zine, [zeen] noun. 1. abbr. of fanzine; 2. any amateurly-published periodical. Oxford Reference

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Sunday, August 10, 2008

Small Press Review (Mother Planet)



 
 

Sent to you by Jack via Google Reader:

 
 

via M.A.D. Rants by noreply@blogger.com (MAD) on 7/13/08

Okay, I've got two of these right'chere in front of me. Mother Planet is a nice little fanzine which circulates in the gaming stores round these parts. Which reminds me, I should go visit the Guardtower sometime soon. Side note: on a quick google search for the Guardtower's url, I rapidly found a forum where my husband was posting away. Ah, gamers. Gotta love them.


Mother Planet is put together by a collective of four: Mike Getridge, Graeme Henson, Tim Razler, and Ed Shields. They seem to have a few rotating contributors also, who they thank on the front page of each issue. I had the pleasure of meeting Ed once IRL, the test of them remain mystery men to me. Really, I should be hunting these guys down, at least through the interwebs and saying hidey--hidey--hidey--ho. In the tune of Minnie the Moocher, ala Danny Elfman in the Forbidden Zone:



Okay, maybe I shouldn't do that. Maybe there are better ways to say hello.

So on to the review. Basically, this magazine features a few short articles. It is printed on legal sized paper (8.5x14) and is about 8 pages long printed on front and back. The overall graphic design is very well done for a small publication. My repressed inner editor approves of the graphic design and notes that the text is aligned very well along the the end of each article, with a good amount of runaround on the pictures and small advertisements throughout. My less repressed non-prick non-editor self forgives the fact that the small page numbering header at the top of the page is occasionally cutoff.

As you can tell by the covers, this is a humorous fanzine. The short articles contain gaming advice, movie reviews, gaming reviews and comic book reviews. I enjoyed reading Ed's Kung Fu Christmas Review, in which he identifies the top 5 Asain martial arts movies (in his opinon, of course). Which are Shogun Assassin, Sanjuro, Yojimbo, The Legend and Return of the Dragon. I still need to see Shogun Assassin. I also got a kick out of Tim Razler's scathing review of the comic book adaption of City of Heroes.

The back page of the Mother Planet has a listing of gaming store locations around Ohio and an events listing. I imagine that it is circulated at said gaming stores: Alley Cat Games & Comics, Armoury Games, British Paper Mill, Comic Town, Darkwood Manor, Dave's Clubhouse, the Guardtower, The Laughing Ogre, The Soldiery & Ravenstone games. So next time you are getting your comics & gaming fix, check the free table and see if you can pick up some issues.

 
 

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