Multiple Warheads

Hmm. I don't know what I think of this. On the one hand, I'm attracted by the world-building future history of it: I like the far future, weird, post-apocalyptic, Soviet-descended setting. I also like the whimsical art and design of it: bursting at the seams with colors and hijinx, it feels like a blend of Dr. Seuss and Moebius (yeah, yeah, I know, I'm comparing everything to Moebius these days.) Vast vistas of weird landscapes; the cities are especially convoluted. You know the jokey bits in Blade Runner? Like the little toy soldier that welcomes Harrison Ford to the creepy gene splicer's apartment? Yeah... capture that jokey-weird tone, purify it, and blow it up BIG.

So that's all good. But, I also found this VERY slow - plodding, even - to read. And this is because of... more Moebius! That is, I read this Moebius thing that talked about his innovative use of linguistic and visual puns and endless referencing. Well, Brandon Graham has stuffed this FULL of puns puns puns, endless puns. OMG. I can't handle it. But, like a puzzle, they called me, and so I had to read each and every tiny little scrawl on each and every item (and Graham literally labels almost every item in this story). There's the “Organ Trail”. There's “Multiple Wormheads”. There are others. I can't remember them.

At times, this extreme referencing/punnage, coupled with the Soviet inspirations and surrealism of the setting, made me think of good ol' fashioned Russian surrealism. Which I hate. Here, I didn't necessarily hate the surreal, fourth-wall-breaking puns; it didn't even pull me out of the story (which is what surrealism usually does for me). But it did slow everything way way down. It just took me FOREVER to get through every panel and its million hidden whiz-dings, and thus the actual plot just kind of limped along. Overall, I don't know if I'll be coming back for the next few issues.