Stephanie Hans

Thanks to that Simpsons joke I can't stop myself thinking of this comic as 'The.' So, this is 'The volume 1!' A group of friends vanish during a fateful birthday D&D session, only to reappear two years later, one member (and one arm) down unable to talk about where they were or what happened to them. Decades later, broken and haunted and middle aged, they are sucked back into the magical fantasy world of Die where they have to play the game to get home again. Written with savage affection, show more drawn with lush and epic genius, this is a pretty amazing book, even for someone like me who never really got into D&D but was always vaguely fascinated by it. show less

This series was created with such a fantastic concept: what happened to the kids from the 1980s D&D cartoon after the series got cancelled? What if they spent years trapped in a magical land, battling and magicking their way through the way explorers in these adventure stories do? What if they came back to the real world, went on with their (sometimes fortunate, sometimes downright depressing) lives, only for their middle-aged selves to be dragged back into the fantasy world to face the show more consequences of their teenage choices? Kieron Gillen’s mind truly works in mysterious ways, and I’m grateful because he’s hit it out of the park with the world he’s constructed here.

However... something about the book itself did not jive with me. It felt like a slog to get through, and until I started reading the backmatter and connected the inspiration to the story I’d just read, I don’t think I really liked it. The 3 stars are mostly for that inspiration, because I do love that, and I’ll probably keep reading just to see where it could develop from here. show less

(Full disclosure: I received a free e-ARC for review through Netgalley. Content warning for allusions to sexual assault.)

A former foster kid, Lori is used to feeling abandoned. When she wakes up alone one day to find that almost everyone on earth has seemingly vanished overnight, it almost doesn't come as a surprise to her. She quickly bands together with fellow "weird-ass rapture" survivors Annette and Beatrice, scavenging for food; trying to keep warm and sheltered; and all while evading show more the Dogs, a local gang whose hobbies include sex slavery (charming).

Things go from weird to downright bonkers with the appearance of two giants - one that glows a fiery red, the other emerald - and a pack of supernatural wolves. When Red starts feeding and then collecting the humans like pets, Lori's instincts tell her to run. Though well-earned, is Lori's cynicism misplaced?

I wasn't entirely sure what to make of WE CALLED THEM GIANTS. While the artwork is gorgeous, the story feels a little incomplete. (Who are these giants and where did they come from? We'll never know!) I suppose it's a tale about fostering communication and understanding against seemingly insurmountable odds (politics, sigh), but it was hard to empathize with the giant(s) since we know so little about them. show less

Lo que parecia que iba a ser una simple historia de un grupo de gente que acaba en un mundo de fantasia jugando a rol, se convierte en una deconstrucción del genero fantastico y de los juegos de rol en si mismos. Una meta historia que descompone los tropos de ambos mundos (rol y las historias de genero) y crea un mundo autoreferencial ideal para sentirse como un adolescente de nuevo pero con toda la oscuridad y profundidad de una historia adulta. Y sobre hacerse adulto y las fantasias de show more cada uno habla este primer tomo. show less