Lasky, Dave – Boom Boom #2

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Boom Boom #2

Here it is, another in what’s turning out to be a long line of “what do you mean this guy or girl doesn’t already have a page here?” posts.  It may have taken me until 2010 to put the guy up on my website, but he was one of the precious few comic artists that got me hooked on this mini comic business.  His adaption of Ulysses into mini comic form was a thing of brilliance, and that probably should have been the comic I posted first, but hey, that just leaves something good for later, right?  This particular issue is, essentially, a birthday card to his dad.  He wanted to do something different for his dad’s 55th birthday, so he asked a bunch of relatives and friends to tell their favorite stories of the man and illustrated them.  He kept things interesting by illustrating these tales in a lot of different styles, including old school Popeye, Matt Groening overbite, and Peanuts, including a few more that I probably just didn’t recognize.  Stories in here include his dad growing up, running away from home and picking cotton at the age of 13, volunteering to discipline some neighbor kids, telling the kids that they’re going to the zoo and having the day fall completely apart, never paying his parking tickets (and eventually getting his car booted), accidentally joining a spa for the elderly, and how he had an endless supply of stories to tell his sons at bedtime.  It’s sweet, it’s funny, and even if you’re too cold-hearted to care about am over-sized birthday card to the guys dad, the variety of artistic styles alone should be enough to keep you interested.  I didn’t see any way to buy these on his website but, as is often the case with these mini comics folk, somebody really should put all this older stuff into a collection of some kind.  It’s a shame to have so much of it be impossible to find trivia at this point.  $2