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Animal Control: Special Creatures Unit (Preview)

By Andy Frisk
June 8, 2010 - 16:36

Al Kaminski and his rookie partner who goes by her last name Vasquez, when not being referred to constantly as “rookie” by Al, are animal control officers of the near future. A few years after the popularity and novelty of transgenic animal breeding has more or less taken America by storm, and gone criminal in some cases, weird and dangerous creatures roam loose and need controlling on the occasions they become…feral.

Writer, publisher, and creator of Animal Control: Special Creatures Unit, Rob Anderson, combines his love of animal welfare and comic books in this interesting new series. The transgenic animal creations of this near future world range from the cuddly panda dog (which lends its name to Anderson's publishing house Panda Dog Press) to the pretty terrifying ‘gator-snake and the many interesting and scary creations in between. It is the two main animal control officers that really make the stories in AC: SCU work though. Kaminski is an aging animal control officer whose legend precedes him, but is nursing a failure of seemingly great proportions, which occurred recently in his past. Vasquez is the eager and serious rookie who’s learning the ropes and facing dangers on her own occasionally while Kaminski drowns his past regrets.

Two of the three tales contained within this special preview issue are penciled by Leandro Panganiban, a Philippines based artist who designs creatures for the Facebook Flash RPG game, Lost Survivors, among other projects. His work is incredibly solid. He does a great job penciling realistic looking humans and, interestingly enough, realistic looking fictional animals such as the gryphon-like creature that Kaminski manages to save Vasquez from. Panganiban really excels when the transgenic animals leap, run, crawl, and occasionally slither onto the scene. They are well designed and look real enough to be believable.

Manga artist Eve Yap contributes the pencils and inks for the third story in AC: SCU which involves a solo adventure of Panda Dog, the missing pet that Kaminski and Vasquez set out in search of at the beginning of the first of the three tales contained herein. “Girl Trouble” is a cute little tale for kids that is illustrated well, and shows a lighter side to Anderson. Overall, the three tales are all ages friendly, but “Girl Trouble” is more for the kids and is simply added for fun. It could though serve as an interesting balance to the more serious AC: SCU when it gets rolling on a regular basis.

Animal Control: Special Creatures Unit is an interesting and potential filled debut from Anderson’s fledgling Panda Dog Press. It’s a unique concept and is worth seeing more of on a regular basis.

Rating: 7.5 /10

Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12