Fanfic to the eXtreme!

Okay, so it took me weeks to do this in my actual move to the first state, but I'm here to review what can probably best be known as "eXtreme fanfic" ... and I say that with my tongue way, way, way, way in cheek. It's something my brother said, after all.

So, what constitutes eXtreme fanfic? How about a $75 porn collection where Alice (of Wonderland), Dorothy (of Oz) and Wendy (of Neverland) all do the nasty? Or how about Tiny Tim all grown up and working in a brothel house when he stumbles on a child prostitution ring? eXtreme? I would say so!

Lost Girls
by Alan Moore and Melinda Gebbie

If you're in the comic book fandom in any capacity, this graphic novel needs no introduction. If you're not ... the short story is that the three aforementioned girl-goes-to-a-magical-land heroines all meet up in a hotel as adults and tell each other the stories of their sexual awakenings, which are all loosely represented as the original tales.

Opinions of this book have ranged from "this is a work of genius" to "this is appalling trash" to "this is so outdated and sexist and lame." I fall firmly into one of these categories, but before I tell you which, I want to say a couple of things.

First of all, one of the very true things about this book is that it knows no taboos. Working on the assumption that this is, at it's heart, a work of fiction ABOUT works of fiction, Moore and Gebbie take that conclusion to the [cough] ... extreme. This comic contains homosexuality, beastiality, and incest ... in a couple of scenes with characters who are not only underage, but are obviously prepubescent. So, there basically are going to be some scenes that are going to make you uncomfortable (I was uncomfortable, anyway).

The other thing is this, I've read a couple of books by Alan Moore: Watchmen, League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Vol. 1 & 2, The Mirror of Love and Marvel's Captain Britan trade. I think all of these books have ranged from excellent to sublime, but their beginnings? With the exception of The Mirror of Love, not so much. The beginnings to both LoEGs are obtuse and boring (especially in number two, where the whole first issue of a sequel story starts us off with characters we never saw in the last story and aren't seen for the rest of the tale). Captain Britan nearly put me to sleep. Even Watchmen, which starts off with the blood-stained happy face and a murder mystery, is outshone by the later chapters.

So, when he and Gebbie start Lost Girls, what do they do? They dump the first couple of chapters into the market, stop to finish the rest, and end up doing so over a decade. So the impression left in everyone's minds is of the typical slow-burn Alan Moore beginning with a naked, elderly Alice talking to reflection in a mirror, a silver-shoed Dorothy getting fucked by someone the audience doesn't know, and Wendy and her husband's Austin Powers-esque shadow play. These passages are servicable, and re-acquaint us with the characters/acquaint us with Moore and Gebbie's versions of the characters but that's just it.

So I think Lost Girls was just a tough sell to begin with, and the exorbiant price tag just made it worse for people who were ready to hate the book based on the little they saw, which was not a very good representation of the rest of the work. This is a shame, because it's left people with the impression that this is basically just pretty, exploitative femmeslash.

It's too bad. Because the book is so much more than just a bunch of old fantasy characters having sex with each other. It's also about what they have to say about sex: how it feels, what it does, the good and the bad about it. One of the best illustrations of this comes at the end of the first book, when the characters go see "The Rite of Spring" and become sexually inspired by the work, because I think it's just a perfect representation of what it feels like to read or watch something and have those feelings awakened. I remember being in awe when I read it, because Moore, supplemented by Gebbie's free-wheeling, dreamlike art, just caught it all so well.

The book is also brilliant in how it utilizes the cliches of pornography while making a comment and adding depth to them at the same time. For example, Wendy starts off as one of pornography's stock characters: the repressed woman who needs a good fucking. This is usually a sexist cliche, and Moore follows it to an extent when Alice quasi-rapes Wendy, who soon grows to enjoy it. However, as Wendy's story comes to its conclusion, we see her as she once was: someone who not only was familiar with sex, but faced it's ugliness incarnate as a sexual woman and emerged a damaged warrior.

And Gebbie's art is beautiful, both as her own and in her pastiches of various artists. And yes, resentful slashgirls, there is m/m in this story, so long as you don't mind the old men. Some of it's more explict than some yaoi, even.

I don't think I'm going to change anyone's minds with this review, but I thought this book was one of the greatest things I've ever read: it's explicit without being exploitative and appeals to both the base and cerebral in the reader. At least it does for me. I love it.

I must ask, though ... what brings to mind lesbianism and mental institutions when it comes to Alice. Miyuki-chan in Wonderland had the Wonderland-characters-as-horny-women theme and American McGee's Alice takes place in a mental institution. I must be interrogating the text from the wrong perspective ... and all.

Mr. Timothy
By Louis Bayard

I still don't know where you get "A grown-up Tiny Tim stumbles on a child prostitution ring" out of the original story. I really don't. What was his pitch like? Why did they take this on the basis of that pitch? Did curiosity get the best of the publishers?

At any rate, I'm glad it did. As weird as the concept is, this book is actually very good. Bayard said in the Afterword that he didn't mean for this to be an imitation of a Charles Dickens novel, and indeed it doesn't feel like one. In fact, it often mocks the conventions of a Dickens novel. However, Bayard does so in a manner that sort of turns around again back into a homage. When he writes the reformed Scrooge as getting so into Christmas that he keeps up the decorations and serves wassail well into March, it may seem like Bayard is making fun of Dickens, but on the other hand, extremely eccentric characters who took their behavior to such extremes are common in Dickens novels, as are characters with houses which reflect their personalities.

Overall, I would say that while the book does not feel like it was written by Dickens, it feels like it takes place within the same universe, albiet a darker corner. Stuff like Captain Gully having a wrench instead of a hook and having a house infested with cats to the point where three come running out the door when Timothy opens it seem right at home. As does the overall theme of evil adults preying on the weak children. Of course, Dickens would never show a girl being raped and the Artful Dodger would never grope a woman like the 11-year-old rascal Colin the Melodious ...

Plus, the book works really well as a thriller. I felt engaged throughout the whole thing, even through some of the harder vocabulary. I think if you like Dickens, you should give this one a try. It's a really interesting and entertaining work. Plus, Dickens himself makes two cameos as "the staring guy."

Next: I don't know, either Lupin the first or Battle Royale manga