Debbie: The Queen of the Tellers #7

Posted: Tuesday, October 31, 2000
By: Darren Schroeder

Cover of Debbie: The Queen of the Tellers #7 Creator(s): Jeff Stoneking
Publishers: Self Published
From: USA
Price:

Once and a while a comix arrives in my mail box that proves just how different small press can be from the main stream dross that floods the shelves of most comic shops. Debbie is just such a comic.

I don't quite understand who Debbie is. I do know she works as a teller in a drive through bank, but much that happens to her doesn't have much to do with deposits and withdrawals. In one story she becomes part of time paradox concerning a song that keeps being sung throughout time, and as time passes the time between each recital is getting shorter and shorter. Debbie is the only person that hears the song, and it is overwhelms her.

In another tale Debbie takes over Penuts, with all the regular characters becoming version of her which disturbs the Charlie Brown character no end. There are also stories involving self referential comic book character angst, as well as Debbie telling some bratty kids to go play on the road, with fatal consequences.

The book is filled with dark humor with few real belly laughs. It is not quite so over the top to be called surreal, but it ain't life as we know it. Example: A brutal fight between Chad the bank teller, armed only with his teller stamp of thunder, and his manager who seems quite adept at swing a fire axe with murderous intent.

All this is portrayed in Jeff's occasionally scratchy black and white line work. While not the best comic art out there, it is always coherently drawn and Debbie looks quite cute in a Hanna Barbera kind of way. Track this one down.

In a Word: Uneasy.



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