{"id":6098,"date":"2011-01-19T06:00:47","date_gmt":"2011-01-19T06:00:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/?p=6098"},"modified":"2011-01-18T17:13:36","modified_gmt":"2011-01-18T17:13:36","slug":"jimbo-in-paradise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/2011\/01\/19\/jimbo-in-paradise\/","title":{"rendered":"Jimbo in Paradise"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nBy Gary Panter<\/strong> (Raw\/Pantheon)
\nISBN: 978-0-39475-639-4<\/p>\n

Gary Panter has been an iconic force in comics and the visual arts since the late 1970s, and his unique distillation of American popular culture through the frenetic lens of his savage design style (alternatively termed \u00e2\u20ac\u0153ratty line\u00e2\u20ac\u009d or \u00e2\u20ac\u0153punk\u00e2\u20ac\u009d) has been seen in such varied fields as set design (winning 3 Emmy Awards for Pee-Wee’s Playhouse<\/strong>), interior design, TV and computer animation as well as record covers for Frank Zappa, Red Hot Chili Peppers and many others.<\/p>\n

His expressionistic, beautifully ugly, primitivist, high energy anti-art has influenced a generation of cartoonists and illustrators including Matt Groening, whose Simpsons<\/strong> design style owes much to Panter’s innovations in the 1970’s hardcore punk-zine Slash<\/em> and his contributions to Art Spiegelman’s legendary art comic Raw – <\/strong>from which these wildly eccentric strips are culled.<\/p>\n

Long considered a dominant force in punk and alternative comics, Panter is the leading figure of a second generation of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Underground Cartoonists\u00e2\u20ac\u009d, doing much to legitimise the movement and elevating this potentially misunderstood arena of graphic narrative to a position of High Art which most mainstream comics have never been able to achieve.<\/p>\n

Born in Durant, Oklahoma in December 1st<\/sup> 1950, he became an integral part of the US New Wave movement (not to be confused with our British effete, big-haired, baggy-bloused, excessively made-up electro-pop scene of a decade later). He worked for Time<\/em>, Rolling Stone<\/em>, Entertainment Weekly<\/em> and The New Yorker<\/em> as well creating his own comics and graphic novels such as, Facetasm<\/strong>, Dal Tokyo<\/strong> and Cola Madnes<\/strong> (created especially for the Japanese market) as well as his signature creation Jimbo<\/strong>: a punk icon <\/strong>whose bizarre life was (mostly) explored in <\/strong>the seminal Raw <\/strong>magazine before being collected into the intimidatingly oversized tomes Adventures in Paradise, Jimbo’s Inferno <\/strong>and Jimbo in Purgatory.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Set – not that it’s particularly relevant – in a semi-futuristic, dystopian urban hodge-podge landscape, burly, kilt-clad Jimbo is just getting by and making do, but stuff always happens to him\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

First, a new fast-food place opens up near the derelict building he lives in, but the telepathic robots who run it are really creepy and things start going bad when mutants chase him, trying to steal his burger. He takes refuge in the sewers but life doesn’t get any simpler. In ‘Jimbo’s House is Gigantic, but Condemned’<\/em> his skeevy pals Gruten, Zipper and Fluke come for a rather destructive visit, before they all go clubbing – giving the artist license to go hog-wild with stunningly complex full-page art-riots. Of course the authorities take a dim view of all the fun the kids are having\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

‘Jim30’<\/em> begins a aeries of connected vignettes which abandon formal narrative structure as the punky pariah experiences the downside of waking up, making breakfast and bathing before ‘Jimbo meets Rat-Boy’<\/em> introduces our non-hero to a kindred spirit – and his disgusting pet\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

After a devilish pastiche of the comic strip Nancy ‘Jimbo Erectus’<\/em> describes the evolution of the punk sub-species, after which we return to the future where Jimbo has scored with his buddy Smoggo’s harshly take-charge sister Judy. Now firmly entrenched in a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153relationship\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Jimbo is now confronted by a whole new world of give-and-take – so when giant cockroaches abduct his girlfriend he and Smoggo must rise to the occasion\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

Many of these strips are accompanied by an ancillary strip running at the foot of the pages. Now, at the most inconvenient moment, ‘William & Percy’<\/em> take over the main page before the dramatic hunt continues\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

Disillusioned, our man contemplates joining the army before opting for the natural life of a primitive shaman in ‘Jimbo is Running Sore’<\/em> (complete with graphic diversion ‘Klorex & Purox: the Mad Bombers’<\/em>). After a brief conversation with God the hunt for Judy resumes; an extended odyssey leading to a fantastic barrage of visual extravaganzas that encompass the explosive death of the world and its aftermath: an eye-popping crescendo of apocalyptic imagery that perfectly captures the philosophy of 20th<\/sup> century punk.<\/p>\n

If you’re looking for something a little strong, a little strange, perfectly outrageous and boldly experimental this is the ideal introduction to the works of an absolute maestro.
\n\u00c2\u00a9 1981, 1982, 1983, 1984, 1985, 1986, 1987, 1988 Gary Panter. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Gary Panter (Raw\/Pantheon) ISBN: 978-0-39475-639-4 Gary Panter has been an iconic force in comics and the visual arts since the late 1970s, and his unique distillation of American popular culture through the frenetic lens of his savage design style (alternatively termed \u00e2\u20ac\u0153ratty line\u00e2\u20ac\u009d or \u00e2\u20ac\u0153punk\u00e2\u20ac\u009d) has been seen in such varied fields as set … <\/p>\n

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