Um, Actually…

Missives from and to the internet, delivered by a series of tubes.

Welcome, dear readers, to our Thursday feature - a letter column of horrors culled from our inboxes. There will be things that are real and decidedly unreal - but hopefully all content presented here will be entertaining.

That said, WE ARE LOOKING FOR LETTERS! We are hiding in your bushes, metaphorical or otherwise. We crave your sweet correspondence. Contact us by clicking on that handy contact button right above the site banner to save yourself from our sweet lips on your power bills.

Letters might be edited for space, but not for intent.

Thank you, internet.

———-

Jay Runham (@jayrunham) asks:

Dear James and Brandon… Is this the appropriate time to use this gif?

Brandon: The fact that you felt the need to ask this throws your credibility into question, good sir. When would this not be appropriate to use? I’m just going to toss out some examples, for shiggles.

WHO WANTS TO WATCH iCARLY!??!

WHICH OF THESE GUYS IS GONNA GET QUALITY LAID TONIGHT???!

LEMON PARTY!!!!!!

Somebody please stop me, I can do this all day.

James: No, I want to see where this goes.

———-

Delivered to James and Brandon via the e-mails:

Dear Parents,

Brandon: Go on…

Join us this Summer in France for New and Exciting Adventures!
VSF gives children from around the world a chance to practice their
French language skills by living in total immersion with French
children of their own age in a real French Summer Camp.
A few weeks holiday in one of VSF's program offers your children the
opportunity to learn about France, its people, its language and its
culture...
LEARNING FRENCH WHILE HAVING FUN!

Brandon: I’m going to stop you right there, fancy French summer camp people, for two reasons. One? The rest of your e-mail is terribly boring. And b, I highly doubt that a person can learn French while having fun. Have you seen the French? I’m guessing you have, since you claim to be based there. You are lying, and I will not have it.

The supposition that James and I have offspring though… I’ll let that pass. Our hypothetical kids would be rad as fuck.

James: Ma’am, I don’t know where you got this, but emailing random dudes on the Internet about hanging out with a bunch of kids in a foreign country might not be the best business plan. Do you hear sirens yet? You probably should.

———-

Andrea Speed (@aspeed) asks: So what’s the next great Canadian comic, guys?

Brandon: Like Scott Pilgrim or Essex County? I say the next great Canadian comic will be Lapjackers Inc.

James: This is actually a tricky question, because it’s so hard to say what will catch on, especially with you southrons. No lies, when I started watching Game of Thrones and the northerners in it started talking about the weirdness of the people to the south and how unnatural their lack of summer snow is, I immediately understood what they were talking about. I enjoy living where I do because a place with six months of winter, where I’ve seen snow in 11 of the 12 months, seems completely natural and preferable.

Anyway.

It’s also hard to say because so many Canadian creators collaborate with American ones for American companies. There are a ton of great Canadians not making what you could call Kanadian Komiks, guys like Francis Manapul (The Flash) or Kurtis J. Wiebe (Green Wake & The Intrepids, which have ended, and Peter Panzerfaust, Grim Leaper and Debris, the last two being upcoming) but who are still producing unbelievable work.

That said, Faith Erin Hicks recently released Friends With Boys, a coming-of-age story with a slight paranormal edge, and it’s fantastic. With a bit of love and attention, it could very well be a breakout hit in the young adult (and cool adult) market. The slam dunk bet however, is Russian Olive to Red Queen, from Kathryn and Stuart Immonen, whenever it eventually comes out. We talked with them about it last year, and I’ve been eagerly awaiting it ever since.

———-

Josh Bazin (@joshbazin) writes:

A few months ago, I was searching the Kobo store for a book to read on my brand new Kobo Touch. I didn’t really know what I was looking for. I wanted something different than what I was reading at the time (which was basically A Song of Ice and Fire and Warhammer 40k novels). If there’s one knock I have against the Kobo is that shopping just seems harder than going to the dead-tree book store.

So, was thinking about what I wanted to read, then it dawned on me - @soupytoasterson had mentioned that the writer on Birds of Prey, Duane Swierczynski was a novelist in addition to his work on comics. That’s when I started searching for the writers of the comic books that I really enjoyed (Neil Gaiman excluded, since I knew his stuff wasn’t what I wanted).

Now, anyone that has followed my comic reading career should know that @soupytoasterson dropped the first issue of the Batwoman: Elegy storyline on me as my ‘free hit’, which of course, really opened my eyes to things I would have normally completely discounted.

Greg Rucka was the writer on this book. I searched him. Turns out, he wrote a book called A Gentleman’s Game. It was a spy-book, had decent reviews on Goodreads, and was something that sounded interesting to my Bourne/Bond/Bauer loving self. On top of all that, it also had a run of comics that had actually started the universe.

I purchased the novel and began to read it. I didn’t realize I was reading things out of chronological order, and honestly speaking, the novel was easy to follow, any important back story was clarified (though, not in heavy detail). There were vivid fight scenes. Interesting espionage. The twists weren’t difficult to see coming, but a story doesn’t need to be overly complex to be enjoyable. The end of the book is bittersweet.

A Gentleman’s Game wove an interesting story with characters that I want to read more about. I will be starting at the beginning of the story with the Queen & Country Essential Edition Volume 1.

Brandon: It’s interesting to hear how you discovered and approached this series from outside of comics. It actually speaks a lot to how I like to try and get people to read comics - first by asking about their likes in other media. A lot of people treat comics as almost a completely separate thing, its own little genre - but the fact is, a good spy story is a good spy story is a good spy story, no matter what medium. You moved your enjoyment of comics and writers out towards prose. The same can be done for pretty much anything. And that’s rad.

James: Buying books is super easy on my Kindle! I just buy them like any other book and they appear over thin air to my devices! It’s so much easier than going to a physical store, because when was the last time you bought a young adult novel while relieving yourself? Probably more recently than I’d like, but whatever. That’s a matter for the courts.

You hear that, Amazon? I will promote your products for free. Just imagine what I would do if you paid me!

Josh, in response to your letter:

———-

That’s it for the first installment of Um, Actually! Check in every Thursday for a new batch of questions. If you have anything you’d like answered, hit up our Contact page! If you submit anything via Twitter - to @blogaboutcomics, @leask or @soupytoasterson - remember to include the hashtag #UMACTUALLY so that we don’t lose it. Remember: you can ask us anything.