Ice Cream Man Vol. 6: Just Desserts
W. Maxwell Prince, writer; Martín Morazzo, art; Chris O'Halloran, colors
Image Comics, 2021
Another collection of four diverse tales about the world of the Ice Cream Man. "The Big Sweet" is about a cult that is apparently murdering ice cream men. Private detective Ray Kowalski is hired to find one of them, and what he finds is enough to convince him to turn his life around and save his failing marriage. A kind of happy ending, despite the overall bleakness of the story. "Advent Calendar" depicts a desperate young pregnant woman deciding what to do--via the daily small gifts from an Advent calendar. The Ice Cream Man makes a couple of brief appearances (as a plastic figurine and a snowman), but it is otherwise a serious story with a call for donation to Planned Parenthood in the last frame. "Late Night Splashes" tells the story of a late night TV host named Mack Benson, largely though text pages narrated from the point of view of various characters. They are interspersed with illustrations, including a fairly tasteful depiction of the horrific onscreen snake attack. There is also a callback to the first story, in the form of a reference to Uncle Ray and his nicotine addiction. The final story is an especially bleak tale about a telethon to benefit an average guy named Jerry, who has no idea he is the star. The Ice Cream Man is the telethon's host, so it should not be surprising that it does not go well. Jerry's decline includes a divorce from Sweet & Associates, divorce attorneys, as well as an appearance from Holt Dairy Corporation (both callbacks to the first story). Last but not least, the Ice Cream Man calls on readers of the very graphic novel we are reading to stop, or the dog gets it!
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I still have not gotten around to Ice Cream Man (maybe someday), but I am enjoying HaHa.