The First Issue of, "Moonjiggle," is Spicy, Clever, and Hilarious

Space Between Entertainment is a smaller independent publisher I am familiar with, as I've followed the work of creator Pat Shand for years and he does a lot with them--which makes sense as he founded and owns the company! SBE recently released print and digital copies of a new series, "Moonjiggle." It is written by Dave Franchini with art by Bamburat. It is a bit of a tongue-in-cheek satire that heavily mocks concepts of censorship through sci-fi metaphors. A regime dedicated to eliminating concepts of pleasure and free love known as The Puritanus (a bit of clever wordplay with that name), is after a ragtag group made up of sexy (and often horny) space folk due to how they've got an artifact capable of directing the holder to a galaxy full of romance/pleasure/etc. It is a fun parody of old sci-fi that isn't outright pornographic (there are plenty of non-sexual moments and jokes) but has some panels that are definitely explicit. Don't let the action-packed or titillating moments overshadow the fact that this first issue is packed full of clever symbolism, however. One could easily use the lens of our present-day society and its views of sexuality in any form beyond what is heteronormative and, "Traditional/vanilla," as our current-day society has its own, "Puritanus," forces.

Bamburat's art is superb, whether providing readers with quite detailed examples of gentilia, fights breaking out, or spaceships rocketing to safety. "Moonjiggle," is the perfect blend of having a vintage, "Sexplotation," sci-fi vibe (gotta love a classic like, "Barbarella,") mixed with some sharp political satire. Should that sound like a good time, I'd highly recommend getting a copy in digital or physical form for yourself!

5 out of 5 Stars.

Rant Reviews: Checking-In With the Small-To-Medium-Sized Publishers

Not That Long Ago...
Pretty recently I reviewed an assortment of books from the big publishers--Marvel, DC, and Image. I thought it would be good to check-in with them and discuss the books I was reading and enjoying. Well, I also am a huge fan of the books put out by the more medium-sized as well as smaller/indie publishers, so of course I only felt it appropriate to discuss comics from those too.

Maybe Lesser Known, Not Lesser Quality
Wyrd
Dark Horse is probably the biggest publisher around to not quite qualify as massive but still qualify as a good deal bigger than indie. That said, as a bigger-yet-not-too-big publisher it can have the power (and nerve) to publish something a bit edgier. "Wyrd," and its second issue is an example of that. Following a supernaturally-powerful man employed by an unclear Governmental power, Pitor Wyrd fights against other mysterious entities requiring his expertise to handle In this issue he combats a British politician who has gone mad from an occult ritual that involved having sex with a pig in order to gain power and special abilities. Also, it is made abundantly clear the politician is David Cameron, who shamefully resigned from his position as Prime Minister after the mess that is Brexit was voted for (odd fact: there are actual rumors about Cameron and a pig, albeit a dead one, as well). So yeah, a weirdly political and nasty story that is funny and gross can be found within this comic. The back-up yarns also penned by writer Curt Pires are even more twisty, with an assortment of vignettes in Nazi Germany, the year 2049, and a surreal visit to a time-traveling city run by a Hunter S. Thompson-esque fellow. It is all very weird, not unlike the comic's title, but it is my kind of off-kilter storytelling so I dig it.
4.5 out of 5 stars.

Babyteeth #14
Donny Cates once was a little-known writer who gave us such cool works as, "Buzzkill," with the equally talented but lesser-known artist Geoff Shaw, a man with whom he still often collaborates. Now Cates is a huge name who seems to be writing all the notable books at Marvel (with Shaw illustrating some of them) but before Cates signed that exclusivity deal with the company owned by the House of Mouse he started this weird little series at Aftershock Comics and keeps plugging away at it, even if issues only seem to come out every three months or so now.

A dark comedy about a girl who gives birth to an Anti-Christ (one seems to be born every couple of decades) and has to deal with all the forces both pleased by and opposed to this, "Babyteeth," is Cates operating with basically no filter, and artist Garry Brown complimenting it perfectly. This issue has our heroes (the immediate and extended family of the baby) running into none other than Lucifer/Satan himself as they've gone to Hell on a rescue mission for some other family members. Satan is pretty chill though, with his own beach-house and states he'd honestly rather not invade Earth and lose, but knows God will make him do it. This leads to a shocking-twist, that God basically makes all these magic babies be born and Jesus was essentially one--e.g. there is no, "Anti-Christ," as all the babies are basically just the same magical beings and the most famous was Christ. It's strange, edgy, and anyone who is super-religious and can't take a joke will hate this series, which makes me love it all the more. Now, if only issues didn't take forever to come out, that would make me even more joyous.
5 out of 5 stars.

Wulfborne #1
SCOUT Comics was my independent publisher of the year thanks to their stellar assortment of books and as, "Wulfborne," shows with its debut, they have not slowed at putting out great stuff. "Wulfborne," has a bit of a minimalist plot, but by this issue's end we see the overall idea is how a hero wants a witch to help him get over a broken heart--but the witch quite likely can't be trusted. The imagery that accompanies our hero facing various threats in his journey to find the witch is great, some swords-and-magic-style stuff with a cool creepy vibe. Writer and artist Brian Middleton has me intrigued by the pieces of story he has given us so far and gives us some beautiful imagery resulting in my interest being very piqued--I look forward to more, in other words!
4 out of 5 stars.

Belladonna: Fire and Fury #11
This issue the comic outright states what I discussed in a previous post it had been hinting at for some time, namely that the protagonist, Belladonna, is in fact the villain of the comic. Sure, she fights and kills some people even worse than her, but we've basically been unwittingly rooting for someone who has slowly made it abundantly clear she is the bad-guy. Credit to writer, Patrick Shand, who very carefully had the story unveil our "Hero," was actually a terrible person over this mini-series, with Boundless Comics showing yet again even if their comics are loaded with cheesecake-art and graphic scenes of sex they also can work in some damn fine storytelling. If I may spoil the end of this issue, it appears Belladonna meets a gruesome end for her evil deeds, but I'm betting that seeing as there have been other times she seems defeated that she hasn't truly been stopped and the next issue will have a clever twist in regards to how deceased (or not) she truly is.
4 out of 5 stars.

Atomic Robo: Dawn of a New Era #3
I've been a fan of the character, "Atomic Robo," since his debut mini-series at Red 5 years ago before the property moved to IDW (its current publisher). Mini-series about the smart-and-sweet robot generally are good fun, and this book has been so far, albeit I feel like so many plot-lines are happening at once it makes for a slightly jumbled read. There are stories about one researcher stuck in a time-loop, vampire-monsters from another dimension being fought by a man once thought dead, Robo teaching another sentient robot about the world, and there is a team of new researchers learning the ropes--all this is crammed into a standard-length comic! I have the feeling everything is going to come together at some point, but right now all the events going on simultaneously is a tad disorienting and makes me feel like the overall comic is moving along a little slow. It still is good fun, I just hope it starts merging the stories so it can pick up the pace before too long.
3.5 out of 5 stars. 

Smaller Companies, Big Ideas
Whether these publishers are not massive yet still solid in output (Dark Horse, IDW), or more indie in regards to their size (Aftershock, Boundless, Scout Comics), they all can make some quality reads and have some fantastic concepts/ideas expressed within their illustrated yarns.

"Lookers: Ember," #11 Review

The 11th and final issue of "Lookers: Ember," ends as it began--having just the right mixture of self-awareness and self-indulgence to be a fun read. Published by the more cheesecake-focused imprint of Avatar Press, Boundless Comics, this series mashed-up two entites who had previously appeared in their own one-shots (Ember and the Lookers) into one surreal and interesting story. The Lookers are private investigators who specialize in helping women at risk of having private photos or videos leaked by vengeful ex-boyfriends/husbands, and Ember is a super-powered celebrity who can manipulate fire and utilizes that to achieve movie-stardom.

The focus of the series itself is how Ember has a sex-tape stolen of her and and a U.S. congressman, which results in a myriad of interested parties trying to acquire it from drug-lords hoping to blackmail the politician to so-called, "Men's Rights Activists," hoping to smear the name of Ember. Also, lots of graphically illustrated sex occurs between men and women, women and women, and so forth because this series had enough plot to apparently not have it be in the, "Adult," section of Previews magazine (besides some really risque covers) for people ordering it, but boy-howdy this book can be pretty raunchy. The weird thing about the mini-series, "Lookers: Ember," as well as the one-shots that preceded it that made me love it enough to consider it one of my favorite mini-series/maxi-series of 2017, is that it can at times be kind of genius despite at least half the audience probably just buying it for the T&A (which is admittedly very well-illustrated along with all the other story-elements thanks to the artwork by Gabriel Andrade and back-up story by Christian Zanier).

Every issue has been loaded with observations about internet culture/the digitization of of sex, sexism (the MRA group and their twisted logic are soundly mocked), and the idea is heavily explored how it is depressing to even think we would need people to be hired to help women suffering from threats of revenge-porn. It is becoming a more and more common news story these days as jilted exes purposely put private pictures and videos of women who trusted a partner enough to send private such imagery online for all to see in hopes of basically slut-shaming a woman for the, "Crime," of being a sexual being. Besides exploring a lot of concepts the book did interesting things with its storytelling too, jumping around in time enough that it wasn't annoying but instead set-up interesting plot twists. Plus, fun and weird characters were introduced like one finally taken down in this concluding issue, "Cobra," a sex-obsessed drug-lord who becomes absurdly violent after having his--ahem--member shot off by the Lookers--he then finds his only pleasure in life that makes him feel manly now is hurting others (a lot of psychological concepts to unpack there for sure). Much appreciation is due to writer Patrick Shand for such a well-written series.

"Lookers: Ember," has its characters often having sex, but it never treats the idea as something dirty, instead trying to shame the haters. It is a book that says being monogamous, poly, or any other configuration of a relationship one wants is fine, and if you say otherwise or are a jerk the Lookers will beat -up and/or Ember will quite literally burn you. There is just enough self-aware winking at the reader weaved into the series that you don't feel like you're reading some silly dirty comic so much as a cleverly sarcastic mixture of action, social commentary, and saucy romance. This final issue does all this and sets up the possibility of future storylines that has my interest piqued as well. This last issue of, "Lookers: Ember," is just as great as the first and the lead-in one-shots. I ecstatically rate it...
5 out of 5 stars.