Exit Wounds
by Rutu Modan
2008 Eisner Winner for Best Graphic Album - New
I can acknowledge the technical craft in Exit Wounds. The art is fine, the story is structured well. And yet I wound up not liking it. The impression I was left with at the end was that I just didn't care for it and I couldn't really put my finger on why. It took quite a bit of soul searching and I think that it comes down to the story that Modan was telling.
A middle aged taxi driver in Tel Aviv gets a call from a young woman who is about to finish her mandatory military service. She was his estranged father's lover and has not been able to reach his father for weeks. She fears that his father was an unidentified victim in a cafe bombing and pulls the taxi driver into a hunt for his father.
The mystery at the heart of the plot is an intriguing one. Is there something to what she says or is she just another discarded woman? What really happened that day at the cafe? The thing that bothered me in Exit Wounds the most and prevented me from enjoying it were the characters. I was never able to connect with them and care about their actions. The heart of the story is the shifting relationship between these characters. One of them is completely off stage, one of them is so flighty I couldn't follow, and the other is completely indecisive. A character driven by strange whims isn't sympathetic. While I suspect that Moran was attempting to make the other come across as conflicted I wanted him to just get on with it one way or the other.
In addition I found the dialog to be incredibly clunky. Everyone has the same flat, abbreviated voice and many of the sentences have a strange backward construction. There's no credit in the book for a translator so I'm uncertain if that's an artifact of Moran's writing, her use of English, or if it is just a poor translation from the original Hebrew. No matter the cause it's clumsy and pulled me out of the story.
The artwork in Exit Wounds is very European in style. Modan has a simple, tight technique with her drawing that isn't flashy but is sufficient for her story. It's not dynamic or mood setting or demonstrating wild layouts but this is an internal story and it's also never distracting or clashing with the mood.
I suspect that if I encountered another book by Rutu Modan I would like it better. She is clearly a very skilled comic creator and I'd be happy to give her another chance. Exit Wounds just didn't work for me.
Friday, March 5, 2010
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Review - Cerebus: Flight
Cerebus: Flight
by Dave Sim and Gerard
1994 Eisner Winner for Best Graphic Album - Reprint
These days Dave Sim is best known to comic book fans for his extreme misogynistic views. When I say extreme I mean extreme; stuff that makes the typical attitude of the 1950's look enlightened. But before he went off the deep end and just was hinting at these attitudes he was known as a pioneer of independent comics, a major supporter new comic book creators, and one of the most artistically ambitious creators himself. In one of those strange twists of fate the Eisner was awarded for Sim a few weeks before he published what is generally regarded as the breaking point in the series where anti-woman theme went from a strange back current to explicit authorial statements. Less than a month after his award people would be re-evaluating his work in that context and becoming disturbed by what they found.
Cerebus started as a simple Conan the Barbarian parody but before two years of publication passed Sim made a bold announcement: he would create three hundred issues and then end the series with the title character's death. The series transformed from strict parody to something containing a lot more drama though throughout it Sim continued to parody the current state of the comic book industry. As time went by Cerebus the barbarian anthropomorphic aardvark became prime minister of a country and pope of a major religion all the while being as brutal and nasty to people as character could be.
Flight takes place after Cerebus's spirit has been broken. He knows that he will "die unmourned and unloved", the city that he ruled has been conquered by a militant matriarchy, and the woman he loved married someone else and was hauled off by the secret police. He spent roughly the past year of his worth of stories catatonic and with the 150th issue, the exact mid-point of the series, he finally took action and began cutting a bloody swath through occupying soldiers. Flight picks up at that moment as Cerebus's actions have consequences that are destabilizing reality. As he fans the flames of rebellion he is drawn away to a confrontation with a mystic who has been entangled with him from almost the beginning and wishes to impart personal insights before its too late.
Flight is not a complete story. It's not even a complete arc. It picks up in mid-story beat from the previous issue, has a lot of ominous but not very enlightening things happen, and in the end nothing is resolved. The only thing that has a semblence of resolution isn't really for the careful reader. It's a fragment of a story that just cannot stand on its own.
Making things worse is that Sim spends a lot of time bringing together some of the stranger story elements from the first few years and trying to tie them to the story he started working through much later. These are things he used when he was creating a Conan parody and if you're not familiar with the early issues they make even less sense. Going back and trying to force old story elements to fit in with a radically different direction taken years later inevitably comes across as clumsy and Flight is no different.
Which isn't to say it's completely lacking is entertainment for people who haven't been reading from the beginning. I enjoyed the parody of the Punisher as a completely repressed lunatic who can only respond to his urges through violence and the extreme behavior of comic characters from the early 90's. The sections with Cerebus's confrontation are one of the earliest points where the series dives directly into the head of it's main character. The whole thing does present an ominous atmosphere where you get the impression that the world is about to change dramatically but you can't be sure how it will change.
Dave Sim is terrific at using pacing both in his writing and artwork. He was the first comic book creator to write "for the trade" and created his issues to be read in a large block. Part of that is how his art is laid out. He'll switch from slow, tension building sequences where it can take pages for a character to walk across the room to sequences done as illustrated text.
As for the art itself Sim has a style that allow an anthropomorphic aardvark to stand next to caricatures standing next to more realistically drawn figures and it all looks smooth. He partner Gerard draws backgrounds with an architectural flair that I enjoyed. Together they create an effect similar to an early Disney animated film with hyperdetailed backgrounds and multiple styles of characters all coming together.
Strangely enough I think the strongest aspect to Sim's artwork isn't his character work or even the pacing. In my view he is the best letterer that comics has ever seen. The word balloons in Cerebus are an integral part of the artwork in a way rarely seen elsewhere. They aren't populated with words, they're illustrations of words that add emphasis to the dialog in a way that only comic books could use.
I definitely do not recommend Flight as a starting point for Cerebus. It's just too heavily tied into the backstory for that purpose. I also don't recommend starting to read Cerebus if you're going to put it down in anger a book or two past Flight (if I remember correctly the real breaking point comes at the end of Reads which is two books past this); there's no reason to get involved with a three hundred page story only to walk away when it's two-thirds done because the creator went off on some very bizarre and very offensive tangents. With those caveats in mind there is quite a bit to like in Cerebus before that point. In fact I plan on finishing reading the series some day just because the first two-thirds are so good that I want to read an ending despite my feelings about Dave Sim. It's just been really hard to justify picking the books to finish it off.
by Dave Sim and Gerard
1994 Eisner Winner for Best Graphic Album - Reprint
These days Dave Sim is best known to comic book fans for his extreme misogynistic views. When I say extreme I mean extreme; stuff that makes the typical attitude of the 1950's look enlightened. But before he went off the deep end and just was hinting at these attitudes he was known as a pioneer of independent comics, a major supporter new comic book creators, and one of the most artistically ambitious creators himself. In one of those strange twists of fate the Eisner was awarded for Sim a few weeks before he published what is generally regarded as the breaking point in the series where anti-woman theme went from a strange back current to explicit authorial statements. Less than a month after his award people would be re-evaluating his work in that context and becoming disturbed by what they found.
Cerebus started as a simple Conan the Barbarian parody but before two years of publication passed Sim made a bold announcement: he would create three hundred issues and then end the series with the title character's death. The series transformed from strict parody to something containing a lot more drama though throughout it Sim continued to parody the current state of the comic book industry. As time went by Cerebus the barbarian anthropomorphic aardvark became prime minister of a country and pope of a major religion all the while being as brutal and nasty to people as character could be.
Flight takes place after Cerebus's spirit has been broken. He knows that he will "die unmourned and unloved", the city that he ruled has been conquered by a militant matriarchy, and the woman he loved married someone else and was hauled off by the secret police. He spent roughly the past year of his worth of stories catatonic and with the 150th issue, the exact mid-point of the series, he finally took action and began cutting a bloody swath through occupying soldiers. Flight picks up at that moment as Cerebus's actions have consequences that are destabilizing reality. As he fans the flames of rebellion he is drawn away to a confrontation with a mystic who has been entangled with him from almost the beginning and wishes to impart personal insights before its too late.
Flight is not a complete story. It's not even a complete arc. It picks up in mid-story beat from the previous issue, has a lot of ominous but not very enlightening things happen, and in the end nothing is resolved. The only thing that has a semblence of resolution isn't really for the careful reader. It's a fragment of a story that just cannot stand on its own.
Making things worse is that Sim spends a lot of time bringing together some of the stranger story elements from the first few years and trying to tie them to the story he started working through much later. These are things he used when he was creating a Conan parody and if you're not familiar with the early issues they make even less sense. Going back and trying to force old story elements to fit in with a radically different direction taken years later inevitably comes across as clumsy and Flight is no different.
Which isn't to say it's completely lacking is entertainment for people who haven't been reading from the beginning. I enjoyed the parody of the Punisher as a completely repressed lunatic who can only respond to his urges through violence and the extreme behavior of comic characters from the early 90's. The sections with Cerebus's confrontation are one of the earliest points where the series dives directly into the head of it's main character. The whole thing does present an ominous atmosphere where you get the impression that the world is about to change dramatically but you can't be sure how it will change.
Dave Sim is terrific at using pacing both in his writing and artwork. He was the first comic book creator to write "for the trade" and created his issues to be read in a large block. Part of that is how his art is laid out. He'll switch from slow, tension building sequences where it can take pages for a character to walk across the room to sequences done as illustrated text.
As for the art itself Sim has a style that allow an anthropomorphic aardvark to stand next to caricatures standing next to more realistically drawn figures and it all looks smooth. He partner Gerard draws backgrounds with an architectural flair that I enjoyed. Together they create an effect similar to an early Disney animated film with hyperdetailed backgrounds and multiple styles of characters all coming together.
Strangely enough I think the strongest aspect to Sim's artwork isn't his character work or even the pacing. In my view he is the best letterer that comics has ever seen. The word balloons in Cerebus are an integral part of the artwork in a way rarely seen elsewhere. They aren't populated with words, they're illustrations of words that add emphasis to the dialog in a way that only comic books could use.
I definitely do not recommend Flight as a starting point for Cerebus. It's just too heavily tied into the backstory for that purpose. I also don't recommend starting to read Cerebus if you're going to put it down in anger a book or two past Flight (if I remember correctly the real breaking point comes at the end of Reads which is two books past this); there's no reason to get involved with a three hundred page story only to walk away when it's two-thirds done because the creator went off on some very bizarre and very offensive tangents. With those caveats in mind there is quite a bit to like in Cerebus before that point. In fact I plan on finishing reading the series some day just because the first two-thirds are so good that I want to read an ending despite my feelings about Dave Sim. It's just been really hard to justify picking the books to finish it off.
Monday, March 1, 2010
Review - Kyle Baker Cartoonist and The Bakers
Kyle Baker, Cartoonist
The Bakers: Do These Toys Belong Somewhere
The Bakers: Babies and Kittens
by Kyle Baker
2005 and 2006 Eisner Winner for Best Writer/Artist - Humor
These books are the flip side of Dork. Dork was dense; these are fluffy full page, silent cartoons. Dork targets a mature audience of twenty to thirty year olds; The Bakers is so accessible I'd hand it out to anyone from eight to eighty. Dork was about as black as humor can get; these books are so cheerful they could be prescribed to people with clinical depression. And while I liked Dork I loved these offerings from Kyle Baker.
The reason I've combined these together is that Kyle Baker, Cartoonist and The Bakers: Do These Toys Belong Somewhere have an identical format and even share some of the same cartoons. And as long as I was talking about the first books it made sense to combine it with the other one. The first two books are a collection of cartoons. Most of them have no text other than a caption. Cartoonist are mainly single illustrations while Do These Toys expands things to multiple panels and occasionally going for two or three pages. Babies and Kittens on the other hand is a single story in a traditional comic book format.
Most of these stories are about Kyle Baker and his home life. His wife, children, and himself are the only characters in The Bakers. They have the usual domestic problems; a lost tooth, a poorly cooked dinner, and getting the kids dressed to go out. In Babies and Kittens a mouse loose in the house puts them in mind to get a cat but Kyle is allergic to them. The cartoons in the other book are more free form taking on any subject that came to mind.
Because these are so brief and so simple it makes commenting on them easy. The sour notes in the comedy are rare. This is material that has been fodder for jokes since the first caveman comedians but the reason for that is they are completely universal themes. You have lived a bleak and lonely life and have my sympathies for it if you cannot recognize the scenes in The Bakers. None of this comes across as rehashed Bill Cosby routines because Baker is exceptional at telling a joke through the art.
Baker's art drips with style. His characters are astoundingly expressive as they have to be since they often have to carry the narrative or joke without saying a word. There's a section in Babies and Kittens which is a long cat and mouse cartoon and Baker is just as adapt with the animals. These are beautiful books and the skill demonstrated in the artwork is what makes them worthwhile.
I loved all three of these books and in case I haven't made it obvious I strongly recommend all of them. The best way to sell them to you, though, is that Babies and Kittens can be read on Kyle Baker's website. There is absolutely no reason not to try it out other than the fact that the real book looks nicer than the small flash animation on the website. These books are completely charming and worth checking out.
The Bakers: Do These Toys Belong Somewhere
The Bakers: Babies and Kittens
by Kyle Baker
2005 and 2006 Eisner Winner for Best Writer/Artist - Humor
These books are the flip side of Dork. Dork was dense; these are fluffy full page, silent cartoons. Dork targets a mature audience of twenty to thirty year olds; The Bakers is so accessible I'd hand it out to anyone from eight to eighty. Dork was about as black as humor can get; these books are so cheerful they could be prescribed to people with clinical depression. And while I liked Dork I loved these offerings from Kyle Baker.
The reason I've combined these together is that Kyle Baker, Cartoonist and The Bakers: Do These Toys Belong Somewhere have an identical format and even share some of the same cartoons. And as long as I was talking about the first books it made sense to combine it with the other one. The first two books are a collection of cartoons. Most of them have no text other than a caption. Cartoonist are mainly single illustrations while Do These Toys expands things to multiple panels and occasionally going for two or three pages. Babies and Kittens on the other hand is a single story in a traditional comic book format.
Most of these stories are about Kyle Baker and his home life. His wife, children, and himself are the only characters in The Bakers. They have the usual domestic problems; a lost tooth, a poorly cooked dinner, and getting the kids dressed to go out. In Babies and Kittens a mouse loose in the house puts them in mind to get a cat but Kyle is allergic to them. The cartoons in the other book are more free form taking on any subject that came to mind.
Because these are so brief and so simple it makes commenting on them easy. The sour notes in the comedy are rare. This is material that has been fodder for jokes since the first caveman comedians but the reason for that is they are completely universal themes. You have lived a bleak and lonely life and have my sympathies for it if you cannot recognize the scenes in The Bakers. None of this comes across as rehashed Bill Cosby routines because Baker is exceptional at telling a joke through the art.
Baker's art drips with style. His characters are astoundingly expressive as they have to be since they often have to carry the narrative or joke without saying a word. There's a section in Babies and Kittens which is a long cat and mouse cartoon and Baker is just as adapt with the animals. These are beautiful books and the skill demonstrated in the artwork is what makes them worthwhile.
I loved all three of these books and in case I haven't made it obvious I strongly recommend all of them. The best way to sell them to you, though, is that Babies and Kittens can be read on Kyle Baker's website. There is absolutely no reason not to try it out other than the fact that the real book looks nicer than the small flash animation on the website. These books are completely charming and worth checking out.
Saturday, February 27, 2010
Review - Dork
Dork
by Evan Dorkin
1995 Eisner Winner for Talent Deserving of Wider Recognition
2002 Eisner Winner for Best Writer/Artist - Humor
There isn't a good way to describe Dork. Between its format, the subject matter, and Dorkin's own style Dork is an explosion of insanity. It's what you'd get if you stuck a dozen of the strangest comics in a blender and hit frappe. It's the spawn of Lewis Carroll and the entropic death of the universe. In short, it is the very heart of madness. And I think it makes for an interesting comic.
Dork is the comic book that Evan Dorkin assembles his odds and ends in. It's his kitchen junk drawer. If there's something he's done that hasn't been printed in a comic it goes in Dork. If there's an idea he gets at three in the morning and can't fit it in with anything else it goes in Dork. That makes it an anthology but a very irregular one since it leaps around from topic to topic.
The two paperback collections of Dork are not complete issues and aren't even collected in order. For one thing they're missing the Eltingville Club stories which ironically might be the best known of the material in Dork since they were turned into a pilot for Adult Swim. The first volume is generally more coherent since it got the bulk of the longer stories that remained. The second volume on the other hand contains a lot more rapid fire jokes.
An advantage of the format is that if you're not enjoying a story give it a page because things are sure to turn over and become something else completely different. I didn't like the Murder Family stories which were a sitcom about a family of serial killers because I found it be one note but then I turned over the page and found some zany comic strips and forgot all about the part I didn't like. That's how Dork works; it's constantly shifting.
Enjoyment of Dork is going to be dependent on how much you enjoy Evan Dorkin's humor. He tends to the absurd but never steps over the line to completely random. He's got a great sense of wordplay (when Carl Jung goes on a rampage the headline for the next panel reads "28 Collectively Rendered Unconscious"). The closest thing I can compare it to is Monty Python since they both seem to be drawing their humor from the same sources.
Dorkin's art is just fine but it's not going to be a selling point for Dork. He seems far more comfortable telling a joke through words rather than images so the writing carries the stories. The occasions where he does go for a visual joke it works just fine but it's never the focus of the book.
I wound up enjoying Dork quite a bit but not really sure if I would recommend it to anyone. I suppose that anyone who likes quirky, nerdy humor should get a kick out of it but it's so idiosyncratic that I can't be sure. Dork is concentrated, joking madness and if you can enjoy the ride down that rabbit hole then you'll probably like it quite a bit.
by Evan Dorkin
1995 Eisner Winner for Talent Deserving of Wider Recognition
2002 Eisner Winner for Best Writer/Artist - Humor
There isn't a good way to describe Dork. Between its format, the subject matter, and Dorkin's own style Dork is an explosion of insanity. It's what you'd get if you stuck a dozen of the strangest comics in a blender and hit frappe. It's the spawn of Lewis Carroll and the entropic death of the universe. In short, it is the very heart of madness. And I think it makes for an interesting comic.
Dork is the comic book that Evan Dorkin assembles his odds and ends in. It's his kitchen junk drawer. If there's something he's done that hasn't been printed in a comic it goes in Dork. If there's an idea he gets at three in the morning and can't fit it in with anything else it goes in Dork. That makes it an anthology but a very irregular one since it leaps around from topic to topic.
The two paperback collections of Dork are not complete issues and aren't even collected in order. For one thing they're missing the Eltingville Club stories which ironically might be the best known of the material in Dork since they were turned into a pilot for Adult Swim. The first volume is generally more coherent since it got the bulk of the longer stories that remained. The second volume on the other hand contains a lot more rapid fire jokes.
An advantage of the format is that if you're not enjoying a story give it a page because things are sure to turn over and become something else completely different. I didn't like the Murder Family stories which were a sitcom about a family of serial killers because I found it be one note but then I turned over the page and found some zany comic strips and forgot all about the part I didn't like. That's how Dork works; it's constantly shifting.
Enjoyment of Dork is going to be dependent on how much you enjoy Evan Dorkin's humor. He tends to the absurd but never steps over the line to completely random. He's got a great sense of wordplay (when Carl Jung goes on a rampage the headline for the next panel reads "28 Collectively Rendered Unconscious"). The closest thing I can compare it to is Monty Python since they both seem to be drawing their humor from the same sources.
Dorkin's art is just fine but it's not going to be a selling point for Dork. He seems far more comfortable telling a joke through words rather than images so the writing carries the stories. The occasions where he does go for a visual joke it works just fine but it's never the focus of the book.
I wound up enjoying Dork quite a bit but not really sure if I would recommend it to anyone. I suppose that anyone who likes quirky, nerdy humor should get a kick out of it but it's so idiosyncratic that I can't be sure. Dork is concentrated, joking madness and if you can enjoy the ride down that rabbit hole then you'll probably like it quite a bit.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Review - Elektra Lives Again
Elektra Lives Again
by Frank Miller
1991 Eisner Winner for Best Graphic Album
There was a time when I enjoyed Frank Miller's work a lot. I have both omnibuses of his Daredevil work to use an obvious connection. I enjoyed at least the beginning of Sin City. I genuinely liked 300. I'm not a fan of Batman and I find Batman: Year One to be magnificent. In spite of this at some point Miller started slipping. These days it's almost guaranteed that I'm going to hate anything he creates. Elektra Lives Again has a strong attachment to his good work so I was expecting something that I'd at least enjoy. What I got was a book that was good to look at and a story that I could only follow by knowing the history of the characters involved.
In the early 80's Miller wrote a story for Daredevil where the title character's former girlfriend Elektra became a ninja assassin, turned on her masters, and then died (essentially the story used for the Daredevil movie). Miller revisited this story a few times before this graphic novel where Daredevil fears that the ninja clan may be attempting to resurrect Elektra and brainwash her. Then he finds signs that she may already be alive and the ninjas are working to create an even deadlier warrior to put Elektra back into her grave.
I could barely follow the story as I read Elektra Lives Again. It is a mess. I could give you a broad outline of events but the details blur and get muddied. This was after going through some portions again ten minutes ago to make sure I had things straight. Miller was solidly tied to the ninja craze in the 1980's and it shows through in this book as the ninjas are magic assassins who can do anything except kill the heroes because they're ninjas.
Character motivations are opaque to me for anything beyond the broad strokes. I can get the Elektra wants to kill ninjas, ninjas want to kill Elektra, and Daredevil wants to save her aspect of things. The problems for me are when Daredevil just lets Elektra walk past him on a staircase. Or when in his identity as a lawyer he jumps into bed with one of his clients. Or why the ninjas attack Daredevil to get information when any observation would demonstrate that he still thinks Elektra is dead. Topping it all off the conclusion is built on an emotional epiphany that that left me baffled; it was the equivalent of having a caption saying, "And then suddenly he was all better."
On the positive side of things Miller's art is just as terrific as always in Elektra Lives Again. He draws elaborate, dense pages that just pull me in. He often uses a jumble of staccato images that look like they should be a chaotic mess and then as I examine them closer the story in them emerges. As with 300 his wife Lynn Varley painted over his pencils and her soft coloring adds a pleasant texture to the book.
Good art by Miller doesn't justify the unreadable story. While he was creating Elektra Lives Again he was gearing up for Sin City which features both an engrossing story and great art. Miller is capable of so much more that it just isn't worth it to bother with this.
by Frank Miller
1991 Eisner Winner for Best Graphic Album
There was a time when I enjoyed Frank Miller's work a lot. I have both omnibuses of his Daredevil work to use an obvious connection. I enjoyed at least the beginning of Sin City. I genuinely liked 300. I'm not a fan of Batman and I find Batman: Year One to be magnificent. In spite of this at some point Miller started slipping. These days it's almost guaranteed that I'm going to hate anything he creates. Elektra Lives Again has a strong attachment to his good work so I was expecting something that I'd at least enjoy. What I got was a book that was good to look at and a story that I could only follow by knowing the history of the characters involved.
In the early 80's Miller wrote a story for Daredevil where the title character's former girlfriend Elektra became a ninja assassin, turned on her masters, and then died (essentially the story used for the Daredevil movie). Miller revisited this story a few times before this graphic novel where Daredevil fears that the ninja clan may be attempting to resurrect Elektra and brainwash her. Then he finds signs that she may already be alive and the ninjas are working to create an even deadlier warrior to put Elektra back into her grave.
I could barely follow the story as I read Elektra Lives Again. It is a mess. I could give you a broad outline of events but the details blur and get muddied. This was after going through some portions again ten minutes ago to make sure I had things straight. Miller was solidly tied to the ninja craze in the 1980's and it shows through in this book as the ninjas are magic assassins who can do anything except kill the heroes because they're ninjas.
Character motivations are opaque to me for anything beyond the broad strokes. I can get the Elektra wants to kill ninjas, ninjas want to kill Elektra, and Daredevil wants to save her aspect of things. The problems for me are when Daredevil just lets Elektra walk past him on a staircase. Or when in his identity as a lawyer he jumps into bed with one of his clients. Or why the ninjas attack Daredevil to get information when any observation would demonstrate that he still thinks Elektra is dead. Topping it all off the conclusion is built on an emotional epiphany that that left me baffled; it was the equivalent of having a caption saying, "And then suddenly he was all better."
On the positive side of things Miller's art is just as terrific as always in Elektra Lives Again. He draws elaborate, dense pages that just pull me in. He often uses a jumble of staccato images that look like they should be a chaotic mess and then as I examine them closer the story in them emerges. As with 300 his wife Lynn Varley painted over his pencils and her soft coloring adds a pleasant texture to the book.
Good art by Miller doesn't justify the unreadable story. While he was creating Elektra Lives Again he was gearing up for Sin City which features both an engrossing story and great art. Miller is capable of so much more that it just isn't worth it to bother with this.
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
The 2009 Nebula Nominees Are...
Here are the finalists on the 2009 Nebula ballot straight from the SFWA:
Novel:
The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi
The Love We Share Without Knowing by Christopher Barzak
Flesh and Fire by Laura Anne Gilman
The City & The City by China Miéville
Boneshaker by Cherie Priest
Finch by Jeff VanderMeer
Novella:
The Women of Nell Gwynne’s by Kage Baker
“Arkfall” by Carolyn Ives Gilman
“Act One by” Nancy Kress
Shambling Towards Hiroshima by James Morrow
“Sublimation Angels” by Jason Sanford
The God Engines by John Scalzi
Novelette:
“The Gambler” by Paolo Bacigalupi
“Vinegar Peace, or the Wrong-Way Used-Adult Orphanage” by Michael Bishop
“I Needs Must Part, The Policeman Said” by Richard Bowes
“Sinner, Baker, Fabulist, Priest; Red Mask, Black Mask, Gentleman, Beast” by Eugie Foster
“Divining Light” by Ted Kosmatka
“A Memory of Wind” by Rachel Swirsky
Short Story:
“Hooves and the Hovel of Abdel Jameela” by Saladin Ahmed
“I Remember the Future” by Michael A. Burstein
“Non-Zero Probabilities” by N. K. Jemisin
“Spar” by Kij Johnson
“Going Deep” by James Patrick Kelly
“Bridesicle” by Will McIntosh
Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy:
Hotel Under the Sand by Kage Baker
Ice by Sarah Beth Durst
Ash by Malinda Lo
Eyes Like Stars by Lisa Mantchev
Zoe’s Tale by John Scalzi
When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead
The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland In A Ship Of Her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente
Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld
Dramatic Presentation
Star Trek by JJ Abrams, Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman
District 9 by Neill Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell
Avatar by James Cameron
Moon by Duncan Jones and Nathan Parker
Up by Bob Peterson and Pete Docter
Coraline by Henry Selick
If you're wondering why those people get the credit for the dramatic presentation award it's because the Nebula goes to the credited screenwriter.
Novel:
The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi
The Love We Share Without Knowing by Christopher Barzak
Flesh and Fire by Laura Anne Gilman
The City & The City by China Miéville
Boneshaker by Cherie Priest
Finch by Jeff VanderMeer
Novella:
The Women of Nell Gwynne’s by Kage Baker
“Arkfall” by Carolyn Ives Gilman
“Act One by” Nancy Kress
Shambling Towards Hiroshima by James Morrow
“Sublimation Angels” by Jason Sanford
The God Engines by John Scalzi
Novelette:
“The Gambler” by Paolo Bacigalupi
“Vinegar Peace, or the Wrong-Way Used-Adult Orphanage” by Michael Bishop
“I Needs Must Part, The Policeman Said” by Richard Bowes
“Sinner, Baker, Fabulist, Priest; Red Mask, Black Mask, Gentleman, Beast” by Eugie Foster
“Divining Light” by Ted Kosmatka
“A Memory of Wind” by Rachel Swirsky
Short Story:
“Hooves and the Hovel of Abdel Jameela” by Saladin Ahmed
“I Remember the Future” by Michael A. Burstein
“Non-Zero Probabilities” by N. K. Jemisin
“Spar” by Kij Johnson
“Going Deep” by James Patrick Kelly
“Bridesicle” by Will McIntosh
Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy:
Hotel Under the Sand by Kage Baker
Ice by Sarah Beth Durst
Ash by Malinda Lo
Eyes Like Stars by Lisa Mantchev
Zoe’s Tale by John Scalzi
When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead
The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland In A Ship Of Her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente
Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld
Dramatic Presentation
Star Trek by JJ Abrams, Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman
District 9 by Neill Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell
Avatar by James Cameron
Moon by Duncan Jones and Nathan Parker
Up by Bob Peterson and Pete Docter
Coraline by Henry Selick
If you're wondering why those people get the credit for the dramatic presentation award it's because the Nebula goes to the credited screenwriter.
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Review - The Left Bank Gang and The Last Musketeer
The Left Bank Gang
by Jason
2007 Eisner Winner for Best U.S. Edition of Foreign Material
The Last Musketeer
by Jason
2009 Eisner Winner for Best U.S. Edition of Foreign Material
There are several reasons why I'm pairing these books together rather than giving them each a turn in the spotlight. They're both extremely short, they're both from the same creator, and they both have a similar style in storytelling. The art style is identical in both with their animal headed people and rigid panel structure. They're also both absolutely terrific.
My favorite of the two (and it's a close thing) is The Left Bank Gang. It depicts Ernest Hemingway, James Joyce, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Ezra Pound as struggling comic book artists in early 20th century Paris. Most of them are having money troubles when Hemingway comes up with a plan for a large heist. Zelda Fitzgerald gets wind of the plan and then things go badly.
The Last Musketeer is a pulp adventure romp where Athos is the last person to wear the uniform of the Musketeers four hundred years after the end of the novels. When Mars invades Paris he travels to the red planet to fight back even though he stands alone. Once there he finds a princess who is more capable than the men around her and willing to help stop the invasion, an emperor who is too bored for his own good, and an old enemy waiting for a showdown.
I'm going to start with The Last Musketeer since that's the one that I have the least to say about it. That's because while it is a charming mash up of Dumas and Flash Gordan there's nothing more to it than that. Athos confronts some Martians in the anachronistic way of a French gentleman, they fight, and then cut to an interlude before things repeat. This is appropriate for the homage Jason is creating but the impression I'm left with at the end is "Well that was fun."
The Last Musketeer also a funny book. Athos's mindset is stuck in the seventeenth century so his reaction to scifi tropes like an evil robot is amusing. The princess is set up in a traditional pulp role where she should be the clinging damsel who betrayed her father for the love of the hero; instead she's a no-nonsense, tough woman who has no time being kept in that role. And the villains seem to be just playing their their required part even though they're not really happy about it.
The Left Bank Gang, on the other hand, starts off in a straightforward method but then when the heist starts splits in over half a dozen viewpoints of the events where no one has the whole story. Suddenly there's seven interwoven narratives being told one at a time and each one reveals just a little bit more. They're all complete from their own perspectives but the they make up something greater when combined. Jason is masterful in his use of this technique and it made the last half of The Left Bank Gang extremely engaging.
I also had a lot of fun with the reimagining of early twentieth century authors into comic book artists. The humorous parts of the book tie into that theme. If you have a broad familiarity with their lives then it adds an extra layer to the story.
The best word I can describe the art with is rigid. Every character is stiff as a board with limited movement. Every page is a nine panel grid. Everything is hard edged. These are not beautiful looking books but the artwork serves its purpose.
One of the things that I like the most about my hobby is that every so often I find some writer who is so intriguing that I want to read more from them. I had never read anything by Jason before these books and now I want to read a lot more of his books. They're entertaining and charming and that's more than enough reason for me to recommend them.
by Jason
2007 Eisner Winner for Best U.S. Edition of Foreign Material
The Last Musketeer
by Jason
2009 Eisner Winner for Best U.S. Edition of Foreign Material
There are several reasons why I'm pairing these books together rather than giving them each a turn in the spotlight. They're both extremely short, they're both from the same creator, and they both have a similar style in storytelling. The art style is identical in both with their animal headed people and rigid panel structure. They're also both absolutely terrific.
My favorite of the two (and it's a close thing) is The Left Bank Gang. It depicts Ernest Hemingway, James Joyce, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Ezra Pound as struggling comic book artists in early 20th century Paris. Most of them are having money troubles when Hemingway comes up with a plan for a large heist. Zelda Fitzgerald gets wind of the plan and then things go badly.
The Last Musketeer is a pulp adventure romp where Athos is the last person to wear the uniform of the Musketeers four hundred years after the end of the novels. When Mars invades Paris he travels to the red planet to fight back even though he stands alone. Once there he finds a princess who is more capable than the men around her and willing to help stop the invasion, an emperor who is too bored for his own good, and an old enemy waiting for a showdown.
I'm going to start with The Last Musketeer since that's the one that I have the least to say about it. That's because while it is a charming mash up of Dumas and Flash Gordan there's nothing more to it than that. Athos confronts some Martians in the anachronistic way of a French gentleman, they fight, and then cut to an interlude before things repeat. This is appropriate for the homage Jason is creating but the impression I'm left with at the end is "Well that was fun."
The Last Musketeer also a funny book. Athos's mindset is stuck in the seventeenth century so his reaction to scifi tropes like an evil robot is amusing. The princess is set up in a traditional pulp role where she should be the clinging damsel who betrayed her father for the love of the hero; instead she's a no-nonsense, tough woman who has no time being kept in that role. And the villains seem to be just playing their their required part even though they're not really happy about it.
The Left Bank Gang, on the other hand, starts off in a straightforward method but then when the heist starts splits in over half a dozen viewpoints of the events where no one has the whole story. Suddenly there's seven interwoven narratives being told one at a time and each one reveals just a little bit more. They're all complete from their own perspectives but the they make up something greater when combined. Jason is masterful in his use of this technique and it made the last half of The Left Bank Gang extremely engaging.
I also had a lot of fun with the reimagining of early twentieth century authors into comic book artists. The humorous parts of the book tie into that theme. If you have a broad familiarity with their lives then it adds an extra layer to the story.
The best word I can describe the art with is rigid. Every character is stiff as a board with limited movement. Every page is a nine panel grid. Everything is hard edged. These are not beautiful looking books but the artwork serves its purpose.
One of the things that I like the most about my hobby is that every so often I find some writer who is so intriguing that I want to read more from them. I had never read anything by Jason before these books and now I want to read a lot more of his books. They're entertaining and charming and that's more than enough reason for me to recommend them.
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