Oh, poor Melvin, that dude cannot catch a break. Looking around Aaron’s website it appears that Melvin has been a character for awhile now, with him changing here and there as Aaron’s style evolved. Or it’s a bunch of different characters named “Melvin” and I’m just not understanding it because I’m parachuting into a situation where he’s been working with the character for years and I’m doing a quick skim of his website. This particular comic is an epic story about a fairly simple day. Aaron really takes the time to let the situations breathe, whether they’re deadly or mundane, which really helps with the sense of inevitability of the whole story. We start off with a view of Melvin’s normal routine, with a ticking clock problem left in place when he leaves to walk to work. Along his walk a tragedy occurs, as he’s entirely too close to a crashing airplane. He gets away without being hurt (or this would have been a very short comic), but not unscathed, which was plenty for his supervisor to notice and chastise. Our hero then remembers that he left his coffee pot on but, office culture being what it is, he doesn’t get permission to leave, so he has to wait for his lunch break. Is there also an obstacle over his break that prevents him from getting home promptly? Reader, you’d better believe it. He arrives home to the sample image below, which I just could not resist using. From here he returns to work, but as you might have guessed from that last panel, that doesn’t go well either. It’s a “three strikes and you’re out” rule at work, and if you’re wondering if there was also a third strike, there absolutely was, and you wouldn’t guess it in a million years. It’s a spellbinding journey, and I couldn’t help but root for the poor guy even though it was clear that he was doomed. Is this the winner of SPACE so far? Eh, it’s tacky to rank comics like that, but let’s just call it one of the better comics I got from a solid pile of them. $15
Posted by Kevin 
