April 16, 2014
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Wicked Chicken Queen
You know that part of the comic where things need to get wrapped up in some fashion, and you’re left wondering what exactly the creator was going for with that ending? Well, without giving anything away here, that’s where I am with the end of this comic. It seemed like the events of the end of this were going to get a bit of an explanation, then the comic literally just faded away. Boy howdy am I ever getting ahead of myself with this review, but that’s the last part that I read, so it’s the first part on my mind. This one starts off with a race of people relocating to a new island. They find a giant egg pretty early on, and it becomes a crucial event in the development of their society. The egg eventually hatches and the giant chicken is adopted by the king, eventually taking over as ruler of this land (as you may have guessed from that title). The chicken queen marries her best friend, they reign happily for many years, and her friend eventually dies of natural causes. From there the queen becomes different, mostly showing this by being more distant, but the violence does come eventually. While I may not have been totally happy about the ending, the individual pages were fantastic, as there’s plenty happening on every page. Each page is one panel, and they each show basically the entirety of the island and many things that are happening on it. I did like the bit towards the end describing the inability of the townspeople to communicate with the chicken and why that was the case, I was just a little underwhelmed with the ending. To me that still makes this a comic well worth reading, as I thoroughly enjoyed the ride and several little touches along the way. If you’re the type who has to have a completely satisfying ending to make it all worthwhile, maybe you should move along. Of course, there’s always the chance that other people will have a different opinion of the ending than I do. Shocking, I know! $5
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Posted by Kevin
June 19, 2013
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Unknown Origins & Untimely Ends
You should have a pretty easy time knowing whether or not you’d be inclined to like this book from the title alone, and I’m happy to tell you that the contents more than live up to it. Emi has been doing mini comics on this theme for a few years now, and she took her chance to edit this anthology and ran with it, doing a really fantastic job of picking out/accepting these stories. I should say up front that I have no patience for those stupid “ghost hunting” shows with the shaky cams and the loud noises and won’t believe that aliens have visited us until I see solid proof (which is not the same thing as declaring that no other life exists in the universe), but overall this isn’t that type of book. These are all, as Emi says in the introduction, unsolved mysteries, so the reader doesn’t get the satisfaction of getting the story neatly tied up in a bow by the end. Instead you’re left wondering what the hell happened for these 32 stories. If you’re a naturally curious person and/or at all interested in the weird and bizarre then you’ve probably already stopped reading this and ordered a copy. For those of who are too polite to quit reading in the middle of the review (and it’s OK if you do, I’ll never know), subjects include a mysterious gelatinous goo that rained down on a town, the monster with 21 faces, an unexplained shower of meat from the sky, an arcade game that quickly came and went in 1981 under mysterious circumstances, a tumor that was bigger than the carrier, Gef (of which I will say no more but this may have been the most intriguing tale in the book), that weird hum in the air that some people can hear all the time, the Nain Rouge and his continuing destruction of Detroit, the money pit of Oak Island (which some bored billionaire should look into), creepy kids with black eyes trying to enter homes, the Leatherman and theories of who he might have been, unsolved murders at a campsite, the former Prime Minister of Australia vanishing while swimming, the missing body of Addie Mae Collins, why 9 campers in Siberia ran from the safety of their tent (sometimes barefoot) and why they never went back to it, two bodies and their lead masks, Rasputin (an oldie but a goodie), Frederick Valentich and the UFO that seemed to by toying with him, D.B. Cooper and his disappearance (it’s an ever funnier story to anybody who watched Justified this season), a bridge where 600 dogs have committed suicide, the Axeman, and a serious skeleton in the closet of Orson Welles (possibly). DC comics used to do a series of “Big Books” on various subjects, and after seeing this I’d suggest that they start it up again and put Emi in charge. Not every story was perfect, granted, but good luck not having several of these stories haunt your dreams. Also good luck on not taking to the internet to learn more about them, as I already know how I’m spending the rest of my afternoon. And look at that pile of talent in the tags section! Why would you possibly need any more convincing to check this out? $12
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