As the Harper family has always said going back to my great great great Grandpappy Elias Harper, when in doubt, the tie goes to Zdarsky Comic News. So, in this week’s edition of Comics Disassembled, I wrote about ten things I liked or didn’t like from the week of comics, led by the resurrection of a great (for an extremely limited time).

Zdarsky Comic News, Getting Collected

Big news for folks who love glorious things: Zdarsky Comic News is being collected! Perfectly titled “Zdarsky Comic News: Eighteen Months I Can’t Get Back,” this tome takes readers into Chip Zdarsky’s year and a half long path into madness (aka being a comics journalist) in his monthly free comics magazine that featured interviews with top creators, unique infographics, elite portraiture of notable folks, recommendations, and a whole lot of other fun things.

I’d say I’m a top tier ZCN fan — I have all the issues still, none of which are CGC graded, but trust me when I say they’re all 9.8 — so, needless to say, I wholeheartedly recommend this new release even though it’s apparently not free. It couldn’t be, as this is, like the rest of ZCN, a self-published release that’s going to cost a lot more to produce than the original monthly version. But Zdarsky Comic News was Eisner Award-nominated for a reason, as ZCN is both a fun look inside the world of comics and Zdarsky’s mind, one that is worth a read even with significant separation from the projects each issue was promoting. Or, “promoting,” really. Chip was having a good time with his pals more than doing the typical dog and pony show, something that fully comes across in each entry. Plus: You know it’s going to look good.

This is only being printed once, and it’s exclusive to comic shops. If you like good things and supporting comic shops and poor, poor Canadian cartoonists, than this book is for you. I’ll be getting it, if only because that means I can now CGC my ZCN issues so I can sell them and become filthy rich. Thanks Chip!

DSTLRY, Back Already!

In what felt like the world’s shortest hiatus, DSTLRY — the comic publisher from Chip Mosher and David Steinberger — went from announcing a break in publishing where they tried to sort out everything they had going on at the end of January to revealing this week that the hiatus? It’s over. DSTLRY? It’s so back! Making it even better, I was just chatting with someone who was wondering if the publisher would actually return at all as the news hit, as if the crew over there had a sense of this conversation and wanted to wholeheartedly insist, no, no, the reports of our death are greatly exaggerated.

And this isn’t vaporware, either. It’s not a promise of a return with nothing to show for it. The comics that were announced as being on hiatus are all back on the schedule, with my two most desired reads in White House Robot Romance #3 and A Mischief of Magpies #1 being included in their number (the former arrives on June 24th and the latter hits on July 15th). But because all orders had to be canceled, everyone’s going to have to go back and do their ordering once again, and by that, I mean quite possibly both retailers and readers. If you’re interested in these books, you may need to let your shop know you want them once again. But hey, welcome back to DSTLRY, and congrats to the creators who I’m sure are eager to see their comics in stores.