Bombos vs. Everything Volume 1

by Maximo V. Lorenzo, Maximo V. Lorenzo (Illustrator)

To get to the most awesome city of Bokonon, a select few prospects must survive an epic showdown with the mysterious Qualifiers. So here's Bombos, paperboy extraordinaire. More than anything, he wants to get to the city and he knows how to do it -- with attitude and a big ole bat.

Genres: Manga, Comics

192 pages, Paperback

First published August 7, 2007

Reviews

[Lesya BlackBird · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have to admit, that as an artist, i'm drawn to this book mainly for the art and not the story.

[Francine · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really good prologue volume that sets up something cool. My biggest issue is the dialogue: I wish there were more variety between the characters - now every male sounds "badass", which gets tired fast.
Another thing I dislike about this is that there's only one volume and no hopes of a second (probably because they tried to sell this as a manga, which it is not). Shame, because I wanted to read more.

[Nick · Rating 1 out of 5]

Overall Rating: F
Synopsis: Created by Maximo V. Lorenzo, the series follows the titular Bombos, a paperboy who talks and fights too much. In the series, paperboys are a guild that involves a lot of strange challenges and fighting, and very little paper delivery. In the world of Bombos, there is only one goal, to get out of the backwater town he lives in, and move to the "totally awesome" city of Bokonon. To accomplish this goal, Bombos must win the mysterious (and somehow at the same time uninteresting) Qualifiers, overcome the bizarre challenges his editor-in-chief throws at him, defeat his annoying rival Veng, and dealing with his feelings for his friend Addy.

I like checking out American manga to see what's being done in that style these days, so I tried checking out Bombos vs. Everything. This book was a big disappointment for me. The art looked cool, and I was hoping for something in the vein of Scott Pilgrim or Black Metal, but the series is trying too hard. Maybe it will get more interesting in Volume 2 (apparently the series is a trilogy), but I can't recommend this one. If you're looking for good non-Japanese manga, pick up Scott Pilgrim by Bryan Lee O'Malley, East Coast Rising by Becky Cloonan, Black Metal by Rick Spears and Chuck BB, or King City by Brandon Graham instead.

For more manga and anime reviews, please check out Hobotaku.

[Jamie · Rating 2 out of 5]

The best thing about Bombos is the art, which is kind of like a cross between Scott Pilgrim and Ueda Hajime, who did the FLCL comics. The story, however, leaves much to be desired. It's a fight comic, and the fights are neatly drawn, and I realize that it doesn't really need to be any deeper than that, but I found the lack of any real characters annoying, exacerbated by the fact that every person in this book talks, like, exactly the same or whatever. (Yeah, that's some sentence. Yeah, the last clause mimics the book derisively.) I was disappointed that the comic wasn't more fun, more crackling with humor and energy.

[Jenna · Rating 2 out of 5]

Kinda agree to one of the comments... I only like the art.