An earlier version of this article appeared on Indie Creator Explosion in May 2020. Intro In this article, I delve into the work of Barry Blair, a controversial figure in alternative and independent comics in the 1980s and 1990s. I want to preface this piece by saying that as a kid I was a fan … Read more
From Gasm # 4 by James O’Barr Part 1: The Crow Creator James O’Barr’s Early Years Part 2: The Crow and Caliber Years Part 3: After The Crow: The Works of James O’Barr Note: I might receive a cut of any referrals to Mycomicshop.com. Even if they sold fairly well, most Outlaw Comics existed on the … Read more
Our tagline here at Sewer Mutant: “excavating comics that you can’t find anywhere else.” But there actually is another place to find a lot of the same comics I cover: a zine called Strangers: A Celebration of the Forgotten and Overlooked, which could also serve as the tagline for Sewer Mutant. Strangers has featured interviews … Read more
Tim Vigil’s first project for Comics Express was Omega, a sci-fi series co-created with inker Paul Martin. Omega was a big departure from Grips. Vigil tapped into his love of Jack Kirby and Fantastic Four to produce cosmic psychedelia complete with “Kirby Crackle.” The story is the tale of a hiker who stumbles upon a … Read more
Tim Vigil cleaved his way into public consciousness with Grips # 1 in the fall of 1986, around the same time as Watchmen # 1. The artist announced his arrival with a double splash page — aggravatingly split into two frames — highlighting what has become the hallmarks of his work: sex and violence. In that spread, vigilante protagonist … Read more
Bill W. Miller Promises More Jontar as Bib Fortuna Actor and Other Celebs Induct Cartoonists Into the First Power Comics Hall of Fame Before Sewer Mutant, before Cartoonist Kayfabe, there was Power Comics. For nearly a decade the Power Comics crew has been excavating and documenting the diamonds they find in the dollar bin rough, … Read more
For this month’s trash barrel fireside chat, I interviewed Nicholas Bunch and MechanicalPencilGirl, two of the people behind my favorite current comic: Reptile House Comix. Reptile House is a collective of Philadelphia-based comics creators. Every issue of their zine-format anthology is chock-full of lowbrow comics, art, and gags by creators like Tia Roxae, ShittyStyle, Cum … Read more
It had to happen! Sewer Mutant now has a podcast! You can listen to it on YouTube above, or subscribe to the feed. You can also find it on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and a bunch of other places. For our inaugural trash barrel fireside chat, I talk with Barbatus and Meanboss, the artists … Read more
EC only published horror comics from around 1950 until 1955. But that was long enough to warp a new generation of cartoonists. A decade after the Comics Code Authority defanged newsstand comic books, Underground Comix . “I always saw the underground comix movement as a sort of extension of the ECs,” S. Clay Wilson told … Read more
Continuity Studios. The Studio. Homage Studios. Extreme Studios. Gaijin Studios. These are near-legendary agglomerations of talent that comics fans will remember forever. The short-lived Homegrown Studios should have been on that list, if only they’d gotten more of a chance to show off their work before the mid-90s comics market crash. They published a small … Read more