Soul Story

Hey there all you soul brothers and soul sisters, honkeys and honkettes. It's time for us to get down and chillax and read us a story about a man. A strong man. A man of action. A man who gets all the chicks. A man you don't want to mess wit, ya dig? A real cool cat. This here's our first ever blaxploitation tract and, dig this, we were more blown away than anybody to discover that we...

We... didn't hate this one.

Weird huh? So catch us on the flipside and see what's shakin' as we check out...




wurwolf: Okay, so with this tract, as opposed to the last tract we covered, we get the truth about the date this was published. Clearly, even from the front cover alone, this tract was written in the 70s.

Lita: I love this cover. I love everything about this cover. This is the best cover ever.

wurwolf: The 70s was rife with blaxploitation films, from which I suspect this tract got inspiration.

wurwolf: And only blaxploitation films.

Lita: If I could get this cover blown up and in high res and put it on my wall, I'd do it so fast.

wurwolf: I have to agree with you, I think that this is the most badass cover we've ever seen. And I include the Dungeons & Dragons tract in that.

Lita: Can the tract itself possibly live up to the cover's badassery?

wurwolf: We shall see!


Lita: Hey, it's a return to The Contract style art!

wurwolf: That's right. It's nice to switch back and forth sometimes, although we sadly will not see the usual Fang/Badcat hijinx from this artist.

wurwolf: Wow. You just know it's an emergency -- look at that Code Blue font. If that doesn't say emergency, I don't know what does.

Lita: What tipped him off that the riot is phony? Are they throwing foam rubber bricks at the guards? I guess when they bounce off their heads, that would be a clue.

wurwolf: I'll bet the warden thinks there's a riot going on, but it's really just the prisoners practicing their "Thriller" dance moves.

Lita: One thing that this artist does well is the rage face. It makes the rage faces in other tracts just look poorly drawn and stupid.

wurwolf: I agree, the rage face is pretty extreme.



wurwolf: Alright, I'm calling bullshit. How did the prisoners get a baseball bat and a knife? The most prisoners would ever have is a spoon chiseled into a shiv.

Lita: The black guy's name is Jackson.

wurwolf: It was a toss-up between that or Washington or Lincoln.

Lita: The guy in prison is a black guy. The other guy in prison appears to be some variety of Asian.

wurwolf: I thought the other guy was Latino.

wurwolf: I'm guessing they'll be breaking out the @!**! a lot in this tract.

Lita: Suppose that's a stirring indictment of our justice system for unfairly targeting racial minorities, do you think? Or a society that contrives to keep minorities down while glorifying the criminal lifestyle to the point where they feel they have no other options?

wurwolf: No, I think it's just Jack Chick lumping in as many stereotypes as he can fit in one panel.

Lita: Oh, ok. I guess that makes more sense.

wurwolf: At first I thought the guy kneeling over Jackson was holding a wineglass until I realized it was a stethoscope.

Lita: I thought it was a razor. I was thinking, "Oh! That nice man is going to give Jackson a shave!"

wurwolf: Is it wrong of me to think that Jackson's chest looks really hot and sexy?

Lita: That depends. Is Jackson still alive?

Lita: It's not good to get yourself all worked up over a dead guy.

wurwolf: I think he's dead, which is why I'm keeping a lid on getting worked up. That, and he's a cartoon.

Lita: Good call.

Lita: Leroy, though, he's alive. Golly.

wurwolf: Enter bad, bad Leroy... well, I don't know if he's Leroy Brown or what.

Lita: That is a mountain of a man.

wurwolf: For reals, yo. Tru dat!

wurwolf: (Just getting into the spirit of the tract.)

Lita: Is this happening now or are we in flashback mode?

wurwolf: I am not exactly sure. We've been given no indication that there's a flashback going on. No wavy lines or word boxes.

wurwolf: So I guess it's safe to assume that Leroy's grandmother is in prison with him?

Lita: She's on the other side of that glass you talk through.

wurwolf: Oh! I thought the artist was getting arty and showing a split screen, but she's on the other side of the glass. Yes, I see that now.

Lita: Aww, Leroy loves his Grammy. I like Leroy.

wurwolf: It's nice of him not to yell, "STFU, BITCH!"

Lita: That's why I think he'll get saved at the end. Usually people in these things who don't get saved have no redeeming qualities whatsoever. They are unrepentantly evil all the way through. Except Broosey Woosey.



wurwolf: Leroy, I can't blame you. "Gotta go!" is usually my reaction when someone starts preaching at me, too.

wurwolf: I spend too much time on the intranets. At first I thought the guard said, "Sounds like your Grandma is a fanfic!"

Lita: That would be pretty insulting. Though not very sensical.

Lita: That is such a douchey smile on the prison guard's face. Whatever else happens in this tract, we can't fault the art. It's fantastic.

wurwolf: I agree, and I also think the guard's suit is electric. Like seriously electrified. Because the damn thing is glowing like crazy.

wurwolf: *GASP!* There's a ghost in the background!

wurwolf: Usually when someone is calling me a white @*!!! my first instinct is to do the total opposite of "C'MERE!"

Lita: Mine is to kick them out of the classroom.



Lita: His name IS Leroy Brown!

Lita: Baddest cat in the whole @**!!!@ town!

wurwolf: HOLY SHIT

Lita: I'm noticing a disturbing amount of variation in the swear censorship punctuation in this tract.

wurwolf: So this confirms my theory that regarding African Americans, Jack Chick only knows what he's heard in pop culture.

wurwolf: I guess being a lifer means you don't have to go to boring meetings with the warden.

Lita: They figure you have enough bummers in your life already.

wurwolf: It's nice of them to be so accommodating.

Lita: If I were the warden I'd fire that guy in the back. It is really unprofessional to grin and make jackoff motions during a meeting of this magnitude.


Lita: Now that is an OUTFIT, Leroy!

wurwolf: Leroy turned into Super Fly.

Lita: I know that this tract was just written a long time ago, but I prefer to think that (a) Leroy's been locked up for a LONG time and these are the clothes he was wearing when they arrested him, or (b) this is what Jack Chick thinks black people really dress like.

wurwolf: I think both are valid conclusions.

wurwolf: Am I missing something? What does "Littlebit" mean?

wurwolf: Is that his friend's name? Or is he saying he'll go upstairs in a little bit?

Lita: Is that just what he calls his brother?

Lita: Or... wait? Is this guy really his brother or is he just calling him his brother because they are black people?

wurwolf: I honestly don't know. I'm not trying to be funny, I just don't understand what Chick is going for here.

wurwolf: Looks like his brother just finished up his shift at the Jesus Pizzeria.

Lita: This tract is a narrative mess. But the art is FANTASTIC.

wurwolf: Agreed


wurwolf: I mean, SERIOUSLY. Look at that outfit!

wurwolf: The man is a magnificent pirate!

Lita: Holy shit. He turned into a bullfighter or Zorro or something.

wurwolf: It's almost like you can just skip the crappy dialog and just look at the pictures.

Lita: That's what I've been doing. Has anything happened in this story so far?

wurwolf: Hell if I know.

wurwolf: Leroy is so badass, he ripped the door right off the hinges with one hand and didn't even break a sweat.

wurwolf: How did they make a prison that contained him?

Lita: This is a slum. The door probably wasn't screwed on so tight to begin with.

wurwolf: Shh! I prefer to think that Leroy is just that awesome.

Lita: The look on his face is wonderful, though. It's a look that says, "Yes, I'm the greatest. Drink me in, Ladies."

wurwolf: Seriously, the dialog is shit. "Jive turkey" -- WTF? Jack Chick must have been watching Good Times when he was writing this.

Lita: Is that Gloria peeking out from behind the Jive Turkey?

wurwolf: Possibly.


Lita: OH WOW!!! Wait... what just happened?

wurwolf: Cthulhu showed up?

wurwolf: An earthquake happened?

Lita: It's taking some time to parse.

Lita: I guess one guy pulled a knife and got punched out by the other guy. Not sure why the fat guy in the crowd is the one who's groaning with pain, though.

wurwolf: I think you're right. RD pulled a knife and Leroy was all, Oh hell no and punched the shit out of him. And then little tiny Gloria, who's a midget, is hanging onto Leroy out of fear.




wurwolf: Or maybe a truck rolled by and ran over RD.

Lita: That's what he looks like. Jive Turkey is spitting his teeth out onto the floor.

wurwolf: "Jive Turkey." Please. Don't you know their names yet?

Lita: Leroy's the boss. If he says that guy's name is Jive Turkey then that is what that guy's name is.

Lita: That bible verse seems pretty out of place. It doesn't seem to match anything we're looking at.

wurwolf: I'm not sure whether it's applying to RD's past or Leroy's future.


wurwolf: Apparently being the boss comes with an opulent office.

Lita: I always hear that gang bangers live a life of luxury.

Lita: Well... maybe not really.

wurwolf: Looks like Rudy from Fat Albert showed up to give some plot exposition.




wurwolf: The ghost of Leroy Brown is on his way!

Lita: Oh gross!!! I scrolled down to this row too slowly and thought we were getting a love scene and I was thinking, "Wow! Pretty racy for a Chick Tract!" and then I scrolled down more and saw he was with his GRANDMA!!

wurwolf: Yes! I thought the same thing!

Lita: "I'm glad you came!"

wurwolf: I'll bet she is. Leroy is a gang-banger!

Lita: Even when the art in a Chick tract is really good, it still manages to be really bad in its own special way.

Lita: Take Grandma, for example. Why is Leroy's grandmother an Eskimo?

wurwolf: I thought she was an elderly Chinese woman.

wurwolf: Man, Grandma just laid a smackdown on Leroy. "I love you too, Grandma." "Child, you don't know what love is until you know Jesus!"

wurwolf: Jeez. Sorry, Grandma. Next time I'll just keep my feelings to myself.

Lita: "Fine, then Grandma, I don't love you and I never did. Are you happy now?"

Lita: Grandma: *dies*



wurwolf: Oh, phone booth. How I am taken by your nostalgic whimsy.

wurwolf: "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" Free funeral food!

Lita: Nowadays you're lucky if you get a flimsy little phone alcove.

wurwolf: Yeah, once in a while I'll see a phone booth still around and it's always beat to hell.

Lita: I don't think I've ever seen an actual Superman's Changing Room phone booth.

wurwolf: You're not missing a whole lot.


wurwolf: Second tract in a row with a funeral scene.

Lita: How could he miss? The car's aimed right at them. Keep driving straight and you can bulldoze them all right into Grandma's grave.

wurwolf: I don't know, but I love the pencil work on this tract. Look how it conveys the feeling of motion. Beautiful.

Lita: I agree. I really can't say enough times how great the art is in this thing. It's really refreshing after the drek we've looked at in the past.


wurwolf: I guess Leroy and friends have an aversion to someone yelling "BUDDA BUDDA BUDDA!" out a car window at them. Knocked them on their asses.

Lita: I don't blame them. I was never a big fan of Mike Meyers' portrayal of Jewish women.

wurwolf: I like Leroy's Harry Potter scar. Yet another thing JK Rowling lifted.

Lita: I guess she was as impressed by the art as we are

wurwolf: Aw, Gloria's dead. Not a surprise, really.

Lita: Hooking up with your late girlfriend's sister while looking at her corpse in the morgue? I'm sorry, Chick Tracts, I know you're all, "uppity black people!" but I do not believe that Leroy is that sleezy.

Lita: Or the sister, for that matter.


wurwolf: And then they take it to a whole other level of skeeviness, because Gloria's sister not only reminds Leroy of Gloria but of his grandmother, too.

Lita: "Why do I feel this way? She's not at all like Gloria... She sort of reminds me of my grandma!"

Lita vomits all over her keyboard

wurwolf: Yeah. I know the feeling.

wurwolf: Oh those two crazy kids, from two different worlds wanting to cross over. It's like the battle of the TV show titles.

Lita: Well, Leroy isn't the first guy to "find religion" in order to get into a girl's pants, and he won't be the last.



Lita: Jive Turkey seems like a fine upstanding young man to me. I don't see any reason why Leroy shouldn't put his complete trust in him.

wurwolf: I'm too busy checking out Leroy's half-naked bod as he's lolling around in bed. Nice.

wurwolf: Also, nice padded headboard.

wurwolf: Jeez, AK-47s and grenades? Leroy is the final boss in a video game.

Lita: Hey! They all brought guns! Can't I trust any of you guys???

wurwolf: I'm a little confused about exactly who is shooting who.

Lita: Everybody's shooting everybody.

wurwolf: I mean, I assume Leroy just strolled into the church with no weapons on him and got stabbed in the back (literally) by RD, but I can't really tell.

wurwolf: Wait... Leroy brought a gun with him?

Lita: Leroy brought a gun, Jive Turkey brought a gun, EVERYBODY brought guns. And grenades! KAVOOM!



Lita: That's just the way you are if you're a black person in a Chick tract.

wurwolf: Yeah, good point.

wurwolf: So Chick is saying that black people are just toting around guns and grenades all the time, I guess.

Lita: They been spendin' most their lifes livin' in a gangsta's paradise.

wurwolf throws her shoe at Lita.

Lita: OW!! You know, I guess I shouldn't expect more from you. You come from such a violent race.

wurwolf: You're just lucky I don't sue your ass.

wurwolf: Okay, so we're skipping some panels where everyone's bleeding all over the place, some dudes might not make it to the car, blah blah blah

Lita: Moving on.

wurwolf: Was Joyce getting ready to become a Russian bride or something?

Lita: Yeah. That is really some hat.

wurwolf: And dress.

Lita: And those are really some arms on Leroy!

wurwolf: Well, he did spend a lot of time in jail, probably weight-lifting.

wurwolf: Okay, the dumb dialog boxes are covering way too much of the awesome artwork, so I'm skipping the gospel message.

Lita: You know, in the white person tracts the person telling about Christ doesn't feel the need to explain everything in parentheses. If I were black I'd be so insulted.

wurwolf: Like black people are all, "Buh?" when someone says "believeth".

Lita: That's all I have to say about the gospel, part, though, so you're right. We can safely skip it.

wurwolf: We've heard it a billion times before anyway.

wurwolf: You know, I can't help but think that if Leroy hadn't been saved he'd still be alive.

Lita: If he hadn't been dying he wouldn't have gotten saved.

Lita: I really like this last panel, though.

wurwolf: Huh.

Lita: I don't know if I've been reading too many tracts or if it's because I'm on the rag or what, but I find this panel genuinely touching.

wurwolf: I think it's because you're on the rag. I find nothing touching about it.

wurwolf: Or maybe I'm just a cynical asshole.

Lita: She's crying because he just died, but he has this faint smile because he's finally at peace. It's kind of nice.

Lita: I can see how this tract would be more successful than any of the others we've looked at before on this blog. You know. If it weren't so racist.

wurwolf: Yeah. They must just use it for white people.

Lita: I think this is seriously the best tract we've ever done. And it's all in the artwork. See, Chick Tracts? See what happens when you hand the pencil to somebody with a little talent?

wurwolf: And it's a tract where the message can be taken seriously.

wurwolf: Oh, who am I kidding.