Review: Brute #2 - The Toughest Teddy Bear in the Galaxy
"I'm a human. From the planet Earth."
"Your planet's name is 'Rock'. Makes sense if your world is rocky."
"It's actually 70% water."
"Uh, okay."
In Brute: The Toughest Teddy Bear In The Galaxy issues 0 and 1 we were introduced to Kodee a.k.a. Brute, a short, green furry alien with immense strength and a love for brawling.
One day on Tars Station he sees a young being fighting with three huge Plactori aliens. The smaller being is a species unfamiliar to Brute, something called a 'human'; young, female and wearing a slave collar. Whoever she is, she doesn't stand a chance...
So continues the tale that started in issues 0 and 1. Here we learn Brute's backstory and how he came to join the crew of the Vanguard as a bounty hunter (his incredible strength - due to his home planet's immense gravity - making him a very useful addition.
On Brute's homeworld water only exists as underground ice and it has to be mined. A miner like his pa, Brute was due to be married until his bad temper caused his fiancée to have second thoughts. Feeling dejected, he decides to risk his life uncovering a mystery. Someone is paying the miners to extract not ice, but a worthless metal: gold...
Our hero soon finds himself adrift in a galaxy in which nobody knows where his home planet is or how to find it. It seems he is destined to forever be cut off from his world and his own people. In Rose he finds a friend in a similar predicament, she has been trying to get to Earth for a very long time.
This second instalment by writer Preston Squire and artist Owen Keenan adds depth to the main character and adds to the drama of the story. We begin to understand the reasons behind Brute's "ornery" disposition and, indeed, why he chose to change his name. Here we have an individual in the process of questioning who and what he is, who and what he should be... There is a hint that his friendship with Rose may cause him to find the peace with himself that has eluded him for so long.
...If they live long enough! There appears to be no end of aggressive aliens wherever he finds himself. For the present, at least, our furry protagonist has no choice but to rely upon his phenomenally powerful little muscles to save the day, again and again.
Some questions are answered here but plenty more remain tantalisingly in place. Barely have our heroes paused for breath than they once again find themselves in fight-or-flight mode. The momentum of the story moves them, and the reader, along like a relentless tide, with no clue as to where they are going.
This is light-hearted action adventure with some thoughtful serious notes and a colourful array of characters. Will our heroes find what they are looking for? In a big, hostile universe it seems anything is possible.
Zak Webber
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