Broken Frontier

A lot of stories these days seemed contrived if you catch my drift. Pre-planned if you will. X, Y and Z happens this way and always in this order. A formula that is not to be messed with or else.

Not so with Pinocchio Vampire Slayer, the wonderful brainchild of Van Jensen and Dusty Higgins. Things don’t really happen as we’re taught they should. An orphan vampire-killing machine that lies in order to produce an endless stream of wooden stakes...

Furthermore Pinocchio is brash crude and has anything but a, ah, wooden personality. As a matter of fact he’s kind of what you get when you have a mash-up between Hellboy and Atomic Robo. But wooden. And a kid. Oh and on top of that, Geppetto’s dead and at least one other main character dies by the end of the story.

The graphic novel itself is perfect bound with a glossy cover and has a Mingola-esque touch to the cover art: a disembodied vampire head colored in blood red graces the background, with our eponymous (anti)hero in the foreground looking surly, clutching his makeshift stakes, giving you the same type of look you’d expect to see from Clint Eastwood or Charles Bronson. In other words, it’s almost perfect. (Almost being the operative word, because I have a slight idiosyncratic tendency towards glossy covers. I can’t stand the fact that every time I touch them I’ll be able to see my fingerprints. It drives me a bit mad. Although I’m not sure if a matte cover would’ve worked. Or perhaps UV coating although if you’re an indie publisher you definitely want to watch cost...I guess I’ll just have to live with the fact it’s glossy and get on with bigger and better things like how good this book is.)

Mark Waid has a pretty straightforward quote on the back. He goes on to say "It’s funny. It’s scary. It’s suspenseful. It’s romantic. It’s the greatest thing I’ve read all year." In an industry chalk full of hype, every time I read about a book someone’s declaring it’s the best thing since sliced bread on ciabatta bread. Waid hits pretty close to home. Because of its unvarnished approach, because of its honesty and love of the character, because of the cleverness found in its simplicity, Pinocchio Vampire Slayer is one of the top five comics/graphic novels I’ve read in 2009. And that is saying a lot.

You see, I enjoy the fact that they story is black and white, I enjoy the fact that Master Cherry and the Blue Fairy make a comeback as Pinocchio’s personal monster squad, and above all I enjoy the fact that Pinocchio uses LIES TO KILL VAMPIRES. Once he fibs, his nose grows and - voila! - his very own vampire-killing stake. In other words, he’s the perfect vampire slayer. And on top of that the creators did a bang-up job on updating the wooden protagonist. Gone are his little wooden shoes and his lederhosen, to be replaced by an iconic cowlick and rolled-up sleeves held up by suspenders. He’s basically Pinocchio’s older brother who just got out of jail. On top of that, his not-so-cheery disposition immediately adds a certain level of charm the Disney incarnation never had.

Master Cherry, I understand, was a bit of brawler in Carlo Collodi’s original piece. And that’s carried through in Vampire Slayer. He’s a blue-collared type o’ guy, and he’s here to kick all sorts of ass. He’s even got this mean looking cross bow that shoots multiple stakes and a pony tail which is choice. On top of that, Blue Fairy is old, withered and reluctant to use her powers. And then there’s the ghost cricket, who heck, doesn’t even have a name. And he’s definitely not Pinocchio’s conscience – he’s as surly as everyone else in this book.

Alas, the book was over before I knew it. But a good book will do that, I guess. It’ll make you want more. And the brand of humor – curt, surly, using the word "crap" a lot - is my cup o’ tea, so accordingly, I’ll devour anything that reads like your college buddies writing a graphic novel.

Incidentally, this installment merely scratched the surface. We were introduced to the characters, there was a small conflict that only hinted at something much more ominous and we got enough character out of the story to care. But most of all, the book is raw. Vampires getting massacred by a broken-hearted, revenge-fueled wooden boy. A sarcastic ghost-cricket. And Pinocchio finding a noose around his neck and being hung from a tree three-quarters into the book...just raw.

And it’s these nuances, these bits of carefully crafted content, that keeps Waid’s (and my very own) nose from growing.

Pinocchio Vampire Slayer is available now from Slave Labor Graphics priced $10.95.