By Brandy Dykhuizen. A truly entertaining and pleasantly demented jaunt through Los Angeles’ semi-organized crime, The Fix follows two cops — who are also, intriguingly enough, robbers — as they exploit a resident of an old folks home, only to then investigate their own misdeeds. We’re not talking about criminal masterminds here, just a couple of schmoes who have sussed out which palms to grease (and the proper psychos to heed) in order not to get caught.
Partner #1 may be too thick to realize that it would be more appropriate to change out of his garishly floral shirt to interrogate the man he just robbed, and Partner #2 is just pie-eyed enough over the thought of a movie fashioned after him that he lets a producer wreak havoc under the influence of bath salts, but both have found a line not to cross. The real monster in this story isn’t the crooked cops or the internal affairs suit, or even the movie man with the truly foul, Ugg-boot-humping tendencies. The guy that leaves them quaking in their boots is Josh.
Kale crunching, anti-vaxxing Josh. A stay-at-home dad who sings his baby to sleep with Flaming Lips songs. In a laugh-out-loud couple of pages, we see Josh alternately cuddle his infant, gouge a man’s eye out with a hot poker, ask a vendor if his vegetables are pesticide-free and perform other deeply disturbing atrocities on folks who have presumably crossed him. If that’s any indication of what’s to come, then hey. *thumbs up*
Between Josh and a drug sniffing pup named Pretzels, our heroes have their hands full. They’re caught between a gluten-free rock and a furry, cuddly hard place. The Fix is a hilarious book depicting what we’ve all suspected about L.A. – that crime rules, those who succeed got where they are out of sheer luck, and that anyone who makes their own kale chips is probably fueled by deeply-seeded, taint-carving sadism. Highly recommended.
Image Comics/$3.99
Written by Nick Spencer.
Art by Steve Lieber.
Colors by Ryan Hill.
Letters by Nic Shaw.
8 out of 10
