Moreton, Simon – Smoo #4

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Smoo #4

Hot damn, I think he’s done it. I think Simon has created the perfect comic about growing up in the suburbs, the little rebellions that you take along the way to try and keep things slightly interesting, and the shock of feeling exactly the same but finding yourself several years older, with irrefutable physical evidence of that fact. Now, “perfect” is a word that’s hard to quantify in much of anything, let alone a comic, and this is obviously my personal opinion (note: that fact is usually given away by the fact that I’m the one writing the review). But every single note of this felt like it was spot on, with no cutting of corners and no fake happy moments thrown in. I don’t want to ruin anything about this (even though I probably already did just by describing it), so I’ll go with some generalities. There’s the actual picture of Simon’s friends when they were younger to go along with the hazier drawn image of those friends several years later. There’s the fact that this house that 11 year old Simon moved into was mostly just a collection of angles and “other people’s carpets.” There’s remembering how every single thing that happened in the time when he was growing up was crucially important. Not “seemed” important, which is a meaningful distinction, but actually WAS important, which has to ring true for anybody reading this who has grown up. And every step along the way there are Simon’s drawings, sparse images against a field of white, that show how insubstantial the whole thing seems now. I’ve liked Simon’s previous comics, don’t get me wrong, but it feels to me like they were all leading up to this. I also have #5 here, and how it tops this issue I have no idea, but if you’re curious about Simon’s work, start here and work your way back. $5 (?)

Posted on May 2, 2012, in Reviews and tagged , . Bookmark the permalink. Comments Off on Moreton, Simon – Smoo #4.

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