Graphic Novel Review: ‘Sally of the Wasteland’
Written by Victor Gischler | Art by Tazio Bettin | Published by Titan Comics | Format: Hardback, 128pp
Southern Lousiana, 82 years after the Fall. The apocalypse has come and gone, leaving behind a withered ravaged landscape of wreckage and mutant crawfish. Still, you gotta laugh, and Sally does, often using her beloved shotgun, Bertha, as the punchline! Inspired more by lust than common sense, and by a teenage desire to protect Tommy, the object of her desires, Sally leaves her bar job and joins the deranged crew of the Mississippi Duchess on a mission into the remains of New Orleans.
Sally of the Wasteland is a comic for those among us who like the post apocalyptic scene. I could draw many comparisons between it and the Fallout game series, so if that is your jam, you might want to check it out. Sally has mutated monster, cannibals, bandits, lots of violence, you name something you think you would find in the remains of a nuclear war, Sally can probably give it to you. But how does it hold up in comic book terms?
Very well is the answer, you’ll be glad to hear! Sally of the Wasteland has ample action, humour and crazy monsters to keep you entertained for a long time. Plenty of death too, which is always a laugh. If there is one thing which I should probably mention, it’s the fact that the main character Sally, and most of the females in this comic, seem to find as many reasons as possible to take their clothes off. Now, not that I am complaining about naked ladies. No, I am a big fan of naked ladies, but they seem to get naked for reasons which have no purpose except for nakedness. I know it probably isn’t a big deal for most of you, but I did start to wonder at points if I was reading a comic or if it was the writer Victor Gischler’s fantasies in comic form. Also I am pretty sure with breasts that big, the women in this world suffer regularly from back pain issues.
Apart from that though, the story and the art (brought to us by the talented mind and hands of Tazio Bettin) are both very strong. I was entertained and awed by the rather insane and strange things which happen to the Sally and her companions as they sail down a river in Louisiana. When the women aren’t stripping off, there are some hilarious, violent and exciting antics going on in Sally of the Wasteland . At the start, I was expecting a slower paced tale, but was proven wrong once the story really kicked off. Once it starts you have to hold on tight because the action is pretty non-stop right up until a dramatic and quite unexpected ending which left me wanting more. But will there be more? That is the question.
If you like your worlds post apocalyptic, your action fast and bloody and your women unreasonably proportioned and naked, then Sally of the Wasteland is the perfect comic for you. Funny, brutal and sprinkled with crazy, this comic is an exciting adventure right up to the last page.
Sally of the Wasteland is released on March 24th, courtesy of Titan Comics
