You can definitely feel the Adventure Time similarities here; similar sensibilities and approaches to humor. Similarly absurd overall situations played straight, and lots of humor being pulled out of the absurdities. In this case, going to a clown planet to defeat Sadness... But that's just a skeleton plot that the jokes are built on. Everything is sill and funny and absurd and cute and all other kinds of puffy positive adjectives. I've not watched the series, but if this book is a fair representation of it, it's definitely going on the list. This is a fairly family friendly book that most kids should be fine with, even if there is a fair bit of decapitation. And zombies in mall food courts... The Bravest Warriors webshow is one of the coolest things to happen on the internet in some time. Co-created by the brains behind Adventure Time, Pen Ward, it follows the space-faring adventures of the Bravest Warriors, a group of teenagers, separated from their parents, and taken on their mantles as heroic space-vigilantes for hire. In space! Part of the reason it works so well - and part of the reason it continues to work well in comic form - are that the characters are so damn likable. Just like Adventure Time, which managed to lay genuine emotional depth beneath an outrageous, often inane fantasy world, Bravest Warriors features a principal cast of very human, very real teens, set against a spectacularly odd backdrop of weird cartoon creatures, planets, and technology. It doesn't outright take Adventure Time's formula - if anything, I'd equate it more with something like Red Dwarf - but the similarities are many, and, frankly, welcome.This volume features a lot of stuff, with a main plot running through and a lot of tiny little stand-alone gags, jokes, and even entire mini-stories by Ryan Pequin littered throughout. The main plot concerns our Bravest Warriors, Chris, Wallow, Danny, and Beth, alongside their sometimes-friend Plum (who is, naturally, a half-mermaid, somehow, and has two brains). Chris is the leader. Wallow is the enthusiastic one. Danny is the frightened one. Beth is the girl (well, to be fair, she often comes off as the core protagonist, but, for the sake of differentiation, she's the girl). Each and everyone of them has their quirks, fears, desires, and unique voice, provided aptly by Joey Comeau.The long-form nature of the volume-spanning arc is a major deviation from the webshow. Often clocking in at under ten minutes, the show deals with vignettes of the Bravest Warriors' adventures - here, we have a full story, replete with inciting incident, conclusion, and... that stuff that goes in the middle. Y'know. Storytelling. It takes the "emotional realism against backdrop of wacky surrealist cartoon universe" completely to heart, telling the story of a planet of people who are completely, unbearably depressed for some reason. A planet of clowns, of course - such comic irony cannot be devalued! - but a planet of super depressed people, whom the Bravest Warriors really want to cheer up. It turns out that the sadness is coming from a supernatural villainess who is literally the physical embodiment and manifestation of sadness itself - her name, Sadness. Believe me, it may not sound so, but hijinks do ensue.One thing that perhaps separates Bravest Warriors from its cousin Adventure Time, is its unrelenting attitude towards adult themes. Adventure Time has them, but this is a comic in which, within the first few pages, they've blown up a planet because it's full of misogynists. That's... that's pretty full-on, there, sport! Not that I don't welcome blowing up planets full of misogynists, but it's not something you see every day (sadly). Later on, where Sadness herself shows up and she's juggling skulls and threatening to put on puppet shows with the Bravest Warriors' corpses (albeit, adorable cartoon skulls, and adorable cartoon corpses), it takes a turn for the dark. Hell, she actually manages to behead all of them, killing them instantly. Say what? Yeah, I said it! You'll have to read the comic to see how the Bravest Warriors get out of being dead. Needless to say, it's not an uncommon recurrence in their line of work.The art takes the styles of the webshow and makes them significantly fuller in detail, and I actually think the book looks damn beautiful. Mike Holmes provides the illustrations, and the way he's approached Pen Ward's signature style without being confined completely to the look and feel of the web series is absolutely masterful, with fantastic use of colour and shadows in particular - something an internet cartoon show with a limited budget has to use somewhat sparingly. And Pequin's stories are well-illustrated too, but they're kind of aiming for something a bit different.Bravest Warriors is a real treat, both in its online form and here, as a comic. I actually think I prefer the comic - its meatier, (somewhat) edgier, and looks fantastic. The cover gallery included is of particular note, because, as with the Adventure Time comics, various artists have taken on the task of drawing the Bravest Warriors. Their unique styles and approaches are thrilling to witness, and the various variants collected here are welcome additions to the volume. There's very little negative I can say about Bravest Warriors - a lack of fan-favourite characters like Catbug and Impossibear, perhaps, but I assure you they feature in later volumes, and it's a nitpick in the face of the spectacular adaptation of a surprising and exciting piece of modern-day entertainment. I can wholeheartedly recommend Bravest Warriors to pretty much anyone who likes cute cartoon characters you feel attached to going on a surrealist emotional journey and talking about friendship and their feelings and stuff. Check it out.
What do You think about Bravest Warriors Vol. 1 (2013)?
This was a really fun read, make sure to read all of the little comments at the bottom of each page
—willy123
Love the style, cute stories. Give it (of course) to Adventure Time fans.
—smikes
I didn't like it as much as other ones because catbug was not in it
—Cypire
Lots of fun when it's building, unsatisfying when it's paying off.
—eszti
