Review: Three dispatches from the Philippines
These three books don’t represent the comics community of the Philippines: I know almost nothing about that community and I’m sure of that. Extrapolating from these three stories – from the three comics stories I happen to have – is futile and silly and I’m going to try not to do it. Drawing any conclusions about the larger Philippine comics market would be like reading [[[Iron Fist]]],[[[ Scott Pilgrim]]], and [[[Fun Home]]] and from them alone creating a unified theory of North American comics.
So all I really want to say up front is this: these may be some of the best Philippine comics. But I seriously doubt that they’re all of the best. There’s probably even some projects even better than these. It’s a big world out there. (I also want to thank Charles Tan, who sent me a big box of Philippine comics and SF late last year, and without whom I wouldn’t have heard of any of these books.)
Elmer (issues #1-4)
By Gerry Alanguilan
Komikero Publishing; May and Oct 2006, Nov 2007, Nov 2008; 50 Philippine pesos ea.
There’s something about the comics form that attracts really unlikely premises – flying men, teenagers who want to do their homework, retellings of operas without music, and whatever[[[Alice in Sunderland]]] is. [[[Elmer]]] is another in that proud and odd lineage: it’s a serious contemporary story set in a world where chickens suddenly became intelligent in 1979.
Yes, chickens. The protagonist is a young chicken named Jake, who comes back from his dead-end life in Manila to the rural farm where he grew up, because his father, Elmer, has had a stroke and isn’t expected to last long. He rejoins his sister May (a nurse) and brother Francis (a movie star) there, and stays there after his father’s death. Except for the chicken thing, the plot set-up is very like an indy movie, some Philippine [[[Garden State]]]. (more…)