While it's their past that unites them, it's their fabricated online identities – some more dangerous than others – that lead to their "real" lives colliding years later. Other Lives follows three former college classmates: a self-loathing journalist whose family secret is the least of his problems his girlfriend, whose obsession with getting married borders on Bridezilla status a conspiracy theorist who may or may not work for the Homeland Security but definitely lives with his mother and a divorced, unemployed gaming addict who lives in his car.
Best known today as the precursor to the Itchy and Scratchy characters in The Simpsons, this cult classic comic series is finally coming back into print in a gorgeous and affordable hardcover.
This silent comic series gained notoriety in the US when customs agents seized a shipment of Mattioli's books deemed pornographic, the work was subsequently made the subject of an obscenity trial (which was won by the publisher). In sum, a tour de force of unrelenting transgression, rendered in clean line art and dazzling pastel colors.Ĭonceived in the early '80s, Squeak the Mouse was originally serialized in the Italian underground comics magazine Frigidaire to much acclaim. And the comic's gratuitous bloodshed is not to be overshadowed by its crude humor and over-the-top sexcapades.
Laying full-on slasher horror onto wacky cartoon violence, Mattioli's characters embark on a sadistic bloodthirsty rampage, leaving a trail of mangled corpses and pools of blood in their wake. In the hands of renowned Italian cartoonist Massimo Mattioli, however, this classic premise is infused with a whole new perverse and anarchic energy. And Galvañ's visual style, anchored by a mastery of pastel and primary colors, will make you want to do so immediately.Īn outrageously cruel cat versus a wily mouse: a rivalry as old as time, popularized by the beloved Tom and Jerry cartoons of the '40s and '50s. Yet, it's also rife with futuristic flourishes like little robotic eggs that walk and talk, like anthropomorphic Alexas.Īt its heart, however, Afternoon at McBurger's is a timeless story about friendship and innocence and the discoveries of adolescence (both good and bad), with layers to be revealed only through multiple readings.
There are mean girls, and fast food, and BFFs with crappy older brothers, as well as familiar hints of 1990s design and fashion. Galvañ manages to create a vivid world that is both a recognizable and alien depiction of adolescence. Those who do, go to a room where they can view five minutes of one of three moments in their future. But there's a catch: not everyone who does gets the special prize. The "Once Party" menu, for ages 11 and up, can only be ordered once (of course). Hippy, Padre Puto, the Snowman, Baron Mungo, Red Tempest) that echoes the sheer visual imagination of Jack Kirby. Crumb said, "It's only lines on paper, folks!" It is also a howlingly funny book, filled with a rogues gallery of colorful comic book monsters (the Pollum, the Junipero Molestat, the mythical Forest Nimmy) and characters (T.A.C. Blubber veers between an absurdist satire of porn (and occasionally nature documentaries) as well as a defiant provocation to those unable to appreciate the difference between cartooning and obscenity. Elvis, John Dick, the Mentor), creatures (the Mau Guag, Doogs, and Orlats…), and anthropomorphs (the Cloarks, the Kekeppy) visit places where most comics fear to go. In this issue, the Decimator presents… The Rat Queens! And unfortunately for them, they are front and center in his most horrific red room broadcast yet! As seen on the YouTube channel sensation, Cartoonist Kayfabe, from the creator of X-Men: Grand Design and Hip Hop Family Tree!Ĭollecting the first five issues of Gilbert Hernandez's comic book series Blubber, an absurdly X-rated showcase for the most surreally transgressive of Hernandez's short stories.
The best selling, most talked about series of 2020 kicks off its second four-issue "season" with another self-contained mini-masterpiece of monthly comics storytelling.