Wednesday, October 19, 2022

What I Bought 10/15/2022

I'm somewhere out on the road as this post goes up, smack in the middle of a long week. From where I sit, typing this on Sunday morning, if I make it through tomorrow, I can almost coast through Friday. I hope.

Anyway, trying to get any comics I want to actually come out is still a pain in the ass, as apparently everything is waiting until the end of the month (counting today, 5 books through 3 weeks). I got one from two weeks ago, so let's go with that.

The West Moon Chronicle #1, by Frank Jun Kim (writer), Joe Bocardo (artist), Manoli Martinez (colorist), El Torres (letterer) - First time I saw that I cover, I thought he had a lightsaber. Told myself no way, it's not that kind of story. It's the beam from a flashlight. Got a closer look now and it is a glowing sword after all.

Jae-sun returns to his grandfather's house near the town of Vane, Texas. he doesn't want to be there, but he's in debt to some unpleasant people, and his lady friend Sunny suggested he convince his grandfather to sell his home to get the money. Grandpa, who is only referred to as that or Mr. Rhee, isn't willing to sell his home or land, certainly not when Sunny is a nine-tailed fox. Bocardo draws the old man with a lot of sharp lines. There's age on him, but it's expressed not by him having lost strength, but that most anything soft has been carved away. His face is still open, if not expressive, during the conversation, but once he starts swinging a sword, his eyes tend to go into shadow.

Lit on fire, "Sunny" flees into the forest, grandson and grandfather after her, bickering all the way. They don't find her, and what are likely some old arguments kick up and get them in trouble with some gremlin-looking things called dokkaebi from Korean folklore. Bocardo sticks to short, wide panels during the argument, zooming in first one their faces, then on just mouths or eyes so the audience can't see how bad the situation has gotten until the characters calm down. 

Trying to escape, they run to a nearby lake, Grandpa intending to use the full moon to escape through a lotus gate. Except Jae-sun's old girlfriend/wife/baby mama comes out, with a dragon, after being gone 18 years, saying their daughter is in danger.

There's a lot going on. The old man's sword glows sometimes. He fought in Vietnam, but his unit committed war crimes. He contends he wasn't involved, but didn't stop them, either. Jae-sun carries a lot of resentment of his grandfather being taken away because of this and left in the care of a local bartender or something. There's a lot of backstory Kim just hints at, I assume to be expanded on later. I'm not sure why Texas would be such a hotspot for being of Korean mythology, unless they're there because some who believes in them is as well. Or they exist all over and it's just a matter of what different cultures call them.

Maybe this is common, but the old man mostly speaks in Korean, which Jae-Sun clearly understands, but responds to in English. Which the old man knows, because he uses it when he's still conversing politely with Sunny. I guess each of them sticks with what's most comfortable when they can.

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