9/29/14 - Sugar Skull (Pantheon)

Now son, as you may well know by now, SPYGOD deals with a lot of strange and crazy !@#$.

I've had to handle weird !@#$ing science, more parallel worlds and alternate timelines than you want to !@#$ing know about, spontaneous apotheosis, sideways reincarnation, rogue pantheons, nasty concepts made flesh, angry angels, bad evil Jesii, two-headed space zebras, and super-tenacious mother!@#$ers who want to force me to answer the !@#$ census.

(I even !@#$ing suckerpunched "Bob," once, if you can !@#$ing believe that. !@#$er had it coming.)

And I bet you can guess where I crammed that !@#$ pipe, too.

But none of that !@#$ can even hold a candle to John. 

Who's John? Well, that's a !@#$ good question, son. I never really knew. No one did. He was el hombre invisible, as he liked to !@#$ing say. There but not, here but gone.

A shadow walking, not even worthy of a real name.

See, John was an Operator. A Grey Man. The sort of person who could take time and space and mix them the !@#$ up like the contents of a drink. Past and future, life and death, he could see them for what they were, hold them in his !@#ing hands, cut them up like paper dolls, and put them back together any which way but !@#$ing lose.

And he said he didn't !@#$ing fear death because he'd already seen it from day one. And it was just the punchline to the joke we tell while we live our life.

He also said he could kill us with his !@#$ typewriter, and I believed him.

Now, is that deep or just !@#$ing clever? I got no !@#$ing idea. He was always saying cryptic, circular !@#$ like that. Talking with John was like doing crosswords while being !@#$ed up on mescaline, drunk on white lightning, and running for your @#$ life.

I met him under strange and dangerous as !@#$ circumstances, worked with him a couple dozen times over the years, and maybe earned the right to call him friend. But then he just sort of !@#$ing vanished one time, leaving a grey hole in our lives.

And as far as we could tell, he'd never !@#$ing been there at all...

Spooky? Son, you got no !@#$ing idea. But every so often I remember just what it was like to get all caught up in crazy, bent reality hi-jinx, and I really !@#$ing miss that warbling, grey-suited, hard-drinking !@#$hole with his echoing telephone line of a voice.

Which is probably why I've been loving the !@#$ing !@#$ out of Charles Burns' latest work, which just concluded with Sugar Skull. This series has been one dark headtrip from start to !@#$ing finish (X'ed Out, The Hive, Sugar Skull) and manages to be a tragically broken love story, a time-looped chronicle of a mental breakdown, a travelogue of a truly alien landscape, and a weird homage to William S Burroughs, bad romance comics, and Herge's Tintin at the same time.

Trust me on this, son -- no one is !@#$ing ready for this kind of !@#$.

I mean, !@#$, son -- I read Black Hole and El Borbah, so I thought I knew what I was !@#$ing in for. But this series threw me for a big !@#$ loop, all the same. It reminds me of Grant Morrison's early "Word and Picture Salad" work on such things as Doom Patrol and The Invisibles, except that Charles Burns is twice as !@#$ing hardcore. And it also reminds of me of Daniel Clowes' earlier, pre-Ghost World work, only twice as hard-hitting.

What's going on? Well... *cough*

See, here's the thing. I can't say too much about what happens in Sugar Skull, because then I'd have to !@#$ing kill you. Or you'd !@#$ing kill me for ruining the surprise. And trust me, son, there are some surprises, here.

But let's go over what we know so far. There's a guy named Doug, who fancies himself an artiste, and has clearly been through the mother of all !@#$ing traumatic breakups with another artiste named Sarah -- involving some kind of nasty injury. But Doug is also Johnny 23, who's a weird-!@#$ Tintin stand-in, trapped in a strange and grisly world where he's trying to get with the new Queen of the hive, but not doing too well in that !@#$ing regard, and having to rely on some creepy, malformed dwarf who's clearly scamming his greenhorn !@#$.

Who's dreaming who? That's hard to tell, sometimes. Everything's all !@#$ing jumbled up like one of those creepy plates of eggs the dwarf wants him to pay for. His dead dad shows up both places, and aspects of Sarah's art keeps coming back to !@#$ing bite him in the !@#$ every time he turns around.

Truer words were never !@#$ing spoken. I'll be over here, drinking to forget.

See, it's clear as !@#$ing glass that something happened, beyond the obvious answer of "boy got his !@#$ handed to him." But because Doug's not ready to !@#$ing face it, yet, we're not quite sure what it is. And Doug and Johnny are doing everything possible to tiptoe around that big !@#$ uncomfortable truth, like a drunk who just can't face up to the fact that he drinks to forget what drove him to !@#$ing drink in the first place...

Got all that, son?

Well, this is where we find out what the !@#$ actually happened, in all respects. And it's a credit to Charles Burns' work that, even if you figured out some of what was !@#$ing going on, either right from the get-go in X'ed Out, or after reading The Hive, the ending smacks you upside the !@#$ skull like a punch you just can't duck, and you're flat on the !@#$ floor not long thereafter.

"He saw death, and death was a psycho with a terrifying haircut."

What I can tell you, however, is why I'm giving this installment of the series three big !@#$ thumbs up, SPYGOD style.

1) The Art

Charles Burns' art has always been astonishingly good. Even when it just looked like crazy weird !@#$ for the sake of being crazy weird !@#$, it was amazing crazy weird !@#$ -- well-suited to the crazy weird-as-!@#$ stories he wanted to tell. (Look at El Borbah if you don't !@#$ing believe me.)

Well, as time's gone on, he's gotten even !@#$ing better. His work's more refined, more defined. Tighter, even. And in a story like this, where we're going back and !@#$ing forth between Normalsville and Whatthe!@#$ Town? It makes the sliding and sudden transitions all the more jarring.

"The way... is shut."

But -- and this is a big !@#$ but, here -- this trilogy has revealed just how good color can make his art. Normally, I haven't minded its absence, because he's one of those artists whose stuff looks !@#$ing great in spite of being black and white (and maybe because of it, sometimes -- I can't really imagine Black Hole being as stark and spooky if it was in color). But the use of a pallete in these three books has really opened up a new world for him. Hopefully he sticks with it (where artistically appropriate, of course!)

2) The Story

Like I said before, this is some heavy !@#$. It takes a number of really odd images, thoughts, and occurrences, and re-assembles them together into a new and darkly-amazing form -- creating a surreal blend of events that have been carefully constructed to make you feel utter, soul-crushing dread sneaking the !@#$ up behind you like a crazy-faced, midget bouncer in a doomed leather bar full of !@#$-gobbling mutants that are one bad 80's song away from using your head as a big !@#$ suppository. 

But you know what? None of that would mean a !@#$ if it wasn't for those two words: "carefully constructed." It's clear to me that there was a big !@#$ plan at work, here -- one that took time and expertise to plan, craft, and then execute. He wasn't just winging this !@#$ on a bender while dodging !@#$ty drivers on those crazy, Pennsylvania hills.

No, son. This was Poe at his desk, writing The Raven. This was Alan Moore writing Watchmen. I would love to have been a !@#$ing fly on the wall while he was scribbling notes and demanding booze. I might have !@#$ing learned something. As for the rest of us, we get the end result, and what a long, strange trip it's been.

Because...

3) The Mercilessness

Here's a thing you may not yet !@#$ing know, son. Fate is a !@#$. You can duck and cover, run and hide. But sooner or later you are going to have to !@#$ing pay for what you've done, or at least face up to it. And on that day, there will be no hiding place.

Especially from yourself.

"Every man has inside himself a parasitic being who is acting not at all to his advantage."

Well, this is proof positive, son. You know how all of Burns' works have a sense that your !@#$-ups are going to come back and !@#$ you in the !@#$ with your own !@#$ shoe? This trilogy has it in spades. And when you finally figure out what's going on... well, we already talked about being laid out on the !@#$ floor, didn't we?

But here's the big !@#$ brilliance of this work -- you can't !@#$ing look away. You know the !@#$ is going to hit the fan but you can't duck to save your life, any more than you could get your !@#$ car off the tracks before the train hits. You are trapped in the merciless machinery of a clock you wound up yourself, thanks to what you've done and left undone.

And here you are, smiling like a pipe-smoking !@#$hole as the pendulum swings to take your head off at the neck...

Brilliant stuff, son. It'll make you think. It'll make you drink. And after you've taken a shower or two to wash off the bad feeling, you'll go and read all three volumes again, just to see what you !@#$ing missed the first time around, or to make sure that one girl is who you think she is. And there's no higher complement you can give someone like Charles Burns than that.

Other than maybe buying his !@#$ books.

SPYGOD'S Verdict: Three thumbs up for a haunting and merciless conclusion to a well-crafted story that's been dragging us through all kinds of brutal but beautiful strangeness for the last four years. Sugar Skull both clears up the confusion, punches us in the gut several times, and deftly showcases Charles Burns' ability to present a vision of suburban life as dark and surreal wasteland, where fate and brutality conspire to make certain no sin is left unspoken for. 

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Speaking of which? You may notice that I end these reviews with a call to go get them at your local comic store? There's a reason for that, son.

You see, big box book stores and the like might sell things like Sugar Skull, or any of the other hardcovers or trade paperbacks that high-rolling publishers and mainstream comics producers might !@#$ out on a regular basis. But only your local comic store is going to carry so-called "underground" and truly independent comics magazines.

And that's mostly because they're the only ones willing to realize that just because something's chronically late, perpetually delayed, and subject to weird adventures in publication and distribution, it's not an unreliable POS, but is, in fact, something wonderful and unpredictable, and worthy of carrying when it actually !@#$ing comes in.

So if if hadn't been for things like, say, Raw, which didn't see the light of day in snooty, big box book emporiums, (Or even Little Professor) but rather decorated the shelves of the sorts of places where skeedy, one-eyed men with rats in their beards got into knife-wielding arguments over whether Miracleman was genius or !@#$, and if Robert Crumb actually had sold out or not, Charles Burns would not have gotten his start, and we wouldn't have something like Sugar Skull to !@#$ up our heads.

You're !@#$ing welcome. Now go get some !@#$ comics, son. And tell Crazy Mike at the Broken Unicorn to feed that !@#$ rat before it eats his other ear, too.