Random Happenstance

Cowboys never quit!

From Scud the Disposable Assassin #5, "Corvette Summer" Created, written, and illustrated by Rob Schrab.


Good advice there, particularly since I feel like I've been blogging in my sleep the last couple of days. Lot of home stuff to deal with this week, the last bits of the basement, and some other nonsense. It's all chores that need to be taken care of, but I could care less about, if that makes sense; so I don't want to let extraneous matters prevent me from doing what I actually care about, like play with the kids, exercise, crap out a post...

For those among you who never saw this book, or the game, be sad. Scud was the story of a robot, a disposable assassin, as you might have guessed. Purchased out of a vending machine to take out a lab full of monsters, mid-firefight Scud accidentally saw the warning label on his own back:

Scud Disposable Robot Assassin: Heartbreaker Series 1373

This Unit will Self-Destruct Upon Termination of Target

Realizing he was doomed if he killed his primary target (the monster Scud would later name Jeff, who only spoke in samples of videogames and TV shows) Scud instead shot it's arms and legs off, took it to a hospital, and had it put on life-support. Needing money to keep the monster alive, Scud sought work as a freelance hitman, which led to the Cyborg Mafia, giant linking robots stolen from the Yakuza, the zombies of Voodoo Ben Franklin, werewolves, the true reason for the Rapture, the Four Horsemen, and a lot of comedy.

So, I know I've complained about how Scud and Rob Schrab pretty much vanished off the face of comics, but I keep harping on it because it was a completely unpretentious comic that I really enjoyed. Of course, circa 1994 it was still more or less expected for a comic to come out on some kind of schedule: monthly, bi-monthly, quarterly...whenever the hell you feel like doing it. In that aspect, Schrab may have been a trailbreaker, but if he was still doing it, I'd be happy with an issue a year. After all, I don't give Evan Dorkin or Adrian Tomine any grief, and they make All-Star Batman and Robin the Boy Wonder seem timely.