The comic strips in “The Trial of Colonel Sweeto” are hilarious and multicoloured and filthy like uhm…. like rainbow poop.
The majority of PBF strips have these simple white bald smiley-face characters. Those and the humour are the defining recognisable trades of The Fellowship. What makes the PBF extra fun and interesting (for illustration enthusiasts that is) are the variations of drawing styles that help the strips and add a layer to the jokes. Gurewitch manages to whip out all sorts of different styles. Many of them look like drawings from children’s books or ‘classic illustrations,’ and sometimes he uses the style of different artists, Edward Gorey being an example.
Maybe it´s the contrast between happy and evil that makes the dark humour and colourful drawings go so well together. The downside to that is probably only apparent to parents that want to control the amount of horror that enters their children’s lives, but are too stressed and overworked to notice when they accidently grab this colourful book as they run guilt-ridden through a bookstore, desperately trying to find something to compensate for their lack of being there. Imagine their shock as they realise what they have done, when little Olaf or Hilde mutters their first obscene word or asks an embarrassing question in public…..but you know, whatevs. It only scars the soul a tad.
There are plenty of people who grew up with the occasional copies of Heavy Metal, The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers and/or MAD lying around the house, and they are mostly fully functional adults today. It´s the Garfields of this world that do the real damage to people’s personalities.
- A Collection of the Comic Strips of The Perry Bible Fellowship By: Nicholas Gurewitch
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