SEX CRIMINALS #17

Writer: Matt Fraction

Artist: Chip Zdarsky

Publisher: Image Comics

It’s been awhile since Matt Fraction and Chip Zdarsky’s amazing adult comic, Sex Criminals, was coming out (hee!) on the regular, so I had to refresh my memory about the story so far before I jumped into this issue. The last thing I remembered clearly was that the evil sex cop that Jon and Suzie had nicknamed “Kegelface” was hot on their heels and shtupping his therapist as part of her nasty plan against them. 

What I was mostly invested in was Jon’s emotional journey towards learning how to let himself feel all of his feelings, especially the ones surrounding his anger and depression and inability to say the magic “L” word to Suzie. So this issue was a bit unsatisfying to me on a personal level, because it was pretty much all narrated by Kegelface. Fraction seems quite intent on making his readers empathize, if not identify, with just about everyone in the book. As if it weren’t enough to use Kegelface to narrate this issue, we get a focus on a new character with a new sexual hangup to fold into the plot.

At this point, it is starting to feel a bit like we readers are collecting sexual types like cards in a pervy Pokemon deck - there’s the former porn star, and the anime fetishist, and the asexual girl, and now the dude who gets off from having women stomp on gnarly little naked trolls that he makes in his basement. I feel sort of bad for harshing on this issue quite so much, especially since it’s a pretty rare thing to see adult human sexuality handled with quite this much finesse in any medium. It’s just that it’s been awhile since I’ve had my fix, and the heart tends to want what it wants.

One thing that hasn’t changed at all about Sex Criminals during its months-long absence is the goofiness of Chip Zdarsky’s artwork. I’m an Archie fangirl, but I was really worried that Zdarsky taking on the Jughead title would cramp his style. My concern, thankfully, seems to have been wholly misplaced. This particular issue was a little lower-key than some others, mainly because most of the characters in it were fully clothed and not in compromising positions of a mainstream NSFW kind. However, the background gags and puns are still just as ridiculous as ever. The bus and billboard next to Kegelface’s workplace were a couple of my favorites. But hands-down the single best image of the issue was Jon’s impersonation of Kegelface as he introduced himself to the new character. Full disclosure that my crush on Jon as a character is biasing me, but the face he makes to describe her is going to amuse me for a long time to come. 

What I’m hoping for is an eventual showdown of sorts between Kegelface and her minions and Jon and Suzie. In the meantime, it looks like we’re going to have to settle for the invasion of the creepy little sex trolls. I just hope they don’t stick around for too long.