After 30 years, you might think you know what to expect from a Hate comic from Peter Bagge, but I still never expected to feel actually feel sorry for Stinky.
Stinky!
It's been years since the wonderful Hate Annuals slowly faded away, and Hate Revisited - Bagge's return to the misadventures of Buddy Bradley and the gang - has most definitely been a cause for celebration.
The art is not as slick as it once was, and it looser, thicker and sloppier in an extremely appealing way, but Buddy is still the same old affable loser that he's always been, holding on to his very Gen-X sense of irony in an age of political strife with a surprising deftness (at least in the first couple of issues of the new series).
But then you get to see Buddy and Stinky's first adventure together, and it's weird and fucked up and a little sad, because it's clear that fuckin' Leonard never stood a chance.
Stinky died years ago, and you'll never know if it was a suicide or stupidity, but it still has echoes down the years. It always felt like Buddy was always reacting to Stinky's death with exasperation, and never had the chance to properly mourn his shithead of a pal. It's genuinely pleasing to see him finally tell Lisa, who is just as wonderfully messed up as ever, because if he can't tell her, who could he ever trust?
We all know somebody like Stinky, just too wild to ever grow old, and we can miss them forever, even as they stay young in our memories.
Fucking Stinky, man.
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