Following in the wake of Alan Moore's Swamp Thing and the post-Crisis reimagining of the DC universe, Grant Morrison was able to grab a relatively obsFollowing in the wake of Alan Moore's Swamp Thing and the post-Crisis reimagining of the DC universe, Grant Morrison was able to grab a relatively obscure character like Animal Man and really go to town creating a masterpiece. On the one hand, Buddy Baker is a grounded, believable character with a real personality and relationship to ethics and politics beyond the average superhero. On the other hand, Morrison was able to use him as a creative springboard to break into the avant garde of comics. Coyote Gospel alone is one of the most surprising, funny, and intriguing single issues I've ever read in superhero comics. Consistently innovative and evocative....more
No. 5 sets itself apart not only by its strange and visually distinct world, but by an impeccably precise artistic vision. Aesthetically there are eleNo. 5 sets itself apart not only by its strange and visually distinct world, but by an impeccably precise artistic vision. Aesthetically there are elements of Moebius and Otomo, but Taiyo Matsumoto has a real distinctive approach to drawing, favoring expressive cross-hatching to screen tones and bringing life to the drawings with scratchy contours that seem to buzz with energy. Moreover, the panel-to-panel storytelling is exquisite, frequently cutting between locations and moments, evoking a powerful sense of ambiance and atmosphere. The way action sequences are plotted out on the page is breath-taking, segmenting out erratic glimpses of moments. The way the artist employs panel size to invest the reader in the jarring chaos of a tense pursuit and then open up to a serene landscape shows the total mastery of temporality....more
Toni Morrison's prose is so rich and fluid, just dripping off of each page like thick honey. She populates her world with a cast of fully realized chaToni Morrison's prose is so rich and fluid, just dripping off of each page like thick honey. She populates her world with a cast of fully realized characters with strange names and stranger lives. She explores the power of names and naming, of family and legacy, of property and powerlessness. What is the inheritance of Black Americans? Is it gold or bones? Property or kinship?...more
**spoiler alert** Published posthumously, this is a sprawling and ambitious work divided into five parts, originally intended to be published as separ**spoiler alert** Published posthumously, this is a sprawling and ambitious work divided into five parts, originally intended to be published as separate volumes (although it must be said that some of these would read very strangely on their own).
I. The Part about the Critics: The book unfolds with a small cohort of European literary critics who find themselves to be experts on a somewhat obscure, reclusive German novelist by the name of Benno von Archimboldi. Over the decades they become a close-knit group, obsessed with their expertise on the German author and in discovering the secrets of his life. As the Archimboldians meet up at various academic conferences across Europe throughout the decades, they play a part in boosting the prestige and mystique of Archimboldi, all the while descending into a chaotic and frivolous love triangle. When they receive a tip of dubious authenticity that Archimboldi was seen in Santa Teresa, a fictional border town in Sonora, they rush out to Mexico in hopes of finding him and bringing him back to Europe to receive the Nobel Prize. Throughout this section, the mythological weight of Archimboldi weighs heavily over the reader, despite the fact that we know next to nothing about him or even his literature, which is only hinted at in the most pretentious and meaningless critiques.
II. The Part about Amolfitano In Santa Teresa, we follow Oscar Amolfitano, a Chilean philosophy professor who, being the only person in town to have even heard of Archimboldi, briefly helps out the hapless literary critics. His life in Santa Teresa is overshadowed by the growing rumors of the murder of women around the city, and he grows to worry about his adult daughter. Ultimately, he descends into a sort of madness, drawing inscrutable philosophical/geometrical diagrams and tormented by incorporeal homophobic voices.
III. The Part About Fate Oscar Fate, a reporter for a Black magazine, interviews former Black Panthers and the Last Communist in Brooklyn, before being sent out on assignment to Santa Teresa to cover a boxing match. This section is dripping with a noir dread, a Lynchian unease lurking in the shadows of the city. The mystery of the murders overshadows everything, making the boxing match, philosophy, and literary criticism all fade away into frivolous noise.
IV. The Part About the Crimes Far and away the longest section, here the reader is essentially faced with a challenge of endurance. For hundreds of pages, you are beset by description after description of every woman murdered in Santa Teresa, month after month, year after year. The descriptions do not shy away from the disturbing details of sexual assault and violence, but all with a clinical, detached tone that washes over the reader again and again and again for hundreds of pages. I completely understand if this puts off a lot of readers from finishing the book. Eventually a suspect, a German-American expat, is arrested for the murders, but seeing as the violence continues un-abated after his arrest, it seems that the real killers will never be discovered. This part is brutally exhausting.
V. The Part About Archimboldi Finally, the long-awaited mystery of Archimboldi's mystery is revealed. The descriptions of the Eastern Front and the discovery of a secret notebook detailing the life and literary career of Ansky, a Soviet Jew, are heart-breaking and sublime. Strangely, the unfolding of Archimboldi's life is full of pathos, and yet surprisingly spartan and banal, especially once he begins his literary career. I was worried that the so many loose threads from this would all be left unaddressed in a messy sprawl at the end of this, but the ending is emotionally satisfying and impactful while still leaving a thousand more unanswered questions.
Ultimately, it's hard to recommend this book as its scope and subjects are all over the place, but after reading it I felt like I've underwent a journey of some significance to my life. Maybe in 2666 some of this will make more sense. ...more
A brilliant deconstruction of modernism's quest for truth through the prism of the detective novel transplanted into a medieval monastery. While WilliA brilliant deconstruction of modernism's quest for truth through the prism of the detective novel transplanted into a medieval monastery. While William and Adso think they are navigating the labyrinth of the Aedificium towards its exit, they are in fact enmeshed in a Deleuzian rhizome, in which all paths connect infinitely, and there is no escape. William embodies both a burgeoning modern logic in the wake of Roger Bacon and William of Occam, and simultaneously a post-modern deconstruction of that logic. In the search for knowledge and the rooting out of heretics, the reader finds obvious parallels to contemporary political conflicts, yet every detail in the text is extremely rooted in its particular medieval cosmology. That the mystery converges on the idea of humor as an existential threat to the Church is strange and yet fully supported by the apocalyptic worldview you have entered into. This is a narrative about narratives, in which sexual ecstasy is expressed through recited biblical metaphor and nightmares through parodic medieval romances:
"Now I realized that not infrequently books speak of books: it is as if they spoke among themselves. In the light of this reflection, the library seemed all the more disturbing to me. It was then the place of a long, centuries-old murmuring, an imperceptible dialogue between one parchment and another, a living thing, a receptacle of powers not to be ruled by a human mind, a treasure of secrets emanated by many minds, surviving the death of those who had produced them or had been their conveyors."
"Moral: There exist obsessive ideas, they are never personal; books talk among themselves, and any true detection should prove that we are the guilty party."...more
I've been on a real capeshit kick lately and thought I had consigned myself to an acceptance of a certain level of mediocrity, and then I got around tI've been on a real capeshit kick lately and thought I had consigned myself to an acceptance of a certain level of mediocrity, and then I got around to this one and remembered why I love comics. The artwork by Veitch and Totleben (no Bissette on this one, though he writes a lovely forward) conjoins exquisitely with Moore's writing to create a living visual poetry on the page. Also after being subjected to some horrible "remastered coloring" I have to praise Tatjana Wood's masterful color work, especially in "My Blue Heaven," which draws out so much lonely pain out of such a limited palette.
Getting my hands on this has finally completed my reading of Alan Moore's run, albeit all out of order, so I'm probably due for a reread from the beginning. This is probably my favorite superhero run ever? (If you can even call it that) So much quiet, mournful pathos, yearning and love, and magical philosophy. Abbie Arcane is maybe the best written female character in superhero comics?...more
An aching life story of abandonment, alienation, and self-discovery, all tinged with the psychedelic, supernatural, and Lovecraftian. One of Clowes' bAn aching life story of abandonment, alienation, and self-discovery, all tinged with the psychedelic, supernatural, and Lovecraftian. One of Clowes' best....more
The quintessential fairy tale, seamlessly blending naive innocence with dark morbidity. Gender shenanigans abound, from classic theatrical quiproquo tThe quintessential fairy tale, seamlessly blending naive innocence with dark morbidity. Gender shenanigans abound, from classic theatrical quiproquo to surprisingly nuanced explorations of gender identity and presentation. The visual storytelling on display is unparalleled. It all seems very simple and yet there is a sense of motion and momentum and animation that is truly remarkable. There's a strong visual inspiration from old Disney cartoons, but also I think a lot of the action reminds me of the great classic Max Fleischer animations. Osaku Tezuka really is a master of the craft....more
After reading Silver Surfer Black, I knew Tradd Moore was an artist to look out for, but even still this totally blew me away. I love this self-contaiAfter reading Silver Surfer Black, I knew Tradd Moore was an artist to look out for, but even still this totally blew me away. I love this self-contained epic of Dr Strange as a midwife having to deliver this Eldritch hell baby. The visuals are incredible, a surreal, psychedelic, Boschian nightmare. The character designs are also really inspired, with Dr Strange giving slender sexy elf against a whole horde of outstanding Dark Souls bosses. The composition of action sequences are impeccable, with the multiplication of figures ad infinitum and every line of motion stretched and squashed to the absolute limit. Despite there being so much chaos going on, the heft and weight of momentum is so clear and you can practically hear the action screaming out of the page. Terrific, terrific stuff....more
While there are a bunch of good stories in this retrospective collection, I got this for one reason: Rocket Raccoon!
As a kid I picked up Issue 3 of BWhile there are a bunch of good stories in this retrospective collection, I got this for one reason: Rocket Raccoon!
As a kid I picked up Issue 3 of Bill Mantlo and Mike Mignola's Rocket Raccoon series from the comic store and I became completely obsessed. I read and reread that one issue, poring over the pages and trying to copy Mignola's art. The artwork, clearly riffing off the popular Star Wars comics of the time, drew me in, but the strange world kept me coming back time and again.
Halfworld was founded long ago as a lunatic colony, but when the Shrinks were forced to return to their home world, they left behind robots to care for their patients and animals to be their pets. But as time went on, the descendants of the lunatics, born into a society structured entirely around the framework of an insane asylum, developed a religious worship of their long-departed Shrinks, reduced to myth. And the logical robots, tiring of their duty to oversee the lunatics, retreated to their half of the planet to build a colossal humanoid spacecraft. They left behind the animals, granted sentience through cybernetic implants, to care for the humans. This culture, structured around insanity, devolved into a "Toy War" between two competing capitalist toy-making factions, vying for a monopoly over toy manufacturing. Our heroes, Rocket Raccoon, Lyla, Wal Rus, and Blackjack O'Hare, must navigate this insane society and eventually uncover the truth of its origin.
This premise is absolutely insane, unlike anything I'd ever read in superhero comics, and despite its goofy absurdity, it is grounded in its attention to detail for this world. Every panel has some crazy detail that is just absolutely joyful. The characters are all vibrant and unique and the action is dynamic as hell. The panel-to-panel storytelling is incredible, and filled with a slightly-meta cheeky tone. (Characters finish the sentences of narration boxes, at one point as the villains are spying on our heroes, a view screen repeats the previous panel, text boxes and all...)
As a kid just that one issue kept me coming back for more, imagining the incredible world that this story was a part of. So it was an absolute joy to finally read the full Rocket Raccoon story....more
From it's first line, ("Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aueliano Buendía was to remember that distant afternoon when his fatheFrom it's first line, ("Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aueliano Buendía was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice") One Hundred Years of Solitude brings to life the story of a family trapped in a strange curse of time, memory, and tragedy. Already, we are brought into Macondo as a remembered place, the last memory at the end of a life (although, in this case, as it turns out, not the end of Colonel Aueliano Buendía as it seems). As one experiences the lives of the many Auelianos, José Arcadios, and Remedios of the Buendía family, generation after generation, all repeating and reliving the joys and sorrows and mistakes of their namesakes and ancestors, one can't help but to think of Marx's famous adage: "The tradition of all dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brains of the living."
It is a rare thing to be struck by such tender pain as this while reading a book. The long life of defeat of Colonel Aueliano Buendía, who lives to see his revolutionary project be co-opted by the very Conservative order it sought to overthrow, and who in death becomes but a half-remembered myth. José Arcadio Segundo, the lone survivor of a massacre of striking workers, who lives on as a living ghost, repeating the truth of the 3,000 dead to a world that not only believes that no such massacre occurred, but that the workers and the banana company that killed them never even existed in the first place. And at the end, the bastard Aueliano who is cursed to live "in the tide of a world that had ended and of which only the nostalgia remained."
This book reminds me a lot of Naguib Mahfouz's masterpiece The Harafish, both of which lay out tragedies generation after generation, with cycles of prosperity and degeneration. You close this out like Aureliano, who "with a flash of lucidity [...] became aware that he was unable to bear in his soul the crushing weight of so much past."...more
It's hard to describe what this book is, let alone what it's doing. A surreal graphic memoir/how-to book? "Do you wish you could draw?" the cover asksIt's hard to describe what this book is, let alone what it's doing. A surreal graphic memoir/how-to book? "Do you wish you could draw?" the cover asks you, and the book proceeds to turn the way we think about drawing on its head. Barry's approach to art is one full of joy, yet never shies away from the dark places, the creepy shapes that appear at night as a child stares at the ceiling unable to sleep. "When we see the water-stain creatures, are we inventing them or is the ceiling inventing them?"
"What is making a picture all about? Is it for everyone? What makes kids draw? What makes adults scared to draw? Yes, it IS real fear. But of what? Why aren't kids scared of it? And what is it that one day comes to make them afraid?"
Working with kids everyday, I am fascinated by the process of drawing and how it changes as kids grow up, how they gain fine motor control and yet grow to lose the spark of spontaneity, becoming obsessed with how to draw such and such a thing the "correct" way.
"In terrible times, people sing. Things can be said no other way. Mourners sing. Music makes a way. It's not a way out but a way in. Where do you go when you color? Where can a brush take you? It can take you to the singing place."...more
**spoiler alert** Trading in the gothic horror for Kirby-esque psychedelic science fiction, this is nevertheless one of the finest showcases of the Sw**spoiler alert** Trading in the gothic horror for Kirby-esque psychedelic science fiction, this is nevertheless one of the finest showcases of the Swampy genius of Moore, Bissette, Veitch, Totleben, and everyone else. Swamp Thing's consciousness endures an odyssey lost in deep space, manifesting itself in the various flora of distant planets. In "Loving the Alien," Swamp Thing's consciousness is absorbed by a nightmarish bio-mechanical planet, descending through layer after layer of psychedelic photo-collage hells, his body liquefied and stripped away, his genetic material used to inseminate the living "island". Then, in "All Flesh is Grass," Swamp Thing inadvertantly initiates the Human Instrumentality Project, manifesting a corporeal form out of hundreds of thousands of living sentient plants, their consciousnesses merged together into an ungodly nightmare of intimacy. As always in Moore's Swamp Thing, there is a lot of sensuality, with some very sexy hawk ladies and finally, at long last, some sweet, swampy lovemaking....more
This is an incredible portrait of Canada's dirty underside, an extractive sore that churns through human beings and bituminous sand alike. Everyone isThis is an incredible portrait of Canada's dirty underside, an extractive sore that churns through human beings and bituminous sand alike. Everyone is complicit in this exploitation, and everyone a victim. Working-class men are sucked in from the Maritimes by the lure of quick money, deprived of their community and identity, isolated in a remote frozen shithole for years on end. In turn they harass and assault the small cohort of women brave or desperate enough to risk living and working in such a male-dominated industry. And everyone is digging up the earth, destroying the land of the First Nations, and killing the humans and animals who have nowhere else to go.
"Do you think people are different at home than they are here? Then, are they different forever? People do things here they wouldn't do at home. But is that who they really are? Or are they who they are at home?"...more
Starting out this book might be daunting, as you are thrown into a world full of neologisms and untranslatable terms. Much like in The City & The CityStarting out this book might be daunting, as you are thrown into a world full of neologisms and untranslatable terms. Much like in The City & The City, Miéville explores the ideological and cultural contradictions of his world by describing around them- the keys to understanding these societies are often found in what is taboo, what is not spoken about, or even not thought. But stick with it, and by the time the linguistic revolution erupts it is something truly radical and brilliant. ...more
It's tempting to overlook Weimar Germany as nothing but the interim between the First and Second World Wars, and with the benefit of hindsight, it is It's tempting to overlook Weimar Germany as nothing but the interim between the First and Second World Wars, and with the benefit of hindsight, it is easy to see in the aftermath of Versailles all the seeds being planted for Hitler's inevitable rise to power. Such a view is overly teleological of course, and more importantly, overlooks a period of radical cultural vibrancy and political turmoil that is woefully underexamined. Some historians even point to Weimar as a historical triumph- a secular, pluralist liberal democracy with a progressive constitution rivaled only by the Soviet Union and Mexico, cut down in its prime by fascism. This reading, I feel however, overlooks the reactionary turn of the so-called "Social Fascist" SPD and ignores the difficult reality that some historical realities are over-determined– liberal democracy could never hold up under such heightened social contradictions.
Lutes' work here does an excellent job of bringing all these historical subtleties to light. The political tensions between socialism and barbarism are always just beneath the surface, without feeling like the spectre of Hitler is always just out of frame. Most all of the characters here are painfully aware that this fragile society cannot last, but at the same time they are still living their lives every day. Lutes spends a lot of time lingering on the private lives of these characters even when they are all alone, doing their chores and holding themselves together. There is a clear filmic influence from both Berlin: Die Sinfonie der Großstadt (the city as a character, a rhythm punctuated by the comings and goings of transit) as well as Der Himmel über Berlin (the omniscient look into the thoughts and desires of everyday Berliners in moments of quiet). Lutes also reminds us that even if liberal Weimar was untenable, it did represent a period of radical community for queer people that is joyfully and tragically illustrated by Lutes. ...more
"Squeeze! squeeze! squeeze! all the morning long; I squeezed that sperm till I myself almost melted into it; I squeezed that sperm till a strange sort"Squeeze! squeeze! squeeze! all the morning long; I squeezed that sperm till I myself almost melted into it; I squeezed that sperm till a strange sort of insanity came over me; and I found myself unwittingly squeezing my co-laborers' hands in it, mistaking their hands for the gentle globules. Such an abounding, affectionate, friendly, loving feeling did this avocation beget; that at last I was continually squeezing their hands, and looking up into their eyes sentimentally; as much as to say,–Oh! my dear fellow beings, why should we longer cherish any social acerbities, or know the slightest ill-humor or envy! Come; let us squeeze hands all round; nay, let us all squeeze ourselves into each other; let us squeeze ourselves universally into the very milk and sperm of kindness."...more
This book excels in the blunt, sincere, complicated, messy realities of gender, queerness, and parenthood. Nothing is sugarcoated or mystified to makeThis book excels in the blunt, sincere, complicated, messy realities of gender, queerness, and parenthood. Nothing is sugarcoated or mystified to make it easier for a cishet audience to swallow. The desires of characters are interrogated to a degree that is genuinely uncomfortable- desires of femininity and motherhood, trans or cis, in a patriarchal society are necessarily gonna be laced with some pretty fucked up shit and this book doesn't shy away from wrestling with that. I think the book is strongest when the limited third person narrator reveals the thought process of the characters obliquely- Reese's blunt, defensive righteousness and Ames' stoic dissociation are communicated fluidly to the reader, and the subtle unreliability of the narrator really digs into how these characters see themselves and their world. It's a little weaker when you get characters having long dialogues about social issues, but at the end of the day, that is the way that real people have conversations around these issues. There is a ton to chew on here even beyond the particulars trans experiences. It's a really beautiful and painful exploration of human identity, relationshipsd and desires....more
Radically intimate. Challenging in an ambiguous, yet fiercely resolute way. This is a masterpiece. "A wrong that can't be repaired must be transcendedRadically intimate. Challenging in an ambiguous, yet fiercely resolute way. This is a masterpiece. "A wrong that can't be repaired must be transcended."...more
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