Department of the Peculiar #1 & 2


By Rol Hirst & Rob Wells
No ISBNs:

In strikingly similar vein from alternative press veterans Rol Hirst and Rob Wells is a splendid mash-up of X-Men and X-Files, given a splendidly seductive British taste and tone.

DotP #1 sees scripter Hirst and illustrator Wells take a laconic look at what ails the world in ‘Sick Day’ where we meet Malcolm Drake: an American metahuman embarrassed by his powers and hiding out in the UK.

His sad life didn’t get any better this side of the pond but suddenly changes forever when he is blackmailed by the ever-vigilant government quango known as the Department of the Peculiar into joining their covert, severely under-funded and cash-poor rapid response team.

Malcolm makes people sick (that’s his power, not his attitude – well, maybe a bit of his attitude too) and when abrasive chief administrator Lisa Cole confronts him in a Manchester shopping centre that is exactly what she needs.

Another “Peculiar” has seized control of an office building owned by food conglomerate Matheson-Beaumont. He did it by making people ill and wilfully distributing heart attacks and transfats amongst the security staff.

Threatened with deportation unless he replaces D.O.T.P.’s already-downed field agent, Malcolm reluctantly approaches the hostage building, but discovers that his strange gift can’t protect him from a heart attack either…

The story concludes in #2 with ‘Cure for Cancer’ as Drake provides a life-passing-his-eyes flashback and origin tale whilst aggrieved eco-warrior and nutritionally-abused walking cholesterol bomb Paul Aday carries out his ghastly revenge on the execs who poisoned a nation.

However Malcolm is made of stern stuff and rallies just enough to do the necessary…

Gross, scary, funny and wildly beguiling, this is outrageous non-stop spoofery, surreal whimsy, deceptively gritty action and bureaucrat-bashing as only world-wearily laconic Brits can do it, marking this as one of the best indie titles I’ve seen in decades…

Comicbook sized in stunningly powerful black & white, Department of the Peculiar #1 & 2 are available from rolhirst.co.uk and you can follow him on Twitter (@rolhirst) whilst these and Rob’s other wonderful canon of cartoon fun can be found via crispbiscuit.co.uk. He can be Twitterstalked on (@robertdwells).

© 2012, 2013 Rol Hirst and Rob Wells.
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