Image Comics 2015
Written by James Robinson
Illustrated & Lettered by Greg Hinkle
First thing I want to know is how autobiographical is this! Because the guys doing drugs and running around stark naked with Greg possessing one heck of a large member is something I sure as hell wasn’t expecting to see. I mean this issue opens with James on the toilet and he doesn’t want this assignment at all and he’s totally uninspired to write this book. There’s a part of me that really wants this to have happened and another part of me that says even if it doesn’t it’s bloody brilliant.
I was a teenager when I first found Airboy who was being published by Comico at the time and I found myself in an on again off again fan of the character and for him to find a new home at Image under the guidance of James I was more than intrigued. What I hadn’t expected was what this first issue delivers. Not a comic about the character himself but more a journey of the two creators who don’t know what to do with him. Yes as the story says James is known as the Starman guy and the Golden Age guy so it would seem on the one that he’d be perfect for this. He has other ideas though and isn’t a fan of the character.
Once he hooks up with Greg and the two have a hard time figuring out what to do with the character it becomes this drug, sex and alcohol infused story of two men who try their damndest to come up with a way to make this work. I have to say I liked the way that James has this personal dilemma with finding a take on the character and when in San Francisco Greg joins him the real fun begins. Instead of working on the book they have this buddy pick type story the only missing was while high on ecstasy, coke and booze while having sex at the same time with the same woman was the two men having sex with each other.
After the worst of the drug use, debauchery and hanging out together naked, nice depiction of that anaconda too Greg, the man they are supposed to be telling stories about instead comes to life and is staring at them chastising them for their behavior. Suddenly this is more of a story of how Airboy changes their life than telling his adventures and rebooting or revamping the character.
We’ve seen stories where the fictional character comes to life but never in such an adult oriented fashion. If this is completely fictional on the guys parts then this is a very tongue in cheek look at their lives in comics and are hella good sports for letting themselves become central characters in a story like this. In a fabulously campy in an absolutely NSFW manner they’ve managed to shatter the fourth wall in ways no one has ever attempted before. James and Greg are delivering something extraordinarily fun and twisted that just pushes the envelope of what one should expect from comics today.
Greg’s interiors are a stark, frank and honest portrayal that brings it life in the such a marvelous way. This is brilliant stuff and you won’t find a better story that’s completely off the rails like this one is and could be the pinnacle of men’s careers.