Tuesday, July 18, 2006

THE CHROMA-TICK #1 New England Comics Press, 1992



I have raved about Ben Edlund's The Tick before, and since this is my blog and I can start posting nothing but pictures of cats if I want to, I am going to rave about Ben Edlund's The Tick again.

From its humble beginnings as a small press black and white book published by New England Comics Press, The Tick grew into a pop cultural juggernaut, with a really well done cartoon and a short-lived but kick-ass live series starring Patrick Warburton. Perhaps "pop cultural juggernaut" is overstating things a bit, but The Tick was enough of a hit to boost creator Ben Edlund's career; he worked on Joss Whedon's lamented, beloved TV series Firefly and wrote some of the funnier episodes of the series ("Jaynestown" and "Trash" I believe). In my book, Ben Edlund has built up some cred as Bringer of Goodness.

This particular issue, The Chroma-Tick Special Edition #1, is a colorized re-print of the first Tick issue. I'm not all that convinced that The Tick needed to be in color, but whatever.

I'm not going to give a detailed analysis of the story or artwork or offer an insightful exploration of the themes or socio-cultural context of this comic book, primarily because I never do that. I'm all about summarizing comics and throwing in a couple of cheap gags - but why do all that typing if the comic can do it for me?

Here's a sequence that made me laugh when I first bought this comic back in The Day and made me laugh last night when I was flipping through it. The Tick gets knocked out and wakes up someplace dark (a train tunnel):

A thinly disguised Clark Kent analog is on the subway platform and he notices somebody in the tunnel. There's no time to change into his super alter ego, so he runs down the tunnel to rescue The Tick, who is convinced he is inside a whale.

The Tick's brain works in strange ways. Once he has locked into a conclusion - I am in a whale - he has a hard time switching gears when presented with new information that might contradict his initial conclusion. Observe:

He struggles with the Clark Kent clone, with predictable results:

My standards are low, but I think that is funny. Thanks, Chroma-Tick #1, for making me laugh twice at the same joke - once in 1992, once in 2006. That is comic book value, right there.

20 comments:

Matthew E said...

Don't forget Edlund also wrote some good episodes of Angel--the one where the monster-of-the-week calls Wesley 'talky meat' and, best of all, the famous Puppet Episode.

Anonymous said...

"I DO NOT HAVE PUPPERT CANCER!!!"

He also wrote "Jaynetown", one of the best Firefly episodes.

Best thing about Tick live action? Liz Vassey. As a superheroine. Oh MAN...

Sleestak said...

Best. Cartoon. EVER.

Anonymous said...

It's possibly this very same issue of The Tick that has the best ever sound effect. When The Tick is facing a gun-wielding opponent, he swipes the weapons from the bad guys' hands. The sound effect is "Take. Take."

Check out "The Tick's Giant Circus of the Mighty" if you can find it. It's sort of a Marvel Handbook for the Tick Universe. All Hail "Agrippa! Roman God of the Aquaduct!"

Anonymous said...

"He also wrote "Jaynetown", one of the best Firefly episodes."

"Whoo! We gotta go to the crappytown where I'm a hero!"

Anonymous said...

I'll second the Liz Vassey comment. Give me Captain Liberty or give me...oh, just give me Captain Liberty.

The next best thing was Warburton's Tick. After tossing a whole fortune cookie into his mouth and chewing, he discovers the paper fortune "...a message from my teeth!"

Word verification: rbokp --Another fine product brought to you by OCP.

Mike Podgor said...

Ben Edlund is also doing minor work for "Venture Brothers". He helped out with the first season episode "Careers in Science" and he wrote a second season episode called "¡Viva los Muertos!"

zyphryn said...

I loved the comic and I really liked the t.v. show, which was a mix of superhero parody & Seinfeldian interaction. Thanks for the reminder, Dave!

A Army Of (Cl)One said...

All I have to say is "SPOOOOOOON!!!!!"

Anonymous said...

Night of a Million Zillion Ninjas (hell, the whole storyline) is a work of sheer genius.

Anything that brought us the goodness that is the Ninja Hedge shall be beloved forever.

"We are a hedge. Please move along."

Jon the Intergalactic Gladiator said...

Ninjas? They're more scared of you than you are of them!

J'onn J'onzz, Martian Manhunter said...

I'm having fun typing in random words on the word finder and finding your embarrasing deleted, yet somehow still findable posts... Oh, and since when did AOC comment here? And the tick is hilarious... Yeah.

Senor Cheeseburger said...

Yeah, the Tick is great and all, but if you want to see pictures of Jessica Simpson naked body parts you should probably check out www.supersexypictures.blogspot.com

McGone said...

Mike P beat me to it by mentioning Edlund's helping out on "Venture Bros." His contribution is spotty in name credit, but the show's creator - Jackson Publik, - started out on The Tick cartoon, so his imprint is definitely there.

And if you read this site and DON'T watch "Venture Bros."... well, shame on you.

As for his work on "Firefly" I tip a mug of Mudder's Milk to the man.

Mike Haseloff said...

He was great as Freddy Kreuger, too.

Anonymous said...

Dave, delete that spam, now!

Senor Cheeseburger said...

It's not spam or porn numbnuts... at least mine isn't....

Anonymous said...

I'm down with the pictures of kittens...xesqdw

Food Kitty said...

a message from my teeth..he he.

I didn't know there was a cartoon version until I blogsearched "The Tick" looking to see if there were more than 9 episodes of the live action version.

This has filled in the gaps nicely.
THANK YOU

Prosper said...

The guy is totally just, and there is no skepticism.
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