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Loading ...I Am The MAXX : Comic Review.
Big_Adam
As a few of you might have twigged, I love comics. It’s a rather new love for me but still I do really enjoy a good comic. One I picked up via the internet was “The Maxx” by Sam Kieth. I’ve had this comic on my drive for a while and never got round to reading it as I really hate reading loads of text on my computer screen. Typed text is okay but comic text doesn’t work.So I never got round to reading it.
A short while after I managed to find “The Maxx” on Youtube. So I sat down with some cereal and watched it. The series was made for MTV back when MTV used to actually play something other than reality shows, back when they played music! Anyway, watched the series and I’ll be damned if it wasn’t really good! It was up my street of weird and wonderful. So I set about trying to find the comic issues on eBay. The occasional one or two popped up but I wanted the full set and I prefer trade (collections of “X” number of comics) compared to single comics. Much searching and a few emails to Heroes4Sale I managed to procure a full new set of all six trade books (Thanks to Michael of Heroes4Sale!).
So, that long rambling brings me to my point, a review of “The Maxx” series of books. To start, lets have some back story to what “The Maxx” is, or more who he is. To make my ramblings simpler, here’s the sonopsis from Wikipedia.
The series follows the adventures of the titular hero in the real world and in an alternate reality, referred to as The Outback. In the real world the Maxx is a vagrant while in the Outback he is the protector of the Jungle Queen. The Jungle Queen is similar to the Maxx in that she also exists in the real world as Julie Winters, a freelance social worker who often bails the Maxx out of jail. While the Maxx is aware of the Outback, Julie is not, though it is integral to the story of both the Maxx and Julie.
(Hey! I either quote or ramble on for a crap load longer, you’re choice)
So, that’s the basics of it. The story goes on to follow both Maxx and Julie as they sort out both plains of existence (real and The Outback) all with the help/hindrance of Mr Gone (“a student of the mystic arts” as he puts it). Mr Gone is the main sort of bad guy for Maxx (Lex Luther to Superman). Later on his true self becomes apparent as he slowly becomes, well … less evil really. Let me breake all this down, or I’m going to be here forever with this review.
Story
The collection starts off well in the first three or so books. The first three books are a collaboration of Sam Kieth and Messner-Loebs. The story is well rounded and makes sence, some parts are a bit confusing but they do work. My problem is with the later three books where Julie has gone AWOL and Maxx is left with Sarah as they sort out Mr Gone stuff and Sarah works though her own stuff (as she’s not the main focus in the first three books really). My problem is with the Sarah story line, well … it’s bat-sh*t insane at some points and I got REALLY confused by the end of it, just because a lot of characters where introduced for the soul reason of (as far as I could see) fluff. Sarah grandfather is introduced but no one (not Maxx, Sarah or Gone) meet him and he’s gone (away, not dead) after a rather short time. Okay, the Sarah has its good bits such as meeting her own Maxx, the floating fairly pink IDZ’s and the Banana Slug (A massive yellow slug that spouts self help nonsense then chops people up). Although, with the end Sarah story comes the ending and of the entire story so it all gets nicely wrapped up, with each character having a nice little bit to show how it all ends for them.
Books/Story.
Then there’s book six. Book six has NOTHING to do with “The Maxx” series and is an entirely different animal altogether. It follows two sets of people; Dude and Mickey a couple who are attempting (and at time failing at times) to stay together while growing up in their 20-30’s. Then there’s the story/travel of Charley and Ira. Ira (just out from prison) somehow ends up on a trip with his Uncle Charley which consists of Charley attempting to teach Ira how to be man, hookers, dead bodies and teeth in a bumper. Think a sort of coming of age but with low riders, truckers and Rocky Horror Picture show. Although neither of these stories really fit in with The Maxx timeline I did like the one about Ira and his Uncle, it was nice and I just enjoyed it.
Art.
As normally, I’m swayed by pretty pictures of The Maxx series. At times the drawings are VERY crude and well … crappy but at other times their glorious to look at. It’s like the entire series was done at random times and 2.00am’s when ever the writer/artist could get a chance so the style is schizophrenic at times but is fairly solid throughout (check the pics for examples of good and bad).
Worth.
Hmmm, well. I really did enjoy reading the entire series of books. Problem is I had to go through the trouble of importing them and it did cost me a bit. Although I’ve paid more for my four Transmetropolitan books than I did for the entire The Maxx series so that comes into account. I’d say if you’ve seen the series (I’ll put links up then get told off) and possibly read one or two of the books from the internet (they float about, still recommend buying them over downloading) and you want something weird and wonderful to read then give them a shot. It’s not JTHM weird, as JTHM is weird and violent as I’d expect from JV. The Maxx is still weird and very good (was for me). So give it a look, maybe pick up a copy in a comic shop and have a flick through.
Score.
8/10
Videos -
Note, due to the way the series was made it is almost identical to the first few comics. Even the art looks like it was lifted from the comic. This wasn’t a cheap out tactic, Sam Kieth wrote a comic and he wanted it to retain it’s comic fell which is dose so wonderfully! So if you like these, you’ll probably like the comics themselves. That said, parts are heavily changed in order to make the series short and have an ending.
Oddly, the easiest place to find the series is YouTube as its only rarely seen on VHS on eBay now.
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