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Elephantmen #1

August 14, 2006 | Comics

Elephantmen #1
Image Comics
$3.50/$2.99 US
**** (out of five)
When U.S. President George W. Bush delivered his 2006 State Of The Union address he had me in stitches.
He actually included a line in his speech about the importance of passing legislation preventing the creation of human-animal hybrids.
No, seriously.
But where I, and so many of my colleagues, saw humour, Richard Starkings — creator of the critically acclaimed series Hip Flask — saw something he was already interested in.
What if we did experiment with those hybrids? Where could that lead to in, say, 250 years from now?
Starkings’ answer is Elephantmen, a series containing humanized beasts of many varieties, including the obvious elephants, along with boars, hippos, alligators and more.
Issue #1 stars Ebenezer, an elephantman with a dark past, who befriends a kindly little girl named Savannah. As Ebony’s brutal adventures in Africa replay in his mind, he, and the reader, ask the same question: is this an elephant, a man or both?
Elephantmen is harp, stylish and thought provoking stuff.