A Bushel of New Comics Collections Dig Into the Pleasures of Print

If you're reading this on your phone, drop it! (Or at least, drop it once you've finished this article.) That little screen of yours won't give you access to some of the wildest, weirdest, most innovative images and words bubbling up into the culture right now. Said miraculous content can only be found — brace yourself — on paper. To be precise, it can only be found in a flood of new periodicals by brave (or perhaps deluded) publishers who've declared war on digital monotony. Where in the world could such a quixotic movement emerge, you ask? Only in alternative comics.

In the past year or so, storied arbiter of the indie-comics world, launched a biannual paper edition in January — the first time it's been in print form since 2012. Publisher IDW is on vol. 3 of its quarterly andpolitical cartoon site is putting out its fourth print issue (). Then there's Fantagraphics' anthology whose sixth installment dropped in May, and , from Top Shelf comics' Brett Warnock.