All-Star Section Eight # 6 Review and *SPOILERS*

Written By: Garth Ennis

Art By: John McCrea, John Kalisz, Pat Brosseau

Cover Price: $2.99

Release Date: December 2, 2015

It’s the End of the World As We Know It, and I Feel Drunk

*Non-Spoilers and Score At The Bottom*

Here we are at the end of the All-Star Section Eight mini-series, and what a long, strange trip it’s been. Did I write “strange?” I meant “gross.” After getting inside Six Pack’s drunken noggin last issue and seeing his true self as a homeless alcoholic, the ol’ barf bag was visited at Noonan’s Bar by a beckoning Superman. Where do they go? What do they do? Do you think Superman can super-smell Six Pack? Read on to find out!

Explain It!

Six Pack and Superman step out of a teleporter into the Fortress of Solitude, presumably because the sub-zero temperatures will dampen Six Pack’s stench. He’s awed by all the cool stuff Supes keeps at his Fortress, but the freezing, windswept location makes him think of seeing himself frozen and nude in some alley last issue which understandably bums him out. He confesses that he thinks he might not be real—indeed none of what we know to be the DC Universe is real, instead it is the drunken dreams of some loser slob that is Six Pack himself. Superman replies that, in some ancient cultures (for some reason unnamed) there is a belief that God dreamed the universe into existence, which really is just the sort of thing a dreamed-up Superman would say. Along with “You’re super cool, Reggie, and everyone is jealous of you,” and “Jim and Eric are stupid and I, Superman, would never hang out with them.”

Meanwhile, back at Noonan’s Bar, the band seems to be breaking up. The Grapplah goes to take a whiz in a bathroom—and I just need to point this out—where the urinal is a trench on the floor. I have seen bathrooms like this, though not in many years, and it is the most foul thing ever. Better you should just pee behind a dumpster or in some alley rather than let your urine coagulate with unrelated refuse and dead rodents all collected around a useless central drain. It must make the Grapplah sick, too, because he fires off his grappling gun to a skylight above and appears to take off. We also see a family of not wretched, horrible people enter Noonan’s; it’s Dogwelder’s family, who have been looking for him before he was possessed by his predecessor’s welding gear and joined up with the Section. Yeah. “The Section.” That’s what the kids are calling it, I swear.

Back to Six Pack and Superman, they’ve teleported to Guinness Park in the Irish section of Gotham City, where Six Pack remembers some of his past exploits and places he’s passed out. Superman reassures Six Pack that he’s a hero, and proves it by showing him a statue erected in his honor right there in Guinness Park, in an awesome splash page that I can confirm works very well as wallpaper for your cellphone. That reassures Six Pack and Superman tops it off by handing him a fucking bottle of bourbon. I guess if someone’s got to get their hands dirty to keep the Multiverse alive, it’s Supes. Meanwhile, back at Noonan’s, Dogwelder’s wife and two kids are there pleading with him to take his mask off and return to the fold, until they pull out their dog Scraps and he presumably welds the dog to one of them. I don’t know, it happens off-panel for some reason, which I thought was sort of incongruous given how nauseating this comic has been for six issues. I mean, if you’re the kind of person who would be offended by a dog being welded to a child or a family for some reason, then I can’t imagine that you’ve made it beyond issue two of this miniseries, much less to issue six.

Six Pack returns to Noonan’s and tries to rile up the gang to go defeat the Threat, which indirectly causes Powertool to electrocute himself. Baytor hides in the bar’s basement, and Six Pack opens the men’s room door to find that the Grapplah hung himself on his own grapple. Bueno Excelente and Guts are still on their honeymoon in the ladies’ room at Noonan’s, so Six Pack decides to tackle the Threat alone! He drinks a bottle of whiskey, runs outside and immediately pukes on the sidewalk, then stands in the decidedly chunky puke to proclaim his intention to defeat the Threat before a bunch of startled and probably sickened onlookers. It all ends with a big splash page of Six Pack springing grossly into action, which by the way I can also confirm works nicely as cell phone wallpaper.

I have loved this series from the start and the ending was not a disappointment. The artwork remains a perfect fit, makes Superman in his plated glory look perfectly good and, quite frankly, I feel more of an affinity for this liquor-doling Superman than the one currently appearing in the pages of Superman. The conceit that it was all a glimmer in a dying drunk’s eye might be a little trite, but the yucky and silly way the story is told is a delight for sophomoric idiots and aficionados of bathroom humor which, if you’re reading this site, you probably are.

Bits and Pieces:

Fans of the series are rewarded with an ending that is more silly than touching, which is just what we want. Superman acts as Six Pack’s guide through his emergence as a hero, which involves probably a lot more vomiting than most rebirths. I mean, I bet Hal Jordan puked a little when he got rid of Parallax, but do you think it was enough barf to stand on? Ennis and McCrea have done a great, crass thing with this book. It’s not for everyone, but it’s for me and other deplorable humans with no moral compass like myself.

8/10