Young, Max – Blacked Out #1

July 24, 2012

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Blacked Out #1

I would never recommend that somebody buy a mini comic because it will eventually be worth something, as they suffer the same fate as most other comics: it takes decades, if that, before they’re worth more than the cover price, and even then you have to find somebody willing to buy them. That being said, if the sheer quality of Max’s comics doesn’t convince you (and there’s plenty of that in the two issues I’ve seen so far), this guy is so clearly going to be a big deal in comics someday that you’d be stupid not to buy these early minis. The technical term for his art is “crazy awesome fantastic,” he seems to be doing a nice job of building up his characters, and he also looks to have a long term plan for this one. I should probably talk about the plot at least a little bit and no, that ridiculous cover of his was not a fake-out. This comic starts with our hero waking up in a bar from being blackout drunk, only to discover that every biker in the bar has been either beaten senseless or killed (his friend says killed, but I think there may be a few more repercussions for something like that than are depicted here). They go back to their apartment, where we see that the two of them are roommates with a young lady who appears to be his concerned platonic friend. They tell him that the can’t hold his liquor, what a problem that is, and eventually wander off to a party with all the booze they can drink for $30. You’d think that you could see where this is going from here, but you’d be wrong. At this party our hero meets up with an older redneck man who’s been watching our hero, and he decides to impart his wisdom about being blackout drunk on the dude. It’s so brilliant that I don’t even want to give it away here, but kudos to Max simply for coming up with that idea. I’m really looking forward to future issues of this one, and you can always tell a book is a winner when it instantly raises your opinion of the past work of the artist. More, please! $3


Young, Max – Jetpack Shark #1

March 8, 2012

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Jetpack Shark #1

It is very obviously silly to take a comic called “Jetpack Shark” too seriously, but because I’m such a colossal dork I just have to mention something that’s been bugging me. In the page I sampled below our hero is getting his teeth knocked out by the villain of the first piece. Which is all well and good, but on the next page he has a two full rows of teeth (as he’s a shark), no problems at all. I know that this isn’t meant to be taken all that seriously, but silly comic law dictates that the main character has to keep the damage inflicted on him for the duration of a story. Using the same silly comic logic he can have two full rows of teeth in the next story, but failing to remove the teeth for the first story makes it seem like he’s not taking any damage, which makes it seem like he was never in any danger. Which I know he wasn’t, as the comic is named after him and all, but this is the kind of thing that bugs me. Yes, I am aware that that most likely means that I have a problem and not necessarily Max. Oh, and a shark biting the head off somebody wouldn’t result in intestines spilling through the new hole, as there are no intestines up there. Whew! Now I can talk about how much I enjoyed the rest of this comic. Unless all of you readers have already been scared off by my relentless nitpicking, that is. So! Two stories in this one, and the first deals with an angry shark at a bar. Two other gentlemen want the shark to kill an enemy of theirs, and this enemy also happens to be the guy that took Jetpack Shark’s eye. Which would be a huge problem for a shark, as that giant snout of theirs cuts off most peripheral vision… clearly I’ve been thinking through the angles on this a little too much. What can I say, I’ve been watching the new BBC Sherlock Holmes series. Anyway, the first story deals with our shark getting revenge for his missing eye. There are also boobs a’plenty, which removed any idea that I might have had that this was meant for all ages. The next story is the origin story, which I thought was a nice touch, as we got to see him in action for a bit before learning how it all happened. Would you be surprised to learn that there were Nazis involved? More mayhem occurs, and this time it’s some good old-fashioned “let’s kill some Nazis!” fun. The art is amazing and damned near perfect for this type of story (the man can depict a panel zoomed in a shark’s eye just as well as he can a shark flying through a closed window) and the stories themselves were a pile of fun. There’s more to come, so I’m curious to see how this story develops, if at all, or if he’s just going to go with mayhem until he gets sick of it. There are benefits to both paths. No price, so let’s say $4 at a guess.