I Killed Adolf Hitler

Title: I Killed Adolf Hitler

Series: Original Graphic Novel

Publisher: Fantagraphics Books Inc.

Publication Date: 2006 (France), 2007 (USA)

Creative Team:

            Writer & Artist: Jason (John Arne Sæterøy)

Genre: Fantasy, Sci-Fi, Relationships

I Killed Adolf Hitler was the book that introduced me to Jason.  I have been reading comics for years but I’ve never encountered another comic creator quite like him.  His work is deceptive within the medium’s American comic landscape.  It would be easy to pass his work on the shelf and assume that you were looking at a comic made for children.  His characters are anthropomorphized dogs, rabbits, and birds.  His dialogue is simple and sparse.  His illustrations have a minimalist style.  It would be easy to think you were looking at a children’s book. However, that assumption would be very wrong.

From the classic Children's tale 'Mom is Horny but Daddy is a Hitman'

Jason is actually the nom de plume for Norwegian comic creator, John Arne Sæterøy.  Apart from living in Norway he’s also lived in Denmark, Belgium, and France.  Much of his work began life overseas before being translated to english and published in the United States by Fantgraphics. The interesting thing about European comics to me is how differently they have evolved over time compared to American comics.  In 1950s, American comics were attacked by Fredric Wertham in his now infamous book, Seduction of the Innocent.  These ideas gained traction when Senate hearings on the subject forced the comics industry to self regulate by forming the Comics Code Authority.  The Comics Code pushed some publishers to the point where they had to close their doors and forced entire genres out of the American comics medium.  The regulations were so draconian that famous comics writer Marv Wolfman was not allowed to have his last name in print because of its association with the mythical half-man/half-wolf creature.  But comics in Europe didn’t face these trials they weren’t forced to adapt or die.  They were allowed to grow as an art form.  In the United States, the stigma of being seen as juvenile and trivial has forced many comics creators away from anything that even gives the appearance of youthful frivolity.  A comics creator like Jason would have a hard time finding a place in mainstream American comics.  But lucky for us, he’s not American.

Nobody noticed Hitler's illiterate attempt
to read a gibberish newspaper due to an assassin's arrival. 

I Killed Adolf Hitler follows the tale (no anthropomorphic animal pun intended) of a hired hitman, his girlfriend, and a time machine.  A story with a title like this one sounds like it would be all about putting Hitler on ice but really it’s more about relationships and timing.  The story starts out in present day with the hitman and his girlfriend (who are never named) clearly having problems in their relationships.  Our hitman’s business is positively booming.  He has calls from people from all walks of life to kill people for all sorts of petty reasons.  If that weren’t bad enough competition in the hitman business is pretty stiff.  Assassinations of average people in broad daylight are a common occurrence.  The hitman would continue killing lousy bosses and noisy neighbors if it wasn’t for a client with a time machine.  The hitman can’t pass up the chance to kill Hitler and accepts but things quickly go awry.

Who hasn't tried to hire someone to kill there mother?

Just another day in the life of a hitman.

Jason’s works is often almost completely silent.  While I Killed Adolf Hitler has sparse dialogue, it’s quite verbose in comparison to works like You Can’t Get There From Here and Sshhhh!.  The dialogue Jason does include is very concise.  This works in interesting concert with his illustration style.  While his characters are dogs, cats, birds etc, there faces are almost always stoic.  They rarely betray emotions.  His stories depend more on slow burning plot lines to instill emotional weight.  He could have a character say they were lonely or their face could look depressed but instead Jason chooses to show a lonely life over time.  Through repetition he gives a clear view of what the character must be feeling without having to spell it out.  He’s not a writer you would ever accuse of telling more than showing.

Jason’s art work seems partly inspired by Herge’s ligne claire (“clear line” in french) style.  His line work has equal weight.  He never uses illustrated shading.  His colors are usually flat rather than employing the use of gradients.  His work is a fun change of pace visually from most other American comics.  However, his simplistic art style occasionally makes distinguishing characters a bit of a chore.  There was a point in the story where I had a difficult time seeing that a character had aged significantly and there were a couple times where I didn’t realize I was following a new character.  Both these issues threw off the the story for me momentarily.  

Overall I Killed Adolf Hitler despite the morbid subject matter is a lot of fun.  I think most people can relate to the relationship issues at the core of the story and who doesn’t like a little zany time travel from time to time.  If you decide to check this comic out and find you like it then I would greatly suggest looking into Jason’s other work.  Hey, Wait... is probably my next favorite of his works but be ready for a rather heartbreaking story.  Enjoy!

Grade: A+

Freddy Vs Jason Vs Ash

Title: Freddy vs Jason vs Ash

Series: Limited Series

Publisher: Wildstorm Comics

Creative Team:

Story: Jeff Katz

Writer: James Anthony Kuhoric

Artist: Jason Craig

Colors: Thomas Mason

Genre: Slasher, Horror, Black Comedy

No one seems concerned about burning alive but then Freddy's already done that.

 Before getting too deep into this review I think it’s worth noting that this comic isn’t for everyone.  There is fiction that’s written to be universally accessible and there is fiction written for a target audience.  Freddy vs Jason vs Ash is definitely the latter.  I have a hard time imagining someone being interested in this comic who wasn’t already a fan of one or more of the film series.  On top of that, this comic sits firmly in the Slasher genre so it will be violent and there will be sex.  If that sort of thing bothers you, you should probably seek entertainment elsewhere.  And like a group of happy-go-lucky teens who have just encountered a crazy old man prophesying doom…You have been warned!  Enjoy.

  

Friday the 13^th was rebooted in 2009.  Nightmare on Elm Street was rebooted in 2010.  And now this month the reboot of Evil Dead has been released.  Before there was talk of reboots there was an attempt to bring all three franchises together.  Things didn’t pan out and a film was never made but the script was able to live on in comic form.  So I figured what better way to celebrate the reboot of the Evil Dead franchise than to visit what could have been.

I'm still waiting on that Leprechaun reboot.

Freddy vs Jason left Jason as more or less the official winner.  Freddy was brought out from the dream world (as is usually the case in the Nightmare on Elm Street series) at which point Jason was eventually able to overpower him.  However, at the end it’s made clear that Freddy has still managed to survive in some capacity.  Five years later the story of Freddy vs Jason vs Ash begins.  Crystal Lake is going through a bit of a town reboot (as is usually the case in Friday the 13^th sequels).  In the wake of this redevelopment an S-mart Super Center has been constructed and is nearly ready to open.  The kids working at the new S-Mart store are more or less the same clichés you would expect to find in a post Scream slasher film engaging in the same clichéd dick and fart jokes.  Where S-mart is, Ash is not far behind.  Ash has been asked to transfer to the new store to get it ready for its big grand opening.  However things aren’t going to go too smoothly.  Jason is still at large same as usual but now Freddy is trapped in his head and desperately wants out.  Freddy’s escape requires the Necronomicon.  As you can imagine Ash will have something to say about this.  

With S-Mart's new all Deadite staff everyday feels like Black Friday at Wal-Mart!

The hardest thing about bringing Freddy vs Jason vs Ash to life has to be the tone.  All three movie franchises have gone through tone revisions.  Friday the 13^th has jumped back and forth between black comedy and straight up horror.  Freddy has evolved over the years into something like a sexually charged standup comedian.  Meanwhile, in only 3 films Ash’s character has turned from a standard frightened horror movie character into the ultimate parody of masculinity.  To imagine the Ash from Army of Darkness fighting Freddy and Jason requires a tone that does justice to all three characters.  All three franchises have dabbled in comedy but comedy is a varied genre unto itself.  I think Billy Madison and I Heart Huckabees are both hilarious but the two mixed together would be a mess.  This is my main complaint with Freddy vs Jason vs Ash.

It looks like Freddy's played knifey spoony before.

Later Jason and Ash had a brutal
slap fight that left few survivors.

Freddy and Jason’s worlds mesh pretty well together.  I know not everyone liked Freddy vs Jason but for me it mostly worked.  However, adding Ash to the mix is where the problems come in.  When I think back on how Ash survived the 2 films he did (I am excluding Evil Dead because Ash isn’t really Ash until Evil Dead 2) it’s really been dumb luck more than skill.  The Deadites seemed more content to subject Ash to Three Stooges gags rather than any real attempt to kill him (Sam Raimi loves him some Three Stooges).  It’s not a problem with those films.  In Evil Dead 2 and Army of Darkness the slapstick horror worked.  The problem is Jason isn’t going to playfully poke Ash in the eyes.  Freddy isn’t going to grab Ash’s nose and then slap it.  Quite frankly Ash shouldn’t survive these encounters unless he steps his game up.  Yet throughout the whole story Ash pulls the same crap as always and meanwhile Jason and Freddy seem to dial themselves down to accommodate him.  Jason will cut people in half without stopping in one scene but in the next he’ll just throw Ash around.  Freddy will slaughter most people in their dreams without hesitation but he’ll stop and let Ash deliver a monologue.  

Nothing good can come of this.

I have spent more time with the Evil Dead series than I have either Freddy or Jason.  With my self-proclaimed PHD in Evil Dead (still waiting on accreditation) I noticed that James Kuhoric recycled a fair amount of dialogue from the original trilogy.  I know that the intent was to provide a nod to what came before but I can’t help feeling that it comes off as a little lazy.  There are three instances in Freddy vs Jason vs Ash where a spell needs to be read from the Necronomicon: once to free/give power to Freddy, once when Freddy tries to trap Jason, and multiple attempts to send both Freddy and Jason away.  All of these spells apparently require the same three magic words: Klattu Verata Nikto.  It was kind of funny the first time but even Evil Dead 2 had more magic words than that.  Beyond that Ash lifts several lines verbatim from both Evil Dead 2 and Army of Darkness.  When he’s not doing that his characterization is a bit spotty.  On the other hand Jason and Freddy feel spot on.  The move and act just as you would expect Freddy and Jason to.  Jason even has the requisite number of bizarrely creative kills (I doubt I’ll ever look at a grocery cart the same way again).

The art on this story was very hit or miss.  There were sometimes when the art was dead on perfect.  Ash looked like Bruce Campbell, Freddy looked like Robert Englund, and Jason looked like Ken (Guy from Freddy vs Jason).  But then other times it looked like a mess.  Rick Burchett is listed as Storyteller on issues 3 – 6 which I assume means he worked on page layouts.  The first two issues looked great but as the series moved on the art work started becoming more erratic.  By issue 6 the book looked like Jason Craig was rushed for time.  The level of detail had fallen dramatically and Ash is face looked right maybe a quarter of the time.  The coloring was however solid all the way through.

Ash began phoning in his personal appearance during the course of the story.

Freddy vs Jason vs Ash is certainly not going to go down in comics history as anything special but I did enjoy it.  It was fun seeing Ash take on these two modern movie monsters.  I wouldn’t rush out to buy this comic but if you see it on sale somewhere you could certainly do a lot worse.  Now we just need someone to take the material a little more seriously and get a movie made before Bruce Campbell’s too old to handle the recoil of a boomstick.  In the meantime have fun seeing the Evil Dead reboot.

Grade: B-