Sad, sad, sad. Oh, man, that’s some sad stuff. Jason is easy to read. It’s light stuff. Long sections of mostly wordless comic strips. You know, simple. Except that he’s a bastard who grabs your heart and craps in it. What I did is a collection of three Jason books. Each one is good, and each fairly different, while still being very much of his style.
In ‘Hey, Wait…’ he takes us back to the happy days of youth. Flying pterodactyls like kites, checking out girls, loving Batman, and being menaced by bully zombies. And then tragedy. From that point on, we follow the sad life of a man consumed by guilt. And it’s heartbreaking. ‘Sshhhh!’ is a weird one, even for Jason. It seems to hop realities, break all sorts of rules, and flow with an only slight hold on coherency. But it does have some great gags. The uplifting then crushing love story in the first chapter is great. The fantasies about an ex in chapter five…Oh, man. I get that. The final part of the book is ‘The Iron Wagon’ an adaptation of a classic Norwegian mystery novel. The story is pretty typical of that turn of the 20th century detective fiction. And as an adaptation, I think it lacks some of Jason’s magic. But it’s still interesting to see him turn his art style onto someone else’s story.
Jason’s work always leaves an impression. This is no different. He’s someone to seek out, especially if you’re either not normally a comic reader, or are, but are in the mood for something different. It’s different all right.
What I Did
Author & Artist: Jason
Publisher: Fantagraphics Books
ISBN: 978-1-60699-414-6
-Matt
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