Rabbiting On Again... (Malcolm Magic #4)

A while ago I promised you all a pissed up bunny. I had a whole column planned and everything, and then Glenn bloody Carter went and stole my thunder with a review of Malcolm Magic. Well now the Bunny is back, as Malcolm Magic #4 hits the stands.

The Etherington Brothers, Robin and Lawrence, the creative geniuses (Genii?) behind the Fur-lined Fun and Frolics were good enough to send me a copy of this latest issue and it is my privilege to share it with you!

For the uninitiated, Malcolm is a Rabbit with a problem. He lives, with his anthropomorphic friends in Fuzzton, an idyllic little settlement full of cheer and goodwill.

The problem?

People keep telling him he drinks too much.

Malcolm is a Rabbit who, to be frank, likes his ale. A lot. Not to put too fine a point on it, he’s a bit of a drunk and his inebriated behaviour has made him none too popular in some quarters of the town.

And then, out of the blue he gets a blow to the head, he loses consciousness and wakes up somewhere else. Somewhere very similar to Fuzzton, but not quite. A place where he is recognised, and most surprising of all, a place where he can think clearly and speak coherently – however odd the architecture looks.

He has discovered (or, perhaps re-discovered) Happy Hippy Dale. A parallel universe? A figment of his alcohol addled brain? Who can say? One thing is clear - something is going on, and Malcolm is just about the only person who can do anything about it.

Oh dear…

#4 moves this story along a little, as Malcolm and his motley band of friends (I particularly like the bear…) discover what may well be an evil secret society under the pub, and the authorities in Happy Hippy Dale begin to move against a very rabbit like threat to their peace and security.

What we’re dealing with here is nothing short of a work of genius. Malcolm Magic is funny and well written. When I first came across Malcolm Magic and his producers at Blink Twice Publishing I worried that he may have been a one joke comic, but not a bit of it. There are any number of levels of pop culture references (#4’s “Netball” game owes just a little to “Quidditch”, for example) and neat little in-jokes – but there is far more to Malcolm than that.

The story is well paced, fast and frantic with well-realised and convincingly drawn characters. Robin Etherington is a mean storyteller, and the world he’s dragging us into is well worth the price of admission.

Then there’s Lawrence Etherington’s truly stunning black and white art.

Oooh boy.

I don’t but comics for the art, you know that.

But this is something else, I tell you. Drawing under the pen name “Lorenzo”, Etherington has a clean black and white line and well defined cartoony style which never the less maintains a hard, almost punkish edge. Sure the world of Fuzzton is surreal enough – the trippy and warped Happy Hippy Dale even more so. But you’ll recognise it, and everyone in it – I kid you not.

I have to be honest, this is brilliant stuff. The attention to detail, care and forethought that has been lavished on every issue stands as an example to everyone who ever thought of making their own comics. The covers are of heavy textured card and printed in colour. The inner pages are in clean, well defined black and white on a heavy textured paper.

Each and every issue so far has been just a beautiful, solid, lovely thing – a delight to hold in your hands. I wish Marvel and DC made comics as well crafted as this, I tell you. Bloody lovely.

Of course, this comes as scant surprise to me.

I first came across the wacky Blink Twice crew at Bristol back in May and they were, quite simply, the most enthusiastic bunch I have ever met.

Ever.

We spoke on the Sunday afternoon, a point when most Festival goers have begun to flag after a weekend of drink and debauchery. Heaven only knows where they got their energy from, but they were something approaching irrepressible. Lawrence was good enough to add this shifty looking feline to my collection of cats, and seemed pretty taken with the result. I look forward to seeing him in a future issue...

This energy and wit comes through in every issue of Malcolm Magic - comics just don’t get any more refreshing than this!

- Regie Rigby