I have never been a fan of humor comics. Except for Larry Alcala’s work, nothing has really gotten my interest. I’m easily put off by trite, hand-me-down types of humor and well, that is exactly what makes up a greater part of our comedy corpus. It is indeed astonishing and ironic how we Filipinos are supposed to be one of the happiest people in the planet when our body of comedy is plain pitiable. Abangan ang Susunod na Kabanata, Michael V’s Bubble Gang, Zsa Zsa Zaturnnah, Mark Meily’s films particularly Crying Girls and Gagamboy were okay but apart from them, we haven’t really produced anything remarkable—be it on TV, in film, in comics. Don’t even mention Dolphy, purportedly our king of comedy. To this day I still wonder how he had earned the title: he is but a sorry reminder of how depressing the state of our comedy is. One time while changing channels I chanced upon our own version of Conan O-Brien. You gotta give whoever that guy is some credit for his dancing. But when it comes to wit, the show needs some major, major makeover.
And so I thought I should check out the latest titles out to see whether something funny in comics format has surfaced. And voila, I found PSICOM’s Topak, a monthly humor comics magazine featuring different works of various artists and writers like Elbert Or, Jonas Diego, Ron Tan and Gerry Alanguilan.
The magazine was quite impressive—collecting together a variety of stories told in different visual styles and approaches. This worked well for the magazine so while its difficult to appreciate the whole thing as there are, as expected, your usual brand of Pinoy slapstick humor and sexist punchlines from storytellers who cant come up with anything “funny” without alluding to women’s boobs in the collection, its not impossible to find at least one up to your taste. There were a number of gems in the magazine that I enjoyed a lot like Julius Villanueva’s Punyetang World with its hilarious take on the ironies of Pinoy life, Jomike Tejido’s Bulimic Boy and Five reasons why you must always feed your pet, both bracing with their refreshing macabre sense of humor, Ron Tan’s Supercaptainman and Lico Reloj’s The Fifty Peso Ninja, both a parody of the regular superhero, and lastly, Jerald Dorado’s The Legend of the Golden Pupu, with its effort to infuse humor with our times past (plus, the artwork was terrific). I would follow succeeding issues of Topak even for just these stories.
Another notable feature of the magazine was the inclusion of the Who’s Who in Pinoy Cartooning and How to Draw the Topak way sections. The two ensure that the reader not only laugh his/her heart out, but learn more about the industry and the art behind komiks. Topak sure is packed with goodies and we all need some humor once in a while. Once in a month is just fine. Go get Topak!
