A long time ago… well, okay, it wasn’t that long ago, but it was the ’90s, and it was when friend-of-Nerdist Bob Fingerman created the comic Minimum Wage. It was ahead of its time in deriving its comedy from brutal, unvarnished honesty — cringe comedy before it was a thing — in following the saga of struggling artist Rob and his girlfriend Sylvia in New York, with the kind of atmosphere and attention to detail that puts you right in that time and place. It had a devoted following (including a lot of comedy and comics luminaries). Bob has gone on to write several more graphic novels, non-graphic novels, and comics, some of which involve zombies or vampires.

And now, the original Minimum Wage is getting a renewed lease on life from Image Comics in a deluxe version called Maximum Minimum Wage, a hardcover with the original 72-page comic (Book One) and a “director’s cut” of the main storyline, plus a color section with original cover paintings and more art by people like Mike Mignola, Kevin Nowlan, Dave Johnson, Jill Thompson, Dave Cooper, and Glenn Barr. And the foreword’s by Robert Kirkman.

Seriously, yeah, this one’s worth picking up. You can pre-order it through Amazon by clicking here.

But don’t take my word for it. Here’s a special political advertisement from trusted celebrity spokesmodels like comic artist Dave Johnson, MST3K‘s TV’s Frank Conniff, Margaret Cho, and Phil LaMarr:

Buy it.