Quick Catch-up:

The Social Network: (A) It's directed like a thriller, but no one dies. It's got some very funny bits, but it's not a comedy. You got your Fincher in my Sorkin. Whoda thunk it?

True Grit: (B) Solid remake of the John Wayne classic. Not a major Coen Brothers film, but I'll take what I can get.

Tron Legacy: (D) Well, the soundtrack was nice...

Running Wilde: (C-) Methadone for Arrested Development junkies. Well, if there's any justice, we'll see Peter Sarafinowitz in something else soon.

Despicable Me: (C) Loved the character design, thought the story was too, well, contrived. (Woulda been nice to see an actual super-hero to offset the villains.)

Drunk, Stoned, Brilliant, Dead: The Writers and Artists who Made the National Lampoon Insanely Great by Rick Meyerowitz. (B) At this point, I've got enough 'NatLamp' memoirs to last me a lifetime, and I'm hoping this is the last one that a contributor puts out.

Acme Cartoon Library 20: Lint: (C) The main character-not protagonist-in Chris Ware's latest comic is one of Rusty Brown's tormentors in school. It's a biography for the type of person who doesn't usually get a biography, and in retrospect, there's a good reason for that. Ware portrays Jason Lint as the type of lower-level alpha male who goes through life with an inflated sense of entitlement, whom, given his social class, has most of his entitlements fulfilled. When someone like Ware makes something like this, it comes across as an act of literary revenge, not unlike 'Revolutionary Road', where the protagonists suffer not because of the elements of Classic Tragedy, but because someone like Lint gave Ware a wedgie in gym class. Because Lint doesn't have any capacity for self-reflection, the reader doesn't have any ability to empathize with him.

Between this comic and Dan Clowes' 'Wilson', maybe a new trend in 'alt-cartooning' is coming. By which I mean the Rise of the Unlikeable Lead Character. I'm on record as being a Chris Ware fan myself, but I can see why a lot of cartoonists really find his work a turn-off.


Finally, might I recommend you stop by this website and check out my pal Steve LeCouilliard's web-comic, 'Much the Miller's Son'? It's a funny bit of ribaldry in the classic model of a French comic from the 70's. (Well, that's the best comparison I've got for now.) And he just got a much-coveted Xeric grant, too! Jolly Hockeysticks for Steve! (Best part: there's no video game references, role-playing game references, gay furries, tormented goth kids or Mary Sue characters to be seen! A true mark of a potentially great web comic!)