Results tagged “Dylan Horrocks” from Birmingham Mail - Speech Balloon

SOME SUNDAY reading...

The Names of Magic
By Dylan Horrocks & Richard Case (DC-Vertigo/Titan)

The previous Books of Magic collection I read (The Books of Magic: Transformations by John Ney Rieber & Peter Gross) meandered at best and more often dithered. Dylan Horrocks tells a story well for me though.

There's a predictability and indeed inevitability about this collection with that old chestnut that there's power in the possession of somebody's true name being the theme. That whole Shaman native American Indian approach comes over all Rumpletstiltskin then gets given a distinctly British flavour with secret societies and fairy folk alike trying to subdue, or murder, DC's Timothy Hunter.

Mind you, England and the English is portrayed a bit too twee in places, curious since New Zealander Horrocks appears to have had background research from those living on the once Great isle. Also, the characters do tend towards Vertigo stereotypes and Case services the art rather than takes it to the next level but it's the way that Horrocks tells the story literally rather than the actual questing theme of it all that makes it work.

Mort - A Discworld Big Comic
By Terry Pratchett & Graham Higgins (Victor Gollancz)

Voted into the BBC's Big Read Top 100, this is adapted from probably Pratchett's best-selling Discworld novel, and in this humorous fantasy we follow the misadventures of that Grim Reaper, Death, as he takes on an apprentice by the name of Mort.

It's very much a Readers Digest version of the novel, but there are some good jokes, both literal and visual, all pulled together in a sprightly 93 pages.

Higgins' art exaggerates and pulls unusually but appealingly towards the height of the US comic sized pages rather than its width, the lines and twirls of his tidal swimming inking is tasty, his design of his own intuitive playful nature. He is an illustrator who brings a stylistic bag of tools to the comic book playing field rather than the derivative baggage far too many others do.

Higgins previously illustrated Terry Pratchett's Guards! Guards! - The Big Comic,, that was adapted by Stephen Brigg, and that too demonstrated that he has a consummate designer's eye matched by an illustrative feel and flair , underpinned by an understanding and appreciation of the storytelling qualities of the comics medium as well.

The City by James Herbert & Ian Miller (Pan McMillan)

This original graphic novel surfaced in 1994 but looked dated by a decade or two even for its time.

A continuation of horror author Herbert's The Rats saga it takes us to some future apocalyptic time where those humans who've survived an obvious but never mentioned nuclear war get by in whatever fashion they can.

Some are mutants, some are mad, most just mingle through scavenging; and some thrive. None of them do any of these things as well as the rats though!

It has a mediaeval feel to it, as if some knight had wandered into a plague-filled castle but in fact it's an Iron Man styled guy come back to a city for the wife and child he left behind.

As mentioned, it feels rather dated, if not predictable, in that comic book way, - the painted art recalls the various clones that which surfaced once Simon Bisley made his initial rise to fame in the UK on 2000AD, & Miller may well be celebrated in the fantasy art field but comics wise there's nothing here that really excites.

The book is oversized in the European GN format, dating it to the 70s, while the story itself, if shortened a little, would have made a filler series between the pages of Warren's Eerie or Creepy. On its own it doesn't stand up.

True there's the occasional sickly comic moment and two pretty downright scary surprises near the tail end of the book, but the first half's basically a shoot-up akin to countless computer games, whereas the quest or purpose that takes up the latter part is predictable in its eventual outcome.

Not surprising this didn't do well sales wise when it came out. If however, you're a fan of Herbert's fiction you'll probably want this in your collection, and copies are pretty rare so come at a price.

The Sandman: The Dream Hunters
By Neil Gaiman & Yoshitaka Amano (DC-Vertigo/Titan)

A prose story, similar to the way Gaiman originally did Stardust with Charles Vess, but featuring The Sandman (analogously most of the time) to celebrate the tenth Anniversary of the Gaiman/Sam Kieth visually-created version of the DC character originally created way back in the 40s.

It's a retelling of an old Japanese legend, or rather fable, wherein a fox and badger try to trick a monk out of his monastery, only for the fox to fall in love with the monk and a tragedy to unfold as others enter the picture.

There's no denying that Gaiman writes smooth and flowingly. Fairy tales are his great strength but, for me, the moral in this story's conclusion is not so much ambiguous as pointlessly vague and distractedly so. The journey is fine and interesting, alas the final destination boring.

I must declare that Amano's art does absolutely nothing for me. It's flat and uninspired when not obvious. But what do I know? This book won a 1999 Bram Stoker Award for Illustrated Narrative and a Best Related Book Book for the 2000 Hugo Awards.

Little Demons
By John Robbins

This short self-produced chap book us beautifully designed and tells the story of young Tim Odlum and his believing that he can see demons down people's throats. Young Tim's presumed skill makes him popular, and attracts fans, but it can bring the much-needed love this little Demon Slayer requires.

It is an exemplary work of natural art and fiction that surpasses the aforementioned The Dream Hunters in every way. It leaves an ambiguity in its conclusion but the moral value is present where it should be in understated form. It captures the mannerisms or the young without patronising is evocative in theme and show s fiction to be an art.

REVIEWING MORE comic books...

The New Frontier Volume 1
By Darwyn Cooke (DC)

A re-evaluation of 50s real world events and how they might have shaped the characters who sprang forth from National Comics (DC Comics as is) in the crimson dawn of the Silver Age of American Comics.

It's earnest, heartfelt without being whimsical, visually appealing in a sub-Alex Toth vein, utilising an interesting three-panel single tier layout in the main, that surprisingly doesn't dull.

Nitpicking, Howard Chaykin could have done a similar job with a spicier bite, and Steve Englehart and Dick Dillon actually told a similar story in a one-off from the original Justice League of America series back in the 70s (albeit that it was a giant sized one-off issue). For modern readers it's both a nostalgic reminder of past reading habits and a nod and a wink to real history. To most faithful older readers a smile may still be wrought about their lips. I do have mixed feelings about revisionist comics but Darwyn Cooke is obviously talented.

Thirt3en
By Mike Carey & Andy Clarke (2000AD)

Joe Bulmer's a telekinetic and a thief, and when he steals a black pearl (that's always coloured white in the story?) his powers increase and he starts seeing a hot-to-trot blond, straight out of a Fighting Fantasy derived game.

Alas, there are some men in black after him who use every Die Hard twist and turn cliff-hanger catastrophe to good effect, while Daksha, an Asian female telepath in their trust, goes over to the other side to help Bulmer.

It transpires the Amazonian blond (called Aden) came from a race who created Earth, and the men in black were her race's slaves

In the end it's a case of questioning who to trust and the conclusion is quite unique

The story attempts a Heavy Metal mag approach but it's grounded in old fashioned British comic strip values, both the good and the cliched.

Clarke's very average looking cover doesn't do him service .While a little stiff in places and with a penchant for figures rather than backgrounds, he has an appealing style in a Steve Dillon meets Jim Lee vein.

Carey is a writer whose dialogue used to grate with me in the past as I always found myself rewriting each and every balloon when I first saw his work on Lucifer. Not that anyone else has cared and he obviously did well in the intervening years I avoided reading his work. There was the odd mock cockney line I didn't care for here, but this was a story I enjoyed right to the end, being a satisfying adventure with plenty of sci-fi action.

City of Glass
By Paul Auster, Adapted by Paul Karasik and David Mazzuchelli (Faber & Faber)

There's something awfully pretentious about this graphic novel.

It starts right from Art Spiegelman's backhanded compliments in his new introduction for this edition. He poo-poos the very idea of graphic novels as an entity, follows it by making a couple of historical comics fact errors, then starts name dropping for all he's worth, then seems grudging to give David Mazzuchelli his due (he makes it sound like the guy came up from the gutter drawing Daredevil and Batman), then praises Paul Karasik because he was his own student at New York's School of Visual Arts.

With such a foul taste already in my mouth I really wasn't feeling enthused to sit down and digest the actual contents of the book.

As it is the art's appealing, easy on the eye, in a casual non-intimidating manner, although it can be forced/strained a little in its use of visual metaphor at times. I'm also unsure who did what. Did they share art, did Karasik do some layouts but not all, Spiegelman's unclear and it doesn't say elsewhere in the book.

The story leaves more questions than answers and if someone says all modern stories are meant to I'll put my pacifist fist in their face right now. There are also actually too many questions unanswered in the actual relaying of the story for me to know the lead character intimately enough to care about his actual outcome.

This book dresses itself in the detective genre to tell a tale that is basically that of a widowed writer who now uses an alias to tell detective novels and then somehow gets involved in a real mystery himself that ends up questioning life, existence, duplicity, religion and self-sacrifice. Been there, seen it, done it, have we? Well, this book, or at least the comic adaptation doesn't actually. We just infer it's supposed to. It's heavy handed in its higher goal attempts, failing in results. But apparently it's an award-winner!

It's okay, there are some awfully nice sections but there's too little for me to applaud intentions over goals attained.

Hicksville
By Dylan Horrocks (Drawn & Quarterly)

Collecting the main storyline from the comic Pickle but with new and revised pages.

This is a tale of imagination and hard work put in on each page by Horrocks. It tells the tale of world famous cartoonist Dick Burger, or rather comics Journalist and biographer Leonard Balts' search to uncover how and why he got to be famous.

As Balts goes to Burger's remote New Zealand hometown (where they collect rare and obscure comics from around the globe. It's a world we're drawn into, one we dream of living in but is there innocence lost in this paradise?) it becomes a tale of betrayal, lost love and magic found. It embraces the comics medium and gives back to it. Italo Calvino's name is mentioned once and for those who've read his novels some of the things evoked in this book spring from a common source.

Certainly it feels influenced by the 80s British Fast Fiction/Escape school of comics - Paul Gravett, Ed Pinsett and others are given lip service and some might see an Eddie Campbell quality present but really it's Glen Dakin's Diary strips that was evoked most for me. And yet there's also a Daniel Clowes feel. Horrocks himself appears to love superheroes as much as all other genres and they're given an equally deserved footing.

A valuable book to hold up to show what the comic medium can achieve but more importantly a great read.