Comics About Lawyers and Monsters … Or You Might Ask, What’s the Difference?
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It snowed the week Batton Lash, writer and artist of Wolff & Byrd: Counselors of the Macabre (a comic about lawyers who represent the supernatural because even monsters need legal counsel), flew into Salt Lake City with his lovely wife and publisher, Jackie Estrada. They were on a mission to autograph books for comic fans waiting outside the Night Flight Comics store in the Cottonwood Mall. Looking forward to the snow and the Utah mountains, neither had ever been to Utah, and with the interest in Lash’s book they just couldn’t stay away.
The line was long, but that didn’t put them off. Lash had provided an original print to be given to all who waited for his autograph and no one was giving up their place in line. Before he got started, Lash walked the line of fans and shook everyone’s hand in greeting. It is a rare but welcome gesture, and I believe that most felt like I did that day; the wait so far was more than worth it. Not to mention that I got to reread several of my Wolff & Byrd: Counselors of the Macabre books before getting up to the front of the line. Lash was friendly and sincerely interested in my comments about his work and art. There were a few lawyers in the line and they apparently had been reading Lash’s creations for years. I felt a little jealous that I didn’t know about this great book sooner than last April.
Just to let you know a little about what Batton Lash writes and draws, Alanna Wolff and Jeff Byrd are lawyers, the two main characters in cases of Counselors of the Macabre. They represent the supernatural and are the most experienced in supernatural laws. As attorneys, Wolff and Byrd used the full extent of the law to protect all of their clients’ rights. Lash not only writes and draws this book with the correct legal terminology, he uses that same legal dialogue to poke fun at the legal process. Does all of this sound humorous? Well, it is, but believe me, when you are involved in a lawsuit, it can be anything but humorous. So what do you do when you and your husband finally buy that dream house with the white picket fence only to find on the next full moon that the house is haunted or really a “Warehouse” complete with fur? Or what about that dog that came back from the dead and is roaming the neighborhood? Well, Wolff and Byrd come highly recommended and have been in the pages of the “National Law Journal” for the last 11-plus years, allowing their cases to be open to the scrutiny of all lawyers in the country. So, forget about the O.J. verdict, go out and buy this book, then, sit back and enjoy the fun Lash makes at the circus that is the legal community with his bi-monthly comic.
I also happened to pick up a new book collecting the first four issues of Wolff & Byrd: Counselors of the Macabre with new cover art and while waiting in line, noticed a small poser of Wolff and Byrd handing their business card to a hand reaching out from the grave! Yes, I think that I’ll be following the legal cases Lash is documenting (?) because I believe he has those legal vultures down pat. —Therese G. Lynch