Meyer, Doug – Napalm Pinata: The Lost Years

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Napalm Pinata: The Lost Years

One thing you can say about “best of” comics is that if they suck, chances are nobody is going to buy other issues of your comic. Why should they? You just put out a collection of the strips that you think are the best and the issue is lame! Not that that’s what happened here, I just wanted to offer a word of caution to comics folks to make sure their best stuff really is in their “best of”s. Ahem. So what do we have here? Mostly comics from Napalm Pinata #1-3, with some other stories from anthologies and whatnot. That story I raved about from issue #3 is in here (go ahead and read that review, it’s right up there, if you’re curious), there’s Bumble Doug, crazy Virginia, an escape from a demon using word balloons as actual balloons (a funny idea that goes on for a few too many pages), rearranging a sleeping man’s dream for maximum creepiness, an impassioned plea to let comics be fun, the best stories from #3, a Rabie Babie, and mentioning imminent death. Oh, and the first strip he ever did on the back cover, to give you a bit of historical context. I think he’s gotten better with each issue that I’ve seen, and it’s reflected here with the later half of the issue getting better than the first half. Still, this is a good career retrospective, and if you don’t like at least half of the stories in here you’re probably not going to like any of his stuff. This is about 60 pages so I’m thinking it’s around $4, but why not send the man an e-mail and find out?