{"id":11592,"date":"2010-04-26T11:57:18","date_gmt":"2010-04-26T16:57:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/opticalsloth.com\/?p=11592"},"modified":"2010-04-04T12:47:06","modified_gmt":"2010-04-04T17:47:06","slug":"robbins-john-the-monkey-head-complaint","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/opticalsloth.com\/?p=11592","title":{"rendered":"Robbins, John – The Monkey-Head Complaint"},"content":{"rendered":"

Website<\/a><\/p>\n

\"monkeyhead1\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The Monkey-Head Complaint<\/strong><\/p>\n

You know, there’s a downside to my usual method for reviewing these comics.\u00c2\u00a0 To the curious, here it is: I read the comic, go the computer and write a review.\u00c2\u00a0 Some days I take more time than others, but mostly it’s a pretty simple formula.\u00c2\u00a0 There is occasionally a comic like this one, however, where as I sit down to write it feels like the story is still blooming in my head and, in this case, increasingly making me uneasy.\u00c2\u00a0 Not in a bad way; for the story involved that means Sean\/John succeeded admirably.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s just a solid hint that my usual instant reaction to these things is probably going to be lacking.\u00c2\u00a0 This is the story of (and I’m cribbing this from the back of the comic) a jaded couple, a contrary mother and her oddly troubled son.\u00c2\u00a0 The husband of the couple Frank, sees the son (Jack) out shoplifting a couple of times and, vaguely knowing the mother, decides to stop by and try to talk some sense into the lad.\u00c2\u00a0 Most of the story here is told by the couple sitting at a table and chatting, and the idea to have them tell the story in a smarmy and literary manner (while the husband briefly bitches about it) was brilliant.\u00c2\u00a0 Soon after this talk the mother ended up dead from a self-inflicted wound, or so everybody thought.\u00c2\u00a0 Frank decided that perhaps his visit set something off in the boy and he needed to find out if that was the case; meanwhile the wife is worried sick after not hearing back from her husband.\u00c2\u00a0 If this all seems vaguely creepy, Sean\/John did a great job of making the story seem almost casual as I was reading it, even with a vague undercurrent of dread that was always around the corner.\u00c2\u00a0 Still, the tone of the conversation alone kept things light, which is how they managed to make everything that happens next even more shocking, while still managing to\u00c2\u00a0 make perfect sense in hindsight.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 This doesn’t even mention the monkey-head, which is the sampled page anyway, so read it for yourself.\u00c2\u00a0 Hell, read the whole thing for yourself.\u00c2\u00a0 If we want comics as a whole to get smarter things like this are going to have to lead the way.\u00c2\u00a0 Subtle horror is damned hard to come by in comics, or anywhere else for that matter.\u00c2\u00a0 No price but John usually keeps these things cheap, so I’d guess $2-3.\u00c2\u00a0 Send extra money and just get a bunch of his comics to be on the safe side.<\/p>\n

\"monkeyhead2\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Website The Monkey-Head Complaint You know, there’s a downside to my usual method for reviewing these comics.\u00c2\u00a0 To the curious, here it is: I read the comic, go the computer and write a review.\u00c2\u00a0 Some days I take more time than others, but mostly it’s a pretty simple formula.\u00c2\u00a0 There is occasionally a comic like […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[3222,1948,1945],"class_list":["post-11592","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-john-robbins","tag-sean-macroibin","tag-the-monkey-head-complaint"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/opticalsloth.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11592","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/opticalsloth.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/opticalsloth.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opticalsloth.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opticalsloth.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11592"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/opticalsloth.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11592\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11596,"href":"https:\/\/opticalsloth.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11592\/revisions\/11596"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/opticalsloth.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11592"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opticalsloth.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11592"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opticalsloth.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11592"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}