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I’m finally digging into some comics I picked up at C2E2, starting with Ryan Kelly’s Funrama #2. You guys, it’s so cool. Funrama #1 felt like a goofy riff on Chris Claremont-era X-Men comics so that Kelly could scratch an itch and do something light-hearted and different from his usual, Vertigo-type work. That’s so not a bad thing, please don’t misunderstand me, but this second issue, though still weird and entertaining, gets deeper and hints at even further depths for Kelly to explore in future issues. It’s obviously still a way for Kelly to blow off some fun steam, but the main character – a high school superheroine named Raccoon – feels more real than the first issue’s Mutant Punks. It’s also surprising that he explains the name of the comic by using it in the story. I won’t spoil how, but it was a revelation to discover that Funrama is more than just a generic name for what I thought was going to be an anthology of loosely connected stories. Kelly’s doing some real world-building and even though he’s obviously having a great time doing it, he’s also building in some sinister elements that will pay off later. I highly recommend tracking him down at a convention for these or ordering them through his website.
-Michael May
