A whole whack of links about comics and the comics that comics them.

Item: Alpha Flight Collector gets the goods!

Item: No art show for Shuster Awards.

Item: Speaking of the Shusters blog, Robert Haines has some good comics retail news for a change, including a big interview with the manager of The Blue Beetle comic shop in Barrie, Ont., and a big list of new stores that opened across the country over the past year. A nice contrast to the closure of several Toronto shops.

Item: Comics blogger for The Walrus magazine, Sean Rogers is back in fine form with an interview/profile of one of the big stories of 2009, cartoonist Jeff Lemire.

Item: Speaking of great Canadian comics bloggers/critics, Jeet Heer has another post about historical cross-dressing in U.S. comic strips. You can also see Jeet on Tv –lots of heavy Catholic homosexual action!

Item: I can’t remember if I mentioned it the first time, but the collection of 10,000 comics being donated to Western by retired prof and comic shop owner Eddy Smets includes about 125 “Canadian Whites”, comics published in the 1940s and featuring Canadian characters and stories. You almost never get to see these comics and now researchers will have a place to go besides the National Archives in Ottawa.

Item: Quill and Quire reports on a conservative U.S. group/website that objects to the “pro-homosexual” content of the Skim graphic novel and the American Library Association. I wouldn’t be surprised if similar bigoted ideas sprouted from Canada’s own homegrown conservative bloggers and lobby groups, but it sure is taking these folks awhile to get around to the big comics story of 2008.

Item: Comics writer/cartoonist legend Ty Templeton is holding forth on his career over at the revamped Comics Journal and is also teaching a new workshop in Toronto. Templeton has had an interesting career. The son of Canadian cartoonist and bestselling author Charles Templeton, Ty has worked on all the major U.S. superhero properties as well as being a pioneering indy cartoonist and the editorial maestro behind Canuck imprint Mr. Comics.

Item: Mr. X’s Dean Motter talks to Inkstuds.