Brain Food

Video games and comic books were invented decades apart, but they seem like they were made for each other. There are plenty of decent video game adaptations of comics, including…

Kringle jingles

By now you’ve probably heard a Christmas song or two playing overhead on a grocery store trip. The typical bland covers of classic holiday standards you’ll find at Safeway or…

Pulp Infliction

Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men? Not many these days. Save the brief blip that was The Shadow movie (starring Alec Baldwin) in the 1990s, pulp…

All the things, considered

Not many people can say that they’ve influenced an entire section of the internet. Local cartoonist Allie Brosh is known for creating the “Alot” monster and “All the things!” memes,…

Thin Blue Lines

For years, Portland’s Top Shelf Productions has continued to publish unique autobiographical comics. Earlier this year, the Vanguard reviewed Jeffery Brown’s A Matter of Life and Jess Fink’s We Can…

The evil of the chiller

It’s about that time. The days are getting shorter. The sky is getting darker. The weather is getting colder. Just in time for Halloween, Dark Horse Comics has released Colder,…

A new hope for Star Wars

Star Wars might have the biggest expanded universe of any franchise. With so many books and video games, it’s tough to know where to start if you’ve just watched the…

The Bridge City beat

When it comes to comic books, it doesn’t get more Portland than Stumptown. Set in Portland, published by Portland’s Oni Press, written by Portland fan favorite Greg Rucka and drawn…

Classic classism

Will Eisner isn’t a household name, but when it comes to comics, he should be at least as ubiquitous as Stan Lee. Known as the father of the graphic novel,…

Faith and fatherhood in graphic form

From beginning writing classes to novelist question-and-answer sessions, one of the most common pieces of advice given to writers is to “write what you know.” It explains why so many authors choose to write about themselves. What does one know better than oneself?