Less is more with Michael Hind. His “Jay the Blind Jaywalker” strips are simple, juvenile and totally politically incorrect, yet they had me guffawing in the subway. Well worth the two bucks. Meanwhile, his continuing biography of the Russian futurist poet Mayakovsky is uneven and over reaching. It was a struggle. “Jo the Squirrel”, a new character for Hind, seems to be aiming for a middle ground. It’s beautifully drawn, but Jo’s encounter with the KKK (narrated in verse to the metre of “The Night Before Christmas”) is bizarre. Left an unpleasant taste in my mouth. As witnessed by the “Jay” strips — not to mention a cute spoof of Brad Yung’s comic Stay as You Are, entitled “Stay Away You Arse”, in which Hind…*ahem*…critiques bp and “that rat” editor Hal — the best reason to buy New Pompeii is for the good old simple satire. (Shaun Smith)
comic zine, 44 pages, Michael J. Hind, $2, 9-385, Caterpillar Press, rue Edouard-Charles, Montreal, QC, H2V 2N1, [email protected]