In advance of the 2010 Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards, we here on Suvudu will be running down all the nominees in all the categories. Except this year, we’re going to let you tell us who you think will win. So check out a few synopsis, some artwork, and debate the merits of each if you see fit, then cast your vote at the bottom of the post. Be sure to keep an eye out for a few free samples along the way!
Okay then, let’s get started. And the nominees are…
Abominable Charles Christopher, by Karl Kerschl, www.Abominable.cc
What’s it all about? That’s a darned fine question. As Comixipedia writes:
Its main character is a Yeti-like animal named Charles Christopher who never speaks. It also has a large cast of forest animals, most of which are far more talkative than Charles. There is a large story arc (according to Kerschl, it will eventually be “a skewed retelling of the Gilgamesh Epic”), but there is no set plan for getting there. Also, many of the strips are comedic and stand by themselves.
Of course, we’d be remiss if we didn’t mention that our own Funn-e-Pages has also delved in to the Cedar Forest. You can read that review of the webcomic here: The FUNN-e-PAGES: The Abominable Charles Christopher
Bayou, by Jeremy Love, http://ZudaComics.com/bayou
Bayou is one of the best comics to come out of Zuda, DC’s online comics competition/launch website, and that’s saying something. From the official synopsis:
South of the Mason-Dixon Line, lies a strange land of gods and monsters. Born from centuries of slavery, civil war, innocent bloodshed, hate and strife lurks a world parallel to our own. LEE WAGSTAFF is the daughter of a poor, sharecropper in a depression-era, Mississippi Delta town, called Charon. She’s an introspective, brave child and hard labor in the fields has made her sturdy and strong. One day, Lee and her father help the sheriff retrieve the body of a boy who’d been lynched and thrown into the river. Lee dives into the depths to tie a rope around the boy. While under water, she catches a glimpse of a strange world. Ever since that day, Lee hears voices in the trees and rivers. When Lee’s playmate, Lily, is snatched by BOG, an evil inhabitant of that place she saw, Lee’s father is accused of kidnapping.
As the racial tensions grow, Bog grows more powerful, so not only are Lee’s friends and father in peril, but all of Charon.
The Guns of Shadow Valley, by David Wachter and James Andrew Clark, www.gunsofshadowvalley.com
Looking for a Western? The Guns of Shadow Valley might be just what you’re looking for. What’s it all about? Here’s how the creator describes it (from the Guns of Shadow Valley About page)
Somewhere in the mysterious Shadow Valley lies a secret that could forever change the face of the frontier. To protect that secret, a posse of gunmen with special abilities must come together and defend against a tribe of ghostly warriors, an advancing army led by a deranged Colonel, and the perils of the valley itself.
Power Out, by Nathan Schreiber, www.act-i-vate.com/67.comic
Creator and writer Nathan Schreiber describes the series on his Power Out Info page:
Fourteen and friendless, Justin doesn’t want to run away from his domineering family – he wants them to run away from him. When a massive, extended power out grants him his wish, the quietly introverted teen must learn to survive in a world he’s always tried to escape. In his seemingly quaint New England suburb, Justin encounters a unique collection of friends and tormentors, including a brazen young neighbor uninhibited by her inability to speak English, a dead woman who cheerfully haunts his wet dreams, and the eccentric holdouts in a town that has been evacuated by the military.
Atmospheric, surreal, but suffused with all the inherent humor and humiliation of adolescence, Power Out captures the exhilaration and terror of discovering how big the world is for the first time.
Now, it’s one thing to write that yourself, but quite another when you earn praise from your peers for your work. So to back up the above, you might consider the following quote when appraising the quality on display in Power Out
“It is said that literature and art are rewarded with contempt if you fail and hatred if you succeed. Are you ready for the hate, Nathan Schreiber!?!”
- Tim Hamilton, illustrator of Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451: The Authorized Adaptation
Sin Titulo, by Cameron Stewart, www.SinTituloComic.com/
Brought to you by the same folks (Transmission-X webcomic collective) who collect The Abominable Charles Christopher online, Sin Titulo is vastly different. It’s dark and edgy and mysterious. It’s also very, very difficult to summarize. The Webcomic Overlook does one of the best jobs I’ve read in describing the story. What follows below is just a short exceprt of their description and those interested in discovering what the comic is about would do well to click on over and read the whole article. You can find it here:
Sin Titulo centers around Alex, a normal man with a normal life who finds out that his grandfather passed away a month ago. He arrives at the retirement home to collect his personal items. While leafing through his book, he comes to a strange photo. It’s a picture of granddad with a hot, young blonde woman in sunglasses. Curious as to who the girl is, Alex brings the photo up to an orderly. She’s flustered, mentioning that Alex wasn’t meant to see it, and she whisks the book away, disappearing.
And this is about the time when life starts to fall apart.
When he falls asleep, Alex dreams of a beach with single tree. As Sin Titulo progresses, the dreams become stranger and stranger yet. The setting is the same, yet unwelcome alien elements seem to intrude. The boundary between the dreams and reality begin to breakdown, to the point where, in the real world, Alex encounters a man whose entire artistic output is based on the same tree and the same beach.
Like I said, the above is only a small excerpt. Check out their review and head on over to the comic for a better understanding of what is going on.
