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Review: Achewood - The Great Outdoor Fight
Achewood: The Great Outdoor Fight
By Chris Onstad
Published by Dark Horse Comics. $14.95 USD
This was an odd experience. I'm not what you'd call an Achewood fan, as I don't read the webcomic regularly at all, but I've seen chunks of it and have enjoyed it. When I was an Eisner Awards judge in 2006 I'm sure I rated it highly as a possible award winner (though honestly I don't remember who won). Anyway, when I ordered this I figured it was just a collection of the webcomics, but it appears Dark Horse hired Onstad to come up with a new, book-length adventure, judging by the varying page layouts and quiet, gagless portions. The story goes that Ray, who I guess is the scam artist of the cast, discovers his father was the 1973 winner of the Great Outdoor Fight, a kind of last man standing annual contest that has been going on for decades, so Ray decides to use his blood connection to get in on this year's fight, aided by his pal, Roast Beef. With cunning, mental cruelty and not a little bit of legitimate asskicking, Ray finds himself defeating man after man, and I'll leave it at that.
Now, I didn't hold it against Onstad that his Introduction and The Beginning text pieces about the history of this fictional fight were very tedious and self-indulgent. If one of you readers makes it through even the second page of The Beginning, you're stronger than me. But really, that's fine. The guy gets a book and gets a little carried away. No problem.
And honestly, for much of the book I was enjoying it. Although Onstad's lack of punctuation in his word balloons is a little annoying, both Ray and Roast Beef are very funny, both what they say and the rich patois in which they say it. The best parts are where they figure out the weaknesses of various fighters and exploit them. But at some point, the story gets away from Onstad. It may be sort of the problem with the recent film Pineapple Express, where the violence and comedy don't sit that well with each other, but I think it's more that an easily-winning, actually pretty tough Ray is just not that interesting. There's not much to fight against or root for, and the cutaways to the other characters at home are as distracting and unsatisfying as the flaming Jeep climax is just overblown action without the comedy. It felt like Onstad may have experienced some doubt about the conclusion, and decided to just go big and hope for the best. It could be that Ray just works best in small doses where he's not required to be sympathetic. An appearance by Ray's dad almost pulls the story back on track, but significant damage was done. I did enjoy the fake recipes and blog entries at the end of the book. Overall, a good try and a lot of effort put into the book itself as an object, but the story went wanting for laughs in too-long stretches. I'd probably be more interested in a collection of strips but can't fault Onstad for trying to stretch.
By Chris Onstad
Published by Dark Horse Comics. $14.95 USD
This was an odd experience. I'm not what you'd call an Achewood fan, as I don't read the webcomic regularly at all, but I've seen chunks of it and have enjoyed it. When I was an Eisner Awards judge in 2006 I'm sure I rated it highly as a possible award winner (though honestly I don't remember who won). Anyway, when I ordered this I figured it was just a collection of the webcomics, but it appears Dark Horse hired Onstad to come up with a new, book-length adventure, judging by the varying page layouts and quiet, gagless portions. The story goes that Ray, who I guess is the scam artist of the cast, discovers his father was the 1973 winner of the Great Outdoor Fight, a kind of last man standing annual contest that has been going on for decades, so Ray decides to use his blood connection to get in on this year's fight, aided by his pal, Roast Beef. With cunning, mental cruelty and not a little bit of legitimate asskicking, Ray finds himself defeating man after man, and I'll leave it at that.
Now, I didn't hold it against Onstad that his Introduction and The Beginning text pieces about the history of this fictional fight were very tedious and self-indulgent. If one of you readers makes it through even the second page of The Beginning, you're stronger than me. But really, that's fine. The guy gets a book and gets a little carried away. No problem.
And honestly, for much of the book I was enjoying it. Although Onstad's lack of punctuation in his word balloons is a little annoying, both Ray and Roast Beef are very funny, both what they say and the rich patois in which they say it. The best parts are where they figure out the weaknesses of various fighters and exploit them. But at some point, the story gets away from Onstad. It may be sort of the problem with the recent film Pineapple Express, where the violence and comedy don't sit that well with each other, but I think it's more that an easily-winning, actually pretty tough Ray is just not that interesting. There's not much to fight against or root for, and the cutaways to the other characters at home are as distracting and unsatisfying as the flaming Jeep climax is just overblown action without the comedy. It felt like Onstad may have experienced some doubt about the conclusion, and decided to just go big and hope for the best. It could be that Ray just works best in small doses where he's not required to be sympathetic. An appearance by Ray's dad almost pulls the story back on track, but significant damage was done. I did enjoy the fake recipes and blog entries at the end of the book. Overall, a good try and a lot of effort put into the book itself as an object, but the story went wanting for laughs in too-long stretches. I'd probably be more interested in a collection of strips but can't fault Onstad for trying to stretch.
Posted by ChristopherAllen at 11:33 PM [Link to this post]
2 Comments:
It IS a collection of strips.
http://www.achewood.com/?date=01112006
After I wrote the review, I had a nagging feeling that that was probably the case. Now, was there anything added to the strips? I was struck by all the silent and rather sluggish sequences, that made me think it wasn't originally a webcomic.
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