Luke Owen reviews Christopher Daniels and Kazarian Wrestle Aw Yeah Comics!
AW YEAH! It was bound to happen! The Team-Up you’ve been waiting for! TV’s Pro-Wrestling SUPERSTARS Christopher Daniels & KAZARIAN travel to Beautiful Downtown Skokie to challenge Action Cat & Adventure Bug to a TAG-TEAM wrestling match?! What the…? How did this happen? That doesn’t sound right. How can real-life wrestlers meet comic book characters? Hhmm… I wonder if that bottle of Super Secret Inter-Dimensional Transit Potion has anything to do with this! You bet it does! Watch Out CD and Kaz! Your worlds are about to collide! Join us for this Epic Crossover Event between Pro Wrestling Superstars Christopher Daniels & Kazarian and AW YEAH COMICS characters! Action Cat, Adventure Bug, and… Awesome Bear! There will be table crunching, chair smacking, broom slapping, and comic reading action! Guest starring the Evil Marquaid…(dot evil dot com dot evil!).
If you’ve opened this review asking, “who the hell are Aw Yeah Comics!”, then allow me to fill you in. Aw Yeah Comics! are a group of comic books that live in that bright and wonderful world where they are allowed to be fun. They don’t need to be dark and brooding, they don’t strive to be serious adult fiction and instead are loveable, entertaining stories that can be read by children while not being patronising for adults. On the flip side, if you opened this review asking, “who the hell are Christopher Daniels and Kazarian?” then allow me to once again give you the low down. Christopher Daniels and Kazarian are two professional wrestlers who have made a name for themselves on the wrestling scene for many years and were recently part of the Total Non-Stop Action roster until they were let go for (some reports will tell you) cost cutting measures.
We’re all up to speed now? Good. Because Christopher Daniels and Kazarian Wrestle Aw Yeah Comics! is a great and fun read and well worth your time.
Written by Daniels himself, Christopher Daniels and Kazarian Wrestle Aw Yeah Comics! sees our wrestling heroes (in picture book form) hanging out backstage when they accidentally consume a bottle of the Super Secret Inter-Dimensional Transit Potion which sends them into the world of Aw Yeah Comics!. Of course, their first port of call is to find somewhere to wrestle, but before that they take a trip to the local comic shop where they happen to get into a tussle with the town’s superheroes Action Cat, Adventure Bug and Awesome Bear!
The brilliance of Christopher Daniels and Kazarian Wrestle Aw Yeah Comics! really lies in its writing by Daniels. It is not easy to write a comic book that will have the child-like nature needed to appeal to kids but remain something that adults can read and get some enjoyment from, but he has nailed it perfectly. The script is full of great jokes, funny sight gags and knowing nods to the reader that this is a comic book and it is supposed to be light hearted (but very enjoyable) fluff.
Aw Yeah Comics! have a very unique style in terms of artwork and Art Baltazar has done a great job of integrating the real-life Daniels and Kazarian into their world without compromising their established style. The wrestling scene itself flows beautifully and Baltazar never lets the artwork fall away from him.
If there is anything wrong with Christopher Daniels and Kazarian Wrestle Aw Yeah Comics! is that it’s only one issue. Daniels needs to join the writing staff full-time and start penning outings for Action Cat, Adventure Bug and Awesome Bear on a regular basis. The balance of child-like joy and adult-enjoyment is perfect and Christopher Daniels and Kazarian Wrestle Aw Yeah Comics! is a testament to how much fun a comic can be.
Luke Owen is one of Flickering Myth’s co-editors and the host of the Flickering Myth Podcast. You can follow him on Twitter @LukeWritesStuff.
Originally published June 4, 2014. Updated April 12, 2018.
