Reviews 

“Golgotha Motor Mountain” #1

By | March 8th, 2024
Posted in Reviews | % Comments

When an ancient meteor breaks off of a passing interstellar rock, it rains down on Elwood and Vernon Damnage’s meth lab in Golgotha Knob, Kentucky. From that point on their lives are turned into a redneck body horror nightmare. Mild Spoilers Ahead

Cover by Robbi Rodriguez & Marissa Louise

Written by Matthew Erman & Lonnie Nadler
Illustrated by Robbi Rodriguez
Colored by Marissa Louise
Lettered by Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou

Knowing that they must make their planned deliveries with horrible mutations sprouting up everywhere, the Damnage brothers set off through Golgotha Knob. Once they hit the road they are attacked and hunted by crazed addicts, cannibal police, and mutated Neo-Nazis. Though this trip is a ride through cosmic hell that the brothers will probably not survive, if they do, they’ll have enough money to set them up for life, and start over in Cincinnati, which they see as utopia in comparison through the rose colored glasses of childhood memories.

Working in a slightly comedic tone while standing firmly in a horror and sci-fi sandbox, writers Erman & Nadler have put together a big script that they use to lay a lot of foundation down and information out to build their story that will fill the upcoming issues. Right from the start, the script gives a lot of backstory and character details just from the back and forth dialogue between our two leads, Elwood and Vern. We get the very sense and essence of these men immediately. Not quite redneck stereotypes, but not quite realistic people either, the two brothers speak with a specific Kentucky twang, philosophies that border on some intelligence, or at least a moral compass, and that of their poor, religious, and southern backwoods upbringing. They know who they are, and almost immediately we know them too. Their lives and motivations are simple. Cook meth, hand it over to be sold, and make what profit they can, hoping to eventually leave their little corner of hell, Golgotha Knob, Kentucky. They have their sights set on moving to Cincinnati, based on a few childhood memories of visiting the city. Vernon especially remembers it as a land of opportunity and is ready to sell what they can to get there. It is the familiarity of their story that makes us connect with them, even if we find their actions deplorable. We get these guys and on some level sympathize with them. Because if we can’t, there is almost no point in continuing to follow the story.

The issue opens during a normal day for the brothers, cooking up a batch, playing card games, practicing close-up magic, and simply put just shooting the shit. That is until a meteor, broken off from a massive interstellar asteroid, comes crashing through their barn/meth lab, destroying their fresh batch of meth and scaring the hell out of them. Once they realize that they can’t sell what they just made, the brothers look to make money a different way. Vern notices that the giant space rock is very close to a color of meth made by another group of local cooks. He figures they can break some of the rock up, crush it up, and sell it as a different colored bit of meth, cutting out any middle men and making a ton of money; getting them out of town well before anyone knows what they bought. Of course, this plan seems to work at first and then goes completely sideways as the smoking of this meteor causes some unforeseen side effects.

This premiere issue is very much a lot of set up, and that is ok, if this series is going to take off and last a while. The building of this foundation is needed for something that’s longer than a miniseries running for a handful of issues. If I have a problem with this comic at all, it is the balancing act that the writers do to give us the issue that they want. There is the necessary dialogue and storytelling that pairs up with the artwork for the events happening in that moment and on top of that there are large blocks of text giving us backstory and history on various subjects, including this region of the United States and factions of the KKK that would eventually break off into groups of Neo-Nazis, also seen within this issue. This is where I’m the most torn with how I feel about the book. On the one hand, the story is dense enough without these history lessons, that mostly feel extraneous and tend to slow down the pace of the comic, but on the other hand, I am a connoisseur of context, and typically love knowing all I can to help me fully understand a story or situation. So, in the end I am conflicted on how I feel about this script, but I am leaning towards it being a problem, mostly for the problems it causes for the pacing.

Continued below

I was nervous as the issue went on that there would be little or no payoff of the promised body horror made clear in all of the advertising for this series, but I can say happily that by the end of this issue there is a good amount of gross out horror that delivers enough to make its appearance here worth it and, like most of what this issue offers, sets up what is to come. This really feels like the tip of the iceberg which is also good. We get a nice amount of nasty fun without it feeling like this creative team is showing their whole hand; and I can’t wait to see where this series takes us.

The artwork and colors by Robbi Rodriguez and Marissa Louise respectively is very cool. There is a sleekness to the illustrations that never feels over-produced as Rodriguez’s style keeps things a bit loose and abstract while never straying too far in that direction either. Although this is our planet, in a very small rural town found in one of the largest countries on the planet, something about it all feels off-kilter and not of this universe. The color by Louise plays a major role in what makes this comic feel so other-worldly. There isn’t a single panel of this issue that feels “normal.” To the point that right from page one I wasn’t sure if the meteor was supposed to have crashed already and these guys were living in a post-apocalyptic sci-fi wasteland or if (the actual story) this was just a wild looking comic and the meteor had yet to come down and wreak havoc. In some respects the artwork is feels similar to that found in books like “Black Science” (Matteo Scalera/Dean White), “Oblivion Song” (Lorenzo De Felici/Rus Wooten), and “Skyward” (Lee Garbett/Antonio Fabela) while never feeling derivative or all that close to either.

In short, this was a fun and interesting read that really kept me guessing as to where it would go next, even when it hits familiar story beats and character tropes. This could be one of the next great sci-fi/horror comics if it tightens up some of the scripting, focusing on what makes this story and characters important, and continues to give us truly horrible sights.

Final Verdict: 8.0, Falling somewhere between Breaking Bad and “The Colour out of Space,” “Golgotha Motor Mountain” is nothing short of bizarre, funny, and terrifying.


Christopher Egan

Chris lives in New Jersey with his wife, daughter, two cats, and ever-growing comic book and film collection. He is an occasional guest on various podcasts, writes movie reviews on his own time, and enjoys trying new foods. He can be found on Instagram. if you want to see pictures of all that and more!

EMAIL | ARTICLES