Goldfish [Paperback]

Brian Michael Bendis (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 2001

Goldfish is the story of an enigmatic grifter with a heart of gold, who returns to his old haunts to find his old flame, Lauren, practically running the city's underbelly, and his oldest friend and ex-partner in crime, Izzy, now a police detective. But David Goldfish has come back for one reason, and one reason only--for his son. This beautiful volume features a brand new GOLDFISH prose story written especially for this collection. A complete crime fiction novel in a film noir art style. Fans of Raymond Chandler books, Humphry Bogart films, and crime drama will be delighted.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

Brian Michael Bendis is the EISNER award-winning creator (The Comic Industry's Oscar) of several crime graphic novels published by Image Comics. His other Image works include TORSO, GOLDFISH, JINX, and FIRE. Fortune And Glory, his Hollywood tell all from Oni Press, was given an ""A"" by Entertainment Weekly. He is also the recipient of the Cleveland Press Excellence in Journalism Award.

Product Details

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: Image Comics (October 1, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1582401950
• ISBN-13: 978-1582401959
• Product Dimensions: 10.2 x 6.6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #567,775 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Gritty Comic-Noir...., January 19, 2002

By 

Daniel V. Reilly (Upstate New York, United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Goldfish (Paperback)

Goldfish is, at it's simplest level, a revenge story. A grifter returns to take back something that belongs to him; something that his former partner is unwilling to relinquish, and will kill to keep. The difference between this and every other revenge story is the prize in question is not stolen loot, but a child- the son of David "Goldfish" Gold and his former lover/partner Lauren.

Lauren is now a bigshot crime-boss, while Goldfish is still pulling small-time cons. To give away anything else would be to do potential readers a great injustice.

Writer/Artist Brian Michael Bendis keeps the twists and turns coming, and the book is HUGE- a great value.

The drawbacks are the same ones I've had with most of Bendis' collections, including Jinx, Fire, & Torso: Poor production values. The climax of Goldfish has a few pages printed out of order, and the book is FILLED with misspelled words. (That kind of stuff drives me nuts!) Bendis' art is too murky also, and at times it was very difficult to tell who was doing what to whom.
But readers who are looking for a well-told, twisty crime drama will probably enjoy Goldfish.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Too cool for school genre writing exercise, December 28, 2003

By 

IT person "amazon7690" (Albuquerque, NM) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Goldfish (Paperback)

Goldfish is a fast-paced noir thriller with a theme, plot and characters worthy of any crime writer, and a revelation of what a graphic novel can do. You waste no time reading descriptions of people, surroundings, body language, car crashes and gun battles: your visual cortex does the work with immediate impact. Bendis's art is simple, dark, very expressive. Here and there facial expressions are awkwardly drawn, but the overall layout is effective and the acting is really good. I love the way he only paints surroundings every couple of pages, but they're so carefully selected that they stick with you for a long time. His lighting, close-ups and sustained high tempo do remind you of a movie (think Reservoir Dogs or Memento), except that the dialogue is unimpaired by PG ratings. It's sassy, to the point, true to its characters like a tape recording.

Now you might say that it's almost overdone. The author devised a rigid formal structure that is very densely packed with points and counterpoints, comic relief, dramatic confessions, flash-backs, flash-forwards, action, anticipation, etc. His technique is a little bit too obvious, and the female characters end up a tad shrill. But that's just a tiny gripe for purists, and I'm glad to report, Bendis is completely over that now (look at Jinx, it's a true classic). Besides, many layered themes are woven into this story just as carefully as its plot twists and turns, and its final offbeat perspective makes up for whatever feels formulaic before that. So, don't pass up on Goldfish. It's a great read, it has real feeling and makes more than one good point. It definitely deserves a spot in your collection.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A Bendis fan finds herself disappointed, June 1, 2005

By 

jancola (Encino, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Goldfish (Paperback)

I really like Bendis, in general. He is probably my favorite comic book writer. I really like Powers, and Daredevil, and Alias. Since all of those books are superhero books with noir elements, I figured that this book, his root of noir, would be the rosetta stone of Bendis. Instead, it was just kind of lame.

Goldfish himself was only somewhat interesting. He is a crook who is pretty much just a run of the mill crook who never redeems or elevates or changes himself in any way. I sometimes had trouble knowing which one he was because Bendis' art was pretty unprofessional. A lot of stuff happens to him in this book that you feel is going to add up to some firecracker ending, but then the ending, also, is just kind of lame.

Since Bendis both drew and wrote this comic, and it is all black and white noir, it draws an obvious comparison to Frank Miller's Sin City series. While Sin City is not my favorite comic (I generally find it amusing but one dimensional), it was a lot better than this. I am sincerely surprised that this made the Wizard top 100 list, as I would not even count it among the best of Bendis' work. An interesting debut, yes, but not a book I would recommend to anyone else.