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Comic Reviews, Dragon's Claws

DRAGON’S CLAWS #8: BEGiNNiNG OF THE END?

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Here we are at the beginning of 2024. Or should that be 1989? I took my Christmas decorations down yesterday (the 5th January is the 12th day as you know, and I like to enjoy that one final day with them), the snow on the blog’s logo has melted and it’s time to kick off the New Year with something not very new at all, the latest issues of Dragon’s Claws and Death’s Head, both available to buy today 35 years ago.

This striking yet funny cover has Slaughterhouse of The Evil Dead taking centre stage and inside they’re very much back in the thick of it. The Fastfax on the editorial page makes another mention of the Miami Bloodbath, this time linking it to this Game team (a dead ambulance crew in London has been killed with the same precision used in Miami). Cue Slaughterhouse and his new cohorts entering N.U.R.S.E. Central dressed as that crew has been described and accessing the upper managerial floors.

After losing three of his men in #2 to Dragon and his team, Slaughterhouse has recruited Hack, Rend and Slash who remind me somewhat of Hook, Link and Sinker, other creations of writer Simon Furman’s in Transformers. This isn’t the first (or indeed the second) time aspects of this comic seemed to contain a knowing nod towards that other title. Not much is made of these three, they’re really just here to make the numbers up, but Slaughterhouse and his true love, Death Nell play major roles this month and not just in administering a bit of chaos.

First we check in on the Dragon’s Claws HQ where Steel, Scavenger, Mercy and Digit are relaxing between missions (Scavenger fixing the hole created by a certain mechanoid in Death’s Head #2) and we find out Dragon himself has taken off after fielding a telephone call from the World Development Council’s Ambassador Golding, who we saw meeting Stenson and Deller last time in N.U.R.S.E. HQ.

Mercy is on top form after her recent run in with Scourge, her copycat from the previous two issues. It seems to have exorcised some ghosts for Mercy and she’s reinvigorated and ready for whatever lies ahead. However, what lies ahead is The Evil Dead. The team are called into action to stop their enemies from slaughtering everyone inside N.U.R.S.E. Even the shadowy Matron (seen above) is uneasy and soon we’re catching up with the people she’s trying to track down.

At the farm in Norwich Dragon is in need of restraining. Who could blame him after what happened with his family? Over a few pages here we get some surprising revelations and by the end of this chapter things seem to be heading towards a climax between the Claws and N.U.R.S.E. I can’t help but wonder if Simon knew the comic was going to be cancelled at this stage already or if this storyline, which I’d assumed would last a lot longer, was just the beginning of what he had in mind.

Geoff Senior’s art is powerful in these scenes combined with Steve White’s bold colours. I think the images he produced of an enraged Galvatron in Transformers are seared into my retinas. I’ll certainly never forget the impact they had on me. I can feel that same rage here in Dragon’s eyes, the powerful anger behind Golding’s and the desperation in Stenson’s. There’s no way you could read these few pages without the characters screaming at the top of their lungs in your head.

But even amongst all this tension there’s always a chance for a quick moment of levity, such is the craftsmanship of this comic’s writer and artist. When Stenson tries to threaten Dragon and Golding by telling them they’re out of their depth it backfires spectacularly, the ambassador seemingly suggesting if he doesn’t cooperate there’s nothing he can do to stop Dragon from killing him, to which Dragon responds by showing he’s more than up to the task.

It works, but you can see as Dragon walks away there’s a cheeky grin on his face. Despite not communicating their intentions with each other it’s clear the former Game player and Council ambassador are in sync with each other and want the same thing. It’s a surprising working relationship and fun to see it seemingly come out of nowhere here, these two men clearly working from the same page.

Meanwhile the rest of the team are taking on The Evil Dead to protect their employer. The three new recruits are making quite the impact but even amongst all the chaos Scavenger still has the ability to make light of things. He’s such a fun sadistic character. But it’s the match up between Steel and Death Nell, who we know from a previous issue used to be lovers, that really heats things up and I don’t mean that in the clichéd way.

We find out in this issue that N.U.R.S.E. is basically running a protection racket on all of the Game teams who were still playing when it was shut down, employing Dragon’s Claws as their enforcers and feeding them disinformation on their targets so they would think they were doing the right thing. This was hinted at when Dragon went up against The High Father in #3 and when another team was desperately worried about a non-payment to someone in #5.

As such, it’s a bit of a disappointment that this was the answer to the mystery all along. I’d guessed it months ago and so assumed it couldn’t be something as obvious, that it was misdirection. As a result I discounted the idea and was looking forward to finding out the complexities behind all of the mysteries. That’s not to say if the comic had continued it wouldn’t have kept developing the plot into something far bigger of course, but for now this seems to be it. Maybe the next couple of issues will prove me wrong.

After kissing him, Nell pleads with Steel to work with her like in the old days. She easily could’ve ripped out his throat with her jagged teeth during that kiss and so this has Steel questioning everything, asking himself if he should believe her and if they’re fighting the wrong people. The reader already knows he should be fighting N.U.R.S.E. but will we see a turn of fortunes for Nell in the remaining issues?

Matron starts cleaning house, eliminating her top managerial team in a Bond villain-esque way before moving on to a much more dangerous target. After containing Golding and Deller in a flaming death trap room, Stenson is the first of our main characters to die as he escapes only to unknowingly step into the same room as Slaughterhouse. However, only seconds later Dragon finds Slaughterhouse unconscious and barely alive on the floor before a voice in the darkness tells him they’re delighted to have the two of them “to play with now”.

Then we turn to the final page.

Okay, look, I know this is meant to be a shocking ending with the reveal of who Matron is but Dragon’s exclamation seems a bit over-the-top. With a name like ‘Matron’ and the glimpses we’ve seen I was expecting a woman in some form of nurse’s outfit (especially with the name of the company she runs) and if Dragon stood up her size isn’t really an issue either. Maybe in the 80s, when times were different this would’ve made an impact but nowadays she looks a bit like a lovely former manager of mine, her facial expression even matching the one my previous boss would pull when telling a particularly rude joke.

As a result, for me personally it’s hard to judge how this would’ve been received by readers at the time. As it stands it’s the first story moment in eight issues when I’ve been left a little disappointed so I can’t complain really. On the opposite page sits Steel’s fact-file with information on his father belonging to the Yakuza so apparently they’re still around thousands of years into the future.

It’s not confirmed here if Steel’s (or rather Ikeda’s) dad was killed so I’m assuming this could be yet another little breadcrumb of possible future storylines if the comic had been a success. Sadly we just won’t know. The letters page is conspicuous by its absence this issue. Not enough coming in? Or perhaps the comic’s cancellation gave them pause in answering questions about future stories?

Instead, two adverts and one of those Classifieds pages we saw all the time in Marvel UK comics make up the remainder of the comic. Marvel’s own promotion for three graphic novels isn’t the most inspired design but gets the point across and on the back page is an advert for a movie I’ve never heard of before, which is surprising given the director and that cast!

Just two issues of Dragon’s Claws remain and that makes me sad. Cliffhanger aside this has been a blast, although there’s a definite feeling of the pace very suddenly quickening and a lot of exposition happening. Only with hindsight does it feel like Simon is quickly trying to move the story towards a satisfying climax. At the time I don’t think anyone would’ve guessed that.

If I’m right then at least that means we should get more answers and hopefully a nice conclusion for most of our characters over the next couple of months. Perhaps some threads planted in earlier issues won’t get elaborated on but if the main ones get tied up instead of the story just suddenly stopping (like we saw with Havoc) then I’ll be very happy, I’m sure. The penultimate review will be here on Sunday 4th February 2024.

iSSUE SEVEN < > iSSUE NiNE

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Comic Reviews, Death's Head

DEATH’S HEAD 2: KiLLER COMEDY

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Well this is a turn up for the books, isn’t it? Previously guest starring in Dragon’s Claws #5 and being reconstructed beneath The ‘Pool of Greater Britain in 8162, where he’d been exiled by The Doctor when he bumped into him in the corridors of time, after disappearing from The Planet of Junk in 2007 where he helped the Autobots defeat the Chaos Bringer god Unicron (do keep up), ol’ Death’s Head is now the one welcoming the special guest stars to his own comic

You see, he’s been rebuilt by a Game team looking for revenge on Scavenger of Dragon’s Claws and as always business comes first, so up he pops in as characteristic a manner as ever. First though, don’t forget to subscribe to 12 issues of the comic that would only last for ten. Obviously Marvel UK had much bigger plans for their smaller US-sized comics. A sad reminder of that to kick things off with.

Alongside writer Simon Furman, penciller Bryan Hitch, letterer Annie Halfacree, colourist Nick Abadzis and editor Richard Starkings comes inker Dave Hine (Spawn, The Joker’s Asylum, Will Eisner’s The Spirit), who brings a completely different feel to proceedings, especially to any human characters who seem to emote more and have a rougher, harder edge to them. I approve. I still much prefer the original design of Death’s Head from Transformers though.

So the Freelance Peace-Keeping Agent has been sent to round up Scavenger rather than kill him, and deliver him to the Game team. The first half-dozen pages consist of their back and forth battle involving anything that comes to hand for Scavenger, including Scratch the dog! As ever, Death’s Head keeps his cool and even has time for the occasional quip before he finally overcomes his target.

When the rest of the team show up Dragon spots an “old friend” and they recover Scratch who leads them out into the wastelands towards the Chaney Maximum Security Prison, where criminals the World Development Council wanted to forget were sent. So forgotten were they that when an earthquake destroyed the prison the authorities didn’t attempt any rescue and just assumed all of those within had perished. They were wrong.

At this point we get a little insight into the past of Dragon and Scavenger, specifically how they first met. This was exciting to begin with for me as Scavenger is a favourite character and one I’d like to know more about, but I didn’t think we’d get the chance given the comic’s short lifespan. In the end though it’s pretty inconsequential, Dragon having his life saved seven years previous at the last moment by a silent Game player who disappeared just as quickly afterwards, Dragon vowing inwardly he’d recruit the stranger to the Claws next time they met.

Still, it’s interesting to have a flashback for these characters in this comic instead of their own. Death’s Head finds himself conflicted at this point. The Chain Gang had become agoraphobic from living underground for so long and they’d used Scavenger, a relatively new prisoner at the time, as their gopher to go and fetch food and supplies, tying an explosive device to his leg so he’d have to return. Eventually earning their trust, as soon as they removed the device Scavenger had legged it, and now the team has reconstructed the galaxy’s greatest bounty hunter (their words!) to recapture he who had betrayed them.

Death’s Head knows he’d have done exactly the same thing in Scavenger’s case, but money is money and a contract is a contract. However, such distaste does he have for this situation he’s set a timer counting down to the very second said contract expires. It’s at this point, while he’s lamenting his situation, that he meets the technical whizz who recreated him from his scrap parts, and co-star of the strip advert for the comic, Spratt.

Of course we know from the marketing that Spratt will end up working with Death’s Head so it’s interesting to see how this relationship starts. Spratt is basically brushed aside, despite his obvious intelligence and technical abilities. The “eyes on the back of my head” line will come back to haunt our anti-hero before this issue is over, but at this point in the story there’s no indication of how they’ll end up together. I like the build up.

Scavenger’s teammates then turn up and basically all hell breaks loose. As you’d expect, really. But that doesn’t mean the humour has been forgotten about, not even for one page, as Steel finds out in a rather painful way. With the clock counting down on his wrist, Death’s Head even surprises himself with what he’s thinking while he fights.

He finds himself respecting Dragon, something that simply hasn’t happened with a human before. Not that he takes it easy on him of course. Nope, he’s still under contract for another nine seconds and will continue to fight just as hard until that time runs out. Meanwhile, the leader of The Chain Gang, Fox, chases Scavenger through the crumbling prison. However, his wish to kill clouds his judgement and he doesn’t realise that Scavenger isn’t really running away from him.

He’s being deliberately led somewhere but his prey is very convincingly playing the desperate victim, right up until he jumps on Fox, wrapping his whole body around his head and obscuring his vision. It’s all been a ruse and suddenly Fox finds himself in the most terrifying of places. It’s not the prison itself nor the earthquake damaged cells ready to collapse and kill everyone at any moment. No, now he finds himself outside.

Inside, our two title characters are still fighting and Dragon is taking quite a bit of punishment when, with his spiked metal ball raised to come down hard on Dragon’s head, Death’s Head checks his wrist and just stops. Walking away, he apologises for the fight lasting longer than it should’ve and blames his timer for running slow!

It really is the only way this fight could’ve ended; neither of these two could actually win anymore, they’re heroes of their own comics after all. In fact, as the authorities arrive to clean up and arrest The Chain Gang, Dragon looks up and sees Death’s Head looking down from a hill nearby… and waves. This sight of mutual respect has me wishing both these comics had lasted longer because I would’ve loved to have seen these two slowly become friends and even work together at some point.

As for the story itself, Scavenger insists Fox is treated with leniency as he was just looking out for the community he cared for but had just gone about it the wrong way. It all ends with Spratt being the first person to ever sneak up on Death’s Head, and probably the first to offer to be his partner. After all, the mechanoid is from a different time and doesn’t know this world, so Spratt offers to help him with that while handling the business side of things. He’s a free man now and knows a good thing when he sees it. Death’s Head refuses and walks off… then the chapter ends with Spratt following anyway and continuing to talk about his proposition. To which Death’s Head merely sighs. And the reader laughs.

A couple of Marvel UK adverts round off the issue. The first is for Dragon’s Claws and uses the excellent Dave Gibbons cover from the current issue, while the other advert is somewhat more cryptic. For a comic that wouldn’t even turn up until June of the following year, six months hence, Marvel UK were certainly playing the long game here.

I remember this particular promo appearing in The Real Ghostbusters and Transformers comics week after week, month after month. Even at that young age I began thinking, “Enough already, just tell us more!” The Sleeze Brothers, namely El Ape and Deadbeat would follow Death’s Head into the pages of Doctor Who Magazine first but that wouldn’t even be until March. I guess you’ll just have to wait until then to find out more… because yes, The Sleeze Brothers will be joining the OiNK Blog in 2024.

For just the second time we come to the end of an issue of Death’s Head and I really like the fact all of the pieces have taken a couple of issues to put in place. Actually, I’m looking forward to seeing how Death’s Head’s and Spratt’s partnership works out, so I suppose everything isn’t quite set yet. While this and Dragon’s Claws are very natural sister publications, this one is definitely a lot funnier and lighter, despite its title character’s name and job! Great fun so far. The next review will be after the festive season (right after it in fact) so come back to kick off the New Year in style on Sunday 7th January 2024.

iSSUE ONE < > iSSUE THREE

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Comic Reviews, Dragon's Claws

DRAGON’S CLAWS #7: NO MERCY!

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As I mentioned last month the cover for this issue of Dragon’s Claws caught my eye. Finally, I’ve been able to take a closer look at the first guest artist cover and it’s none other than Dave Gibbons. Dave’s work has featured on the blog before, namely in the hilarious Superhero’s Day Off in OiNK, written by Lew Stringer which lampooned the comics Dave would draw. This is a great Dragon’s Claws cover, but does the inside match up to this first impression?

The Fastfax catches us up on the secondary plot from last issue which spills over to become our main story this month, with Mercy stopping herself from falling to certain death by grabbing a power line, nearly dislocating her shoulder and ploughing through a barber shop window! The Fastfax sums up the whole “criminals who operate about the law” Knight Rider-esque vibe of the people she used to hunt and who her copycat is now killing.

We also get a quick introduction to the L.W.J., the League of World Justice which is investigating the World Development Council, the organisation behind The Game and the bosses of N.U.R.S.E. Will the LWJ prove to be just as corrupt in this future Earth of 8162? Will we find out more in the next three months?

For now, Mercy is not as down-and-out as we think as she springs back up to confront her copycat, Scourge.

Simon Furman is paying homage to the Marvel UK series that made him

Hmm, last month in Dragon’s fact-file a previous Claws member was called ’Megaton’ and now this lady is called Scourge. I don’t think these are coincidences somehow, so either writer Simon Furman can’t think of any new names or he’s paying homage to the Marvel UK series that made him, namely The Transformers. Clearly, I think it’s the latter.

Scourge is hunting a villain named Judden, a small, fat slimy guy who reminds me a bit of Penguin. He was cleared of all charges but Scourge is convinced the system is corrupt and that he bought his freedom. (Now we know the Fastfax was laying some groundwork.) Interestingly, it’s never revealed if he’s innocent or not. Perhaps it was to be picked up on in a later issue but his story isn’t the point here.

Scourge is very much a mirror image of Mercy before she accidentally killed an innocent woman and joined the Claws, now fighting from the right side of the law. Scourge even carries the same Black Dagger symbol Mercy used. Meanwhile, while assessing the mess at Dragon’s farm in Norwich, Stenson mentions someone called ‘Matron’ for the first time, giving the smallest of clues to the real boss.

Scavenger’s mutt also gets an easier name to roll off the tongue than ‘Lady Killer’. Scratch will end up playing an important role in this issue’s story, more important than any of the other male members of the team. Then a couple of pages later we catch a glimpse of this Matron person and how the all-important Stenson is really nothing more than another gopher, another cog in the machine.

It’s all very cloak and dagger and I hope we have time over the next three months to get some answers. Having the head of N.U.R.S.E. called ‘Matron’ and wearing what appears to be a nurse-like hat behind the shadows has me intrigued as to the real nature of this organisation. Obviously the Claws are key to her plans but what is this empire she’s built up? What is N.U.R.S.E. really? What do they control already?

Mercy easily tracks Scourge down to the roof of a shopping mall as she’s basically living Mercy’s earlier life. Knowing she’d need a place just like this to rest, recuperate and stash weapons, Mercy reveals she killed an innocent woman during her revenge spree, that she’d become a murderous menace just like those she was fighting against. But it falls on deaf ears as Scourge is just as entrenched in her vendetta as Mercy was.

Accusing Mercy of being brainwashed a fight ensues and once again our heroine finds herself falling off another tall building. At least this time the landing is much easier on her. Meanwhile, the “guest” referred to is Ambassador Golding of the W.D.C., who Dragon’s Claws rescued from a rebel group gone rogue in #4. Back then he got to speak to the group and Dragon promised him he had a lot more to find out.

It appears he’s done so. He tells Stenson while inspecting the Claws’ HQ that N.U.R.S.E.’s independence has come into question, that there are fears of the Game team being misused against their knowledge and he demands to meet Matron. Stenson objects but then Deller pops up for the first time after last issue’s shoot-out, ready and willing to be questioned. I’m finding all of this particularly fascinating but for now it’s just ticking over until it can be addressed further in an upcoming issue (I hope).

Back to the action and the object of Scourge’s revenge is having a night out at a club so the Claws are assigned to undercover protection detail, although Dragon’s more concerned about the whereabouts of Mercy and why she didn’t talk to the team about what’s going on. Distracted, they miss Scourge, who’s easily able to identify the team in their weak disguises and sets off the fire alarms with a smoke bomb.

Among the chaotic evacuation she grabs Mister Judden and takes him to a back corridor to force him to confess to some previous killings. Adamant that he’s innocent, Scourge doesn’t care, she wants a confession to justify what she’s about to do. As I said, we don’t find out if he’s innocent or not but that’s not the point, judgement has come first and the evidence will bend to it rather than the other way around.

After this page comes my only disappointment with this chapter when the final confrontation isn’t even seen! Although, story-wise, I can understand why the fight between Mercy and Scourge happens off-camera (as the phrase goes) it still feels like an anti-climax. The Claws come to her rescue to find Judden saved but Scourge lying dead. Mercy just tells Dragon she’s faced some of her own demons that day and walks off. As she leaves a confused Dragon turns to Steel who simply says, “There but for the grace of God”, pointing out how Mercy could’ve shot to wound.

Mercy’s fact-file essentially ruins all of the drama surrounding the character

A cliffhanger involving the return of a newly assembled Evil Dead takes second place to this temporary (I hope only temporary) end to Mercy’s development as the most interesting of the Dragon’s Claws team. It has expertly answered some questions and opened her up a bit while at the same time leaving plenty of mysteries (and adding new ones) to solve in the future. That is, until we come to the next page in the comic which somewhat ruins that brilliantly written ending.

Mercy is the star of this month’s fact-file and while it starts off with some interesting background, such as her father being of Irish descent and the tragic loss of her mother to cystic fibrosis, it goes into far too much of her own mysterious background which I’ve enjoyed being drip fed in these past two issues, essentially ruining all of the drama surrounding the character. In fact, by the time I finished this page it felt like there were no more mysteries to be discovered!

This feels like a very strange thing for the comic to do. Why give the game away for so much of her character in an extra page separate from the strip? Maybe as a kid I’d have enjoyed getting these insights but all I can think of now is that the intrigue is completely gone. Not through intelligent, enjoyable storytelling like the other characters either, but in a chunk of text instead. It’d also mean any graphic novel reprint would most likely leave readers unaware of these details. Strange, indeed.

On the letters page a reader asks how Digit ended up with a computer instead of a human brain and the answer given is that this will form the basis of a future storyline. Seems rather unfair on Mercy to be honest, unless of course a future Digit fact-file spoils this for us too. Anyway, not wishing to end on a sour note I’ll leave the final words to Mercy who got the whole back page to herself as a nice extra and tell you that the date for the review of Dragon’s Claws #8 will be Sunday 7th January 2024.

iSSUE SiX < > iSSUE EiGHT

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Comic Reviews, OiNK Contributors

NOUNS: A DAViD LEACH EXPERiMENT

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I need to explain the premise of this comic’s existence before the review, so bear with me. Okay, so Web3 is a new-fangled idea for the next version of the internet which is meant to de-centralise the whole thing away from the small group of companies some feel have too much control over it. Web3 is based around things you may have heard about such as blockchains and token-based currencies and NFTs. (If you’re having to search for meanings for these terms I sympathise.)

It has its sceptics who believe it would simply take control away from one group of people and place it in the hands of another and that without regulation a whole heap of trouble could be the result (but Elon Musk hates it so it has that going for it). The push continues and many are behind the idea. I personally have no opinion because I’m lost already and I’m the one writing this introduction! Anyway, this is where the ‘Nouns’ come in.

You know that whole NFT craze that seems to have died a death? That’s what these are. Every day (apparently forever) a new Noun character will be created and sold at auction. Despite that character being bought by someone it remains devoid of ownership rights and anyone can use that character in any way they see fit. Seems counterproductive but apparently if they’re popping up everywhere then that’ll increase their worth to the person who owns them. Clear? Nope? Thought so, but this is where we find ourselves.

Whether this reverses the downward trend to obscurity that NFTs seem to be on is anyone’s guess but we’re here to read this premiere issue of a new comic based on the idea. Why? Because it’s been written by OiNK’s very own David Leach of Psycho Gran and Dudley DJ fame. In a nutshell, apparently public domain brands are going to “change the game”, the plan being that creators could then concentrate on the quality of what they produce and smaller creatives could share this space. So as a starting point does the Nouns comic work?

The story concentrates on a group of Nouns (basically human bodies with a wide range of completely random heads, anything from an onion to an old boot) making a pilgrimage to Nountown, where all of their kind came from, to meet their creator. It’s all quite overwhelming to begin with; it feels like all the characters are trying to talk at once in a sort of random, unfiltered fashion, perhaps like that used online by people who would have these as their avatars.

Over the first few pages it has a feeling of promoting these NFTs rather than telling a good story or developing characters, but thankfully this seems to be by design. It gives us a sense of their chaotic nature and the world in which they inhabit. In the second half of the comic it settles a bit, we get a decent (and funny) plot and two or three of these strange creatures come to the fore to become genuinely identifiable and likeable. 

It’s all drawn endearingly by illustrator Danny Schlitz, David handles the lettering too and colours are by Braga. It looks like a fun, innocent little children’s comic and for the most part it is. There’s some nudge-nudge, wink-wink bits of non-explicit adult humour that teenage readers will get a kick out of and which I found genuinely funny, but for the most part it’s child-friendly. Different audiences will get different things out of it, basically.

Pay attention and there are some genuinely hilarious callbacks to earlier scenes and dialogue towards the end of this first chapter. Once the plot itself gets going it’s fun and topical too. I won’t ruin it for you because it’s a nice surprise and the best part of the comic, so I wouldn’t want to take that away from the experience for any potential readers. I’ll just say it’s bang up to date and involves climate change, fast food and veganism in a clever way that’ll have you laughing.

The narrative captions in particular have many of the best lines. It’s a shame then that a few spelling and grammatical errors seem to have slipped through. These give it a sense of maybe being somewhat rushed to get it out into the market (while the market these are based on is crashing). I may be wrong of course, but it’s just the feeling I get. David’s name is also spelled wrong on the credits page so it may have been more to do with the editing rather than our lettering friend. These few errors (and it’s only a few) don’t take away from the fun to be had though.

At the end of the comic are adverts for various other projects based on Web3 and Nouns and they all went over my head but then again I’m not the target audience for such things. Speaking of which, this comic does have a very specific target audience, basically those clued into everything it’s based upon. I am very much not one of those people, so the fact I genuinely found this to be such a good laugh should say a lot.

I can see what the comic is attempting and it’s an audacious idea. Based on its originality alone it deserves some success. With David at the helm it has a good chance. As a fan of his OiNK work there are moments here that harken back to the best of his Psycho Gran strips and that same sense of dark, chaotic humour. It’s not often a truly experimental comic comes along and as pig pals I’m sure we can all appreciate that.

Nouns is a mini-series from Titan Comics and is available from all good comic book stores.

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MONOLiTH: AN ACE ODYSSEY

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Hot on the heels of Lew Stringer’s Fanzine Funnies which reprinted the misadventures of The Prisoner’s large white ball, including his attempts to get another acting job after the cult television series ended, comes fellow OiNK cartoonist and Psycho Gran creator David Leach’s Monolith. Based upon the flat matte slab and key mysterious element at the centre of the plot to the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey, just like the Monolith itself this is a comic of few words. Or rather, no words for the most part.

While it only appeared in two films (Stanley Kubrick’s original and 2010: The Year We Make Contact) it appears their lack of a long and satisfying Hollywood career wasn’t for the lack of trying. Each of David’s three A5-size comics features 25 full-page movie poster-like illustrations of the Monolith in key leading roles from some of the most successful and memorable films in cinematic history. Naturally I’ll start with my favourite movie of all time.

While I half expected the Monolith to be in place of the shark, with perhaps a corner poking out of the water, the point here is that they’ve auditioned for lead human roles in all of these films, in this case the character of Quint from Jaws who was just perfectly played by Robert Shaw. Another Steven Spielberg movie favourite of mine is also a highlight from this first issue, as is a certain slice of 80s cinema magic starring the hugely missed Prince.

As you can see there are no captions or movie titles on any of these and part of the fun is the surprise when you see an image and realise it’s one of your favourite films. There were a couple here and there throughout the three issues that took me a few seconds to work out which film they were simply because I wasn’t that familiar with the original promotional image, but needless to say you should know them all, or at least the vast majority.

The middle issue starts off strong with a Free Willy piece, the best page in the whole issue for me. I just found it so funny to see this great lumbering rectangle replace the natural, elegant imagery of an orca. (That’ll be one hell of a belly flop.) So maybe he could’ve been Jaws’ shark after all. The Monolith’s impression of a Dalek somehow captures the cheap and thrown-together feel of those 60s serials, and for me David’s take on The Exorcist poster is infinitely better than the movie was.

At the rear of each issue are the answers to which movies have been pastiched and the Monolith explains why he didn’t get each and every part. For a movie prop they’ve certainly been subjected to an awful lot of allergies in their professional career. Thankfully that didn’t stop them from enjoying a full and fulfilling life if #3 is anything to go by. After a handful of new movie posters the rest of the final issue is made up of photos from the Monolith’s personal albums, beginning with that fateful audition day.

As well as having the obligatory James Bond movie poster this issue has images of all the key moments from an average person’s life. Such events as their first bike, first school play, Hallowe’ens and Christmases and even graduation are all given a new, and very funny, makeover thanks to David’s imagination.

This is just a small selection of the 75 illustrations David has completed for Monolith. Everything from Alien to Singing in the Rain, from Citizen Kane to Dirty Dancing is included. But you don’t have to take my word for how enjoyable this mini-series is, also included is a page of praise from some of those given an early look at the comics including a couple of notable OiNK alumni, namely co-creator Tony Husband and cartoonist Davey Jones.

Comedian Rob Deering gets the best quote, though: “Thanks – I’ll have a look and get back to you.”

This irreverence kind of sums up David’s work better than anything. If you were a fan of his OiNK contributions then I can’t recommend these highly enough. At £5 per issue you can get yours from Dead Universe Comics in Aylesbury by contacting them on 07852 836307.

Go on, treat yourself, or since the festive season is just around the corner throw a Christmas hint at a loved one!

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