thinking
I've been re-reading SiP for the last few days.
(Everyone who knows me should know SiP, but just in case - http://www.strangersinparadise.com . If you never read it, start now).
It's one of those things that, no matter how many times I read it, completely shocks me with its beauty every time. When Katchoo visits Emmie in the hospice - I cry every time. Every damn time.
I wish he hadn't made the action subplots so...prominent. The _point_ of SiP was really not to be a superhero action comic, yet at times it comes a bit too close for comfort.
But it's okay. The real point is always there. There's a little comment on the sketch page in the first TPB collection - "I don't have capes so I draw hair". There's more emotional depth and complexity in the hair in the vital scenes between David, Francine and Katchoo than there is in most people's _writing_.
I guess what struck me this time through most of all is how uncomfortably bleak much of the story is. There's an odd juxtaposition throughout the series between the power and value of the David / Francine / Katchoo relationship and the...tawdriness, I guess...of just about every other relationship portrayed. (Except the detective's marriage. I've never quite worked that one out...) There's a recurring theme of middle-aged couples growing old and bitter, either hating or ignoring each other, the women usually drinking, the men lusting after younger women.
I think Moore is trying to say that many, or even most, people never really find love - but they believe they have, and they barely even notice what's missing. At one point he puts a phrase in a character's mouth, "It's possible to spend your entire life with the wrong person. I've seen it happen." The bitter couples he portrays don't seem to be very self-aware. Even the few characters who are don't seem to find it...wrong, or unexpected, to be in the position they're in.
Anyway. The thing that scared me the most. Reading the whole section where Francine sits in the washroom and tries to decide between marrying Brad and going back to Katchoo...I never really saw the whole thing before, as I was reading it in instalments as issues came out quite slowly and I lost the thread. But this time I did.
Francine is making a choice between what she'd always believed she wanted - what she really had wanted, at some point - what would be expected of her, and safe - and what her heart had been telling her she truly wanted but what was wild and dangerous and risky and unknown.
And...really. Everyone who ever truly believed in and wanted and cherished love should be screaming from the rooftops for option B. For Katchoo. For the unknown but truly desired. I know I was. Every time I ever read it.
And then I realized. I had the same choice. And despite who I always believed myself to be...
I went for option A. I chose my Brad.
*sigh*
it's odd how every time I read SiP I decide I'm a different character.
This time through, I'm worried I'm Casey. Well, it's not the best or the worst possibility, I guess. At least I'm not Freddie.
Not yet, at least.
(Everyone who knows me should know SiP, but just in case - http://www.strangersinparadise.com . If you never read it, start now).
It's one of those things that, no matter how many times I read it, completely shocks me with its beauty every time. When Katchoo visits Emmie in the hospice - I cry every time. Every damn time.
I wish he hadn't made the action subplots so...prominent. The _point_ of SiP was really not to be a superhero action comic, yet at times it comes a bit too close for comfort.
But it's okay. The real point is always there. There's a little comment on the sketch page in the first TPB collection - "I don't have capes so I draw hair". There's more emotional depth and complexity in the hair in the vital scenes between David, Francine and Katchoo than there is in most people's _writing_.
I guess what struck me this time through most of all is how uncomfortably bleak much of the story is. There's an odd juxtaposition throughout the series between the power and value of the David / Francine / Katchoo relationship and the...tawdriness, I guess...of just about every other relationship portrayed. (Except the detective's marriage. I've never quite worked that one out...) There's a recurring theme of middle-aged couples growing old and bitter, either hating or ignoring each other, the women usually drinking, the men lusting after younger women.
I think Moore is trying to say that many, or even most, people never really find love - but they believe they have, and they barely even notice what's missing. At one point he puts a phrase in a character's mouth, "It's possible to spend your entire life with the wrong person. I've seen it happen." The bitter couples he portrays don't seem to be very self-aware. Even the few characters who are don't seem to find it...wrong, or unexpected, to be in the position they're in.
Anyway. The thing that scared me the most. Reading the whole section where Francine sits in the washroom and tries to decide between marrying Brad and going back to Katchoo...I never really saw the whole thing before, as I was reading it in instalments as issues came out quite slowly and I lost the thread. But this time I did.
Francine is making a choice between what she'd always believed she wanted - what she really had wanted, at some point - what would be expected of her, and safe - and what her heart had been telling her she truly wanted but what was wild and dangerous and risky and unknown.
And...really. Everyone who ever truly believed in and wanted and cherished love should be screaming from the rooftops for option B. For Katchoo. For the unknown but truly desired. I know I was. Every time I ever read it.
And then I realized. I had the same choice. And despite who I always believed myself to be...
I went for option A. I chose my Brad.
*sigh*
it's odd how every time I read SiP I decide I'm a different character.
This time through, I'm worried I'm Casey. Well, it's not the best or the worst possibility, I guess. At least I'm not Freddie.
Not yet, at least.