ATTABOY

by Tony McMillen

Overview

Boy robots. Fallen fathers. Evil motherboards.
Do we ever stop playing the games we played as children?

"There's a video game from when I was a kid that no one else seems to remember."
Attaboy is an action-adventure comic disguised as an illustrated instructional booklet for a video game. The "byte"-sized hero is forced to avenge the destruction of his father and creator, Dr. Atta, by the sinister rebellious mechazoid Motherboard. However, the turn of each page unravels a much deeper story of pixelated thoughts, real world references, and heartbreaking truths.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781545811757
Publisher:	Mad Cave Studios
Publication date:	05/07/2024
Pages:	88
Sales rank:	655,522
Product dimensions:	6.50(w) x 9.90(h) x 0.20(d)

About the Author

Tony McMillen makes comic books as well as some books without pictures too. Even though those usually also contain a few pictures. He can't help himself. He's behind the heavy metal horror novel An Augmented Fourth published by Word Horde, the sci-fi fantasy graphic novel Lumen and now Serious Creatures; his comic book series about a teenage special fx artist working in Hollywood, riding the wave of practical effects that carried the blockbuster movie industry of the 70s, 80s and 90s.

Editorial Reviews

You can spot a Tony McMillen comic a mile away—raw, vibrant, one cannot look away. Now here comes Attaboy, sprung from the inky forehead of Zeus, fully realized and ready to do some damage.

Michel Fiffe (COPRA

2024-04-08
In McMillen’s graphic novel, an instructional booklet for a “lost” video game tells a larger story.

There is an old video game that the unnamed narrator vividly remembers but no one else can recall. “So,” the narrator tells the reader, “I started drawing this...instructional booklet. To convince myself that it was real. Or...reassure myself that I just made it all up.” Illustrated in a deliberately sketchy style that recalls the art of creative middle-schoolers filling their notebooks with cool battles, the book introduces the game’s narrative in a dialogue-free prologue: Dr. Atta, a scientist and creator of his “son,” Attaboy, is killed by a machine called Motherboard, prompting Attaboy to seek revenge. Alongside Motherboard and her “mechazoid menagerie,” there’s the mysterious Skrapper, a character who appears early on and leaves the narrator puzzled as to whether he was a friend or foe. McMillen’s presentation of different characters and his depiction of gameplay—sometimes in scribbled colors and a graffiti-like style, other times in double-page pastel spreads that recall the work of comic-book legend Jack Kirby—capture the haziness of memory. Sometimes, especially toward the beginning of the story, the action resembles that of an old arcade game. At other times, it feels so immersive that it seems to transcend mere gaming, suggesting a memory beyond what one could experience through the simple pixels of a 1980s video console. As the narrator advances in the game, his personal story gradually unfolds: The game was a gift from his mother, who had left his abusive father when the narrator was young; she had always tried her best to compensate for the difficulties in his life, even if it meant allowing him to immerse himself in games. As the parallels between the gameplay and the narrator’s life story become more pronounced, the narrative shifts from an account of a fascinating lost diversion to a metaphor for confronting early loss. Interweaving these elements, the story become a resonant memory piece.

A masterful blend of action and emotional depth.

Kirkus Reviews