Wacky Raceland #6

Coming soon to an America near you!

• I grew up in the late 70s and early 80s when the Cold War with Russia was really heating up. At the time, I thought the Russians were the scary country with a finger poised over the launch button. Little did I know how much Reagan and his people were egging them on, poking at them, aggravating them, and just generally daring them to do something stupid. For people who like a little more truth in their history, just know this: the world almost certainly survived those times because Gorbachev was a patient man who understood just how close far the world was teetering on the brink and he refused to play Reagan's games. For a lot of you, you're probably thinking, "Bullshit. The Russians were crazy and Reagan handled them deftly." Go ahead and continue to think that rather than reading historical accounts of the time. That's fine with me. But also realize that right now, it's even more obvious that Donald Trump is making the world a more dangerous place. Not because of a conflict with Russia, obviously! He loves Putin. But he certainly has no understanding of diplomacy and consequences. He is a man who thinks he can punish anybody who does him wrong, or goes against his wishes, or just points out he has tiny hands and the worst comb-over. The fucked up, selfish Republicans think they're having a surprise Quinceañera and America is the piñata. They're going to whack it until it falls apart and then fight each other for all of the succulent candy that falls out.

• How does this relate to this comic book? Well, it is about a post-apocalyptic landscape, isn't it?!

• The Wacky Racers have recently discovered the Butcher Shop, a place behind the origins of nearly each and every one of them and their cars. They also discovered that Pat Pending has access to the facility which makes them all angry. Pat Pending has recently discovered that his underwear can hold about half a pound of human feces.

• Pending has another surprise for the Wacky Racers, one he hopes will keep them from killing him and then desecrating his corpse by doing things that, if I described them, would get me scolded by rational and well-behaved Internet citizens (I mean well-behaved when they're not shaming and scolding somebody who said the wrong thing in the wrong way and probably doesn't deserve the life they had before saying that thing, so why not completely tear it down?).

Pat Pending has almost certainly stuck his dick in that giant brain.

• Last issue was called "The Butcher Shop, Part One: Revelations." So you might think that this issue would include, somewhere in the title, "Part Two." But you'd be wrong! You probably weren't surprised by that revelation since that was such a standard set-up. No, this issue is also called "The Butcher Shop, Part One: Revelations." I guess that means it's Part Two of the first part of The Butcher Shop story although it doesn't make that explicitly clear.

• Pat Pending's wife is the all-powerful Announcer. He blames her for destroying the world after she went insane. He doesn't explain how or why she went insane but I'm willing to put twenty dollars on "Pat stuck his penis in my amygdala."

• The Announcer decides to blast some Wacky Raceland history into the heads of all the racers. Please oh please let it be that moment that I've mentioned twice now about the pinky and the brain.

• The Announcer tells everybody about Pat Pending's experiments to help enslave the world: weather control, nanite swarm death panels, dwarf clone armies, and weaponized Scooby Dogs. I knew this was the same universe! Now to just have Slutty Velma behind it all, making plans and gobbling dicks, and I'll be happy!

• Too bad for Pat Pending, his experiments revolted, led by the Slag Brothers. In the riot, Pat's wife was mortally wounded so he stuck her brain in a jar. That seems like a shitty idea. Could you really keep loving your partner if they were just brain? I'd bring women home to have sex with and they'd be all, "What's with the brain in the jar?" And I'd be all, "Just put a sheet over it." Then because I was stupid enough to hook the brain up to censors and microphones and computers, it would be all, "What's that sound? Tess? Are you fucking another whore?!" Man, just let her die, Pat!

• Angelique, who probably goes by "Ann" since that works for Announcer too, became Godlike in her powers over the world being linked directly into the World Wide Web. She decides to kill the world leaders and take over. I'd probably do something like that if I were a brain as well.

• You know the most worrisome thing about a Trump presidency? I once fleshed out one of our No Apologies! Press characters from the Galactic Hero Corps called Global Thermo-nuclear War Dude. I revealed that his main goal was the destruction of everything because he couldn't bear to die knowing that the world would still go on without him. I have a feeling if Trump gets some kind of health news where it's revealed he doesn't have long to live, he's taking us all out with him.

• Pat's wife not only killed all of the leaders, she destroyed the Earth.

And they're off!

• Pat Pending's plan was to train the Wacky Racers until they were strong enough, and a cohesive enough unit, to take down his wife, the Brain in the Jar. He probably could have offered to change out her brain water and then "accidentally" dropped her on the floor and kicked her under the fridge. Although that probably would have been a short comic book series and it wouldn't have involved the Wacky Races. So I'm glad it was done this way.

• The Announcer's jar is impervious to most weapons. But it has one weakness! It can't stand up to the Wacky Racebot! That's the robot that the Wacky Racecars turn into when Pat Pending initiates secret FuckCar Protocol 777. We all know why 69 is 69 but 777 is when a bunch of cars stick their dicks in each other to become one giant car.

• The Wacky Racebot defeats the brain by putting a cancer bomb inside of it. That's one way of like ten million ways to destroy a brain, I suppose.

• Afterward, all of the Racers head off to get drunk. But Pat Pending stays behind because he's not Pat Pending anymore!

I fucking hate it when this happens.

The Ranking!
+1! Um. I guess that's it? I wasn't prepared for this to be over so soon. I guess I'll just have to go stick my Wacky Races DVD in and pretend they're racing through the end of the world. At the very least, this version will probably always shade my reviewing of the cartoon in a positive way. I always loved the cartoon because it's fucking silly. I mean wacky! But I also always loved the "competition" cartoons where you never knew who was going to win each week. Although when your favorite character is the guy who is never allowed to win and his dog, it made for some sad Saturday mornings. But come on! Dick Dastardly should have won them all! And the Really Rottens should have won the Laff-o-lympics every week! We all knew it was true! Anyway, I'm sad this is over although I'm always kind of happy to find out I've got one less comic to read each month! That's me! Always* looking on the bright side!

*Always represents between 1 and 3 percent of all of the times.

Wacky Raceland #5

This looks like the most boring race yet!

The Commentary!
• This is the first issue that begins with a "Part One" tag on the title. That must mean it's getting into the real meat of the story! The first four issues set up the world and background of a few characters but now it's time to find out what the races are all about. Oh, also this part of the story, "The Butcher Shop," is called "Revelations"! That means stuff will be revealed! Unless it's the Biblical version of the word and then it means everything is coming to an end! Maybe it means both. Although, how much more can end in the Wacky Raceland world?

• Gravel, one of the Slagg Brothers, poisons everybody with hallucinogenic mushrooms. Maybe poison is too strong a word. I've poisoned myself with hallucinogenic mushrooms on multiple occasions and it was always the best poisonings I've ever done to myself. The worst time I ever poisoned myself was walking barefoot on a roof that my grandfather was spraying with termite poison. That wasn't anywhere near as fun as poisoning myself with magic mushrooms!

• The Butcher Shop is where they do all the genetic manipulation of creatures and mankind. It's where the Ant Hill Mob were cloned, although I don't think they have the butcher's knife splicing DNA tattoos. At least not anywhere anybody can see them. Maybe they'll get naked while tripping on the shrooms and Dick will be all, "Hey! You guys have tramp stamps?!"

Is this Muttley sniggering for the first time?

Between that last caption and this sentence, I threw my back out. That was about 24 hours ago. I actually couldn't get up from the floor because it hurt too much to move in most directions. At one point, I was struggling to get out of my thick winter jacket because I was so hot and just laughing uproariously at my predicament. I also pledged to never again laugh at old people in commercials who say, "I've fallen and I can't get up!" It is extremely frustrating, lying there with your face in the carpet and thinking, "Why the fuck don't I ever vacuum this shit?"

• I'm skipping work for the rest of this week in the hopes that my back will be ready to go again next week. This isn't a fancy fun holiday freebie piece of time off since I own my own business and nobody fucking pays me for time missed. Stupid self-employment is stupid.

• I've also learned that my upper body strength is far worse than I thought it was. And I didn't really think much of it before! My legs are still pretty muscular from biking but they don't help much when you can't get them under you! Stupid legs are stupid.

• Back to the comic book, Muttley has a memory of The Butcher Shop as well. He was given some genetic enhancement that might prove that the Wacky Raceland is Earth many years after the Scooby Apocalypse. It's probably the same universe as The Flintstones too! But not Future Quest. I'm bored of Future Quest. I'm not reading that book anymore. Unless Blue Falcon and Dynomutt eventually show up! But I'm hoping they'll appear in this comic book or Scooby Apocalypse.

• The Ant Hill Mob were created in the Cloning Vats. Muttley was created in the Darwin Pits. And the Slagg Brothers were brought back to life in the Resurrection Room. So apparently they really are cavemen from the past! They might even show up in an issue of The Flintstones! I hope!

• The last time I did acid (as opposed to mushrooms which I've done since this last acid trip), I was telling my cousin about the episode of In Search Of where they investigate a tribe in Africa who drew paintings on the walls of aliens and a star map that seemed to suggest the aliens were from Sirius B. When we got back from the beach party that night and beginning to come down, that episode of In Search Of was on TBS or USA or one of those stations that loved to show old series. This was sometime in the mid-90s. After that, I fell asleep while watching All the President's Men and wound up in a fucked up dream of layers upon layers of secrets and conspiracies which just kept getting deeper and more convoluted. That dream was a lot of work. I woke up exhausted!

• The Racers wake up from their trip having remembered that their minds had been wiped. But now that they recall their time in the Butcher Shop, Muttley is ready to lead them all back there. Of course the Announcer has other plans.

• The Racers face typical obstacles on their way to the Butcher's Shop: Sandtipedes, Nanite Storms, Back Pain. But once they get there, Professor Pat Pending voices some emergency protocol codes and the Announcer begins doing as the Professor says. The doors open and the announcer welcomes Pat Pending back to the Butcher Shop. That's when everybody remembers that it was Pat Pending who experimented on them.

• The issue ends with everybody angry at Pat Pending. But they should cut him some slack! All this time, he had control over the Narrator and he didn't use it to his own advantage! He was still racing fair and square! Although I'm sure his knowledge of what's going on only extends to The Butcher Shop. He probably had his mind wiped too by whoever is behind the races. Although he could still be the brains behind it! He could be the one testing them and making sure they're ready to battle the aliens who have destroyed this world! Unless the person really behind it all is Super Slutty Velma. That's the same Velma you're reading about in Scooby Apocalypse but with less clothing and more dicks in her hands.

The Ranking!
+1! I'm still having issues with the art and the weird jumps in the action from panel to panel which make it all a bit hard to follow. But I'm thoroughly enjoying the world building of a post apocalyptic Wacky Races World. Everything is slowly being explained and it's all coming together and it's all making sense in that way that stories don't usually make sense when they're answering questions about the overarching plot. Maybe that's because the series has been set to answer questions from the start and didn't spend three years asking questions before it started answering! I'm looking at you, The X-Files!

I should probably go rest my back now! Stupid office chairs are stupid!

Wacky Raceland #4

I guess it's Peter Perfect's time to shine! Oh, and his car, the Boner Special.

The Commentary!
• This issue begins at the finish line which is so postmodern that I just put my copy of Tristram Shandy in a blender with some ice cream and blueberries so I could drink it while reading this issue. It's not very good. I probably shouldn't have added the blueberries.

• No, I really don't know how postmodern it is to begin a comic book about a race by telling the readers who just won the race! It was the Slag Brothers, by the way. Here's the current Wacky Races Tally for the season:

Dick Dastardly: 1!
Penelope Pitstop: 1!
Professor Pat Pending: 1! Maybe!
The Slag Brothers: 1!
The Other Chumps!: 0!

• Most comic books wouldn't be able to stand the strain of beginning in the middle of a story, let alone the end of the story. After narrating the middle of the story for about three pages, they'll jump back in time to explain how it all began. Usually that explanation is boring bullshit that any intelligent reader could have figured out on their own. I'm only saying all of this because I'm fairly confident that since last issue pretty much explicitly stated that the winners of the races don't matter, Ken Pontac won't force a flashback on us. Although he might be doing one of those stories that's told backwards. I hope not! I hope the story just continues with the Racers after-race orgy.

• The Slag Brothers have killed a gigantic octopus which they call an Elder God. Speaking of Elder Gods, I'm going to take this moment to admit that I actually adore H.P. Lovecraft's writing style. It's not much of an admission, to be sure, since I've said it before in my commentary on Red Hood and the Outlaws #33. Here's what I said about it then so I can lazily fill up more space in this commentary:

Anyway, I said I wanted to say something about Nabokov's writing, didn't I? Let me start by saying something about H.P. Lovecraft's writing! When I read Lovecraft, he makes me want to write. I tend to begin writing projects in my head spurred on by Lovecraft's prose and then realize I've read a page or two of Lovecraft without any memory of what I'd read because I was lost in my own writing projects. But Nabokov's writing makes me want to destroy all the typewriters in the world and hang myself. He's just so fucking good at the words. He make me hate mine ability to put things. Bad Nabokov! BAD!

Why does Dick care about clues?! This isn't Scooby Apocalypse!

• The race they just raced ended at the Hoover Dam and you know what that means! Well, maybe you don't. I guess if you're not familiar with the local geography around the Hoover Dam, you might not have realized that ending a race there is the perfect time for a trip to Las Vegas! This issue is called "What Happens in Vegas..." which is a pretty good title because we all know that stupid fucking tourism saying that's just another way of saying, "You will be doing a lot of drinking, drugs, and fucking of prostitutes here." But the pretty good part is that it's also a good title about the Racers in Vegas because this story is literally about "What Happens in Vegas."

• The Narrator explains all of the gangs running Las Vegas now. There's the Pharaohs (unless I spelled that wrong and then it's different somehow), the Clowns, the Comb-Overs, and the Caesars (unless that's spelled differently too! What's with all the words with strange vowel pairings coming out of the Mediterranean? Oh, I get it. Everything is hard to spell in that area).

• Forget Peter Perfect's backstory this issue. This one is all about Red Max! It's really hard to tell what any of these old cartoon comic books might be about by relying on the covers since they always have so many variants. And it's not like they tell you on the cover if they're a variant or the regular cover. DC really should have some kind of code. Maybe they do have one! I just don't know how to crack it!

• Red Max was a gambler in the past and he seems to have cheated the wrong people. They're the wrong people because they still exist in Las Vegas and he's been identified by the Caesars.

• The Red Max is still being called The Red Baron in this comic book. I refuse to call him that!

• Because of the Red Max's past debts, all of the Racers are captured and thrown in the arena. Meanwhile their sentient cars, led by Muttley, are breaking out of the parking garage. This is just the kind of exciting thing that happens in Las Vegas that you're not allowed to tell anybody about after you leave! Worst travel destination ever!

• So, anyway, the Racers have a great vacation in Las Vegas and nothing out of the ordinary happens at all and they go back to their normal lives. And if you ask them about the two-headed tigers or being chased by an army or escaping thanks to a flood created by a bunch of intelligent cars, they'll just look at you and smile and say, "Where'd you hear that malarkey? We just hit a few buffets and played some craps!"

• After escaping thanks to that flood that didn't happen, The Red Max quotes Genesis. But, for some reason that must have to do with his intense homophobia and racist attitudes, he quotes the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah instead of some quote about Noah's flood. I mean, both events happened because God wanted to wipe out sinners, so either one would work. It's just that the flood seems more appropriate to this specific situation! I guess if I don't want to be argumentative simply because I'm an asshole, I could accept that the Red Max is a hatemonger, and everybody refers to Las Vegas as a modern Sodom and Gomorrah. So it's fitting enough. Besides, the flood of Noah seemed sort of relaxing compared to the firebombing of the Twin Cities of Sin.

The Ranking!
No change. One of the things I really like about this comic book is that it's telling one and done stories. But that's also the reason for my biggest issue with this book. It feels like there are gaps in the story which I imagine is because of the limited pages to tell the story. And it's not like the art helps when something in the story has me confused because a bit seems to be missing. A little more clarity with the art, and fewer rough jump cuts to the story would do wonders for this book. As it is, I'm still enjoying it but then I come from a background where I loved the Wacky Races. So how could I not love this book?! I suppose if Cullen Bunn were writing it, I might have some trouble with it.

Wacky Raceland #3

I really want to feel joyous thanks to the Muttley sticker but my mind is screaming because of the fucked up dice.

The Facts!
• Today's race takes place in Big Sur! I put the exclamation point on there because anybody who was ever in The Sierra Club in High School in California probably first got fingered there. Apparently the place is now called Poseidon's Toilet. I assume that's because fingering isn't the only "first" that happens there anymore.

• If there isn't an urban dictionary entry for "Poseidon's Toilet," just imagine it's when somebody pees in your asshole as you're receiving oral sex.

• Apparently Peter Perfect is a God-fearing man. What a puss.

Dick didn't mock God at all! He was mocking victims of sexual abuse! Get it right, Peter!

• Luke of the Arkansas Chuggabug declares God is dead while Pat Pending points out that the search for a supreme being has been mankind's biggest folly. Now, I don't know about all that! I'm sure believing in something greater helped people until they didn't need the crutch of religion anymore. Sure, some people still need it. And that would be fine if they kept it as their own business. But when somebody sees you walking around crutch-free and having a good old time, I really wish they would stop insisting that life would be easier if I got some crutches too.

• Peter answers Pat by pointing out that science doesn't answer everything. No, it doesn't. YET! But you can't just decide that anything you can make up in your imagination is as good an answer as anything else! Science continues to paint the floor of the universe with explanations while God is desperately trapped in an ever-decreasing corner. He's just not needed as an explanation. For anything!

• The mountain the Racers are driving across collapses into a deep body of water which knocks Penelope Pitstop into a memory of her youth. It's mostly composed of crayons.

• Penelope's memories might be a little wonky from the near drowning. Or else she actually had a Cyclops for a step-father. She seems to worship Zeus, so I guess it's possible! Anyway, her backstory was one of abuse so you'd think she would have been more offended by Dick's comment than Peter was. But why would she get offended at Dick Dastardly?! He's the hero of this story!

• One of the rules of the race is that the Racers can't let other Racers die. That seems like a ridiculous rule. I guess this race isn't about finding a winner to send to a fabled Utopia after all. The Announcer must need them to save what's left of the world and the only way to do that is to forge them into a strong team who can depend on each other.

• I still wish they could kill each other. I guess that would make things too easy.

• Sawtooth has a metal chastity belt and a metal mouth gag. What the fuck is up with that?! I guess he's Rufus's sexual subservient.

See? A deviant! Rufus and Sawtooth are definitely fucking. Violently.

• Penelope and Dick bond over slaughtering mutant crabs away from the rest of the Racers. Penelope even admits that Dick makes a lot of sense. Of course he does! He's the most intelligent Racer in the group! He also hates everybody and knows life is a piece of shit that simply wears you down until you're too tired to argue with it anymore and you die listlessly! That whole raging against the dying of the light? Impossible! Life has almost assuredly crushed the spirit from you long before you're gasping your final breaths.

• Dick also probably reviews comic books.

• The plant monster controls Red Max like a puppet in the way you're probably imagining a puppet is puppeted. He says to Rufus, "I don't know what you see in this, Rufus." Is the only point of Red Max to insult all of the characters in ways that allow the reader to discover their gender and sexuality?! He's quite the important character then!

• Dick and Penelope are almost eaten by a monstrosity of a Leviathan. It's not a natural sea monster though! It has the logo of some gene-splicing company: a hatchet chopping a double helix in half. Is the company the bad guy The Announcer is training the Racers to battle? Or is the company just one of The Announcer's many assets to make the Racer's life more difficult?

• I hope the ultimate enemies are aliens.

• The issue ends without revealing who wins the race. It was probably Pat Pending! But I think this issue is the one that's saying, "Look! It doesn't matter who wins each race because the race is beside the point! The point is what the Racers learn about themselves and each other during each race! Sheesh! Pay attention!"

• I'm just going to mark down that Pat Pending won! So that's one for Penelope, one for Dick, and one for Pat! Go Dick!

My Opinions!
I wish the art in this comic book were a little bit clearer. I get that it's gritty and post-apocalyptic but sometimes I actually want to be able to understand what I'm looking at without having to cross my eyes and stare through the page until everything comes into focus. As for the writing, I have a feeling it will get better as Ken Pontac gets more comfortable with the world he's building. I do like that each issue has been one individual race, like the episodes of the cartoons. I also like that the race doesn't actually matter. It's just a metaphor for life, and the Racers a metaphor for those we're closest to on our journey through it. Getting to the finish line ahead of the rest isn't the point. It's how you treat the others on the journey, and it's about discovering the things you're capable of, and it's about redeeming the things you eventually become wise enough to realize need redeeming. This book has a lot of potential, I think. Dick Dastardly has always been my favorite Racer and he continues to be in this comic book. My second favorite from the cartoon? Rufus and Sawtooth! And, hey! Guess what? I think they're becoming my second favorite here too! They just need more on-panel time!

Wacky Raceland #2

If at all possible, I will always choose a cover with Dick Dastardly. Unless one of the covers eventually shows the Turbo Terrific and the Compact Pussycat fucking.

The Facts!
• It's sometimes hard to tell how filthy-minded people from the past actually were. In a general sense, I believe the amount of cynicism among the general populace wasn't as great while the amount of naiveté was greater. So when I look back at the Wacky Races cartoon, I have to wonder if the artist who designed the Turbo Terrific and the Compact Pussycat knew he was making a sexually explicit visual comment on the Peter and Penelope? I would have to think he knew but owing to that greater level of naiveté, it was something that could easily make it onto a kid's cartoon. For those who don't know what I'm talking about, here are the two cars:

A head-on collision between these two cars would be x-rated.

• The current race is in San Francisco. That probably means they'll encounter a gay earthquake who is tripping balls.

• Dick Dastardly drives by a building that allows him to reminisce about his life before the apocalypse. He can't do it while driving though so he stops and gets out of the car, ignoring the radiation and cannibal mutants. Maybe he left some devious trap supplies in the building and he needs them to make sure the Anthill Mob wind up with Hepatitis C. Oh, and also lose the race, of course!

• Apparently Dick Dastardly was a famous concert pianist before the world went to shit. And also not-so-apparently and maybe I'm interpreting the story wrong, but his piano playing causes plagues. Also maybe he plays the violin. And maybe the plagues were just happening. And maybe...well, anyway, some horrible cataclysm hits San Francisco and Dick, being inside the secure vault with the Stradivarius he was showing his wife and child, survives. But his wife and child were locked out of the vault. By Dick. So, you know, he watched them die. So I guess that's supposed to make him a bad guy? I think it makes him a survivor!

• Meanwhile, the rest of the racers are being attacked by cannibals and nanites and underground comic book artists. It's not the most exciting story. Just a bunch of scenes with how each of the different racers tries to avoid the nanites. Pat Pending gets his Convert-a-Car to convert. The Gruesome Twosome gruesomely drag some cannibals behind the Creepy Coupe to distract the nanites. The Red Max continues to say as many transphobic things as he can think of to Sergeant Blast. And Peter Perfect decides to blast an EMP to disable all of the nanites. Of course, that kills all of their cars as well. If this were the cartoon, the Anthill Mob would all lift up the frame of the car and run across the finish line on their feet to win. But since this is a comic book and not a silly cartoon, I hope Dick Dastardly wins since his car is still operational, being that he was left way behind while he picks up the violin he left all those years ago for some reason. I mean, why didn't he take it with him the night his son and wife and everybody in San Francisco died?

• Oh, maybe he didn't want the violin after all. He just wanted to finish his concert and apologize to the audience for taking their money without giving them the performance they paid for.

I would prefer it if Muttley were sniggering.

• After Dick's family died that night, The Announcer came to him and turned his car into the sentient Mean Machine. The Announcer then promised Dick that if he could win the Wacky Races, she would be able to bring Dick's wife and son back to life. He agrees although he forgets to ask The Announcer if they could be brought to life with just a little bit of their memories cut off at the end of their previous lives. Because, I mean, how happy are they going to be to see him when their last memories are of him locking them out of his safe room to watch them die in a firestorm?

• Back to the others, it seems the EMP killed the cars but not the nanites. They were able to bring themselves back online and now the racers are all racing on foot to the finish line as they try to outrun death.

• Dick passes by the other racers and refuses to blow his EMP to help them out. Why do they even ask him? They saw how that didn't work before! I think they're just trying to get him to be stuck in the same position. What awful, awful people all of the racers who aren't Dick Dastardly are!

• Dick does use his EMP but only after he wins the race. Good job, Dick Dastardly! I can't believe he won a race in only the second issue! Did Ken Pontac ever even watch the fucking cartoon?! Dick never wins!

• At the finish line, the Racers are beset upon by cannibals before they can beat Dick's ass for not saving their lives quickly enough. Fucking ungrateful bastards! Dick Dastardly is a hero and a race winner and a survivor! How dare they treat him so shabbily. I've never read a character that is more upstanding and inspiring as Dick Dastardly! My hero!

My Opinions!
Hopefully this comic book doesn't concentrate on just the more human of the racers. I think we've got a pretty good handle on who Dick and Peter and Penelope and Red Max and Sergeant Blast and Pat Pending are. I want more stories about the Gruesome Twosome and the Slagg Brothers and Rufus Roughcut's beaver friend, Sawtooth! What's going on with those guys?! We already saw what was up with Blubber Bear which was less interesting, I thought, than having Luke running around with a cowardly, anxiety-filled bear as his partner. Why couldn't he have a sentient bear in this book? Why isn't Muttley more human? Why can't a beaver be a co-driver?! This thing has sentient cars and an omnipotent announcer! I want this comic book to be weirder than it is and less based in sci-fi realities. I want sci-fi fantasies!

Wacky Raceland #1

And away they go on the way out Wacky Races!

The Review!
Look, I was a fan of The Wacky Races when there was barely any plot and it just consisted of a bunch of twenty second jokes dealing with how one car passes another. Now it actually has a backstory and a plot and a whole world being built around the races? Sure, I'm in! Especially since the premise is so mind-numbingly silly already, none of it has to make a whole lot of sense. I imagine this comic will be mostly a bunch of two to three page black humor jokes about how one car passes another with the occasional sub-plot dealing with a racer or two having gone off course and running into cannibals or mutants or something. Also a few pages need to be set aside for some of Dick Dastardly's dirty tricks! The only part I'm still not sold on is the sentient cars. I especially dislike how the Mean Machine is so antagonistic toward Dick and Mutley! I suppose it makes sense. I bet if my work van were sentient, it would fucking hate my guts. "Hey, dude. Dude. You do know what oil is right? You've heard of fucking oil? And let me tell you something: I did not come with a television. That little light you're constantly staring at and ignoring is the fucking Check Engine light. Do I need to explain what that means because it's right there in the name of the fucking light, you goddamned moron. I can't wait until the bottom rusts out of me while you're barreling down the freeway. You fucking deserve it, asshole."

The Commentary!
Hopefully Dick Dastardly and Mutley best all of these other assholes. He was always the best racer. He never won not because he couldn't win but because he had so much fun trying to murder the other racers. They were all so fucking incompetent, he could have won if he just raced within the rules. Christ, the Arkansas Chuggabug was steered by the feet of a sleeping redneck while a bear with severe anxiety rode shotgun! Peter Perfect was never going to win in a fair race against Dick because then he'd have to celebrate with Penelope Pitstop and he was obviously overcompensating for some sexual problem. Plus, you know, racing against a guy named Dick was a bit of a too on the nose metaphor. Rufus Roughcut's fucking car, the Buzzwagon, had saw-blades for wheels! How the hell did that thing even move? Some of the other cars were a tank, a steamboat, a biplane, a rock, and a haunted house! Dick Dastardly had a fucking rocket car! He knew he could win in a fair race so he decided to have fun simply trying to murder everybody else. Or it's possible he just went insane chasing that goddamned fucking pigeon.

The issue begins with the Wacky Racer's cars all parked outside of a bar. The cars are having a conversation with each other so I guess they get to be actual sentient characters in this story as opposed to just cool eye candy. I'm not really sure how I feel about that although I'm already picturing Peter Perfect's Turbo-Terrific mounted on back of Penelope Pitstop's Compact Pussycat. Christ, I was young when I loved this cartoon because now every time I think about the cars, I get a boner.

So The Mean Machine is bullied and laughed at by the other cars? No wonder it and its drivers are so foul tempered!

Meanwhile in the bar, Blubber Bear turns out not to be a real bear at all. He's just a guy wearing a bear head over his own. Maybe in the future, they take the gay slang term a little more literally? I guess Arkansas Chuggabug is slang for a gay sex act.

Penelope Pitstop is a hard drinking woman in a tight outfit. The Anthill Mob are some kind of freakish clone mutants that probably have a hive mind. Dick Dastardly is still my hero. And The Red Max is apparently a fascist and a racist. At least I think it's the Red Max. It isn't until a flashback to earlier that the characters are all properly introduced along with their vehicles. It's also on the introduction page that the entire premise of the comic book is explained. An Omnipotent Narrator (Yay for keeping him in! Yay for a comic book with an omnipotent narrator! Even if he talks directly to the characters! That's probably just another yay!) sponsors the race and the winner gets to live in the only paradise left in the world. Everybody else must remain in the apocalyptic landscape of Wacky Raceland. I have a feeling nobody ever truly wins the Wacky Races!

As the story flashes back and forth between the race earlier and the current post-race bar brawl, the readers learn the Narrator is female. But I'm reading the narrator's dialogue in Dave Willock's voice!

See? Fascist and racist! And transphobic too!

Penelope Pitstop won the earlier race by riding a Sandtipede across the finish line. Talk about cheaters! Although I highly doubt it matters who wins. These races are just a way to get their hopes up and torture them in the Wasteland! It's all a big game and they're all being taken for fools! Although I wonder if The Compact Pussycat does more than makeovers in this modern interpretation?!

See? Dick and I think alike! My hero!

So now that the story is introduced, it's time to end the issue so a new race can begin next issue. But there's still a back-up story featuring Lazy Luke and Blubber Bear called "And Sometimes The Bear Eats You". That sounds gay. I mean literally gay and not gay used as a pejorative! I already assumed Luke and Blubber were homosexuals due to the whole bear shtick as well as naming their car the Arkansas Chuggabug. Maybe this story will be the semen on the pudding.

The story is about how Luke and Blubber were attacked by a bear and Blubber loses most of his face and an arm. But that's okay because the Announcer breaks in and reports that he can fix Blubber up with a bear head and a bear arm and maybe give them a sentient car with a still attached if they agree to be in his Wacky Race!