Bo Nanas: Monkey Meets World

    (Andrews McMeel, 2006)
™ and © Andrews McMeel

The protagonist of this new comic strip is a talking monkey who, through no fault of his own, has been set loose in the world of humans. As an “alien” being, Bo Nanas has a unique perspective on human society, a view that offers ample opportunity for warped commentary of the satirical kind. Creator John Kovaleski compounds the opportunity by making sure that the humans Bo encounters are not your ordinary, everyday sort.

Bo goes out for an evening stroll, wondering why he doesn’t fit in, but he’s cured of his insecurities when he meets a man rowing himself around in a bathtub. He finds a runaway piggybank and meets a man in a duck suit. In a day of predictable sitcom humor, Bo Nanas is never predictable. Bo wonders into a saloon and goes to the bar just as a customer finishes his mug of beer, waves it aloft, and says, “Barkeep—I’ll have another one of these.” Bo ponders and then says, “Why would you want another empty mug?”

Kovaleski’s drawing style is refreshingly whimsical, a wiry flexing line defining abstracted forms.

— R.C. Harvey
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