Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency: The Salmon of Doubt #1 Review

"Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency: The Salmon of Doubt" #1 from IDW -

       Dirk Gently is back to solve another case...Holistically, of course. You see, Dirk doesn't concern himself with trivial things like fingerprints, and following clues to catch his culprits. Oh, pshaw - how utterly boring. Dirk is guided by the universe's invisible hand, choosing to count on the interconnectedness of all things to guide him to the resolution of his cases. It may seem weird to go traipsing all willy-nilly after tangential connections in random ways to solve a crime, but Dirk always gets his man, or woman...person. Well, you get it. However, Dirk's new case is quite different from any other that he's had before. Why? Because Dirk is his OWN CLIENT! It seems that Dirk's memories are being lost; no, he's not forgetting, rather he seems to be remembering extra occurrences that never happened. There seems to be some trouble with time! So, Dirk and his lovely assistant, nurse Sally Mills, hop the first thing smoking to Cambridge to his old alma mater to find an old colleague with an active time-travel device so that he can get tot the bottom of his morphing memory malaise. But things start to go pear-shaped when Sally's feelings for Dirk surface in an untimely manner, and Dirk's cat, Berenice is kidnapped by a jovial abomination. With his cat missing, a grumbly assistant in tow, and a time-traveling colleague that is a nuttier than a Payday, can Dirk Gently ever hope to solve his most baffling case yet?!

     Arvind Ethan David and Ilias Kyriazis are back again to give us their take on Doug Adams' iconic character, Dirk Gently. David is, once again, right on the money with the tone and pace for a Dirk Gently adventure. This first issue is so much fun to read - you'll get many hearty chuckles sifting through Dirk's zany thoughts in the caption boxes...Until you realize that Dirk is starting to win you over and make sense to you - and you might begin to question your own sanity. Dirk is such a great character because he takes himself very seriously while seeming to avoid taking himself, or the cases, very seriously at all. Yet, he never fails to get the job done, while being totally random and seemingly oblivious to how detecting actually works. Arvind Ethan David gives us great insight into Dirk's inner-workings in the caption boxes and weaves dialogue which appears whimsical and flighty but still manages to help the reader to understand the characters and their motivations while advancing the story forward, backward, or wherever David wants the reader to go. Ilias Kyriazis' art is even better than in "A Spoon Too Short" - he keeps the art pretty, cartoony, and uncomplicated. Kyriazis' pencils, coupled with Charlie Kirchoff's rich colors make this one gorgeous book. After the awesomeness of "A Spoon Too Short," I am very excited to see where "A Salmon of Doubt" takes me. Through someone's tampering with time, it looks like Dirk is about to get some serious retcons that will explain his new appearance, and walk us into what's been happening on the new, hit BBC America series, "Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency." Here is a taste:

FUN FACT: This isn't the first Dirk Gently TV series. The first series starred Stephen Mangan, and it was an absolute hoot. I have no idea why on Earth it was canceled. Here's the trailer:

RATING: 9 out of 10. "Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency: The Salmon of Doubt" #1 is a lot of zany, tangential fun.

RATING for The New TV Show: 9 out of 10. The show is frantic, quirky entertainment.

RATING for The 2012 TV Show: 8.5 out of 10. Mangan was a revelation as Dirk Gently.

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