Showing posts with label Jordie Bellaire. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jordie Bellaire. Show all posts

Wednesday, July 17, 2019

Shuri Volume 1 The Search for Black Panther by Nnedi Okorafor, Leonardo Romero, Jordie Bellaire


Rating: WARTY!

It's no wonder I'm reading that TV and movies have taken over the SDCC, because comics just aren't cutting it any more, es evidenced by this one, and many others I've read of late.

The only thing I'd previously read by Okorafor, the writer of this graphic novel, was Street Magicks which was a collection of short stories by assorted authors, and hers was one I did not like. So perhaps it's not surprising that in the end, I did not like this comic, with art by Romero, and colors by Bellaire. The story is ostensibly about Shuri, the younger sister of King T'Challa of Wakanda, aka the Black Panther. It started very strongly, but then sort of faded into mediocrity. I hate it when that happens.

When T'Challa, as the Black Panther, was out of commission in the past, his sister Shuri had stepped up and took over the role, but when he disappears this time (flying a warp spacecraft of Shuri's design!), she feels very reluctant to replace him again, and instead of exploring that, or showing her determined efforts to find out what happened to him, the novel goes off in two or three different tangents which have nothing to do with her ambivalence or her brother's disappearance. It's never even explained why T-Challa has to fly this craft. Evidently T'Challa is from the Star Trek world, where he can't delegate and has to go on every single mission himself, which is utterly nonsensical, but it seems to be the way things are done in fiction!

The story just felt way too dissipated and disingenuous to be an engaging one, and the artwork was not appealing to me. There was a huge gulf between the cover art and the occasional full page image of similarly striking quality, and the very angular and rather simplistic artwork in the actual story where Shuri looked nothing like she did in those individual images. I had a hard time reconciling the one with the other because those full-page pictures really showed-up the mediocrity of the regular and very utilitarian work in the panels.

But while the art is a large part of the graphic novel and can help to make or break it, for me the story is always the most important part and if the story sucks, no amount of brilliant art can save it. But unfortunately, here the art wasn't brilliant and the story sadly betrayed the agency of Shuri because it put her constantly in need of others helping her and thius robbed her of any power. It felt like a sellout - like she couldn't handle things on her own with her macho bro out of the picture, so she needed others to come rescue her including the white savor at the end, in the form of Tony Stark. I was disgusted by that.

To me there's a difference between an ensemble story like the Avengers, and an individual story about one of Marvel's characters, and I don't mind if there's some interaction between one super hero and another in an individual story, but it seems like every Marvel comic I've taken a look at recently insists upon dragging into the story the entire Marvel stable. Enough already! If you want to do that, then make it an Avengers (or whatever team) story. Don't proclaim on the front cover that this is a Shuri story and then proceed to portray her as a maiden in distress requiring periodic rescue by other characters. When these other Marvel heroes flock into the story for no apparent reason and worse, serve no useful purpose, then you have to really wonder if the writer knows what she's doing.

The first of these was another female 'goddess' (so we're told). I'd never heard of her, but then I'm not steeped in Wakandan lore. The problem is that this goddess disappears and contributes zero to the story. She could, were she actually a goddess, have helped Shuri on her mission, but no! Why do go that route? So Shuri is sent into space in spiritual form and completely flies by the place where she's supposed to go - her brother's spacecraft.

No reason is offered for that failure and it makes no sense since it's her brother she's focused on, not the two guys she ends up with! She then finds herself battling a ludicrous 'space insect' which is sucking power from Rocket and Groot's spacecraft. What? Why would she go there? No logical reason - except that the writer evidently decided to include those two in the story to serve no purpose whatsoever! Shuri inhabits Groot's body - again for no reason - and starts chanting "I am Shuri" in complete disregard of the fact that such a phrase would be meaningless in Groot's language since the phrase, 'I am Groot' is actually not Groot's way of introducing himself!

The insect follows them back to Wakanda (of course, because why not?!) despite there being no reason at all why it would. It evidently feeds on electricity, and let's not even get started on how such a creature would even evolve in space before the advent of machines using electricity. This insect is evidently a direct rip-off of the Mynocks from Star Wars. Yawn. And since there's no air in space, why does it have wings? Again, no reason at all. It's possible to have fantasy and magic in a story and have it make sense within its own framework, but this author simply doesn't care, so then why should I? This was a poor story, indifferently illustrated and an outright insult to the Shuri character. I dis-commend it.


Monday, July 20, 2015

They're Not Like Us by Eric Stephenson, Simon Gane, Jordie Bellaire, Fonografiks


Rating: WORTHY!

This is volume one of a new series. "Syd" is hearing voices; she has done so for a long time, and can't stand it any more. She tries to kill herself, but she survives and is sprung from the hospital by a guy who whisks her away to a charming old house hidden behind iron railings and deep foliage, where she meets others who, like her, have some sort of telepathic ability. The house is so representative of what these people have done to themselves, it's almost like it was planned that way....

In a tableau of introduction we meet: Fagen (pyrokinetic), Wire (invulnerable), Runt (strength and agility), Blurgirl (super speed), Moon (Illusions), Misery Kid (delusions), Maisie (clairvoyant), and Gruff (telepath). The guy who rescues Syd (her super-hero name) is named The Voice. He can communicate telepathically, too. What Syd doesn't expect is the lifestyle these people lead: violence and robbery. If they see something they want, they take it and woe betide whoever gets in their way. This sanctuary is so important to them, that even parents aren't allowed to trip it up.

Starting on page forty-nine, it felt like I might be reading an excerpt from the graphic novel version of the movie Fight club which I haven't seen and have no interest in seeing. It was bloody and violent as Syd and Gruff fight each other - presumably as training. But after punching each other in the face several times they're suddenly kissing. This felt not only inappropriate, but also entirely predictable, and it marked the point where I started losing interest in this comic.

It got worse when we went through a bunch of adolescent posing, angst, and machismo, to say nothing of the soul-searching and he dramatic plans which fell through. All the tedious back stories flooding-out really brought the main story to a screeching halt. After that, it picked up again and turned out, by the end, to be a merit-worthy read. It's not often I can say that, so this makes a pleasant change.

Since this blog is about writing, here's a writing issue. On page one hundred, Maisie is talking to Syd, and she's saying that The Voice isn't perfect, and she follows it with "none of us are". Should she have said, instead, "none of us is"? It can be used either way, but the number has to agree, I think. Strictly speaking, in this case, Maisie meant that no individual is. If she had said, "This group isn't perfect, no groups are" this would have worked, but it seems to me that this isn't the case.

She's talking in the same frame as when she said "The Voice isn't perfect," so it seems to me that since she's talking about an individual, in which case, correct use should be "none of us is", as in "He isn't perfect; none of us is." However, this is not a narrative, it's a person speaking, and people in general use poor grammar, so while it might sound odd, I think it works here. But you're welcome to disagree, since I am far from a grammar expert. The important thing to keep in mind is that what works in your narration may not work for a given individual's speech, and vice-versa.

So overall, I rate this graphic novel as a worthy read, which surprised me given the way I thought it was going - downhill! It turned around and so did my opinion. I'd be interested in reading volume two, which is also a nice change from the position I've been in vis-à-vis some of the graphic novels I've reviewed recently. The dialog - apart from a sorry bit just after the middle, was good, and the art work was superb. I recommend this.


Thursday, May 15, 2014

Pretty Deadly by Kelly Sue Deconnick


Title: Pretty Deadly

Author: Kelly Sue Deconnick
Publisher: Magnetic Press
Rating: Worthy!
Art: Emma Rios
Colors: Jordie Bellaire
Edits: Sigrid Ellis
Letters: Clayton Coles (I did a search for Clayton's website on Google and it brought up this blog three times - at the top of Google's list! I guess this is his website! lol!

(see also Three for other work by Bellaire and Coles)


DISCLOSURE: Unlike the majority of reviews in this blog, I've neither bought this book nor borrowed it from the library. This is a "galley" copy ebook, supplied by Net Galley. I'm not receiving (nor will I expect to receive or accept) remuneration for this review.

Here's a novel-ty: I'm rating this graphic novel as a worthy 'read', but not on the basis of what I read. Instead, this rating is based solely on the basis of what I saw! The artwork is remarkable, and it's worth 'reading' for that alone. The story, on the other hand, lost me completely. Maybe you will have a better time with it, but no matter how hard I tried to follow it, I could not figure out what story was being told here or what I was supposed to take away from it.

It's obviously about death, but it seems to be a meld of a western novel and a Greek tragedy, and it seems also to be that supposed no-no of the story telling world: it's all a dream, or at least it's all happening in some sort of a dream world. Or at least part of it is. Or something. See what I mean? It's confusing, and I felt bad about that. maybe I'm missing something, but I felt like it oughtn't to be that hard to enjoy a novel!

But this is a graphic novel, so I don't expect each panel to be filled with expository text, yet when we get multiple pages with little or no text (and then the occasional panel which is jammed with text!) and with small images that, beautiful as they are, don't offer much in the way of exposition, it makes reading a chore rather than a pleasure, and there's no excuse for that.

The idea of the story is what appealed to me: death has a 'daughter'? How cool is that? This vengeful 'daughter' is definitely not one to forgive trespasses, and she rides out wreaking havoc, and evidently needs to be reined in at some point. This whole story is encapsulated in a tale told to a butterfly by a dead rabbit. I have no idea what that's all about. And what's with the sword she carries? These pieces just didn't fit together for me, although now I think back on them, I do so with a warm smirk on my face!

The graphics are, in places, very violent and gory, just FYI. I know this is about death, and the setting is the purported 'wild" west, but that level of blood and guts seemed a bit much for this particular story; however, as I said, the artwork was spectacular overall and it merits support for that alone. It would be a tragedy if Emma Rios illustrated no more stories because one such as this failed. Not that disappointment in the writing will cause it to fail - thankfully!

Other than the artwork, one really interesting aspect of this graphic novel is that it's almost entirely female-centric with regard to the development team, and that's another reason it grabbed my attention. The comic-book world has thankfully never been devoid of women, but traditionally it's been dominated by men and it's liberating to see that antiquated 'norm' being so strongly challenged with this contribution.