Johnny Hiro #2

Sometimes, you see a new number one on the shelf at your local Comics Emporium, and you sigh heavily, and you walk past.

Other times, you pick it up, flip through, maybe read a bit. You put it back, sigh heavily, walk past.

Still other times you know what you want, and so you buy that number one, and you read it, and maybe you sigh, or maybe you don't. Then you bag the book, file the book, and walk past.

Once in a great big blue moon, you will find a new comic that not only fulfills any expectations you may have had for it, but far surpasses them; it easily vaults over your wildest hopes and becomes something that just amuses and entertains the living shit out of you.

That comic, my friends, is Johnny Hiro.

Johnny is a busboy living in Brooklyn with his beautiful girlfriend, Mayumi. They struggle, but they make ends barely meet, and they love each other very much.

Also, Johnny has adventures. Wild, stupid, crazy fun adventures that spring whole-cloth onto the page from the brain of writer/artist Fred Chao, in some remarkable goulash of chop-socky kung fu comics, cutesy indie relationship books, and just wildly imaginative good comics.

In issue 2, Johnny is chased by crazed ninja busboys, angry at him for stealing a precious lobster so that his boss, Mr. Masago, can serve it for the food editor from Vogue and save his dying restaurant. The heart of the book is a dynamic chase sequence that takes Johnny and his pursuers onto the rooftops of Brooklyn before a stunning one-page splash with follow sound effect that gives your stomach a little jump, like when Luke and Leia swing over the chasm in Star Wars.

Everything about this book just works. It stands alone, so it's a great one-shot book to pick up next time you see it. And unlike other indie books of similar length, the price point BEATS that of your average monthly comic from the Big Two, so you can even give it a shot without forking over more than you'd usually pay for any crappy superhero book.

Johnny Hiro was an amazing, refreshing, exciting surprise--one of those books that makes you feel so glad you even bother buying and reading comics. I cannot recommend this one highly enough.