NEWSLETTER

GARY PANTER’S TOP TEN COMICS

Gary Panter is a famous artist who designed Pee-wee’s Playhouse, drew three Frank Zappa album covers, designed the Screamers’ logo, recorded music with members of the Residents, and has made many great comics about his punk everyman, Jimbo. Recently there was a fancy two-volume retrospective published about him, and he just put out a new CD with Devon Flynn. Gary’s an amazing man who spurts creativity like an open artery. He’s been kind enough to rattle off his absolute favorite comics in a sweet little list.



ZAP COMIX #3 (1968)
R. Crumb, S. Clay Wilson, Rick Griffin, Victor Moscoso, Gilbert Shelton
Apex Novelties

Crumb, Wilson, Williams, Griffin, Moscoso, Shelton—the most talented hippie drawers in the same place, at the same time, often drawing on the same pieces of paper, and trying to outdo each other in experimental graphic approaches and moral compromise. The Griffin cover is a masterpiece visually; and technically, one of the most astounding handmade color separations of the 20th century. Like if the Fugs could draw real fucking good.







CAPTAIN JOHNER AND THE ALIENS (1967)
No artist credited
Gold Key

This was a spin-off comic from Russ Manning’s Magnus, Robot Fighter comic and featured aliens that didn’t look human-derived and stories that actually contained speculation about interspecies diplomacy. Manning, who seems to have written and drawn the comics, was kind of stiff and kind of great.









COSMO CAT #2 (1959)
No artist credited
Norlen Magazines Inc.

Maybe because my father ran dime stores in the 50s, I am haunted by third-rate funny-animal comics and their anonymous characters executed in virtuoso thin brushwork, often by the Fago brothers; also noticed by Eduardo Paolozzi and Robert Crumb. The unevenness of the stories, usually on the terrible side, is redeemed by slipshod and very simple coloring jobs misprinted on coarse yellow newsprint.








DAFFY #10 (1957)
No artist credited
Dell

How can I say that this is what a comic book looks like to me? “Dell comics are good comics”—it said so in bold blue lettering at the bottom of the first page. In a striking scene in the Italian pop-future film The 10th Victim, Marcello Mastroianni is reading his priceless comic collection—Porky, Daffy, and Sylvester—while his baby-headed robot pet crawls nearby.







COLOR (1971)
Victor Moscoso
Self-published

Victor Moscoso—a silent, full-color, cosmic hippie trip in maximum psychedelic metamorphic splendor. He might still sell it on his website. Metallic space birds fuck their way across a Betty Boop mirror-world continuum.

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Comments

Anonymous, on Jul 24, 2009 wrote: skidmarx neon park did the weasels painting
	jnevs, on Jul 23, 2009 wrote: Tarzan’s looking a little bit like a sexual predator on that cover that bird needs to be careful
Anonymous, on Jul 22, 2009 wrote: Tarzan has a rad moustache.
Anonymous, on Jul 22, 2009 wrote: i never knew tarzan was italian.
	Fuck Russia, on Jul 22, 2009 wrote: George Hansen basically cribbed directly from Crumb it looks like. He’s got talent but why so obviously take someone’s style as your own?
Anonymous, on Jul 22, 2009 wrote: they just don’t make em like they used to. or if they do i haven’t found em yet.
Anonymous, on Jul 22, 2009 wrote: Holy shit, that beetle speaks Hebrew!
Anonymous, on Jul 22, 2009 wrote: there is such a different in the graphics even just from 1957 Daffy to 1968 Zap... i kind of like the old school style better though
Anonymous, on Jul 22, 2009 wrote: daffy duck used to be a comic?! awesome
Anonymous, on Jul 22, 2009 wrote: this is a good list. vintage comics are way way way better than the new stuff now
Anonymous, on Jul 22, 2009 wrote: you had me at "hedesigned Pee-wee’s Playhouse"
	skidmarx, on Jul 21, 2009 wrote: shit. i didn’t know panter did zappa covers. did he do weasels ripped my flesh? anyone?
Anonymous, on Jul 21, 2009 wrote: I used to have a 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea comic that was incredibly drawn. Wish I still had it.
Anonymous, on Jul 21, 2009 wrote: this is like a top 50 hip hop songs list without anything after ’96. WEAK
Anonymous, on Jul 21, 2009 wrote: Never seen a ZAP cover I didn’t love.
	thedon, on Jul 21, 2009 wrote: i wish they still made comics like these
Anonymous, on Jul 21, 2009 wrote: the daffy picture takes me back to my youth
Anonymous, on Jul 21, 2009 wrote: the 5th one is awesome...real psychedilic
Anonymous, on Jul 21, 2009 wrote: i have captain johner and the aliens. i think its funny that garry panter picked it