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Milk and Cheese: Dairy Products Gone Bad
A carton of hate. A wedge of spite. A comic book of idiotic genius. The Eisner Award-winning dairy duo returns in this deluxe hardcover collecting every single, stupid Milk and Cheese comic ever made from 1989-2010 along with a sh*t-ton of supplemental awesomeness. This has everything you need! Don''t judge it - love it! Or else!
240 pages, Hardcover
First published November 22, 2007
25 people are currently reading
157 people want to read
About the author
Evan Dorkin
276 books143 followersEvan Dorkin is an American comics artist and writer.
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Displaying 1 - 28 of 28 reviews
December 2, 2016
The Chicago Public Library recently established a partnership with online content sharing service Hoopla, which among other things means I suddenly have access to several thousand old comics I've never read before, including most of the back catalog of Dark Horse, Top Shelf and Boom! Studios. This latest one, the legendary absurdist comic book Milk and Cheese by Evan Dorkin, first started getting published my junior year in college, which is nearly a perfect age to start reading this kind of smartly stupid humor (think Monty Python but with more violence), which is why the title became such a revered indie darling for my friends and I back then, back in the late '80s before the Web obliterated the idea of "underground" literature. Of course, none of us had started reading the classic but still at the time East-coast-based Zippy the Pinhead by Bill Griffith yet, so we weren't aware that Milk and Cheese is essentially a conceptual ripoff of that; featuring random surrealist characters saying random surrealist things, weaving contemporary politics into it all, and delighting in Voltaire-like wordplay and double entendres, if you like one of these titles you're nearly certain to like the other, while if one of them made you scratch your head angrily while reading it, the other is bound to do that too. A densely worded collection of over twenty years of stories here, this is a perfect gift for the smartass teen in your life, and will help you found a series of inside jokes with them that will last you the rest of your life. Disarm the state! Arm your desires! MAIM THE STUPID!
January 23, 2012
I couldn't really take the collected works. Fine individually, but a bit grating all together.
September 9, 2023
Don’t intend to read this anymore so I’ll count this as a dnf, not that I didn’t enjoy this it was ok but I don’t think a whole book of newspaper comic strips is for me.
March 10, 2014
It's Milk & Cheese. It's awesome.
Some are complaining that it's a one joke strip. OF COURSE IT'S A ONE JOKE STRIP! It's a really good joke, and I doubt you'll find as much truth in other books that you find under that one Milk & Cheese joke. I doubt Dorkin would want to admit to the amount of truth in this book. Having all the work in one place really shows Dorkins evolution as an artist. It's also laugh out loud funny.
So don't read it one sitting, savour it over many sittings. Savour the hate and spit of M&C!
Some are complaining that it's a one joke strip. OF COURSE IT'S A ONE JOKE STRIP! It's a really good joke, and I doubt you'll find as much truth in other books that you find under that one Milk & Cheese joke. I doubt Dorkin would want to admit to the amount of truth in this book. Having all the work in one place really shows Dorkins evolution as an artist. It's also laugh out loud funny.
So don't read it one sitting, savour it over many sittings. Savour the hate and spit of M&C!
November 2, 2017
One one hand, it's a complete collection of a comic that's always been a favorite, but as some of the other reviewers mentioned, it's also not something that you want to sit and read cover-to-cover in one sitting -- M & C works much better doled out into smaller portions. Still makes me laugh, though, and while some of the jokes are a little dated, for the most part it holds up well, and Evan Dorkin's unique art style is always a favorite.
October 3, 2020
Ever chugged a whole gallon of milk in one sitting? That's what reading the entirety of Evan Dorkin's "Milk and Cheese" in one volume is like. Don't get me wrong, I like Dorkin and I like Milk and Cheese, but it's an intentionally smart-stupid, one-joke experience.
Milk and Cheese are violent, chaotic alcoholic dairy products who speak in a weird half-Damon-Runyon, half-Invader-Zim-dialogue argot and maim, kill and destroy anything and anyone that comes to mind. It's puns and carnage and mean-spiritedness but the joke is always on the comic itself being a waste of space and time. Big guilty fun when it's a two-page insert, a bit of a drag over 23o pages at a time. Still, the guy created "Kid Blastoff," so I can never speak ill of him.
Milk and Cheese are violent, chaotic alcoholic dairy products who speak in a weird half-Damon-Runyon, half-Invader-Zim-dialogue argot and maim, kill and destroy anything and anyone that comes to mind. It's puns and carnage and mean-spiritedness but the joke is always on the comic itself being a waste of space and time. Big guilty fun when it's a two-page insert, a bit of a drag over 23o pages at a time. Still, the guy created "Kid Blastoff," so I can never speak ill of him.
February 5, 2023
Loved these comics in my 20's, wanted to see if they hold up. And do they hold up? Yeah, kind of. Some of the gags and puns are laugh-out-loud funny, but (as Dorkin repeatedly acknowledges in the comics) it's pretty much a one-joke premise. As a completionist, it's nice to have all the Milk & Cheese content in one package, but 238 pages of it gets rather repetitive. Still, I enjoyed revisiting it. 3.5/5
December 28, 2019
It's just one joke repeated over 200+ pages that work much better a strip at a time in a collection of other comics read when I was a student than in one big glut of mayhem rammed down your throat in one go at whatever age I am now. That said, there are plenty of chortlesome moments if you pace yourself, and even mindless violence can be funny sometimes...
July 3, 2017
This was a great book during my angry teenage years. You get exactly what it says on the cover: dairy products gone bad.
I still love the 'zine style art, and the one-liners are still good but... it loses its luster once you've grown up.
I still love the 'zine style art, and the one-liners are still good but... it loses its luster once you've grown up.
July 22, 2025
Always funny.
always chaotic!
I've been reading milk and cheese since i was too young to probably be reading milk and cheese. One of my favorites forever and always. also the edition i ordered wound up being signed by Evan Dorkin himself.
Excelsior!
always chaotic!
I've been reading milk and cheese since i was too young to probably be reading milk and cheese. One of my favorites forever and always. also the edition i ordered wound up being signed by Evan Dorkin himself.
Excelsior!
November 8, 2019
I really ate this shit up when I was 11.
September 21, 2021
I just got here too late.
July 11, 2023
Such a special thing are Milk & Cheese. So wonderfully dumb.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 24, 2024
The dairy version of A Clockwork Orange with all of the pillaging, chaos and ultaviolence
November 26, 2011
Milk and Cheese: Dairy Products Gone Bad by Evan Dorkin is a graphic novel that will be released on December 21 2011. This hardcover volume will contain the collected works from the series, everything released between 1989 and 2010. This Eisner Winning comic is about two drunk and violent dairy products that insult and beat down just about anyone that crossed their path. Some have dubbed this comic a book of idiotic genius.
Milk and Cheese: Dairy Products Gone Badmade me realize that I must be getting old. I have always enjoyed a little off color humor, and violence does not turn me squeamish. However, I have to admit that I just must not be getting the joke in this cmisanthropic and anthropomorphic book. I thought I would be entertained, sadly I was not. Apparently spite, anger, and hate filled dairy products simply do not amuse me, although I will glad;y sit down and watch some Aqua Teen Hunger Force. The stories revolve around a hunch of cheese and a small carton of milk that drink huge amounts of alcohol and become willfully embroiled in unbelievably violent altercations.Some of my frustration and lack of connection with this book might have been the galley I was reading, since the black and white comic have copy write watermarks in the background. That combination occasionally made the words and details difficult to make out.
If you have been following Milk and Cheese, and get the joke that alludes me, them you will greatly enjoy all the dairy violence collected in a single book. If you have never heard of this lactose heavy duo before, then you might just want to skip it. The humor might speak to you, unfortunately it did not speak to me.
Milk and Cheese: Dairy Products Gone Badmade me realize that I must be getting old. I have always enjoyed a little off color humor, and violence does not turn me squeamish. However, I have to admit that I just must not be getting the joke in this cmisanthropic and anthropomorphic book. I thought I would be entertained, sadly I was not. Apparently spite, anger, and hate filled dairy products simply do not amuse me, although I will glad;y sit down and watch some Aqua Teen Hunger Force. The stories revolve around a hunch of cheese and a small carton of milk that drink huge amounts of alcohol and become willfully embroiled in unbelievably violent altercations.Some of my frustration and lack of connection with this book might have been the galley I was reading, since the black and white comic have copy write watermarks in the background. That combination occasionally made the words and details difficult to make out.
If you have been following Milk and Cheese, and get the joke that alludes me, them you will greatly enjoy all the dairy violence collected in a single book. If you have never heard of this lactose heavy duo before, then you might just want to skip it. The humor might speak to you, unfortunately it did not speak to me.
January 11, 2016
Evan Dorkin is a cartoonist I admire. I've picked up just about everything he's done since finding his Pirate Corps series back in the day.
Milk and Cheese was a project I liked a great deal in my twenties, but now as a grown-up, it was arduous to make my way through this collection. It goes for such easy targets, is filled with such juvenile spite, and ultimately fails as a property that has anything to say to anyone outside of folks who are young and angry and fourteen years old. Yeah, early on I let some of the garbage and bullying that happened in high school color my view of people in such a way that I was angry at the world, but I got over it. Going around hating everything just isn't funny once you gain some adult perspective.
This collection just can't move past the desire to assault. Taken in small doses over the course of twenty years, the vileness of it doesn't materialize. Reading it all collected leaves me sad that I liked it so much. Dorkin can do better than this.
The good news is that I don't believe this is Dorkin's work he will be remembered for. When I look at the nuance and genius he pours into Beasts of Burden with Jill Thompson, I can see the writer/cartoonist he is evolving into. I believe the work he does over the next ten to twenty years will be the works that define his creativity. I want to see him get as many offers to do projects as he can handle because he is truly a talented cartoonist.
For those who sample Milk and Cheese and find it stubbornly stupid and banal, do seek out his recent work. You'll be glad you did.
Milk and Cheese was a project I liked a great deal in my twenties, but now as a grown-up, it was arduous to make my way through this collection. It goes for such easy targets, is filled with such juvenile spite, and ultimately fails as a property that has anything to say to anyone outside of folks who are young and angry and fourteen years old. Yeah, early on I let some of the garbage and bullying that happened in high school color my view of people in such a way that I was angry at the world, but I got over it. Going around hating everything just isn't funny once you gain some adult perspective.
This collection just can't move past the desire to assault. Taken in small doses over the course of twenty years, the vileness of it doesn't materialize. Reading it all collected leaves me sad that I liked it so much. Dorkin can do better than this.
The good news is that I don't believe this is Dorkin's work he will be remembered for. When I look at the nuance and genius he pours into Beasts of Burden with Jill Thompson, I can see the writer/cartoonist he is evolving into. I believe the work he does over the next ten to twenty years will be the works that define his creativity. I want to see him get as many offers to do projects as he can handle because he is truly a talented cartoonist.
For those who sample Milk and Cheese and find it stubbornly stupid and banal, do seek out his recent work. You'll be glad you did.
January 4, 2017
You know that saying that too much of a good thing is never good for you? Try consuming milk and cheese in large quantities and see what happens. I’ll be waiting while you’re finishing up in the bathroom.
Strangely, the same thing applies to Milk and Cheese by Evan Dorkin. Mostly because on its own Milk and Cheese is a very cool concept: an angry, violent, foul-mouthed anthropomorphic piece of cheese and carton of milk hate on everything– drugs, porn, alcoholism, standup, comics, elitism, etc. The “problem” here is that it’s pretty much the same thing over and over again. Milk and Cheese looks phenomenal and is packed tightly with dialogue and action – the same dialogue and action over and over again. So things get really old and really repetitive really quick. Especially considering that these guys won’t shut the hell up. Dorkin is fully aware of this as Milk and Cheese often reference that it’s a one trick pony.
The format of Milk and Cheese makes much more sense as a single comic appearing occasionally in print but in a collected form, you’d have to pace yourself and read the comics slowly for them to keep your interest. Since I don’t want to have this book on my coffee table for 2 months while I slowly absorb the content, I decided to try and plow through it. The aftermath, as you can probably tell by now, left me a bit desensitized and nauseous.
So, strangely enough, thumbs up to Milk and Cheese, and thumbs down to this book. Weird…
Strangely, the same thing applies to Milk and Cheese by Evan Dorkin. Mostly because on its own Milk and Cheese is a very cool concept: an angry, violent, foul-mouthed anthropomorphic piece of cheese and carton of milk hate on everything– drugs, porn, alcoholism, standup, comics, elitism, etc. The “problem” here is that it’s pretty much the same thing over and over again. Milk and Cheese looks phenomenal and is packed tightly with dialogue and action – the same dialogue and action over and over again. So things get really old and really repetitive really quick. Especially considering that these guys won’t shut the hell up. Dorkin is fully aware of this as Milk and Cheese often reference that it’s a one trick pony.
The format of Milk and Cheese makes much more sense as a single comic appearing occasionally in print but in a collected form, you’d have to pace yourself and read the comics slowly for them to keep your interest. Since I don’t want to have this book on my coffee table for 2 months while I slowly absorb the content, I decided to try and plow through it. The aftermath, as you can probably tell by now, left me a bit desensitized and nauseous.
So, strangely enough, thumbs up to Milk and Cheese, and thumbs down to this book. Weird…
May 19, 2014
I think I saw this mentioned in a comic I was reading by Scott Allie saying that this was the best thing Dark Horse ever published. Seemed intriguing. I'm still not really sure what to make of this. I will admit I found it funny at times and I appreciated some of the cultural references though I also know some of them from the earlier strips definitely went over my head. As far as social commentary, I felt it was often spot on but also kind of unnecessary. I didn't find any of the messages to be shocking or overly thought-provoking. They just seemed obvious. In other words, I appreciated the satire but felt it was a bit surface level. I understand the reason for the gratuitous violence but also felt this became overdone after awhile. I suppose the fact that I read 20 years worth of strips at once may have provided a different effect than reading them as they came out. I will also say I appreciated the drawings and the clear intentionality and thought that went into crafting each strip. I really liked the breaking of the fourth wall. Overall, an interesting curiosity but doesn't necessarily make me want to read Dorkin's other work.
February 18, 2012
I may have gone into this with expectations too high. A comics podcast I listen to has been raving about this for weeks so I checked it out. It can be really funny, but much of the humor is really of its time (a lot of the book was written in the 90's) and doesn't hold up too well. Also, these are not the kinds of strips you can really read back-to-back. The jokes get pretty repetitive so if you do pick this up I suggest reading it in short bursts instead of in one or two sittings like I did. In fact, I think a title like this might work better as an insert in an alternative newspaper more than in a comic book/graphic novel format.
All that bad stuff aside, there are some really fun parts---especially 2/3 through when the two characters become aware that they are just characters and decide they want to become licensed properties with a whole line of movies, toys, etc. Nice commentary on pop culture.
All that bad stuff aside, there are some really fun parts---especially 2/3 through when the two characters become aware that they are just characters and decide they want to become licensed properties with a whole line of movies, toys, etc. Nice commentary on pop culture.
March 8, 2016
Reread all the Milk and Cheese stories for our podcast interview with Evan Dorkin. The conversation was in two parts:
http://comicsalternative.com/comics-a...
http://comicsalternative.com/comics-a...
http://comicsalternative.com/comics-a...
http://comicsalternative.com/comics-a...
did-not-finish
December 11, 2016Repetitive, violent, repetitive, angry, violent, violent, repetitive, angry...
This got so mind-blowingly old I had to put it down. Too bad, because visually the book has lots to offer. 2/3 is as far as I got, and I probably could have ended at 1/3. No bueno.
This got so mind-blowingly old I had to put it down. Too bad, because visually the book has lots to offer. 2/3 is as far as I got, and I probably could have ended at 1/3. No bueno.
November 21, 2011
This isn't the greatest comic I've read. It just seems like it's trying to hard to be funny. Milk and Cheese got a couple chuckles out of me with their crazy antics, but that's about it.
August 11, 2016
Loved the over the top humor when I was younger. Comes off as a bit much collected in this volume.
December 27, 2011
Fun stuff. The brevity of each story (which range from 1-8 pages) and the one-note nature of the characters make this ideal bathroom reading.
September 22, 2014
loved this comic back in the day, still think it's great
MERV GRIFFIN!
MERV GRIFFIN!
March 2, 2016
Milk and Cheese are my spirit animals.
December 19, 2017
Extraño la época en la que los cómics independientes no se tocaban el corazón y tiraban chingadazos a diestra y sinientra (en el caso de Milk & Cheese, literalmente).
Displaying 1 - 28 of 28 reviews