tony fleecs
Tell Them Johnny Wadd is Here Comic Book review
Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009 | WEB | 1 Comment
Written by Tony Fleecs
Illustrated by Dave Wachter
Color, Comics Format
Terminal Press, 2009
Review from Guns in the Gutter:
I posted about this a couple of days ago, and decided to take a chance on ordering a copy. The publisher has only a very small number in print, and are offering them only at conventions and through their website. I got my copy Friday.
Tell Them Johnny Wadd Is Here is a very surprising comic book.
First of all, despite the source material – a series of hardcore sex films from the 1970’s directed by Bob Chinn and starring John Holmes – this comic contains no graphic sexual images. There is sex, and it’s erotic, but there are no drawings of Holmes’ legendary weapon, nor any actual full nudity shown. Secondly, there is an actual, intelligent plot.
Thirdly, it’s damned good.
Private investigator Johnny Wadd is in Mexico looking for the wife of a traffic cop friend of his, who has been missing for six weeks, and may have been kidnapped. As Wadd makes inquiries around the small town of Ensenada, he inadvertently provokes a local drug dealer, and discovers that the truth about the woman’s disappearance may not be quite what he was led to believe.
Frankly, this is a great little book. It’s short – only 18 pages of story, and it’s a POD product, so the price is too high… but damn, it’s a nice piece of work.
The story isn’t 100% original – then, how many are? – and suffers a bit from the short page count, but Fleecs’ dialogue is really strong. It’s suitably hard-boiled and sounds quite natural. His storytelling is good, too, using the comics format well and playing to his artist’s strengths masterfully.
And his artist has many strengths. The art by Dave Wachter is excellent, easily on par with most of the stuff being published by the big companies. Everything is well-drawn – characters, settings, props – and the storytelling is appropriately cinematic. The coloring by Narek Gevorgian complements his illustrations perfectly, setting the appropriate mood for this Mexican-based noir.
I recommend Tell Them Johnny Wadd Is Here with only a few reservations. One: the idea of using a porn film for the source is kinda weird, and considering how much new that Fleecs brought to it, I wonder if it might have worked better as an original creation, and two, the POD nature of the book, and its limited edition nature makes it a pretty steep investment for such a short story. Yes, the story’s good and the art is great, but it’s still too damned pricey. That’s gonna cost them a Bullet.
Five out of Six Bullets.
Tell Them Johnny Wadd Is Here can be purchased directly from the publisher at Terminal Press.
Johnny Wadd brings kick-ass crime drama, handle-bar mustaches to comic books
Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009 | Press Prelease | No Comments
Tell Them Johnny Wadd is Here comic book
Long Beach, NY — January 28, 2009 – The infamous 70’s film classic “Tell Them Johnny Wadd is Here,” from Arrow Productions, is the latest to undergo the “HARD/CORE” treatment, in Terminal Press’ line of limited-run comic books doing artistic takes on iconic adult cinema.
“Tell Them Johnny Wadd is Here” takes the cult classic Johnny Wadd character made famous by John Holmes and transports the “Johnny Wadd” character into a gritty crime drama set in present-day Mexico. For the uninitiated, the Johnny Wadd character and John Holmes himself were most recently the basis of Marc Wahlberg’s lead in “Boogie Nights” with Val Kilmer portraying Holmes as well in the film “Wonderland.”
Director, Bob Chinn said that he wrote the script for the first Johnny Wadd film on the back of an envelope. So, what would’ve Holmes and Chinn come up with if they had really shot for the moon with their script? What if they had to make people pay attention without showing them Holmes’ legendary 13 inches? They’d have done a hard boiled, tough as nails crime story with twists and turns and interesting characters, tough guys and sexy dames. They’d have done on film what we’ve done in this comic.
“This is my favorite comic book that Terminal Press has written so far. I truly love this story and am now a HUGE Johnny Wadd fan. The art is great and they even put in my idea of an orange 76’ Corvette for the Wadd to drive with a Nevada “Wadd” license plate,” says Robert Interlandi the Marketing Director from Arrow Productions.
“Tell Them Johnny Wadd is Here” is written by Tony Fleecs (In My Lifetime, Wonderlost, Li’l FireBreather), with art by Dave Wachter (Scar Tissue, The Guns of Shadow Valley), colors by Narek Gevorgian (Silent Assassain) and Separations by Joe Frazzetta.
Here are what some of comics finest have to say about Terminal Press’ newest book –
“Stop it! Stop complaining that comics aren’t good enough. Stop moaning that all you can find is derivative genre garbage. Stop whining about the glut of moronic super-hero books and impenetrable shoe-gazer lit-comix . You’re holding in your hands the tonic to all those ills. Tell Them Johnny Wadd Is Here is the cure you didn’t even know you needed. This book makes clear once and for all that not only is Fleecs one of the most exciting young artists on the comic scene, but also one of its best new writers.”
-Phil Hester, Writer of the Coffin, The Darkness, The Atheist and FireBreather. Artist of Swamp Thing, Green Arrow, Ant Man, Marvel Teamup and Clerks amongst many others.
“Tony Fleecs is a rising star in comics, and with Wachter’s able hands, you’ve got one of the best reads of the year.”
-Joshua Hale Fialkov, Harvey nominated Creator of Elk’s Run and Punks the Comic, writer of Cyblade & Vampirella.
“Tell Them Johnny Wadd is Here” will make its public debut at the 2009 New York Comic Con on February 6th at booth 2364 and is already available at http://www.terminalpress.com/tell-them-johnny-wadd-is-here.html The Limited Edition print run will only be available through terminalpress.com and Terminal Press’ convention appearances.
Tell them Johnny Wadd is Here comic book page 2
