Flippin' Out
I picked this comic book off the "local comics" rack at my comic book store. Does your local comic book store have a local rack? If not, why not! But as it turns out, it's not quite as local as I thought, this is actually an Australian creator.
For those who are geographically challenged, NZ and Australia are separated by roughly the same distance as England and Russia. Culturally, the gap is much wider. Oh, perhaps not. But even so, it was with great trepidation that I began to read this 12-page B&W mini-comic.
Until now, I was blissfully unaware of "Flippers" - a Fish'N'Chips (in U.S. parlance, a Battered Fish and Fries) fast food restaurant that rests on a punt in Constitution Dock in Hobart Harbour, Australia. Leigh Rigozzi offers five two-page tales of Flippers, verging from the autobiographical to the truly apocryphal.
The first story is a simply explanation of Flippers, and a description of some of the customers, generic an specific. The second story is a Vietnam war translation of a day at Flippers, while the third is a series of fake mythos describing the origins of the restaurant. The fourth explains the cunning and invasive psychological tools which Flippers wields on its customers, while the fifth is a psychedelic Flipper-inspired romance tale.
Rigozzi has a simple voice. The art is simple, and the text (predominantly voice-over rather than attributed) is equally plain. The subject matter is every-day, though it leads into various flights of fancy. The final result is startlingly entertaining.
These short stories are inexplicably intriguing, each in their own different way. Perhaps the final tale is a little too whimsical, but the first four are beguiling beyond logic. I guess it's not what you do, it's the way that you do it. And however it's done, it's good in this case. I'd give it four webs if this was a review.