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Loading... A Blazing World: The Unofficial Companion to the Second League of Extraordinary Gentlemenby Jess Nevins
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Belongs to SeriesThe League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (Companion to Volume 2) Reference guide/companion to
A comic book that contains interviews and commentary, and panel-by-panel annotations. No library descriptions found. |
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There are nice things to say about this companion. First, respect is due to Nevins for the colossal amount of work he must have put into it. Second, the annotations for the actual graphic novel are as excellent as ever. The chap on the flying carpet at the start of the story is identified and there are interesting notes on the various sources for Moore’s fictional Martian history. Truly dedicated fans will enjoy working their way through the panels with the companion open alongside.
While the annotations are the raison d’etre for both companions I found the supplementary material more fun so was disappointed by the lack of it in Volume 2. For consolation, there are interviews with both Alan Moore and Kevin O’Neill. Artists are not wordy people but O’Neill talks interestingly of his work on the project. He calls Alan ’the greatest architect of sequential graphic storytelling in the world’ and opines that though the master allows it he would be a fool to deviate from those precise gigantic incredibly detailed scripts. I believe O’Neill got started in the field with 2000AD and that comic magazine is worth a plug here. It’s a curates egg of a thing and too violent sometimes but it is a seedbed for new talent in the British comic industry, many of whom make it in America too. Our culture, as well as our balance of trade, is the richer for its existence. Subscribe now and tell Tharg I sent you.
Writers are wordy people so Moore’s interview is three times as long. Fans will be pleased to know there are more League tales to come, though not on any definite schedule. He is scathing about the film industry, respectful of literature. He is a fluent and provocative interviewee but to be taken with a pinch of salt perhaps. English people will know how to do this. Americans might not.
Conclusion: Don’t get this unless you really want the annotations as they comprise the vast bulk of it.
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