Reverbstorm 4—
The Auschwitz of Oz

Script—David Britton

Art—John Coulthart

Cover—Coulthart

1995

A Savoy Henry Green Production

48pp

ISBN 0 86130 095 5

The rise of the Ononoes. After lying dormant for 46 years following their original appearance in Burne Hogarth's Tarzan strip, the Ononoes return with a vengeance. Full page drawings recount more violent mayhem in Torenbürgen's nightmare city blocks. Horror rides the Scorpion Horse while his brother rides the Tug Boat-born Phallus Beetle. Over all hovers the malignant Soul of the Virgin Mary. A phantasmagoric meisterwerk.

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Although Hogarth seemed pleased that his creations had provided an inspiration for this issue, he was singularly unimpressed with the degrees of violence, cannibalism and erotic delirium which Britton and Coulthart spared no pains to detail. Mr Hogarth possessed a very personal and distinctive artistic philosophy (and was easily the most intelligent comic creator of his generation): his principles were founded on the beneficent and enlightening potential of art, it was inevitable his views would be at variance with Savoy's on these issues. No hard feelings Burne.

"Mr Britton asks us to stare into the sun with him. Some of us do and, after winding our way through the tortuous labyrinth of western philosophy, rhetoric, political, artistic and scientific theory expounded in the text, we finally confront the minotaur at the centre, crouched atop a pile of human skulls and recognise ourselves with a sudden jarring shock."

"Savoy flay and mock the cherished values of the Disestablishment...If it be admitted that this is a genuinely vicious body of work, it is at least one which attempts real violations or real contemporary norms, and not just the usual tepid pantomimes of rebellion...Coulthart's dark, clogged artwork is superb...The sheer darkness of Savoy's anti-heroes is true to humanity and to history in a way which other recent work fails to be."

"A rollercoaster ride to the end of our collective night, a delirious, erotic and unbridled display of literary savagery and artistic terrorism."

I have not seen in many a long series of months—or years—the kind of continued dedication to the punctilious and meticulous pen and ink work put on board by your artist. It's a striking example of the need to create and the desire to shock the sensibilities of an audience with a phantasmic subject linked to a febrile and phantasmagorical talent.

"There is no clear-cut political code or ethical interpretation, because Savoy is leading us, as usual, into frighteningly unfamiliar territory...yet (in Reverbstorm) there is a strong misleading and dangerous element now present in the seductive form of rock'n'roll."