King of Nowhere #1
- WRITER
- W. Maxwell Prince
- Artist
- Tyler Jenkins
- Letterer
- AndWorld Design
- Cover Artist
- Tyler Jenkins, Christian Ward, Martin Morazzo, Chris O' Halloran, Hilary Jenkins
- Publisher
- BOOM! Studios
- Colorist
- Hilary Jenkins
The idea of a stranger in an even stranger land is certainly not an unseen premise in any medium. BOOM! Studios' new comic book series, King of Nowhere, by W. Maxwell Prince and Tyler Jenkins has more than a few tricks up its sleeve to not only keep readers intrigued but also subvert expectations throughout to keep them guessing where exactly the story is going to go next. A lot of this comes from Prince's natural aptitude for weaving a healthy amount of self-awareness into his stories, along with a sense of deconstructing established genre tropes and constraints of the medium -- all while remembering that he's crafting an entertaining yarn, of course.
The five-issue miniseries starts when a chronically inebriated ne'er-do-well named Denis awakens on the outskirts of a strange town known as Nowhere. He ventures in to discover a strange settlement filled with bizarrely mutated denizens. As Denis comes to the realization that this peculiar town may not be another controlled substance-influenced hallucination, his past literally comes back to haunt him, and Denis' bad trip into Nowhere is poised to get a hell of a lot worse.
As the co-creator of acclaimed comic book series like Ice Cream Man and the Eisner Award-nominated One Week in the Library, King of Nowhere is perhaps one of the most unhinged and light-hearted comics in Prince's catalogue to date, with its charmingly deadbeat protagonist, sly dialogue-driven wit and the delightfully bizarre residents of its eponymous town. That said, Prince also laces enough of an underlying sense of menace into the opening issue to suggest that it won't be all fun and games for the duration, especially with the issue's cliffhanger ending adding a sense of urgency and raising the story's stakes.
A lot of this enjoyment is powered by Prince's self-aware, self-deprecating approach to the story. For much of the opening issue, Denis dismisses the outrageous sights of Nowhere as little more than his latest bad trip and isn't afraid to call out the more ridiculous elements of the setting and its colorful cast of characters. Denis is conscious that he's something of a P.O.V. character into this strange world, taking us on a tour through its unusual sights, with Prince using him wisely yet careful not to make him an unlikeable rube but, rather, an endearing degenerate. Protagonists in Prince's stories have had a fourth-wall-breaking quality at times but Denis is more restrained and has fun with the possibilities of this more than his counterparts.
Tyler Jenkins' visuals, joined by colorist Hilary Jenkins, is more muted and dusty than his previous titles; the art team's work makes the town of Nowhere feel like a psychedelic neo-Western rather than a mature, drug-fueled fairy tale. While the world that the creative team has crafted is wonderfully weird, it's Jenkins' artwork that makes the story feel much more grounded than its inhabitants would initially suggest. Much of the opening issue's sense of foreboding and imminent violence comes from its visuals, and is sure to escalate as the miniseries progresses.
King of Nowhere is W. Maxwell Prince and Tyler Jenkins' delightful blend of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Magical Mystery Tour all at once, with Lynchian flourishes -- black humor mixed with a healthy dose of menace. Psychedelic and surreal, yet grounded with modern Western vibes; the opening issue suggests one man's bad trip will be through his own unreliable inner psyche pitting him on a collision course with his past, made literal in the dusty streets of Nowhere. Bitingly funny and delightfully self-aware, King of Nowhere is another strong debut from Prince and Jenkins, poised to only escalate over the course of its next four issues.