What is Weapon Brown?

Jason Yungbluth is a workhorse of an independent comic artist who's likely best known for Deep Fried. The DF comic is a pastiche of styles written and illustrated by Yungbluth and a compilation of a few different strips (seriously, I've seen at least sever different and distinct styles come out of this guy). A standout among them is Weapon Brown. (I have nothing good to say about the rest of Deep Fried.) Despite the hyper-violence and sexual situations, Weapon Brown is the most approachable and sensible comic of the bunch.

I get the impression that Yungbluth had the idea for a post-apocalyptic, all-grown-up Peanuts story and toyed with it in Deep Fried before blowing the whole thing out into its own series in 2007/8. Weapon Brown features solid black and white artwork as well as a strong and consistent narrative that has grown beyond the Charlie Brown mythos and spilled deeply into all the other classic Sunday comics that used to run in the newspaper. When all of today's 40-somethings were young and impressionable, this stuff was back-hoe'd into our minds. The story works best when you've got all that information in the back of your head as you read along with the mech-armed killing machine Chuck and his faithful dog Snoop. They navigate a desolate wasteland chock-a-block with mutants, gangs, black markets, and all the other cliched madness that defined the early days of apocalyptic science fiction. Throughout it all, a fresh spin is given on the entire trope by a generous layer of warped comic-strip characters. Even minor secondary characters make an appearance either as targets for murder, henchmen, or background noise.

Chuck never disappoints with his snappy dialogue and penchant for violence. It's just the way I always expected poor, set upon Charlie Brown to turn out: full of hate. Weapon brown is a fun read with great art—Yungbluth captures the essence of these classic characters in an unimaginable and recognizable way. The comic currently exists as a compilation graphic novel and, so far, six issues of a continuous story arc and is available for purchase from the Deep Fried web site. You will not be disappoint if you were ever a comic-strip nerd.