HM285LoveLetter

Beloved Hurlers:

The Love Issue: oolala!

My darlings since 1979, with me so rockily, here and gone, but always subscribed together, you offer me formally your love. Yes, Heavy Metal, I love you right back.  Kinda like Grant Morrison, too. Anyway, I got the Florian Bertmer andman, it was the sweetest of frosting on my Valentines cupcake. Amazing texture, line control, all that fine detail regimented into negative space. Absolutely beautiful; and then i go inside the content page and almost cry ‘cause i couldn’t have James Jean as well. So Suhweet!

Let the grand romance guignol, the love slaughter, begin with the torturer, Liberatore! Thank you, thank you, thank you, what a treat. “The Lure” renews an springboard from monster comics and still manages to twist the ending in unexpected and empowering trajectories. Dean Haspiel plays Berni Wrightson for “Frankenstein Unrequited” and spanks it into topical modernity (He can do anything). Baldo’s “Happily Ever After” really wasn’t so much, eh. Makes me think of Wally Wood. Human love sucks. Heavy Metal love rumbles. Ooooo, rumbles.

Ok, Gutt Ghost is funny. He’s Everyman, only dead, and a ghost, with guts hanging out.

Both galleries seemed to seek out unusual artists and succeeded.  Ruben’s LP made me want to paint the walls of my house; Brandon Chiesa’s work evoked victorian storytelling, Asian pop, and cyberpunk with a woody charm with bubblegum overtones. And James Jean is the single most sensual painter I see; his figures seem fluffily soft and increasingly difficult to resolve with the apparent eroticism, alienation, and incongruity of the contents. I could look at this all day.

“Sword of God” and “Herald” don’t fit theme so well as they present worthy objects for attention. Clements smoky gold, silver and ash images caress my mythbone (stop it) and make my imagination sing.  Grebol and Piriz offer a welcome tale of “future-noia” and I expect to see more of them.

I see you being all meta in “Mythopia”, and, while that was pretty easy Mr. Morrison, don’t let me stop you from plugging in these smaller bits. Belanger and Estevez create a very retro feel, like Bashki’s Wizards. Got any more?

Gerhard! In Heavy Metal? Whodathunkit? Morrison, that’s who.  I am so pleased with The Smile of the Absent Cat! Gerhard needs to have pages out there; this work is so textured and tonal its interactive.  It feels like its drawn on papyrus in my eyes. And what a match for the story! Nice choice; which came first? Story or artist? Can’t wait to see more!

Still riding that Salsa Invertebrata-, Atomahawk-, Inki-Bilal-triple-threader-train; well balanced issue, and i felt the love.  

Griffin, like the monster

Mauser, like the gun