By Daniel Torres (Knockabout Crack Editions)
ISBN: 0-86166-047-1
This little lost gem is an absurdist and over-the-top pastiche of hard-boiled detective fiction seamlessly blended with retro-science-fiction motifs and just a dash of colonial imperialism a la “The Yellow Perilâ€. The good citizens of The City are assaulted in both overt and covert ways by that insidious master of menace ‘Sir Opium’ and his evil gang of ne’er-do-wells, but the clear-headed, clean-cut decency of TV host Ruben Plata and his faithful girlfriend Blanche White will surely prove a match for the bounders.
Replete with 1950s fashions, flying cars and Rock-and-Roll, this Pop-culture melange is a graphic delight, raucous and very racy, outrageous and starkly tongue-in-cheek. Clever yet daftly sophisticated, this is a simply superb piece of cartooning – and in the interest of tempting you as much as possible I’ll just mention that Comics Legend Eddie Campbell lettered the translation. Now you’ve just got to have it, right?
©1983 Daniel Torres. Translation ©1986 Elias Garcia & Mike Steel. All Rights Reserved.
Veeeery nice, it inspired Darwyn Cooke in his beginnings
I didn’t know that, but I can see it now that mention it.
Cheers for the info.
Just in case you want to know something more:
“…It was in Torres’ work where I saw for the first time the potential of a place for me in the comics’ world. This discovery was followed quickly by others: Yves Chaland and master of narrative, Prado. Back in Toronto, a young artist named Paul Rivoche …
In subsequent years, I had the fortune of working with Prado while directing the animated series of Men in Black, and my graphic novel, “Selina ‘s Big Score” includes a beautiful illustration of my hero, Daniel Torres. These brief partnerships with these men are brilliant moments I cherish as memorable points of my career.
If any of you doubt the intimate connection that my work has with the Spanish and European scene, I would proudly and quickly point to the men which I would consider more contemporary, Mark Martin and Javier Pulido. I feel that we have been shaped by many similar influences.
This takes me (finally) to New Frontier. This is, first and foremost, a story of great adventures. I hope that your pages reveal a connection so close to Caniff and Robbins as Kirby and Kanigher. But in these pages is also covered the long love story of this modern artist with the aesthetics of North America in the aftermath of war. The worlds of Charles Eames, Raymond Lowey, Saul Bass, Picasso, Norman Parkinson, Eva Ziesel, Al Parker, Harvey Earl, Ava Gardner and Burt Lancaster.
These influences have merged to form an aesthetics in the eye of my mind, but it took Torres to demonstrate that it could be done that all these Muses played in a comic book. As you can imagine, this was a very precious gift to me, and came from Spain.”
http://www.planetadeagostinicomics.com/articulos_detalle.asp?id=385