Okay so PAUL POPE's work appears in two prominent magazines just out on stands this week. First up is a nice full page illo leading off a segment in WIRED about the sure-to-be-wretched Transformers movie. More interesting is a two-page Pope comics commissioned by GQ in which in their own words the magazine asked some of America's best graphic novelists to give us a personal look at their favorite places on earth. Unsurprisingly perhaps, Japanophile Pope takes us on a quick tour of Tokyo.
It's a pleasant if too short piece. One thing that's amusing is that Pope opens with a shot he at this point almost seems fetishistic about--a closeup of a pair of hands poring over a map. It seems Pope uses some very close variation of this shot in almost every comic he draws (or at least his THB comics). As for the Tokyo travelogue Pope recommends cheap overnighters in "love hotels", says that the "public restrooms in Japan are genuinely spartan, featuring holes in the tiled floors and BYOTP (ugh, good reason to stuff those fast food napkins they always give you too many of in your pockets). Pope also decries the lack of good vintage clothing stores in Japan, admits a fascination with the rituals of Sumo, says to avoid the white noise of the pachinko parlors, and instead partake of Kobe beef.
