Axe Cop

For the TV series, see Axe Cop (TV series).
Axe Cop

Axe Cop logo
Author(s) Malachai Nicolle, drawn by Ethan Nicolle
Website axecop.com
Current status / schedule Story episode or "Ask Axe Cop" every Tuesday
Launch date December 2009
Genre(s) Action, Parody

Axe Cop is a webcomic by brothers Malachai Nicolle (age 5 when the series began) and Ethan Nicolle (age 29 when the series began). Malachai is responsible for the ideas and stories, while Ethan turns them into comics.[1][2][3][4] The first four comics were drawn in December 2009 and posted to Facebook; the website was not launched until January 2010.

The site also features Ask Axe Cop, a series of comics where Axe Cop responds to questions from readers.[5]

The webcomic has been highly praised, leading to a publishing deal with Dark Horse Comics for both a limited online and print run.

Synopsis

Axe Cop is about the adventures of a police officer who prefers to wield an axe in battle. He's a gruff, tough man dedicated to killing bad guys. The comic focuses on the times he's called away from the daily grind to help with more complex problems such as rescuing a child from a zombie dog woman, helping Bat Warthog Man find his friends, or babysitting. This generally involves fighting bad guys including the bad guys from other planets. Axe Cop has gathered a loyal team. His first ally is Flute Cop, who goes on to become Dinosaur Soldier (upon exposure to dinosaur blood) and changes into other forms in other episodes. Axe Cop gained other allies which included but are not limited to Ralph Wrinkles, Sockarang, Leaf Man, Baby Man, The Wrestler, Uni-Man, Uni-Baby, Wexter, Presty, Best Fairy Ever, Bat Warthog Man, Army Chihuahua, Gray Diamond, Liborg, Water Queen, and others.

Axe Cop episodes are nominally set in the present day, enlivened with aliens, dinosaurs, zombies, robots, etc., and the episodes tend to feature whatever topic happens to be on the writer's mind like sea creatures, brains, and especially babies. Little effort is made to keep track of back stories, powers, and equipment. This is not to say that the comic is entirely chaotic: the main characters and their relationships stay consistent, there are persistent world-building elements (most notably the shape-shifting properties of being splattered with blood or getting a fruit's juice on them), and a number of powers and items recur (e.g. the hypnotize button on Axe Cop's wrist has not been mentioned again, but the robot arms in his mustache are explained).

Background

Ethan Nicolle was already fairly well known for his critically acclaimed graphic novel Chumble Spuzz when he got the idea to write Axe Cop.[6] The idea arose when Ethan was playing pretend with his brother, who invented the Axe Cop persona.[7] At the time, the elder Nicolle was working on a graphic novel that he wanted to release as a webcomic, and he intended to use Axe Cop as a way of practicing the medium.[6]

Critical reception

Entertainment Weekly listed the comic as their "Site of the Day" on January 28, 2010. In her review, Margaret Lyons described it as "all kinds of silly fun" and asked, "Are we looking at the next great comic franchise?"[8] Detroit News said in their review, "'Axe Cop' is a hoot."[9] GQ named the comic their "Time Waster of the Day" on February 4, 2010.[10]

In response to the success of the online comic, Nicolle was approached by several comic publishers to print an Axe Cop series. With help of the Gotham Entertainment Group, Nicolle found that both he and Dark Horse Comics had the same level of interest in the publishing deal, and accepted their offer. Dark Horse published an ashcan copy of Axe Cop for the 2010 San Diego Comic-Con International, which included the first five episodes of the web comic and some of the "Ask Axe Cop" strips. Dark Horse published the 3-issue Axe Cop miniseries "Bad Guy Earth" in the second quarter of 2011.[11]

Awards and honors

Other media

Comic books

Dark Horse Comics are collecting the comics into individual volumes:

Television

Main article: Axe Cop (TV series)

Axe Cop has been adapted into one of several short animated features that was shown during the Fox's Saturday night counterpart to Animation Domination, that piloted in January 2013. Fox's Nick Weidenfeld, who is developing the content for this animation block, had been interested in getting the rights for an animated Axe Cop for some time, based on its creativity. For the initial season, six 15-minute episodes of Axe Cop will be made, which is envisioned to expand into full half-hour episodes in subsequent seasons. Popular YouTube animators Arin Hanson and Marc Moceri were brought in to help with writing and animation.[16] The television series Axe Cop premiered on July 27, 2013[17] with Nick Offerman as the voice of Axe Cop,[18] Ken Marino as the voice of Flute Cop,[19] Patton Oswalt as the voice of Sockarang, Megan Mullally as the voice of Anita and other characters, Rob Huebel as the voice of Gray Diamond, Tyler, The Creator as the voice of Liborg, Dan Harmon as the voice of Uni-Man, Michael Madsen as the voice of Baby Man, Giancarlo Esposito as the voice of Army Chihuahua, Vincent Kartheiser as the voice of Bat Warthog Man, and Deborah Ann Woll as the voice of Best Fairy Ever.

Web series

Another animated version of Axe Cop is currently airing on the YouTube channel Rug Burn. The animation is done as motion comics based on the original web comic strips.[20]

Other venues

An expansion for Steve Jackson Games' "Munchkin" featuring Axe Cop, with art drawn by Ethan.[21]

References

  1. ↑ Collins, Sean T. (January 29, 2010). "'My five-year-old could write that!': Bow before the blade of Axe Cop". Robot 6. Comic Book Resources. Retrieved February 3, 2010.
  2. ↑ Hudson, Laura (January 29, 2010). "Axe Cop: The Comic Written by a 5-Year-Old, Drawn by a 29-Year-Old". ComicsAlliance. Retrieved February 3, 2010.
  3. ↑ Rickmers, Dan (February 3, 2010). "Axe Cop: The Web Comic Written by a Five-Year-Old". NYU Local. Retrieved February 3, 2010.
  4. ↑ Banks, Dave (February 5, 2010). "Sockarangs, Pretzel Heads and Uni-Babies - A Glimpse Inside The World Of Axe Cop". Wired. Retrieved February 5, 2010.
  5. ↑ Hudson, Laura (February 2, 2010). "Axe Cop, The Interview: Talking with the 5 and 29-Year Old Creators, Malachai and Ethan Nicolle". ComicsAlliance. Retrieved February 3, 2010.
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 "Brother of Axe Cop!". Geekchicdaily. February 4, 2010. Retrieved June 4, 2010.
  7. ↑ Lee, Landon (February 1, 2010). "5 year old's comic 'Axe Cop' sweeps the Web!". KXTV. Retrieved June 4, 2010.
  8. ↑ Lyons, Margaret (January 28, 2010). "Site of the Day: Axe Cop". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved February 3, 2010.
  9. ↑ Detroit News review
  10. ↑ GQ Time Waster of the Day
  11. ↑ Arrant, Chris (August 2, 2010). "Artist's Six Year-Old Brother Inspires DHC Series AXE COP". Newsarama. Retrieved August 2, 2010.
  12. ↑ "Comic-Con 2012 :: Special Guests". Comic-con.org. 2012-07-11. Retrieved 2012-11-12.
  13. ↑ "The Eagle Awards - Results And Dave Gibbons\' Acceptance Speech". Bleedingcool.com. Retrieved 2012-11-12.
  14. ↑
  15. ↑ "Great Graphic Novels Top Ten 2012 | Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA)". Ala.org. Retrieved 2012-11-12.
  16. ↑ Andreeva, Nellie (April 24, 2012). "Fox’s Saturday Late-Night Animated Block Greenlights First Series". Deadline Hollywood. Retrieved April 24, 2012.
  17. ↑ Bibel, Sara (January 8, 2013). "'Animation Domination High Def' FOX's New Alternative Animated Programming Block, to Premiere Saturday, July 27". TVbytheNumbers. Retrieved January 14, 2013.
  18. ↑ Fitzpatrick, Kevin (January 8, 2013). "FOX RELEASES ‘AXE COP’ VOICE CAST, SETS SATURDAY ANIMATION DOMINATION HD PREMIERE". ScreenCrush. Retrieved May 11, 2013.
  19. ↑ Nicolle, Ethan (March 31, 2013). "Animated Series Trailer!". AxeCop.com. Retrieved May 11, 2013.
  20. ↑ "Criminal Past". Axe Cop. 2012-11-21. Retrieved 2012-12-04.
  21. ↑ Doctorow, Cory (2011-03-11). "Axe Cop meets Steve Jackson Games". Boing Boing. Retrieved 2011-03-11.

External links