Title: Ted Noodleman: Bicycle Delivery Boy Volume(s): 1 Author(s): Jim Keplinger Format: Unflipped; Left-to-Right Publisher: Alias MSRP: $9.99 Genre(s): Comedy Rated: Teen (13+)

First the movie industry introduced us to Napoleon Dynamite, and now the comic industry has introduced us to Ted Noodleman. What these two guys have in common is that they are both anti-social nerds who live in their own world and are perfectly content to stay that way. But would we have it any other way? After all, Napoleon Dynamite made MTV over $40 million at the box office and already has a huge cult following, so why can't Ted Noodleman? After all, technically there is no difference between these two characters, including the fact that neither of these guys are really all that pleasant to be around all the time. And for the same reasons I waned a little on "Napoleon Dynamite" at times (though still liked it in the end), I wane a little with "Ted Noodleman: Bicycle Delivery Boy." As you would probably expect, "Ted Noodleman: Bicycle Delivery Boy" is about a delivery boy named Ted Noodleman, who has buck teeth, square glasses, and an overactive imagination.

The story revolves around Ted making his various deliveries, each one with its own huge fantasy sequence. See, Ted has a more overactive imagination than most five-year-olds (except that Ted is around fifteen or sixteen years old). Whenever he's on a delivery, he's either a superhero, a cowboy, or a ladies’ man, helping to solve whatever problem the dream sequence requires him to solve. Keep in mind I said "dream sequence," as his "help" in the real world isn't quite as helpful as he would like to think it is. It starts out simple enough, where Ted forgets to deliver ALL of the groceries to one lady, and then at one point he steps on a kid’s toy truck because in his fantasy world the toy is housing a robber or something. That's all there really is to the book, yet the book does many things right, and at the same time does many things wrong. First off, let’s get to what’s right with the book. The first thing is that this book is funny. It's not laugh-out-loud funny, but it can be funny when it wants to be (and at times it is unusually funny). Some of the fantasy sequences are brilliant in style, humor, and execution, and they really work well. For a little while, I was pretty taken in by all the fantasy sequences, and couldn't wait to see what world he would think up next. What doesn't work well is that we rarely stay in the fantasy worlds, and the author makes the mistake of showing us the consequences of all of Ted's fantasies.

And therein lies the big problem of the story: we grow to hate Ted. And I don't mean we get irritated by him, I mean we truly start to despise this guy after awhile. While the "nerd living in a fantasy world" joke works the first few times, as we go on, his ignorance not only gets to us, but the only payoff we ever get is how miserable he makes everyone around him whenever he has these dreams. It reminds me of a cruel joke that I would tell as a kid before my mom would have to finally tell me, "I get the joke, Kevin, but it's not that funny when it hurts someone." At one point in the book, Ted gets hit by a truck. Strangely enough, even this doesn't bring Ted back to reality, but is instead worked into his fantasy world. At this point, we can no longer laugh at Ted and his fantasies, because we realize that this is truly a sick character who needs medical help. And I don't say that to be funny, because I don't joke about things like that; this guy just needs some help of some kind. Not only that, but the joke truly does get old after awhile, as there's only so many times Ted can have a fantasy sequence that, in turn, makes someone's day miserable and still find a way to make it fresh and interesting. To some credit, though, I did notice that after almost every page there was a blurb to come back next week to see what happens, which leads me to believe that this is better read in minor installments than in one big chunk.

What also hurts this series is that we don't get to really know anyone, including Ted himself. We see people react to the things Ted does, but we end up sympathizing with the people who are mad at Ted because you would do that if you saw anyone have a bad experience, even if we don’t actually know them. At one point, there is a bit of a revelation, though. It is another fantasy sequence, and Ted has to deliver a package to someone in a board room. During the fantasy sequence, he pushes past the secretary, runs through the halls, and presents the package to the chairman while saying something totally silly. The secretary apologizes for letting Ted get by, but the old man smiles at the lady and says, "Don't worry, Ted may be odd but he is very reliable." This scene was a revelation to me: someone understands Ted. This made me mad because I wanted to understand Ted, to know why this man could be so kind to someone who didn't deserve to be treated kindly... in other words, I was touched and wanted to know more. This book didn't give me the chance to explore any such relationship, though, and I never did get any closer to understanding Ted when I finally wanted to know more about him. It was only one scene, but that scene was one of the best scenes in the book.

Near the end of the book, the author throws us for a loop, and the comic becomes more random than you can imagine. Strangely enough, this randomness works, and the book picks up steam again when we have Ted's fantasies and no real world to interrupt them. It makes me wish the whole book was like this, but I digress. The artwork is hard to comment on since the style is always changing and always interesting, particularly near the end of the book (which is where all the eye candy is). By now, I am glancing over to see if I have forgotten anything, and realize that I may be making this book sound worse than it really is. The book really isn't that bad, and at times is quite funny; it's just a bit uneven in its execution at times. I think with some fine-tuning, Ted Noodleman might be a character I could get into a bit more. I certainly am looking forward to reading more (if more is coming), but I also have to make it known that these problems are real, and that they need to be tweaked. I'm not looking for perfection, but if I'm going to read more than three pages of Ted then I need to not start hating him so easily. I think the end finally has the right idea: throw away the real world scenes. We don't need to see what damage Ted causes everyone, his fantasies are entertaining enough alone, and the book works better when we can just smile at Ted's imagination (instead of frowning at the damage he causes).

I was torn between what to grade this. Do I pass the book or do I slightly fail it? Ultimately, I'm going to take the easy coward’s way out and give this book a C, right in the middle. I laughed a few times, I was frustrated a few times, but ultimately this is a character with potential that just needs to have some bugs fixed. Despite the issues I have with the book, I'm looking forward to reading more Ted Noodleman. Hopefully, this isn't the last we'll see of him.

- -Review By Kevin T. Rodriguez- -