What do you think?
Rate this book
Legal Action Comics Volume 1
Paperback, as pictured; signed by sixteen contributors and numbered (47/50); text is excellent; back cover and last few pages are wrinkled (moisture damaged?) along bottom edge (com)
256 pages, Paperback
First published August 29, 2001
29 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
October 6, 2014
This anthology was a fund-raiser for 'Dirty' Danny Hellman, who was being sued by fellow cartoonist*(see below) and general dickhead Ted Rall, over an e-mail prank where Hellman assumed Rall's identity. Provoked by an editorial where Rall viciously criticized Art Spiegelman, Hellman came to Spiegelman's defense, although he was motivated primarily by Rall's arrogance, blatant jealousy and assertions that his own political works were superior... making him the perfect target for a harmless prank. A number of known and semi-known cartoonists came to Hellman's aid, including Spiegelman himself, with a back-cover that references one of Hellman's infamous comments**
Tony Millionaire was particularly generous, contributing a cover, an original story, and a couple of his most offensive and little-seen Maakies strips. The theme is sick humor and Rall-bashing, and Michael Kupperman***, Henriette Valium****, and Kim Deitch follow Millionaire's lead, with new works that are funny, clever, and offensive. Valium's story is amazing, especially his patently over-designed artwork, a strange mix of gothic realism and underground cartoonishness somewhere amidst Kaz, Crumb, and Charles Burns. Vincent Cato, best remembered for his blistering pages in Kramer's Ergot 6, where he went by the name 'Bald Eagles', takes the prize for most offensive story, involving a cat and a lot of weirdly uncalled-for gay slurs. But two who come closest -- Johnny Ryan and Sam Henderson -- also deliver the straight-up funniest tales in this first volume (yes, ther is a volume two). I don't know if I'd recommend this book to anyone, but for people who like humor with a bloody, disease-ridden edge, this is probably their kind of book.
* (If you can call him a cartoonist... he's a talented enough writer, but his art is just terrible. I like any style that works, regardless of simplicity or crudity, but Rall's art does not 'work', on any level.)
** (Hellman imagines a future 'Hall of Cartoon Heroes', where he concedes that Spiegelman's statue might not be in the grand rotunda, with the giant monuments dedicated to Crumb, and Wood, and Williams; it might, in fact, be somewhere on the lower-level, perhaps next to the Coke machine outside the Gift-shop... but it's safe to say it wouldn't be anywhere near Rall's likeness, getting pissed on as a men's room urinal. [I'm quoting from memory, and para-phrasing a bit, but it's close])
*** (Kupperman, who was known mostly as a book, magazine, and newspaper illustrator when this came out well over a decade ago, has since made his name in comics with 'Tales Designed To Thrizzle'. After 'Legal Action' hit the shelves, 'The Comics Journal', who love to instigate and inflame conflict in the comic world, asked Spiegelman and Rall to each provide a review of the anthology for side-by-side comparison in the magazine. Rall was smart enough to offer glowing praise to Tony Millionaire's stories, even though he depicted Rall as a monstrous nerd-worm, because Millionaire was a motherfucking superstar -- both in the comics world and New York... and a Millionaire, too, I guess. But the little known Kupperman was safely singled out, and Rall's anger showed pretty fast, tearing into the story in the most acidic and spiteful terms possible. Since I laughed out loud at the story in question (in which Rall is a hideous and imaginary Zoo-creature, with a large flat fish-like face, tiny useless pterodactyl wings, and hilarious little duck-legs; perched on a high rock he brags to bored Zoourists passing his enclosure, for example: 'I CAN SCREECH LOUDLY AND WITHOUT CEASE!' The rest of the rants are excerpts taken from Rall's own words in interviews. Kupperman deserves top honors for finding and using the weapon that bothers Rall the most: the truth, in his own words.)
Tony Millionaire was particularly generous, contributing a cover, an original story, and a couple of his most offensive and little-seen Maakies strips. The theme is sick humor and Rall-bashing, and Michael Kupperman***, Henriette Valium****, and Kim Deitch follow Millionaire's lead, with new works that are funny, clever, and offensive. Valium's story is amazing, especially his patently over-designed artwork, a strange mix of gothic realism and underground cartoonishness somewhere amidst Kaz, Crumb, and Charles Burns. Vincent Cato, best remembered for his blistering pages in Kramer's Ergot 6, where he went by the name 'Bald Eagles', takes the prize for most offensive story, involving a cat and a lot of weirdly uncalled-for gay slurs. But two who come closest -- Johnny Ryan and Sam Henderson -- also deliver the straight-up funniest tales in this first volume (yes, ther is a volume two). I don't know if I'd recommend this book to anyone, but for people who like humor with a bloody, disease-ridden edge, this is probably their kind of book.
* (If you can call him a cartoonist... he's a talented enough writer, but his art is just terrible. I like any style that works, regardless of simplicity or crudity, but Rall's art does not 'work', on any level.)
** (Hellman imagines a future 'Hall of Cartoon Heroes', where he concedes that Spiegelman's statue might not be in the grand rotunda, with the giant monuments dedicated to Crumb, and Wood, and Williams; it might, in fact, be somewhere on the lower-level, perhaps next to the Coke machine outside the Gift-shop... but it's safe to say it wouldn't be anywhere near Rall's likeness, getting pissed on as a men's room urinal. [I'm quoting from memory, and para-phrasing a bit, but it's close])
*** (Kupperman, who was known mostly as a book, magazine, and newspaper illustrator when this came out well over a decade ago, has since made his name in comics with 'Tales Designed To Thrizzle'. After 'Legal Action' hit the shelves, 'The Comics Journal', who love to instigate and inflame conflict in the comic world, asked Spiegelman and Rall to each provide a review of the anthology for side-by-side comparison in the magazine. Rall was smart enough to offer glowing praise to Tony Millionaire's stories, even though he depicted Rall as a monstrous nerd-worm, because Millionaire was a motherfucking superstar -- both in the comics world and New York... and a Millionaire, too, I guess. But the little known Kupperman was safely singled out, and Rall's anger showed pretty fast, tearing into the story in the most acidic and spiteful terms possible. Since I laughed out loud at the story in question (in which Rall is a hideous and imaginary Zoo-creature, with a large flat fish-like face, tiny useless pterodactyl wings, and hilarious little duck-legs; perched on a high rock he brags to bored Zoourists passing his enclosure, for example: 'I CAN SCREECH LOUDLY AND WITHOUT CEASE!' The rest of the rants are excerpts taken from Rall's own words in interviews. Kupperman deserves top honors for finding and using the weapon that bothers Rall the most: the truth, in his own words.)
May 11, 2012
On the plus side, this thing contains some great work by some of the best artists in the underground comics field. Tony Millionaire, R. Crumb, Robert Williams, John Holmstrom, Peter Kupperman, Julie Doucet, many others. On the minus side, the whole thing was put together as a result of some absurd animus between artists Danny Hellman and Ted Rall. Rall apparently had the audacity to criticize Art Spiegelman in the Village Voice (among other things, for being some kind of power-mad "cartoon czar" of New York). Hellman retaliated on Spiegelman's behalf by writing a satiric email claiming to be written by Rall, and Rall subsequently sued for, among other things, libel. So some of Spiegelman's friends and colleagues collaborated on this book, much of which is concerned with campaigning for Danny Hellman's legal defense, and, to some degree, pig-piling on Rall. Which only serves to prove Rall's original point about Spiegelman. Regardless, there's still bits of great material here, despite the middle-school pettiness of the whole enterprise.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews