ReadItDaddy's YA / Adult Graphic Novel of the Week - Week Ending 20th September 2019: "Internet Crusader" by George Wylesol (Avery Hill Publishing)

For an entire generation of internet nerds, the internet was always something that came accompanied by the binary screech of a modem, cost an absolute fortune in phone bills, and was usually dished up against the backdrop of browser windows that looked like someone had chewed through an entire packet of dead pixels on toast, then vomited the results into a Windows 3.1 powered Pentium.

"Internet Crusader" by George Wylesol once again  proves this innovative comic creative is breathing fresh life into the graphic novel medium, digging into source material that folk my age will still be all too familiar with.

The internet, when it first started to insidiously creep into our homes, wasn't a thing of beauty fed through sleek fibre optic lines, it was a screechy animated mess. Wi-fi? hah, you're kidding right? You had to actually physically sit at the computer to use it, and you had to endure the most painful download speeds imaginable (something George nicely captures at a couple of points in this story to brilliant effect).

And of that, this is the story of BSKskator19, your typical tokin' smokin' malajusted teen looking for kicks on old bulletin boards and messaging systems.

Trying to find a 'clean' shareable screenshot from this GN isn't easy!

One minute he's convinced he's talking to an amazing smokin' hot chick online. The next minute he's drawn into a fantasy battle played out against a digital blocky backdrop, as real and actual satan reaps new followers through the new digital frontier.

But where there's satan there's also God, and he's more than just in your inbox. He knows everything about you and in BSKator19's case, he's your right hand dude in the upcoming climactic battle for humanity.

Hah, you think your desktop looks cluttered and you have too many browser tabs open now? You should've seen it back then!

As we've seen previously in George's brilliant "Ghosts, Etc." he creates believable almost documentarian accounts of the most ridiculously overblown situations. BSKator19 is the best worst kind of hero, one you instantly despise on first encountering, but realise that they have just the right amount of natural-born cynicism and effortless luck they'll need to get through the end of the world.

Superb stuff this, and I'm well aware that most millennials would pick up a copy of this and probably txt "WTFLOL" to a dozen or so of their Instagram buddies. But that's just what makes this so perfect.

Sum this graphic novel up in a sentence: A hectic fast-paced apocalyptic battle played out at 1200/75 BPM.

"Internet Crusader" by George Wylesol is out now, published by Avery Hill Publishing (kindly supplied in digital format for reviewing, of course!)