Sweet Tooth is a brand-new ongoing comic series from DC’s Vertigo imprint. Sweet tooth is both written and illustrated by award-winning Canadian cartoonist Jeff Lamire.

Jeff Lemire entered the comic industry when he self-published the Xeric Award-winning comic Lost Dogs in 2005. Following this, Lemire found a home at Top Shelf Productions, where he produced the Eisner and Harvey Award-nominated Essex County Trilogy in 2008–2009. In 2009, DC/Vertigo published Lemire’s The Nobody, a tale of identity, fear and paranoia in a small community.

Sweet Tooth is Lemire’s first ongoing monthly comic series, and issue #1 of the series was released this last Wednesday, 2nd August 2009, and should be available from all good comic stores for the very low introductory price of $1.00 (U.S.)

The following review may very well contain a few light spoilers, but seeing as the comic has been on release for a few days, and Vertigo published a preview of half of the issue in many of their popular titles, I think a couple of spoilers are allowable. However, if you wish to avoid spoilers, skip forward to my summary… now!

Sweet tooth #1 tells the story of a young boy named Gus, who appears to be some sort of human/deer hybrid. Gus appears mostly human, but he has buck teeth, large protruding ears, a deer-like nose, and… antlers!

The story opens with Gus being chased by a man who looks down at him with cold eyes. He runs and runs as fast as he can, but the man keeps gaining on him… and then he wakes up in bed, sweating. Gus lives alone in a small cabin in the woods with his ailing father. Gus’ father is dying from an unknown disease that seems very much like Cancer, and it is up to Gus to look after his father and care for him in his final days. The disease that is killing Gus’ father is the same disease that killed his mother and everyone else they ever knew, and it seems that everyone started to get sick after something that Gus’ father refers to only as “The Accident.” According to Gus’ father, so few children were born after the accident, that god decided to make them special, so they got fur, antlers, or tails; of these children, Gus is the last. Gus’ father also warns Gus that he should never leave the forest, because the world outside is “fire and hell.” The assumption therefore, is that there has been some sort of nuclear disaster, which caused most people to die from radiation sickness, and caused children to be born with strange mutations.

One day, when Gus is out collecting wood, he ventures to the edge of the forest, and discovers that the world beyond the trees looks exactly the same as that inside, and the “fire and hell” of which his father speaks is no where to be seen. After his trip to the forest’s edge he begins to find candy bars, wrapped in bright red packaging, scattered throughout the forest, and every time he finds one he hears the sound of cracking branches from nearby. Petty soon Gus’ father catches him eating a candy bar, and is furious. His father is very concerned for Gus’ safety once he is no longer there to protect him from harm, and tells Gus to be wary of  hunters, and how they use candy bars as bait to catch special people like Gus.

…That night Gus’ father dies in his sleep…

When spring comes around, and the ground thaws, Gus takes his father’s body outside to bury it. Right then, a pair of hunters happen into the clearing where Gus has laid his father to rest next to the grave of his mother. Gus tries to escape, but the hunters manage to corner him, and he goes into shock because these are the only other people he has ever seen in his life. The hunters plan to sell Gus to a collector of genetic freaks, then at the last moment Gus’ savior comes along: the cold eyed man from his dreams. However, his reasons for saving Gus may not be entirely altruistic.

Sweet Tooth #1 is one of the strongest opening issues of a series that I have ever read! Lemire has created something truly unique and special here, which has originality oozing out of every beautifully illustrated page.

I pick up Previews magazine every month, and I make a special point of searching through it to look out for interesting new comic titles. When I was flicking thorough the October edition of the catalogue I happened on on the solicitation for Sweet Tooth #1, and that wonderfully illustrated cover image just made me stop in my tracks! This vision of a young boy with deer antlers just grabbed my attention and had me completely mesmerized. His sad eyes seemed to stare out at me from the page, and I knew then that this was a book that I just had to pick up! It was a couple of minutes before I read the text that accompanied the image, but all that did was strengthen my belief that this comic should be added to my pull list post-haste!

Sweet Tooth #1 is a brilliant debut issue, which introduces the readers perfectly to the main characters and the world in which they live, while at same time playing its cards close to its chest ever some of the larger mysteries about the world outside the forest, and the disaster that caused so many people to get sick, while others became human/animal hybrids. To find the answers to these mysteries and more, readers will have to come back and pick up Sweet Tooth #2 and beyond… I know I will!

If you haven’t already picked this comic up yet, then I would urge you to get to your store and grab a copy right now! Sweet Tooth #1 is one of the most magical comics that I have read in a long time, and gave me that fantastic feeling I get whenever I read Fables. Sweet Tooth is a classic in the making, and with the opening issue only costing $1, you’d be mad NOT to buy it. I bought Three copies!

Ed Note: Don’t worry, I haven’t lost my mind. Apparently, if you send a copy to Jeff Lamire he will sign it, and return it to you with an original sketch. What a fantastic idea!! See here!

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