Review – Dastardly and Muttley #1 (DC Comics)

Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Garth Ennis
Artists: Mauricet, John Kalisz
Released: 6th September 2017

Rordinarily, Ri’d rake rome rind rof roke regarding row rilly ris role ring ris rut…

Christ, I can’t keep that up. Muttley must have it really fucking difficult, ‘speaking’ like that. It’s a miracle the duo got anything done in their racing career, with such a speech impediment. Can you be able-ist against an anthropomorphic dog? I dunno. Ho hum.

So! In DC’s ongoing attempt to fling all of Hanna Barbera’s back catalog grittily into the 21st Century – and after that half-decent attempt to throw Wacky Races into the… was it the 23rd Century? I forget – herein, we have the inimitable Garth Ennis taking on the villains of the piece, and attempting to make them… heroic fighter pilots?

There’s a good pace to the issue, and Mauricet’s art is rather fine, particularly in his recreation of military vehicles and locations. He styles the book rather more realistically than the source material – of course – but it’s given a nicely cartoony hue by John Kalisz’ colour work, so it’s certainly not going to offend anyone for attempting to take a dump on a classic.

Story-wise, it’s about as intriguing as you could possibly hope one-sixth of a realistic reimagining of Wacky Races to be – having the slightly mental universe leaking out into reality is a really rather brilliant approach from Ennis. But in terms of where it’s actually going, it’s anybody’s guess at this stage – this issue is ground work only, and as is my theme lately, I find myself in the awkward position of saying it’s good without being able to wholeheartedly recommend the book until there’s, y’know, more of it. I reckon Ennis can make as good a go of it as anyone, though I’m not exactly sure if there’s an overlap in the Venn diagram of Wacky Races and Garth Ennis fans.

Still, it’s fun, energetic and lovely to look at, so worth a punt if you’re in that elusive middle ground.

Rating: 3/5.

PREVIEW ARTWORK
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