The Complete Multiple Warheads

Multiple Warheads #0.5-1

by Brandon Graham

Ex-organ smuggler Sexica and her werewolf boyfriend Nikoli travel across a sci-fi/fantasy version of Russia while the hardcore organ hound Blue Nura tracks a bounty across radioactive wastelands.

THE COMPLETE MULTIPLE WARHEADS includes the original adult short story, the 2007 one-shot, all-new material from MULTIPLE WARHEADS: DOWN FALL, and MULTIPLE WARHEADS: ALPHABET TO INFINITY #1-4.

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Graphic Novels Comics, Comic Book, Fiction

208 pages, Paperback

First published January 8, 2014

About the author

Brandon Graham (born 1976) is an American comic book creator.

Born in Oregon, Graham grew up in Seattle, Washington, where he was a graffiti artist. He wrote and illustrated comic books for Antarctic Press and Radio Comix, but got his start drawing pornographic comics like Pillow Fight and Multiple Warheads (Warheads would go on to become its own comic published by Oni Press in 2007). In 1997, he moved to New York City where he found work with NBM Publishing and became a founding member of comics collective Meathaus. His book Escalator was published by Alternative Comics in January 2005, when he returned to Seattle. His book King City was published by Tokyopop in 2007 and was nominated for an Eisner Award. In May 2009 Graham announced that King City would continue publication at Image Comics and his Oni Press title Multiple Warheads would resume publication after a delay, this time in color. Also at Image he is the writer on Prophet, the return of a 1990s series, with the rotating roster of artists Giannis Milonogiannis, Farel Dalrymple, Simon Roy, and himself.

(Source: Wikipedia)

Reviews

[Alex Sarll]

Even the far-future strangeness of Prophet couldn't prepare me for how weird pure Brandon Graham gets. Opening as a post-apocalyptic road movie starring organ-smuggler Sexica and mechanic Nikoli, we gradually lose track of them altogether; in a way, it reminded me of Adventure Time, from the overall weirdness of the world down to that gradual widening of focus away from the original leads. But while Adventure Time can handle adult themes, it certainly doesn't go this far along that road, not least as regards one of the chronologically earliest Warheads stories which nonetheless appears right at the back of the book and is basically porn*. It's very easy for that sort of material to feel creepy in comics, but on the whole Multiple Warheads gets away with it through being so sensuous in general; there's a real relish in tastes, textures and smells that you don't often see in the medium. It covers everything from weird landscapes and alien bodies through to smoking, but the most frequent manifestation is a delight in crazy foodstuffs which more than anything reminds me of Roald Dahl, or the sort of feast you'd see in rationing-era UK kids' comics. These are also a prime arena for Graham's evident love of terrible puns: Chai Guevara and Pol Pot Noodle, anyone? Though they appear in other capacities too: I think my favourite was the Bridge Over Troubled Walrus.

*I'm not complaining as such; I just might not have taken it along as a commute read had I known ahead of time.

[Jose · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a masterpiece. Uses comic as a medium in its own right. At the same level as the blade runner movies.

I wish I could spend the rest of my life reading comics this good, every single minute of it.

[B · Rating 5 out of 5]

I always forget how much I get sucked into Brandon Graham's world when I read his comics.
His style is so unique and there is so much detail and fun little notes&names I want to say scattered about but they are all perfectly placed!

It's kind of like if Fifth Element developed a full series about all the different types of people you come across in the movie&then more.

Great stories, the most crush worthy characters and a little bit of smut thrown in just for good measure!

[Jefferson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Brandon Graham is a terrific cartoonist with a talent for world-building, but in this case he presents a detailed and unusual environment in which very little actually happens.

[Fergus Nm · Rating 3 out of 5]

The good - the gorgeous Jean Giraud (Moebius) inspired vistas, beautiful colouring, and general richness of visual imagination.

The bad - 90% of the puns, the weak "badass assassin/smuggler" subplot, the 2000s scene-kid-ness of the human design, lame authorial insert sex scenes.

The execrable - the truly cringe-inducing sub-adult swim dialogue

Would be far far greater if this was a silent comic, or if all the dialogue was in the glyph form that occasionally pops up throughout.

[Charles · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5

[Ed · Rating 4 out of 5]

Multiple Warheads is both a predecessor and follow-up to King City, Brandon Graham’s masterpiece (so far). The first two MW stories precede it, but the main mini-series (which is the meat of this book) came after.

The mini-series has two parallel stories. The first (which spins out of the earlier comics) is about a couple and feels a lot like King City. It’s young people with powers trying to make it in a shitty weird city while having adventures. It’s heavy in dialogue, jokes and puns. The second story is about a nameless (?) blue haired woman who is on some sort of violent mission. It’s much more abstract and feels very similar to Prophet, Graham’s next major work and his commercial breakthrough.

While the WM mini-series launched the same month as his 10th issue of Prophet, it feels like a predecessor. He’s dealing with a lot of the same ideas that the deals with in the early issues of Prophet: a post-apocalyptic earth filled with aliens; an obsession with eating, shitting and other bodily functions, giant moving cities built around giant walking animals, silent protagonists killing their way through chatty merchant societies.

As I read it, I assumed that it preceded and influenced Prophet, and I’m curious whether or not that’s actually the case.

[Maia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Multiple Warheads: Alphabet to Infinity is the start of Brandon Graham's second sprawling creator-owned sci-fi tale. Like King City, this book is a visual feast. The pages are crowded with street graffiti, urban detritus, bizarre little characters and hundreds of puns. The story begins with Sexica, an organ smuggler working out of Dead City, and her part-wolf mechanic boyfriend Nikoli. When their apartment is destroyed by a falling rocket ship (a common hazard in these parts) they decide to set out on the ultimate road trip- through the wastelands and boarder towns to Impossible City. This story starts up a little more slowly that King City, but each page is such a delight to explore that I am entirely willing to settle back for the ride and let this story take me where it will.

[Francis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nunca hay que dejarse llevar por las apariencias.

Aquí es donde se confirma mi teoría (no siempre se cumple positivamente) de que es el libro el que te encuentra a tí. Paseando por una librería me encontró esta joyita un tanto peculiar.

Una extraficante de órganos Séxica y su novio hombre lobo Nikoli viajan por una versión de Rusia llena de ciencia ficción y fantasía, mientras un cruel sabueso (Blue) persigue una recompensa entre páramos radioactivos.

Un cómic, moderno y atrevido que retrata la vida diaria... en un mundo donde la magia y los monstruos son algo común.

Esta es una novela gráfica para adultos con alguna que otra escena subida de tono. El dibujo es muy original y la historia está llena de sorpresas.

[L.S. Popovich · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's a shame that such magnificent artwork is undermined by amateurish writing. The layouts and designs are reminiscent of Moebius, while the dialogue and plot are barely readable pulp, pun-infested nonsense. Plenty of good ideas, creatures, gadgets, and character potential beneath the immaturity, but it's well-lathered with cringe-worthy speech bubbles. It is worth picking up to gawk at the artwork, but don't expect depth.

[Jamie Perez · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you dug King City, you'll dig this. A fun romp through his imagination, amazing illustration. Not as tight a story as King, and his loves or foibles of fantasies are much more "on display" but it is still a great ride and an imaginative remix of so many great ideas. Would love to see where the story lines go from here.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

Brandon Graham was the ambition of like Mark Millar or Robert Kirkman but with a much more indie/punk rock vibe then those two have (who have become increasingly more corporate).

Multiple Warheads wears its influences on its sleeve. It's manic, detailed and with much world-building scope. It's not always comprehensible to me but if you're willing to savor it...it's much worth the effort.

[Titus · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is just tonnes of fun. It's set in a crazy fantastical futuristic Russia – a weird and wonderful world kind of like a cross between the settings of Transmetropolitan and Saga, but executed with a playfulness and an abundance of imagination more like what's found in Orc Stain, plus a hiply nerdy mentality that reminds me of Scott Pilgrim. It's way wackier and less serious than Graham's Prophet series, but it employs the same non-expository approach to worldbuilding that makes the setting feel rich and expansive, and overall it's no less engrossing. In fact, by giving up any pretence of believability it allows itself space to be even more wildly creative and original.

The story is pretty meandering and directionless: the main plot follows a young couple on a romantic road trip through a deadly post-apocalyptic wilderness, while the secondary storyline follows a lone adventurer who's on a kidnap mission but gets sidetracked into all kinds of unexpected diversions. The lack of focus and the absence of a really compelling overarching plot don't feel like drawbacks though, as this comic is clearly all about having fun along the way, and in this it's a resounding success. Not only is it a joy to explore the world, but the comic has one thing that Graham's Prophet run largely lacked: strong characters. The main couple in particular are likeable and have strong chemistry, and the dialogue throughout is smart and snappy. The conversations and character moments are where the Scott Pilgrim comparison comes in, and they're also what ground the comic and make it more enjoyable to me than something like Transmetropolitan. Oh and I have to mention that Multiple Warheads it's full of dumb (but often ingenious) wordplay, which I love.

Essential to this comic's appeal is Graham's artwork. His style is wonderfully fluid, organic and expressive, with scarcely a straight line to be seen. It feels like Mœbius channelled through manga, with a dash of Jamie Hewlett. His character designs are brilliant, his landscapes and cityscapes look awesome, and his backgrounds burst with detail (especially Mœbius-like in bustling urban scenes). Graham's influences are especially apparent when his art is in black and white, but most of this volume's content is in colour, and his idiosyncratic (and gorgeous) muted colour palette makes his drawings look unique – and instantly recognizable.

My only real complaint is that the volume just ends mid-story, with no kind of wrap-up at all. There isn’t even a cliffhanger ending; it feels like the break between volumes was just made a completely arbitrary point. After the main story is abruptly cut off (i.e. after “Multiple Warheads” issue #1, originally published by Oni in 2007, followed by “Multiple Warheads: Alphabet to Infinity” issues #1-4, originally published by Image in 2012-2013), the collection presents three short comics taken from anthologies, which are interesting as extras but aren’t really essential. The most notable of these is the one called “Multiple Warheadz”, an erotic -pager that was originally published in 2003 and is the origin of the whole series: it's not really my kind of thing, but it's fascinating to see how the series grew out of this decidedly kinky pornography.

In this review I've included a lot of comparisons to other comics, but in fact this series is very much its own thing: full of original ideas and driven by a clear authorial voice. I can't wait to pick up the second volume, which I assume (hope) picks up where this one leaves off.

[Sarah · Rating 2 out of 5]

I expected and hoped to like this a lot more than I did. A large portion of that dislike admittedly came from my inability to keep up-- this thing is all over the place, in good and bad ways. It's gorgeous, intricately drawn, and impeccably colored, and I can't help but admire Graham's ambition. This kind of lawless, imaginative sci-fi is normally right up my alley. But Graham seems to be in love with his own wit in many ways-- a lot of the jokes and puns are embarrassingly bad. I admire how much fun he's having, but the humor doesn't land. A lot of it left a really bad taste in my mouth, especially after the graphic black-and-white scene at the end, which pushed my opinion of the book over from like to dislike. Sexica's gotta be one of the worst names for a protagonist that I've ever seen. I was kind of hoping she'd exist as a jab the notoriously frequent hyper-sexualization of female characters in comics, but it becomes clear pretty quickly that she exists mostly to satisfy the fantasies of male readers. I mean, her name is Sex for short. It's kind of hard to miss the implications of that.

Part of me felt square for that reaction, because sure, I like a sexy comic every now and then, but it's hard not to be disappointed by the entire industry's continuous reminder that it thinks of women more as a commodity to be sold than as an audience or as creators. It is so hard to enjoy the things I consume when their content consists of frequent reminders that they think of me as a triviality, ultimately light jabs at the kind of body I was born into. It feels like reminders of what they think that body exists for, regardless of who owns that body. It's so hard to laugh along with other people if you're what they're laughing at. Sex can be done well in comics, but its execution on paper is a lot like real life: it's not going to be any good if the person who's doing it isn't thinking of how it feels for you. Do better and everyone will enjoy themselves.

[Grzegorz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Kolejne po pierwszym tomie Propheta spotkanie z komiksami Grahama i z tego że niektóre cześci tego są starsze czasem wygląda to trochę bardziej mangowo a mniej Moebiusowsko, i nagle wskakuje tu erotyka ()jedna scena kora chyba była zrobiona przed całą resztą w tym wypadku już szczególne się tu wybija eee... trudnością opasania co tam się stało. Poza tym jak w Prophecie co zeszyt właściwie zaczynała się inna historia w której coś się działo z małym związkiem z tym co wcześniej i historią kolejnego Johna propheta to tu przez większość tomu trwają dwie historie właściwie bez żadnego związku ze sobą. W jednej rzeczy róże robi sobie szmuglerka organów (Tak) o imieniu Sexica (TAAK razem z chłopakiem wilkołakiem. W drugiej zaś inne ręczy robi łowczyni nagród. Jednocześnie myślę że to trudno ocenić i jednocześnie myślę ze jak chce się fantastyczną dziwność z bardziej spójną fabuła to zawsze jest trochę bardziej mainstreamowa Saga

[Bill Coffin · Rating 2 out of 5]

This one routinely lands on various "best graphic novel" lists, and it's easy to see why. This is a work of ferocious creativity and energy that feels like a wild, X-rated mash-up of Moebius, Geof Darrow's Hard Boiled and Sergio Aragones to which even Heavy Metal would have said "We're not ready for this." The problem is that the energy here is so intense and unfocused that ultimately, the story never holds together even a little bit, and the entire thing feels like an extended creative exercise in shotgunning unfiltered ideas onto a page without taking the next step and building something coherent from it. There is a nucleus of a story, but it ultimately succumbs to Graham's mania for wordplay, visual detail, narrative tangents and the occasional pornographic interlude. Too much of a good thing? Maybe...if we could be sure that all of this is a good thing. The more I read this, the more I was reminded of why I found Island to be such a slog.

[b · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don’t think there’s a world where I have enough time to appreciate each pun in this, nor to merely catch and register them all. Incredible slippage and play, anchored in unrealistic degrees of detail and clarity for the art. So inventive, and not beholden to boring plot narrative structure (reminding me of Clowe’s “Like a velvet glove cast in iron,” related kind of recurring narrative elements, latent narrative is a way to put it, but the desire and drives distilled into really great smaller narratives); the secondary and tertiary cast in this are all really adorable and good too. A bit porn-y in some of its moments for my taste, but in a world so wholly realized like this, why not let Graham deploy that impulse? Pretty floored by this overall. Definitely will warrant a reread.

[Rick Ray · Rating 4 out of 5]

Amidst the outlandish alt-futuristic Russia setting is a charming love story between Sexica, an organ smuggler, and her part-wolf mechanic boyfriend, Nikoli. The story is a bit all over the place, but at its core is a quaint story of two lovers on a road trip hoping to find a better life on the other side. The journey allows for a full exploration into Brandon Graham's zany sci-fi landscapes which are teeming with rigorous detail. Though there isn't much to the story nor any resolution by the end, Multiple Warheads is a delightful read due to Graham's silly puns and the palpable chemistry between Sex and Nikoli. The story is pretty goofy, but it fits the light-hearted vibe going for it. There are some great short stories in the back to round out the collection.

[Michael Allan Leonard · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you don't have a high tolerance for a heavy dose of the surreal (and a wee bit o' XXX) in your comics, keep moving along to the latest issue of Secret Civil Infinite Banality Wars IV.

This tome is a strange head trip in a class all its own. I love Graham's artwork, frankly, so just the pictures that pack so much layers of detail that they need to be studied closely to catch all the gags are worth it for me -- the story doesn't quite hang as well together or unravel as smoothly as King City, but there's some beautiful and imaginative sequences that push more than a few envelopes, comic-art-wise. (If you're offended by werewolf genitalia and some nudity, tho, your mileage may vary.)

[Jake Kilroy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This comic is so inarguably its own thing. I'm not even sure what I could point to that's closest. It exists in everything-adjacent, simultaneously romping as laidback and chaotic. It's packed with new slang, new creatures, new transports, new bureaucracy, and so on without going out of its way to break it down. Either you get it or you don't — or you don't and you sure wish you did (or you get parts of it and still have a blast). It's just a wild time and a half about a sly organ smuggler and her wolfy mechanic boyfriend being themselves to their core in a world that itself is very much just itself to its core. It feels throwback as hell without me totally sure what I'm even referencing. It's just so lively and unique. Hell of a vibe, man.

[Carlos · Rating 2 out of 5]

Interesting world, but the story lacks focus. The author is more preoccupied in filling the pages with little funny or cute jests than progressing with the narrative.
I got bored after a hundred or more pages of that and still not knowing what the story was about, besides a couple traveling to whatever and talking about nothing. So I went on to another comic.

Cute drawing and interest world-building are always secondary and complementary to a good story (which this comic lacks).

[Adam Šilhan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Multiple warheads jsou neskutečně divný komiks. Obrovské množství více, či méně jemných narážek (spousta si myslím, že unikne i rodilým mluvčím), hodně divný příběh (spoiler alert: který není ukončen) a úžasná kresba. Nedoporučuji asi nikomu - přijde mi to příliš specifické, aby se to někomu trefilo do vkusu. Prophet, ač dost mimo, je násobně přístupnější.

[Ben Mariner · Rating 3 out of 5]

I honestly have no idea what happened in this book. The saving grace was the art and the absolute onslaught of clever puns throughout, but just based on story alone, I wouldn't rate it very high. They build an interesting world, but I couldn't tell you anything about the story except that someone smuggled organs.

[Ian Carpenter · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful, bizarre, ludicrous, inventive, punny. I love Graham's work and this is my second read. For sure it won't be for everyone but the art in this one is lovely, quirky and often (especially the colours and worlds) reminiscent of Moebius. I want more from him.

[Jase · Rating 5 out of 5]

Outright masterpiece in sequential art and unlike a lot of comics that can be said about, this is actually fun to read.

My only problem? This series and Graham's King City need complete hardcover treatments. Everything seems to get a hardcover these days, these are actually good.

[Berslon Pank · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted more Sexica (even if that is the stupidest name) and Nikoli and less of the weak assassin story or for the two of those to meet up and give the assassin story something for me to care about.

It's an interesting world. I just wasn't interested in most of the things happening in it.

[Jorge Ponce · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don’t recall a life before these colors 😍
Can’t wait for vol 2!

[Craig · Rating 5 out of 5]

Multiple they are. Ghosts of insanity squirt in treble anguish, spent to unforgive your sins, stained in concert's strains on cosmic coloured loos.

[Alex Fyffe · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5

[Barbara · Rating 2 out of 5]

I did not care for the graphic novel at all. I had to force myself to finish reading it. It’s annoying drivel is all it is. Don’t waste your time in this one.