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Tuesday 5 April 2016

Megahex by Simon Hanselmann Review


Megahex is hysterical - I loved this comic. It’s a stoner comedy that you don’t need to be a stoner or high to enjoy and there are some big belly laughs in this book. 

Ostensibly parodying Jan Pienkowski’s Meg & Mog kid’s books, Megahex stars Megg and Mogg, a witch and a cat who’re boyfriend and girlfriend, and their housemate Owl, a six foot humanoid owl, whom they torture mercilessly. The book is made up of strips of varying lengths from one pagers to longer stories, most of them purely comedic but some dealing with more serious themes like depression, growing up, and trying to make something of yourself. 

I appreciate creator Simon Hanselmann giving the comic more dimensions by addressing substantial ideas but I loved the book because of the silly humour in it that had me laughing like cray. One scene has Megg and Mogg knock-out Owl with a rock, strip him naked, put sunglasses on him, load him into a shopping cart and push him into traffic towards the cops; Owl’s reaction was priceless. 

Owl is my favourite character - he’s such a poor, stupid bastard. One time he’s biking home from the mall, gets a boner, and the blood drain from his head causes him to crash his bike! Another time he tells Megg and Mogg that he’s attending AA so they decide to secretly get him drunk and watch him pick fights in the mall. 

It’s pretty edgy humour at times too. On his birthday, Owl’s friends take him to an empty room and simulate raping him! In another story he gets off with a girl he didn’t realise was 13 years old. There’s also a character called Werewolf Jones but I’ll let you discover him for yourself (think Steve-O from Jackass). 

Megg and Mogg are such tremendous arseholes too. Owl gets his dream job so they deliberately sabotage his first day so he gets fired. Another time they lock him out of the house when he really needs to use the toilet so he has to crap in the yard. And then there’s the trauma of the New Year’s story… poor Owl. Heh. 

I really liked Hanselmann’s understated art style too. It’s a very simple, traditional comics layout, all grids, but he tells his stories within them perfectly - he knows exactly what to show in each panel and how to pace things to make the jokes work. The colours are just wonderful too. 

If none of what I’ve described so far has even made you smile a little bit, Megahex is definitely not for you. I was howling with laughter more often than not though and had a blast reading it. Not all the jokes land but many do and some of them are killer. I highly recommend Megahex for a mega fun time!

Megahex

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