Feeble Attempts is a 48-page collection of Jeffrey Brown’s short comics - something of a “pilot” for his forthcoming series, which is expected to be launched under the title of “Sulk” some time this year.

When it originally came out in May ‘07, I was incredibly pleased that it was bringing together a lot of material from many disparate sources. I’d read a couple of the strips online, and one or two I’d found in other comics, but as I’ve said before, being a die-hard, completist Jeffrey Brown fan can be incredibly hard work, trying to track down all the curios, so comprehensive collections like this are exactly what I’m into. They showcase all of his styles, bringing together comedy, autiobiography, and even superheroics all under one title. The topic of religion even gets a look in which is something he rarely tackles so openly.

Even now, it remains one of my favourite releases of his, simply because there’s so much in there. 48 pages from Brown means a LOT of work, since most of the pages contain a number of panels that’s well into double figures, crammed with dialogue, if not necessarily action. It’s really packed in there too - the inside covers have glorious, full-colour comics printed on them. There’s nary an inch of free space in the entire volume, and for $5 it’s incredibly well-priced. You could pay 5 times that for an anthology of similar quality.

The longest story is a reprint of the Bighead piece which can be found in Project: Superior, though not the Bighead anthology, and that alone is worth what you’ll pay for it just to see more of Brown’s take on Superheroics, with his art being taken to a rarely-seen level.

It’s hard to know what sort of beast Feeble Attempts is. Certainly, I’d give it to someone who wanted to get into Brown’s work because it’s got it all in there, it’s like a Jeffrey Brown sampler - but I’m finding it hard to think of a situation where someone would want to get into his work without already knowing what they like about it, so I dunno. All I can say is that there’s no excuse for a Jeffrey Brown fan not to own a copy.

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