SWEET TOOTH #2

Review by: akamuu

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Avg Rating: 4.3
 
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Size: pages
Price: 2.99

Sweet Tooth is not Chew.

One of the reasons I’m an incredible fan of John Layman and Rob Guillory’s comic series, Chew, is that it set up a certain creative future world in its first issue.  It set up a premise that should have been real easy to follow.  A cop comic with a twist.  The detective eats people.  But the second issue veered off in a completely unexpected direction.  As did both the third and the fourth.  The stellar artwork really helps, but the fact that the storyline doesn’t follow any familiar patterns makes each issue a new and interesting experience.  They are really challenging comic readers, while providing excellent stories.

Jeff Lemire is not.

In issue one he sets up your standard post-apocalyptic fare, but with a twist: a hybrid child is being raised in seclusion.  The art was stark, and beautiful.  It was easily my pick of the week when it came out.  But, I feared that issue two would not be a challenge, and I was right.

Much like Nobody was just Jeff Lemire rewriting your standard Invisible Man story, but within the context of an indie film, here Jeff lemire is rewriting your standard coming of age in a post apocalyptic world story (which, be honest, is no longer an original concept) within the context of an indie film.  And, ok, the indie film is actually a comic.  But he hasn’t changed the medium so vastly that it’s unrecognizable.  These read like very beautifully drawn storyboards to a familiar movie.  The twist is the antlers.  The twist is that the kid likes candy.  The twist is really the only thing that keeps this comic from being boring.  But, while it’s not boring, it is also not fantastically interesting, and, after the first issue, that’s really disappointing.

The art here has also already grown stale.  In the first issue there was a lush tree that offset all the death and gloom around the rest of the book.  While I’m glad he didn’t throw another tree in this issue, each panel of this issue felt more or less the same.  I think doing something cool with the fire in this issue would have been another great offset; or perhaps, making the moon something other than a white sphere.  Or else, making that dull version of the moon a bigger player in the book.  As it stood, it looked as if he made that panel on a page of three-hole-punched binder paper.

It bothers me that this series is getting so dull, so fast.  I really hope he has some sort of magnificent turn in the next issue to get me interested.  Otherwise, I’m probably going to drop it.

Story: 3 - Good
Art: 3 - Good

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