By Joe Daly
Publisher: Fantagraphics
ISBN:978-1-60699-544-0
Compared to the other two volumes this is mighty thick tome, and judging from how the story had been going in those previous books I thought this was going to be a double-sized wrap-it-all-up finale. Well I got that wrong.
This truly is a massively ambitious, hugely weird but utterly compelling story of a group of misfits on a role-playing game-style quest that somehow gets better and better with each ludicrous turn and bonkers encounter. If they're not encountering wild Womraxes or dangerous paths then they're discovering the strongest weed in the universe and taking on nefarious bandits who leave them with not even the clothes on their backs.
The quest itself is to gather the parts of the Atlantean Resonator Guitar, which continues to go well as the characters grow in experience, and all this is richly recorded along with the bizarre items, clothing and objects they collect (Calloused Kneepads of the Camel, anyone?).
The artwork is black and white throughout, with lots of detailed shading and contrast. Several pages can go by with the characters just walking through forest, with each panel punctuating the time taken to travel by not actually showing much new at all, but all lovingly drawn all the same. Anyone else would condense this down to a couple of panels with the latter one saying LaterÂ….
This is a series that breaks a few rules, challenges some more and entertains throughout. There should be more books like this out there.
And if you like that: Try Charles Burns' X'ed Out and The Hive.
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