Space Battle Lunchtime #6 is brilliant simplicity for 7 and up

Space Battle Lunchtime is the best (almost) all age comic that you’re not reading.  Its title is ridiculously cool-all that’s missing are bacon, robots or ninjas to utterly claim the title for best comic title ever. The premise is simple; Peony is a baker from Earth who is competing in a mashup cooking/gladiator competition on another planet.

There is more to the plot for sure, but that’s spelled out in Space Battle Lunchtime, Volume One: Lights, Camera, Snacktion!, a graphic novel that collects the first four issues of this eight-issue mini-series is out now. So, I don’t know why Peony is competing in the contest or how she got there. Ignorance is bliss, I don’t know too much about this comic and loved every dreamy space art, food-driven panel in it.

There is a one page introduction that basically spells out that they’re in the Cannibal Coliseum and the rules are ‘cook or be cooked’.

Issue #6 of Space Battle Lunchtime starts out with Peony in a stone jail and it’s five minutes until show time. Thankfully a floating robot camera gives her a hint: ‘don’t get cornered’. It also warns her against preparing Blood Salad because Space Caesar tires of that due to the fact that contestants try it every season.

So, I know it’s a space game cooking show, held in a coliseum where chefs try to cook meals that may or may not contain the other contestants.

The other contestants are Chef Glob Cloud, a purple oozing guy, Chef Meatabax, who seems to like meat, but is quite proper, Chef Magicorn, who loves to cook, but also kills fellow chefs and Chef Peony.  The four are released into an arena where a giant five-floor kitchen with no walls lies in the middle. They have to grab ingredients to make something tasty, all the while fighting each other, a task made even more difficult considering that some of them fly or have razor spatulas.

This doesn’t sound like an all age comic book you think. But it is -and it’s so stinkin fun to read that ages 7 and up will get a hoot from the sly humor and art that is reminiscent of classic Japan, intermixed with that of modern comics.

Published by Oni Press, It’s 23 pages, which is on the short side for us, but its entertainment value is well worth the $3.99 cover price.