REVIEW: Heavy Metal #274

Dear Screamers and Hurlers!

Alright, “Julia and Roem” is heating up.  I will wait to give a better idea after a few installments, but as always, lovely. And “The 49^th Key” is moving along as well.

I liked “Things of Real Life” and its ironic ending.  Interesting how Christianity parallels what Christians I know would classify as witchcraft.  But attacks are easy. The artwork makes me think of Rick Veitch.

I liked the Gallery feature, despite my eschewal of titties in HM (remember “why does Johnny read HM?”). While I don’t want this to be an all female cosplay, I recognize the talent and effort that goes into these photos, and they are quality.

Tessandro’s and Lages’ “Homo Bonum Est” shows some talent; fine line, color and great fight scenes.  These are not easy; I’ve one friend who has worked several months to produce such choreography and these guys got the chops.  Yay for strong women and a merciful ending.

Despite some delightful grotesquerie, don’t get me wrong, I am still not in love with the Molen’s “Aftermath”. Maybe it will work out into a complete world build and I will be ecstatic, but so far, I just look for the pictures.  Again, though, same problem as Bisley. So it’s grotesque and has that same oily veneer you see in Glenn Fabry. So?

 

”Matriyoshka SA” is certainly typical HM fare, but the artwork here falls down a little. Could be taste; I often prefer more refined lines, but I sniggered anyway.

“The Last Laugh” (should I put all my HMs in my bunker to read again?) was a worthy short, though nothing to write HM about.  Although, I enjoyed Bagatzky’s vision of the aliens in Mary’s dream.

“Miss Necro” was gross.  I showed it to my girlfriend.

Kari Christensen’s Studio was great; not just pinups like so many HM covers.  I like the variety of subjects and creatures.

Branko Jelinek’s “Oskar Ed” is funny and reminds me of some of the Druillet strips from “back in the day”.  Hook him up with a writer for a longer work.

“The Initiation” seems to reference so many works that contain the same kind of rites: I am thinking of the initiation jump of the Dauntless  in Divergent. 

While hellishly obscure, or maybe meaning-ambivalent, “The Sadmen” has a distinct alien feel.  Its tone, both in story and art, hint at something much more complex and inscrutable behind the action of the story.  I would like to see more about the Sadmen, their origins and the world they inhabit.

I loved Ruotolo’s “Mia”! Great artwork and color, full and rich design, and a funny story with a bittersweet lesson and fantastic panel work.  Love the last pic of the lizard and redeemed man heading off panel.  I would love to see a lot more of Ruotolo.

“MI9” makes a great last page, and while not my favorite, it consistently delivers.

Overall, I give the issue a meh, but I have been reading since ’76. You keep publishing, I will keep buying.

Another review by Griffin, like the Monster.

Review: Heavy Metal 273

Metal!

I was glad to see my new issue in this month, and more pleased after reading it.  Marco Turini’s “Homage to Frazetta” is not as chunky and dynamic as the model, but certainly augured an authentic Heavy Metal. 

The height of this issue is, for me, Hugo and Geland’s “The Souvenir”.  Classic HM fare, a complete tale; weird, fantastic narrative with imaginative and highly individual design.  A great package from detailed landscapes to ship designs, character and costume. The Products of this world, clothing, weapons, instruments, seemed to match the materiality of the World of “The Souvenir”.  The Mariner comes to a poor end.  How could he not? Several full page panels, feats of design and a treat to see, create a sense of scale and support the pacing of panel to panel narrative.  A legible story and some real treats.  My only complaint is the typefaces; while they are certainly expressive of the characters, and lend a weird voice, they were not particularly easy to read. Tough call.

Like Hugo, Inki Bilal creates uniquely identifiable worlds.  But Bilal’s is idiosyncratic of his own personal medium.  While I still recognize lines from painted and inked-and-colored work, his medium has transformed. Now limiting himself to black, white, and the surface of the paper, he manages to create authentic worlds with minimal detail, worlds that seem always on the edge of unraveling. A post-apocalyptic dust storm. So, “Julia and Roem” is kind of the desert of “Animalz” aquatic setting. Dehydrated water, okay, but just because you deliver. Still obscure, but, that too, is in tradition for HM.

Erika Lewis and J K Woodward’s “The 49^th Key” delivers lush art that is effectively, if not spectacularly, rendered.  The narrative carries the plot clearly and deliberately, though the art is quite dark overall.  I would have liked to have been able to see more of it.  A pretty realistic approach for a near future.  I’ll be waiting to see the next installment.

I enjoyed the more refined control of Joseph Kelly’s “Ymir”.  Who doesn’t like Giants? I want to see more substantive stories with this artwork.  The joke ending kinda undercuts the craft.

“Aftermath: The Big Clean” has too little signal versus noise. I like the almost Bisley stylings, it’s big and heavy, but it’s too dark.  I want to see all the crazy-clown-funhouse-grotesquerie up close, and I want it to mean something. The story made me think of a Halloween candy bag of mythology of the “aftermath” and a mental bellyache.  I’ll read the next installment, but it better be good.

“Exile”, sorta science-fictional and mythopoetic, but the art did not particularly appeal to me.  It ended up looking like stills from a Pixar movie.  I liked the Ourobouros, the seahorse, the spiraling gyre, so, meh.

Both Gallery and Artists Studio were pretty piquing.  I would like to see pages and pages of story work by Abrar Ajmal. He obviously has the chops to do even hyper realistic artwork of fantastical subjects, which is really cool to look at. Myka Jelina’s big-eyed Lolita Goth girls are both adorable and transgressive.  Scary cute at worst, certainly printworthy images and great traditional coloring! Me likey.

Finally, M19 and Kristian Krank’s Dead Earth Comics.  I like these one page scripts and remember Jeffrey Jones’ I’Mage and Paul Kirchener’s The Bus.  Keep looking for more of these. I don’t get a belly laugh off M19, it’s probably too European for me, but, I get that something is there and I do want Heavy Metal to challenge my tastes with new genres, formats, and artists. Dead Earth Comics I love! The chunky, red, white, green, black and zip is so cool low-tech and sci-fi near future.  Love it. Are there any longer Dead Earth tales?

Thanks, Kev, et al, for a fun month.

Judge Dredd Mega City Two: the los angeles tale!

Griffin Mauser

Citizen Jury

Memorandum: Judge Dredd: Mega City Two #1

000001

To Citizens Wolk, Farinas, Hill, Long, Tipton, Wood

Gentle Citizens:

Regarding Judge Dredd: Mega City Two #1

I could not be more delighted! I like this Dredd: no sarcasm, all the tough and a Mega City straight out of Luc Besson! I think you have hit the judge in the lawgiver!

 Judge Dredd in a second Mega City, similarly gigantic and overwhelming but with a vastly different philosophy toward the law.  This is gonna be great! What seems crazy is that Dredd will perform exactly as expected within the law and this new city will turn out to be much like home, at least as it applies to Joe and his job.  And, even better, he’s going undercover (I don’t remember him ever doing so before)!  I can hear the gravel in his voice; Joe talks as he should, his tone, his patterns, the essence of Eastwood and Keitel. And he’s serious. He is the straightman.  Back in DC’s Legends of the Law, Joe Dredd actually made the only sarcastic remark I have read.  I had to quit reading it.  Dredd is never sarcastic; this is why when he tells a perp, “report to the iso-cubes”, perps do.  It’s Dredd’s world that obfuscates, exaggerated and threatens.  Dredd is the axis of the law and never moves.  I like what you’re doing!

Farinas is in his element it seems; if he has half as much fun drawing this stuff as I have reading it, I’m sure he feels a little guilty.  From his Darrowesque splash page (Mr. F, I have seen every line and read every sign) to closeups, Farinas controls the detail to match the shot.  Not afraid to draw a characters, hm thirty-two characters in that frame, but not married to crowds or detail. Sequences of plot are simple and straightforwardly presented without seeming empty and just around the corner will be another slice of frenetic Mega-City pie! And it’s just gonna get better! Already Farina’s figures are more individual than his beautiful work on Catalyst. And so much more to see!

Hill’s color work manages to create the garish decadence of Mega City Two without losing the signal in the noise.  Deft manipulation of a screaming loud palette, use of tonal gradations, and special effects like the flashback and television “filters” evoke the garish color of the old Eagle books, shows off Farina’s linework and makes perfect visual sense.

Citizen Tipton, please maintain the Dredd characterization, continue the historical and literary information about the Dredd books.  I now have an idea how much Dredd I want to find. IDW has impressed me with its respect for and dedication to existing properties.  You guys really take the high road with your works and it shows.  Thanks for bringing such a good Dredd back to the table.

So there you are guys, All you have to do now is get even better.  Don’t screw it up!

Citizen Juror Griffin Mauser

Mega City Weird

Austin Texas

By Art We Live: Scott McCloud's The Sculptor

Copyright 2015

First Second Books

NY NY

490 pages

By art we live.  These four words appear at the bottom of the copyright page and drive David Smith’s story in Scott McCloud’s  new work, The Sculptor.

David Smith has seen success and lost favor due to his inherent inability to behave sociably and now he struggles daily to keep body and soul together in New York, until the afternoon of a “very bad day” when he meets his Uncle Harry in a local diner. 

Dead Uncle Harry.

 “What would you give for your art, David?” Harry asks.

“I’d give my life.”

Now David has the ability to mold any material with just his hands and only two hundred days to live. He spends his two hundred days searching for meaning: who is David Smith, what is art, what is most important?  And he meets Meg, the angel who tells him “everything will be alright.”

With help from Meg, his friends, and dead Uncle Harry, David begins to rebuild himself, painfully constructing a meaningful life as he navigates the maze of relationships with his new love, Meg, his friends, the art community and the rest of the world, fighting to create a true art, a true identity, and a true life.

Scott McCloud, creator of Zot! and Understanding Comics and its companions, has crafted a virtuoso combination of art and story with only the most traditional graphic tools. If you want to make comics, you can learn it all from just this one work.  He creates tone with a simple pallet of blue, white and black that can alternately alienate or sanctify characters and scenes; express awe, loneliness or distance in time or space. Panels that bleed off the edge of the page make dramatic transitions, create a sense of scale, or establish simultaneity or internalized focus. Narrow panel borders with white gutters control conventional passage of time, helping to create rhythm with their size, shape, and position, but McCloud manipulates even these, creating intimacy with panels placed without gutters, separated only by black lines, varying the thickness to stretch quiet moments into tears. 

His content, too, counterbalances the palette and layout; establishing panels of cityscapes, interiors, parkland and suburbia filled with the rejectamenta of daily life are interspersed with panels empty of backgrounds altogether focusing attention on moments of characterization, facial expression, or dialogue.  McCloud’s panels are simple and unpretentious, yet sufficiently grounded in real detail to root a story filled with moments of poignancy, humor, tragedy and intelligence. These patterns pace his story, creating a full world without cluttering every page in detail. And Scott McCloud is apparently a sculptor as well, creating a world of work ranging from pedestrian to in David’s hands.

But if you have ever seen any of McCloud’s works, you already know he can draw.  Apparently he can write, too.  David Smith leaps and stumbles to his destiny through a world filled with ephemeral moments, running subplots, and a humor and love obviously Scott McCloud’s own. When Harry tells David he could’ve drawn funny books for a living, “those guys make tons of money,” David muses, “I’m …not sure that’s right.” Later, Uncle Harry admonishes, “and no crime fighting either!”  McCloud characterizes David through these moments.  David’s deep love of his family and his close friend, Ollie, are revealed in Ollie’s recognition of moments from their lives in David’s sculpture. Ollie’s abusive relationship with the upstart trust-fund-baby-cum-artist Finn develops David’s artistic aesthetic, the heart of his need to create. David’s promises (the “thirty six” of them are almost a character) both characterize him and drive the story. And David’s life is full, there are few cracks left unexplored.  Seemingly unrelated events reinforce the verisimilitude that grounds the whole work: when one David Smith is shot, another David Smith calls to reassure his family that he is alright; friends worry that their recipes are not well received at a parties; life surrounds David.  These details, dovetailed into his two hundred days fill every nook and cranny with experience, and David learns what Meg knew, and he didn’t: Every minute is an ocean…let them in…let them all in. David does, defining himself, his art and his legacy in a startling climax.

Beautiful. Just beautiful.