Month: October 2006

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Dungeon Twilight Vol. 1-2

Written by Lewis Trondheim and Joann Sfar
Art by Joann Sfar and Kerascoet
96 pages, color
Published by NBM

Up until now, reading Lewis Trondheim and Joann Sfar’s Dungeon books has been nothing but a great deal of fun. Their “present day” Dungeon Zenith is a wonderful parody of sword and sorcery stories while still having a strong backbone of its own, and the “prequel” Dungeon Early Years installments have been an entertaining mix of intrigue and swashbuckling. Now that we’re seeing the “in the future” books of Dungeon Twilight, we’re getting something slightly different. The series is still full of the brilliant and over-the-top ideas, and it holds the reader’s interest just as tightly. The big difference is that if I had to sum up Dungeon Twilight in one word, it would probably be “bleak.”

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110 Per¢

By Tony Consiglio
136 pages, black and white
Published by Top Shelf Productions

There are some targets that are easy to pick on. Take the whole “boy band” phenomenon, with its endless (and interchangeable) series of generic line-ups of young men trotted out to the sound of thousands of shrieking teenagers. On that level alone, Tony Consiglio’s 110 Per¢ succeeds in its sarcastic look at the whole movement. What makes the book really work, though, is that Consiglio’s greater target isn’t the latest fad, but rather the people who develop obsessions around them.

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12 Reasons Why I Love Her

Written by Jamie S. Rich
Art by Joëlle Jones
152 pages, black and white
Published by Oni Press

There’s no such thing as a perfect relationship. Popular culture likes to insist that there is, be it in books, comics, movies, or some other form of media. The reality, of course, is that relationships do have conflicts sooner or later; the real question isn’t so much how long until one hits that conflict, but rather how the people involved then deal with its resolution. I think that’s what hit me so much about Jamie S. Rich and Joëlle Jones’s 12 Reasons Why I Love Her; it’s a book that is as much about the good times as the bad times, but even more so it’s about how each of those extremes shift into the other.

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