Random Happenstance

It happens about once a month or so: I go into the comic shop and spend more on quarter books than new comics. That's partially just due to when the books fall, and the only new comic I had today was Captain America, which is consistently good.

I did find the last issue (#8) of the Minx, Peter Milligan and Sean Phillips short-lived Vertigo title. It's unrelated to the later girl-centric graphic novel line, but this series was the first thing I thought of when it was announced. I had the whole series, but lost it in that flood last year, and am still kicking myself for not buying the whole series the last time I saw it in the quarter bin. I don't want to get into a big description of a series I don't have all of right here, but if it helps, I liked it more than I liked the Filth, and I liked that one a good amount too. Both had everyman (or everywoman) leads who are thrown into bizarre, subversive, and horrible hidden societies; and both are better equipped for survival than they think at first. Both series are willfully unclear and abstract, but while humanity comes off pretty bad in the Minx, there's more likable characters there. Sigh. I really need to keep an eye out for the rest of the series, even if the ending probably isn't where Milligan and Phillips planned on stopping.

I've also been getting an issue of DC's late-eighties horror anthology Wasteland every week or so. A friend was big on them as a kid, so I remember reading them back then. (Interestingly, Hellblazer started about the same time, and I vaguely remember borrowing those as well.) Despite having a pretty good pedigree with John Ostrander, William Messner-Loebs and Del Close; they're not great comics. Imagine old EC horror comics. Then dilute them down until you get DC's horror books like House of Mystery or Ghosts. Don't water it down to the level of Charlton. Fortify with swears, stir well, and serve. Bingo, Wasteland. Despite having a "Mature Readers" label, I think it only had the occasional bad word.

That said, I remembered this story, because I thought it was funny then: A Shirley Maclaine look-a-like channels her past life: Ghengis Khan. Which has the unfortunate side effect, of the Khan channelling Shirley:

Sadly, that musical number goes over better than the Khan in the present day...

Art by George Freeman.