The Broadcast graphic novel review

When first I saw this book I knew exactly what to expect.

After all, it is a tale set around the famous (and possibly mythical, but that’s another story) panic that arose when folks out there in radio land mistook Orson Well and the Mercury Theatre’s adaptation of War of the Worlds for a news report.

So here, I figured, we have a small group of country folks who were going to watch huddled in a barn for most of the book, terrified by the radio reports, jumping at shadows and possibly accidentally killing one of two of their number.

Yeah, I had it all figured out.

Trouble is, I could not have been more wrong.

While Wells himself makes a few appearances in this book, it quickly became clear that the broadcast was almost incidental to what was going on here, and that everything would probably have happened, or something close to it, eventually anyway.

There are a number of story strands running here, each expertly interwoven by writer Eric Hobbs, who has a formidable talent, and an ear for dialogue that is second to none.

The story of Marvin, a black factory worker, is particularly effecting and as it unfolds throughout the book in flashback. The reader finds their sympathies for the character veering wildly about the scale as each new revelation unfolds.

The only sticky point in the book, and it is a big point, is the art. I suspect, not having read any other reviews at the tie of writing this, that it is something that will divide readers.

Now, Noel Tuazon is a good artist, he has undoubted skill and an ability to conjure images with a few vague brush strokes- witness his depiction of New York, for example. However sometimes the art veers too much into the realm of the sketchy and the reader is left puzzling over what they are supposed to be looking at.

When it works, however, as with the page above, that art is masterfully atmospheric and oppressive and he can paint a characters expression with a few small pen strokes.

All in all, this is a very good book.

I am passionate about comics that show just what the medium is capable of. That can demonstrate just how clever and intricate and moving a tale can be told with comic pages, and this is one such book.

The Broadcast is published by NBM Comics.

The Story of Lee review

Writer Sean Michael Wilson is a Scot living in Japan. One of the main characters in this book is a Scottish man living in Hong Kong- I wonder if it would be too much of a leap to see this book as somewhat autobiographical in places?

If it is, it is a remarkably honest one. Matt, the character in question is, while being a quite nice guy, not without his faults- particularly when it comes to his attitude to women and sex. Indeed, this honesty is something that permeates the whole book.

Apart from our title character Lee, most of the others are shot through with just enough flaws to lift them above what so easily could have been clichéd (domineering father, long suffering mother and kindly grandmother) stock characters and turn them into something altogether more real.

This is helped considerably by some wonderful artwork from (and this is where we declare an interest!) Hi-Ex! guest (indeed, Hi-Ex! stalwart) Chie Kutsuwada. While some of her work at the beginning of the book seems a bit shaky, the reader can almost see her confidence grow after only a short number of pages, and the standard of work just gets better and better as the volume goes on. Her brilliant use of silent panels and understanding of body language (like a heartbreakingly sad panel of Lee’s parents in bed together) really add depth to the emotion of the story.

While the arc of the story will, I suspect, not surprise many readers, it is told with such warmth, skill and truthfulness that the reader cannot help but be carried along by it and then lifted by the note of hopefulness at the end.

And ending which does a superb job of leaving the reader wanting more.

Seek this out!

The Story of Lee is published by NBM Comics.