WAR AND PEAS – FUNNY COMICS FOR DIRTY LOVERS / AUTHOR: JONATHAN KUNZ, ELIZABETH PICH / PUBLISHER: ANDREW MCMEEL PUBLISHING / RELEASE DATE: 3RD MARCH
Being able to produce regular four-panel gag strips that are also reliably funny is an uncommon thing. The internet is filled with many different sorts of web-comics, but only the brave tackle the challenge of producing short, well-made strips. It’s much harder than it looks.
War and Peas – Funny Comics for Dirty Lovers is a collection of cartoons from the website of the same name. Jonathan Kunz and Elizabeth Pich’s art is pretty and also minimalist; we have cute but not highly detailed depictions of the various characters, in a style that would be familiar to fans of work such as The Perry Bible Fellowship. The sweet, quirky design is innocent and simple. The humour, however, isn’t.
This is a collected comic book stacked high with filthy humour and lots of subversion. One of our recurring characters is Death, who apparently has a dog and is getting a little bored with his job. The breakout character is ‘slutty witch,’ a long-legged redhead with a pointy hat who apparently dresses in a revealing Halloween costume. Most of her gags involve sex and the supernatural in some way, with some human sacrifice thrown in for added spice.
We also have a horny robot who doesn’t really understand love, a dumb dog who understands people a little too well and a pair of permanently lost hikers who don’t seem to understand anything. This is quite clearly a collection of strips from a web-comic; one page is dedicated to the memory of Laika, one of the Russian space dogs. This is a lovely tribute and makes sense on a website, but here it just seems like a bit of a non-sequitur as it appears in the middle of the book.
War and Peas – Funny Comics for Dirty Lovers isn’t essential in any way, and it’s most likely going to be the sort of book that sits in one place and is read at random. However, it’s a lot of fun and, if you have a friend who has a dark sense of humour (and a big sense of humour), it would make an ideal gift. This is perfect casual reading for anyone who might find themselves in need of short and funny distractions. Ideal for putting by the phone or leaving on a bathroom shelf.
Silly, sexy and just dark enough. Rather fun.
