I've you've never read The Perry Bible Fellowship webcomic, now's the time to start. Dark Horse recently published a giant omnibus of material from Nicholas Gurewitch's PBF, The Perry Bible Fellowship Almanack, and it's a concentrated dose of the kind of dark, twisted humor that makes you bark with laughter and look away at the same time.
Gurewitch's comedy is solidly in the "unexpected turn of events" school, the surprise in the final panel that contains as much surrealism, malignancy and social commentary as it does humor. This is complemented by Gurewitch's visual style, which veers from the simplistic and cartoonish to incredibly detailed line art that's like something out of Tony Millionaire.
Last year, Gurewitch had a huge success with the first collection of his strip, The Perry Bible Fellowship: The Trial of Colonel Sweeto and Other Stories, which pre-sold three print runs before its ship date (!), so it's no surprise that Dark Horse would reprise the collection this year.
Be warned, though: the Almanack duplicates all the material in the Colonel Sweeto collection, though it's twice as long, including many strips that were omitted from Sweeto, including a number that were too racy, gross, unfunny or weird for the newspaper syndicate, as well as sketches and interviews.
Here's what I'd do if I already owned Colonel Sweeto: I'd get this one anyway and give the Sweeto to someone who needed a good mind-blowing. Both books are very handsomely made (Dark Horse does a quality product) and both are the kind of funny that's worth having around.
