Writer and illustrator Mike Topping reviews Simon Pegg's iphone app for FutureBook: Deep in the bowels of a mock-tudor manor house somewhere in North London, a suave, buff superhero sits in his cavernous, tricked-out superhero lair. On the bank of giant screens before him: a YouTube video of a farting baby. Fans of Spaced, Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz will immediately recognise Simon Pegg’s patent mix of genre parody, pop culture references and knowing, juvenile humour, embodied here in digital comic-book form and packaged as a mobile app (£1.79 for iPhone, iPad and Android) titled, *deep breath*, “The Adventures of Simon Pegg and Canterbury and the Mystery of the Scarlet Panther and the Star of Nefertiti and the Tablet of Amhotep IV” (hereafter simply “Adventures”).

The story - taken from the fictional component of Pegg’s autobiography, Nerd Do Well - casts Pegg in the role of implausible, self-important superhero engaging in world-saving adventures with the aid of his long-suffering robot butler, Canterbury. Written by Pegg and illustrated by Gaz Roberts, it has fun with several tropes familiar from Marvel and DC comics. There’s also some sex, swearing and - of course - Star Wars references. In a typically self-referential gag, Pegg’s Random House editor, Benn Dunn, appears as a character, chasing Pegg’s superhero alter-ego for the memoirs he is supposed to be writing between adventures. This mirrors the structure of his actual memoir, which charts what Pegg calls the “circularities” of a life that has taken him from childhood sci-fi nerd to working with Stephen Spielberg and playing Scotty in the rebooted Star Trek.

Despite being a digital-only product, “Adventures” is laid out as a conventional, print-friendly 68-page comic, suggesting we may see this on paper one day. The app uses a similar panel-to-panel navigation as other mobile comic readers like Panelfly (tap right for the next panel, left for the previous panel). The transitions between panels are smooth and quick, with some nice automated panning and zooming actions for larger panels. Occasionally the app takes over, delivering a series of panels in quick succession to convey pace. There’s coverflow style page level navigation, and pinch to zoom is enabled, though the iPhone screen is too small for viewing entire pages, especially as the app is locked in landscape orientation when reading the comic. Overall, the experience is slick and effective, though it remains - like many comics on the iPhone - a touchscreen interface on top of a product designed around the constraints of print media. The one device-specific narrative element - an occasional buzzer - feels a bit gimmicky, and uses the same effect for an intercom buzzer as a massive explosion (which, to be fair, may be a deliberate gag).

Extra features include wallpapers, a “song picker” (essentially an in-app music player with which you can create a bespoke playlist to read along to from your own music collection), and the ability to share panels by Facebook or email. The latter worked only once for me - I’m not sure if this is a bug or a deliberate anti-piracy restriction (since this feature is essentially a viral marketing tool, a deliberate one-use restriction would seem self-defeating).

Although "Adventures" is a complete standalone story, it feels very much like an add-on to (and marketing exercise for) Nerd Do Well - there’s a synopsis and a (rather too brief) extract included, both with “buy the book” links at the end. Having gone to this much effort to whet the appetite of mobile device users, it’s a little surprising that these links take you to the Amazon hardback page (£7.41, discounted from the RRP of £18.99) : the option of an instant ebook purchase would seem a good option for converting interest into sales. At time of writing, Nerd Do Well was available as an ebook from the Kindle store (£6.67), Waterstones (£18.43) and WH Smiths (£13.57), but not on iBooks. The simplest solution for readers (who may not already have ereader apps installed on their devices) would be an in-app purchase option, though this would presumably have required coding extra ereader functionality into the app and, on iOS devices, giving Apple its 30% cut (and of course there’s also the VAT issue with ebooks).

Minor gripes aside, The Adventures of Simon Pegg (etc etc) is a fun, quick read that will likely appeal to Pegg’s fan base and increase awareness of his memoir.

Mike Topping is a writer and illustrator. He writes about the evolution of the book at www.darwinslibrary.com and his book cover illustrations can be seen at www.despotica.com. You can follow him on twitter at @darwinslibrary.