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8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Robinson's best to date, but baffling title and presentation, August 4, 2008
This review is from: Too Cool To Be Forgotten (Hardcover)
"Too Cool to be Forgotten" is probably Alex Robinson's finest work to date, though at a scant 128 pages it's far too short. Maybe I'm just a spoiled reader after the chunky "Box Office Poison" and the similarly thick "Tricked," but there's easily enough conceptual meat here (guy goes in for hypnosis, wakes up back in high school) to match the scope of those books. While the book flies by, Robinson still manages to hit all of the right and expected notes, and some of the funniest and most touching moments are derived from the natural conflict of a man with 50 years' experience trying to do things the "right" way instead of the way that his teenage self would have done them.
One spoiler-free note about the book's title and presentation in general; the final act takes such a heartbreaking left turn that I sat and cried for almost ten minutes after I finished it, having recently dealt with a similar experience in my own life. It's sort of baffling that the book has such a wackity-schmackity title and joke ciggy-pack presentation when the emotional center of the story ends up being a sledgehammer to the center of the reader's chest, though maybe that's the idea.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
My review for Comicbookdb.com:, August 1, 2009
This review is from: Too Cool To Be Forgotten (Hardcover)
Wonderful Cartoon Storytelling
There is a blurb on the back of this book that states something about the fact that no writer captures the pain, anger, happiness, and triumph of being a teen better except maybe Stan Lee, and boy is this ever true.
I dove into this book thinking it was going to be good, but I was blown away at how great it was. The art is A+. There is brilliant flashes of great cartooning. In some ways it reminds me of a Jeff Smith, using the panels to assist in telling an wonderful story.
The lettering is fun and understated, while being interesting to read and sometimes challenging when it serves the plot. There is a great scene when the main character is being hypnotized where Alex Robinson uses the lettering to spell out what he is hearing and thinking, then reverses chunks and spells everything out backwards for a bit as he delves into his sub conscience mind.
The story is A+ as well. It starts out with a middle-aged man who wants to quit smoking, quaintly, almost comical. Then he decides to try to get hypnotized to never want to smoke. This opens his life back to when he was in high school, but with the mind and thoughts of a middle-aged man. As he reflects and lives out his day as a 15 year old again, he tries to make amends and finds keys to his life in current days. Finally he finds a certain moment that he feels that he has to change in order to quit smoking. After that is done he learns of one last task that he must accomplish before he can be sent back to his life as a middle-aged man.
The ending is very emotional and sad, but good in a way. I got a bit teary myself for a second because I know a lot of the pain that our main character was going through. There is not much falling action after the emotional climax; the ending is almost totally understated, but I like it. After all of that, I was drained myself, so the ending keep sweetly and quickly.
This was definitely the best book of 2008 in my view. If you are a comic book fan or even just a fan of great storytelling and great cartooning, this is a book that is well worth picking up. I cannot imagine a comic book fan not having this on their shelf. It goes next to your Complete Bone book, your copy of Comic Book tattoo, and your Strangers in Paradise books.
A+
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5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
One Cigarette, September 25, 2008
This review is from: Too Cool To Be Forgotten (Hardcover)
Eisner, Harvey, and Ignatz Award winner Alex Robison made his impact in the world of independent comics with the release of his long running Box Office Poison which eventually culminated in a 600 plus page slice-of-life graphic novel that depicted the lives of a ragtag group of comic book artists, historians, bookstore clerks, and others attempting to get by and find fulfillment in New York. Now, Robinson has produced a new graphic novel, To Cool to Be Forgotten, which, although under a quarter length of Box Office Poison also makes a fine edition to graphic novel fans who like their books to be sans superheroes, girls in chainmail bikinis, and fellows whose epic battles extend to some twelve books.
Too Cool to be Forgotten centers on the life of Andy Wicks, a bald, myopic, middle-aged man who has done his best to quit smoking--patches, nicotine gum, cold turkey--but the allure of cigarettes always brings him back to his habit. Finding himself at a dead end, he takes his wife's advice to try some "new age mumbo jumbo" in order to help him overcome his addiction. His doctor puts him under hypnosis and, instead of finding himself thinking that he is a chicken, finds himself back in 1985 when he was 15-years-old, a time during which he was a fan of Iron Maiden, had a nice stash of girly magazines, and was friends with a group of nerdy, marginalized students who, while not being the complete outcasts of the school, were among the "social elite."
Realizing that he has been given a second chance to nip his bad habit in the bud, Andy decides to turn down the first cigarette that he will be offered at a party. Not wanting to change his future dramatically in any other way ala Back to the Future, Andy limits himself to interacting only with his old friends, but when the opportunity comes up to ask a girl whom he has a crush on if she will accompany him to a party, he can't turn down the opportunity, and slowly he realizes that there might be other things that he needs to remedy besides his addiction to cigarettes.
One of the aspects that makes Robinson's Box Office Poison such an enjoyable graphic novel is its brightly colored canopy of characters each of whom have very distinct personalities and, because of the length of the book, there personalities are fully fleshed out so the reader can truly feel and identify with each character. Too Cool to be Forgotten is quite different in this aspect not only because of the brevity of the book itself, but because the reader is in the mind of one character whose perceptions act as the reader's perceptions and Robinson does a great job of truly showing how lacking a number of person to person relationships can be and truly little people know about each other. However, Robinson also shows a darker side of personal perspective and memory, showing how an individual's memory can be quite selective of what it remembers and how things that are forgotten, or repressed, are the things that truly should be remembered.
Robinson's artwork, for some, might leave a bit to be desired. It is minimal and the character designs are rather simple, but through them he is able to convey emotion quite well to which at some points becomes quite cartoony in an overall more realistic work. Where Robinson's art truly shines is within the beings of his characters. Not one to make idealized stereotypes in comic form, Robinson's characters suffer from frizzy hair, pimples, and all matter of other traits which truly make individuals unique in this imperfect world.
While it might not be on the same scope as Box Office Poison or his later worked Tricked, Too Cool to Be Forgotten makes a fine edition to ones graphic novel collection.
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