Today’s catalog was Bud K, something I hadn’t seen since I was in high school. It struck me today that this stuff is basically just a Previews catalog without the explicit nerd pandering.
Honestly, this stuff is kind of amazing, in a “really not for me” sort of way.

And right out of the gate, we’ve got a Predator mask…
Okay, so there is still some nerd pandering. Hey, the bread-and-butter of this operation seems to be selling movie replica and “fantasy” weapons. You’ve got to expect a little of this.

And then we get kitty-cat shaped knuckle-spikes right next to testicles for your key-chain. Because if your truck already has testicles, your keys need them too.
Actually, the kitty spikes need a little something…

There we go…Sanrio, call me.

Part of me wants to know whether walking into someone’s bedroom and seeing a Confederate bedspread is a turn on for some people…

It’s a horn…

A sword hidden inside an umbrella makes perfect sense. I’m constantly having to fight off swashbucklers in the rain.

If the idea is to create an inconspicuous stash box, something that looks like a gun and straps to your steering wheel doesn’t strike me as the best solution.

Oh, sure, a Masonic watch sounds like a good idea, but you have to be initiated into at least the 12th degree to read it correctly…

No joke, I really do think it’s fantastic that Bud K’s customer base includes people who would wear an “Armour of God” t-shirt and people who would buy “jiggly-boob” beer cozies.
Also on this same page:

It truly is your one-stop shopping resource for Christians, Pagans and Creepy Guys.

I think “futuristic” here is being used to mean “legally distinct from anything Lucas owns the copyright on.”

Yes. Your “law enforcement” needs. Because that’s exactly what hand and leg cuffs that cost under $20 are going to be used for.

This is nothing short of breath-taking. The Bud K people have found a way to get people to pay to have pieces of wood shipped to them.
They are brilliant. There is nothing more I can say about this catalog. Oh, no…there is one more thing…

It’s a horn…

No, that doesn’t happen. Oh, sure, I’ve heard those sub-Dane Cook level comedians make those same sophomoric jokes: “Hnurr hnurr, I wish I was a lesbian, I’d just stare at myself all day, amiritefellas?”
It’s not funny. It’s really kind of offensively stupid. And the joke really doesn’t translate when being applied to gay men. Especially not when it appears in a comic aimed at 25-35 year old man-children who would probably shriek in terror at the thought of a nude gay man.
And yes, this is me being appalled at something in the worst comic since Skate Man. A fool’s errand at the best of times.

Amazing Spider-Man #2338; While many fans, myself included, were upset with what it took to bring the character to the new status-quo, the new creative teams on this title have met with critical and commercial success. A new storyline starts here for those curious about what’s been going on.
Astonishing X-People #2222; While the combination of Ellis and Bianchi are not to my taste, a new storyline starts here, tying in to the larger “Manifest Destiny” branding in the X-books. It’s a good jumping on point for those who enjoy Ellis’s super-hero work.

Hey, whoa, did you see that there? I gave as neutral a judgement as I could while still finding a way to tell interested customers to check the book out. And it was easy.
Of course, this doesn’t address the concerns of those bloggers who see nothing wrong with what the retailer in question did because he was bashing super-hero books in his newsletter. But I’m sure that if he had slapped a big NOT BUY on Kramer’s Ergot or Love and Rockets, the art-comix bloggers would have had my back.

DC Comics circa 1960 has your back!

Cue comic fans bitching about Character X not getting an “All Star” book before this in 3…2…

Even though I (thankfully) no longer work in comic retail 24/7, I still keep my hand in and assist my former employer with the manga orders. I really try my best to maintain as diverse and full a stock of new titles as possible, and research new titles as they’re solicited as much as I can. But I don’t have an unlimited budget and manga is not the focus of the business, so cuts and exceptions have to be made. Occasionally I screw up. I never ordered any of the Project X books, for example, because I couldn’t imagine anyone possibly wanting to read a comic about the history of Cup Noodles. And then it became a hit with the discerning manga blogerati.

I’ve got a pretty good grasp, otherwise, about what does and does not sell to our customers. Manga novels don’t sell. Sports manga don’t sell. So-called “global manga” titles don’t sell. A few Korean titles will sell every once in awhile, but the “original English language” stuff is almost always dead on arrival. So I keep in mind the types of material customers won’t buy at the store when I set the order numbers.

But a great way to keep orders down on certain titles, or entire lines, is to pull stupid, un-friendly to comics retailer moves. I’ve been very impressed with Go Comi’s line of books, particularly their production values. But I won’t order any of their titles that have been Borders exclusives. Why should I? Anyone who wants them has already had four or five months to buy them at Borders. We haven’t carried anything from Net Comics either, because, as I said earlier, Korean comics tend to be a tough sell with our customers and they solicited something like twelve first volumes their first month in existence. That was simply too much at once on unknown properties from a new publisher. I may start ordering some of their material, now that I’ve had a chance to see it for myself elsewhere, but I have no regrets for not letting them flood our shelves early on.

And now I have to decide what to do, if anything, about Tokyopop. I’m extraordinarily upset about this latest move of theirs. They’ve always been a bit of a nuisance to deal with, from an ordering and budgeting angle. They put out too much at once, their section in Previews is a mess, and now doesn’t even include descriptions for anything more than one or two volumes old, and their production values are somewhat lacking in comparison to almost all their still in business competitors.

My first impulse, honestly, is to simply stop ordering any Tokyopop titles outside of what we need to fill pull-lists. Why should I take a chance on ordering a new series from Tokyopop if, two or three volumes later, they might decide that it isn’t selling what they think it should be and make it an online exclusive item? Why should I attempt to build an audience for a title in the store if Tokyopop could decide that they’d rather cut out the middle-man and sell the title direct themselves? And what do I tell customers already buying a title when Tokyopop decides to take it exclusive?

I’ll probably have to talk with the rest of the people who work at and operate the store before I come to a final conclusion, but I have a hard time imagining that anyone is going to have an opinion about what to do that’s far different from my first impulse. Tokyopop really did a lot to usher in the current manga marketplace in the U.S., but their actions since then have been frustrating and baffling and have burnt out a lot of people’s goodwill towards the company.

“Excuse me, do you have any Candy Butchers albums?”

Uh…did you look under “C”.

“Yes. In ‘Rock’ and ‘Used.’ But I’ve learned from past experience that things in this store tend to be shelved according to the musical standards of whoever happened to be working put-away that day, else how do you explain why The Damned keep ending up in your ‘Goth/Industrial’ section while Pink is in ‘Punk’ and No Doubt is in ‘Reggae’.”

Let me check the computer…We have about a dozen different Canned Heat albums, is that what you’re looking for?

“No, I don’t really care for hippie blues bands, and besides, I came in looking for Candy Butchers.”

Dude, I don’t think they really exist. If they did, we’d have their albums. We’re the local alterna-hipster indie music store, after all.

“Let’s see…the last bands or performers an employee here told me didn’t exist were Queen Adreena (you kept trying to sell me Queen), Scissor Sisters (Michelle Shocked), Hidden Cameras (Mott the Hoople), Mountain Goats (Madonna), Polyphonic Spree (Pet Shop Boys) and Stephen Lynch (Sleater Kinney). And yet, in each case, I was able to purchase those albums either on-line or from a chain store. Oh, and by the way, is it really necessary to play Salt-N-Pepa so loudly in the store we’ve had to have this entire conversation while shouting?”

We’re playing Salt-N-Pepa because it’s part of the drinking song mix we play here!

“Salt-N-Pepa’s ‘Push It’ is a drinking song?”

Dude, it’s ironic!

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why I buy music online.

“Still outnumbered by panty-flashing fan service books, though.”

I discovered today that, in my absence, the manga section has actually managed to expand a little. Which is a promising sign. It was at the expense, of course, of my great experiment with racking manga by genre. Without a full-time person aware enough of manga in the store to keep it going, it was becoming too hard to determine what should go where. Also, I gather that the “but that’s not shojo” factor was a problem as well, where people refused to accept that certain titles really and truly belong in certain genres. This was always a problem with racking certain manga titles in the kids graphic novels section. Apparently Dragon Ball Z fans really don’t like being told that it’s a kids book.

Though I did pick up School Zone by Kanako Inuki. I was flipping through it, slightly put off by the cutesy-goth horror manga aesthetic that almost every Japanese horror comic seems to use, when it struck me that the book was completely bat-shit insane.
“Bat-shit insane” is pretty much a selling point on manga for me.

I also picked up The Battle for Bludhaven. People seem to be having mixed reactions to it. Given the general tenor of Palmiotti’s and Gray’s other collaborations, and the fact that the first issue prominently features the Force of July and the Atomic Knights (and the return of the Monolith), I’d say that the mix of played-for-straight and tongue-in-cheek material is deliberate.

And I grabbed a copy of Superior Showcase, the art-comic that tricks people who get snitty about not reading super-hero comics into reading super-hero comics.

And I got this, because one can never have too many “Bugs Bunny in drag” objects in your collection.

And a small stack of Lois Lane comics were purchased. I also said mean things about a particular Vertigo comic with good art and a dreadful writer to Mike, and he countered by describing one of the books in a certain company’s cross-over mania as an example of their attempts to get women to read super-hero comics.

DudeTube, comics and naughty YouTube videos.

Here Now, comics and pictures of men in various states of undress. It’s like the perfect blog for me.

Blockade Boy is excellent, and I really should have drawn attention to my link to it before now.

The New Adventures of Queen Victoria, because clip-art funnies about historical figures are your best entertainment value.

(I suspect this may be my dullest post ever…)

Mike is always eager to show a customer around the store, until he’s completely satisfied they know what they came in for.

Inside, Corey and his brother Chad were cruising the New Arrivals section looking for something interesting.

Aaron is always eager to service the customers with a smile.

Nathan usually ends up taking his bike to work.

I don’t see him there very often anymore, but Tom happened to be there, looking like he just got off work.

Ian was outside, waiting to get picked up.

Even Kid Chris managed to come by, looking awkward in his fraternity shirt.