All-New Henry & Glenn Comics and Stories could be described with many adjectives, including cute, gay, punk, and metal. Cartoonist Tom Neely turns in one of the most wholesome comics of 2024 with a tale of Henry Rollins and Glenn Danzig adopting a new cat named Iggy after their previous one Lemmy passed away. As elucidated in a black and white backup nonfiction comic where Neely was confronted about previous Henry and Glenn comics on a plane ride with Samhain guitarist London May, Neely plays off the aggressive masculinity of especially Danzig’s public persona and turns into something silly, fun, and inclusive. And you know, Glenn Danzig has complained about not being cast as Wolverine on a daily basis in real life.
From the cover which is a classic Peanuts homage, All-New Henry & Glenn is a love letter to classic comics by Charles Schulz as well as Garfield and Disney’s Duck comics. Horror punk/heavy metal and gag strips are truly a match made in heaven with tiny mesh shirt wearing Glenn running around trying to care for Iggy while Henry is off filming a campy grindhouse film with a copyright friendly John Waters and Ru-Paul. (The character is named “Ru-Vine” in homage to both Ru-Paul and the late drag icon Divine.) The amount of sheer destruction that happens to the Henry/Glenn domicile during the second half of the comic is one for the record books as Tom Neely gets to flex his physical comedy muscles.
Neely’s lettering is a big part of the comedy too from the incessant yellow “chime” of the Grindr-for-cats app that Henry is addicted to Glenn just freaking out about various things with text filling the page to go with his overdramatic face. All-New Henry & Glenn is definitely a comic where the lettering is additive and sets the tone for each sequence like when Henry and Glenn visit a cat shelter and the familiar Sarah McLachlan ASPCA tune turns into a little doom metal ditty. It’s like the book has its own soundtrack.
As a queer person, who likes genres that sometimes have homophobic lyrics or performers, like punk, metal, and gangster rap, All-New Henry & Glenn is a balm for me. It has all the ghoul’s night out/horror business trappings of Danzig’s best lyrics with a soft, two men loving each other despite their differences story at the center. As mentioned earlier, Henry and Glenn definitely have their tiffs, but there are sweet scenes of Henry comforting Glenn like when he has a bad dream about their old cat Lemmy or gentle parents him through his anger about not getting a film role like Henry. Plus there’s more overt commentary on this theme in the autobio backup strip “True Tales of Henry & Glenn Forever” where Tom Neely talks about what he loves about making the Henry & Glenn comics with a real/semi-famous someone who didn’t understand the strip. All-New Henry & Glenn does come out of place of fandom, and punk rock Mad Magazine is the perfect descriptor for the series. I also love the realism of Neely and London May not seeing eye to eye about the book coupled with the awkward humor of their seatmate just trying to survive the flight.
All-New Henry & Glenn Comics and Stories combines classic comic strips, punk rock, heavy metal, and loving queer relationships into one silly, beautiful package. It’s for folks who sing “Last Caress” and “Pink Pony Club” at karaoke and know that Danzig is a better singer than Jerry Only, but wish he had Only’s suburban New Jersey dad energy.
Story and Art: Tom Neely
Story: 8.5 Art: 9.0 Overall: 8.8 Recommendation: Buy
Microcosm provided Graphic Policy with a FREE copy for review
Purchase: Microcosm Publishing – Amazon
