Courtney Crumrin: Volume 1: The Night Things

by Ted Naifeh, 125 pages

Young Courtney Crumrin is none too thrilled when her parents eagerly agree to become "caretakers" of her wealthy, eccentric great (?) uncle Aloysius and move the family to his creepy old house beside some spooky woods in a class-conscious town where things go bump in the night (and not everybody comes out of the woods who goes in).

Naifeh takes the old fairy tale tack of keeping the darker bits in order not to shield children from the more unpleasant aspects of reality and, so, doesn't pretend bad things don't happen or that protagonists don't have personality flaws like everybody else.  His heroine makes as many selfish, ill-advised decisions as the rest of us, but she has the pluck to sometimes succeed in getting herself out of fixes, too.  No little angel role model, is Courtney, but she's got what it takes (including luck) to face both the school cliques and the things lurking in the shadows.  If she gets a little in over her head now and then, well, that's when kids need to rely on grown-ups, right?  Or at least on the reliable ones who understand her.

Jim Henson's Return to Labyrinth: Volume 4

by Jake T. Forbes (story), Chris Lie (art), and Kouyu Shurei (cover art), 199 pages

Remember Labyrinth? Edgier than usual Muppets? David Bowie as the glam rock Goblin King? Those creepy Fire Gang things that play basketball with their own heads? It freaks me out a little, but I loved it when I was in junior high. Return to Labyrinth is, as you might guess from the title and cover, an original English language manga sequel to the movie. I thought it sounded cool. But then I read it. :(

While that cover art might look somewhat snazzy and like a good fit for the style of the movie, it bears no resemblance whatsoever to the interior art, which is far less realistic and attractive. The latter is excessively screentone-heavy and cartoonish, and the flat, awkward characters often look like different people from one panel to the next. The Muppet characters lifted from the film are much more detailed than the others and almost look as though they were drawn by somebody else. And The Goblin King, Sarah, and Toby are boring fuddy duddies and not at all cool. As for the plot itself (in which Jareth passes on his King status to a teenage Toby as part of a scheme to re-trap Sarah and avoid his end of a bargain with another character), it isn't bad, when you can decipher it; but between the unclear storytelling, especially in the first volume, and unhelpful art, that can be a challenge.

I think if someone else had drawn this four-volume series, it could have worked out better along with some minimal story and dialogue tweaking. But as it is, the art is totally wrong for the story, characters, and atmosphere expected by fans of the film (who one assumes are the target audience in the first place). I remember when I cracked open the first volume and realized the cover artist was not the same as the story artist--I was a little offended as well as disappointed. Truth in advertizing, people! It's a comic book! I oughta be able to judge at least a little by the cover, no? Grrr. Arg.