Peter Bagge and Me

 

Back when I was 12 I discovered Peter Bagge. I was at this great comic shop over in Biloxi MS. The owner had gotten to know me and knew that I was kinda gotten bored with the stuff DC and Marvel was putting out. "Hey you like Mad Magazine right? Here's the first two issues of Neat Stuff. It is like Mad." I bought them both,and he was great only charged me cover price. Once I was home I kicked back in my bed,put a Ramones cassette into my stereo. Then read both issues. I loved the energy in the art. I loved how Peter Bagge managed to capture what it felt like to be a teen in the mid 80s.

2 weeks later I was back in the comic shop. Telling the owner to put not only Neat Stuff on my pull list but to put anything Peter Bagge did on my pull list. Being a indie title Neat Stuff never came out on a set schedule. But I was lucky about a month after I got those first 2 issues,issue 3 came out. Plus the comic shop got in a small collection of Weirdo. Weirdo was a underground comix started by Robert Crumb. After a short bit Crumb turned the title over Bagge. The owner of the shop was nice and had put aside all the Weirdo issues. Of course I wanted all of them but only had 20 bucks on me. Thankfully this owner was a nice guy. He agreed to put the ones I couldn't buy that day aside and I could get them once I had more money.

Skip ahead a few years.I had turned 15 and was now starting high school. I goto the comic shop and learn that issue 15 is gonna be the last issue of Neat Stuff. I was mad. "Hey calm down. Peter Bagge is starting up a new title." Of course I told him to put this new title on my pull list. Wow even though it was only 4 months between Neat Stuff 15 and the first issue of Hate,it felt like years.

See in Neat Stuff Bagge had a pile of different strips. Goon on the Moon,Studs Kirby and my favorite The Bradleys. Hate was gonna focus on Buddy Bradley. Buddy got tired of being stuck in suburban hell that is New Jersey. So he moved to Seattle. Which was inspired by Peter Bagge's recent move to Seattle. And this was Seattle in the late 80s/early 90s. Long before the grunge music scene blew up. Long before Starbucks took over with their over-priced shitty coffee. 

I loved Hate. Buddy was sharing an apartment with a bunch of similar folks. Working what ever shitty job he could find. And going to lots of concerts. Now I was only 15 back then but I was already going to piles of concerts and it felt like Bagge talking directly to me.

Hate can be divided into two groups really. The first 15 issues were black and white. And had Buddy living in Seattle. Trying to find a girlfriend. And also trying to not get dragged down by the many schemes his friend Stinky got up to. Out of these first 15 issues issue 12 stands out the most to me.

In the issue Buddy and his slightly insane girlfriend Lisa had paid for a dealer's booth at a convention.Buddy was trying to make some extra cash at the con. But this was right before the comic boom of the mid 90s hit. So comics were dead but the bootleg/"Collectors" vhs was booming. Ya know what I'm talking about. The dealers that have on vhs,and in modern days dvd or Blu Ray,stuff that isn't out on that format. In the early 90s you could make big money dealing in vhs copies of stuff like the Green Hornet tv show or one of the many horror/sci fi/cult films that hadn't hit vhs yet.

At this convention there is a bootleg tape dealer,known as Yahtze. Yahtze and Buddy don't get along. While Yahtze is distracted Lisa steals a bag full of Yahtze's bootleg tapes. Our lead couple get a ride home from a long time con dealer and how this guy acts makes Buddy realize he doesn't want to be like him. Lisa and Buddy get upstairs to their apartment. And Lisa tells Buddy about the stolen bag of vhs. Buddy freaks out cause Yahtze is known for being extremely violent. And of course not long after they start watching the first of their stolen vhs there is a knock at the door. It's Yahtze. Yahtze comes in and it looks like Buddy is gonna get his ass handed to him. But Lisa grabs a baseball bat and starts smashing all the VHS. Yahtze gets the fuck out of the apartment. And the issue ends with Buddy and Lisa watching the only tape she didn't smash.

With issue 16 of Hate a lot was changed. First off before this Peter Bagge was doing all the work. He wrote,drew and lettered the comic. With Hate being a pretty big indie hit Fantagraphics wanted to start publishing it in color. Peter recruited Jim Blanchard to handle the inking duties. And IIRC Bagge's wife was hired to do the coloring. Also this is when Hate became more than a comic. Each issue would have articles written by people like Dame Darcy or Selwyn Harris. Plus you got short 1 or 2 page comics from various artists. Bagge's has said he wanted Hate "to become something like Zap Comix. Where you not only get work from a well known creator but also you get stuff from some lesser known creators." I was introduced to so many comic artists and writers through the second half of Hate.

The biggest change was that in issue 16 Buddy and Lisa moved to New Jersey. Buddy was tired of struggling in Seattle. So his plan was to move back in with his mother and hopefully have a better life back where he grew up.Buddy and Lisa had many wacky adventures once they moved to New Jersey. I personally loved it once Buddy started up a collectibles store with a friend. 

Not long before issue 27 came out I moved. Like Buddy I needed a change. So I moved from the MS gulf coast area,where I had lived for 90% of my life,to the Gulf Coast area of TX. Got lucky and found a great comic shop with in two weeks of moving to TX. And added bonus the owner of the comic shop was also a Peter Bagge fan. Whenever a new issue came out I would hit up the comic shop on new comic day. Buy my comics. Then the owner and I would sit down at the back of the shop. At the tables that once it hit 3pm would be full of people playing Magic the Gathering. We would read the new issues of Hate and PReacher.

March of 97 it is new comic day. I took my lunch break hour from work to goto the comic shop. I walk in and Jeff the owner has a upset look on his face. "Hate is ending with issue 30!" Fuck! I kept wondering why Peter Bagge was ending the series. It was a huge seller. 

Issue 29 came out not long before Xmas in 97. I remember reading it while riding back to MS for Xmas.Once I got back from my Xmas vacation I sat down and wrote a long,it was 5 pages,letter to Peter Bagge. Thanking him for providing me with so much entertainment for so long.

Then the long wait started. I knew issue 30 was the end of Hate but had no idea when it was coming out. Finally in May of 98 it was published. And WOW what a way to end the series. Buddy finds out Lisa is pregnant with his child. And now Buddy has total ownership of the collectibles store. Plus in the last panel of the story Lisa and Buddy find a magic whistle. That is another thing I love about Peter Bagge. He is known for taking ideas from the fans and putting them in the comic. Way back in issue 12,I think it was 12,a fan wrote in and asked for a story where Buddy and Lisa find a magic whistle.

In October of 98 Hate Jamboree came out. This oversized comic was packed with interviews with people that worked on Hate. Plus all kinds of hard to find Peter Bagge strips and sketches. I love this special but have one major gripe about it. For some reason the cover is made of newsprint. Which means it gets damaged super easy.

Skip ahead to 1999. I'm suffering from Bagge withdrawls. Goto the comic shop and get great news. First off Bagge is one of the many artists working on Spicecapades. This was a magazine sized one shot all about the Spice Girls. No I'm not joking. It was a huge indie comix about the Spice Girls! Bagge's kid is a huge Spice Girls fan. So Bagge's strip was about him going to a Spice Girls concert with his kid. This is another kinda hard to find Bagge comic. The comic  shop I went to when it came out only ordered 3 copies. 1 for me,1 for the comic shop owner,then one to be put on the wall. Add in that it was magazine sized means since 99 I have seen 2 copies of it in the wild.

YEAH! was a short lived series. Published by DC through the Homage imprint. I remember hearing about this series months before it started. "What Peter Bagge's new series is published by DC. AND IT'S ALL AGES. AND THE ART IS BY GILBERT HERNANDEZ!!!" Yeah! was about an all girl rock band. On Earth they can't get any gigs. But through out the universe they are the most popular band of all time.Managed by a crusty old white dude named Crusty this was one of the best comics coming out at the time. But sadly no one was/has read it. Look at those cover up above. That is just great art. Another thing that made YEAH! stand out was the letters page was ran by Crusty, Yep the manager of the band would answer the letters. 

After YEAH! ended Bagge kept busy. He would do Hate Annual each year. Which normally had a long Buddy and Lisa story. Then piles of extra stuff. He wrote and drew an amazing Hulk story. Bagge even took over the Bat Boy comic strip that was published in Weekly World News. And sure I already had every issue of YEAH! but I wanted a nice trade paperback collection. And in 2011 Fantagraphics did just that. I was happy that this great and kinda unknown comic was getting collected. But there was a few small things wrong. First off YEAH! was a full color comic. The Trade was in black and white. The other thing was for some reason the letter pages weren't reprinted. 

Hope yall enjoyed my rambling about Peter Bagge.There has been many times where I buy a comic just cause it has a page of Bagge art. Many hours have been spent digging through a comic shop's back issue bins hoping to find a new to me Bagge creation.