Panic.

- Panic. Lauren Oliver. The impoverished town of Carp, New York, has an annual tradition: the Panic game. During the summer, all willing high school graduates will compete in a high-risk series of dares for a jackpot that might give them a chance to flee their stifling town and start a new life. Heather, out for meaning and Dodge, out for revenge, are seemingly the strongest contestants this time. But life is full of harsh, unexpected twists and turns…

Oliver, of “Before I fall”, gives us another YA thriller with a finely developed teenage cast. The plot is intriguing, though a couple plot twists are fairly easy to guess and the resolution is somewhat unsatisfying. But the real virtue is the characters, their believable motivations, contradictions and increasing desperation as the game draws to a close. 

While not quite on par with “Before”, this is nevertheless a perfectly serviceable suspense yarn, worth at least one look. 

Grandpa's monster movies.

- Grandpa’s monster movies (Deadtime stories #10). A. G. Gascone. Snooty city cousins C. T. and Lea are not having a good time at their family reunion. Oh, Grandpa and Grandma are okay, mostly on account they serve fried chicken. But the lower-class uncle and his wife and kids who eat stuff that doesn’t come out of a KFC? And the single uncle who likes animals and happens to be very hairy! They keep EXISTING and, like, not apologizing for it, how dare they! And there is also a man-eating monster on the loose, but really, that’s noting compared to the fact that these poor privileged middle-class kids are expected not to spit on their ugly poor relatives. The horror. 

“Deadtime Stories” was one of several children’s horror knock-offs that littered the 90’s in the wake of the success of “Goosebumps” (and several predecessors). Some, like “Shivers”, tended to be even better than the series the publishers wished to ape. And some, like this series offered by sisters Annette and Gina Gascone under a shared pen name, reminds us that 90% of everything is at best mediocre. 

To be sure: In terms of plot itself, this book is neither particularly bad or good: It’s a fairly standard monster story that takes a specific horror sub-genre ant presents a somewhat watered-down version to make it suitable for —not for children, exactly (good authors for children know that they are often much more resilient than adults and teenagers), bur rather suitable for mainstream publishers. The genre in question here is equal parts “Southern Gothic” (as the name implies, Gothic tales set in rural South US) and what one might call “Hillbilly horror”. 

And it’s this second part that is the problem: The atmosphere and the violence might be toned down, but the classicism inherent in the sub-genre is present in full (the only thing not applied is anything sexual —and frankly, the book is *this* close to insinuating that one set of characters are inbred and that the single uncle is a zoophile). Every description of the rural, blue-collar characters is meant to evoke revulsion from the reader, or at the bare minimum a nervous titter. I have seen at least one review that comes this close to agreeing with this viewpoint, too. Small surprise. Appealing to the lowest common denominator usually finds the vilest kind of sympathy. 

One might say —okay, but what if we ignore all of that and just focus on the monster part? Well, first, it’s difficult, because the book is 90% gross descriptions of relatives, 10% plot. And the plot itself is… undercooked, to say the least. The concept isn’t bad: A “wild pet” that has been kept captive and secret for at least three generations but which gets loose every so often and wrecks havoc. But the actual execution is riddled with plot holes: How can this creature be kept a secret when it has killed people in plain sight, even registered in film? (Why, yes, the title is literal. Grandpa kept home movies of the monster for reasons that are left as an exercise for the reader). How unfortunate does a man have to be to be stuck by lightning SIXTEEN times and also get a literal monster at an arcade? Where did that arcade machine come from and why was it in the middle of a county fair? How can one take a cartoonish plot like blowing up a monster with TNT seriously? (Some might argue that the ending is meant to be silly, but nothing in the prose suggests that the Gascone sisters are playing it tongue-in-cheek. Involuntarily hilarious is more like it). 

The result, then, is a book that is more a curiosity (an often irritating curiosity), a sampling of a specific era, than a good story on its own right. 

Golden Kamuy.

- Golden Kamuy, vol. 1. Satoru Noda. Saichi Sugimoto, a veteran of the Russo-Japanese war, has been mining for gold in Hokkaido, hoping to be able to fulfill a promise he made to a fallen comrade (well, he has a couple other reasons besides the promise). One night, he hears what appears to be a tall tale about a legendary treasure buried somewhere in the region —and the map leading to the treasure was tattooed on the skin of twenty runaway prisoners. The next morning he discovers that the story is true and he has just found the first piece of the map! Now he sets on a journey along with Asirpa, a courageous Ainu girl who seeks revenge for the murder of her father. It will be a long journey, full of dangerous forces of nature and even more dangerous men…

Terrific adventure story that benefits both from Noda’s gorgeous artwork and from a careful investigation both historical and cultural (Noda credits the help of linguist Hiroshi Nakagawa and this volume includes an extensive list of reference material on Ainu customs and history). The story is quite brutal, yet never gratuitously so. It pulls back no punches regarding inclement subzero conditions or wild animals, nor when depicting hunting and skinning of animals (…and people, when the villains get horribly creative), yet it’s presented less for spectacle than for conveying a specific atmosphere. 

Also notable is the subtle depiction of cultural prejudices —at one point Sugimoto beats up a man who calls Asirpa a “pet dog”, and to her comment that she is used to it, he replies “And why should you have to get used to it?”. Sugimoto himself was despised in his hometown for being the last of a sickly family (all neighbors shunned him fearing contagion —all but his two friends, that is). When a man from the prosperous port town of Otaru thanks Sugimoto for his military service (“It’s thanks to soldiers like you that we were able to take back Southern Karafuto. Thanks to you, this port will continue to prosper. Thank you for all you’ve done”), he bluntly replies “The merchants are the only ones getting rich”. It’s a harsh world, then and now, there and here, but ultimately what we do about it matters. 

A very recommended comic, one that I look forward to continue reading. 

Yon & Mu.

- Junji Ito’s Cat Diary: Yon & Mu. Autor J-kun has just moved into a new home with his fiancée, A-ko. But with her comes an unspeakable curse: A pair of cats. Ghastly looking, mysterious…and adorable! Can J-kun shed his dog-lover persona and win the sympathies of his new feline friends? 

In 2009, famous horror manga artist Junji Ito (Uzumaki, Gyo) delivered a comedy based on his real-life experiences with pet cats (partly on a suggestion from his Editor; partly to recapture his start as a humor comic author). The result is an unusual comic with which Ito pokes fun at his own excesses. Be they the over-the-top expressions, the characters over-reacting to any little surprise or the monstrous designs out of nowhere, it delivers a much-needed splash of cold water to fans who take his work a little too seriously. 

And outside of that, is it a good comic? Well, it’s a fairly original slice-of-life yarn, and while the comedy will probably not be as effective for people unfamiliar with Ito, it still manages to be an occasionally moving story wrapped in a bizarre exoskeleton. 

Generally, an interesting, off-beat manga worth at least a look. 

The lobster.

- The lobster (Ireland, et. al. 2015, dir. Yorgos Lanthimos). Middle-aged David has just been left by his wife. Sad, yet ordinary. Well, except that in the world he lives in, it is not possible to live in society without a partner. In fact, when you are single, you are sent to a posh hotel that is also a concentration camp, in which you have a total of 45 days to find yourself a new partner (only heterosexual and homosexual options. Bisexuality is not allowed). If not, you are turned into an animal so you can more or less contribute something to the world. David has already chosen —he wants to be a lobster. But maybe there are other options, such as the renegade singles called “Loners” —well, maybe if the hotel ‘guests’ weren’t expected to hunt Loners for sport…

The best high-concept movies are those that start with a wacky premise and play it with aplomb and seriousness (without falling into involuntary humor, that is). Here we have a dystopia that is all the more horrifying because of how convincing its over-the-top premise manages to be. In a world where non-romantic relationships are heavily discouraged and children are ‘assigned’ to quarreling couples on the premise that it will help them solve their problems, becoming an animal almost seems a sensible choice. Except that said animals are invariably killed an eaten anyway. 

A darkly comic, profoundly disturbing little movie. Very much recommended, particularly for fans of off-beat cinema. 

Yuge!

- Yuge! 30 years of Doonesbury on Trump. G. B. Trudeau. A compilation of Doonesbury strips featuring or commenting on the shenanigans of Donald Trump (hardly even exaggerated, given that the man is practically a living caricature), covering the 80’s (ostentatious yachts perpetually circling his casinos), the 90’s (said casinos driven to bankruptcy), the 2000’s (hosting a morally repulsive game show) and the current 2010’s (political circus that ended in a real life nightmare). 

As it is the “Doonesbury” strip, there are thousands of recurrent characters, and lots of arcs will be seemingly forgotten or left unsolved —although, most of them have a pretty easy to grasp personality and history. While one wishes the author’s introduction had given as much attention to the ongoing storylines and characters as to the importance of satire in general, it is nevertheless an entertaining compilation. 

It has been hailed as something of a warning (indeed author Trudeau has appeared on actual tv shows and been asked how he predicted Trump’s presidency) —yet, reading the strip, it’s rather obvious that anybody with a grasp on American history and celebrity excesses knew it would head that way. Which may say more about the public at large than about the comic strip…

Either way, the result is a book that is still worth revisiting, not just to laugh for a while but to see what disasters might yet be fixed and prevented in the near future. 

(P.S. For anybody wondering, “Yuge” is, I’m told, a stereotypical New York pronunciation of “Huge”)

Free country.

- Free country: A tale of the children’s crusade. Neil Gaiman, et. al. Overnight, the children of Flaxdown have disappeared without a trace —a phenomenon that is soon repeated in several places all over the world. Investigating the case are Rowland and Paine, detectives far more earnest than experienced, but who have a certain unique asset: they are both ghost children. Soon it becomes apparent that there is a massive conspiracy at play, involving millennia-old magic and five very special children en route to a place called Free Country. But is it a heaven for abused children or an altogether new kind of hell? 

This particular comic is something of a curiosity —not only for the high concept premise (which mixes real life tragedies like the infamous ‘Chidren’s crusade’ with the legend of the Pied Piper and a dash of “Childe Roland to the dark tower came”, plus even more ancient rhymes and fairytales), nor for the decidedly unique cast —but because it is the “collected edition” of a story that never truly was. 

You see, “The children’s crusade” was conceived circa 1992 as a crossover between the major Vertigo titles. It would involve the children of each ongoing book — Rowland and Paine from “The sandman” (and the spinoff “Dead boy detectives”), Maxine Baker from “Animal Man”, Dorothy Spinner from “Doom Patrol”, Tefé from “Swamp Thing”, Suzy from “Black Orchid” and Tim Hunter from “The books of magic”. Gaiman wrote two issues, the first by himself and the second with Alisa Kwitney and Jamie Delano, which were effectively the prologue and epilogue of the crossover. Each chapter would be covered in the Annuals for each of the other comic books. 

But… that didn’t quite happen. Most of the writers were simply uninterested in breaking their ongoing stories for the sake of an experimental crossover (to be fair, this gimmick has certainly become bloated in current times, particularly at DC and Marvel). 

Consequently, this edition features a completely new middle written by Toby Litt and Rachel Pollack, and between the three they make a coherent story… kind of. Truth be told, as a story it can be best described as “uneven”. For one thing, out of the seven intended protagonists, Dorothy is not really in the book at all, while Tefé is reduced to a couple pages-long cameo. Maxine is practically a villain because of her compressed character arc. Suzy, being left with very little to do, comes across as something of an airhead. Rowland and Paine solve the mystery pretty much by accident and then save the day thanks to a deus-ex-machina. And while Tim Hunter fares much better (he has a consistent personality and is the only one who both acts as an actual child and is actually smart enough to think before he acts), he essentially appears out of nowhere and then simply drops out of the story. 

Yet there is a lot to like here, particularly an extremely intriguing plot involving Freedom Land itself (and peopled by some truly disturbing villains). It is very tempting to imagine the entire story done again, this time without the baggage of needing to accommodate already-existing character beats and instead with characters made from scratch. 

There’s a writing prompt, for sure…