A review by colinreedmoon
Hopeless Savages Greatest Hits Volume 1, by Jen Van Meter

4.0

Hopeless Savages features a sort of 'who's who' of indie comics from the period, and explores a sort of domestic punk world--the world of classic punk rock moving into family life. It's cute, and illustrates the sort of social consciousness which came from that movement on a familial scale: what do children of punks idealize, and in what manner of tiny ways? The genre skips around from series to series, but always makes a point to high light a better world through punk's dying--and forgotten by the majority of the population--influence, through the eyes of children who live through a subculture which focused on group identity well after that identity has been replaced by 21st century homogony. While contemporary punk culture is still trying to fight the good old fight, the kids in HS had that fight handed down from them from parents the way religion and politics often are handed down; the Hopeless-Savages are a stronger familial unit even than functional families of a more conservative bend, possibly because their ideals are so fiercely inclusive.