Cipriano, Sal – Altered Realities 2000

Altered Realities 2000

Welcome to an annual anthology of fighting, killing, and more macho cliches than you can shake a stick at. Most of the stuff in here is written by Sal (but not illustrated), which is why I chose to pick on him. Let’s get one thing clear here. I’ve seen a lot of comics like this in my day, and this one is better than most. That being said, most of them are really bad and this one is somewhere between bad and “his heart’s in the right place”. At least he knows how to spell, that’s always good for some easy points with me… Anyway, the comic. This has a story of a boy who hears voices (but the voices are real and the boy can command them, kind of), a breakup, mostly naked girls fighting, pinups, a boxer who was supposed to throw his fight, a reality eraser, and a bully picking on a fat kid and a slut. A lot there, obviously. The highlight of the book is the story of the fat kid, done by Darrell Landa. A cute story, if a bit predictable. Everything else is OK for what it is. Some of it’s good, some of it’s bad, but it’s mostly OK. He’s keeping it cheap (this is a fat book at 64 pages and it’s $2) and he’s trying to keep it on a yearly schedule. It might be worth a look for some of you, if you like a lot of mindless violence with a few interesting plot points thrown in amidst all the junk. Send some money to him at 1819 West 11th St. Brooklyn, NY 11223, or e-mail him to see what else he has available. This sample is from one of two quiet stories in the whole book, so don’t think that they’re all this heavy on dialogue…