AIR GUITAR #5
by Mike Gorman
($2.00 ppd from Mike Gorman / 6 Brown St. / Westbrook, ME / 04092 USA. Web:
www.mikegorman.com.
Mature Readers)
Reviewed by Henry ChamberlainMike Gorman definately has chops. There's no doubt about it. Take a look at his website and there will be no surprise this man is a successful illustrator. At first glance, especially on the cover to
Air Guitar 5, and the first story about a miserable misfit who masturbates in public, you can't help but think of a Dan Clowes influence. Then there's another misfit story, with excellent illustrations as well, and here I began to wonder if this book was really just a mini-portfolio by an amazing illustrator but then I read the next story, "The Amazingly Stupid Adventures of Super Douche and his buddy, Harry Burrito!" and I knew there was more than first met the eye.
In "Super Douche," Gorman is in full control of the retro vocabulary. The drawings are more simple with clean cartoony lines. Unexpected fun and undeniable wit prevail. Hanging out in a dingy apartment are two very weird losers: one unemployed superhero type dude and a mass of hair with sunglasses resembling Cousin Itt from the Addams Family. They argue with another freaky character, possibly a Tarzan wannabe, make lunch, burn the TV, go shopping, and humiliate an old high school classmate they always hated. This goofy stuff is razor sharp and gives Gorman genuine cartoonist cred.
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