Happy #3

Written by Grant Morrison
Art by Darick Robertson

Three issues in, and I still have to keep glancing at the cover credits to convince myself that I'm not reading a comic by Garth Ennis instead of Grant Morrison.

Nowhere in this book are the usual things we've come to associate with Morrison's writing - sure, the main character has hallucinations, but they are of a blue flying imaginary horse, not of extra-dimensional gods or something like that.  Likewise, the plot of this book is more or less linear, as Nick Sax, disgraced ex-cop, assassin for hire, eczema sufferer, and general creep decides to ignore the exhortations of the imaginary horse to save a little girl from a Santa Claus impersonating serial killer, and instead tries to leave town to avoid the mobsters that are after him.  Add to this scenes of murder in a train toilet, and it's hard to imagine that this really isn't being written by Ennis.

Regardless, this is a good comic.  Sax is the type of curmudgeon we're used to seeing in comics, and the surprise that his 'redemption' hinges on is telegraphed pretty obviously earlier in the book, but still, Morrison paces things nicely enough to keep our interests, and Darick Robertson's is always a treat.

I doubt this will go down as one of Morrison's more memorable comics, but it's nice to see him try something that is not uber-ambitious and kind of obscure for a change.