Midway into the second episode of their four-ish mini-series, the creators of Tank Girl: Bad Wind Rising (Titan Books) let the reader know what they’re getting for their entertainment dollars or pounds with the following pledge:
”In our continued quest for quality and value, we would like to assure readers that at least one character in each episode of this story will be shot in the bollocks.”
Writer Alan Martin and artist Rufus Dayglo stick to this promise, too: assailing the crotches of both humans and male mutant kangaroos. (The “Adults Only” U.K. comic book may be rudely groty, but it keeps its word.) This latest hardback collection of post-Apocalyptic snicks and giggles splits our punkish anti-heroine from her mutant boyfriend/partner Booga, when a mad scientist’s implant foments discord between the two. Our estranged duo sets off for disparate Outback adventures that have Booga hooking up with a pair of panty stealing surf punks and TG being impersonated by the equally feisty Jet Girl in an attempt to throw off the diabolical mad monitoring those tracking implants.
As par for this series, the results are packed with inventively filthy insults, tons of random violence, casual sex and drug use — all smirkingly delivered without a smidge of seriousness. There’s a convoluted back plot involving a time machine that can only travel back in time to the invention of the first time machine, the use of which may destroy the universe as we know it, but to reveal any more would be to blow some of the final episode’s best jokes.
Artist Dayglo, continuing in the style established by TG original co-creator Jamie (Gorillaz) Hewlett, captures all this nonsense with his usual grubby élan. Per reports, this is his last work on the series, with a present mini-series (“Carioca”) currently running in England illustrated by Mick McMahon. His energetic work on the band-aid festooned adventuress will be missed, but at least Martin will be continuing to churn out more of these never-mind-the-bollocks antics — and bully for him.