Axe Cop
Axe Cop is a web comic drawn by a 29 year old Los Angeles native Ethan Nicolle, and written by his 5 year old brother, Malachai.
It’s hard to sum up what is so great about Axe Cop. The stories began whilst the two were playing with toys during a week’s break over Christmas. In a truly inspired moment, Ethan decided to sit down and make sense of Malachai’s narratives, and after a week the first four episodes were drawn (at first just for friends and family).
Since then, Axe Cop has become an internet phenomenon. A friend has kept the site running under the weight of 45,000 (and rising) viewers a day. There is a growing merchandise store. Hollywood, no doubt, is just collecting its keys and wallet.
Yes, it is hilarious and endlessly inventive on its own terms. But it also provides a great example of the endless nature of creativity. Over several weeks, with a combination of unrestrained play and learned visual language and skill, we have a universe as rich as, say Futurama or Watchmen… and Axe Cop seems to be only just scraping its own surface.
By way of an absurd example… Axe Cop has a buddy Flute Cop, a delightfully chubby, mustachioed, and fierce brother Axe Cop forgot he had (but was fortunately reunited with over a job interview). Flute Cop was later turned into a dinosaur soldier, then an avocado soldier, and in a further triumph, a uni-avocado soldier.
The entire universe is endlessly enjoyable. A standout moment in Episode 4 features a couple who had lost 1,000 children having them all restored to life, plus an extra two billion. Axe Cop and Uni-Avocado Soldier have to save them all on a snow world from being eaten - by a snowman, and a tree “that sang really annoying songs.”
Ethan’s drawings are superb, not only grounding the facts and bringing the absurd to life, but also very touching - in their patient respect given to the inner world of a five year old. Ethan plans to keep drawing Axe Cop as long as he can eke the details out from Malachai. Judging by the six episodes so far, there is plenty of material in this rich inner world to come.
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