REVIEWER's NOTE: In the interest of sanity and taste there will be only one sports metaphor in the entire review.

Plot: Twisted board game becomes comic with tongue planted firmly in cheek (then ripped out and smashed into the astrogranite to cheering crowds).

Commentary: Some time ago “The Onion” had an article headlining “Sports Geek Looks Down on Science Fiction Geek”. It made the valid (and funny) point that social acceptance of geekery is only defined by the popularity of the subject of obsession. Somehow painting your face and body with your team colors is OK but dressing like a Jedi isn’t. The truth is both are loons. Sports -- with its violence, inflated egos, superstitions, and blind loyalty from fans -- has more geekery than any entertainment genre (and some overlap), it just has the numbers to make such obsession seem normal. People who dress like Jedi are asking for it. But what if you have a taste for fantasy and sports? You want your blood real and imaginary? Where does the twain meet? Back in the day you had the board game Blood bowl, a twisted send up of football with Orcs and humans duking it out on a sports field instead of the field of battle, a spiked football instead of the one ring. As a game it was demented fun, as satire it hit square in the chest too.

The concept is so out there that you have to play to the hilt in execution. Matt Forbeck and Lads Helloven (gotta be a former death metal guitarist with a name like that) fortunately get it and they have a fun time going nuts-o with Blood Bowl in comic form. The comic captures the freak-a-zoid mayhem you got in a Blood Bowl game; Orcs with chainsaws (and product endorsements), heads being mistaken for the ball, violence so over the top all you can do it laugh at the excess. Body parts tumble through the air, people are tossed across the field and the coach has a peg leg and a hook. It would be grim if it weren’t so damn silly. The humor has its fill of puns on names such as “Rhett Karve” or “Orcland Raiders” or the announcers saying, “Brought to you by Bloodweiser, this blood’s for you!”; silly and worth a chuckle. Blood Bowl’s real comic strength lies in physical excess. It's three stooges cranked up to 11 with Helloven’s (maybe he was in the band “Fire Hose of Vomit”) funky artwork.

As far as the plot goes, Dunk Hoffnung of the Bad Bay Hackers (I warned you) might be getting a little tired of the violence of Blood Bowl and clashes with Pegleg, the team coach, when he saves rookie Kalter Morder from a chainsaw wielding Orc (I think that’s the name of Helloven’s old band). Morder has his own agenda, being an assassin hired by a goblin to whack a dwarf in the following game (like you need an assassin to kill somebody in Blood Bowl). Morder finds himself relishing the teamwork and camaraderie of the Bad Bay Hackers. He’s still going to kill his mark but homicide in the form of sportsmanship has an appeal. Sports stories usually follow a particular pattern; underdogs fighting the champs, maybe a temptation to fix a game or sell out. Everyone rallies through personality conflicts and tomfoolery to discover that teamwork is the most important thing. Though some of that is here, Blood Bowl seems to be rejecting that structure in favor of other genre plot structures (a traitor in the midst, romantic tribulation). So there is room for some surprises in the story. Hopefully these plot threads will be developed fully but, even more hopefully, we’ll see the off field antics of the team and more of the world which Blood Bowl takes place.

Helloven’s art is, as said, funky and funny. Everybody looks like a broad caricature (hard to do for Orcs). Its gleeful excess hits the comic tone upside the (dismembered) head and yet it still delivers coherent action. There is no confusion as to what’s happening even with the characters looking like a cross between graffiti and those big head portraits you get in amusement parks. Obviously the game art is a template but Helloven (formally of the death metal band Skulldeathdeathskull) ramps it up.

Final Word: This isn’t your typical fantasy football. Blood Bowl is good bloody fun. Pulling off the tightrope act of embracing and satirizing sports and violence is tricky, injecting goofball fun is even harder. For sheer maniac weirdness it scores points and bullets. The real test will be if Blood Bowl can carry this craziness off the field and into an expanded world. I really look forward to finding out.

For a website with no sports metaphors…

"Who is Crazy Mary?"

---

What did you think of this book?
Have your say at the Line of Fire Forum!

---