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Welcome back to another edition of Wacky Comic Wednesday! Bucky O’Hare is an awesome, green, space pilot rabbit created by writer Larry Hama (G.I. Joe, Wolverine) in 1978. Bucky made his first comic book appearance in 1984 in the series Echo of Futurepast published by Continuity Comics. The character had a brief 15 minutes of fame that hit its peak in the early 1990s when he earned his own action figure line complete with good guys, bad guys and accessories for both, a video game by Konami for the NES, and a bad ass TV show with an awesome theme song:

Click here to check it out!

I love that line: “Get the funky fresh rabbit who can take. care. of. it!” Is it me or does it sound like that line wanted to be  “take. care. of. S**T!” …? Anyway, the show didn’t last very long as it premiered in September 1991 and ended in January 1992. Still, I can remember watching it as a kid and loving every episode.

So the Bucky O’Hare comic series rode the wave of the franchise’s peak, being published in 1991 by the same company in which the rabbit made his debut- Continuity Comics. The premise (in case you didn’t watch the video ya jerk) is that a space war is going on between the United Animals Federation and the sinister Toad Empire.

This first issue starts off with our hero, Bucky, being chased by a squadron of Toad Fighters in his ship, the Righteous Indignation. Next to him is his co-pilot, a pink cat named Jenny, and the rest of his crew includes Dead-Eye Duck (a gunner with a cowboy dialect), Android First Class Blinky (who is a cross between R2-D2 in usefulness and C-3PO in annoyingness) and Bruce the Betelgeusian Berserker Baboon (the engineer). For most of the issue we are treated to a space battle between the two sides, but things start to go south for Bucky as his ship takes some unrepairable damage and a member of his crew bites it, becoming ‘one with the universe.’

The final quarter of the book takes us to San Francisco where we meet the human member of the cast, a 12 or so year old boy named Willy DuWitt. Willy lives with his hippie parents who constantly badger him with political issues he could care less about, claiming that all he wants to do is be left alone and study science. Uh, yeah, he doesn’t have many friends. The issue ends when Bucky is forced to make a blind warp jump, displacing he and his crew into our universe via Willy’s room!

Maybe it’s because I’m a huge nerd about the cartoon series and was totally into it growing up, but this comic kicks ass. The writing is great as each character has their own style of speech, and once the Righteous Indignation crew arrives on Earth every little kid wanted to be Willy DuWitt. Have you ever read the kids book Aliens Ate My Homework by Bruce Coville? Well, this story kind of like that- cool aliens enter a young boys life and take him on some awesome adventures. What really roped me into this comic though is the art work by Michael Golden (The Micronauts, The ‘Nam, cover artist for G.I. Joe and Nightwing) and the coloring by Cory Adams (I couldn’t find much on this guy except that he also colored Superman vs. Muhammad Ali). The pencils are clean and detailed with beautifully blended colors. Thanks to the art work, while reading this comic I felt like I was watching the cartoon all over again!

Now check out these quotes from the issue:

“Oh… calamity and woe!” – Android First Class Blinky

“How’s about coming along with us to the anti-nuke demo in Golden Gate Park?… Give your head a rest now and then, son… do something that’s good for the soul.” – Mr. DuWitt

“The kids in school think I’m a creep because I get good grades… the neighborhood kids think I’m weird ’cause both my parents are happily married and living together… my own parents think I’m some sort of Republican ’cause I don’t get upset about the whales and baby seals… I don’t give two hoots about macrobiotics, zen archery, ceramics, macrame, Sartre, Gurdjieff, Soleri, solar power, or my karma… I just care about science.” – Willy DuWitt

“Well that’s the bottom line, then… when you’re faced with the choice between certain destruction and the great unknown… there’s really only one choice you can make!” – Bucky O’Hare

If you like space sagas and talking animals, definitely give Bucky O’Hare #1 a shot- or at least watch an episode of the show on youtube.

Until next time!

Andy Liegl
andy@comicattack.net