Customer Reviews
Worlds collide - By: S. Bentley, 27 Aug 2008 
Zot! has a certain reputation amongst comic readers of an age. It came from the same stable as Alan Moore's Miracleman of Eclipse comics in the 1980s & approaches a similar idea, of superheroes intruding on the real world, but from an entirely different direction.
Zot is from a paralllel Earth that is much more advanced technologicallly than our own. He has met a girl from our world callled Jenny & visits her often. Jenny hates our world & longs for the day when Zot will take her to live in his world, where everything is brighter & good always conquers evil. Zot, optimistic & enthusiastic, faces some surprises in our world, where things are not so clear cut & people are indifferent, but continues to show Jenny that there is much to love about her world. And them both being teenagers, their feelings for each other grow & blossom.
Scott McCloud, the writer & artist on this book, also produced some important texts on the way comics are written, such as Reinventing comics. Zot! was where he learnt his lessons, experimented with comic narratives & wrote some heartfelt stories that deal with growing up. There is enough super hero stuff to keep the book flowing, but it is the emotional stuff that impresses.
The book is, as per the title, completely in black & white. It misses the first ten issues of the series which were in colour but were also a more straightforward super hero story that would misrepresent what Zot! became.
If you like fantasy & romance mixed in with your superheroes, & are happy to chuck out the ultra-violence & posturing, Zot!'s utterly charming storylines are probably what you're looking for. People who like Ultimate Spider-man & Jeff Smith's Bone will probably love this.
Sheer delight. - By: IanW, 26 Aug 2008 At last we have, if not the complete Zot, the complete black & white Zot which McCloud considers effectively a reboot of his original 10-issue colour series. And who am I to argue? Me, I'm just glad to have to have my Zot collection complete at last.
Zot is a number of things. Partly a joyous celebration of the innocent days of superhero comics -Zot comes from the golden future of 1965; partly a bitter-sweet celebration of adolescence; partly about the clash between fantasy & reality -Jenny, his friend, comes from our world. It's also one of the first American comics to show the influence of manga, the humorous side as opposed to the violent energy of material like Lone Wolf & Cub which was making its initial mark around the same time, but the emphasis is on 'influence' rather than imitation.
This is an early work by McCloud but it hasn't dated,it's just as much fun as it was twenty years ago, indeed it's enhanced by the author's frequent comments on chapters & story arcs.
McCloud features notably in two recent books 500 Essential Graphic Novels: The Ultimate Guide (500 Essential...) & The Rough Guide to Graphic Novels (Rough Guide Specials) (they complement each other well & are recommended equallly) largely because of his graphic novel trilogy about reading & creating comics. I'm sure that this book will appear in any future editions.
Get it.
