Dear Frank,

So the first time I read Transmetropolitan, I was visiting Whitney, one of my oldest friends, in New Jersey. It was 2005, I was on a very random cross-country trip, and Whitney had a day job, and so spending the better part of 48 hours reading her trade paperbacks made sense.

Then, Transmetropolitan BROKE MY BRAIN.

By which I mean I loved it. Even though it BROKE MY BRAIN. And gave me nightmares. And did…

It did some other things, Frank. They mostly involve shouting. I shall explain.

Transmet, as it’s conventionally know, is writer Warren Ellis and artist Darick Robertson’s magnum opus for Vertigo Comics, a five year odyssey through an imagined future where genetics are easily manipulated, technology is something you swallow as pills, and we just call New York City “The City.”

If you read it in less than two days on a futon in New Jersey, it’s really intense. If you reread it in two weeks on an actual bed in Los Angeles… Actually still really intense. Read the rest of this entry →