My Hat Is Like A Shark's Fin...

The Ray was one of those under the radar series that few people ever read and fewer still ever remember. As is the case with a lot of these little books that get no hype and no attention - it was pretty damn good.

I must warn you though the book starred a surly teen in the nineties so you must have the ability to survive a terrible onslaught of cheesy hippety-hoppity slang. It's enough to make Vanilla Ice cringe:

I Beg your pardon?

If you can turn a blind eye to the overuse of the words 'gafflin', 'buggin' and Ray's constant attempts to 'get his serve on' then this is a really great little book - and I ain't trippin' holmes.

No! Please readers, wait! Come back! I'm sorry, I won't do that ever again I promise.

Anyway, the book is about Ray Terrill - the son of the original Ray from Uncle Sam's Freedom Fighters. He's inherited his dad's powers and decided to become a super-hero. Unfortunately for Ray, he sucks at it.

Stories of fledgling super-heroes botching things up and finding their feet are always fun to read. This one ditches all of the usual angst and keeps things light and frothy. Even when he's in costume Ray's pretty much just a goofball kid in a bad leather jacket and a dopey fin hat.

Ray #1 is full of quality goofball moments. None of them match my favorite moment though and it doesn't even involve Ray. It involves this little green fellow:Our lil green buddy here is an exile from Apokolips who's trying to curry favor with Darkseid, ruler of Apokolips, by kick-starting one the Big D's Techno-seeds. These Techno-seeds grow into big scary monsters that like to stomp cities and eat babies. Darkseid's a big fan of baby-eating.

The industrious little scamp manages to awaken a big fiery beastie called Brimstone. Unfortunately it turns out that Brimmy just ain't a morning person:Ouch! Such a shame - those bloodstains will never come out of that snazzy Hawaiian shirt!

So if giant redneck monsters crushing little aliens dressed like Sammy Hagar is what you want from a comic, not to mention inept super-heroics and even worse leather jackets, then I can't recommend Ray #1 enough.

It's the bomb!

Word to your mother.