Euro Comics: Reviews of Moby Dick and The Interview - a podcast by Stergios Botzakis & Derek Royal

Time Codes:

• 00:00:26 - Introduction
• 00:02:36 - Catching up
• 00:05:04 - Moby Dick
• 00:48:50 - The Interview
• 01:18:18 - Wrap up
• 01:18:58 - Contact us

This month on the Euro Comics series, Edward and Derek discuss two black-and-white narratives, one an adaptation of a classic text and another an offbeat tale of aliens and relationships. They begin with Christophe Chabouté's rendering of Herman Melville's Moby Dick (note the lack of hyphen in the title), released earlier this year from Dark Horse Books. After mentioning many of the earlier comics adaptations of the great American novel -- and there are a lot -- they plunge into Chabouté's handling, highlighting some of the differences from the earlier versions. Both cohosts come from two very different perspectives in their analyses, since Derek is very familiar with the original novel and Edward has not yet read it. As such, their approaches are varied and multifaceted.

Next, they turn to the latest translation of Manuele Fior, The Interview (Fantagraphics). This is a markedly different kind of story from 5,000 km Per Second, a book that Gwen and Derek reviewed last year. As Edward points out, the draw of The Interview isn't so much the story, but its tone or the affect generated by the text. This is a tale about relationships, and Fior's art deftly expresses the subtitles and complications that underlie all of our interactions. You may come away from this book with a feeling of uncertainly and irresolution, but that seems to be a part of Fior's project.

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