Many comic books are fantasies, filled with feats and adventures that ordinary people wish they could pull off. But some of those fantasies can also invoke sex and violence in ways that make folks feel icky. And if youāre the one turning out those stories, what happens when youāre burnt out doing the thing you used to love? Should you give up?
Warning: some images that follow may be NSFW.
Thatās the problem facing a middle-aged cartoonist in Sam Zabel and the Magic Pen, a graphic novel that came out late last year in the U.S. from Fantagraphics. The titular character of Dylan Horrocksā most recent opus is a creator whoās in a rut. After making a splash with more acclaimed, critical-darling early work, Samās fallen into a unfulfilling routine of banging out scripts for a generically shallow superhero character called Lady Night. Heās missing a deadline, stuck for inspiration and, basically, nothing feels good anymore. Lady Night chafes at his stewardship and even calls him a hack.
Like the pages Sam used to turn out, the original versions of Lady Night were more tonally textured and interesting. But the passage of time and the real world creeps into both realms, turning Lady Night into a sexed-up lesser version of herself and Sam into a family man hamstrung by doubt. After accepting an invitation to speak at an academic conference, he stumbles into discovering the existence of the Magic Pen, which has let generations of artists escape into their own creations. One breath from an actual human onto these special comics and the person in question gets whisked away into their panels. From there, he clumsily embarks on an adventure through the worlds of a bunch of forgotten comics, where the creations have taken on lives of their own.
Horrocks does a great job at channeling the weirdo charms of works from unheralded comicsā Golden and Silver Ages, which themselves might have been deemed āhackā work fit only for making ends meet. But heās using their offbeat rhythms and hoary old tropes to illuminate how fandomsā engagements with comics creativity has changed, too. When Sam winds up on a Mars populated with submissive Venusian damselsāproduct of an older 1950s creator named Evan Riceāhe doesnāt happily jump into the orgy that they want to happen. Heās tempted, yeah, but mostly feels weird about being inside a fantasy that isnāt his.
Magic Pen is about the uses of fantasy and the reality of having to engage with the creepier aspects of a nerd culture thatās evolved over decades. One of the ideas that the book floats is that the power of fan interpretation and reclamation can create wayward, unintended lives for characters meant to fulfill barely sublimated fetishes. When he creates a stereotypically unsavory subtext for the origins of manga heroine Miki, Horrocks has her redemption happen at the hands on another, younger cartoonist named Alice who, basically, doesnāt have time for hentai tentacle-rape bullshit.
Itās the passion that Alice has for Miki, fan-fic and deconstructing icky tropes that points the way towards Samās eventual creative salvation. These are all the possible journeys that love for a creation can send you on. Thereās the official/canonical story-path, sure, but parallel excursions are just as good or even better for those willing to imagine them. Yes, some of them will be pervy and gross. But even those mean something to someone. And, if slimy re-interpretations make their way to people who donāt want them, they too have the power to reject or reshape them. When Sam first meets Miki, sheās his guide through imaginary worlds that she wasnāt made for, creating a smaller, more intimate sort of genre crossover. Horrocks himself breaks the fourth wall in reverse a few times, telling the reader whatās supposed to happen in a few scenes. And in those moments, too, you can see the characters not quite easily fitting into the roles they were intended to play.
Creating comics or any kind of art/entertainment can be a lonely endeavor. Itās work done in private, where one tries to cater both to the mysterious whims of a fickle public and their own urgent inspirations. A creator only knows if something succeeds once itās in someoneās hands and, even then, thereās no guarantee that feedback makes its way back to the place of origin. But, Sam Zabel and the Magic Pen shows that when the loop of creation to appreciation is completeāand better still if the creative energy spins out on its own unpredictable orbitāthat the relationship between audience and artist carries its own sort of eldritch power.
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