High Society (Cerebus, Volume 2) by Dave Sim captures the first 25 of an amazing 125 issue run of comics (unfortunately it kept going for a mediocre to bad additional 150 issues).  This collection shows Sim starting to master his satire of politics, religion and comics that made Cerebus such a successful comic. In High Society, Sim starts pulling together the characters he had created in his first 25 issues and sets the stage for the rest of the series.

Cerebus the Aardvark walks into a bar (stop me if you’ve heard this one before) and is looking for a beer and a fight and he’s not particular about which one comes first. But not only will no one fight him, but people keep giving him money. Apparently Cerebus’s previous position as Lord Julius’ kitchen supervisor has convinced people that he know the way around the bureaucracy of Palnu. Cerebus is content to make vague promises and keep the cash until a series of events surrounding a duck statue and a fake kidnapping push him into a corner.

Out of nowhere comes Astoria who promises him power and money if he just does what she says. She wants to use Cerebus to further her political desires. When the political winds point to Cerebus making a run for Prime Minister (against Lord Julius’ goat), the political satire gets funnier and funnier. Sim takes swipes at Moon Knight, Groucho Marx and Elric among others along the way and at the end, you feel like the story means something.

Dave Sim is one of comic’s great successes in self-publishing and this is the start of his run of his best work. You don’t have to read the first book to understand or enjoy High Society, but you should read it anyways. And when you get hooked on Cerebus, stop reading after Melmoth (you’ll thank me later).