Publisher: Image Comics
Writer/Artist: Ryan Browne
Release Date: 3rd September 2014

Four days from Crabulon, Admiral Tiger Eating a Cheeseburger’s ship collides with a homemade rocket silo containing members of an Astro-Farmer cult attempting to reach Golden Moon Heaven, seat of the great Space God.

Yup, it’s one of those love ‘em or hate ‘em titles, and at this point I’m not really sure which side of the fence I’m on. Ordinarily it’s easy to decide due to poor artwork, writing, or both, but this book is an interesting contradiction. From the ridiculous premise it’s reasonable to assume that we are not meant to take it seriously, but there is plenty here to admire. Ryan Browne is clearly a talented artist who knows how to put a narrative together, albeit a very silly one. There might also be a subtle commentary nestling in there somewhere; the cult of Astro-Farmers would appear to be a reference to the God-fearing religious zealots of America’s ‘Bible Belt’. In addition, the title itself is evocative of the Westboro Baptist Church’s most infamous and utterly reprehensible mantra.

On the art side, the issue features some crazy anthropomorphic character design, nice layouts, framing and colour work and plays around with formal elements of the medium; using ‘onomatopoeia’ to describe an action or emotion in addition to sounds. We are also introduced to a narrator named 3-D Cowboy (an actual 3-D image), who brings us up to speed with character backgrounds and the story so far.

Although it might seem harmless from the outside, the content is most definitely aimed at a mature audience. It’s jammed-packed with cursing, puerile humour, and crude sexual references, including some bestiality. Some of the material is pretty funny to be honest, but it does become tiresome fairly quickly. The book in general feels a little too long, and perhaps a twenty page issue might have made a difference to how I felt about it overall.

Rating: 2/5.

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PREVIEW ARTWORK.

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The writer of this piece was: Martin Doyle
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You can check out more of Martins reviews and thoughts on random retro things over at Retromuse

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