Customer Reviews

Fafhrd And The Gray Mouser

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There are two undisputed godfathers of Swords & Sorcery fiction. One is Robert E. Howard, creator of Conan, King Kill, Bran Mak Morn, and Solomon Kane; and the other is Fritz Leiber who created the duo of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser. It was, in fact, Leiber himself who coined the term "Swords & Sorcery." The adventures of the huge red-haired northern barbarian Fafhrd and the slight, mercurial thief The Gray Mouser were written over a span of fifty years, beginning in 1939 in the pages of the fantasy pulp magazine Unknown. In all, Leiber wrote some forty stories about the pair.

This trade paperback from Dark Horse Comics collects the four-issue mini-series originally published by Marvel Comics' Epic line in the 1991. The stories are adapted by Howard Chaykin with art by Mike Mignola and the legendary Al Williamson. The pairs adventures generally take place in and around the Lankhmar, the most notorious city in Newhon. The first story, "Ill met In Lankhmar" is perhaps the most famous, winning both the Hugo and Nebula awards. It tells the story of the first meeting between Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser although this "origin" story was not written until 1970.

The pair are after the same quarry of riches and soon strike up a great friendship...over many tankards of ale. When both of their women are killed by dark sorcery, the two team to kill both the wizard and the thieves guild before vowing to never return to Lankhmar. After leaving the city, each will encounter a mysterious, patron wizard, who provide cryptic advice and send them off on dangerous missions, seemingly often for their own amusement.

Another excellent story is "Bazaar of the Bizarre", written in 1963. A cadre of off-world merchants has set-up shot in Lankhmar, dazzling their customers with fantastic wares but it is all illusion as it is merely junk they are selling. They bleed cities dry of all their gold before moving on and the Gray Mouser is caught in their trap. Other stories adapted include "The Howling Tower", "Lean Times in Lankhmar", "When the Sea King's Away", "The Price of Pain Ease", and "The Circle Curse."

Had I been choosing the stories to adapt, I would have picked a few different ones, as a a couple of these are not Leiber's best work. Chaykin has done a superb job in adapting the stories, capturing the clever and witty dialog and the superb chemistry between the two characters. The dark humor of these tales is as important as the action. As a Mignola fan I loved his art along with the assist from Williamson. Mignola has that quirky style which fits the tone and characters so well.

If you didn't read these in the first go round sixteen years ago, here's your chance again to read some of the grandest work in fantasy by a true master.

Reviewed by Tim Janson

I've been a big fan of Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser since the 1960's, when the first anthologies of their stories began to appear. They are seminal characters in fantasy, and Leiber's dark-toned, ironic narratives strongly appealed to me. The short stories and novellas of the early years aren't uniformly terrific, but some of them are very, very good.

So I was interested enough to buy it when this compendium of earlier comics of some of the stories came out. I found the adaptation to be only partially successful.

Partly, it's because half the fun of Fafhrd and the Mouser is Leiber's language, and in particular the gritty, languid descriptions. It must have been terrifically hard to adapt those descriptions. Ideally, some of the narrative gets moved to the drawings, but Leiber blended action and description so well that his own words can't be used, leaving the adapter with trying re-write. Chaykin isn't Leiber.

Partly it's the sacrifices that have to be made with the change in medium. Lots of elements have to be left out, some of them pretty important. Leiber's writing, again, is so tight, and his plotting has so few extraneous elements, that the narrative force gets lost when Chaykin unavoidably has to chop those important bits out. Maybe if this had started as a graphic novel and not as a series of comics, the excisions wouldn't be so big.

For whatever reason, because they were comics or to make them socially acceptable in the early 1990s, the stories are bowdlerized as well. Fafhrd and Grey Mouser are lusty guys. That lust, which motivates stories like "While the Sea King's Away," has been written out. The assignations with the Sea King's wives, critical to the plot, are simply gone. It makes the heros' motivations nearly inexplicable.

Lastly, it's the drawing style. Mignola and his team used a lovely, near-perfect color palette, but too many of his characters are drawn as long, attenuated shapes. Not only does the short, slim Mouser sometimes appear as tall as the giant Fafhrd; the wizards who attempt to direct the heroes are also drawn as long, ghost-like shapes, when Leiber wrote them quite differently.

The story selection is pretty good. Any compendium has to include "Ill-Met in Lankhmar," the story of how Fafhrd and Grey Mouser first met. "Shadowland" needs to be included to bring closure to the problems raised in "Ill-Met." Mouser has to rescue Fafhrd in one story, so Fafhrd has to rescue Mouser in another. And two of my very favorites, "Lean Times in Lankmahr" and "Bazaar of the Bizarre" are included, and done reasonably well, so that's all right.

But the problems in "Lean Times" illustrate the issues I've described above. Basharat is never really explained, the careful set up for Fafhrd's big scene is glossed over, and the general eeriness of Pulg's behavior is completely lost. Most importantly, the explanation of migration up and down the Street of the Gods is completely left out, leaving the new reader to only guess at the importance of Fafhrd to Bwardes and Issek.

Bottom line: a decent, but generally unsuccessful effort at bringing Leiber's epic heros to the graphic novel format.

For whatever it's worth this book was for me. I've always loved the Fafhrd and Mouser tales.
These adaptations are among my favorites. Howard Chaykin channels Fritz Leiber like a kindred soul. Chaykin brings out the pairs' wit, arrogance, doubts and, ultimately their worldly humor as they wander through through their many adventures and misadventures. They're friends who do not need each other but love playing off of each other, as if together they are better than they are alone. These are great buddy stories with a sword and sorcery world as the setting. Best of all is that these stories (all of them, not just those in this collection) are richly detailed, realistically powerful and memorable in a way few S&S tales are. It's easy to relate to these two scoundrels.
Couple this with the stunningly effective and distinctive art provided by Mike Mignola (inked by the always remarkable, fine line of Al Williamson, also proving there is no one Al can't ink and still look great) and colorist Sherlyn van Valkenburgh provides a great reason to shun digital color. She's a gem and one rarely seen in comics anymore. Even Michael Heisler's lettering is worth noting for it's melding so well with the stories.
The stories selected for these adaptations give everyone a chance to shine. Mignola establishes himself as one of the more respected artists in the American comic scene by drawing everything under the sun on Newhon.
The half star missing is for the book's binding. It's fine for what it is and the art director and editor deliver one of the best looking graphic novels to see print, a beautiful package. So, why did the publisher not put out a hardcover edition. It would have been worth another $5 to $10 dollars.

Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser are Fritz Leiber characters appearing in short stories back to 1939. The characters were sardonic, ironic, cynical and sarcastic. Naturally, both characters seemed to live a charmed life. In addition to the witty repartee between the characters, Leiber filled his stories with incredible descriptions that made the stories a joy to read for a fan of sword and sorcery. Given the popularity of these characters over the course of decades, it seemed inevitable that they would be adapted to another format.

Seven Fritz Leiber stories have been adapted in this collection. Though there is something of a flow between stories, in fact the stories are independent from each other so that each stands alone. The seven stories as printed in the book and their original year of appearance are as follows:

Ill Met in Lankhmar - 1970
The Circle Curse - 1970
The Howling Tower - 1941
The Price of Pain Ease - 1970
Bazaar of the Bizarre - 1963
Lean Times in Lankhmar - 1959
When the Sea King's Away - 1960

Fritz Leiber established the chronological order of these stories, so even though the years of original publication are significantly out of order, the story order is correct.

Since the point of adapting a story from one medium or format to another medium or format is to bring something new to the story, the question one should ask is what is the new? In this case, the new is the visualization of Fafhrd, the Gray Mouser, and the world in which they live. The visualizations are imaginative and well done and are a definite enhancement of the world of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser.

Of course, there must be sacrifices in the transition to a different format. In this case, there are two sacrifices.

The first sacrifice is the elegant and descriptive prose of Fritz Leiber. Reading Fritz Leiber is a joy. The authors of this graphic novel were kind enough to include a portion of Fritz Leiber's writing at the end of the graphic novel. I hope that readers of this graphic novel will try some of the many Fafhrd and Gray Mouser stories after reading this graphic novel.

The other sacrifice is a significant portion of the dialogue between Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser. Some of that dialogue is included in the graphic novel, but there is so much more than can be included within the confines of a graphic novel.

I bought and read this book to see how Chaykin, Mignola and Williamson adapted these Fritz Leiber stories. I have already read a number of Fafhrd and Gray Mouser stories and have enjoyed them. This graphic novel augments the original stories rather than supplants them. My recommendation is to get the original stories and read them, and then get the graphic novel to see how effectively the authors adapted the stories to the graphic format. I think they did well.

Enjoy!

I first ran into Fritz Leiber when many of the S&S books talked about him and his work in the forward or introduction. They praised him, frankly, as one of the Fathers, if not the Grand Master, of fantasy. So I picked up the first book of the series. And was very disappointed.
I don't know why. It was gritty, full of action, had lots of wine and thievery. But most of it didn't even happen in the city of the title and the stories seemed to drag. On and on. They were neither short nor were they full length novels. I decided not to collect any more of his books.
Then I found this graphic novel and decided to make another go at enjoying this work. I figured, if the written text seems to be too slow, maybe a graphic novel, where much of the information was in a visible form, would allow the story to move faster. And I was right. Within a night I had read the book from front to back. The plot, the characters and the setting need to be brought to life via the brush and pen of the comic book artist to truly be enjoyed.
Still, the characters seem to talk too much. Silence in many of the panels would have worked just as well.

When comic legends Howard Chaykin and Mike Mignola adapt the legendary fantasy works of Fritz Leiber, you certainly get a book worth buying.

Done in the early 90s for Marvel Comics and now reprinted by Dark Horse this book features some of the most famous stories featuring the barbarian warrior Fafhrd and the wily Gray Mouser. At first glance the pair may seem a fantasy cliche, the big honest guy and the shifty small guy, taking on evil wizards, the Thieves Guild and other fantasy staples.

But if you know something about their background you learn that these are the stories that created those cliches! Lieber's works were one of the main inspirations for Dungeons and Dragons and helped set the mold for swords and sorcery books.

My one complaint is that Chaykin and Mignola seem to assume we're more familiar with the characters and setting than most readers will be. I've read some of Leiber's books and read about them in various D&D books and without that additional knowledge some of the chapters here would have made little sense. But I think most readers will enjoy the book even without much background in Leiber's work.

This book is great- a small collection of Fritz Leibers' Fafhrd and Gray Mouser stories.

Fafhrd and The Gray Mouser is simply good fantasy with lots of action, comedy and darkness. Any one who enjoys Mignola's work, will like this. I read through it and wished there was another volume. Luckily there are other Fafhrd and The Gray Mouser books out there that I have yet to explore. You can really see where Mignola gets Hellboy's since of humor from. Definitely worth reading if you enjoy Hellboy, Conan etc...

I like the the Sword and Sorcery genre. The drawings are quite nice here (the muted colours are terrific)but somehow, the short stories don't quite fit together.

... and "a Picture is Worth a Thousand Words" are common axioms and they aptly apply to common writers.

Fritz Leiber, however, is an uncommon writer - a veritable artist of semantics - whose eloquence of soliiquy transcends the pedestrian cartoons that so feebly fail to get hardly anything (w)right about these two superlative antiheroes.

I know that in our increasingly illiterate society the graphic novel has become an amazingly popular medium and for ordinary comic book characters the medium is apropos.

The omission of Leiber's poignant prose, however, makes the otherwise outstanding artwork in this failed attempt merely mediocre at best.

The colored panes of Mignola's comic adaptation, even with Chaykin's inclusion of some of Leiber's own story, doesn't come anywhere close to the mental images conjured by the original unillustrated stories by themselves.

Buy the books instead and draw your own conclusions.