With the “Back Matter” series of posts, I am reprinting my initial writings on comics from roughly 2006. A more detailed explanation can be found
here.
-Thanks
BACK MATTER #5
Translating
a story from one medium to another may, on the surface, seem like a lesson in
creative typing. But if that were true there
would be a higher percentage of good movies adapted from good books or good
comics. The problem isn’t necessarily
that those adapting the works lack the requisite skill, thought that can often
be the case. The problems that arise
come about due to a lack of understanding of the varying strengths and weaknesses
in each medium. For example, with The
Courtyard from Avatar Press Antony Johnston, ably assisted by artist Jacen
Burrows, is adapting a short piece of prose by Alan Moore into comic form. The biggest hurdle with this endeavor is the
fact that prose contains internal monologue, which is part of its beauty. But with comics being an overwhelmingly
visual medium, an internal monologue is not feasible without something also
happening in the pictures. Thankfully, Johnston and Burrows have
a strong understanding of these differences.
The
Courtyard is the story of Aldo Sax and his investigation into a series of
strange, ritualistic murders. Fifteen
victims from different parts of the United States have shown up dead
without any heads or hands, while their torsos have been carved apart in a
layered star. With all of the victims
having been killed in this identical manner it appears to be the work of a
single killer. But the first suspect, a
20-year-old bookstore clerk from Seattle,
admits to only six of the murders, no more.
The authorities expect to pin him with the others eventually until a wino
picked up for vagrancy cops to three of the murders. Only three.
Of the final six, four are related and the sole survivor of that
massacre confesses to murdering them. Now
the murders seem to be the result of a copycat syndrome, except for the fact
that many details were never given over to the press. The subsequent investigation turns up no links
between the three killers leaving the motive, and the possibility of finding
the killer of the remaining two victims, almost impossible. That’s where Sax comes in.
Sax
is a federal agent who deals with anomaly theory. He looks at cases and sifts through all the
obvious facts in order to find those obscure, anomalous ones that he
intuitively knows may lead to the connection he’s looking for. In this case the fact that all three killers
have shown a tendency toward gibberish, along with a slim thread tying them all
to a new rock band called Ulthar Cats, has led him to Red Hook where the Cats
are scheduled to play in Club Zothique this night. Walking out into the shadows of early
evening, Sax heads across town to take in the new band and try to find the
answers his superiors are so intent upon.
In the course of the night Sax is turned on to a local drug dealer,
Johnny Carcosa, who might just hold the key to everything. There’s a new drug on the street, aklo, which
the lead singer of the Ulthar Cats takes before performing and of which Carcosa
appears to be the main dealer. The drug
causes people to speak in gibberish, part of the appeal of Ulthar Cats, and
could explain this oddity among the three murder suspects. Making his play, Sax gets Carcosa to agree to
meet with him, but the discovery he makes when Carcosa gives him the aklo will
be beyond anything he could have imagined. Opening up a new world to Sax, it will give
him all the answers he is looking for.
But, will he be able to handle it?
Moore’s original story
appeared in the anthology The Starry Wisdom in which contemporary
writers and artists such as John Coulthart and Grant Morrison pay tribute to
H.P. Lovecraft. Like a thin shroud, a
layer of foreboding and unease settles over Moore’s narrative leaving the reader anxious
through to the shocking climax. The
Courtyard is a wonderfully moody tale and is set in the near future lending
it a mingled sense of exoticism and familiarity, which adds to the tension
pervading this short story. Like looking
in a distorting mirror at the funhouse, the audience finds itself looking at
its own world from a slightly different angle and a slightly different time
when maybe, just maybe, the horror found within could actually happen.
As in most Moore
tales, the reader is bombarded with ideas and inventions at every indent of a
paragraph, every jump across the comic gutters, and in the hands of many
writers any one of these ideas – a character dealing with anomaly theory, the
ritualistic murders, the revelation of exactly what aklo is – could be extended
out over a decompressed 6-issue storyline quite easily. But for Moore
such is not the case as he only mentions these things in passing, utilizing
them either to add an air of truth to the tale or propel it forward. And instead of writing a novel he wraps
everything up nicely in ten pages, which translates into two – TWO – issues of
the comic adaptation. And yet, it is as
fulfilling a read as one will find.
Johnston’s biggest worry when approaching the
adaptation of The Courtyard was the fact that he has such an affinity
for the works of Alan Moore and H.P. Lovecraft he wanted to be sure he did
justice to the source material. When
adapting a work of fiction like this I would say that caring about the material
goes a long way toward a superlative creation.
Retaining a vast majority of the internal monologue Johnston has Jacen Burrows
include scenes in the background – a guy mugged by three vagrants while others
just ignore it – which not only expand upon the characterization and flavor of
the setting, but also add another layer of realism to the story. Johnston
understands the strength of comics and allows the visuals to move the story
along at a leisurely pace without losing any of the wonder and esoteric
qualities of Moore’s
original.
Something else
these creators do is to take a page from Alan Moore’s and Frank Miller’s works
and adapt it to their own needs. They
utilize a formal page setup – two vertical panels per page, not unlike the
9-panel grid in Watchmen, and only deviate from this standard when the
story dictates. What this repetition of
form allows is a familiarity for the audience, so that when a “big moment” occurs
– such as the introduction of Dr. Manhattan in Watchmen or the
revelation of the drug aklo in this story – the artist can utilize a full-page
or double-page spread that will stand out and lend a visual impact to the
emotional one.
Johnston noted in his introduction to the
companion book for The Courtyard that he was happy to find he was
working with artist Jacen Burrows who was also an admirer of Lovecraft. Along with his work in videogame design
Burrows has been one of the artists that has set the look for Avatar Press, not
only working on this project but also illustrating a number of books written by
Warren Ellis as well as Garth Ennis’s 303. His art is amazing, and it’s a wonder he has
not been snatched up by the “Big Two” yet.
One can only surmise that this is a conscious act on his part because
his pages are as clean and polished as anything you will see come off the
presses from Marvel or DC. Burrows is
able to adapt his style to anything asked of him by the writer, energetic when
called for, but also subdued when need be. He also uses standard techniques to showcase
Sax’s mental state. Throughout The Courtyard
Burrows uses grey tones to great effect until Sax opens his eyes after doing a
line of DMT-7. At this point he renders the
images in a very stark pen and ink style signifying the protagonists’ altered
perception. But once the aklo kicks in,
with the heightened understanding of the world that comes with it, the multi-layered
grey tones return signaling Sax’s newfound understanding. It’s subtle, it’s simple, and it works so
much better than any computerized technique could have. An artist plying his trade with the tools
that have always been at artists’ disposal.
Brilliant in its simplicity.
This is one of the
best adaptations in comic form I’ve ever read and it is one of my favorite Alan
Moore stories. This easily could have
been overdone – horror being a genre where over-the-top storytelling is not
uncommon – but Johnston and Burrows remain faithful
to Moore’s tale. Pulling readers along, they lull the audience
into believing Sax might come through this unscathed before exploding a climax
upon readers that is as revelatory about the fictitious mystery at hand as it
is about the world around us.
Anyone familiar
with Moore’s
thoughts on magic will understand the implicit lesson to be found at the end of
this story. Regardless, the ultimate
meaning of the drug aklo will allow the audience to look at the world with a
different perspective and have them pondering what the most damaging
mind-altering substance – as dispensed by Charles Manson, David Koresh, Jim
Jones, et al. – can be.
Our second
selection this time is the mini-comic
Cells from Scott Mills. Published in 1998, Mills was the recipient of
a grant from the Xeric Foundation as a result of this work. Available through Mills’s website,
www.scottmills.net, this is a story of
two cellmates in the Baltimore Department of Corrections – one black and one
white – and the evolution of their relationship.
Amazingly, Mills
takes us on a journey through thirteen years of the convicts’ lives, from 1997
to 2009, and does it in only 22 pages.
Aptly utilizing the cliché that less is more, Mills drops the reader in
at specific points in these characters’ story, giving his audience just those
bits of information necessary to drive the narrative. For its brevity, readers miss nothing of the
nuance and maturation in this relationship, watching it slowly grow from an
antagonistic one into one where these two men might be comfortable calling one
another friend. Conversations that were
once argumentative – more monologue than anything else – eventually become the
familiar wise-cracking dialogues that embody those exchanges between male
friends. And when, at the end, one of
them succumbs to cancer it is as touching a moment as one will come across.
Scott Mills is a
great storyteller. His art will not be
to most people’s liking, but it ably illustrates the stories he wants to
share. Stripped down to a minimum of
fluid, graceful lines, his approach to comics is similar to John Ford’s
approach to moviemaking – keep it simple, resist overstated set dressing, and
focus on the characters. Mills’s
characters are far from one-dimensional, refusing to speak in clichés. And despite the lessons that can be taken
away from this particular creation, Mills never talks down to the readers. His stories are exciting and daring and
Mills’s use of the comic page is as accomplished as any veteran – close-ups,
long shots, and black panels all adding visual weight to the story being
told. An amazing debut from an important
storyteller, and one you should hunt down.
