Written and drawn by Jason Howard & Ryan Ottley. Gray tones by Cliff Rathburn
The Story: A grizzly bear living in the ocean, a killer great white shark living in the forest… Mayhem and chomping ensue!
What’s Good: Everything! This is the awesome sauce that I wish we got to see more of in the world of comics. I had heard teasers for this comic for a few months and knew the general concept: What if a killer shark and a killer bear traded places so that the shark was chewing up campers and the bear is attacking fishing boats? As it says on the cover, “They got mixed up!” That sounded like a zany enough concept that I had to give it a try, but I didn’t really know what else to expect.
We get two stories. The Sea Bear story (by Jason Howard, artist of Astounding Wolf-Man) starts off with the bear slaughtering a boat full of people and then zooms off into a zany story that includes cyborgs, killer robots and a sexy bear/human hybrid (yes, you read that right). The Grizzly Shark story (by Ryan Ottley, artist on Invincible) is even more over the top. Two scenes that stand out are a teenager who has been bitten in half being dipped into the campfire by his Dad to “cauterize the wound” and a buxom powerwalker getting chomped such that all that is left is the head and boobs. The whole thing is completely tongue-in-cheek and simply outrageous.
Of course, with the artists also handling the scripting, the art is in perfect sync with the story.
What’s Not So Good: You could criticize the lack of plot development. It also is completely untied to continuity or any other current comic crossover. But, if you make those complaints you just don’t get this comic.
Conclusion: Track down a copy and when you’re done with it, pass it on to a friend.
Grade: A-
– Dean Stell