Lunch Break is a short round-up of favorite webcomics appearing here each weekday at noon. Here’s something for you to enjoy over your lunch break or whenever. The premise is simple: it’s another day on the internet. Here’s a new or forgotten comic that seems interesting. Have something to recommend? Email us: crosshatchdispatch@gmail.com.

1. Serial Typist by Kevin Cannon // ~ May 2010
2. A Walk With My Double by David King // October 2010
3. “When Janitors Die” from Toothpaste For Dinner by Drew // 02.19.2005
4. Climate Change by Darryl Cunningham // December 13, 2010
5. Sleeping Together by Julia Wertz // June 7, 2006

– Sarah Morean

For many years I’ve had a sensitivity about the lack of webcomics coverage on this site.  The reasons for this are boring and familiar — lack of manpower, lack of time, etc.  Still, I’ve loved, followed and found a number of great webcomics over the years and until today haven’t done enough to promote them.

We cover alternative comics on The Daily Cross Hatch.  Read the mission statement.  But many of the paper comics we write about — especially the minis I receive — first appeared or still exist online.  So while it’s a little silly that we don’t pay comics much notice here until they see print, I hope it’s at least understandable.  Something about the finished object — a book — begs for summary and criticism while ongoing, ephemeral web content does not.  At least, that’s how it strikes me.  I’m afflicted with an inability to assess a comics project until it’s fully presented to me as a book.  Probably this is genetic.  On my mother’s side.  Pray they find a cure.

When I find something great online, my first instinct is to share the link.  Certainly there are great resources like Fleen and The Webcomics Beacon and ComixTALK that go above and beyond to discuss and examine the webcomics scene, but link sharing is what I like to do and all can bring to the table.

Starting today, and continuing regularly (knock on wood) after the holiday break, expect to see a short round-up of favorite webcomics each weekday at noon.  Here’s something for you to enjoy over your lunch break or whenever.  The premise is simple: it’s another day on the internet.  Here’s a new or forgotten comic that seems interesting.  Have something to recommend?  Email us: crosshatchdispatch@gmail.com.

1. Welcome to Falling Rock National Park by Kid Shay // 12.21.2010
2. Tom the Dancing Bug edited by Ruben Bolling // 12.22.2010
3. Yet More Letters for the Guardian Saturday Review by Tom Gauld // date unknown
4. Cruis’n USA: A Graphic Memoir by Toby Jones // 09.25.2010
5. Afghan Life (Chapter 1) by Matt Bors // 12.15.2010

NOTE: Future installments of Lunch Break will appear on a separate page of this site. LINK

– Sarah Morean

This year-end list my be my favorite annual Cross Hatch feature, if only for the fairly consistent complaints I receive from a litany of prominent cartoonists, writers, publishers, journalists, museum curators, and other industry folks. It’s always the same thing: how dare I ask them to boil down a year’s worth of comics into a list  of five books? Don’t I know that we’re in the middle of a sequential art renaissance?

Fair enough, but let’s be honest, given the sheer number of folks who respond to this list each year, five seems like a pretty good cap—it took me a few hours to piece this thing together, as it is.

The other reason I love compiling this list is the opportunity to spot trends amongst those surveyed—do any books seem to stand out as clear favorites? Last year that title belonged to David Mazzucchelli’s modern sequential masterpiece, Asterios Polyp. The year prior, it was a four-way tie with Bottomless Belly Button, What it Is, Swallow Me Whole, and Skyscrapers of the Midwest all nabbing high marks.

While I wouldn’t go so far as choosing a clear “winner” for 2010, Chris Ware really did sneak in last second with the latest issue of Acme Novelty, a book that has blown away nearly everyone who has cracked open its cloth cover, your humble blogger included.

As always, I encourage readers and artists alike to contribute their own lists to the comment section below. Let’s keep the conversation going.

Read the rest of this entry »

Cartoonist/educator Jeremy Tinder joins us for a very Chicagoan episode of the podcast. We talk the city’s red light district, a U.S. Acres movie, and whether anyone can ever truly own Ira Glass.

Cross Hatch Podcast 014 [CLICK TO LISTEN]

[Above, serene contemplation. Below, disjointed conversation.]

Read the rest of this entry »

Anna Trodglen is a painter and illustrator living in Atlanta with her husband, cat and three dogs. That’s not just personal, “get to know her” information, as dogs and cats are her artistic subjects. Her love of animals is rivaled only by her love of classic children’s book illustration. She is particularly inspired by work of Louis Wain, Garth Williams and Tasha Tudor.

Aside from her whimsical paintings (she works in acrylic and watercolor), Trodglen is a cartoonist with a twice-weekly strip appearing on Facebook. Additionally, she just completed a graphic novel, The Blue Mountain, a silent story following her recently deceased corgi-mix pup named Jack and his adventurous journey of self-discovery in the afterlife.

Keep up with her comic on Facebook HERE.

Read the rest of this entry »

Eschew #1-2
by Robert Sergel
Sparkplug Comic Books

Robert Sergel’s comics always amaze me. For work that’s clearly so photo-referential, there’s still something in the form of the art that tricks my mind into thinking maybe it’s NOT photo-referential. The people and landscapes and interiors all look so real and well-proportioned, yet alive, as though there is a perfect cartoony version of our normal world out there and Sergel’s comics are more like a snapshot of that world than they are a reflection of ours.  Perhaps this comes as a result of referencing a complete shot, instead of merely referencing a person in a shot, but whatever the method, I find the results truly lovely and unique.

Read the rest of this entry »

[Above, philosopher or baseball star of the 70's?]

Ignatz-nominated comics writer Fred Van Lente talks with us about Four Loko, his favorite island, impressive facial hair, and the trouble that comic book criminals have finding a good alley in NYC.

Fred Van Lente Day happens annually on December 6 over at the Comics Should Be Good blog at Comic Book Resources.  Relive the memories HERE.

Cross Hatch Podcast 008 [CLICK TO LISTEN]

Is this second part of our interview with Doug Allen, we discuss the beginnings of Rubber Rodeo, Steven’s punk rock origins, and the possibility of a complete collection of the cartoonist’s best-known strip.

[Part One]

Read the rest of this entry »

Erich Fletschinger grew up in Vermont where he drew a lot of Dungeons & Dragons characters before discovering metal and punk rock — after which he made a lot of gig posters.

For awhile he also rocked.  Until, one day, he fell for a girl.  Then he quit his band and headed to Brooklyn where he now designs, illustrates and does some fashion event planning.  Since cohabiting with his lady in a Park Slope apartment (complete with a backsplash) he has became obsessed with comics.

He just finished his first sizable mini-comic Beloved and has been working on a strip called This is How We Love which you can read on his BLOG.  This guest strip comes from a new series he’s starting up called Brooklyn.

Fletschinger says he’s brand new to comics.  Welcome to the club, buddy!

Read the rest of this entry »