The Doofus Omnibus

Rating:
Summary: Hilarious and Outrageous Comix!
Review: If you dig the more controversial work of Crumb and Clowes, Johnny Ryan's "Angry Youth Comix," Tony Millionaire's "Maakies," or the work of Sam Henderson and Ivan Brunetti, you'll find "The Doofus Omnibus" hilarious. A substantial collection of Rick Altergott's work over the past ten or fifteen years, it draws from out-of-print Doofus comic books as well as Peter Bagge's HATE and The Seattle Stranger,where Doofus was a long-running weekly strip.

Altergott has created with "Doofus" Andersen an amusingly degenerate, beer drinking, panty-sniffing, porn-loving philosopher who lives in his mother's basement, though he seems well into middle age. His pal Henry Hotchkiss (who lives in a shack near Doofus' backyard) is a sub-normal, slack-jawed dope who shares with Doofus many of these proclivities, with the exception that he's the stupid one. So, in the course of their many adventures in the tiny burg of Flowertown, Henry Hotchkiss plays the fool as Doofus' sidekick, friend and confidant.

The comic is carefully rendered in a style not unlike that of MAD magazine legend Jack Davis, giving it a unique, almost dated feel. The gags are over the top, obscene and hilarious. Take, for example, the strip where Doofus becomes a dog breeder: he tells Hotchkiss "I like to watch." But it's not all about the gross-out. Altergott's wit is sharp, and his use of language is even funnier than his ... jokes. Doofus is positively erudite, and the way he speaks stands in sharp contrast to his enthusiasm for beer, toy cars, and "underwear games."

I recommend this book without hesitation for fans of adult and underground comix.