X'ed Out (2010)

A bizarre comic about a sick young man, literally a tortured artist, haunted by repellent dreams. The dreams revolve around his relationship with an equally aberrant photographer. The artwork is excellent and references Tintin -- though it depicts no landscape that he would have been found in. More like H.P. Lovecraft than Hergé. The book is quite short and is the first part of several. I am unsure if I will go back for more. ( )

At first I thought this was a stand-alone graphic novel, but it's only the first chapter of what promises to be a much longer work. I am intrigued, baffled and creeped out in the same manner that I was intrigued, baffled and creeped out by "Black Hole" when I first read the comic book installments. With "Black Hole", one of the problems of reading it in installment format was the length of time between issues, sometimes a year or more. I would tend to forget key images and plot points that hold the overall story together. But when I finally got hold of the hardcover of BH, it all made sense. As much sense as Burns' work makes, that is.

If you've read Burns' other work, you know what dark, nauseating worlds he creates, and "X'ed Out" is no exception. The narrative alternates between the real-world story of Doug, a young artist, and an alien and mysterious dream world he inhabits. In the dream world, he appears as a dazed, shell-shocked version of the Belgian comic character Tintin, and some of the landscapes in "X'ed Out" resemble the kind of thing you'd see in Tintin, except as seen through a dark lens. Tintin fans will also note that Doug has a black cat named Inky rather than a white dog named Snowy.

I look forward to the next installment. ( )

Wonderful. Looking forward to the rest of the series. ( )

http://nwhyte.livejournal.com/1929682.html

I picked this up when I went to a Charles Burns exhibition, struck by its front cover which is a direct homage to one of Hergé's Tintin albums, The Shooting Star. The story here is completely different, though, as young Doug wakes up in a nightmare world of strange and slightly horrible people; we get flashbacks to his "normal" life in our world which may or may not explain what has provoked his dreams, if they are dreams; and then a big reveal in the last frame shakes some sense into Doug's new world, and prepares the way for the next volume; which I will buy. ( )

I maybe change the rating if I could read the sequel of it. Right now, the first chapter is way too ambiguous and strange. I can sense author has a big picture in his mind. However, the story just stops before something which could be meaningful. The next chapter may explain the story and make the whole as a great one. Maybe not. Whatever it will be, I don't think the current one is a good beginning for release a series. It simply kill readers' interests and push them away. Maybe it could be better if two chapters come out together or more contents are added into chapter one. It feels bad I spend time on this well-illustrated book and get nothing. I wish the second one could come out as soon as possible. Or I will forget the story at all.

Many people gave high-ratings here because it "seems" a great things to come and it's the same author writing Black Hole. Black Hole is a fine one which, actually, brought me to this one. However, I don't think it's objective to give a work high-ratings only based on its potential. You never know what will come next! Only the next chapter will let us know. But after reading this beginning, I really can't care more about what will come. ( )