Bug! The Adventures of Forager #4

Storytellers: Lee Allred & Michael Allred
Colorist: Laura Allred
Published by: DC’s Young Animal

After an explosive ending to the previous issue, the Allreds begin this issue with the fallout of Forager creating a negative boom tube and how it has affected his current Mother Box. With his expertise as a bug, he’s able to fix it up enough that it will be revived and he’s off, continuing his adventure of trying to stop Chagra.

Unlike previous issues, Forager now has a plan, and he’s going to get the teddy bear and Kuzuko on board. Up to date, they’ve been following and a step behind Chagra. However, this being a time-travelly, multiverse-style story, Forager now believes they can get ahead of Chagra and lay a trap for him.

For this plan to work, he enlists Sandman - he of the 1970s Kirbyverse - to get him and his cohorts in contact with Tatsinda, a lady who can get him to Chagra. But first, she wants a favour from Forager: to help out her boyfriend, who turns out to be Deadman, escape from his current robot body (they explain how he’s trapped in the story, don’t worry). This in turn brings them to the Manhunter - another Kirby character - who will help them track down the man who murdered Deadman.

This seems overly complicated, and a little bonkers to be honest, as far as a plot goes, but the Allreds do a very good job of keeping it going without it tripping itself up. This series is a clear send up to the old Kirby-style stories and a great way to introduce newer readers to Kirby’s creations over the years (see: the Kirby specials from August for even more introductions).

In all, this series has been great fun up to date and reminds me of another bug from the DC Universe: Ambush Bug! I wouldn’t be surprised if the Allreds had some influence from Ambush Bug’s series from the 2000s as a template for this series. They both have similar “hopping” through the DC Universe backlog to them, and as a comic history nerd, this has been a lot of fun.