10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
flawed, but entertaining, July 30, 2008
This review is from: Water Baby (Minx Graphic Novels) (Paperback)
Like the other Minx comics, "Water Baby" features an unconventional and fairly strong heroine, whose unique experiences (in this case, being partially eaten b a shark) and takes on life create a singular world. Unlike the others I've read (though I haven't read all of them), "Water Baby"'s story is meandering and seems to lack some basic storytelling elements, like a climax or a solid resolution. The characters are basic at best, and lack much backstory. This wasn't always a problem, although I personally wondered why someone as fiery as Brody was ever attracted to someone as slimy as Jake in the first place.
The main issue I took with this book was actually the artwork. While Campbell has a firm grasp on female anatomy--sometimes too firm a grasp--his male characters are poorly drawn. The character of Jake, for instance, is blocky and flat, with stiff and poorly executed positioning. The female characters, on the other hand, are much more natural seeming and far less awkward. That being said, it seems as though Campbell is far less interested in creating male characters than he is with creating female characters. The females, Brody, Louisa and Chrissie, are rendered with utmost care, with shading and many a detail, while Jake's bod is mostly delineated with flat straight lines, and his shading is minimal. Whiel Jake's characterization could also be called "flat," the difference in his stylization only serves to undermine the comic's artistic integrity.
Even though they are tough, dirty and decidedly unfeminine in the conventional sense, Campbell still manages to focus what is in my opinion far too much attention on their bodies, featuring most of them in skimpy clothing, and zooming in on their breasts, leaving them bra-less and unnaturally perky. In the car scenes, for example, the characters of Brody and Louisa are both shown with their seatbelts neatly bisecting their breasts, causing them to bulge outwards. Reading it, it seemed to me to be more of a statement about the type of woman Campbell finds sexually attractive than a testament to the personalities of his characters. Even their sexualities seem to be created for a voyeuristic and male gaze.
Writing-wise, the story starts out strong, but somewhere along the way it gets lost and eventually sort of peters out. The story of Brody's attack by the shark, the loss of her leg and her physical and emotional recovery is far more interesting than the plotline involving ex-boyfriend Jake. She has several inventive and nicely disturbing dreams involving shark-human hybrids and such. It would have been nice to have seen the shark dreams and the recover process figure in more prominently, but it seems to get lost in the end.
It's not a bad book, just not the most well-thought-out one I've read. Of the Minx comics, I preferred the Plain Janes and Kimmie66, mainly because of their more solid storylines. That being said, "Water Baby" is an entertaining read, if a flawed one. To me, it was an attempt at something without the knowledge of how to become that something, and written without the patience or care to figure it out.
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3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Water Baby Sunk, July 16, 2008
This review is from: Water Baby (Minx Graphic Novels) (Paperback)
I'm a big fan of Campbell's distubing zombie story, Abandoned, and his mysteriously haunting Wet Moon. Water Baby left me quite bored. Campbell's artwork is great. His figure work has a presence and weight to it. His gray tones add dimension. However, the story seemed to meander and finally go nowhere. The Minx line of graphic novels seem to be aimed at teens and twenty-somethings. I guess I may be too old to fully appreciate the complexities of this story.
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3.0 out of 5 stars
Depends on what you're looking for, July 9, 2011
This review is from: Water Baby (Minx Graphic Novels) (Paperback)
This is a great time in the comics world. Indy publishers, like Minx, are exploring stories and characters far beyond the Bam-Pow of the Marvel/DC world. "Water Baby" represents one worthy direction for these experiments to try out. This isn't real drama in the traditional sense. Instead, it's more 'a day in the life' of Brody, the surfer-girl protagonist, drawn more from the soap operas than from Buck Rogers or from Conan the Barbarian. In tracing the characters' ups and downs, including their dawning and defunct loves, this reaches out to readers more interested in the players' feelings than in their exploits. It very consciously addresses the interests of a female readership.
I like the artwork and story well enough, but this just isn't my style. It doesn't have to be. That's what's great about these experiments, they can appeal to tastes that have been under-served for a long time. So, when I say that "Water Baby" doesn't address my tastes, I mean it with honest respect. This is my first experience of Minx titles. The craftsmanship in art and story will bring me back to try more of their titles - but the kind of story they choose might not bring me back often. Especially not if other Minx characters hold onto dirtbag boyfriends as long as Brody did before dumping him.
-- wiredweird
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