Skullkickers: It's The Comic I Wish I Had Written
Yesterday the Skullkickers trade paperback hit the streets. I've been picking up issues of this comic book ever since the writer, my buddy Jim Zubkavich told me about it. The trade contains the first five issues, plus a couple of bonus stories, and I can pay it no higher compliment than the one I paid in the title of this post: It's the comic I wish I had written.
You've got these two mercenaries, you see... a big, bald guy and a dwarf, and while they're at least slightly despicable, they're also the only ones willing or able to take heroic action. They take on werewolves, zombies, goblins, assassins, necromancers, and more -- a nice panoply of fantasy tropes handled with humor, action, and what appears to be effortless dispatch on the part of the creative team.
I know better than that. When a creative team makes something this awesome look this easy there are mad skills and crazy feats of artistic heroism happening behind the scenes. And that's part of why I pay the "wish I'd done it" compliment -- a book like this is something people in my industry can go their whole careers wishing to be a part of.
But that's not why you're going to read Skullkickers Volume 1: 1000 Opas and a Dead Body. You're going to read it because if you like mercenaries in space, you'll also like mercenaries in high fantasy. If you like Tagon dancing about getting paid twice, you'll like Baldy groaning about trying to get paid once. And if you like Schlock eating his enemies and rejoicing in Ovalkwik you'll absolutely love the scene where somebody tries to poison the dwarf, and he ends up on an indigestion-powered spirit quest.
I've linked to it at Amazon, but you can pick it up at any brick-and-mortar comics shop. They'll love to have your business. It's just $9.99. And if you're coming to GenCon in August, Zub and Edwin Huang will be there signing books, and I have it on good authority that their booth will be very, VERY closely positioned to yours truly.