My favorite “graphic novel” (the Hollywood term for comic book) Is called Supermarket. It pairs Kristian Donaldson, one of my favorite artists with Brian Wood, my favorite writer. There are a whole lot of “favorites” in that sentence, but for good reason. Wood’s darker subject matter is beautifully offset by Donaldson’s Vibrant colors making it into something that is surprisingly unique, attractive to the eyes, and will inspire you to blow up the nearest shopping mall(I’m probably on my way to Guantanamo now for typing that).
By the way, all these pictures are uploaded at full resolution so clicks on them will enlarge to giant size!
I’m always hesitant to discuss the story of something because I’m horrible about spoiling things. Forgive me as I try to give the most spoiler free description. The main character is a 16 year old half Japanese/half Swedish girl living in near future Los Angeles who spends almost the entire story on the run. She’s a great heroine and you know nothing can stop her. Despite taking place in the future it is not too different from our own time. The freeways are much wider, but with a lot more electric cars. Of course the malls are transcendentally huge, becoming their own self contained worlds with even the food courts spanning several stories.
Since his first published work Wood has had heavy anti corporate/anti consumerism undertones in his writing, but while his early writing shows his youth his modern work benefits heavily from his maturity. I don’t mean to discount his early work at all, but hes certainly gone from a creative and fresh writer to an incredible writer that has done an incredible job at every genre he has written so far. Also, I can’t think of anything Brian Wood has written that wasn’t anti establishment, including his viking comic. I’m sure that plenty of his fans like him just because of that, but that just ads a personal touch to it if you ask me. He comes from an artist background, and I think that is why he always finds an artist that compliments his work so perfectly. I would have liked it if he had done the covers on supermarket just to see how he would match it up to Kristian’s work.
Donaldson brings something different to the table: a pretty unique artistic style that I am extremely fond of. You can see from the pictures that cartoon wouldn’t quite describe it because of the high level of detail. In fact, I find that the high level of expression he gives the characters is what makes them “pop.” I am also absolutely in love with the way he uses colors, and I think its what really sets him apart from other artists. When I visualize things in my head they are colored in a similar way so I’m dying to ask him if his brain works like mine or he just likes pretty colors.
http://www.tinymeat.com/tmstore/catalog/index.php?manufacturers_id=47 My birthday is this Friday if anyone wants to buy me something cheap, Kristian Donaldson wallets. They seem pretty girly, but I really like them.
Tags: brian wood, idw, Kristian Donaldson, los angeles, supermarket
November 7, 2008 at 5:24 am |
Yet another thing we have in common – graphic novels. Thanks for this tip.
Monsieur and I read a lot of French GNs (called bandes dessinees over there). We’ve recently enjoyed two series in particular – XIII (Thirteen) about an amnesiac on the run trying to discover who he used to be, and Largo Winch about a billionaire playboy who’s constantly getting himself in trouble with mafia types. See if you can get them in English. They’re page turners.
November 7, 2008 at 12:43 pm |
Marvel comics is actually bringing over a few french comics from a company called Soleil. Sky doll is the only series they’ve completed so far but it was incredible.
I’ll see if those are in english, XIII sounds good.