The Maxx

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A homeless superhero is taken into custody during an altercation with a duo of muggers, bailed out only by his long-time ally Julie, a social-worker in our world, and the queen of the Australian outback in his.

I vaguely remember secreting myself away and watching this in my youth, but it was so short-lived, and I was the only person that seemed to have heard of it, that I almost became convinced that it had all been an elaborate dream. Years later, working at a comic book store, I would discover that it had been based on an Image publication by Sam Kieth, and I would find a renewed desire to track the series down. Now that the Internet's more readily available, it seems like a good opportunity to see if this series lives up to the expectations that I have held over from my childhood.

I absolutely love the idea that is being set up with the hallucinations to the Australian outback, and whether or not that's really happening to our possibly-schizophrenic protagonist. A part of me has no idea what's going on, and the other part of me only claims to have a grasp on what it is that I'm watching; either way I love it.

When there is a change of perspective, the animation style is altered, and I find that really interesting. The scenes in the outback are far more detailed than some of the other scenes, and I can clearly see the early use of some CGI techniques that have been integrated into the show. For a program that's about the confusion experienced of someone who's possibly mentally unbalanced, I think these animation techniques work very well together to make the audience feel as though they're seeing what the Maxx is seeing.

I have to say that I'm not a big fan of the two cops as presented in this episode. They've tangled with the Maxx before, and, naturally, they've had enough of his shtick, but what really bothers me about them is their dismissal of the female victim. They made no attempt to look for her, and just assumed that the eye-witness was mistaken? I'm aware that bad cops are a trope of the noir genre, but these two must be from Sunnydale, because they are deeply, deeply stupid.

The run-time of this series is half that of the average animation, and I assume this is because it was aired as a series of vignettes as part of MTV's programming. Still, it's very irritating, as the story seems to just get started before the episode comes to a close.

The voice-acting is exactly what you would expect; it's not bad, but it doesn't stand out. It's very well-matched to the genre that it's going for, but the only voice that really makes me take notice is Barry Stigler's Mr. Gone; he has just the right amount of menace in his voice to make you worry about your own safety, but, depending on his tone, he can come across as just your Average-Joe, making him all the more terrifying once you realize who he is and what he's doing.

Gregg Vanzo's direction seems to lift panels directly from the comic books and put them onto the screen, sometimes with minimal animation involved, but it works here, especially during the Maxx's superhero antics. When it comes to lighting, including the sudden shadows, it's somewhat jarring, but that works very well considering the subject matter.

The writing on this episode is fairly solid, introducing us to both of our leads as well as our villain; while I don't have a great grasp on the story so far, I can tell that I'll enjoy the journey. I especially like the narration as done by the Maxx, where he thinks that he's speaking to himself and only later learns that he's speaking his voice over out loud, making him seem all the more insane.

A cartoon unlike many others from its era, the Maxx is an interesting watch. It couldn't be described as fun or lighthearted, but you can tell that there are some interesting revelations to come with a great deal of imagination behind them.

The Maxx is in the running to become the feature for Tuesdays. The series ran in 1995 on MTV with a total of 13 episodes.