MOMO REVIEW: JOHN CUSACK AND IGNACIO NOÉ TAKE A DETOUR STRAIGHT INTO COSMIC MADNESS

John Cusack jumped into comics and apparently decided the shallow end was for somebody else. MOMO comes rolling in like a busted-up 1970s road movie carrying government secrets, UFO paranoia, political grime, occult craziness and enough weird shit in the trunk to get everybody arrested twice. Cusack writes it, Ignacio Noé handles the art, and somehow Jackie Gleason gets caught in the madness. Yeah, fam. This book is on some shit.

The story kicks off with two fugitives caught up in circumstances that already smell funny, then Cusack keeps twisting the screws. What starts like a grimy crime-road joint starts messing around with government conspiracies, buried history, Richard Nixon, Antonin Artaud, experiments and cosmic insanity. Every time I thought I had the destination figured out, MOMO changed highways. Eventually I quit asking where the hell we were going and just enjoyed the ride.

Cusack can write, too. I had my antenna up because celebrity comics can sometimes feel like somebody rented the medium for the weekend, slapped their name across the cover and bounced. That ain’t happening here. The dialogue has some dirt under its nails. People interrupt each other, talk reckless, hide shit and carry themselves like they had lives before page one. The political paranoia fits naturally because damn near everybody in this story has a reason not to trust authority. Somebody says, “Trust us,” and immediately I’m checking where the exits are. That’s New York survival instinct right there.

Cusack does have one problem, though. Papi packed EVERYTHING. Crime, satire, pulp sci-fi, occult mystery, conspiracy history, dark comedy, political paranoia and cosmic horror are all fighting for elbow room. Most of that insanity gives MOMO its personality, yet a few scenes barely get time to breathe before another crazy idea kicks the door open. I’m sitting there like, “Yo John, I’m still chewing the last bite!” Giving a handful of moments another page would have helped the rhythm without sacrificing any of the madness.

Ignacio Noé? Coño, this dude came ready. His artwork is grimy, expressive and beautifully strange. Motel rooms feel stale. Streets look dirty. Cars have weight. Faces look exhausted, suspicious and lived-in instead of everybody having the same pretty comic-book mug. Once reality starts getting funky, Noé turns the whole visual language sideways. Perspective stretches, shadows start acting disrespectful and ordinary environments melt into psychedelic nightmares without the storytelling becoming impossible to follow.

His colors push that insanity even further. Dirty oranges, nasty greens, deep blacks, electric blues and sudden explosions of cosmic color make the pages feel radioactive without turning them into visual soup. Plenty of comics confuse “psychedelic” with throwing every damn color at the page. Noé has control underneath the chaos. You can follow the storytelling while simultaneously wondering what kind of interdimensional mierda these people just stepped into.

Taylor Esposito earns his money lettering this beast because some pages have dialogue, narration and visual craziness competing for the same real estate. The reading order stays clean, voices remain easy to follow and the lettering never starts wrestling Noé’s artwork for attention. James B. Emmett also deserves credit on the editorial side because MOMO has enough moving pieces to become conspiracy gumbo real quick, yet the characters remain the thread pulling us through the madness.

One thing I appreciated is that MOMO actually feels like a comic book, not some Hollywood screenplay wearing panels until somebody buys the movie rights. Cusack and Noé use page turns, pacing, visual reveals and big compositions like people who understand the medium they’re working in. Noé gets room to tell the story instead of functioning like an illustrator hired to decorate somebody else’s script. Comics ain’t Hollywood’s waiting room, fam, and MOMO never treats them that way.

The Jackie Gleason angle gets absolutely bonkers, and I ain’t spoiling that for you. Cusack mixes real people, conspiracy folklore and complete bullshit with such a straight face that eventually you start side-eyeing all of it. That’s half the fun. By the final stretch, Noé gets increasingly wild with the visuals while Cusack pushes the paranoia toward full cosmic madness. Not every question gets gift-wrapped with a cute answer either. Good. A clean little ending would feel wrong after everything this book just dragged us through.

MOMO gets crowded and occasionally needs Cusack to ease off the gas for half a damn second, but boring? Hell no. This book has grime, personality and some serious cojones. Cusack brings the paranoia and reckless ideas while Noé turns that madness into some gorgeous, nasty-ass comic pages. It feels like somebody found a forbidden underground comic in the trunk of an old Cadillac next to classified government files and something you definitely shouldn’t smoke.

 This one is strange, loud, paranoid, funny and beautifully unhinged. Exactly the kind of weird comics need more of.

CRUSADERS SCORE:
4.5/5

Written By: John Cusack
Art & Cover: Ignacio Noé
Letters: Taylor Esposito
Editor: James B. Emmett
Publisher: Mad Cave Studios
On Sale: September 29, 2026