My approach towards reading comics began changing two years ago. I can’t pinpoint exactly why it happened, and I could use inflated highfalutin language to describe it, but I’ll be honest with you: now more than ever I like to be immersed in fantastic art. I used to be in the habit of catching up–voraciously reading something, finishing it, and going on to the next thing. But as it turns out, reading comics is a lot like lovemaking. The most rewarding experiences are often the most leisurely.

I read volume one of Katsuya Terada’s fully painted manga The Monkey King shortly after it was published in 2005. I was a different person back then and the book didn’t leave a strong impression. When I heard a second volume was finally due this month (a seven-year hiatus!) I took note. The preview artwork made me wonder if perhaps I was in a place to better appreciate something like this, and it turns out I am!

The Monkey King takes its name and characters from the classical Chinese novel Journey to the West, a frequent source of inspiration in Asian pop culture. For example, Dragonball was originally based on it. You probably knew that already.

Journey to the West is about a Buddhist priest’s quest to retrieve ancient scrolls from India, running into all sorts of demons and monsters along the way. He eventually allies with a powerful monkey and a hedonistic pig, as well as a man-eating demon and a god who takes the form of a horse.

Katsuya Terada is a Japanese artist whose most substantive credit to Western audiences is the character designs he provided for the 2000 anime Blood: The Last Vampire. His take on Journey consists of short bursts of story focused on the monkey character, in what I can only imagine are heavily remixed accounts of the original text, ramping up the violence, gore, and sexuality. I mean, the original novel may have had masturbation jokes in it, but I’m guessing not. Terada even transforms the main priest character into a sexy nun, for indecent reasons I won’t spoil.

Each story is unrelated to the other, and don’t seem to be assembled in any particular order. They’re totally Heavy Metal, in the Moebius/Arzach sense of the phrase. Because Journey to the West is a famous story Japanese people absorb naturally, there are details Terada leaves out which may baffle Western readers, details which probably should have been given more mention in the book’s supplementary notes.

I’ll mention them succinctly as possible: the monkey king is ridiculously overpowered. He can shapeshift, clone himself, and has immense physical strength and speed. He wields a heavy staff that can become longer or shorter at will, and rides a cloud. Before he is recruited along the priest’s journey, the monkey is punished by the gods for his pride and left trapped under a mountain. He is controlled by the priest character using a metal band held around his head which is able to magically contract, causing pain.

Knowing these things will make your reading experience of Monkey King flow better, as the events fit along a loose timeline, but aren’t always presented in order.

Volume two continues the pattern set out in the first volume admirably. The same unpredictable sense of imagination is applied, and the narrative is just as impulsive, to seemingly fit whatever Terada feels like drawing, such as the story of how the monkey king comes to own his magical staff. The book is filled to the brim with blood, violence and nudity, affectionately crafted in living color for your pleasure.

The plan seems to be that this manga will run for three volumes. But be warned: in Japan, there was actually a twelve year gap between volume one (1998) and volume two (2010). Remember what I said about the value of leisure in comics? I’d selfishly prefer if the artists themselves didn’t take it to heart.

Katsuya Terada’s The Monkey King Volume 2 hits stores April 18. Review copy provided by Dark Horse Comics.

Last month comic artist Simon Bisley uploaded a series of candid YouTube interviews which are worth nothing for two reasons: 1.) I haven’t seen them publicized anywhere, and 2.) I now respect Bisley even more. He seems like chill dude.

Various Simon Bisley art. On the far left you have the cover he did for one of Verotik's horribly colored issues of the entirely skippable Shin Devilman manga. Seriously, that cover is the best thing to come out of any of that mess.

You’re probably familiar with “BIZ” even if you don’t know him by name: his style warps male and female figures alike into tight collections of tense muscles and corded waists obscured with very little clothing. His flair for enormous boobs, butts and biceps is only matched by his raw painting ability, which imposes upon these forms what I can only describe as “fleshy volume.” Don’t let the crudeness of some of these illustrations fool you, he’s an immense talent.

Bisley is from the United Kingdom, where he drew for the comics anthology 2000AD in his early career. Some of that material is newly available in the States, including ABC Warriors: The Black Hole, a terse sci-fi yarn about a bunch of robot losers tasked with saving the galaxy. Bisley’s black and white work can be just as compelling as his paintings, though it’s obvious in the weekly grind of 2000AD he preferred to sacrifice a bit of readability rather than omit a maddening barrage of detail.

Bisley hit it big in the United States with Lobo: The Last Czarnian (1990), a collaboration with Alan Grant and Keith Giffen that re-invisioned the DC Comics character Lobo as a heavy metal mass-murderer who both channelled and mocked the stylistic excesses of superhero comics at the same time. Bisley’s art could not be ignored and the series was a hit, leading to a role he plays to this day: making American comics appear much cooler than they actually are with badass painted covers.

One year before Lobo, back in the UK, Bisley painted the best selling 2000AD graphic novel of all time: Slaine: The Horned God. It features Pat Mill’s fantasy hero Slaine, an Irish take on Conan the Barbarian, in the original Robert E. Howard sense of the character. Slaine is an adventurer, but he is also stilled, unassuming, and reasoned. The book is really, really, ridiculously good-looking, and it’s infused with Pat Mill’s writing sensibilities: unrestrained in both violence and action, with a free-wheeling sense of humor no one could blame you for calling a little bit corny.

Most recently the Biz has been whittling away at a still-incomplete biblical art project, not for especially religious reasons, but because he wants to play with the power of those symbols in his work. He’s also involved in an upcoming series called Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, which sees him doing comic interiors at Heavy Metal for the first time in almost a decade.

I read the news of French artist/cartoonist/awesome guy Jean Giraud’s death as I browsed Twitter Saturday morning, between gulps of cheap, bitter coffee. The news chewed at my stomach, not because it was highly improbable or deafeningly tragic, but because in the last few weeks I’ve felt as if I was beginning to truly appreciate Jean Giraud (also known as Moebius and Gir) and his work.

It was inevitable among the Internet’s rush to memorialize that his life would be reduced to a few soundbites. They’re now ubiquitous. He’s the man who defined the look of Alien, Tron and Blade Runner (an overestimation, and slightly rude to the other visionary talent who worked on those movies, but fine. It’s not like Moebius’ greatest achievement was drawing for Hollywood, anyway.) He was besties with Hayao Miyazaki (fair enough, but this information says little about him, instead bridging a superficial gap to people disconnected from his work, similar to the way Brian fucking Bendis was selected to write the foreword to the US edition of The Incal.) You get the idea.

I’m not writing this for people who are intimately familiar with Jean Giraud and want to revel in his magnificence. I’m writing this for you, for people who know next to nothing about Moebius, and perhaps associate him with a certain kind of impenetrability complimented with an air of pretentiousness. Moebius comics are a real pain in the ass to find translated into English, often running for ludicrously high prices on the secondary market. And a lot of his later work still isn’t translated, so as far as I’m concerned, there aren’t a lot of English-speaking Moebius experts out there. It’s an almost tragic association we’re burdened with, because Moebius was as far from pretentious as someone of his repute could possibly get.

You Should Read The Incal

The Incal is a science fiction epic written between 1981 and 1989, available uncensored and most affordably from the UK. Written by the moderately insane Alejandro Jodorowsky, it’s everything science fiction should be: weird, exotic, unnerving, and psychological. And drawn by Moebius’ hand, it’s a work of art, gorgeously imbued with his masterful sense of atmosphere and space.

It is said Moebius is one of the few to bridge the gap between “art” and “comics.” If you accept the underlying pretension of that maxim, it’s true. Moebius can be as appreciated in the comic shop as he is in the museum gallery. Still, I find it most rewarding when his abilities are focused towards telling a story. Even if comics weren’t so looked down upon in the art world, the simple fact is most traditional artists could never draw good comics, because it takes too much work to do well. Moebius excelled at it, and he excels at it here.

The Incal is a sweeping futuristic adventure in which a strange artifact causes upheaval across the universe. A petty, whoring detective sporting 18th century European clothes named John DiFool  comes across the Incal shortly before creatures willing to kill for it come across him, and over the course of his tactical retreat he makes friends (a man with a wolf head, and a universe-feared assassin named The Metabaron, for example), and enemies (including a president with a penchant for cloning and body impermanence.)

The Incal is fun, unpredictable, and just plain weird, three things which you can say about comics with increasing rarity. And unfortunately, it’s meager taste of Moebius’ capabilities. Somewhere beyond tumblr posts, platitudes, and aged comic scans, Moebius the comic artist can be found in all his breadth and width. I hope American publishers realize we all deserve the privilege of knowing him and work out the logistical details necessary to get more of his material published over here.

If there’s a trap that ought to be maligned more in American comics, it’s the bait-and-switch cover. I know it’s good business sense to make covers the most attractive part of your comic, but all too often shitty books are graced with the shiniest exteriors.

A few months ago I read the first few issues of The New 52 Deathstroke purely on the basis of Simon Bisley’s amazing cover art. Eventually my enthusiasm for the covers was outpaced by my disappointment in the book’s writing, and I had to tap out.

It happens in every genre, including fantasy comics. Some of those covers look stunning, going so far as to incorporate Frank Frazetta paintings, but you’d be hard pressed to say anything nice about the art or stories contained within.

These sorts of infractions are why I neglected Orc Stain for so long. I’m glad to have finally relented against my former skepticism.

The excellent coloring of Orc Stain is what initially caught my attention. It posesses a masterful palette of purple, green and red gradients, which makes everything blend together cohesively, while also adding depth to the detailed and frenetic linework. Since comics began to be colored digitally, gradients this conspicuous have defiled what are often serviceable pencils and inks, a tell-tale sign of heavy handed colorists rushing to make their deadlines. Here, the coloring is nothing short of breathtaking, adding balance and actually elevating the already impressive line drawing. I wouldn’t be surprised if coloring is the most time-consuming part of creating Orc Stain.

Luckily, Orc Stain isn’t an exercise in style over substance. Its plot, which follows a thoughtful one-eyed orc trying to keep a low profile as an explosive paradigm shift overtakes society, is grounded in an unpredictable world filled with unusual beasts, weapons, and magic. Orcs are a race of obstinate, single-minded brutes, constantly engaged in fickle tribal warfare which accomplishes little. Most humorously, orc economics is based entirely around the gronch, the orc penis. It’s both amusing and disgusting to read about orc currency and how it’s generated. This is a book where you’re just as likely to turn the page to see what happens to the protagonist as you are to learn one of the weird quirks of the world he inhabits.

Great-looking book. Unique and compelling milieu. What’s the catch?

The closest thing to a catch is that it takes James Stokoe a long time to release each issue, because he writes, draws, inks and colors them himself. I don’t have a problem with this. In fact, I would embrace an alternative model of American comics closer to what you see in Europe, where 45-60 page chapters are released annually in high-quality hardcovers. There are talented comic book artists suited to the monthly format, but a lot aren’t. Put shortly, this book is worth the wait.

Okay, there’s one more catch, and I’m surprised I’d ever say it: this comic looks better digitally than in print. I have the Orc Stain trade paperback (which collects issues one through five), and Orc Stain #6, the most recent issue. Both are printed on an uncoated paper that greedily absorbs the rich tapestry of ink that makes up an issue of Orc Stain, reducing its contrast and vividity. Would it raise the price-point too high to print the comic on glossy paper? I can’t say.

I can tell you with confidence, however, that when you compare two-page spreads that run across both a comic book page and the inside back cover, it’s the half on the coated cover that looks best. The other side appears limp and demure by comparison. When you read the comic digitally, you don’t have this problem. It’s bright and beautiful, exploding off the screen. Good thing it’s available on comiXology for 2 bucks an issue.

Orc Stain is an artist’s compelling vision of brazen weirdness, a genuine labor of love carefully crafted. In North America, people deserve more credit for creating comics in this fashion.