experimento del alma Writer/Artist: Joshua Boulet Format: Black and White, 50 pages Price $7.00 US

Reviewed by Jamie Coville

First thing I notice about this is it's a handmade book. Appears to be glossy printed paper, but cut down into a smaller but version of a regular sized comic book. It's also hand stapled together. Within the indicia there is a humorous message about how there is only a limited number of these, they are hand made and there won't be any more. In flipping through it what is striking is the artwork. It looks like Alex Toth and an expressive Bill Sienkiewicz con sketch rolled up in one. Each page is one panel that shows a bull fight. The story has nothing to do with the bullfight. It's about well, nothing. The text on each page has nothing to do with anything. They read like quotes from a book or drunken ramblings. I suspect there is some subtext going on here but it's too deep for me. The lettering is really small. I've got good eyes and lucky for me because I can read it. I'm pretty sure others would have a hard time with it. There are no word balloons, everything is in captions. I suspect Joshua put this together to promote himself and land paying work at a publisher somewhere. This could very well do the trick, but I suspect some editors are going to want to see artwork with more than one panel per page. Either way I'd like to see some more work out of him. He's got a great style that hasn't been seen in the comic industry for many years and it's cool as hell. I give the book 3 out of 5 stars.

Birth of a Nation Writers: Aaron McGruder & Reginald Hudlin Artist: Kyle Baker Publisher: Three Rivers Press Format: Color, 144 pages Cover Price: $13.95

Reviewed by Jamie Coville

Once in a while a book comes along and it makes you scream "YES! THIS IS WHAT COMICS IS ALL ABOUT!" This is one of those books. For those of you who don't know, writer Aaron McGruder does the comic strip Boondocks which is very controversial. Reginald Hudlin is a known movie director with 8 movies to his name. The two were talking about doing a movie together at San Diego Comic Book Convention. They came up with an idea, fleshed it out some and then realized no way it hell would Hollywood ever make this movie. So they got Kyle Baker to turn it into a graphic novel instead. The story takes a real situation and plays what if with it. The situation is the Presidential Election of 2000. In Florida a number of African Americans were turned away at the polls which caused much controversy. This book takes that situation and puts it in East St. Louis, which is where Reginald Hudlin grew up. The mayor gets so ticked off about the situation he has the city secede and form its own country. From there it's a battle of wits and PR between the Mayor and his supporters vs. President Bush and his. Kyle Baker does a great job drawing this with cartoonish characters but without making the story a total joke. As with many Baker's works, the script is below his panels. Despite the dead serious nature of the premise and the somewhat outlandish direction it flows to, his art keeps things light, easy and fun to read all the way through. I give this book 5 out of 5 stars. Regards, Jamie Coville http://www.TheGraphicNovels.com News and discussion on a free, Delphi like forum.

[Back to Collector Times]

[Prev.]

[Return to Comics]

[Disclaimer]

[Next]