The Mini Comic Library

A YOUNG boy darts past me waving an imaginary sword at his father, shouting 'I am Usagi' as I walk away from the Southwark Playhouse's adaptation of cartoonist Stan Sakai's anthropomorphic samurai epic Usagi Yojimbo. Usagi Yojimbo - adapted for stage by Stewart Melton and directed by Amy Draper - pulls together a number of stories from Sakai's 30 year run on the comic, to tell the tale of how a young Miyamoto Usagi was trained in Bushido, the code of the samurai, a way of life which places honour, loyalty and chivalry above all else. It's a wonderful, joyful production, beautifully crafted, and a fitting tribute to a man who has dedicated decades of his life to entertaining fans, is regularly mentioned as a favourite of fans, fellow creators and critics alike, and is generally recognised as one of the nicest guys in the business. One would hope too, that even amid Sakai's recent personal tragedy, he would take some pleasure in the obvious enjoyment of the c...

LIKE the mini comic equivalent of a  punk cover version, Tyler Hutchison's Die Homer Vol I is a balls-to-the-wall tribute to a cult classic, in equal parts homage and parody, and 40 stories high, with suspense, excitement and adventure in every panel.  I don't honestly know how anyone walks past Hutchison's table at comic cons and doesn't stop to inspect the book's cover - rendered on excellent high-quality waxy paper stock that perfectly accentuates the pastel tones used to highlight the surreal image of Springfield's finest taking on the Bruce Willis role for this action-packed anarchic roller coaster. Die Homer is bold, brilliant and ballsy cartooning with a punk ethos that echoes the  grand traditions of the groundbreaking US underground comics scenes of the 60s and 70s, of Crumb, of Shelton and perhaps even a little bit of Harvey Kurtzmann's MAD. Hutchison doesn't rest on his laurels over his title gag either, instead  assaulting us throughout his ...

ELEGANT and intricate, Kristyna Baczynski's Hand Me Down is a triumph of visual storytelling, bravely eschewing dialogue to tell a silent tale about an object grown in nature and its travel through the millenia. I don't know Bacynski's work as well as I would like to but I have known of her for some time, and always been impressed by the high level of detail she puts into every beautiful, intricate image she creates. If you do know her work, you might be forgiven for believing she would struggle to recreate that level of detail in a comic created as part of the 24 Hour Comic Marathon at this year's Lakes International Comic Art Festival. If you did, like me, you would have underestimated this hugely talented and engaging cartoonist. The level of detail and skill that has gone into  Hand Me Down  in just 24 hours (considerably less I'm told anecdotally) is truly impressive - precise lines and marks fill almost every inch of the beautifully rendered panels. And Baczyn...

IN Tom Hands: A Tale of Stories, Warwick Johnson Cadwell, draws on the maritime tradition of tall tales to spin us a series of salty yarns which ask a profound question about the power of stories to remember us after we're gone. Created at The Lakes International Comic Art Festival as part of the 24 Hour Comic Marathon Tom Hands is a tremendous achievement in storytelling, as visually stunning as it is accomplished in its narrative choices. It is clear from the outset that the author thoroughly enjoyed the production of this story and there were times where I wondered whether the conditions of the 24 hour challenge hadn't somewhat release Cadwell from his artisitic shackles so to speak.  His artwork throughout is full of life, almost frenetic in places, with lines that at first glance might seem casual, that prove on a second lookl to be meticulously placed and essential struts and building blocks in the layered experience Tom Hands offers its readers. Bold black strokes cast...

A DARKLY beautiful ghost story, that is both powerful and evocative, Dan Berry's Nicholas and Edith, has a lingering quality, perfectly hitting its storytelling beats throughout to craft something like a narrative palindrome and a true masterclass of the mini comics short form . That it was created in under 24 hours at this year's Lakes International Comic Art Festival just makes it all the more impressive and marks Berry as a must stop for any collector browsing tables at future festivals. His artwork recalls Quentin Blake. It's simple and elegant and gives his cast a fluid form, allowing then to be strong and fragile, brutal and vulnerable, and  finally ethereal and dreamlike, as they turn into shapes our mind reaches to make sense of, but can never truly focus on. In his backgrounds and settings too, there's a hazy fairytale-like quality that could place the story anywhere and at anytime. Berry uses colour sparingly but precisely throughout Nicholas and Edith , letti...

VERSATILE, talented, intelligent, imaginative are all superlatives which could be used to describe Joe Sparrow and introduce his anthology series Omnipathy, but it would be better to describe him as a fearless storyteller who knows no frontier in the medium of mini comic. Omnipathy 1 opens with  The Still Planet, a  powerful introduction to Sparrow's work, warning the reader this is an author with a deft skill for atmosphere and dialogue, a dark and dangerous imagination, and no fear of taking risks. Like all the best sci-fi shorts, The Still Planet  takes the audience on a rollercoaster ride which leaves us questioning exactly what it is we have just seen. Sparrow's use of negative space helps creates a sense of foreboding, neatly underlining the story of two astronauts heading deeper into a mysterious perfectly square black hole cut into the side of a recently discovered asteroid. But it's is their dialogue that draws us in, hinting at the madness that is creeping over ...

A RAPIER-SHARP wit, that is at once debonair, distinguished and drunk off its ass, The Megatherium Club by Owen D. Pomery, is a mini comic unlike any other and an essential addition to any civilised library. Pomery's take on this late eighteenth century gentlemen's club, dedicated to the pursuits of 'gin, taxidermy and fucking about', is a heady cocktail of sequential debauchery, stylish prose and elegant artwork. Volume 1, The Great Ape - which I liberated from Pomery at this year's Lakes' International Comic Art Festival from the veritable cornucopia of good-looking comic books that graced his table - tells the tale of a drunken bet that leads the club's members on a hunt for that most elusive of mythological beasts, the yeti. The rambunctious joy of The Megatherium Club is perhaps most obvious in the quick-fire, often grotesque, irreverent, drunken, frat-boy humour of its members, which will inevitably raise a guilty laugh in even the most cynical reader....