Venture Bros and Giles: Wouldn't have a clue

The Venture Bros has come to an end, and while I still love the whole thing dearly, I also don't mind admitting that I am completely and totally lost when it comes to the big plot. All the machinations of the Guild of Calamitous Intent, all the deep lore about the original Doc Venture's team, I've seen all the episodes at least a couple of times each, and I still don't follow most of it.

But I don't let general bafflement get in the way of a good time. I learned that lesson a long, long time ago, and I learned it thanks to Giles.

My Nana Smith is most responsible for my comics fixation, she fed me some of the greatest comics of the 70s when she worked in a second hand bookstore that is still there, (although not long for this world).

But while she happily encouraged my reading of all sorts of comics at a very young age, she never had many around her house. Except for the Giles books - she always had loads of Giles books.

Giles is one of the quintessentially English cartoonists, a highly detailed line serving a wicked sense of humour. His massive single panels, taking up a whole page of every collection, packed with character and incident.

And these books were at least a decade old, and were full of commentary on topical events in the UK, so I had absolutely no idea what was going on in them because I didn't understand the political scandals and global trade figures that fueled the jokes.

But they were still funny as hell, largely because of their glimpses of life that felt very familiar - the characters in Giles looked like my relatives, from the philosophical Dad who just wants a tiny slice of peace and quiet, to the anarchic energy of the battleaxe Grandmother and the posse of impish children.

Who cares who the Chancellor of the Exchequer was, when you've got those kind of characters, getting up to all sorts of mischief? Even as a little kid, that shit was hilarious.

And now, decades and decades later, that kind of general bafflement works for the Ventures too.

Never mind about the long, convoluted continuity, and how some things just don't make any sense. Some plot threads - like the identity of the twins' mum - have been unraveling forever, but I never really cared about any of that.

It was the weirdos and freaks pulled into it - clones, henchmen and Brocks. HELPers and Brick Frogs. The way Doctor Girlfriend always sticks up for the Monarch and genuinely loves him, baboon blood and all, and the way mad scientists and discarded sidekicks could form new families out of the ruins of their lives. Who cares what The Orb actually was?

Still, while it might be all over now, I would still take a whole series about Gary. I could always follow Gary's story.