What can I say about the cover? It's cool, not awesome, but definatley cool. I actually bought it cos it guest starred Mike Allred's Madman, and I was into that series at the time. It also features the SD villain BrainiApe (it's all so funny until you realise that his titular brain belongs to HITLER!) and the Madman supporting characters known as The Atomics, a superhero team made up of mutated beatniks. Yeah I know it's silly, Madman's existance is based around that.
My main 'problem' is that the cover could easily be switched to Hulk and Spider-Man. In fact, since Larsen had a run on Spidey, it's possible that it's even an homage to one of his previous covers, but I don't know. Hey, I'm a comic geek, not a psychic.
Basically what's happened is that Dragon killed a psychic alien named Darklord who had been screwing around with his life. Unfortunatley, this caused the universe to seemingly reset, and to get right down to it, Dragon is now in Thunderdome for superpeople. Honestly, can we get Beyond Thunderdome?
Apologies to EVERYONE
So, why was this so controversial? Well this turned SD into a Post Apocolyptic story where it had previously been about police and street crime (with superheroes). This was an attempt to boost sales, and many condemned Larsen for selling out his original idea for money instead of ending before it got stale. Considering that as of this writing the next issue will be #157, I think that sales ploy of his may have worked.
With the artwork, unlike the title, it is genuinley awesome. At some other point I will include actual pictures from the comic in my reviews.
We open with Dragon locked in combat with some guards and a creature we can only assume is this Droog character that is mentioned in the dialogue. Droog looks like a big...thing? I actually don't know how to describe iy. He's purple, has fangs, is very hulkish and has a big head.
An annoying things about this point in the series is that every single issue seemed to feature Dragon bitching about his old world and filling in the role of a recap page. I have to admit, it helped me cos this was the first issue I picked up. He also complains that we're in Australia. Yeah, destroyed Chicago full of super powered criminals, and Australia which is only depicted here, admittedly with giant insects. Yeah, big competition really.
There's a pretty neat moment after this where Dragon gives some of my favorite dialogue in any comic book I've read, 'Looks like it's just you and me, pal. How about you just letting me go? I swear anybody asks and I;ll tell them you put up one hell of a a fight.' Then we go into his inner monologue, 'It never worked that way. Still it never hurts to try. One day somebody's going to tak me up on that offer. But not today.' He is then knocked out by Droog's psychic blast. I guess with giant monster things the last thing you expect is to get punched out by their MIND!
Dragon is returned to his cell with Madman, who ironically looks much cooler in Larsen's style. He goes onto explain exactly what he did to get into this situation and admits that it's his own fault. However, Madman has no idea what he's on about. Dragon claims that he's worse off than Madman because everyone he loved is dead and his entire home is destroyed, and that at least Madman has Snap City (his location in the comics). Madman tells him that during the devestating war, Martians destroyed Snap City, and Dragon apologises for lashing out like that. Rightfully so. Wow, Madman hasn't done anything remotley heroic and he still seems cooler than when Allred does it. Irony away!
The next day Dragon is to be taken to the Thunderdome to...I'm sorry, The Arena of Deathm to fight with another superherofor the entertainment of the crowd. He notes that everything is backwards, namley Badrock and Barbaric, two SUPERHEROES are dragging him to the arena instead of two of his rogues gallery. He also notes the many superfreaks who are locked up, and that The Atomics could break out with insane ease, so mind control must be in the works. Or maybe they're just tired and depressed? If my home city was destroyed I'd be depressed too, it's okay.
He sees Guy Masters fighting fighting someone for the entertainment of BrainiApe. Guy has taught Dragon to survive in Giant Insect Australia, so naturally Dragon is horrified to see him killed in battle. But he isn't fooled and realises that seeing this was the true reason they brought him up here. In an Unstoppable Rage moment, Dragon slams Badrock and Barbaric's faces togethor and jumps into the arena to get a final look at his friend. He then goes onto angrily berate BrainiApe for wasting the life of a man who had done nothing to them. 'Is that what a man's life is worth to you? Is two minutes of entertainment really all a man's worth?' 'You animals! You vicious coldhearted animals!' BrainiApe answers, 'Everybody's a critic.'
So then in a pretty good full page spread, BrainiApe leaps out and attacks Dragon, managing to get a few hits in until Dragon hands his ass to him. Dragon manages to beat the living crap out of him until he realises that he's nowhere near strong enough to be a gorilla. To his horror, it reveals that he has been viciously beating Madman, and BrainiApe is comfortably in his seat. In his shock, Madman gets a few good hits in, but our green hero decides to put his attention to whatever caused him to attack his friend. Lcukily he is able to find the likley contender, a pink man with a giant head. You know, cos all psychics are pink with giant heads, it's pretty normal.
Unfortunatley, before Dragon can give our Pink Fiend his just desserts, The Atomics are released into the arena to save their friend. The sonic screamer Metal Man launches him into the air, from which he is then punched by the purple bralwer Slug, and then flung on the stretcher Mr. Gum, and finally punched by Absorbing Woman It-Girl. If you don't get what that means, she absorbs materials so that she can mimick them, in this case it would appear to be a stone seat. And then Madman delivers a final knock-out punch...Wow, in one issue of Savage Dragon comic, we've gotten more action than the entire run of Madman Atomic Comics!
Then we move onto Finaddicts, the section where Larsen answers your mail. I love it when comics have these cos it reminds me that I'm not the only one reading. There aren't many interesting ones beyond questions regarding previous issues. I'm actually a bit sorry I didn't review one of the earlier comics, I think around about 78. This one basically cemented my respect for Erik Larsen in one letter. A fan starts out complaining that this new direction is completley different to what we had before. He dosn't stop there though, he continues to go into a rampage of calling Larsen a sellout and a dirtbag for ruining a perfectly good series that should have ended with dignity instead of died trying.
Usually one would answer, 'Sorry you feel that way,' but not Erik. He goes into an Unstoppable Rage of his own and finds himself disgusted that the reader never once even thought of just not buying the book if he didn't like it, and that although he was trying to boost sales, he chose a way to do it he'd enjoy, and that he's based the entire comic on that, and that if that particuler fan dosn't like it, it's no consequence to him. I can honestly say that if a celebrity went off like that for what I said, I would literally shit bricks. It's even cooler once you find out that Larsen's voice sounds a lot like Bruce Campbell.
I guess I could've reviewed that one, but this one is just much better.
So that's mostly Savage Dragon 83. How does it fare? It's awesome. The rest of the series is as awesome and original, and I highly recommend it. Maybe you might want to wait a few months though. Apparently Larsen's going to kill off Dragon and replace him with his son in a few issues.
Wow, I said that sooo casually, weird eh?
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