Beat It, Rufus

Rufus Baxter is an ageing, professionally unemployed loser, desperately—delusionally—hanging on to his 1980s hair metal fantasies of headlining arenas, despite so much evidence to the contrary (like audience members ducking when he tosses promo t-shirts at an open-mic night). The rest of his bandmates in Funky Cool died decades ago in a horrible plane crash on the cusp of their first big break.

When he gets kicked out of the Denver storage unit he's been illegally sleeping in, his only prospect is a last-second wedding gig the very next day—in Wyoming. A hop in his car, and possibly a peyote button or two, sends Baxter on a psychedelic and existential road trip through his past, and forces him to confront every bad decision he's made along the way.

Beat It, Rufus is very much a kindred spirit with Van Sciver's Fante Bukowski series, a comedic character study both played for laughs but also infused with a surprising gravitas that has you rooting for Rufus despite having every reason not to. Van Sciver's comedic and graphic talents are in peak form in this original graphic novel, his follow-up to the award-winning and critically acclaimed graphic bio, Joseph Smith and the Mormons.