Review of "Transmetropolitan: Lust for Life," by Warren Ellis, Darick Robertson and Rodney Ramos

Review of

Transmetropolitan: Lust for Life, by Warren Ellis, Darick Robertson and Rodney Ramos, ISBN 9781401222611

Five out of five stars

Antihero journalist navigates bizarre dystopia

 Spider Jerusalem is an extremely talented investigative journalist that finds and experiences some of the bizarre aspects of a society that would be a dystopia if even one-third of the current features were true. Fearless in pursuing his craft despite his claims to the contrary, Spider will go anywhere and do almost anything to learn the truth about the wackiness in his world.

 In the opening story, the “boyfriend” of Spider’s female assistant is going to have his consciousness transferred into some form of electronic form where he will live for a long time. As part of the process, his physical body will be completely deconstructed.

 A plot thread that runs through these stories is that the head of Spider’s ex-wife was frozen at the time of her death, and she was not to be revived until there was conclusive proof that Spider was dead. That head was lost/stolen and Spider is involved, even though he has legitimate claims of innocence.

 There is a great deal of creative bizarreness in this graphic novel. There is a sentient police dog that was emasculated by Spider, a two-headed cat that smokes two cigarettes at the same time, a headless child that claims to have been fathered by Spider, a banner that offers cloned human meat at a low price, and Spider seeking refuge for writing in a portable toilet on a city street. He is rousted by members of a sect that consider physical contact between humans to be vulgar.

 An unusual reading experience, Spider Jerusalem is a strange hero in a world where technology is advanced, but it has gone in many bizarre directions.