roach's reviews
268 reviews

 

(Quote re-translated from my German copy.)

The second volume in this collection of Alan Moore's praised run of Swamp Thing still has some very bright highlights and lots of fun characters, but overall doesn't quite reach the heights of the previous issues. The character develops further in an interesting way, though nothing here quite hits as strongly as the bigger moments of growth in the past.
The art is still amazing and we get a couple more creative alternative looks for Swamp Thing as he learns to fast-travel from location to location through the green, re-growing from scratch at his destination. With that, there also comes more of the psychedelic, slightly abstract art that blew me away near the end of volume 1.

Still a fantastic comic series and I'm excited to read the final third volume as well. 

 

[Quote translated from my German copy.]

It makes sense that Pauline Harmange's I Hate Men garnered a standing as an essential feminist text. It is a short read about the importance and significance of female rage, an emotion that women have historically been not allowed to express or wasn't taken serious by the men in charge. The strong title is radical but understandable, and I believe it is a good thing that Harmange put this sentiment into some clear words, adding some context that critics of this aggressive feminist stance might not be aware of.

For people that haven't yet spent much time with feminist ideas and values, I think this would be an interesting introduction. If you're already familiar with the sentiment and its arguments, Harmange's text might not tell you much new but it is a well-written text nonetheless. Really, my only criticism might be that I would have liked it to be more extensive and ideally acknowledge intersectionality but maybe that just wasn't the purpose of this essay.
Either way, if it encourages more women to express their anger and frustration, it succeeded. 

 

When this book originally released, I was probably still at the height of my appreciation for Koji Suzuki after having read the first two Ring books in the years before it and loving them. I remember being pretty excited when Edge was still fresh but I never actually got to it until now. It feels pretty good to have it finally checked off the list after it spent around 12 years on my "to read" list.

In theory, the premise and themes of this book are something I'd love to see Suzuki put his hands on. What I loved about his Ring books is the mixing of hard science and spooky paranormal elements. In Ring it's biology, but with Edge, he tackles physics. I give him props for attempting to wrangle some very ambitious, large-scale concepts too, but it doesn't really come together in a very engaging or satisfying way in the end.
I didn't hate reading the book as there were parts I enjoyed just fine. It has a good set-up with a journalist investigating mysterious sudden disappearances of people, which eventually leads into the bigger revelations. But none of the characters were very interesting and the story takes lengthy, meandering breaks from the actual plot to dive into their personal struggles and tragic backstories.
The main character's story about her perfect scientist dad having gone missing from one day to the next when she was 17, leaving her without any parent figure but a boat load of cash, comparing every man in her life with her perfect dad, wasn't really that interesting. Plus, Suzuki isn't the greatest at writing a female protagonist in this one in general, with some classic Japanese conservatist ideas about gender roles peaking through in a slightly annoying way.

The final reveal about why all of the strange things are happening felt too much for me as well and I would have much preferred if there was no actual reason or if it had simply been left ambiguous. I don't think the end of the universe has to have a reason to be effective. In fact, I think it would have been more powerful if it just happened without being able to pinpoint an instigator. But a lot of the reveals and explanations in the final act felt unnecessary and strange.

Well, all of these things made this one a slight curiosity but an ultimately mediocre read. It wasn't painful to get through because I still like Suzuki's simple, clear writing with the occasional neat embellishment which flows pretty well and builds decent atmosphere at points. But this is surely the weakest text by his that I have read so far. 

 

I heard quite a lot about Takehiko Inoue's work lately and when one online acquaintance, who is a huge fan of the guy, told me about Real, I was very interested to get into it.
I think the sports genre is a really popular and lively one in manga and anime, and I have a feeling that somewhere someone already covered every sport conceivable in those types of media. But wheelchair basketball as the crux of a series like that was news to me and considering how much good I heard about the creator's skill to tell and depict good stories, I really wanted to see what he accomplishes with Real.

Volume one did not disappoint either. It has really good pacing, great energetic artwork (also dude can draw great faces), genuinely interesting characters that I'm looking forward to see grow through their problems... and it has a guy shitting on the ground after dropping out of school in the first couple of pages. I was already sold right then and there. 

 

I stumbled over Erika Price's art online someday and spontaneously bought some of her comics.
Disorder seemed especially interesting, seemingly dealing with themes of dysmorphia and transness.

Her art is remarkable for the incredible richness of detailed line art. I cannot imagine how long it takes for her to finish a single drawing, filling every crevice with intricate texture. She doesn't really take any shortcuts in this 148 page collection of the original volumes. Every page is as intricate and filled with detail like her individual pieces. It's impressive. And the art rocks pretty hard.
Visuals aside, the content is rather vague and dream-like. Or nightmarish, rather. Most of it is more of a poetic read fueled by your own interpretation than a consistent story that is told. A couple chapters follow a more straight-forward story but overall it seems like it's more interested in expressing a feeling and experience, which is of course interesting in its own right.

I highly recommend checking her stuff out. Even if it's just for the gloomy, hypnotic designs. 

I never heard of this little Max character until a friend told me about it recently, so I had to check it out. It's a cute collection of short, wordless comics of the titular groundhog going through some shenanigans has he eats, smokes, and indulges in other hobbies of his.
Some nice and simple entertainment.

 

[Quote re-translated from my German copy.]

Yeah, okay. This rules.
After hearing so much about the beloved Alan Moore run of the Swamp Thing comic, it's very satisfying to finally read those issues and not being disappointed at all. I spent a lot of time reading the original Len Wein issues first because that's what I got my hands on first and while those did lack a lot in depth and variety, it pays off now to see Alan Moore take elements of those and put them to actual good use. Telling a proper engaging overarching story throughout the issues.
Swamp Thing really grew as a character, which is amazing considering how simplistic and gimmicky its original concept really was. But Moore's talented writing figured out a way to portray him and his supporting cast as pretty rounded characters that go through interesting conflicts.
Add to that the amazing art by the illustrators who created cool, funky creature designs and norm-breaking psychedelic sequences where the panels decide to fuck the traditional format and go vertical, and you got yourself a really inventive comic series.

I'm excited to continue this with the next volume. 

 

Philip K. Dick's later years were absolutely wild. His entire experience with that celestial pink light that beamed down at him and gave him a million earth-shattering revelations that he wrote down in his massive Exegesis and also worked through with the VALIS trilogy of novels is still incredible to me.
I read the first VALIS about a year ago and was absolutely baffled by his autofictional attempt at processing his real-life experience through his alter ego character named Horselover Fat. There wasn't too much plot and much more abstract, philosophical/spiritual rambling about his newfound knowledge that honestly virtually fried my brain at points, which made that whole thing more interesting as a novelty and for what it stands for than being an actually entertaining read.
So, when I decided to continue this trilogy with the second book, The Divine Invasion, I was sort of bracing for something equally mind-numbing. But I was very positively surprised.

The Divine Invasion isn't a direct sequel as it tells a mostly independent story of new characters in a world that's presumably built on some of Dick's "enlightenment" and new-found beliefs. Details of the previous VALIS book are mentioned, as well as the pink light from Dick's real-life reports, to make it clear that this is set in the same world, but the plot has very different goals. Instead of unravelling himself through a fictional version of his, here there is an actual science-fiction story more akin to his usual writing with some elements reminding me a lot of other books by his, like Ubik for example.
There are still some grand, abstract ideas of religion and philosophy and dimensions and reality in here, as this essentially deals with a return of the messiah who eventually gets challenged by other celestial entities with deep references to real-life religions, but unlike the first VALIS book you don't get overwhelmed by walls of rambly text this time.
The story is actually paced pretty well and explores some genuinely engaging ideas. It's generally an interesting combination of futuristic science-fiction with hard religious elements.

I was a bit let down by the ending to be honest, but up until then I was pretty hooked and had quite a good time. Maybe the low expectations after the predecessor book helped with that, but I would genuinely recommend this one to people that have already read the big, famous Dick novels. I couldn't necessarily say the same for VALIS.
I'm very curious now where the third book in the series, The Transmigration of Timothy Archer, Dick's final finished novel, takes this whole thing. 

 

This was a very chill little xenofiction novel about a cow living in the Basque countryside, passively experiencing some effects of the Spanish Civil War, about which I don't know much. In fact, part of me would have welcomed a bit more insight into that part of Spanish history, but it does make sense to leave all of that vague and simple for this story that's mostly aimed at younger readers.
Probably not a book that I will think back to much, but I did have a decent time and I like having a cow be the main character of a story. At some points I wonder if certain details were meant to be metaphors or allegories for something political, but there is a good chance I just went in with the wrong expectations and tried to look into things too deeply.
Props for the inclusion of some actual Basque language even in my English translation copy. 

 

[Quote (re-)translated from my German copy.]

I picked this volume up at the comic store thinking it was something else (Sex Criminals by Matt Fraction) but when I figured out my mistake at home, I wasn't too angry. Bluntly titling a comic Sex is an interesting decision and I was curious to see how it would back that up. Unfortunately, the content isn't very enticing, like plenty of people before me have already said.

The initial premise of an ex-superhero of a similar style to Batman coming back to normal life in a corporate world isn't super exciting but a decent enough idea for an introspective look at the genre. The theme of sex being all around in a way through the thriving red light district of the city and the hedonistic lifestyle of the rich suits in skyscrapers is there to give the title a bit of purpose but none of it really every goes anywhere interesting or really makes a point to latch on to.
The story meanders without actually moving around very much, introduces a couple characters with vague motivations, and then this collection of issues ends without really leaving behind much of an impression.

The art isn't great either. It's not awful since there are some cool panels here and there for sure. But I did think the style was rather bland when it came to the actual people and characters started looking very rough real quick when they weren't the focus of the panel.

I didn't hate reading this. It had the occasional promising character and slightly interesting attempt at exploring what pleasure can mean in one's life. But it fails to actually build on any of it and so it ends without truly having anything to show for itself or remember it by. I would call this near-perfect mediocrity and if I could, I would give this 2.5 out of 5 stars.
I was gonna give it the benefit of the doubt and try another volume because I would love to see this flimsy groundwork actually get somewhere, but reading reviews gives me the impression that it basically stays the same.