Mark A. Lester's Five Star Pulp/Altered Ego

Currently, Five Star Comics (the independent output of Mark A. Lester, writer and illustrator), has two books available to the public. These are Five Star Pulp and Altered Ego, the result of much love, devotion, sweat, frustration, and suffering--and, sometime in the future, The Knight Wolf, a graphic novel featuring Morgan Stone, whose origin story is told here, as the first feature in Five Star Pulp.

Mark has said that he originally conceived this series to represent a sort of "total entity" for his creative output: a medium through which he can deal with any of many subjects that interests him. Like Dust, the other feature in this volume, it is highly aware of the pulp traditions from which it emerges, simultaneously paying tribute and refining. Both of these titles share a central interest in the nature of reality.

Five Star Pulp serves as a compelling introductory volume. In its current form, The Knight Wolf shows extensive promise. Of course, as an isolated origin story, it's somewhat less effective than Altered Ego (which also has a very amusing two page short at the end of Pulp), but rather, requires a longer volume, allowing Mark to elaborate upon this universe he's created--and, fortunately, we're going to get one.

Dust deals with somewhat similar themes, except on a cosmic level. The first few pages feature my favorite artwork in the book. I'm not aware of the future of this project, but it's extremely interesting as well.

Altered Ego is a lot of things at once. Most everything in it is funny. But it also offers a very serious, if somewhat disheartening, portrayal of "the artist's lifestyle", a gritty, cosmic accident that comes about as our society's lack of appreciation of art, as well as a witty meditation upon its own medium, chronicling the adventures of its own creator (who appears in delightful caricature, with really shiny glasses) who routinely inserts some extremely cleverer observations on the events at hand.

Based on its format, Altered Ego was originally written as a strip. Because of this, there's something clever at the end of most every line. My personal favorites are "The Knight Wolf" (a rather amusing allusion to his Morgan Stone series), in which, post inspirational speech, pencil in hand, the protagonist falls asleep without ever starting to draw (something that, indeed, he never gets around to, though he drinks lots of coffee); "The Secret Of My Success", a hilarious revelation concerning the tricks of the trade; and "Artsy Fartsy", probably the funniest in the book.

Also included is a dream sequence (with commentary) made up a sample of Mark's older work, featuring a very amusing talking cat.

Support independent comics and pick up your own copies here:

http://www.indyplanet.com/catalog/index.php?osCsid=c7b3c6c2858087e4d2daa9979dd55e06&cPath=36&sort=&filter_id=391

Or check out FiveStarComics.com for more information, galleries, or free reader copies--though really, it's much better to support independent comics.