Review of DOG EATERS #1

Here's the tagline for DOG EATERS #1, a comic book I just came across at my local shop:Mankind failed in its first attempt to transcend the Petroleum Age. The Die Off killed nine out of ten people worldwide. One hundred and seventy five years later, civilization consists of scattered nomadic tribes, isolated casino-cities, and roving bands of predatory bandits. This is the world of the Black Dog Clan.And here's a review:

Dog Eaters #1The Skinny: Post-apocalyptic future. Many people have died in an event called, unimaginatively and ungrammatically, “The Die Off." Civilization has collapsed. Now everyone roves around in tribal gangs: The White Angels, The Black Dogs, et cetera. They look like British punks. ... The Black Dogs are the book’s protagonists. They find a White Angel guy and save him, then there’s some random romantic tension between the leader of the tribe, his wife, a younger Black Dog girl, and a younger boy. That’s about it.

The Fat: This is Thundercats with more blood, more death, more sex, but an absolutely equivalent quality of plot and dialogue.

Dog Eaters is like reliving the '80s and the empty pointless dialogue of '90s Image books. This series has gotten a lot of pre-release buzz, and it certainly looked promising in the previews put out--potentially cliché, but promising. There was even a #0 preview released online for free. Dabel Brothers were excited about the property. But wow, this book is pure and complete pastiche. A wonderful cross-media analogy is Neil Marshall’s Doomsday, which, like Dog Eaters offered a trite and overly-tread post-apocalypse populated by run-of-the-mill punk-flavored villains, because, when all of culture collapses, brit pop glam and eyeliner and kick-ass tats will be the bar to which everything descends. Never mind that glam and eyeliner and tats are constructs of civilization.

Malcolm Wong’s story is paper-thin and uninteresting. The Black Dogs suffer an ambush, have a shoot-out, collect a survivor, and then the story veers into forced melodrama. It’s all very abrupt dramatics, very little substance, and then the issue ends on perhaps the most arbitrary and unsatisfying final panel I’ve ever encountered. I definitely will not be back for issue #2.

Final Word: A pretty, pretty but vapid book, worn out and dog-eared ideas (pun intended). And its prettiness is nothing unfound in a myriad other pretty books. I have to recommend everyone skip this one.Comment:  I bought DOG EATERS #1 because I was curious about the tribal aspects, naturally.

There are no explicit references to Indians other than the generic clan names. The people's skin color is brown but their hair color ranges from dark blond to light brown, so you can't say they're Indians. But the Black Dogs are steeped in a pseudo-Indian culture. It's as if the survivors of the apocalypse reverted to a traditional Indian social structure when modern civilization collapsed.

What makes them Indians?

How can you tell the characters are Indians or Indian wannabes? Besides the clan names, the people sport bone and claw necklaces, leather and fur clothes, and face paint and tattoos. Also, a couple of scenes show dreamcatchers, drums, and other paraphernalia you might find in a tipi.

The comic's title is yet another giveaway. "Dog eaters" was a derogatory name applied to some Indians. As one book notes:Most nations have a taboo about eating "man's best friend," and Indians as dog eaters is one of those proofs of the so-called "savagery" of the Native peoples.The Black Dogs don't actually eat dogs or act like savages--at least not in issue #1. But the name suggests that writer Wong views his characters as less than fully civilized. While "Black Dog" sounds reasonably heroic, "Dog Eater" doesn't.

A generic comic

Anyway, DOG EATERS has your generic brave men and beautiful women. Your generic clan relations. And your generic eagle reference and mystical dream sequence. Nothing too stereotypical, but nothing worth reading, either.

Alas, the book isn't even that "pretty." Most of the characters look similar and the art is sometimes murky and confusing. The cover (below) gives you an idea. At a glance, can you tell how many characters there are and what they're doing?

In short, I'd say this review is basically correct. DOG EATERS is one comic you can safely skip.

For more on the subject, see Comic Books Featuring Indians.