{"id":30132,"date":"2024-07-08T11:00:38","date_gmt":"2024-07-08T11:00:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/?p=30132"},"modified":"2024-07-08T11:00:38","modified_gmt":"2024-07-08T11:00:38","slug":"bunny-vs-monkey-book-8-the-impossible-pig-paperback-edition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/2024\/07\/08\/bunny-vs-monkey-book-8-the-impossible-pig-paperback-edition\/","title":{"rendered":"Bunny vs Monkey book 8: The Impossible Pig! (paperback edition)"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nBy Jamie Smart<\/strong>, with Sammy Borras<\/strong> (David Fickling Books)
\nISBN: 978-1-78845-312-7 (Digest HB)<\/p>\n

Britain and America were a bit preoccupied on July 4th<\/sup> this year and might have missed this major milestone of the Good Times returning. However, now that the happy dust has settled and before all the bunting gets packed away, lets celebrate another earthshaking milestone: the softcover escape of a truly wonderful comics read…<\/em><\/p>\n

Bunny vs Monkey <\/strong>has been the hairy\/fuzzy backbone of The<\/strong> Phoenix<\/strong> since the very first issue back in 2012: recounting a madcap vendetta gripping animal arch-enemies in an idyllic arcadia masquerading as more-or-less mundane but critically endangered English woodlands.<\/p>\n

Concocted with gleefully gentle mania by cartoonist, comics artist and novelist Jamie Smart (Fish Head Steve!<\/strong>; Looshkin<\/strong>; Max and Chaffy<\/strong>, Flember<\/strong>), his trendsetting, mindbending multi award-winning yarns have been wisely retooled as graphic albums available in digest editions such as this one.<\/p>\n

All the tail-biting tension and animal argy-bargy began yonks ago after an obnoxious little beast plopped down in the wake of a disastrous British space shot. Crashlanding in Crinkle Woods – scant miles from his launch site – lab animal Monkey<\/em> believed himself the rightful owner of a strange new world, despite every effort to dissuade him by reasonable, rational, sensible, genteel, contemplative forest resident Bunny<\/em>. For all his patience, propriety and good breeding, the laid-back lepine could not contain or control the incorrigible idiot ape, who to this day remains a rude, noise-loving, chaos-creating, troublemaking lout\u2026<\/p>\n

Problems are exacerbated by other unconventional Crinkle creatures, particularly the skunk called Skunky<\/em> possessing a mad scientist\u2019s intellect and attitude to life plus a propensity for building extremely dangerous robots, bio-beasts and sundry other super-weapons. Here – with adaptive artistic assistance from design deputy Sammy Borras – the war of nerves and mega-ordnances resumes even though everybody thought all the battles had ended. They even seemingly forgot ever-encroaching Hyoomanz<\/em>\u2026<\/p>\n

Divided as ever into seasonal outbursts, this magnificent mass-market (and now soft-shelled) amalgamation of insanity opens in the traditional manner: starting slowly with a sudden realisation. Probably by using his fingers, Monkey has worked out that Bunny\u2019s side has more good guys (Ai<\/em>, Pig<\/em> Piggerton<\/em>, Weenie<\/em>, Metal E.V.E.<\/em> and Le Fox<\/em>) than his own bad ones! Wisely rejecting Skunky\u2019s offer to make more evildoers, the sinisterly stupid simian seeks to steal some of Bunny\u2019s buddies: making insidious individual approaches in \u2018A Big Hole\u2019<\/em>. One immediate success goes utterly unnoticed whilst those worthy stalwarts debate ways to get hapless Pig <\/em>out of a giant pit before finding the \u2018Tunnels\u2019 <\/em>the sweet simpleton used to get there in the first place\u2026<\/p>\n

First contact and a really strange day for all – including a wholly new kind of Crinkle critter – occurs in \u2018Jerb-eing Unreasonable\u2019, <\/em>before Monkey commits carnage in a psychic bodysuit that can literally \u2018Imagine That\u2019: <\/em>opening the doors to another Spring. At this time a certain white rabbit is pilfering carrots from an angry Hyooman, and saved by Monkey in a colossal exo-skeletal \u2018Spade-O-Matic\u2019, <\/em>officially opening hostilities between bipeds and beasts\u2026<\/p>\n

Meanwhile and maybe later, Bunny experiences \u2018Mossy Mayhem\u2019 <\/em>when Skunky\u2019s latest experiment escapes, even as Metal E.V.E ponders astral reality and rashly asks her friend to explain \u2018Pig Science\u2019\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

As Monkey demands 25% more evil from his crew, he\u2019s distracted by Metal Steve\u2019<\/em>s latest faux pas – a doomed relationship with \u2018Wipey\u2019 – <\/em>and \u2018Sun 2.0\u2019 <\/em>renders repercussions of Skunky upgrading the source of all light and warmth, and Action Beaver <\/em>is subject to a \u2018Body Swap\u2019<\/em> after Monkey covets his apparent immunity to pain and harm. It doesn\u2019t end well\u2026<\/p>\n

Once the Great Woodland Bake-off inevitably culminates in \u2018Cakes and Bruises\u2019 <\/em>Monkey use a superstrength serum unwisely. As his bones mend he has a Damascus moment: deducing that being a \u2018Good Monkey\u2019<\/em> might be less harmful. He gives nobility a go\u2026 but it too doesn\u2019t end well\u2026<\/p>\n

A fresh face materialises as Pig meets \u2018The Visitor\u2019: <\/em>inadvertently saving Lucky the Red Panda <\/em>from atomic discorporation. Sadly, the effect is only temporary and when their memories merge, Lucky is stuck in this dimension with our plucky porcine adrift in the molecular stream of the cosmos. Trapped on Earth, the stranger tries desperately to convince all and sundry she is \u2018Actually Pig\u2019, <\/em>often assisted by typical distractions like marauding sprout-farting monster \u2018Gruntulak!\u2019 <\/em>and a no-holds-barred campaign to elect \u2018President Monkey\u2019.<\/em><\/p>\n

Skunky starts disassembling woodland residents: harvesting DNA to make endless duplicates in \u2018All A-Clone\u2019<\/em> but even Skunky\u2019s science can\u2019t handle Lucky\u2026<\/p>\n

As Summer starts, mad science wins again. Skunky sets a trap to prove Lucky is \u2018Not Pig\u2019<\/em> and even finds what happened to the lost one, after which Monkey manages to murder cloud-gazing in \u2018Weather or Not\u2019 <\/em>and Weenie gets a shocking letter in \u2018Blackmail\u2019. <\/em>With the truth about to out, \u2018Pocket Pig\u2019 <\/em>finds our gentle woodland folk forming a torch-waving mob to establish their real friend\u2019s fate, only to find Skunky has already found a way to exploit the situation. However, when he constructs a device to broach outer realms, Monkey makes a shambles of the \u2018Portal Recall\u2019\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

When the awful anthropoid gets a mail-order giant robotic Chicken of Darkness, he never anticipated some assembly required and the woods are saved by \u2018A Loose Nobble\u2019,<\/em> allowing good manners and better natures to resurface. Thus, all the animals contribute to \u2018Lucky\u2019s Home\u2019<\/em> – especially Monkey with his goop gun and crushing space-sphere of doom\u2026<\/p>\n

Elsewhere, as Metal Steve and Metal E.V.E hold a private contest to decide the best automaton in \u2018Who Will Win the War of the Robots\u2019, <\/em>Skunky\u2019s clumsiness triggers a crop of carnivorous blooms in \u2018Chomp!\u2019 <\/em>As Monkey\u2019s alter ego \u201cCaptain Explosives\u201d <\/em>accidentally uncovers a crop of chronal crystals in \u2018Time and Again\u2019<\/em>, Skunky makes a great breakthrough: a remote control for existence with a \u2018Freeze Frame\u2019 <\/em>able to warp and rewind reality\u2026<\/p>\n

With everything on pause, \u2018The Second Pigging\u2019<\/em> heralds the return of a lost friend whose voyage to the cosmos has resulted in Complete Spiritual Enlightenment and manifestation as a Non-Corporeal Vision. Sadly, when nobody cheers, the Ultimate Pig pops off in a dudgeon, leaving Lucky to save the day and restore time in \u2018Hairy Nearly\u2019<\/em>: a major turning point that upsets many participants\u2026<\/p>\n

In what passes for a return to normality, Monkey is possessed by the ghost of a chicken and triggers an invasion of \u2018Zombies!\u2019 <\/em>just as Autumn opens with Skunky & Monkey unleashing a giant robot that is \u2018Turtle-y Ridiculous\u2019\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

Former good guy Fantastic Le Fox<\/em> is also possessed and proffers \u2018A Warning\u2019 <\/em>of failure and worse which Monkey immediately reacts badly to even as transcendent Pig returns to make contact with and elevate \u2018Prophet Beaver\u2019. <\/em>Of course, no one listens\u2026<\/p>\n

Monkey meanwhile has been messing with elemental forces, turning the woods into an \u2018Expressionistic\u2019 <\/em>nightmare before losing patience and challenging Bunny to a duel of \u2018Brain Power\u2019. <\/em>After winning by cheating, the simian sap learns a painful lesson that is only the beginning of his woes as \u2018Double Bunny\u2019 <\/em>depicts a doppelganger emerging who will change the status quo in quite appalling ways\u2026<\/p>\n

Lost and distraught, Bunny undertakes a mission for Skunky into the bowels of the earth in search of \u2018Long-Lost Flopsy\u2019. <\/em>Guess how that ends\u2026<\/p>\n

Drama intensifies when \u2018The Impossible Pig\u2019 <\/em>returns to reality only to learn that being \u2018Disappointingly Mortal\u2019 <\/em>would be better than life as a power battery for Skunky, before \u2018Lucky\u2019s Fortune\u2019<\/em> turns the tide\u2026<\/p>\n

Bunny has not been right since meeting the other rabbit and with Metal E.V.E.\u2019s aid \u2018The Search is On\u2019 <\/em>for a boon companion. Only briefly interrupted by reality running wild, the hunt resumes in \u2018Better Luck Next Time!\u2019<\/em> as Le Fox\u2019s niece arrives for some rowdy \u2018Fennec Fun!\u2019 <\/em>She\u2019s on the run and another relation isn\u2019t far behind her\u2026<\/p>\n

Solitude has bitten our hero hard and nothing Monkey can do will distract \u2018A Lonely Bunny\u2019<\/em> in his morose meanderings, so the little meany challenges Impossible Pig instead, and learns real suffering in \u2018Butt Then\u2026\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n

When Winter arrives, Lucky sees snow for the first time, enduring cheeky hostiles chucking chilly snowballs until the wonder-pig steps up as \u2018Protector\u2019 <\/em>but is tricked by Skunky who wants to depower the self-promoting saviour \u2018At All Costs\u2019<\/em>\u2026<\/p>\n

Resolved to return to the Molecular Stream, Impossible Pig takes advice from unknowable factor Le Fox, but stumbles into a wild Christmas Party on his way to the fabulous Lake of Eternity. He also meets Lucky who wants to leave this reality just as much, but as they argue over who should take the one-way ride, a dear friend and desolate hero is already \u2018Jumping the Queue\u2019<\/em>\u2026<\/p>\n

To Be Continued\u2026<\/p>\n

The agonised anxiety-addled animal anarchy might have ended for now, but there are still secrets to share: specifically detailed instructions on \u2018How to Draw Lucky\u2019 <\/em>plus a preview of other treats and wonders available in The Phoenix<\/strong> to wind down from all that angsty furore\u2026<\/p>\n

The zany zenith of absurdist adventure, Bunny vs Monkey<\/strong> is weird, wild wit, inspired invention, stunning sentiment and cracking cartooning all stuffed into one eccentrically excellent extravagant package. These tails (tee hee!) never fail to deliver jubilant joy for grown-ups of every vintage, even those who claim they only get it for their kids. This is the kind of comic book parents beg kids to read to them. Shouldn\u2019t that be you?
\nText and illustrations \u00a9 Fumboo Ltd. 2023. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Jamie Smart, with Sammy Borras (David Fickling Books) ISBN: 978-1-78845-312-7 (Digest HB) Britain and America were a bit preoccupied on July 4th this year and might have missed this major milestone of the Good Times returning. However, now that the happy dust has settled and before all the bunting gets packed away, lets celebrate … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Bunny vs Monkey book 8: The Impossible Pig! (paperback edition)”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[42,113,125,97,225,107],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30132","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-best-of-british","category-comedy","category-humour","category-kids-all-ages","category-mystery","category-science-fiction"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4AFj-7Q0","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30132","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30132"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30132\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30134,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30132\/revisions\/30134"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30132"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30132"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30132"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}