When I glanced upon the first issue's first few electronic pages, I wondered: Will Sweet Tooth taste of blandness? You see, I worried that this completed series about an antlered boy was one of peculiarity for eccentricity's sake despite the marvelous art that masquerades as one of simplicity. Yet I scolded my nascent assessment of the deer child story...only to be utterly disappointed...that I almost dismissed this series! To my delightful surprise, I discovered that Sweet Tooth is one of my favorite stories, graphic novel or otherwise. There are a couple sequences which weren't to my preference, places where an unnamed and unseen narrator takes the storytelling reins from the characters. Furthermore, the execution of this creative decision lends a feeling of rising from the characters to a bird's eye view of their experiences while being sped along an otherwise transportive journey. Yet the narrative and characters are so enrapturing that the emotive adventure cannot be dampened by those two shorthanded segments. Anyways, this thematically rich series indeed proposes answers to the driving mystery of how Gus ended up with antlers (which is but one aspect of the enigma) before it leans heavily into a multi-layered yet easily ascertainable mythology and mind-blowingly unique solution without cutting off other possibilities. Yet more importantly, Sweet Tooth is an achingly beautiful human narrative which fleshes out almost every featured character while organically bringing them to the same prominence as the initially sole protagonist. This series is one which embraces the necessity of hope and perseverance yet melancholy, tragedy, and fear are not shortchanged; Tragedy and triumph coexist, a development which prevents Sweet Tooth from being superficially inspirational. I entreat you to read Sweet Tooth as soon as you are able. - Reviewed by C.A. Nicholas. A Bonus Recommendation: I Hate Fairyland.
This is a wonderfully cathartic black comedy series which lampoons children's fairytale tropes, including cutesy aspects and saccharine happily ever afters. There's a definitive ending of sorts to the 20 issue comic book series as well so that's another plus (it can be quite tiring trying to keep up with neverending series after all).
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Sometimes it takes me a while to register that which is spoken to me.
The latest instance transpired this afternoon at my place of occupation: [Tuesday, circa 1:00 PM; Location = A neighborhood cafè.] (Squeak! Squeak! Kerplash! Charlie is washing the dishes as if he were a parent and they his children's mouths who recently brought forth a marathon of particularly salty words). (Boss Chef walks away from his delectable creations in progress and utters the following as he passes by Charlie... Chef Boss: "You're the best!" (Charlie fumbles out a response in his bashfulness as he etches a small yet luminous smile upon himself). Charlie: "Thank you." (Charlie notices that Chef Boss stroll is continuing towards the basil. Charlie's mind corrects what his ears received. Too late, he realizes that Chef Boss really said...) Chef Boss: "I need basil." ⭐⭐⭐ [This reminds Charlie of another time about two weeks ago.] [Location: Same place. Chef Boss is in the kitchen and Charlie is in the dining room with a customer.] Customer: Does Chef Boss still have his dog? (Unfortunately, Charlie heard "Da, la, ne, la?") Charlie: "I'm sorry. What did you say?" Customer: "DA...LA...NE....LA?" (Charlie waits, hoping that his brain will decipher what it has garbled. Thankfully, a coherent sentence forms. He's still not fully certain what Customer asked, and he has to fill in a couple gaps, yet he doesn't want to embarrass himself by asking the person to repeat themself again. The phrase Charlie is pretty sure Customer asked is: "Is it [my food] still on its way?" Charlie: "Yes! We just had to find the cheese. Don't worry, Chef Boss found it! It's on the way." (As Fate would have it, Charlie's brain rendered the Customer's inquiry to completion a second or two after he finished speaking. Charlie's effort to save face is to be silent and act like his response to the question was absolutely normal.) - Written by C.A. Nicholas - Photo by Pexels Author's Note: My boss does compliment my work frequently. |
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