Gladstone’s School for World Conquerors #1 – Review

By: Mark A. Smith (writer), Armand Villavert (art), Carlos Carrasco (colors), Fonografiks (letters) & D.J. Kirkbridge (editor)

The Story: Imagine a Hogwarts-like school where the young super-villains of tomorrow can learn their craft…

What’s Good: This is a charming little comic where you really feel like you’re hanging out for the day at a middle school for baby villains.  If just feels authentic as in, “Yup, that’s probably how they’d act.”  Smith writes breezy dialog for these little monsters and shows them as they go through their days at school.  Even though the whole thing is quite tongue-in-cheek, it has lots of normal stuff you’d associate with a story about 12 year olds.  There are a few kids who are a little too self-important because they haven’t learned humility yet, girls who daydream about the cute boy in class and playground fisticuffs settled with junior-sized super-powers.  It is also a lot of fun seeing the vast assortment of kids in this class and wondering what their powers are.

There is also a lot of humor that starts on the first page where we see a listing of courses for the hellions.  Some are stuff you’d expect: Explosives 101, Subterranean Lairs and Intergalactic Conquests.  Some are kinda funny: Home Economics, Public Speaking and P.E. – Dodgeball.  Then the humor continues as we see how the school was started with the theft of THE world’s ubervillain’s “Playbook”.  This uber-villain is kinda an Iron-Man like character and when the theft goes down, he is trying to entertain guests by serving cranberry muffins and tea (on a silver platter) while wearing a pink, frilly apron.  The whole issue is kinda a knee slapper.