Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Dan Gordon Comics Reprints in The Comics Journal #291

A number of months ago, after posting a bunch of Dan Gordon comic stories on the CartoonSNAP blog, I got an email from Michael Dean, the editor of The Comics Journal. He asked to borrow some Dan Gordon comic books so they could scan them and run the color pages in an upcoming issue of the magazine.

ACG Comics images © Roger Broughton 2009
cartoon dog, rabbit, owl, cat and horse in this comic drawing by animator Dan Gordon
Of course I said YES because I would love to have a part in helping comics readers discover the unbridled joy of the comic art of journeyman cartoonist and animator, Dan Gordon
The Comics Journal made super-high-resolution scans of Cookie and Funny Films for inclusion in their full-color comic-reprint section. I can't wait to see what it looks like. They even asked me to write an introductory article for the section -- only problem with that was I didn't really know that much about Dan Gordon's life. So I put out a call for help!

Cookie Comics by Dan Gordon -- Cookie, Jitterbuck and Angelpuss have a picnic at the beach

 ACG Comics images © Roger Broughton 2009
Fortunately, there are a lot of cool cartoonists and comics-aficionados who were more than eager to help me fill in the gaps. Thanks to: Mike Kazaleh, Kent Butterworth, Scott Shaw, Leonard Maltin, Mark Kausler, and Milton Knight, who were all very generous with their time and knowledge.
Of course, any shortcomings that may be in the article are mine, but there's no doubt that the big Dan Gordon comics section will look fantastic!

The Comics Journal #291 comes out TODAY... Wednesday July 16th, so If you'd like to have some full-color Dan Gordon comic book reprints on real paper (rather than reading them on your computer screen), make sure to pick up issue #291 of The Comics Journal at your local comics shop, bookstore or Amazon.com.


Update:

I just looked through the finished printed copies of the book on the stands at my local comics shop, Burbank's awesome House of Secrets. Bottom line: Fantagraphics did a great job with the reproduction and printing. The comics look sharp and clear, but still retain that "old comics" yellowed-page look.
There are 32 full-color pages which include a Cookie story, two funny animal comedy comics starring Puss and Boots from ACG's Funny Films, and one story of the rabbit inventor, Blunderbunny!