Genre Character of the Week: Scud the Disposable Assassin

Although I like to feel I’m on top of my favourite genres (Fantasy/Horror/Science Fiction) in terms of the classics, the popular, and the upcoming, sometimes stuff does manage to get past me; case in point (and the week’s genre character), Rob Schrab’s Scud: the Disposable Assassin.

First appearing in 1994 (so yes, I’m nearly twenty years out of date), Scud follows the story of a vending machine assassin robot with one simple rule - it self-destructs after it terminates its primary target.  The first story (which includes a nearly 20 page fight sequence) twists the robot’s original programming when the robot (Scud) happens to see a reflection in a bathroom mirror which states:

ATTENTION!

SCUD DISPOSABLE ROBOT ASSASSIN:

HEARTBREAKER SERIES 1373

THIS UNIT WILL SELF-DESTRUCT

UPON TERMINATION OF TARGET

At which point he changes his tactics and (mild, twenty-year-old spoiler) puts his target into a coma, then takes her to the hospital and spends the rest of the series working as a freelance assassin earning money to pay her hospital bills so she won’t die (and therefore, neither will he).

The stories are pretty crazy (not quite Fun With Milk and Cheese crazy, but really close) and although sometimes the writing is tiny (I will admit to using a magnifying glass more than a few times), and some of the monsters defy description, I found I really enjoyed the heart at the centre of the story, and as more characters get introduced (this was almost a post focusing on Scud’s sidekick, Drywall), the story just gets more and more fun.