Minneapolis Mutiny Comics Collective
by various

I'm pretty sure I got these all from the Minneapolis Mutiny Comics Group.

Or the Minneapolis Mini Comics Group.

Whatever. Hopefully, I got them all at the same table. (editor's note: Minneapolis Mutiny Comics Collective)

Doomsday by Megan Bishop is a tiny, eigth-size mini with a green cardstock cover. Signed and numbered 5/10. Pretty limited. Wait. I got this on Sunday. How could this have been 5/10? Maybe there were other editions with different colored covers. I don't remember. It's one panel per page of different characters saying' "I'm in love!" It's cute, well-drawn and uses the format well. So that's doomsday, huh?

It's the begining and the end of the Kanary Kid.
The pink crocodile? He is legion.

Tim Siervert's Kanary Kid? Four color screen-printed four pager straight from the Fort Thunder school in the best way possible (I think it's 101/101, but it's hard to tell). Kanary Kid has a run in with some pink alligator people. The story is endless, presumably wrapping around itself in an endless loop. It's energetic, exciting, much looser than silkscreening can look and one of the best things I picked up at the show. Great drawing.

Makeem Konardy has the minimalistic Blues. Not minimalistic in it's cartooning, but in its subject. A young busker sits down, plays a song and leaves. It's quiet and lonely and vibrant and the character design and body language are spot on. and the paper is blue, just because it couldn't be any other color.

I got the blues, but it ain't so bad.

I assume that Erik Bergstrom's Meese Report: The Musical is from the same table. Xeroxed right from pencils and featuring cute monsters, creatures and a dead president. The best part is the Village People-like squids. It's that kind of book. It's funny and weird.

This is just what life under the Reagan administration felt like.

Diana Marsh's The Bleeding Tree is a Jewish folktale with lush drawing and a truly disturbing last two pages. It seems like there's always a comics adaptation of some folktale or another, their brevity, I suppose. It's rare that someone takes advantage of the visual oppurtunities provided in these neat little stories and it's rarer that the comics are anything more than illustratedexpositions. Marsh's talent really shows through in the last three wordless pages as she lets her drawing capture the quiet moment of something happening in the woods and nobody around to hear. I'd love to see this a little bit extrapolated, but maybe that's just because I've gotten so immersed in the Jewish religion and its prohibitions against blood lately.

I would show you the Human Torso, but this was too cool to pass up.

Brett von Schlosser cut up a paper shopping bag and packaged his Human Torso (and other stories) mini comics into one super special. Human Torso has a character design so disturbing and original, it looks like something your five-year old nephew might create and you'd secretly hand it over your desk. He's cool, and his friend Jelliot is almost as cool. These are four four-page minis on different color paper. Pirate pornographers, king perverts, a really nice Spirit Eisner-esque cover, characters who are as dumb and sweet as they can be mean—That's Human Torso. "The Tube of Dracula" is funny and also leans heavily on the Fort Thunder influence. Another wrap-around story with great textures, awesome antagonists and, well, Jelliot. "Do You have the Runs" (no question mark) is Fort Thunderiish on the more Gary Panter side. If the quiet girl who drew unicorns all over her notebook got mixed up in a transporter accident with the guy who liked to draw his science teacher with a knife sticking out of his head, you'd get this. Like a Brundlefly.

If this is a good indicator of the Minneapolis mini comics scene, then I may have to go there someday soon and check it out.

Many of the artists have sites linked from mutinycomics.com
Maxeem Konrardy can be found at maxeem.com