Customer Reviews

The Birthday Riots (ComicsLit)

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Set in the modern-day London area, The Birthday Riots by Nabiel Kanan is the engaging graphic novel focused on an upscale man who has errantly left behind the ideals of his college days, and now advises a mayoral candidate to turn a blind eye to plight of the homeless and worry more about middle class issues such as transportation instead. But the mounting pressures of embracing practicality over humanity converge upon him, as his fifteen-year-old daughter runs away from home and mounting social pressured all come to a head. The Birthday Riots is a powerfully presented tragedy about losing touch with one's former self, and the disaster that blind acquiescence into moral ambiguity can bring. Highly recommended reading.

The story takes us through a very pivotal time for just about every character in the novel. I don't want to give too much away, but the comic does explore and call into question the ideas of moral values, personal responsibility, and the role of the individual within the network of larger affairs. This is not an action story, and it's not a happy story, so look elsewhere if that is what you want. But this story is very touching and realistic, and displays a beautiful mastery of the medium.

Kanan's graphic novella competently covers familiar turf in 64 pages without any great surprises, only to flounder in an unconvincing climax. Set in contemporary London and its The ex-urbs, the story is about Max Collins and his family. Once a leftist political science professor, he abandoned academia to become an advisor for an up-and-coming politician. With his new job, Max is able to afford to move his family out of the city to a bigger, better house in the country. While on the surface, the family is a happy unit, there are flashbacks of Max's infidelity with a student and broken promises to his daughter.

Now, his candidate is running for Mayor of London amidst a nationwide furor over a new land law designed to prevent travelers or squatters from occupying vacant property. The issue is literally brought home to Max when a group of gypsies move into the field behind his house. What results is pretty textbook stuff -- when the issues move from the abstract to the personal, the former radical (and artist wife) shed their liberal skin and get just as nasty as anyone else. Of course, the teenage daughter rebels against this and becomes friends with a gypsy boy, leading to other complications.

Everything culminates in an election day riot by protesters which results in a rather ridiculous ending. Max's method of self-redemption (or atonement) is both empty, cowardly, and implausible. The themes of selling out to the man and disappointing one's children are unreeled in kind of a paint-by-number manner. That said, the dialogue is pretty good, much better than most found in graphic novels. Especially good are the little family scenes Kanan creates, it feels like a real family interacting. The artwork is very solid and restrained, in the realist style. The panels tend to be really really crammed with text though, so it doesn't breathe or flow very well. The result is that when he does stop and offer a still, wordless moment, it leaves a much greater impact. On the whole, though, the book didn't do much for me.