By Don M. Ventura
Axe Cop #1
Dark Horse Comics
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When I was in first grade I wrote a story about a man named Mr. Clean whose life revolved around cleanliness. He had a nemesis: Mr. Dirty. Mr. Dirty didn’t really give a damn about his unkempt lifestyle and that was okay with him. The story was simple, the motivations of the protagonist and antagonist were clear, and there was probably no beginning, middle, or end to my tale of two opposites.
I hadn’t thought of that story for at least twenty years, but while reading Axe Cop I was immediately reminded of the stories that I would create as a child, written with a stubby pencil on that old brown newsprint with a one-inch wide rule that was commonplace for the documentation of schoolchildren’s creativity.
Axe Cop, with its fairly aimless high-action plot, is a story (as the cover promises) written by six-year-old Malachai Nicolle and drawn by his 30-year-old brother Ethan Nicolle. Now, you might suspect, as I do, that the story was cleaned up by an adult. But I would guess that the clean-up was as minimal as possible, because this damn thing feels EXACTLY like something a six-year-old would write.
And because of this, Axe Cop is beyond a wonderful experience.
Axe-Cop and his anthropomorphic dinosaur partner, named Dinosaur Soldier, are on a case to stop a planet that is getting closer to Earth. “They were pretty sure it was a bad guy planet” says the omniscient narrator. Soon they’re soaring through space in their rocket patrol car, being aided by their T-Rex buddy with guns for arms, visiting a unicorn scientist in an invisible laboratory, turning bad guys into good guys with a Good Guy Machine, then traveling back in time to save the Dinosaurs.
If none of this sounds fun and bizarre and ridiculous, then by no means do not pick up Axe Cop. Your loss. Because this book took me right back to the rambling childhood stories of my youth. Of course the story is enhanced by the fantastic artwork of older brother Ethan Nicolle. The artist gives the lively script the life it deserves and embraces it’s preposterous narrative. Ethan takes the story seriously and there is nothing tongue in cheek about his handling of the story.
I can see Axe Cop being an extremely polarizing read. Either you are going to just submit to its ludicrousness and enjoy it for the dumb fun that it is, or you might simply consider it an affront to comic book storytelling. I have opted for the former. This is good dumb fun at its best. While the story might have last about four pages too long, I won’t knock it for that because I simply enjoyed the book too much.
It’s got chickens whose brains turn into bad guys with cameras for eyes! Come on!
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