Reading The Annotated Mantooth! is much like hearing your "special needs" cousin try to tell a knock-knock joke, except that every time he screws up the punchline, he punches himself in the groin repeatedly in frustration. The joke itself is only mildly funny, but the way it's told makes it fall-down hysterical, even though you know in your heart that you're going to hell for laughing at it. See, I loved the three-part Rex Mantooth feature when it was originally produced in Double Take, but the various contributors to The Annotated Mantooth!, including publisher Larry Young, have taken an already funny joke and built an even funnier joke around the idea of giving deluxe treatment to a story that, however beloved, didn't even make a splash equal to that of a low-rent porn book in the industry when it was first released.
It might sound like there's more fun to be had in laughing at Mantooth! but with it, but that's really not the spirit I took it in. Fraction may not be Alan Moore, but that doesn't mean his scripts aren't interesting to read and worthy of publication. There are some gags to be found in the script that didn't make it to the page, and some of the differing interpretations between the script and art were interesting from a process wonk point of view. In addition, Fraction's comments on the script, the final product and whatever thoughts both inspired in his head at the time of the writing are acidic, cynical and often hilarious.
Then there are the text pieces, contributed by a variety of comics luminaries. Warren Ellis, Joe Casey, Greg Rucka, and of course Larry Young contribute their thoughts, and Rucka and Young hit the nail on the head most strongly with me by their implications that Rex Mantooth is a real guy with a real rep, getting right into the spirit of the book. Fraction sort of inspires this type of writing with his own text pieces, which posit a semi-fictional history of how he came to write Mantooth! and which has the same dark humor that he brings to his online column. And the pin-ups by several artists, mostly from artists I haven't seen before, are a nice finishing touch.
Which brings me to the reason for the whole collection, the stories themselves, and I found them as funny on this reading as I did the first few times I read them. Fraction throws wild ideas, superspy cliches and plenty of well-timed profanity at the reader, and the result is a laugh on just about every page. Kuhn matches the speed and intensity of Fraction's words with some ridiculous visuals all his own, and his visions of some of the more unusual ideas, including carnivorous ducks, giant robots or lesbian armies inspire more than a few laughs as well.
Among the thanks section of Team Mantooth! in the back of the book there is a note to myself and Don thanking us for our "inexplicably enthusiastic online support." I don't find it so hard to explain... Mantooth! is some funny, twisted and imaginative shit, and it earned both Fraction and Kuhn a look at whatever projects they move on to next.
