Lab Rats 7 p 8 (December 2002) by John Byrne

Lab Rats 7 p 8 (December 2002)
John Byrne (1950-) writer/artist
11 x 17 in., ink over graphite on art board
Coppola Collection

Lab Rats is an eight issue DC Comics series by John Byrne following a group of homeless and runaway children who have been taken to "The Campus" where they are used in experiments by Robert Quinlan. When Quinlan isn't strapping them into one deadly contraption or another he's sending them to clean up and investigate the
dangerous results of his other experiments. The Lab Rats start dying on page one of issue one.

Never heard of it? You are not alone. In 2012, Byrne wrote “The book that was killed by the internet. Trashed, savaged, and shredded before the first issue had even come out. Retailers refusing to order it even for customers standing there with money in their hands. May have been the worst book I have ever done…

I have been, and always shall be, a huge fan of how Byrne draws and composes a page. The sense of space and scale is always there, as is the delightful reminder that you are always reading a comic book.