Tim Lieder

61. Balthazar by Lawrence Durrell - I haven't been updating these reviews for a month. I just let them pile up. I was going to just title this entry that's more like it because I finished reading this book after that fucking antisemitic piece of shit by Eleanor Davis, asshole Nazi, the kind of shitty writing who conflates the IDF with the Nazis because lazy. Oh yeah. I seriously hated that fucking book. But this isn't about that graphic novel. This is about two really good books that made me a little less disgusted.

I didn't read the first book in this series but that seems ok. I'm going to read it soon. These books are taking place concurrently, playing with different perspectives. So I get the gist that the first book is about a love affair that ended and this book is about telling the narrator that he was never the intended lover, that Julia always loved the other guy, the one that killed himself. Much like Robertson Davies, I don't remember much of these books when they are over. I love the style. I love the way he writes but everything feels so immediate that once I've finished reading them, i think I've woken from a dream that I want to go back to. I may have to read this series a couple times just to get all the nuance.

But for this one, spies and lovers and angry mothers come together in Alexandria. Some die by suicide. One is murdered by a mob for cross dressing. Nothing is as it seems. There's a war on the horizon.

62.Jupiter's Legacy book 1 - by Mark Millar & Frank Quitely - I'm reminded of Powers, the dumb tv show about superhero detectives. It was forgettable. Seriously, I don't even remember if they got to the end of the world chapter. It wasn't as violent a shift as Lucifer but it was worse. Lucifer at least knows it wants to be Castle but with the devil, and forget all that Mike Carrey writing in the graphic novel. Powers the television show preserves the superhero detective angle but completely 86's the superheroes as rock stars metaphor that made the comic so unique.

I speak of Powers because I watched Jupter's Legacy. I actually kind of liked Jupiter's Legacy. It was a sad imitation of The Boys but I definitely kept watching. I liked it enough to be curious about the source material. And that's where I realized how much they fucked with the adaptation. And not in a good way. In a very bad way. They took an interesting story about growing up and dealing with your parent's legacy and turned it into a lazy soap opera. It should have been called Jupiter's Boring Children.

Granted the entire series (books 1 & 2 or 3 & 4 if you go by Star Wars prequel numbering) is 10 issues. They made 8 episodes of a television show and they wanted more seasons. If they followed the story pattern of the book they would have been barely stretching it out to 2 seasons. They should have done that. Instead of 2 great seasons of television, they gambled on getting multiple seasons. Instead they got one mediocre season where the one character turns out to be the villain in the last episode.

So why do I love this comic so much, so much that I'm actually angry at the television show? Because it's actually about the LEGACY of these characters. Oh sure it begins like the television show. The older heroes have kids who are all celebrities. There are shenanigans involve their kids including the daughter whose a party girl and drug addict and the son whose an entitled loser. They even have the origin story which is takes up most of the show (and is actually why I kept watching).

And then in issue 3 (of 5), the brother of the main superhero FUCKING KILLS THE MAIN CHARACTERS. I mean the old superhero and his wife who are worried about their kids while being the guardians of the world. They just fucking die. And damn it's brutal.

So instead of being a soap opera about old superheroes and their kids in some cheap knockoff of The Boys, the book actually lives up to its title by taking up the story of the drug addict daughter, her spawn of supervillain boyfriend and their kid years later. Hiding out. Trying to live ordinary lives and doing the Clark Kent act complete with making sure that their son looks like a complete loser in sports, academics, etc. (even though he's not very good at hiding since he keeps running off whenever there's a major emergency in order to save people - an observation made by his classmate who practically orders him to go be a superhero like everyone knows). These two issues are silly and glorious with great character beats that prove once again that Mark Millar is NOT just an edgelord writer. Comparisons between Millar and Ennis are inevitable but when it comes to choosing between edgy and sincere, Millar will often choose sincere. Ennis never will and in your face bullshit is kind of Ennis' thing (something that I loved in my 20s but can't fully commit to these days).

Of course the book ends on a "let's go save the world" from her uncle and weak brother but getting there is what elevates this book above a violent deconstruction.

I'm a sucker for stories about growing up and taking responsibility. If only the damn show had seen the value in that.