In Ice Cream Man #37 by W. Maxwell Prince and Martín Morazzo, get ready to be traumatized in a whole new way.
We reviewed the book on the Stack podcast. But in the interest of highlighting more about the title, here’s a summary of the conversation with our thoughts. And if you prefer the longer audio version, that’s below as well!
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Ice Cream Man #37 Review:
The latest issue of Image Comics’ horror anthology series mixes two storylines. In the first, a group of Smurf-esque bunny-type creatures are fighting a war in Viet-nom-nom-nom. Meanwhile, a brother and sister clean up the effects of their brother, who died by suicide. Needless to say, you will be wrecked.
Big spoilers for the end of the book, but the final pages essentially provide a challenge to the reader: what is this issue even trying to say?
Before even addressing this, host Pete LePage called this “a legendary run.” He added on this issue in particular that the “subject matter is such a bold choice… This comic never let you down. It’s always something very interesting. It’s always something that is dark, but twisted and unique.”
To the point of the question, Justin Tyler said he felt the point was that if the brother and sister had taken the time to read their other brother’s story, the clues were all there. “Instead, [the brother] dismisses this thing that was clearly the vessel that [his brother] was pouring” himself into. Tyler also thought the “Viet-nom-nom-nom” joke was a “very funny, dark joke to put in there.”
Alex Zalben added that Martín Morazzo’s designs for the fuzzy central characters “perfectly straddle the lin between horrifying and adorable.”
As for the story, Tyler felt like “we’re getting closer to some overarching Ice Cream Man story or reveal.”
However, Zalben didn’t think that will ever come to pass, stating, “Yeah, I don’t think it’s ever going to happen but sounds good to me.”
Ice Cream Man #37 Official Synopsis:
“Flight of the Figglybumps (Death of a Cartoonist)”
They’re cute, they’re cuddly, and they’re caught up in a conflagration of candy cannons and cartoony combat! But who are the Figglybumps? And what happened to their creator? The hit horror-adjacent anthology is back—and sadder than ever.
