Scud: The Disposable Assassin - The Whole Shebang
Written and Drawn by Rob Schrab
Written and Drawn by Rob Schrab
Published by Image Comics
In the most absurdist of times I can only recommend something even more absurd. Scud: the Disposable Assassin is the comic that we need today more than ever.
Written and drawn by Rob Schrab, Scud (voiced by John Malkovich. Just go with it) is an assassin droid that you can hire to take out your 4th period history teacher to avoid Friday’s test straight out of an everyday vending machine off the street. Once hired for a hit, the too-self-aware bot discovers that he self-destructs once his target has been killed and fulfilled. In this case the target is Jeff, a monolith female mutant voltroned together with knees that scream iconic tv dialog like war cries with mousetraps for hands (no, I’m not making this up). To circumvent his timely self-detonate ending, Scud maims Jeff enough to land her on life-support where the hospital bills rack up and Scud has to take freelance merc jobs to keep Jeff alive in order to avoid a fireball termination.
Schrab is a longtime collaborator of Dan Harmon (who even fills in on writing duties for several issues when his cyborg Scorsese mockup creations, La Cosa Nostroid appear). The development of Rob’s comedy beats and scene setting that would turn into his particular brand are apparent before he went on to work writing and directing shows like Community, Parks and Rec, and Children’s Hospital.
Every issue featured voice casting for it's characters (there it is) as well as soundtrack suggestions for each scene as you read along. Sadly, like most of the 90’s underground comics from that scene came delays, falling outs, and controversy. After 20 issues, Fireman dissolved and the end of the series was never seen. The last issue being one of the greatest cliffhangers in comic history that you never read and dedicated fans were forced to repress in therapy.
2011 saw Image collect the series in trade and released it as Scud: The Whole Shebang! Entire, wildly insane story details even more crazy than what I have let you gleam here have been omitted in the hopes that you pick this book up and discover it. Just please read it in John and Gweneth's voices.