Story by Jim Zub
Art by Edwin Huang
Issue #8 joins our hapless heroes after they’ve been framed for the murder of the Chancellor and several other nobles by a group of fairies and their ginger-elf leader. Dumped into the street with no weapons and little information, Shorty and Baldy’s plan is simple: hide out until nightfall and find the town’s less reputable elements, then press them for information to clear their names, kicking some ass… I mean skulls… along the way.
Everything in this book is as guileless as you would expect: our heroes are simplistic, so their adventures are requisitely so. This lack of depth is balanced by legitimate (if sometimes black) comedy, evidenced by several interjecting scenes involving the retrieval of a golden flintlock. The brainless storyline is not unwelcome, though, and should be expected from a book named Skullkickers.
Edwin Huang’s artwork is suitably dynamic, seemingly built entirely to enhance comedy and action, which is exactly what a script like this needs. The aforementioned gun retrieval sequence is hilariously rendered, and Huang’s choice of framing adds an extra punch to just the right beats. Misty Coats’s colors are bright and vibrant, a good compliment to the book’s overall style.
Skullkickers is what it is: a rambling, anachronistic log of a (pretty decent) D&D adventure, replete with the kind of dialogue you’d expect from a group of cynical long-time gamers. It’s an entertaining ride devoid of emotion or drama – but sometimes that’s good enough.
