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Last I knew of David Mazzuchelli, he was doing great work in the superhero world, drawing (but not writing) excellent stories for Batman and Daredevil. Now he's come out with the next great graphic novel. Who knew?
Asterios Polyp is a "paper architecht," a theorist whose designs and opinons are highly respected, but whose buildings never get built. He looks at the world and sees duality everywhere, no shades of gray (perhaps because his identical twin never made it out of the womb). The love of Polyp's life is Hana, an artist as recessive as he is pushy, who differs from him on every point...are they complementary, or just mismatched? Mazzuchelli does some astonishing stuff here, using the medium of comics to tell a gripping story while dramatizing a great many artistic and philosophical debates. For instance, in one segment Asterios argues with a composer about the concept of "simultanaiety" in music. Asterios says a composer should stick to one idea; the composer says that music is richer when the listener gets to decide which part of a piece should get the most attention. And while they argue, three or four other things are also happening on the page at the same time, vying for the reader's attention...this is the best graphic novel since "Fun Home." It's rich enough to reward several readings.

Asterios Polyp is something special, showing what a comic book can be if an artist really takes the time to think and use the format to its fullest. I'm not aware of another work that makes such complete use of text, pictures, layout, color, drawing styles, and word balloons like this one. Asterios Polyp makes the reader stop and look at the page and think about how Mazzucchelli is conveying his ideas, but not in a bad way that does disservice to the story. I really hope that other creators take a look at some of the techniques being used here and start applying them to more mainstream offerings. The word masterpiece often gets misused, but in this case, the label is appropriate. ( )

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