Shannon Smith's Insatiable Hype Machine

Brush & Pen reviewed by The Dollar Bin.

2011-05-19T21:42:00.000-07:00

Adam and Shawn of The Dollar Bin say nice things about Shannon Smith and his comics in their review podcast of Fluke 2011. Toward the end of the podcast Shawn gives a very nice review of Brush & Pen.

2011 Appearances. Fluke, HeroesCon and SPX.

2011-04-12T12:01:00.000-07:00

Ah, can you smell the comics in the air? That's right true believers, it's convention season again. Shannon Smith and the File Under Other Experience are packing up the tour bus and getting ready to bring the finest in hand crafted comics to a town near you.

The first stop will be on April 23rd in Athens GA for the Fluke Mini-Comics and Zine Festival. This is Fluke's 10th anniversary. A lot of my most favorite people will be there. You should too.

The next stop on the non-denominational mystery tour will be on Indie Island at HeroesCon in Charlotte NC June 3rd, 4th and 5th. HeroesCon has it all. Legends, current fan favorites, indie stars, mainstream stars, dealers, t-shirts, nerd/hipster paraphernalia and me. It's the second happiest place on Earth.

The last stop scheduled on the tour (so far) is the Small Press Expo in Bethesda MD September 10 and 11. I've been wanting to go to SPX for about eight years and this year I'm finally going to pull it off. The tables were booked up right after they were announced but I got to work early this year and landed a spot before they were gone. This will be a new deal for me so I'm super excited.

Isn't that exciting!!!!!!!

I plan on having new comics for sale at each stop. I'm working on a lot of different things but I'm going to break some of it up into little mincomics for Fluke and Heroes and then finally release everything in my nice thick "complete" collection at SPX. (Maybe a sneak peak by Heroes if you say your prayers at night.) And I'll be glad to sketch for you and all that fun stuff. I'm there for you folks. I'm there for you.

And for comics creators that would like to see their stuff reviewed at file under other (and/or some other places I may be reviewing stuff) there is no better way than to get me your comics than handing them to me at a show. I'm way super very much behind on reviews but I seem to get to the stuff in my convention round up posts faster.

So yeah, you should totally come and see me at all of those shows. I'll update more what I'll be bringing to each show as we closer to the dates.

See ya there suckers!

Your best pal ever,

Shannon Smith

Shannon Smith publishes, edits and contributes comics to Shiot Crock 16.

2010-09-22T12:28:00.000-07:00

Earlier this year Shannon Smith published, edited and contributed comics to the sixteenth edition of the Shiot Crock anthology. You can find out more about the book here. You can purchase the book here. What follows is a sampling of comments from other contributors regarding Shannon's work on the book.

Barry Rodges: The Last Days of Analog: I’ve always liked your stories, and the art is real and simple. By that I mean, you don’t seem to be trying to make your work seem showy or pretentious. It seems like you just sit down and start drawing and this is the final product. I like that. That being said, it seems like the first page of this strip was done at a different time than the rest of it. With the addition of backgrounds in all the panels, this page seems more complete than the pages that follow. The first page reminds me of the straight-forward comics of Joe Chiapetta. The rest of it gives me a kind of “web comic” feel. Not, bad, just not measuring up to the first page.
The Nouveau Poore: Funny. Being from the south, I always find southern accents written out both hilarious and peculiar. And there ain’t much better than the panel with the cat pulling the guy in the wheelbarrow while smoking a pipe.
That Jimmy Hendrix Biblical Thing: Nice art. I wish all your stuff had this much care put into it. So you don’t draw perfect? So what? I like the effort put into this. The different “camera” angles, the layout of the panels, all nice stuff.

Sean Robinson: Of all your stories, I liked the Last Days of Analog best, both visually and story-wise. I especially like the horse-hustler and the impossibility in beating him- I certainly had friends that were unstoppable in any competition when there was something for them to gain. It's also the story of yours that relies the most on gray tones instead of cross hatching, and that serves your very loose figure drawings better than the cross hatching, IMHO.

Mark Campos: There are those Spaghetti Junktion Kids again. Good to have this story in good repro. The other two pieces are fine and funny, I like that O-possum.

John Platt: Holy crap, I love that last line. Delightfully weird.

Lupi: Last Days of Analog - great story. I think the best thing about the artwork here is the swoopy poses. It reminds me of those old cartoons where the animators used a lot of curvy lines and creative movements to tell stories.

Nouveau Poore - The kid in the barrel made me LOL, especially the very last line.

Hendrix - Obviously a lot of work went into this one. I like attention to form and texture. Nice work.

Addicted to Distraction #1 reviewed at Poopsheet.

2009-06-24T10:50:00.000-07:00

Poopsheet Foundation
Review by R. Krauss

If you read Shannon Smith's small press comic reviews on his blog File Under Other, it isn't long before you're struck with the notion he must be a pretty nice guy. The image is only reinforced through his latest mini comic.

The book is a collection of several different projects, so while there's no overall theme, the pieces still work together and provide a varied reading experience.

Laughing Sam's Dice is Smith's contribution to a chain story created for Narrative Corpse #2. It's only a segment, but it's fun to watch as Jimi Hendrix guides the unnamed main character (Laughing Sam perhaps?) through Electric Lady Land.

In a World of Savages presents a few pages of auto-bio comic strips in which Smith highlights real or imagined slices of life.

Smith turned Superbowl Sunday into Hourly Comic Day on February 1st cranking out over a dozen comics and gags to celebrate his team's participation and eventual win that day.

Inspired by the drawings fans can pick up from cartoonists at conventions, Smith created Mailcon, a project that extends the concept—without the convention. Just send him a drawing request along with an SASE and he'll send you a drawing. Distraction concludes with a nice sampling of drawings from Mailcon.

The cartooning in Distraction ranges from sketchy (Hourly Comic Day) to polished (Mailcon). Either way, they're full of energy and humor. I enjoyed Smith's writing too. His stories and gags are playful and warm-hearted with an occasional sarcastic aside.

Shannon Smith is Addicted to Distraction is 40 b&w pages, plus color cover. 7" x 8.5", handmade with saddle-stitch binding. It's available for $4 from his website (along with Mailcon directions). Mature readers.

Addicted to Distraction # reviewed at High-Low

2009-06-03T07:07:00.000-07:00

High-Low

by Rob Clough

ADDICTED TO DISTRACTION, by Shannon Smith. The best word to describe this mini is "pleasant". Smith is an amiable fellow with a loving family who enjoys relating anecdotes about his life and the world of comics. The "In A World of Savages" strips are my favorite in the book, as Smith employs a pleasingly shabby line to relate stories about his daughter, his obsession with the Comics Journal, and his status as a cartoonist vs being a musician. The bulk of the issue is devoted to his Super Bowl Sunday drawing experiment, where he drew a page once an hour describing his day. His line here is extremely crude for obvious reasons, but his gentle, self-effacing humor shines through on every page. Smith works the angle of being a laid-back, toy-loving guy in a house filled with women & girls quite nicely, especially in the way he lets his children dictate the pace and nature of their play. A different strip where a character encounters a lyrics-spouting Jimi Hendrix felt more like an exercise than a real story, and his more heavily-labored art doesn't add much clarity. On the other hand, the pages of illustrations in the back were often funny (Lucy Van Pelt haranguing Judge Dredd?) and weirdly enthusiastic (like several pages hyping up Virginia Tech in the ACC football championships). All told, this wasn't an earth-shattering collection of stories, but it was one without any pretenses of such.

Addicted to Distraction #1 reviewed at Optical Sloth

2009-05-16T09:53:00.000-07:00

Optical Sloth

Shannon Smith is Addicted to Distraction

Generally speaking I’m against throwing your own name in your comic title, but if you’re going to go all the way like Shannon did and also picture yourself bursting through the cover, I say more power to the man. This is a collection of odds and ends, so naturally some pieces are going to better than others. Things start off slow with a baffling story of a man who runs into an all-powerful Jimmy Hendrix and gets taken to heaven with a bunch of naked ladies who preach nothing but love. Oddly, the guy can’t wait to get out of there, but seems to have gotten something from the whole experience. Then there a few one page autobio pieces, at least a couple of which I’ve already seen in his other minis, but the piece sampled below was new to me and nicely reflects the struggle to ever find a copy of The Comic’s Journal. The heart of the book is up next, and 24 hour comics folk take note: Shannon has blasted you all out of the water. He decided to do a one page comic every hour of Super Bowl Sunday, starting at 8am and ending around midnight. It’s especially impressive because the guy is a Steeler’s fan and he still took time out of the day to make a comic. Granted, the art is about as simple as you can get, and I got a lot more out of reading this hourly strip that I just about ever have by reading most daily diary comics. The hourly format really gave him time to dig into the small details. There’s waking up, dealing with a nagging headache, cleaning up cat puke, picking up toys for his kids, making unhealthy food for the big day, playing with toys with his kids, and finally watching the game. If that sounds like too much detail for you, you’re clearly not a fan of autobio. You can’t get much more “day in the life” than this. Finally there’s a pile of sketches in the back of the comic, mostly stuff he’s sent to people who’ve mailed in over the years. I particularly enjoyed Ant Man fighting an ant over a twinkie, but maybe Wonder Woman using her lasso the make the Invisible confess her true love would be more your thing. It’s a pretty nice pile of comic any way you look at it, and well worth checking out. It’s $4, and if that’s too rich for your blood at the moment there are always all the cheap, cheap minis listed below this to convince you. $4

Shannon Smith is Addicted to Distraciton #1 can be purchased here.

A-Symmetrical O-Possum reviewed at Optical Sloth.

2009-04-22T07:01:00.000-07:00

Optical Sloth

"I’m going to need to develop a new format specifically for Shannon’s books. A cover sample and one sample from inside the comic is fine for most things, but when the comic is only four pages long it almost feels like stealing. This is the story of an opossum who was born with eyes and ears of different sizes. Naturally, this causes resentment and anger in the locals, who immediately try to kill the poor thing. This leads to an elaborate revenge plan from the opossum, and yes this is a lot to pack into such a tiny comic, especially when you consider that the cover is one of the four pages. Shannon also manages to find the time to make fun of Republicans (or morons of all stripes, it depends on your perspective) and make a moral point or two. Good clean fun, probably not more than $.50, and, for whatever it’s worth, it’s a 12 hour comic."

A-Symmetrical O-Possum can be purchased here.

Video interview with ARC TV.

2008-11-27T05:43:00.000-08:00

From July 2008.

Small Bible in Shiot Crock 14

2008-11-19T08:18:00.000-08:00

A re-formated version of Shannon's minicomic Small Bible is featured in the latest Shiot Crock. Small Bible can be purchased here.

Here is a look at what some of the other Shiot Crock contributors had to say about Shannon's comic.

"Good stuff all around. Pages 4 and 5 are top-notch. Well drawn, well lettered, well composed, and interesting to look at. Excellent." -eric

"Great stuff. Your art is the best I’ve seen from you. This seems to be a project you care a lot about. As a Christian, I’m glad to see you taking the Bible and it’s message seriously and do it some justice. I enjoy your lack of cynicism." -Barry Rodges

"I read it all. Promised Mom I’d go to church this week ---- Done! Thought you did a great job capturing the time period in your art. Lots of detail. Did you draw these for anything in particular? Weren’t you afraid the Crock would explode into flames with this inside?" -Karen Lucas

"I like the use of tones, etc. That flying faceless character is very evocative." -David Robertson

"I've looked it over, brilliant drawings and compositions, but I'm suspending reading the thing until I can get a bible and cross reference these stories." - M. Campos

"The art is the best S.S. I've ever seen. Those cute little family comics never prepared me for this." -Klopner

Shannon Smith comics in Candy or Medicine 5.

2008-11-03T07:14:00.000-08:00

I have two pages in the latest Candy or Medicine on sale now. You can buy it over at the Candy or Medicine site. I've got my copy already and it is a great little mini for just one buck. Go buy it now. It's cheap!

Occasional Superheroine reads Shannon's mincomics.

2008-09-29T11:19:00.000-07:00

Valerie D'Orazio has posted some nice comments about my minicomics. Valerie said, "What I think is so important about books like yours is that they *are* real. They come from a real place. And as such, they have more of the ability to touch other people's lives than a whole stack of the latest offerings from the Diamond catalog." You can read the rest of the note at Occasional Superheroine. Thanks Val!

Here is the complete letter:

Hi Shannon,

Thanks so much for dropping me this note; your words are encouraging, and give me a lot to think about.

I wanted to also apologize for taking so long to sit down an read your mini-comics until now. I appreciated very much the fact that you took the time to send them to me. To be frank, the last several months -- oh heck, I would say ever since MoCCA Art Fest in the Spring -- have been really really crazy for me. I put too much on my plate, and I also was developing concerns and questions regarding my blog and my role in comics.

I had seen hostility to my blog radically increase -- though I still had a lot of readers and fans. But the hostility got to the point where I was receiving not only death threats but had people I hardly knew obsessively follow my blog and tear it apart on a regular basis on other forums. It got really tired, and took up too much of my time. Coupled with that was an increasing pressure to be more mainstream, to "network," to angle myself in a certain way. Marvel never asked me to do that, for which I am grateful. But the pressure was there from certain places, including simply myself.

And I just burned out from all of it.

I believe life is short -- even if you are relatively long-lived, life is still short. All we really have is our integrity, and our ability to touch other people's lives for the better. We touch other people's lives by being true. We can never touch lives by being fake, or using false sentiment. The problem I have with some mainstream comics is that the writers are either just mechanically providing want the readers want (or editorial dictate demands), or they are so overworked that even with the very best of intentions, some of their books by necessity get phoned in. What gets produced are books that don't make people think, that simply retread the same tropes over and over again.

What I think is so important about books like yours is that they *are* real. They come from a real place. And as such, they have more of the ability to touch other people's lives than a whole stack of the latest offerings from the Diamond catalog.

To an extent, I think the comic companies realize this whole thing about *realness*. They want to achieve again that rawness that Frank Miller had on Daredevil and Alan Moore had on Watchmen. But look what happened to these two artists, after 25+ years in this industry. They both ended up hating passionately mainstream comics. One continued to take their paychecks and piss all over their properties in spite, and one retreated in disgust. I think both endings are sad. I don't think they were necessary, but I understand where they came from.

It's only realness that will redeem and prolong this industry. Yes, the backlist provided by Miller and Moore is lucrative. But what are the new classics -- you know, *real* classics, not the "instant" classics that are proclaimed from comic book covers. "The Dark Knight," to an extent, was *real*. But the inevitable clones of "Dark Knight," both in the movies and on the comic stands, will probably not be. Will we see the stands clogged with this sort of stuff? Will this be another situation like in the 1990s, where there was so much prefab soulless stuff?

That's why it's important that you continue to create your comics. Not just for your own satisfaction and well-being, but because without that spark that comic creators like you provide -- hundreds of you, from your homes, from the hearth of your own deepest creative intentions -- this industry would become inbred, banal, and ultimately irrelevant.

Again, thanks so much for reading the blog, and for sending me the mini-comics. I read all of them during lunch, and enjoyed them very much

Best,
Val

Interviewed for ARC TV

2008-07-30T06:21:00.000-07:00

I did a creator meet and greet at Cavalier Comics on July 19th and the fine chaps from ARC TV interviewed me. Apparently this interview will be shown using an ancient technological device known as a "television". Rumor has it, that if you live in southwestern Virgina and have one of these "televisions", you will be able to tune it to "channel 16" (What is a "channel"? Beats me. Google it.) and see me in all my nerdtacular glory. That's right folks! ARC TV, channel 16, Wed. 7/30 at 2:30 and 8:30 PM and Thurs. 7/31 at 10:30 PM. I have not seen it but if I remember correctly, they asked me some questions about comics or something. Tune in kids!

Comic Book Haters Indie Spotlight Video Podcast

2008-07-30T06:17:00.000-07:00

Comic Book Haters Indie Spotlight: Shannon Smith from The Comic Book Haters on Vimeo.

Guesting on Indie Island at HeroesCon June 20-22.

2008-05-28T07:37:00.000-07:00

From the Heroes blog.

Also new to the Indie Island list is mini-comicker and blogger Shannon Smith. While he might not be an editor at a big-time New York magazine, he's no less loved--Shannon has been a big supporter (and attendee!) of HeroesCon for years, and we're super-jazzed to be welcoming him to his first HeroesCon as a guest! Besides reviewing comics under his many blogs, including File Under Other, Shannon is also the man behind mini-comics including Small Bible, Brush & Pen, and Phillip Henry!

Shannon Smith will be a guest on Indie Island at HeroesCon June 20-22.

Small Bible Reviewed by Sequart.

2008-05-04T09:36:00.000-07:00

By Rob Clough at Sequart:

This is a clever mini that's about points of view and description. Taking key portions of the Old Testament, Smith quotes extensively from Stephen's Defense in the Book of Acts, then quotes the original scripture, then provides an illustration--all in just 9 pages. It's a clever comic that's both a straightforward depiction of an event, and a commentary as an interpretation of an interpretation of an event that may or may not have happened--but has enormous importance. Joann Sfar's Rabbi character in THE RABBI'S CAT described Judaism as different from Western (Hegelian) thought, which is thesis, antithesis, synthesis. The history of Jewish thought, he explained, is thesis, antithesis, antithesis, antithesis, and so on. This mini is another step in the argument, providing a visual interpretation of the events that is action-oriented on nearly every page. An angel dramatically swoops in to prevent Abraham from sacrificing Isaac; Moses gets a magic glowing staff from god that cures snake bites; various epic battles are fought. Smith gets across the quite visceral experience of reading the Old Testament, a tact that is quite different from the purposes of either Stephen or the original Torah. It's quite a clever little project.

Small Bible is on sale here.

Small Bible reviewed by Optical Sloth

2008-04-20T19:20:00.000-07:00

By Whitey at Optical Sloth:

Who needs to read all 920 clunky pages of the Old Testament when you could just go and read 9 pages of highly condensed mini comic? As someone who had the bright idea to read the Bible over the last summer I really wasn't sure what to expect here, but Shannon does manage to nail the high points. A brief synopsis of the relevant passage, a quote and an image later and you get the idea of things. Best of all there's no axe to grind here, no moral viewpoint he's pushing, just good old Bible stories. Bits in here include Joseph (you know, the guy with the technicolor dreamcoat), Moses trying to convince people of his veracity, and God being a general dick to his followers who doubted even a little bit, which seemed to happen a lot back then. Oh, and there's also the bit about the ass, but I don't want to spoil it. It's a fun comic for everybody, nothing to offend the overly religious types and it's pretty informative for the rest of us pagans.

Small Bible on sale here.

Profiled at the Small Press League

2008-03-31T07:56:00.000-07:00

The Small Press Leauge.

Member Profile: Shannon Smith
January 12, 2008

You can find Shannon Smith at shannonsmith.net, where you’ll find links to his artwork, minicomics, web comics and his minicomics review site, File Under “Other”. A collection of his minicomics, Sleepwalker, is due out this Spring.

What attracts you to comics as an art form? I love the purity and freedom of it. Comics can be as beautiful or wretched as any other visual art, but its ability to communicate is stronger than any form of expression I can think of. One might argue that film can do more than comics, but one person can’t just sit down and make a movie in an afternoon. I can write, draw, print and distribute a comic in a day. From the reader’s point of view, comics are also much more personal than other mediums. The reader controls the pace and time. It’s up to the reader to decide what is going on between panels. The creator can try to force their intention on the reader, but each reader will read each comic in their own way. It is much more interpretive in that way than a film can be. Comics are also closer to how our minds work. The way we perceive the world is all relative to our mind’s warehouse of memories. We remember things in random, loosely connected images. Just like comics.

What is appealing/satisfying to you about self-publishing? Once again I’ll say freedom. Also the immediacy of if. I don’t need an editor or publisher to make a comic. I can just make it. These are exciting times to make comics. With web comics and online print-on-demand companies, the only obstacle I see as a creator trying to reach an audience is my own lack of time and skill. Even just making mini-comics, I can distribute them through the web and small conventions. I also meet a lot of nice people along the way. Plus, I just like making them. I like the printing and folding and stapling, etc. Making books is fun.

How would you define success as an artist, and have you achieved it? I look at each project as its own entity. My idea of success for each project is simply that the finished project that the reader holds in their hands (or reads online) is true to the original spark of inspiration. If I’ve brought the thing to life successfully, then I’m happy with it. I’ve achieved that a few times. My mini Brush and Pen came out exactly as I imagined it. Some of my three paged foldys have come out as planned. As far as success as an artist? Like a career or something? Just to have the time, tools and skills to tell the stories I want to tell and an audience to enjoy them. I guess most folks would say that to make any kind of living at it would be great. That would be nice.

What artists have inspired you the most? As a guitarist, it’s easy to see my influences as the people I sat down and learned to imitate. As a cartoonist, I would have to go all the way back to being a kid copying coloring books, Sunday funnies, and the Marvel, DC and Charlton comics of the 70’s and 80’s. I could name a hundred names from those days and they would probably be the same guys most people my age would name. The Chaykin and Infantino Star Wars comics were a big influence on me. When I was a kid, I had this one cartooning book that must have been printed in the 40’s or 50’s, because it had all these caricature instructions on how to draw people like Eisenhower and Roosevelt and the old Hollywood Stars. I probably don’t draw much differently today than I did when I was imitating that book. Since I started making comics again as an adult, I’ve been inspired by folks like R. Crumb, Julie Doucet, Paul Pope, David Mack, Gilbert Hernandez, Harvey Pekar, Chester Brown, David B., Daniel Clowes and Chris Ware… I could go on and on. The usual suspects. I came upon alternative comics pretty late in the game, so I’m still consuming the stuff as fast as I can. Just everything I guess. Whenever I’m stumped or need a spark, I often go back to my box of Archie comics and look to Dan DeCarlo for inspiration. At lot of my inspiration to make comics — or at least to make better comics — comes from reading stuff from people I know, like Brad McGinty and Josh Latta.

What artists do you most see being “the next big thing?” Speaking of… Brad McGinty and Josh Latta. Both are super smart and talented and just plain make good comics. Both are probably just one nice fat collection of comics away from getting a lot of notice and respect. Same with J. Chris Campbell. Josh Simmons is one of comics’ best kept secrets. His mini comic Jessica Farm is one of the best minis I’ve ever read. I saw that Fantagraphics will be publishing it this year. Drew Weing, Eleanor Davis, Patrick Dean… lots of great folks making comics in the south. I could go on and on.

What do you see as the most common theme in your work? My work so far has been pretty minimal. I have three or four longer projects I’ve been working on for years that have some strong themes, but as far as the comics I’ve actually finished and printed — it’s kind of all over the place. I wouldn’t call it a theme, but I’m very interested in the idea that almost everyone is an emotional mess when you get right down to it. I guess I’m interested in weirdos. They seem to be interested in me. I also find stereotypes and clichés interesting. At lot of my dialog is 100% cliché but people really do talk that way. I find it fascinating how people are completely comfortable falling into the mold of a stereotype and speaking in the same clichés they hear from their friends or on TV. I find it hilarious. We are all silly little animals with the same silly little animal problems. I’m fascinated by the economy and effectiveness of old TV sitcoms. Again, not a theme but I like playing with that formula.

What project(s) are you working on currently that we can expect to see next? I have a full-time job, I’m a full-time daddy and husband, and at the moment I’m a full time college student. I’m working on collecting all my mini comics into one book by the spring. It will be called Sleepwalker. I’m about a third of the way through with a mini comic called The Lucas Code. It is written by my friend Paul McDonald. It’s part satire and part philosophy primer disguised as a Star Wars/DiVinci Code parody. I’ve been working on a series of small three-paged foldy comics, and I’ll continue to do that as long as I have ideas for them. I also have a web comic I’m working on called The Next War but I won’t start posting until I have several months of strips in the bank. Maybe in the spring. Behind the scenes, in top secret, I’m doing my real work on some longer more ambitions graphic novels. Everything else up to this point has just been practice. I doubt any of the three projects see print before 2009, but I hope to start posting some art soon. Like pre-production teaser stills. The book I will most likely finish first is called It’s Never Easy But Sometimes It’s Hard. It’s about a vegetarian lion who wants to be a farmer but has to go to war against a Wolf Dragon, or… It’s about an alcoholic surgeon who wants to write children’s books but has to go to war against boogeymen and demons, or… It’s about a girl who wants to have a tea party but has to go to war…

The Awesome Possum in Shiot Crock 12 Version 2

2008-03-26T13:15:00.000-07:00

From the Shiot Crock 12 Version 2 Review Thread: My submission was A-Symmetrical O-Possum.

"My favorite. I love how you cram in as much pop culture/comics references as you can. This is just plain fun. Acme Novelty Soduko. Brilliant. What do you ink with? I’d try something else, and slow down. Reading this, I get the feeling that you are so into drawing and writing this that you let small things like the art go to the wayside. This is good, but it could be great!"

Three one pagers in Shiot Crock 13.

2007-12-19T08:43:00.000-08:00

Here are some comments on my three pages in Shiot Crock 13 from the reveiw thread.

"I can relate --Nice pages, Shannon. "

"So YOU killed rock-n-rol! These strips are great. I think the only stuff I've seen from you is your Crock 11 submission, and this is very different. I'd like to see them in color. And I have to be somewhat of a hypocrite here. I know in Hunter's review, I said I didn't like auto bio, but I have to admit that if it is kept in this short and sweet format, I could grow to like it. It's funny you reference Kochalka's work in the last one. I hate auto bio, but I buy everything he does. I really love his art style, but in his diary strips, it is the format that keeps me interested. These strips are like them in the fact that they know where to start, and where to end. They are perfectly paced and funny. Good job. "

"Nice Shannon, again another great indy set. I especially like Daddy Don't Know Nothin'. I think it would be a very nice regular strip, in print or on the web."

"No comments other than I liked this material plenty. "

A-Symmetrical O-Possum in Shiot Crock 12

2007-03-01T11:09:00.000-08:00

Here are some comments from the review thread for the Shiot Crock 12 project. My submission was A-Symmetrical O-Possum.

"Fantastic. Don't write off the low quality production as being related to the story. Funny, inane, semi-relevant. "

"This was thought provoking. That fact that it’s a 12-hour comic made it fun on its own, but add to it the edginess – socially unacceptable, politically incorrect and (usually) nonovert (okay that’s not a word, but that’s what I’m sticking with) ways of getting even….funny as shit…but sad. Got ya goin’ – made ya pissed. Whatever. I liked it. Funny as shit…now I’m just being redundant. "

"Retarded, but funny."

"Quite awesome."

Phillip Henry 1 Reviewed by Optical Sloth

2006-09-16T04:54:00.000-07:00

Optical Sloth
Reviewed by Whitey
Phillip Henry Foldy #1 (a.k.a. 25 cent Funny)
It's the origin story of Phillip! Oops, looks like I read the two shorties (this one is 4 pages as well) out of order. This is the story of how exactly Phillip came to leave Shannon's school in the third grade and, oddly enough, this one also deals a bit with boobs. It also makes me wonder a whole bunch about who Phillip grew up to be, assuming, as always, that he's a real person and not just a construct for the story. Either way, he's a great character. This goes into (brief) detail about Phillip going cuckoo bananas to try to fit in, or possibly just to get by. We learn that Phillip was a Wonder Woman fanatic, and there's no way in the world I'm ruining the punchline to this one. Again, what's not to like about a funny 25 cent comic?

Reviewed by Sequart

2006-08-30T15:00:00.000-07:00

Sequart
Reviewed by Rob Clough
There's a bunch of micro-minis in this batch, with several 4-page minis detailing a wild schoolboy from Smith's childhood and a vengeful possum. One of them was a 12-hour comic and they all have a tossed-off, disposable feel to them. A more substantive entry is BRUSH AND PEN, a stylish mini that pins its effectiveness on how Smith portrays its characters. The main character is an anthropomorphic pen named Clicky and it concerns his travails with his wife, a beautiful but "high-maintenance" brush. The story leads up to the two of them having the writing implement version of having sex: dipping into an inkwell and drawing on fresh sheets of paper. There's a great panel where Brush dips her head into the ink and flings her head back, ink spraying everywhere. It's a genuinely sensuous image that leads to a clever sequence where the two characters express their passion on the page, with the accumulated ink leading to a blackout (quite literally). Smith's playful figures remind me a bit of Steve Lafler's work. This mini had modest ambitions but fulfilled them admirably, and I'm curious to see what else Smith can do.

Phillip 1 & 2 Reviewed by Comicreaders

2006-07-17T07:02:00.000-07:00

Comicreaders
Reviewed by Chad Boudreau
Shannon Smith sent us two four-page shorteys featuring a kid named Philip. He's one of those odd kids from the elementary schoolyard. You know the kind of kid I'm talking about. Every school has at least one or two. The paste eater, the kid who likes to be naked, the kid who had to wear a helmet to school, you know, the real oddest duck in the pond. That's the kind of kid Phillip was. He liked to staple his own fingers, he liked lewd limericks, he liked to sneak into the girls' bathroom, and he loved Linda Carter / Wonder Woman. It was the latter, Shannon Smith reminisces in this biographical tale, which caused Philip to latch his little 6th grader hands on to the bosom of his black haired, curvaceous teacher.
These two little mini comics are plainly drawn and heavy in text, but enjoyable nonetheless, if only for the fact it will turn your mind to memories of the strange kids that populated your own schoolyard.

Brush and Pen reviewed by Breakdowns

2006-07-03T05:39:00.000-07:00

Breakdowns.
Reviewed by Christopher Allen.
Brush and Pen by Shannon Smith is a minicomic about Click the Ballpoint Pen and his wife, an unnamed brush. We see Clicky bemoan his short life, financial pressures and other woes to his philandering buddy Q, the Quill Pen. He gets home and the wife gives him a hard time, taking out her cabin fever on him. Smith has a very modest story to tell here, but it is a story, and though he doesn’t do a very good job of making this world seem real (pens work as they work for us in our world, but somehow they also live in a city, have homes, bills, etc., his dialogue is pretty amusing once the double-entendres start coming—something I can appreciate. This leads logically, yet still surprisingly, to a classy but impassioned love scene for the couple. It’s silly but romantic and bound to make you smile. One problem, though—drawing Pen in pen and Brush with brush is a good idea on, um, paper, but it unfortunately makes Pen look thin and flat as a character.

Phillip Henry 2 (Boob Goblin) reviewed by Optical Sloth

2006-05-18T07:54:00.000-07:00

Optical Sloth
Reviewed by Whitey.
Now come on, isn't that just about the best cover you've ever seen? It's even better once you read the story and it's really not even meant to be salacious. OK, it's meant to be slightly salacious, granted. But this is the story of a boy named Phillip, who gets in trouble in third grade and doesn't come back to the school of the narrator (presumably Shannon) until sixth grade. At that time this perennial troublemaker hasn't had much of a change of heart of his previous and now he's dealing with the onset of puberty. I don' want to give the whole thing away, as this is only a 4 page shortie (and you're already seeing half of it in samples) but it's funny and only a quarter, so who can beat that?

Ruben Bolling on My Dad the Stormtrooper

2006-04-23T12:55:00.000-07:00

"I liked your My Dad the Stormtrooper. Nice paunch. Keep going." - Ruben Bolling of Tom the Dancing Bug.
(This was actually from an old email I had posted on the old website. I'm moving some old reviews here as I get ready to delete the old website.)

Brush and Pen in Shiot Crock 11

2006-04-04T07:35:00.000-07:00

Here are some comments about Brush and Pen from the Shiot Crock 11 review thread at The Comics Journal's message board.

"Hilarious. Freaking hilarious. At first I was wondering why bother using the pens as a metaphor for people if they were the same, but once Q suggested that Clicky find a job with a compulsive clicker or lucky pen, I realized what I was in for. Funny stuff all the way through. Bravo. I'm a sucker for a happy ending too. I'll be hitting your site too, looking for more of your material."

"Very sweet story. I like it when the underdog gets the beautiful woman…and it all works out. Sex is everything in a successful relationship. The ‘black’ page tells it all. Perfect, precise ‘drawing.’ Love it. Loved the play on words…referencing the writing utensils."

"Page 18, last panel: anyone who can make a brush look sexy is okay by me. Girlfrined like this one, so that's a good endorsement."

"Very cool, very clever. Will we ever see them again?"

"I loved the small format. I miss seing minis that are this long, too. Most people think that "mini" means they can get away with only putting like 5 cartoons in a book (see above). I really liked the story. These characters are characters I could read several books of. They are interesting. I think they look a bit like you are trying to draw them really quickly. I don't mean to say that your drawings are bad, but that they could be better. Also, as you have mentioed, backgrounds would make this look a heck of a lot better. Don't fall short on the next one because this seems like the kinda thing that will either be talked about because of the time you put into it, or it will be tossed aside as a "cute" story because of the time you didn't pput into it. I also liked the ending. Thanks for making sex clean again, as that is something I haven't seen in a long time. Brush and Pen really love each other, they don't just hump each other..."

"I like the lovemaking scene. The different lines they make are a good analogy for personalities merging. The story reads well. It’s cute overall."

"I think Brush and Pen is a very clever idea. It's again, a fully thought-out world for the characters to inhabit, and I enjoyed it a lot. The writing and the pacing of the story is first rate. Great fun."

More about Brush and Pen and Shiot Crock here.

Tony Millionaire reads Phillip Henry

2006-02-19T17:34:00.000-08:00

Tony Millionaire, author of Maakies, Sock Monkey and my favorite Jar Jar Binks story ever... was kind enough to send a note about the Phillip Henry comic I did. Tony writes, "I love the Phillip Henry story! The clunky art goes well with school stories, makes it seem more real, like somebody you knew in school drew it."
www.maakies.com

Brush and Pen reviewed by The Comics Journal

2006-02-09T08:09:00.000-08:00

Dogsbody
Review by Austin English.
This comic has characters who are ballpoint pens, characters who are Sharpies and characters who are brushes. Each character is drawn with that particular tool. It's an interesting idea, but a frustrating one. Smith draws pretty well in brush, but not so well in ballpoint pen or Sharpie. The potential for an idea like this one lies in how interesting style contrasts would happen with different mediums, but that doesn't really happen here. You get very nice brush drawings, and really mediocre ballpoint pen drawings that dilute the brushwork.
But there is an artist in Smith. The brush drawings feature interesting expressions and figure movement. I want to see Smith do more comics in brush, and fewer panels where two characters sit stiffly and look at each other blankly with no backgrounds to distract us from the same stiff arrangement, panel after panel. Smith knows how to make an interesting facial composition. The next task is to make an interesting panel composition.

Brush and Pen reviewed by Poopsheet

2006-02-09T08:08:00.000-08:00

Poopsheet
Reviewed by Mark Campos
A romantic and funny, if rough-hewn, story about a ballpoint pen who works all day at an office writing stuff to support his arty wife, who's a brush. They spar, then make up, then make up some more in an ending that's sweet and sneakily erotic.

Brush and Pen reviewed by Comic Book Galaxy

2006-02-09T08:05:00.001-08:00

Comic Book Galaxy
Brush and Pen is the story of Clicky, your average, hard-working pen, who wants nothing more than to go home to his loving, adoring brush of a wife and a good home-cooked meal. Unfortunately none of that’s going to happen. It’s a slice-of-life story told in an extremely unique fashion.
There’s a lot going for this mini-comic, but there are a few things working against it as well. Smith’s art, as well as his dialogue are very simple throughout, occasionally hinting at greater things. It’s put together sloppily, the pages aren’t centered, the staples are off, and the paper used for the cover is speckled with something, and it’s distracting as hell.
But as off-putting as all that can be it adds a lot of charm to an already moderately charming book. There’s something comforting about knowing Smith had to hop on down to his local Kinko’s (or, even better, printed it up himself), staple the pages in order and seal it in an envelope, slap a stamp on it and send it out.
Also adding to all that is the fact that each character in the book was drawn by the same instrument they represent (Clicky was drawn with a ball point pen, Qbert a quill, Sharpster a Sharpie, etc.). It also lends a bit more personality to the characters as well.
The story itself feels like a throwback to the old romantic-comedy television shows, something Smith actively attempted and achieved, to moderate success. It’s lacking the timelessness of those shows, but very much gets the gist of it. Clicky is equal parts Dick Van Dyke and Desi Arnez, cming home after a hard days work to a loving, misunderstood wife, who doesn’t always do the right thing.
Smith has a long way to go before he’s at the top of his game, and Brush and Pen definitely isn’t the best the wide world of mini-comix has to offer, but it’s a good read regardless. Smith’s site has a six page preview of the book, which you can find here, as well as all kinds of information about the man and his work. He’s definitely passionate about making comix, and his use of different tools to illustrate the work shows a desire for variations within the narrative. It’s not a book without failures, but sometimes the success is in the trying, and Shannon Smith definitely tries, and puts more heart into his 23 pages than most books get into their first five issues. I, for one, would like to see this as a continuing series, a Honeymooners for the comix community if you will, and see Smith hone his craft to its finest.
-- Logan Polk

Brush and Pen reviewed by Comicreaders

2006-02-09T08:03:00.000-08:00

comicreaders.com
First off, my apologizes. As I was reading Brush and Pen, my first thoughts were Shannon Smith was a woman writing a comic book about men. But I was wrong; Shannon Smith is very much a guy. I, for one, should not assume anything about a name, as I’ve had to live with constant reminders that Dana is also a girl’s name. But having the knowledge I now hold, this mini comic makes more sense to me. Even though the constant references to picking up women, going out on the town to meet women, and “keeping” a women don’t really make interesting reading material for myself, it’s all in better perspective.
The world of Brush and Pen revolves around a clever gimmick. All the characters in the book are a type of writing utensil, and each starring cast is drawn with the instrument they are. Clicky, the ball point pen, lives his last few moments at work before the weekend hits, bumping into co-worker and friend alike until he reaches his destination at home. The first chapter of this mini comic is rather dry in content, as Clicky drones on with his old buddy, Big Qbert. They ramble on about life and circumstance, with Big Q going on about how lucky Clicky is to have married a brush.
Brush and Pen stands out in the second chapter, “Lefty Lucy”. While the couple of Brush and Pen squabble over petty problems in their relationship, many noteworthy things were achieved. The art really improved with the appearance of Brush, as Smith shows his ability as an artist. The story also took a leap as the two writing utensils consummate their love for one another. I couldn’t tell if the story was suppose to be serious at this point, but I was quite amused at the sexual foreplay – it was quite funny, but at the same time, I could see Smith working on something bigger.
I know this mini comic is a labour of love for Smith, but I do see many problems that could easily be fixed to give him and the readers’ greater enjoyment. The lettering really needs to be cleaned up for one; many of the letters are of different thickness and shape, and small “l”s and capitol “L”s are interchanged throughout. Also, if every panel of this issue was as beautifully drawn as the cover, Brush and Pen would be a visual delight. My advice to Shannon Smith would be: spend more time on the interior pages and panels, and don’t rush to meet some personal deadline. (Dana Tillusz)

Brush and Pen reviewed by Optical Sloth

2006-02-09T07:57:00.000-08:00

Optical Sloth
I do love the random comics, and this one was more random than most. It's all about a brush, a pen and a sharpie, so far at least The brush and the pen are married (as you might be able to guess from the cover) and the sharpie is a horny friend of the pen from work. Not sure what exactly work is, but it's at an office, and it doesn't really matter at the moment. This issue is mostly a conversation between the pen and the sharpie, another one between the brush and the pen, and, well, the brush and the pen having sex. So if you were ever curious what a brush and a pen having sex would look like (and who hasn't been?), then look no further. I should also mention that the characters were drawn with their respective items, like the pen being drawn with a pen, the sharpie with a sharpie, etc It's a fun little story, but the man wanted impartial criticism, so here I come to pile on some negativity! There were almost no backgrounds here, so these already odd characters seemed to be living in a vacuum Slightly unsettling, to say the least And some of the word balloons had some serious run-on sentences that could have used some punctuation, and yes, I'm aware of the irony of me complaining about run-on sentences. Overall it was a pretty good book though, especially good if it was a first effort. Removing them from the void would do wonders for it though. $3

Spaghetti Junktion 2 reviewed by Poopsheet

2006-02-09T07:50:00.000-08:00

From Poopsheet.
This is an angst-driven comic by a young creator that manages to blend romance, action, humor and dream sequences. The protagonist is depressed and lonely (well, he does work in a comic shop after all) and has weird-ass dreams (muppet assassins, anyone?). When he thinks he's met the perfect girl, the reader is clued in to future trouble. From what I gather, Spaghetti Junktion features an ongoing story, but it's not necessary to have read the first issue to jump in here. I think Shannon's got a ways to go, but it's a fun start.