Miss Cellany’s Comic Strip Queue
Skip to comments
Alex Segura on writing The Phantom, Skip Kohloff Tarzan and Big Ben Bolt letterer, MUTTS art prints, Mister Oswald not by Russ Johnson, Snoopy-Zamboni bobblehead, Richard Harvey – Lawyer for Children, Eric Battle profiled.
Alex Segura On Taking Up The Phantom Comic Strip
Alex Segura, upcoming writer of The Phantom comic strip, has mentioned the gig on his Bluesky account:
“… I’ll have lots more to say about this as we get closer to our December launch on @comicskingdom.bsky.social, but in the interim, I want to give outgoing writer Tony DePaul a huge congrats on an unparalleled 27-year run writing The Ghost Who Walks. 2/4
“I’ve been a fan of the strip for some time, and Tony’s Phantom expertise, spot-on characterization, and knack for grounding the hero in today’s world is visible every day. These are big shoes to fill and I know Phantom phans new and old will be watching. 3/4
“I’m only one of a handful of writers to handle the strip (and, I believe, the first Latino!) and I approach it with the reverence and humility the Phantom deserves… “
Skip Kohloff, Hogarth and Celardo Letterer
Comics researcher Rodrigo Baeza has taken a deep dive to uncover the comic strip and comic book credits of letterer Skip Kohloff:
“Trying to find out more about him, my first lead was a mention in the Grand Comics Database thanks to Dark Horse’s crediting Kohloff as a letterer in their reprint of Burne Hogarth’s 1976 graphic novel, Jungle Tales of Tarzan.”
“I was intrigued by the mention of “Big Ben Bolt” strips from 1975 in Kohloff’s belongings. The listing doesn’t detail which strips are included in the archive, but I found scans of strips from that year (unsigned, but apparently ghosted by John Celardo) which seem to have been lettered by Skip Kohloff.”
New Sunday MUTTS Color Guide Art Prints
The MUTTS shop is now offering “museum quality” prints of the color guides of selected Sunday pages:
“In this ‘Color Guide’ print, you’ll see the little imperfections, smudges, and other marks that tell the story of how these comics came to be. They’re fascinating glimpses into the making of MUTTS, and special pieces of comic strip history. These artistic prints are available in two sizes: 8″ x 10″ and 12″ x 15”.
As for the above image:
“For the first time, you can bring home a museum-quality print featuring Patrick’s original vision for the November 9, 1997, Sunday MUTTS strip, which features a title pane inspired by Maxfield Parrish’s ‘Jack Frost’ 1936 Collier’s magazine cover.”
Mister Oswald, not by Russ Johnson
Rob Stolzer is the man who is single-handedly keeping the legacy of cartoonist Russ Johnson alive at the Mister Oswald site. Stolzer has recently added pages to the gallery there, but one of them is a very rare (singular?) comic strip NOT by Johnson (above). Says Stolzer about one of the pages:
“The February 1939 page depicts the Oswalds at the State Convention, but the page was not drawn by Russ Johnson. If you look carefully at the drawing, you’ll see that it is far sketchier than Russ would work, and Mister Oswald barely looks like himself in some panels. In addition, Russ always signed his work and this page is unsigned…”
Mister Oswald first appeared in Hardware Retailing magazine 99 years ago this month and ran until 1989 by Johnson and then another 20 years by Larry Day.
Missed It – Snoopy Bobble Head
The Snoopy driving a Zamboni bobblehead with Woodstock along for the ride is now a collector’s item.
“Join the Columbus Blue Jackets for a night with everyone’s favorite beagle and his best feathered friend, as they take a spin around the rink–Zamboni and all.”
“Score your discounted game ticket plus an exclusive Peanuts-themed bobblehead–featuring Snoopy and Woodstock.”
Harvey Richards, Lawyer For Children
John Gruber at Daring Fireball recalls a specific Tom the Dancing Bug comic strip and in doing so gives us a history of “Richard Harvey, Lawyer for Children” that began before Ken Fisher adopted the Ruben Bolling nom-de-pen.
“Ruben Bolling’s long-running Tom the Dancing Bug is one of my favorite comic strips. I’ve been a huge fan since the early 1990s, when I started reading it in alternative newspapers. (Newspapers were sort of like websites, excepted they were printed daily or weekly. I swear.) Back in 2012 Bolling — noting that the comic was more widely read than ever yet generating less money than ever — started a subscription membership called The Inner Hive.”
“I was reminded to re-endorse The Inner Hive after I wrote a post last night referencing Harvey Richards, lawyer for children — one of the comic’s longest running recurring characters. Tom the Dancing Bug’s entire schtick is premised on a wide array of recurring characters and premises, but Richards is probably my favorite.”
Eric Battle Profiled
Yesterday it was mentioned that the Eric Battle Sunday Tarzans would be showing up on GoComics in two weeks. Today Battle comes up again as he has a graphic novel being released next week and is involved in an exhibit that opened last week. The book and exhibit prompts Jon Caroulis for WHYY’s Billy Penn to profile the cartoonist. The profile notes in part:
“He attended Overbrook High School’s magnet arts program and later earned a bachelor’s degree in illustration from University of the Arts.
“Battle’s first published artwork appeared in The Welcomat, then the city’s alternative newspaper. He went on to draw editorial cartoons for The Philadelphia Inquirer, illustrate children’s books and create fashion illustrations.”
Understandably the piece spends most of the time on the graphic biography of Emmett Till.
“A graphic novel biography about one of America’s most heinous race crimes, Framing Emmett Till: Exposing Dark Fear follows an anonymous Black writer as he investigates Emmett’s murder, confronting not only the unresolved truths of the past, but the ways Black pain is consumed, reshaped, and monetized in the present.”
There is no mention of Battle’s 18 month tenure on the Tarzan comic strip.
Comments