Glamorpuss #2

One-sentence summary: Dave Sim's bizarre half-satire/half-stream of conscious art essay continues, though somehow less satisfying than last issue.

I thought I'd do a review on a more indie comic, though it's certainly getting its share of coverage as it is Dave Sim, of Cerebrus fame, doing it. I actually really get a kick out of the stream-of-conscious art essay portion of it, as I don't know a ton about that era of artist (it's essentially about the pre-comic book artists of the 30s). In general, his parody of Cosmo and ilk aren't too far off, though I thought this issue's rant against anti-depressants was a bit weird (though, honestly, if you're familiar with Dave Sim you know to expect weird).

What Sim's doing here is certainly ambitious. He is, essentially, trying to revive a long-dead art style single-handedly. In doing so, he's also trying to personally work through the whys and the hows of all the bigger name early artists (Hal Foster, Alex Raymond, etc). In order to give some sort of structure to the title, though, he's including a few parodies of fashion magazine-style articles, in particular with the cover of each issue. I think this is hit or miss and much prefer his essay portion, but that's me, I'm sure there are others who just like the Glamorpuss portion.

All in all, I think there is a definite audience for this book. For someone either interested in comic art theory or early comic history would probably like this. However, someone looking for the average comic is going to be feeling disappointed, but, then again, why are they buying an indie title by Dave Sim?