Galaxy Newsbrief 123013: The Balance Between Two Worlds

* The creator of one of my favourite graphic novels of the past decade, Essex County (published by Top Shelf), is featured in the holiday interview series at The Comics Reporter: Tom Spurgeon talks to Jeff Lemire about working in the Canadian comics tradition, transitioning from alt-comix to corporate comics work (as a writer for DC's New 52), and how he balances between the two worlds.

* Spurgeon's interview with Colleen Doran was interesting to me because she talks about the difficulties of restoring old work to be reprinted in the modern day. I once talked to a doubtful comics creator who had been assured how easy the process can be, so it's good to see Doran being upfront about how nightmarishly complicated it can be. I learned as a broadcaster that you can make digital files different, but you can never make them better than the source material. I also appreciate her reminding everyone how shitty Checker Publishing's reprints can be. I'm still angry about what they did with Supreme, and that was what, a million years ago?

* The Comics Journal collects the best of their articles from the past year in their 2013 Year in Review. I don't know if I was aware that Dan Adkins had died this year; I wasn't aware of how far back his career had gone, probably because his work always looked contemporary to me, as opposed to, say, Al Plastino or Carmine Infantino, both of whom also died this year. And Joey Manley. I still can't believe Joey Manley is gone. Take time to read some of those tribute articles; a lack of knowledge about comics history is something I find irritating when talking to other people about the industry and the artform. The information is out there if you care enough to find it. If you don't, why bother?

* Salon's top superhero comics of 2013 list is up. I don't agree with some of the conclusions (Waid's Hulk is worth a read whether Simonson is drawing it or not; Mark Millar is way past the point where I would ever give him another try again on anything), but it's worth taking a look if you like the spandex and the punching.