Peter Bagge - Classic Or Dud

APOCALYPSE NERD #1

Written and art by Peter Bagge.

Imagine yourself in a post-apocalyptic world, where all the creature comforts that you've spent an entire lifetime taking for granted were suddenly gone for good. How do you see yourself reacting to such a situation? Would you "suck it up" and be stoically content? Or would you spend most of the time cursing your fate? We all like to picture ourselves as the former, though the latter is probably a more accurate portrayal - and that's exactly what our "hero" is like in Peter Bagge's new mini-series.

Marvel as our protagonist, an asthma ridden, myopic former middle manager for a software company, has his limited survival skills continually put to the test, only to continually come up short! Thrill as his dumb childhood friend Jeff Beasley bullies him around, as he abuses his new found status as the undisputed alpha-male of the two! Cringe as what's left of human civilization continually deteriorates around them, and they along with it.

Each issue will also feature a back of story detailing poignant yet humorous anecdotes about America's Founding Fathers. Finally, George Washington and his gang will be starring in comics of their own!

I loved all the Hate and Buddy Bradley stuff, the wilder and less realistic the better. His more recent stuff didn't appeal greatly, to be honest. I expect I'll give this a try.

Hate etc. was brilliant. Clasic. Don't know his other stuff but for Hte alone gets a massive pass.

"i scream, you scream, we all scream for heroin"

Studs Kirby was brilliant.

that Beach Boys cartoon he did on the net was great.

the Megalomaniacal Spiderman was brilliant (I only wish the Hulk one he was working on had been released).

So : Classic.

his recent work is curiously up-and-down though. the Spider-Man book was pure classic, and one presumes THE INCORRIGIBLE HULK will also be, should another regime change at marvel allow it to be released. The Lovey strips in HATE ANNUAL are good, so to a degree are the prose reprints, but the Suck stuff was awfully reformatted and see above for Buddy comments.

YEAH! was a really good comic for nine-year-old girls, only of course no nine-year-old girls go into comic shops to spend seven bucks on a tiny little pamphlet. SWEATSHOP, his follow-up from DC (a satire on the comics business, particularly daily strips) started off painfully cliched and mapped onto a template of Bagge story beats without actually having much story. but as the series went on, the characters became richer and the comedy better. of course it was really hitting its stride when it was cancelled. I liked the mix of artists working from Bagge model sheets, too.

his strips for REASON vary wildly from lame old-man-grumbling to incisive and funny commentary. the last one I saw, about the fraudulence of modern art, actually managed to blend the two to gigglesome and non-grating effect.

Action Suits: S the My Janeane/4-Track Mind 7" on Fluffer, it's their two best songs conveniently packaged together!

I found the one I bought fairly lame. I don't buy Hate annuals to read four pages of Hate comic and then loads of non-comic waffle about what Bagge thinks about stuff. He should start a blog.

Anyway completely classic.

man the original Hate run is still so funny. A little shocking how un-PC it is, which registered with me at the time (Buddy's casual n-bombs + homophobic slurs etc), but also interesting in that Bagge seems to have been very aware of what he was doing - other characters push back against Buddy on these things, and more often than not it's clear he's being an asshole. Also charming to see how hard he went in on promoting other cartoonists and zines, truly admirable. the gross-out sex shit ppl would send him in the letters column erm less so.

Also recently got Everybody's Stupid Except for Me Out of the Library and while I rarely agreed with him, this previous ilxor post:

I find his narratorial voice almost always likeable and his viewpoints well reasoned and funny, even when I don't agree with them

is very otm

i reread all of it recently and yeah it's still great. one thing i'd forgotten was just how elaborate with dense cross-hatching the art was in the early issues.

Yeah its crazy detailed

amazed to notice that an early issue of HATE includes a Patrick McDonnell (of MUTTS fame) drawing of Buddy Bradley in the "news"/letters page

The difference between the Seattle and New Jersey runs is very striking - the art becomes much more simplified and standardized, and the writing follows a much more plot-driven sorta structure. Characters no longer digress on various subjects, everything is very much about getting the story from point A to point B, and naturally the focus shifts from shenanigans of 20-something slackers to the family dynamics stuff. Still funny but it seems part of a tidal shift in the way he worked.

i like the NJ phase just as much, and I actually think bringing blanchard on to ink was a boon. I wasn't into the crosshatching proliferation period of his self-inking

really wanna reread the whole thing soon

Lisa's evolution is probably the best thing about the whole run tbh

always feel like bagge missed his chance at simpsons-esque success with 'the bradleys' -- his hate animated test was really awful, though.

there's no way that would've worked on TV at the time - you need all the swearing and grotesque/obscene behavior

floppy spaghetti arms could be proxy for cursing.

the ads in the Jersey issues are a real flashback. I mean, this lamentably named band (who I don't remember at all/have never heard of) placed ads in four consecutive issues:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Icxtar-yWI0

which numbers? if it was early on, they might have been offered a great deal when Fanta had no faith in being able to sell ads at all (having adverts was Bagge's idea, that he had to really push for)

or they could have just been big fans obv

20, 21, and 22. the ads are truly embarrassing though ("13 pop punk songs to help you get over her").

tbf there's also an acquaintance band's ad in one of those (papas fritas) so it wasn't all no-name pop-punk garbage.

I wldn't say that P Bagge's musical choices/opinions are 100% unimpeachable (speaking as someone who owns this):

https://img.discogs.com/johLMmw3qCnRbFjmOOZ-pjI_4Jg=/fit-in/600x547/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(90)/discogs-images/R-2842859-1419337037-1769.jpeg.jpg

I doubt he personally gaf about Her Fault, doesnt seem like his kind of thing and there was no personal connection afaict