ATOMIC ROBO ROCKS!

Happy belated birthday Nicola Tesla, if I would of known earlier that your birthday was last week I would've of dedicated a post about you. See Tesla is the type of scientist that you simply don't learn anything from at school, for irrational reasons, maybe for the fact that he might of created a death ray of some kind, and why shouldn't we learn about a suppose inventor of many doomsday devices is beyond my understanding. I simply think he was overshadowed by Thomas Edison, who in my general opinion was an idiotic genius, he patented a thousands things randomly placing currents until something shined brightly. Tesla on the other hand calculated everything and masterfully invented. Thomas Edison himself even kinda confessed on how Tesla was a better inventor, so remember people quality over quantity. Although because Tesla is so awesome he's featured in almost everything, even the much anticipated (for me at least) Dark Void, where is a whole universe inspired by some crazy Tesla invention or something, they've been scarce with the information, but no, my new favorite fictional toy of Tesla is Atomic Robo!

First picked up Atomic Robo on free comic book day and it was just a teaser and it was the only thing that I actually enjoyed, I did enjoy Jesus and Abraham slaying zombies but that's not even worth comparing to anything. The little preview I got was simply with Atomic Robo having some witty dialogue with Dr. Dinosaur, which alone doesn't sound that amazing but that simple scene made me buy volume one. Firstly I noticed the names of the creators one stood out, which was Brian Clevinger, didn't really remember from where I heard the name, I thought that it must of been from another blog or some random place on the internet, so I started reading. Seriously Atomic Robo is amazing, I love the art style but it kinda made me think of Penny Arcade strip they did a little while back, don't know if it's just me but they took some inspiration from Atomic Robo.

Anyways there was simply something about it, there was simply something all too familiar, and I couldn't put my finger on it. Simple witty answers, followed by another as witty response. Anti-climactic endings that are just as satisfying as any other way. So I remembered about the writer thanking Mike Magnolia, which made complete sense, I think it draws a huge part of inspiration from Hellboy, with the whole paranormal investigations and even Robo shares some attributes with Hellboy himself, more or so being able to get pummeled and still being able to bring witty rethorics into the action. Sure enough for awhile I thought it was it with the little nagging voice behind my head, but it still loomed about. So reading on I reached a point of one of the scientist soldiers being able to finish Megaman 2 without getting hit, seriously anyone that is able to do that should be automatically assigned as a Fighting Scientist. And that's where it hit me the simple connection of a 8-bit character, Brian Clevinger is the frikin writer for 8-bit theater! (Seriously tho I thought of Bob and George first but remember that there's was no possible way they could of written that, still love you guys tho!)

Sprite comics were all the rage (did I really use the term "all the rage"?) back in the early 00's. But there was two primary comics which stood out the crowd of badly gif'd sites, one was Bob and George a megaman sprite comic and 8-bit theater a final fantasy sprite comic. Sprite comic was gateway for those writers who couldn't draw for shit. Bob and George updated daily for 7 years, only missing 29 days in total, that's mother freaking amazing. As for 8-bit theater it was a little more popular because the strip was actually good, although Bob and George had a huge community with the forum and the massive spriter army, which I was kinda apart. Now 8-bit theater wasn't must to look at because of the sprites usage, although after awhile he did get a hold on photoshop and lens flared like there no tomorrow.

You could really follow his evolution of a writer with 8-Bit theater, started off the most two dimensional video game characters ever and gave them some decent personalities, you could seem them expand as the comic went along. He gave of some of the great internet comic lines like "Swordchucks" which obviously inspired the rat morning star and "In the arena of logic I fight unarmed". Going farther into the comic you could really see that his style continued to evolve. And I swear to god the Black Mage is a prototype of sorts for Atomic Robo, albeit the mage being evil and all, his witty responses oozes out with the robo replies, and Robo being a robot with no mouth using only his eyes for physical response was probably easier with the years of experience he had with the Black Mage and the fact that he also only had two eyes to interact with.

Anyways back on Atomic Robo, to say it quick, it's about Atomic Robo a self aware Robot invented but Tesla himself, and with the help of his Fighting Scientist he fights nazis and other supernatural baddies. So moving on, Brian has always been direct with his stories, lines like "I just used my violence on them" are simply brilliant. He's also always been the kind of guy that likes the adventure more than the destination, passing by big battle for something a little simpler and logical. But one of my favorite moments is when one of the team calls Robo and says "Robo? There's a Pyramid in egypt!" and then robo responds with "..." I laughed waaayyy more than I should of.

I don't known what else to say, there are just too many memorable moments to start telling them all would be redundant, like Edison trying to twart Telsa with the Ghost of Rasputin?! Or Robo's massive mockery of Stephen Hawkins! Erm...ok I'll contain myself, and let the whole think sink in my mind, I did just read it like a moment ago. All in all, Atomic Robo, is smart, witty, exiting, awesome and for me, nostalgic all while being completely fresh. That quite sums up my feelings for Atomic Robo, one of the best reads I've had in awhile. ATOMIC ROBO ROCKS!