Connect with us

Comics

Review: ‘Furious’ #1

Published

on

My initial thought while reading Dark Horse’s “Furious” #1 was that readers would inaccurately and rashly equate it with Marvel’s “Kick-Ass”. Real life superhero stirs up media attention…chaos ensues. I cannot stress enough; cannot articulate precisely how much the similarities end there. What Bryan J. L. Glass has created is a very current and relevant look at how our access to social media can transform a person, whether they’re conscious of it or not. Glass is showing us how a superhero would survive a 21st century, millennial generation, information-obsessed world.

WRITTEN BY: Bryan J. L. Glass
ART BY: Victor Santos
PUBLISHER: Dark Horse Comics
PRICE: $3.99
RELEASE: January 29, 2014

Cadence Lark (the person) aka The Beacon (the person’s superhero identity) aka Furious (the person’s media appointed moniker) can’t escape negative attention no matter how much she tries to avoid it. Trying in vain to atone for her sin-laden past, Lark dons a superhero identity—the world’s first real superhero — to right her wrongs by helping others. But the media—her strongest, toughest, most omniscient foe won’t let her reach her much desired redemption. After Lark (as The Beacon) is caught on camera pounding the pulp out of “serial abusers,” a local news reporter dubs her as Furious — a name that sticks, making her a pinup for the bad guys and a menace to the good ones. It doesn’t matter that she always manages to save someone. It’s her brutal tactics, her apropos furious nature that always gets memorexed.

Glass skillfully peppers the issue with all forms of social media: broadcast news, tabloids, BookFace (Facebook), Tweeter (Twitter), blog posts, newspapers, etc., creating an environment his audience is all too familiar with — a tactic that furtively pulls the reader down a very real emotional rabbit hole. The realer the comic, the realer the emotional response. The issue’s execution of social media exploits explores all three identities of this one woman, each identity taking on vastly distinctive roles: a murderous fame whore (Lark), a tortured superhero (The Beacon), and a misjudged villain (Furious).

The real question is who is the real woman hiding inside Lark and which personality will the mounting pressures of media bring to the surface…permanently?

And therein lies the true essence of “Furious” #1. Who are we, and what drives our motivations to become the person we truly are inside?

I was immediately drawn to this comic for two reasons, 1.) I’m infatuated with human nature. What compels us to do what we do and/or become who we become? And 2.) I have a gauche captivation with today’s need for instant information, whether it’s correct or not, relevant or not, worth my time or not. Social media is ever-present, hovering over every minute of our lives, feeding us useless, often erroneous information as if that little Twitter bird is actually sitting on our shoulder chirping superfluous and harmful information in our ear.

Our girl, The Beacon, has fallen victim to this Twitter bird and can’t seem to set the record straight. She’s not Furious. She wants to do the right thing. She wants absolution.

An unreasonable feat considering her temper.

Victor Santos positively kills it with the art. The emotion in his characters’ faces and body language is palpable. The fear, the anger, the distress…it is all there, illustrated to perfection. Each of Lark’s identities are very diverse in appearance to match their diverse nature. Even the coloring feels distinctive with each identity’s panel time. The slightly muted colors add a nice contrast to the occasional vivid coloring of more dramatic scenes.

This is a comic book with implications and escalating consequences. A standout start to what I can only imagine is going to be a stellar comic with some harsh reality infused into a completely badass storyline. Because what I haven’t doled out yet is that The Beacon will be The Beacon for as long as that little angel sits on her shoulder. But that angel has a shelf life and that shelf life is called Furious.

4.5/5 Skulls

Review by – Bree Ogden

Comics

[Review] Graphic Novel ‘Tender’ Is Brilliant Feminist Body Horror That Will Make You Squirm & Scream

Published

on

Tender Beth Hetland Graphic Novel

Beth Hetland’s debut graphic novel, ‘Tender,’ is a modern tale of love, validation, and self-destruction by way of brutal body horror with a feminist edge.

“I’ve wanted this more than anything.”

Men so often dominate the body horror subgenre, which makes it so rare and insightful whenever women tackle this space. This makes Beth Hetland’s Tender such a refreshing change of pace. It’s earnest, honest, and impossibly exposed. Tender takes the body horror subgenre and brilliantly and subversively mixes it together with a narrative that’s steeped in the societal expectations that women face on a daily basis, whether it comes to empowerment, family, or sexuality. It single-handedly beats other 2023 and ‘24 feminine horror texts like American Horror Story: Delicate, Sick, Lisa Frankenstein, and Immaculate at their own game.

Hetland’s Tender is American Psycho meets Rosemary’s Baby meets Swallow. It’s also absolutely not for the faint of heart.

Right from the jump, Tender grabs hold of its audience and doesn’t let go. Carolanne’s quest for romantic fulfillment, validation, and a grander purpose is easy to empathize with and an effective framework for this woeful saga. Carolanne’s wounds cut so deep simply because they’re so incredibly commonplace. Everybody wants to feel wanted.

Tender is full of beautiful, gross, expressive artwork that makes the reader squirm in their seat and itch. Hetland’s drawings are simultaneously minimalist and comprehensively layered. They’re  reminiscent of Charles Burns’ Black Hole, in the best way possible. There’s consistently inspired and striking use of spot coloring that elevates Hetland’s story whenever it’s incorporated, invading Tender’s muted world.

Hetland employs effective, economical storytelling that makes clever use of panels and scene construction so that Tender can breeze through exposition and get to the story’s gooey, aching heart. There’s an excellent page that depicts Carolanne’s menial domestic tasks where the repetitive panels grow increasingly smaller to illustrate the formulaic rut that her life has become. It’s magical. Tender is full of creative devices like this that further let the reader into Carolanne’s mind without ever getting clunky or explicit on the matter. The graphic novel is bookended with a simple moment that shifts from sweet to suffocating.

Tender gives the audience a proper sense of who Carolanne is right away. Hetland adeptly defines her protagonist so that readers are immediately on her side, praying that she gets her “happily ever after,” and makes it out of this sick story alive…And then they’re rapidly wishing for the opposite and utterly aghast over this chameleon. There’s also some creative experimentation with non-linear storytelling that gets to the root of Carolanne and continually recontextualizes who she is and what she wants out of life so that the audience is kept on guard.

Tender casually transforms from a picture-perfect rom-com, right down to the visual style, into a haunting horror story. There’s such a natural quality to how Tender presents the melancholy manner in which a relationship — and life — can decay. Once the horror elements hit, they hit hard, like a jackhammer, and don’t relent. It’s hard not to wince and grimace through Tender’s terrifying images. They’re reminiscent of the nightmarish dadaist visuals from The Ring’s cursed videotape, distilled to blunt comic panels that the reader is forced to confront and digest, rather than something that simply flickers through their mind and is gone a moment later. Tender makes its audience marinate in its mania and incubates its horror as if it’s a gestating fetus in their womb.

Tender tells a powerful, emotional, disturbing story, but its secret weapon may be its sublime pacing. Hetland paces Tender in such an exceptional manner, so that it takes its time, sneaks up on the reader, and gets under their skin until they’re dreading where the story will go next. Tender pushes the audience right up to the edge so that they’re practically begging that Carolanne won’t do the things that she does, yet the other shoe always drops in the most devastating manner. Audiences will read Tender with clenched fists that make it a struggle to turn each page, although they won’t be able to stop. Tender isn’t a short story, at more than 160 pages, but readers will want to take their time and relish each page so that this macabre story lasts for as long as possible before it cascades to its tragic conclusion. 

Tender is an accomplished and uncomfortable debut graphic novel from Hetland that reveals a strong, unflinching voice that’s the perfect fit for horror. Tender indulges in heightened flights of fancy and toes the line with the supernatural. However, Tender is so successful at what it does because it’s so grounded in reality and presents a horror story that’s all too common in society. It’s a heartbreaking meditation on loneliness and codependency that’s one of 2024’s must-read horror graphic novels.

‘Tender,’ by Beth Hetland and published by Fantagraphics, is now available.

4 out of 5 skulls

Tender graphic novel review

Continue Reading