I read some comics over the past fortnight. Or rather… attempted to.
Let’s do the ones I actually read first:
Riviere has done a lot of comics, but Goffin is unknown to me — and so is this series. I picked this up at random at a used book store.
And we’re talking classic, classic French(ey)-style adventure comics for children.
Look at the that hairdo! Just look at it!
I guess this series didn’t really take off, and there’s probably good reasons for that — the only original thing about it is that it’s set in Africa. Still, I really enjoyed reading it. The nostalgic-looking artwork is part of the charm for sure.
This is something I read in translation as a teenager, I think. Or at least something else from the Jessica Blandy series…
… because I could remember exactly zilch of the plot here, so perhaps I hadn’t read this before after all.
Here we’re talking about another French comics staple: Noirish hard boiled crime, set in the US. And again, not very original, but again, I enjoyed reading it and I’m going to see if there’s further albums of this in the used book store (which is where I picked this up).
I think I’ve read some of the previous “seasons” of this Rodolphe/Leo series about a super-natural(ish) investigator before, but I’m not sure whether they were also drawn by Marchal?
Marchal is no Leo, but it’s totally fine. He has a tendency to exaggerate the heads of the characters slightly, which is eeeh, but you’ve got nice interiors and good scenery and all of that stuff, so it’s very pleasant looking.
The story’s fine, too — lots of mystery and intrigue set in Écosse.
However, when we get to the supernatural/alien stuff, instead of giving you a sense of mystery and wonder (which is what Leo usually manages to pull off), here it just sits kinda flat.
But… it’s fine — I’m definitely reading the rest of the series.
And then we come to the other comics I attempted to read over these weeks, and I failed — and not because my French is risibly bad, because these books aren’t even in French:
I guess I shouldn’t even have picked up this Fantagraphics book, because…
… this art style is just so 2025, and it’s a clear signal that I’m not the target audience. That nose.
It’s drawn in a couple of styles…
… and it’s reminiscent of fairy tales, which is another thing that I just don’t enjoy reading. And… the storytelling is very choppy, what with the mixture of partaking of her thoughts and then suddenly an omniscient narrator — it’s just very “huh?”
I gave up after about fifty pages.
This is presented as being the hundredth issue of this thing, which I assume isn’t true…
… because it’s… I mean, I guess it’s a pastiche or send up of these kinds of things.
It’s got absolutely all the clichés. But I just didn’t find it funny, and if that’s how it was meant to be, then I didn’t find it exciting either.
I ditched this after about fifty pages.
Here’s another book I probably wouldn’t have bought if I’d seen it in person first, but I ordered it on line…
Because the artwork is just bizarre. Heavily photo referenced artwork is common, and it can be good or bad, but this time around, it’s like all the photo reference material comes from a phone camera that’s taken the shots five centimetres from people’s faces.
It’s like everybody is giving selfie face in every panel, which gets even more confusing when there’s people in varying distances, and it looks like up-close tick tocks on pause being placed in a 3D model.
It’s so disturbing that I couldn’t really concentrate on actually reading the book — but I did make an effort, and it seems like the worst pile of clichés that have ever been heaped into one book.
But I guess it’s meant for sixteen year olds? So again, I guess I’m not the target audience.
I abandoned this after about forty pages.
However, this one sounds just up my street, in a way.
And look at this artwork! It’s great!
Unfortunately, the storytelling is really choppy.
And the dialogue is so stilted that, and you’re not going to believe this: I gave up after about fifty pages.
It might well be the translation that’s at fault here, but…
And that’s it for these two weeks.