Malcolm Magic #3

Grade: 7/10

Malcolm Magic is a rabbit, who lives in Fuzztown with his friends: Chester the comics-reading chipmunk, Fikov the violent Russian bear, blind Pygmy and Reggy "the sensible one".

The friends live a relatively normal life in Fuzztown — arguing, drinking, eating pizza, fighting and videogaming. Then one day, by chance, Malcolm discovers that he can cross the bridge between two worlds — his own, and that of sage old Punch the walrus (who strangely also appears to be French).

While Punch tries to figure out how this is happening, Malcolm ends up accidentally and entirely uncharacteristically embroiled in heroic adventures as a result of his world-swapping, much to the alarm of his friends.

As issue #3 opens, his friends have decided to force him to see a therapist, even if it means beating him into submission to get him to do so — naturally Fikov is especially interested in this kind of coercion! Unfortunately it seems that whenever Malcolm is knocked unconscious he appears in Punch's world, so beatings are entirely counterproductive.

This time, Malcolm makes two trips to Walrus World — once due to his friends, and the other due to the evil that is Malcolm's Nemesis (MN), of whom we will no doubt hear more in future issues. During the second trip Malcolm acquires a baton of French bread, which he and Pygmy use to defeat the henchrobot of MN. Yes, that's right, a stick of French bread ... and a henchrobot.

As you've probably gathered, Malcolm Magic is primarily a humour comic. The jokes (both visual and dialogue) come thick and fast, and the action is crazy, frenetic, and surreal. The pages fly by, and this is undoubtedly helped by the excellent cartooning skills of Lawrence Etherignton, who draws Malcolm, his pals and the world in a traditional cartoon style with immense background details and expressive faces and mannerisms.

The comic is black-and white, and while it retains mini-comics sensibilities, it is produced in regular size witha colour cover (albeit not glossy). Decent paper and good production values all help this to stand out from many other similar works.

I'll be honest — I usually stay away from funny animal comics, but I made an exception to try Malcolm Magic, and I'm glad that I did. It's fast-paced fun with a suitably silly plot, fabulous artwork and quick-fire dialogue.

Look out for my reviews of the next few issues (I have to find out who the nemesis is!!!), and give the comic a try for yourself — visit the website link and check out the crazy world of Malcolm!

- Marcia Allass