News Talk Radio 97.1 Talks Scott Pilgrim with Jon Scorfina

Click on the image to listen.

***********
New Star Clipper Commercial

***********

Fox 2 New in the Morning Interviews AJ
for Free Comic Book Day 2010

***********

News Talk Radio 97.1 Interviews AJ
About Star Clipper

Click on the image to listen.

***********

From Alive Magazine May 2006

Article Title: “25 Best First Dates”

Gone are the days of dinner-and-a-movie first dates. When it comes to
wooing a would-be romantic partner, a little creativity can go a long
way, leading to increased chemistry, good conversation and–
hopefully– a second date. Secure a lasting connection by planning the
perfect outing for two with our list of the top spots to go a-courtin’
in the STL.
#11: LOST IN TRANSLATION: Start your date browsing the aisles at Star
Clipper (314.725.9110), in The Looop, where you’ll have fun exploring
animae [sic] collectibles and comics before heading to the Missouri
Botanical Garden to watch Sumo wrestlers and Taiko drummers at the
Japanese Festival Sept. 2-4, when you can salso view traditional tea
ceremonies and enjoy candlelit walks in the Japanese gardens. Enjoy
post-show sushi and sake at the Drunken Fish in the CWE– stay late on
Monday night and bring out your inner Idol with karaoke starting at
9:30 PM.

***********

From St. Louis Magazine July 2006

A-List Issue 2006

From St. Louis Magazine’s Annual A List issue, ranking the city’s top
picks for Food and Drink, Shopping, Service, Players, Kids and
Amusements:
BEST COMIC-BOOK STORE

Fans of AMERICAN SPLENDOR don’t usually get into superheroes, and vice
versa, but that doesn’t stop STAR CLIPPER from stocking both. It
defies the cliche of the dark, musty comic shop, and the availability
of McSweeney’s titles, art books and cool anime merch only adds to the
effect. Bonus points for hosting St. Louis’ first Munny Show of
designer toys by local artists.

***********

Riverfront Times 2005
Best Comic Book Store

How can anyone single out a comic book store as better than any other
comic book store? They all carry the same titles, they all put the
books out on the same day, and they all charge the same price for each
issue. Thanks to the comic book industry, it’s a very level playing
field. Like most comic shop staffs, the staff at Star Clipper Comics
is well-versed in the genre as a whole. But Star Clipper’s collective,
unabashed love for the endless possibility of what makes a good comic
book distinguishes them from other shops. That and their massive stock
of graphic novels, which is the easiest, most cost-effective way for
both the novice reader and the committed diehard to connect to the art
form. The folks at Star Clipper are as quick to highlight the mid-’80s
sci-fi pulp of Alien Legion as they are to make a display of the
latest “serious art” comics from France; they’ll point a young science-
fiction fan toward the timeless beauty of Alex Raymond’s Flash Gordon
to discover the roots of the art and advise an old cynic to pick up
the Cartoon Network version of Teen Titans to rediscover the fun of
superheroes. That long, double run of graphic novel-stocked
bookshelves that covers the length of Star Clipper’s sales floor is a
pipeline to fantastic universes populated by immortal heroes, lovable
losers, brooding anti-heroes, normal people, talking animals and other
wondrous strangeness. That’s what a comic book store should promise,
and Star Clipper Comics delivers on that promise.

***********

Riverfront Times 2001
Best Place to Buy Comics

On first entry, the cool, spacious Star Clipper may seem more like a
“real” bookstore than a place to catch up on Spider-Man. That’s the
point. With rock music blaring and easygoing employees who know the
tastes of their regular customers, the store is working overtime to
give comic books a long-overdue aura of respectability. To that end,
you’ll find edgy fare such asTransmetropolitan and Love and Rockets
given the top-shelf space usually reserved for superhero product, as
well as a heroically sized selection of collected volumes devoted to
the medium’s history. Equally friendly to obsessives and novices, the
store offers Japanese manga in the original language and staff picks
that are eclectic but always dead on the money. The icing on the cake,
though, is that they carry an impressive selection of local comics and
zines, thereby providing an outlet for the next Stan Lee or Dan Clowes.
***********

Riverfront Times 2008
Best Comic Book Store

Perennial winner of this particular honor, Star Clipper has a very
fine staff, an excellent selection of comic books and graphic novels
(duh) and a beguiling array of toys that have nothing to do with
comics but are fun to poke through nonetheless. Let us talk now about
Star Clipper’s art gallery, which has gained renown for the quality of
the work exhibited (the customizable vinyl toy mannequin known as
Munny and two different shows of Mark Mothersbaugh’s art, for
example), and the raucousness of its opening receptions, replete with
DJs wrecking shop and crowds standing butts-to-nuts just to get a peek
at the art. In the late 1960s, Marvel Comics marketed its superhero
books as “Marvel Pop Art” in an attempt to draw a more sophisticated
audience; Star Clipper has lifted again that banner, celebrating the
possibilities of the comic book and comic-book culture as an art form.
Star Clipper’s gallery shows bring together musicians, graffiti
artists, more traditional “fine” artists, pop-culture lovers and
unallied folks simply looking for something fun to do on a Friday
night, then shakes them up and releases them back into the world with
a new perspective on comic books and art and how the two relate. That
gallery is an incubator for the next generation of comic-book artists;
twenty years in the business and Star Clipper continues to find new
ways to spread the Four-Color Gospel. That’s commendable, but it’s
downright exciting to imagine what they’ll do in the next twenty years.

***********

Riverfront Times 2007
Best Comic Book Store

Lately we’ve enjoyed a comic-book renaissance. Not only has Hollywood
figured out that funnybooks are a part of our cultural lexicon, but so
have the so-called legitimate publishers, one of which had comic
artist Chris Ware draw the new cover for Voltaire’s Candide. It’s
nothing to see a Pulitzer Prize-winning book about the history of the
industry (Michael Chabon’s The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay)
or an alternative newsweekly print a retelling of Stack Lee’s murder
of Billy Lyons in panels with word balloons. Star Clipper Comics is a
glowing example of the rebirth of comics: Gone are the days of geeked-
out, poorly lit, cramped retail spaces with the product stored in
cardboard boxes. Star Clipper is big, bright and beautiful, and it
offers a stupendous collection of ongoing titles you know (hey, did
you know the Hulk was back? He’s angry!), titles outside the Marvel/DC
multiverse you didn’t know were around (hey, did you know the Lone
Ranger was back? Tonto too!), as well as books, T-shirts, toys, games
and those manga books the kids seem to like. Star Clipper goes
further, though, hosting hipster events like the St. Louis Munny show,
where local artists decorated Munny robot dolls (they’re big in Japan)
and unveiled them at a party complete with drinks and DJ spin.

***********

Riverfront Times 2006
Best Comic Book Store

Yes, Star Clipper won this award last year. And it’s right next door
to the office—does anyone else see an easy out for a desperate writer?
Return your conspiracy theories to their upright and locked positions,
please. This has nothing to with proximity and everything to do with
the ruination of your free time. Star Clipper’s selection of comics,
graphic novels and related ephemera is as exhaustive as a store can
hope to boast. But more to the point: Dude, they’ve sneaked into your
home—taken something as dumb and pointless as “the blog” and turned it
into something as dumb and pointless (and entertaining) as a blog.
Onwww.starclipper.com/blog/scblog.html, staff members pipe a constant
conversation about our beloved comics into the ether—and into the
hours when we used to sleep (or work). Thanks to this blognology, you
can now argue (online) with Dan about why you refuse to read his
favorite book. You can argue (online) with Ben about why you will
watch Battlestar Galactica but you won’t buy the books. You can even
argue (online) with Elizabeth about why neither of you will see the
Watchmen movie, should that monstrosity actually get made. The
greatest part of buying comics is arguing about comics—and now that
pursuit is not just limited to business hours. It’s the greatest
achievement in comics’ arguments since Brian Michael Bendis’ fatuously
overblown reputation (oh, we’re posting that as soon as we’re done
writing this).

***********

Riverfront Times 2000
Best Comics-In-Books Store

Among the reasons comics get so little respect are their ephemeral
packaging and serial publication. Although few comics are printed on
the cheap newsprint of old — which quickly yellows and crumbles –
even when slicked up by glossy paper and card-stock covers with
holograms and die-cuts and spot varnishes, comic books, despite their
misleading name, aren’t really books: They’re magazines, and usually
small ones at that, and those who don’t fetishize and obsessively
collect such periodicals tend to toss ‘em like last week’s People or
Newsweek. Worse, most comic-book stories are told over the course of
many (sometimes very many) issues, and unless you faithfully make a
weekly visit to the comic shop, chances are you’ll miss an issue,
resulting in an unpluggable plot hole. Fortunately, during the last 15
years or so, publishers have begun collecting extended narratives into
trade paperbacks and even hardcovers, making easily accessible what
once required absurd diligence. Of course, the other reason comics get
so little respect is their juvenile content, and no amount of gussied-
up packaging can disguise the puerile nature of most superhero “story
arcs.” But stroll into Star Clipper Comics & Games and you’ll find
dozens, even hundreds, of volumes on its walls, and most are not just
adolescent power fantasies. Try Joe Sacco’s Safe Area Gorazde, his
harrowing journalistic account of the Bosnian war. Or Tony
Millionaire’s darkly antic Maakies. Or Chris Ware’s gorgeously
designed Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid on Earth with its eye-
popping unfolding dust jacket. Or Alan Moore and Eddie Campbell’s From
Hell or Daniel Clowes’ David Boring or Seth’s It’s a Good Life If You
Don’t Weaken or … well, you get the picture. Now go get the words
and pictures.
***********

Riverfront Times 2004
Best Comic Book Store

Now that Star Clipper Comics has moved to its new location in the
Delmar Loop, there’s finally room for all of the great product that
used to be crammed into the old, very small (but charming) Big Bend
location. It’s all neatly laid out now, everything from the mainstream
comics everyone knows and loves to the incredible selection of graphic
novels and obscure rarities sought by the comics aficionado. Whether
it’s the latest Spider-Man or the newest installment of the
underground anthology series 20th Century Eightball, Star Clipper’s
got it — and the friendly staff knows where to find it.