Posted in: Comics, Recent Updates, Review | Tagged: clint, Comics, Kick Ass, Mark Millar, the pro

Saturday Comics Review: CLiNT #5

Published Sat, 22 Jan 2011 05:00:57 -0600

Very brief numbercrunching. Comics page content: 69

Previously unpublished comics page content: 7

Blimey, that's not much: Okay, enough with the numbercrunching.

A lack of Frankie Boyle's Rex Royd is blamed on his busy work schedule – though why his co-writer Jim Muir (Reverend Obadiah Steppenwolf III) can't pick up the slack is not mentioned. And it is a shame, because that really is my favourite strip in the comic and usually worth the purchase of the whole thing. Space Oddities is now down to one page (and seems rather Joe The Barbarian). And while the chapter of Nemesis last issue was new, in the two month gap between issues, Marvel published the full final issue. But you do get is another six pages of Kick Ass 2 #2, still yet to be published by Marvel.

CLiNT's biggest strength, and something I've rarely seen mentioned, is its size. The new Kick Ass material is fun and all, as the supervillain motif starts to spread through the comic, with all of the foreboding laid out nice and clearly, but the size of this scene, skewering DC's Cry For Justice, does make a difference to its impact – and the way it has its legs knocked away in the next panel.

It's nice to see comic book artwork repurposed this size and with modern methods, nothing of the definition is lost by blowing the pages up. So while reprinting Garth Ennis, Amanda Conner and Jimmy Palmiotti's The Pro seems old, considering its age (though to any new reader it will of course be exceedingly fresh) seeing at this size is most welcome. And the same can be said for Chosen American Jesus and Turf.

Despite having a massive lead, Turf has now caught up to the published issues so who knows what will happen next month

The Frankie Boyle interview is a travesty considering Boyle never gives interviews. The recent fuss over some of his jokes on Tramadol Nights deserved addressing head on, instead we get the question "It's fashionable right now for people to be 'easily offended', and the press exploits this by telling us what to be offended by. As one of the tabloids' favourite targets, how do you react to being quoted out of context?" The issue with Boyle's joke about Jordan being in danger of being raped by her own disabled overweight young son was presented very much in context, the instant reaction was very visible on the likes of Twitter with people right there, right then being disgusted, complaining and then turning off. It was very different to the Jonathan Ross/Russell Brand situation, where the only offence came weeks after when The Daily Mail pushed it. The Frankie Boyle reaction was real, immediate and visceral. And this interview sidesteps it, flattering Boyle in the process, almost answering the question for him. Having his own support act conduct the interview made it far more of a one sided point of view, with both participants singing from the same sweary songsheet, rather than taking the opportunity to actually challenge Frankie on one or two points.

As with the Quentin Tarantino issue, the cover seems to suggest an interview with Samuel L Jackson rather than a collection of quotes from other interviews strung together by a narrative. The Edgar Wright piece, albeit shorter, is much more revealing, if nothing else that he is still writing the Ant Man screenplay.

The problem with a regular comic geek like me buying this magazine is the amount of reprinted and already-read content. The new size does help with that. But the plus for a regular comic geek like me is that, yes, I will pay the full cover price just to get six pages of Kick Ass 2 ahead of everyone else. And you just know that Mark Millar knows it…

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