I’m not sure if this crazy variety in comic literature is a recent trend or if it’s been here awhile and I’m just now noticing. Either way, it’s awesome.

I’m reading stories about cibopathic FDA agents that can get psychic impressions from things they eat in “Chew”, to tales about schizophrenics unlocking past lives to fight alongside in “Cowboy Ninja Viking.” Comics about mystical sidearms in the old west in “The 6th Gun” and now a world run by William Shakespeare and populated by his characters created with his magic quill in “Kill Shakespeare.” So yea, I’m pretty excited to be a comic reader these days.

So what’s Kill Shakespeare about? It’s about a world where all the characters and plots from Shakespeare’s plays all live together and are ruled over by The Bard himself, referred to by his creations as Shakespeare the Wizard. Of course most of these character’s don’t get along with each other or their lot in life and the tried and true villains including King Richard and Lady Macbeth seek to usurp Shakespeare and take his magic quill for their own to rule the land.

Luckily not all are against dear Shakespeare as tried and true heroes like Hamlet, Othello, Juliet and others fight in the name of Will. During this time we never actually see William, and neither do the characters in the story. The refer to him as if he were a god, and that they have “faith” that he’ll return someday and do right by them (or punish them).

The story begins in the real world and young Hamlet’s father has just died. Hamlet suspects foul play, and in a fury of revenge stabs an innocent man. Instead of taking over the throne his father left he is banished from the country forever. During his sea voyage to parts unknown a howling tempest devours the ship and sends Hamlet down a path to another land.

Once there he meets with King Richard, who explains that Hamlet has been prophesied in their world as taking up the mantle of the Shadow King. It’s been foretold that he’s the only one that can find where Shakespeare lives and kill the tyrant known as Will. If Hamlet agrees King Richard promises he can return his father to the realm of the living. Once persuaded by Iago Hamlet decides to carry out this wish for Richard.

Doesn’t take long to learn that King Richard, and Lady Macbeth, are playing Hamlet and really only seek to snatch power for themselves. Luckily not every person in the land is cruel and power-hungry and Hamlet soon runs into the jovial Falstaff, the strong-willed Juliet and the powerful soldier Othello who are trying to inspire a revolution against King Richard and lend support to Shakespeare’s return.

As you can probably guess from reading that basic description is that this story really is unique. In fact since these are established characters already from their own stories it’s really unique to even read. There’s a meta awareness on the part of the reader because you know going in that Iago can’t be trusted, no matter what story he spins, and that Othello is going to be righteous and true. So there’s not much surprise when Lady Macbeth turns evil.

The good news is that even if you don’t know much about Shakespeare and his plays you can still read and enjoy Kill Shakespeare. They introduce the characters slowly and give enough backstory and place that you’ll be fine even if you’ve never heard of them before. Of course that being said if you do know your way around the Bard’s tales there’s tons of little nods in there for you too.

One of the things I enjoyed about the writing of the book is that there are flourishes of old English sprinkled throughout to give a little taste of what we used to dread reading in high school English classes. It doesn’t make the writing obtuse or incomprehensible by any stretch, just some “art thou” and “thee” reference to give the world a feeling of place in the Shakespeare universe. And it really works.

Kill Shakespeare Volume 1: A Sea of Troubles collects issues #1-6 of the monthly comic book. I gave up a while ago buying comics month to month, I prefer to get my stories in much larger chunks than the monthly issue and just wait for the bi-annualy (or thereabouts) releases of the trade paperbacks. So that means I’m typically way behind the “current” story but that’s really fine. What it means is that every 6 months I get to revisit the worlds of these comics and get a few hours enjoyment out of them at a time, which I’m totally cool with.

I’m not really sure where creators Conor McCreery, Anthony Del Col and Andy Belanger plan to take this story, or if they can possibly keep up the the momentum put forth in the first few issues. It hasn’t quite raised to the level of the easily compared to Fables series, but I’m hopeful for it’s future and will stay a reader for now to find out where this all goes!