Lee James Turnock -Up Yours!

Up Yours!
Lee James Turnock 
The Comic Company
32 pages (saddle stitched)
Colour cover/ B&W interior
Sized to 5 ½” x 7 ¼” (perfect for stickin’ in your trenchcoat pockets!)/A5
$4.00

http://thecomixcompany.ecrater.com/p/20005131/up-yours-comix-lee-james-turnock?keywords=up+yours!#
ADULTS ONLY!!!


  Britain's least known Underground cartoonist, Lee James Turnock, unleashes another tidal wave of lovingly delineated vitriol. Part autobiographical, part satirical, UP YOURS! is certain to lace your chuckles with mild unease. The highlights of this corker are Turnock's true life confession: "I Was a Teen-age Pervert", "Stinky Pinky", "What Pisses Him Off", and a deft Chick tract parody.

What can I say about Lee James Turnock?  It seems all the good insults have been done.  Seriously.  I am not kidding.  It appears that a lot of people in the UK 'comic community' (sorry, I laughed then) have absolutely no idea what humour is. Or what an Underground Comix is. Combine the two into one and they get more  cross eyed than a 15 year old who has been slapping the bishop too much.

Look at that cover.  All those runny noses in that brown bag. It's...not noses. Oh.

Anyway, lovely cover with great colours and, apart from the over-exposed blancmanges it's a style that might have graced a UK weekly comic years ago....back in the last century when I was young...young......anyway. 

Any...anyway..you really DO NOT get many of THEM to the £ these days.  The problem with having an alleged "family friendly" site is that you cannot post the absolute filth that Turnock produces. Absolute filthy but very funny.  He does have a blog and you can check out work he has done in the past in the Small Press as well as current work:

http://www.leejamesturnock.blogspot.co.uk/

In collaboration with (writer?) Dexter Cockburn there is "The Most Common Cartoon-Based Childhood Accidents..." which is outrageous. Even as a kid, though, I knew NOT to look down the barrel of a cannon (but why we had one in the garden...?).  "This was your Life" hmm.  Well I never once considered that Hell might be more fun than Heaven!! "Whattock Hunt" just goes to prove that you really -REALLY- do need to check that the dvd you put on for the kids is, uh, not "bestial" in any way!!!  "What Pisses Him Off!" Yeah, I think most of us would really like to do one of these strips. Yeah, but then the screaming and legal threats start...meh.

What makes this issue so great is the semi-biographical "I Was A Teenage Pervert" which is funny, depressing, filthy, funny all in one big glop.  Porno mags, porno videos and those "know-all-about-sex" morons you knew who, obviously, knew absolutely nothing about sex!

I like the writing and unless it's my imagination, I think Turnock's artwork has improved (I wear glasses by-the-way)! There is some very neat figure work and it all just melds together nicely.  It IS an "adults only" book but unless you are an adult you probably would not understand most of the stuff in here such as why the woman is letting the pig do that to her or the joy of finding two carrier bags full of porn when you are thirteen!

The biggest mystery is WHY Turnock's work is so ignored in the UK? It's ridiculous.  We've had very few real Underground Comix creators in the UK since the 1970s and yet here is one who, were he based in the US, I'm sure would be a comix star and at least earning some good money for his work.

So, order a copy online (it's cheap enough) and have a good read.

I am obliged here to tell you that self-abuse can lead to poor eye-sight and need to wear spectacles.