Dead West; A Hardcore Review *SPOILERS*

After going damn near a month without a review, I decided to start reading and rereading graphic novels I have in my library. As you may know, my favorite graphic novel of all time is Teenagers from Mars, written by Rick Spears and drawn by Rob Goodridge, better known in the industry as Rob G. Even his wife calls him Rob G. It's kind of like how a group of friends in a sketchbook all refer to one guy by his full name of Paul Fini. The same Paul Fini who does a book called Bliss from his own comic book imprint Indie Only Press. But that's a whole other story.
This story takes a two different genres and mashes them together in a bomb digity comic book. Spears and Goodridge strike again in this 2005 original graphic novel from Gigantic Press the same people who put out the Teenagers from Mars trade. It reads fast paced with seriously cool action in a zombie spaghetti western of movie quality proportions. Dead West could easily translate into either a full length live action movie or an animated movie with all the trimmings.
Dead West marks the revenge of a young native man, who longed to be a hunter and a brave. When his tribe was slaughtered by greedy white men, the brave, who is only ever referred as "Cub" hatches a plot to bring revenge on those responsible. Invoking some sort of death pact, the young brave makes a circle around the nearby town and then commits ritual suicide. But.... the young man comes back from the dead, along with everyone else in the cemetery. The key is the circle cannot be broken by the undead.
In the nearby town a man has been hanged for stealing livestock. A young woman, who is also a whore, pregnant, possibly with his child is forced, along with the rest of the town to witness the "justice." The way he comes back is awesome. Lifting himself up on the noose and biting the rope in half. Dozens of the dead come back to terrorize the town.
There was very little dialog in this book, but some of the lines were classics. When the pregnant whore is given a gun by the man with no name who is being chased by a bounty hunter, she shoots the owner of the whore house and laughs, "I got you! I fucking got you!" I largely suspect the man had raped her.
When "Cub" finds his zombie father, the chief about to take his final resting place, he tells his father that he has enacted revenge. His father tells him something so profound. He says, "Did you take a wife? Have a son?" When the tribe was killed all "Cub" did was live for revenge. When he should have kept the tribe going on.
The story closes with the formerly pregnant, now mother and the man with no name leaving the town and breaking the circle. And a vulture leaves the circle too.
This book is awesome on a lot of levels. True, Goodridge's style can be a bit stiff where his people look like mannequins. But altogether, this book is fucking solid as they come. And even better it's small press.
This Hardcore Review regards Dead West with the grade of a true old school tough son of a bitch who never got his due in the United States, until he got a World Heavyweight Title shot. "Dr. Death" Steve Williams took on the then Extreme Championship Wrestling World Championship Raven in a fight that saw "Dr. Death" bleed on American soil, which is super rare. But it was the end of the match that saw just how hardcore Steve Williams really was. It took three super kicks from leader of the Blue World Order, Big Stevie Cool and a DDT from Raven to stop the man who was an All-American in both collegiate wrestling and football and one of the most dominant American wrestlers who ever stepped foot into a Japanese ring.