Fresh Print: Everybody Loves Tank Girl

Tank Girl is back for another run at causing chaos across a post-apocalyptic Australia and she’s brought out all the big guns and samurai swords.

Tank Girl has it’s roots in the UK from original creators Jamie Hewlett and Alan Martin as a comic strip in magazines in the late 80’s. Since then Tank Girl has spawned many different comics, short stories, collections, and even a movie in mid 90’s. This time around Alan Martin is back writing, with visual genius Jim Mahfood. Mahfood is best known for this breakout illustrating for Kevin Smith’s Clerks, Stupid Comics and his work on Marvel’s Spectacular Spider-man.

Without reading any other Tank Girl comics prior to this one, I wasn’t sure what I was getting in to. The storyline is non-linear, and you are introduced to characters on the fly. Give it a few pages and you will get used to it and you will learn to expect the unexpected, recognizable with Martin’s previous Tank Girl works. The one story that seemed to fade in and out throughout the book was one of Tank Girl and her group babysitting a child and running from a psychotic gang. The offbeat and dark humour with the senseless violence is something that readers will come to love. The artwork is something I loved with a passion; Mahfood has a really gritty style that can be beautiful and chaotic at the same time. Mahfood will blend pages of black and white pen work to full colour spreads. There is a huge amount of detail that goes into each page drawn; it keeps you scanning every corner to catch some offbeat doodle or joke which is really what kept my interest over the writing which seemed unorganized.

Overall, I enjoyed this graphic novel due to the fact that I have been slowly moving away from the heroes in tights and more towards the grittier world of what publishers such as Titan Books and Vertigo are bringing to the table. I’ll be sure to pick up the next book to see exactly where they will take Tank Girl this time.

Pick up Tank Girl at your local comic book stores starting February 27th.