by actually cut out pictures arranged to make all the characters, settings, etc. Very unique and unusual, but very creative and entertaining as well which is pretty much exactly how this book should be described.
PUNKS is crazier than Britney Spears with a heroin needle and a Cabbage Patch doll, but ever the moreso entertaining. The sooner we get more of this the better, unlike the aforementioned Ms. Spears. I'm not sure you could find a better deal out there for just $5 right now...well, okay, except for maybe Britney Spears...sorry, had to do it. Cheers...
This was actually an E-mail to Costello loving buddy Mark Wheaton. But, I though it'd be mean not to share it.
The new release of My Aim Is True came out, and it has an entire disk of him playing the album live with the Attractions like 6 months after recording the album. As the album was recorded with The News, this means it's 1000x better, which is nearly impossible as My Aim Is True is one of the best records ever made.
And, also, this: http://www.rctimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll.../1005/MTCN0303
"I recorded some new melodies for some of my older songs, and for a gag I recorded them on just a cassette player. And I didn't have a microphone so I plugged in headphones into the tape recorder, because you switch them backwards, they work as a microphone. I didn't want to be like a Luddite, so I put them on a CDR, and I put 10 of the CDRs in 10 copies of the best of record that we released in April, and hid 'em in the shops in America, just to see whether anybody bought records anymore. And as nobody's found 'em yet and it's now September, I guess nobody buys records anymore. But somewhere somebody's gonna get a little surprise one of these days . . . They're gonna be in Wal-Mart or somewhere, and they're gonna buy one of these records and they're gonna discover a little free gift from me. . . . There's not enough fun with the business of music. It's all very serious. The record thing for as long as it's gonna last, it needs a little mischief put back into it."
Brendan & Adan’s Picks, Pans & Scans - August 29, 2007 » PopCultureShock
Punks the Comic Summer SpecialAdan: What the fuck?So there’s a dog-man, a Ghost Rider look-alike, a dude with a fist for a head, and Abraham Lincoln, and they all live in an apartment together while fighting off alien invasions and eating dead hookers. So, again, I ask: what the fuck?
This is too absurdist for me. I like Kody Chamberlain’s collage-style art, but even that gets really weird sometimes. Throw in the fact the comic is interrupted a few times by things like the thirteenth page missing, an interview with Rick Remender the fish, and an alien invasions PSA, and this thing is just too damn weird. Fans of The Young Ones will probably enjoy the hell out of this.
Comics Corner: For fans of the comic book
Punks the Comic Summer Special #1 A very interesting fun story written by Joshua Fialkov and a wild and crazy art style by Kody Chamberlain. Four characters, Abe, Dog, Skull, and Fist, all with their namesake for a head... And they live in a house together in anarchy. It's very hard to explain other than there is an alien attack and dead hookers, and wooden indians with Rick Remender doing an interview as a fish. If you like the show Young Ones than you'll love this. Otherwise check the site they came from here
blog.myspace.com/gianlucaglazer
My sense of humor is dark and I tend to go for the less conventional sometimes when it comes to favorite movies, cds and books of all time. That said, I hope I'm not the only one that enjoys this type of book. Please prove me wrong and that I'm not a mental case for enjoying this book very much.
We hope so, too, Gianluca. Go and check out what the man has to say.
I'm still searching for a print copy, but, here's the review. New graphic novels straight from the drawing board - USATODAY.com
Postcards: True Stories That Never Happened Edited by Jason Rodriguez Villard, 160 pp., $21.95
Jason Rodriguez relishes a good story, even if it's just a fragment of one. For Postcards, he combed antique shops for thought-provoking cards, then passed them to comic-book writers and artists. The result is a mishmash of tales that blend tiny truths ("The new barn is up") with imagined details of lost loves, war heroes and forbidden desires. Highlights include Micah Farritor's beautiful illustrations with Joshua Hale Fialkov's story about Americans in France during the Great Depression and a crime-fighting scene written by Robert Tinnell and drawn by Brian Fraim. It's fascinating to see artists' take on, in Rodriguez's words, the "turn-of-the-century equivalent of modern-day text messages." — Matheson
Well, is watching, actually, but that doesn't fit the song as well. I'm on the fourth episode right now. The show's an interesting little drama thus far. I'm really impressed with how quickly and thoroughly they fleshed out all of the characters. The drama has a tendency to fall closer to melodrama, but, due to the high stakes of the world of the show, I think it actually works. There's also a knack for final images. Some really haunting and delicate images tend to fill the final seconds of every episodes, and really manages to draw you back in to see what's going to happen next. The acting is solid enough, with Skeet Ulrich not quite reaching his Miracle level of awesome, but, he's still much better than he usually get credit for.
From what I've read there's a big change 2/3rds of the way through the season, so I'm looking forward to that. iTunes has the pilot up for free online. I'd recommend checking it out.
Graphic Novels - 7/15/2007 - Library Journal
Fialkov, Joshua Hale (text) & Noel Tuazon & Scott A. Keating (illus.). Elk's Run. Villard: Random. 2007. ISBN 978-0-345-49511-2. pap. $19.95. FFor a group of disillusioned Vietnam vets, isolationist utopia in a hidden West Virginia valley is "like heaven"—for a time. But small problems grow larger as the valley children mature and dreams dissolve into violence and flames. When a man tries to escape from the valley to join his estranged wife, he accidentally kills a town teen and is horribly executed by tough-ass leader John for violating the town's isolationist "agreement." Then two state troopers show up, and John kills them also. In a cat-and-mouse game in the underground mine, it's John's son, young John, who leads the other teens to escape and bring help for the rest of the town when the mine starts burning. This thriller combines dark and edgy psychodrama infusing the coming-of-age theme with a blurring of the usual good vs. evil clichés. There are no bad guys—only good intentions gone terribly over the edge. The sketchy art and ocher-crimson coloring evoke a lifestyle badly frayed and heading for disaster. The underpinnings of teens vs. parents and idealism vs. ethics make the title a good bet for classroom use. Strong language; recommended for older teens up in public and academic libraries.—M.C.
Douglas Adams was a genius. Truly a man before his time. Case in point, Hyperland. A documentary discussing the idea of Hypertext (y'know, that whole internet thing) from 1990, that more or less explains exactly how the internet ended up evolving in a startalingly accurate vision. The idea of literary hypertext is certainly a part of the zeitgeist, especially amongst us comic folks, with our production blogs, soundtrack listings, podcasts, commentaries, and so on. It's pretty damn cool to see nearly twenty years ago is good ol' Mr. Adams explaining it all in simple, understandable, and suprisingly not dated language. It's cut up into four parts, but here's the first to get you started.
World Famous Comics >> Tony's Online Tips - Tony Isabella, Jul 10, 2007
Elk's RunMounting dread is the signature mood of the opening scenes of Elk's Run by Joshua Hale Failkov with artists Noel Tuazon and Scott A. Keating [Villard; $19.95] as we are introduced to the title "star" and quickly made aware things aren't quite right in that secluded hamlet. The war-scarred veterans who found it were looking to create an old-fashioned haven from the corrupt world without, but, through the manipulation of their fears and the betrayals of their leader, their dream has become a nightmare. Fittingly, it's a small group of teens - children, really - who embark upon a rite of passage that will change the town and their lives forever.
Fialkov eases us into the disturbing world of Elk's Run, but the first instances of violence in this 200-page graphic novel are relatively tame: a mother slapping a disrespectful son and an awful but not uncommon traffic fatality. It's in the second chapter that the magnitude of the town's wrongness is revealed. From there on in, the terror grows and doesn't stop until the story reaches its satisfying conclusion. With so many extended comics epics proving themselves unable to close the deal, it's great to come across one that finishes as strong as it begins.
Artists Tuazon and Keating hold up their end of the deal. The storytelling is solid throughout the GN. Their visuals convey the drama and emotion journey of the characters and the situations with which they are forced to deal. If this trio of creators have more books in them, I want to read them.
Ignore the puerile intro by Charlie Huston. It's an exercise, a mercifully brief exercise, in dropping the F-bomb for no reason. I accept such coarseness when it's part and parcel of a character in a story. I see small need for it outside the bounds of fiction, especially when one is the opening act for an exceptional work like Elk's Run.
Would you kiss your mother with that mouth?
Skip the introduction, but do read Elk's Run at your earliest opportunity. It earns the full five Tonys.
I believe that's printed in the current issue of Comic Buyer's Guide, which I decree you should go out and support. They've been very supportive of my work over the years, and it's a pretty in depth look at comics today, written by some of the best and brightest in the business.
Blog@Newsarama » Fringe Benefits: Non-DC/Marvel Solicits for July 2007
Digital WebbingPunks: The Summer Comics Special: Josh Fialkov Kody Chamberlain a skull-headed dude, Abe Lincoln, and a dog-faced boy = the Awesome.
Tony picked me up a copy of friend and colleague Marc Bernardin's new book from Wildstorm The Highwaymen. It's an action packed thrill ride, in the most non-cliched meaning of the words. It's a complete and utter fucking blast, and it's highly recommended. It should be at your local comic book store. You can read more about Marc and other reviews of the book here: http://rhinoplastique.blogspot.com/
I liked Elk’s Run and I would definitely recommend it. Strong characters, a compelling storyline and nicely drawn art make this book an entertaining read.
Front Row Crew - GeekNights » Blog Archive » GeekNights 070606 - Elk’s Run The GeekNights Podcast has about 20+ minutes of Elk's Run discussion on one of this week's shows. Link above.
Thanks for the discussion, guys. Really interesting stuff.
Right from the get-go, the introduction of Elk's Run tells you just how smart this graphic novel is. Caveat emptor, this book is going to make you think about stuff. Put it down if you're afraid to think for yourself. This book is important. Joshua Hale Fialkov has gone to the mountain, seen the truth, and brought back mana from heaven. Yadda-yadda-yadda.So what does Elk's give us that any other angst-ridden contemporary American literature doesn't? Well, I'll tell you. It is extremely well-written, with only a few minor flaws.
It’s violent, yet not gratuitously so. Nonetheless, the writing exemplifies realistic, dystopian-horror fiction and suspenseful comic book writing at its finest, most skillful level. Collectors of fine graphic novels will certainly wish to add this to their bookshelves and will certainly read it more than once. This is one of the best graphic novels I have read this year, and another example of how sophisticated the sequential art format can be. “A”-freaking-plus.