Preview: Andreas Butzbach’s ‘Big-Ass Sword’ — A Fascinating Journey Undertaken

Big-Ass Sword, a brand-new original graphic novel from 2000 AD of post-apocalyptic meanderings, is a thoroughly entertaining mix of influences that ends up being all Andreas Butzbach.

We’ve seen Butzbach’s name on a few strips for Rebellion in the last few years, mostly from the Treasury of British Comics. But he’s a German comics artist whose body of work is far, far bigger than that, all of it critically acclaimed.

However, the last thing I expected as his major Brit debut would have been this – an expansive, strange, euro-style, heavy-metal-esque adventure where you can see the influence of so many, all to end up with something very much Butzbach’s own.

It’s talked of as being an original graphic novel, but it’s actually a collection of short stories, connected by its subject and locale, all about the travels and travails of a lone robot warrior journeying across a landscape of some post-apocalyptic world. It’s just the robot, with said big-ass sword strapped to its back, and a foul-mouthed talking Skull hanging off the robot’s belt. Together they head across the wasteland, coming into contact with the occasional remains, living and mechanical, of a war long since fought.

Just looking at the pages here, you can’t help but see the influences. Mignola most obviously, albeit Butzbach never goes as deep or as dark in the blacks, and his expressive use of big and bold single colours really makes each page pop, helping to give each little tale its own identity. There’s also plenty of Otomo in there, especially when we get to the one tale, ‘The Road Less Travelled’, where Butzbach spins out a multi-parter, albeit one dotted throughout the book. But there’s a heavy dose of Kirby in here as well, beautifully done in all those big bits of machinery littering the place. Again, as mentioned everywhere this has been talked about, it’s something that comes across as very European, something that sits tonally and stylistically in the Metal Hurlant/Heavy Metal mold.

 

It’s a strange book, one that you’d expect from the title and the press to be some all-action, swords-out thing of huge battles, robo body parts flying left, right, and centre. But no, the sword barely comes out in the first half of the book, and it’s used sparingly after that, reluctantly even.

This is no Conan gone mech thing. Instead, it’s something in parts melancholy and quiet, reflective and meandering. And it’s all the better, all the more interesting for that.

Against this quiet, reflective tone of the lone robot ceaselessly wandering, Butzbach’s clever use of the Skull to bring the comedy to things, the abrasive, foul-mouthed responses cutting across what could have been a very downbeat thing, is what gives Big-Ass Sword its drive.

As you read through, you’re alongside Skull, wanting to know just what the hell the robot’s doing, wanting to hear his history, and being just as intrigued about where it’s all going. Not to mention snickering at the stuff Skull comes out with.

But then again, perhaps it’s not really going anywhere. Not that that’s a bad thing at all. There’s a sense of timelessness to Big-Ass Sword, a sense that the only reason for any of this happening is that it’s something to do, no grand plan, just the motivation to move on because there’s no better option, the journey undertaken simply because it’s there to be taken. There is a brief mention of ‘Mother’ and ‘the compound’ in the opener, ‘Crossing Paths,’ implying there is a reason for the robot’s journey. Yet this also comes alongside the robot having to switch to standby for two years when faced by an invincible opponent, merely to wait for Mother to generate the necessary antibodies and data. Skull is none too impressed by this…

A completely unexpected English-language debut from Butzbach. A really different, fascinating thing, completely subverting all of your expectations of what Big-Ass Sword would be about. The sword might be big, but it’s the small-scale moments that fill this slim yet satisfying volume that make Big-Ass Sword a thoroughly entertaining, very different bit of Euro-infused sci-fi.

Big-Ass Sword is out now from Rebellion/2000 AD