Too Much Coffee Man, the Original Comic Books 1-9

by Shannon Wheeler

Eisner Award winner! The original Too Much Coffee Man comic books, 1-9 how Shannon Wheeler intended. This book appeals to the nostalgic readers of the comics as well as a new generation of caffeine heads. It includes additional introductions by Wheeler to each each giving context, history, and personal anecdotes. He reveals secrets behind the Japanese Bootleg shirt, animation cels, and shooting comics with guns. It's of its time and timeless. Find out why it won the Eisner. A must for anyone and everyone. All initial orders are signed by Shannon Wheeler.

Genres: Fiction, Graphic Novels

182 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 2022

Reviews

[Alberto Martín de Hijas · Rating 4 out of 5]

Too Much Coffee Man fue una de las series más peculiares que surgieron con la explosión del cómic independiente estadounidense de principios de los 90. Las (surrealistas) aventuras del personaje que da título a la serie se alternan con historias protagonizadas por su autor y otras por un lector de la serie. Una muy buena combinación de una comedia delirante con un drama sobre relaciones personales. Esta edición incluye comentarios muy interesantes del autor sobre la génesis y evolución de la serie.

[Kevin Arbuckle · Rating 5 out of 5]

Easily a new favourite. A work in discussion with itself on several layers. The writeups between issues really spoke to me with Wheelers thoughts on art and making a bad business move because he thought it was funny. We are all TMCM.

[The Poor Person's Book Reviewer · Rating 5 out of 5]

My first taste of TMCM and I want more!!! A great read for first timers

[Joshua Dysart · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a wonderful walk down memory lane. I have been reading TMCM since Wheeler was an indie cartoonist in Austin. Years before I started publishing my own crassly commercial comic books. I am a huge fan.

I had the Japanese bootleg TMCM shirt in the perfect, apparently impossible to reproduce, beige... which I wore for ten years before leaving it in a hotel room at San Diego Comic Con one year. What I'm trying to say is that I'm on board with Shannon Wheeler. All the way. And these are the very comics which cultivated that first love.

Reading them for me here again in this collection isn't just about experiencing the comics themselves all over, though that's awesome. But these stories invoke a time in my life when I was desperate to get out of my day job and be a creative person myself. They span from when I was 22 years old - already a father and getting a divorce from a 4 year marriage that had consumed our youth, feeling lost and trapped by my own choices, no idea what the future would hold; to when I was 29 years old, a partner in a small comic book self-publishing company, several undistinguished works out in the world, and just moving to Los Angeles with money from a movie option deal that never panned out. (They never do.)

This is the thing about art and the people who make art. It's not just a work, like an artifact, out in the world. To the people the art reaches and touches, it is a weft in the fabric of their lives. Art is people, the people who make it in that one single moment in their life, and the people who experience it in all moments throughout the existence of the work.

Thanks, Shannon. Thanks for the really fucking funny, and often very smart, comics. I have many guiding lights, you're among them.

To everyone else, look, this is really just a glorious dopey comic that positions itself against consumerism, narcissism, and corporatism about a guy wearing red butt flap long johns and sporting a cup of coffee on his head. Don't let my swoon tilt into hyperbole, but still, outstanding comics. If that premise sounds like a good time, you should read these.

[Adam Howells · Rating 5 out of 5]

“I’m working hard so I can make enough money to pay for the health problems I got from working so hard.

I should write that down. There’s a cartoon in there.

Damn. I’m working again and I didn’t even mean to.”

Self-published angsty Gen-X perfection. Also, Wheeler skips two issues because he didn’t want to create them, sowing confusion and killing his sales. He found this hilarious because it is.

[Aiden · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was really excited to buy and read this collection, since I read it in the weekly alt paper when I was a teenager and loved it. Unfortunately, it couldn't hold my attention and I only made it through the first two issues. I did like that the author wrote an intro to each issue because the additional context made it more interesting.