Fantasy Comic Book Editor League

And lo, there shall come an ending! With this episode, we conclude our 60 year history of the Amazing Comics Group. Never before has a comic book company that never existed been so extensively chronicled, and so ineptly documented. Our host will have to contend with his rotten reality lacking the relief valve which this podcast provided him. He is seriously considering buying a Monster Manual, or at least some Fentanyl. But to be honest, he’ll probably break down and record a second season, which will simply retell the history all over again even more compulsively. Don’t forget, this podcast is categorized under Mental Health, and what’s more edifying than seeing a person’s mind deteriorating in real time. Be on the look out for his upcoming podcasts Fantasy Quizno’s Manager’s League, Fantasy Safeway Shopper’s League, and Fantasy Alcoholics Anonymous Sponsor’s League. This is what it sounds like when doves cry.

The patient’s Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder fully kicks in and forces him to record an episode that mostly reiterates another episode with a few changes. Living the vida loca sounds way funner than it actually is.

Last podcast cut off by Anchor due to one hour limit. Listened, drank more, trimmed recording, published, then immediately recorded this. Kept drinking. I have to work tomorrow. What are you doing, Dave. Daisy, daisy, give me your answer troooohr…

After hitting rock bottom this week, our wasted and wounded Patient hastily concocts a barely-coherent fantasy comic book company just so he can escape into the womb-like purgatory of his ponderous podcast. Lacking a looking glass, wardrobe, Mother Box, or a pair of ruby slippers, he escapes reality with only a bottle of ersatz bourbon and his unconditional love of comics. A cautionary tale.

In this issue, we shine a little more light on Fun Weekly, our comic book for the wee ones. Then again, how many adults would shit their pants in delight if they could ever find issue #47? Swaddled in a Mac Raboy Captain Marvel Family cover, Otto Binder and C.C. Beck serve up a 15 page adventure of them, Basil Wolverton brings us a 4 page Scoop Scuttle knee-slapper, Carl Barks sends Justin Time and his Uncle Scrooge back to the Aztec Empire for a meaty 12 pager, a center spread luxuriously reprints a Little Nemo In Slumberland by Winsor McCay, George Carlson delivers another delightful Jingle Jangle Tale, Walt Kelly gives us a Pogo and Albert story, John Stanley supplies a perfect kid comic, and Boody Rogers tops it off with a Sparky Watts story. Superb!

In his mission to further illuminate the not-so-brightly lit corners of the Amazing Comics Group, our Host describes the various features of Amazing Weekly with a wit wetted by wine and Pepsi. Take #116 for example. Cover by L.B. Cole, a Thun’da story by Frank Frazetta, a Plastic Man adventure by Jack Cole, Spacehawk by Basil Wolverton, a western tale by Everett Raymond Kinstler, a Prince Valiant reprint by Hal Foster, a classic post-war Spirit by Will Eisner, Hey Look by Harvey Kurtzman, a romance comic by Jack Kirby and Joe Simon, Babe by Boody Rogers, and a Bernard Krigstein story. Now that’s a gonga!

Can you imagine a comic book line that published Elfquest, American Flagg!, Love and Rockets, Watchmen, and Hellboy? We did! Zero Comics, the creator-owned imprint of the Amazing Comics Group, is disingenuously delineated with delirious delight by our drunken docent.

Remember Zero Monthly #283? Cover by Robert Williams, a B. Kliban one-pager, the latest chapter of Freakwave by Peter Milligan and Brendan McCarthy, a Harvey Pekar vignette drawn by R. Crumb, the latest chapter of V For Vendetta by Alan Moore and David Lloyd, a Gerald Jablonski one-pager, an Incal story by Alejandro Jodorowsky and Moebius, a long Ben Katchor story, a Rick Geary one-pager, a painted comic by Kent Williams, a comic by Art Spiegelman, a P. Craig Russell comic, a Hunt Emerson short, a Dragonflame story by Don McGregor and Paul Gulacy, a Joost Swarte short, an El Borbah story by Charles Burns, a reprint of Pablo Picasso’s fanzine comics work, and a comic by Steve Bissette and Rick Veitch? No, YOU DON’T! Because it only exists in my brain, along with the other 749 issues! How about Zero Monthly #145? Cover by Frank Frazetta, a short by Harvey Kurtzman and Bill Elder, a Richard Corben comic, the latest chapter of Lone Wolf And Cub by Kazuo Koike and Goseki Kojima, a comic by Gilbert Shelton, a horror story by Bruce Jones and Berni Wrightson, a Basil Wolverton 2-pager, the latest chapter of Lt. Blueberry by Jean-Michele Charlier and Jean Giraud, a Rick Griffin psychedelic comic, a Voltar story by Alfredo Alcala, an Edward Gorey story, a Jim Steranko comic, a painted comic by Jeff Jones, a Mr. A story by Steve Ditko, a Greg Irons comic, a comic by Bernard Krigstein, a Jules Feiffer vignette, and a comic by Alex Niño. IT’S ALL IN MY HEAD! I HAVE TO GO NOW!

A landmark episode! Our Host figures out how to use the editing tools on Anchor because he recorded past the 60 minute limit, so this issue ends abruptly with no farewell at the end. This is the first half of a two-parter about Zero, the best comic never published. Wakka Ding Hoy!

In preparation for recording this latest illumination of the not-so-brightly-lit corners of the Amazing Comics Group (The Good), a healthy libation of cream sherry and Diet Pepsi (The Bad) is imbibed by our lugubrious Host (The Ugly). If you’ve been disappointed with the lack of slurred speech and yawning in your podcasts, this will be a sumptuous banquet for your ears. Crunchatize me Cap’n!

Now that the chronicling of the 60 years of the best comic book company that never was is finally completed, the Patient obsessively and compulsively combs over the dusty, undelineated corners of it’s history with a surfeit of fucks given for a deficit of necessity.

After a five month hiatus in the realm of romance, wherein attraction turned to attrition, adoration turned to addiction, and affection turned to affliction, our impatient Patient presents a pageant of patently cogent concepts configured to confound the contingents of comic book cognoscenti. In other words, our Prodigal Podcaster returns to wrap up sixty years of the history of the Amazing Comics Group with sluggish and slurring alacrity borne of apnea-induced exhaustion. You’re welcome.

The worst podcast in the world (tm) gets worser. The center cannot hold. All righty, whoah ho ho!

The startling developments in the Amazing Comics Group from 1994-1995 are recounted with a sober dignity rarely heard from our host’s rye-hole. Ken Burns should call this guy up!

Unused to feeling joy, our host befuddlingly recounts the changes in the Amazing Comics Group from 1992-1993 and discovers he is even worse of a narrator when he’s happy. Don’t worry, he’ll probably fuck it all up soon and return to his usual wretched state. L’Chaim!

The Amazing Comics Group finally enters the 90’s with this lengthy (and girthy) episode. The host details all the transcendent title changes of 1990-1991 like an under paid home room teacher calling out attendance roll. The recent transcendent changes in the host’s life remain unspoken, but raise many doubts in his mind about why he even continues with this escapist nonsense. Even the losers get lucky sometimes.

The Patient adds a soupçon of O.C.D. to his simmering stew of psychological disorders (depression, narcissism, delusions of grandeur, cretinism, vagina dentata, hemi-neglect). He continues to comb over the fabricated comic book company that exists only in his brain instead of doing the mental work necessary to improve his reality. The bats in his belfry and the toys in his attic are increasing at an alarming rate. If we cannot reverse this, he runs the risk of becoming insane in the membrane, and then he will have no brain.

The patient (previously known as the host) appears to be slipping deeper into his psychosis. The mental construct he’s created as a coping mechanism is becoming more elaborate and concrete to his psyche. His narcissistic tendencies have devolved into ludicrous delusions of grandeur. He believes that the imaginary publishing company he’s concocted in his feeble mind as a simple means to escape reality could change the world. The prognosis is not good. In my professional opinion, the patient has gone full-on whack-a-doodle.

What if six of the hottest artists unshackled themselves from work-for-hire servitude at the big comic book plantations and started their own company where they could profit from and control their creations? In 1970? Hold on to your tits listeners, because this episode will tell you the alternate history of Image Comics, 1970! It’s gonna knock the socks off your ass!

Secret origins of a hammy sham creator! Our host reveals his earliest comic book editor fantasies in this incredibly disturbing episode. Born to privilege and leisure, why would a young boy turn inward and escape reality to such a manic degree? This episode offers no answers, and our host isn’t talking. Pray for him, and remember his name when you look up at the night sky

This episode chronicles the alternate history of Atlas Comics, the interesting but short-lived mid-70’s comic book company that tried to go head-to-head with Marvel Comics, but who ended up going ass-to-mouth instead. In OUR reality. In my rummy ruminations, Atlas never crapped out and continued to publish for decades to come due to my keen editorial skills and delusional psyche. Fan fiction at it’s finest from the NEW house of ideas!

And Lo, There Shall Come A Hiatus! After 27 episodes, countless gallons of bourbon, wine, and sake, and the tenuous sanity of our besotted host, 50 years of the banana oil history of a horse feathers comic book company have been chronicled to completion. We’ll be putting the Amazing Comics Group on the back burner for a few episodes to focus on other delusional publishing outfits. But for now, revel in the golden anniversary of the greatest comic company ever created in the imagination of a sad old drunk. A good editor beats the odds, a great editor beats the gods!

Mistaking his podcast for a therapist, our drunken idiot host bares his destitute soul for the first ten minutes of the episode without even mentioning comics. As his frozen pea heart thaws, his brain shrinks. Love is dumb, but comic books aren’t, especially the ones never published by the Amazing Comics Group in 1986-1987.

Extra-loaded episode! (Our host, that is). Otherwise, it’s a pretty standard chapter in our ongoing chronicles of a comic book company on the edge of forever. 1984-1985 is slurrily discussed, and just when you think the host will pass out and start snoring for half an hour, he wraps up all of the pertinent information with aplomb and grace. High-functioning podcasting muthafuckas!

Our gaijin otaku host discovers that podcasting under the influence of saki is quite pleasant. The latest Amazing Comics of 1982-1983 are serenely discussed with elegance and grace. I love comics.

How dry I am.

In this extra-stupid episode, the host finishes up the 1970’s for the Amazing Comics Group and talks about alternate history. Remember kids, it gets better, but then it gets so much worse.

1976 and 1977! America celebrates it’s bicentennial and we celebrate the best comic book company if you live 60 miles east of nowhere. If only a tornado would suck me up and deposit me there. I wouldn’t click my heels once. Dorothy was stupid.

The sad but grateful host describes the releases of 1974-1975 from his fictional comic book company. You will gasp at his editorial acumen, and guffaw at his poor diction. Mental health is given lip service by a man who doesn’t even like to examine his own thoughts because he’s scared of what he’ll dredge up. Drinking is easier than thinking, and if it’s true that people drink to escape their problems, I’m fucking Harry Houdini.

After addressing a plethora of mistakes and omissions from the last episode, the host tackles 1972 and 1973. Artist debuts and switcheroos out the wazoo. Koo koo katchu.

The host giddily recounts the releases and artist switcheroos of 1970 and 1971 in his bogus comic book company. Kirby Unleashed, José Luis García-López jumps in the line, Corben draws Gilgamesh (though unfortunately without Gilgamesh’s cock swinging around), and R. Crumb, Frank Frazetta, Moebius, Jules Feiffer, and Goseki Kojima share the pages of a magazine. I’m getting really good at this fantasy comic book editing business.

The host wraps up the 60’s in this episode while realizing that he’s a worse podcaster when he’s sober. You will find out what happens when a Zionist cowboy, a slapstick Apache, a Chinese samurai, a Zulu mob boss, and a freed slave military savant get together in the Old West, and you will be sad that this comic only exists in my tiny brain. Yippie Oy Vey!

Our host had such a bad day that he had to record another episode an hour after the last one because he wanted to remain in a delusional realm where he’s the editor of a groundbreaking comic book company and not a joyless old fuck who flips burgers at a shitty fast food restaurant. And he writes run-on sentences to boot!

1962! Cuban Missile Crisis! 1963! Kennedy assassinated! Big whoop! The real news is that Amazing Comics is putting out the best comics that never existed, and this is the only place you can find out about them. The emperor has no comic book company.

1961! Kennedy is sworn in. I still don’t care. I got a comic book company to run here! New titles, artist switcheroos, and theological musings are discussed needlessly and ineloquently. The host wishes he could afford opioids, or at least Jäger.

1960! Kennedy elected. Who cares? The real news is that Amazing Comics becomes the #1 comic book company in the world. Fuck you, Dell Comics! We got Carl Barks and John Stanley! You should have treated them better, dick wipes!

The host manages to not pass out and record 30 minutes of snoring like he did last episode (He is very sorry about that, but more sorry that he can’t figure out how to edit his podcasts). He does manage to finish up the 1950’s in the fake history of his fake comic book company. Listen if you must, but remember, you get what you pay for.

"The world is hard to love though we must love it because we have no other and to fail to love it is not to exist at all." Friedrich Nietzsche, dumbass “I wanna be a dead boy” Stiv Bators, genius

Third podcast in 5 hours. Wine and Pepsi. 1952-1954 covered. Dead man talking.

The host drunkenly records a podcast 45 minutes after completing the last one and demonstrates a textbook example of the law of diminishing returns. The sumptuous gourmet fare of Amazing Comic Group’s 1951 publications are as poorly chronicled as a Denny’s regular writing a review of a four-star restaurant. A brief yet sensual episode.

The host has had a false sense of well being for a couple of weeks, but a really, REALLY bad day sends him diving back into the delusional womb-like fantasy world he’s constructed to escape a world where people don’t like you as much as you want and you realize that you don’t even deserve that because you’re not a very good person. On the bright side, the host does have exciting developments to discuss as the Amazing Comics Group enters its second decade with sensational new titles, thrilling new features, and hackneyed old concepts. And maybe in this wonderful alternate reality, the editor of this glorious comics company didn’t lose one of his best friends by being an unthoughtful turd. Succor for suckers, opiate for the asses.

A milestone episode, as the simultaneously drunk and hung over host closes out the 1940’s in his imaginary history of the best comic book company that never was. Are you a sad Fantasy Comic Book Editor? Text me your “fantasies” at 503-880-4545. And please, just comic book fantasies. Frazetta!

Special extra-inebriated edition! I’m tired. Good night.

The third edition of this mental health podcast covers the the developments of the Amazing Comics Group between the years 1943 and 1945. Furthermore, the host delves even deeper into his delusional psychosis by explaining how the distribution of his fake comic book company operates. He even manages to throw some shade on the King of Comics, Jack Kirby. Madness!

In this episode, the derelict host backpedals to recount some features he drunkenly forgot to mention in the first podcast. He gives a disturbingly specific nuts-and-bolts history of his made-up publishing company. The comic book releases of the Amazing Comics Group, which has never existed, are described up through 1942. And most surprisingly, he addresses his one listener’s concerns. Yes, someone listened!

In an alternate reality I call my brain, there exists a comic book company that has produced the finest sequential narrative since 1940. And I am the editor and publisher. This podcast is beyond nerdy, beyond geeky, beyond sanity; it’s a cry for help. In our first issue, we cover the contents of the opening salvo of titles released in January, 1940 in my wine-addled brain.