Comic Review: Quick Stops 1

Kevin Smith continues the expansion of the Askewniverse by returning to comic books. This time as a series of anthology stories dealing with various characters.

Quick Stops #1
Dark Horse Comics
W: Kevin Smith
A: Jeremy Simser
L: Andrew Thomas
$3.99

Recap: The first issue of the series has Holden McNeil (Chasing Amy) revealing the origin story of Bluntman and Chronic. The story takes place at Chronic-Con and it starts as an interview between Holden and Alyssa Jones for the Bluntman Beyond podcast. The story takes all of the Kevin Smith beats: Steve-Dave, the Eden Prairie Mall, Banky breaking the window of Comic Toast.

Most of the story is a flash back at the Quick Stop, where Holden worked for a month. He got high with Jay and Silent Bob, where he conceived the idea of Bluntman and Chronic. He imagines their first adventure against Cock-Knocker while sitting with them.

The flashback ends and goes back to Chronic-Con so Holden explains the creation of the comic. There are other flashbacks (“I am the clit comander”) in the podcast. The issue ends with the podcast ending and Jay and Silent Bob showing up, a la Jay and Silent Bob Reboot.

Thoughts: Nothing earth-shattering, but Smith’s work (outside of great dialogue) isn’t earth-shattering. There are great one-liners, fun throwbacks, and a little depth to some of the characters; Smith continues to build the characters we’ve known for over 20 years. We also get Holden in a Daredevil mask.

The art fits the story; Simser’s characters all look like the real life versions and doing the book gave it a “Kevin Smith” feel. From what I can tell, this is Simser’s first comic work (he’s a storyboard artist by trade) and hopefully he’ll continue to do more.

This is a mini-series (according to Dark Horse), so I’m sticking with it in the hopes we get more later on.

Rating: 3 out of 5. Nothing groundbreaking, but a fun story from a universe that I’ve followed for 25 years. I’d recommend it to anyone who’s into the Askewniverse.