Written by Simon Oliver
Art by Mike Hawthorne
Vertigo
If you take a quick glimpse across Vertigo comics right now, you're going to find a far more diverse line of books than any comics imprint going: if you like hard-bitten noir? 100 Bullets. Autobiographical treatises on grocery shopping? American Splendor. Soap operatic stories with fairy tale characters? Fables. Hardcore war comics? The Other Side.
But if you want something that's just around the world goof-off adult fun, than it's time to look past the "omigod somebody call PETA" cover and crack into Exterminators. After succeeding against all reason at telling their first "major" storyline ("major" meaning it wasn't just dialog heavy blue-collar romps, and included the stuff Flash fans seem to want, meaning shotguns, explosions, and death scenes), the Exterminators has decided to apply it's cynical brand of 'tude towards another comic book staple: the "origin" storyline. It's, of course, focusing on the heretofore unknown Dr. Saloth--otherwise known as "that creepy Asian guy who knows all the stuff about bugs."
Origin stories are, admittedly, one of the Factual Opinion's least favorite comic excursions: very rarely are they necessary (unless a writer isn't very smart) and very rarely do they come across as much more than an irritating party-goer making sure you "get the joke" by constantly repeating the punchline. As Grant Morrison put it with the first page of All Star Superman, origins can usually be boiled down to four sentence fragments and a few panels of art. While Exterminators characters may, arguably, be deeper and more complex than the underwear set, it's not like the comic has been confusing to read without a necessary excursion into the melodramatic four issue "When you were twelve..." storyline.
Still, Oliver's earned enough trust by this point to get a wait-and-see: and if the remaining issues continue at this level of disgustingly hilarious, then Exterminators could have succeeded in doing the impossible by topping themselves, again. Anytime a seemingly sociopathic refugee entomologist refers to his new girlfriend as "Angelina Jolie's shorter, more robust, twin" instead of "fat" and/or "dumpy," both of which she, quite horrifically, is, it's sure to trump out anything else on the shelves. Whether one walks away with any new understanding of the Exterminators family from this storyline won't be dealt with for a few more months, but, as per usual, it's certainly going to be entertaining to find out.
-Tucker Stone, 2006
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