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Enigma
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Enigma is a graphic novel by the famous Killla-Bee. It is published by the Justice House and currently has three seasons. The story takes place in an alternate timeline known as Time Town. Time Travel has been created but only allows you to travel forward in time. A bi-product of time travel is causes random time portals to appear in the past that transport people to Time Town. The story explores many social structures including racism, discrimination, and colonialism. The comic takes a lot of influence from Old Town, San Diego and the Greek myth of the big three. There is also references from the novel, A Brave new World and the internment camps for Japanese Americans.
Author
Killla-Bee is an audiophile who believes in the massive impact of music in the world. He listens to everything from R&B to Hip Hop/Rap to EDM to Country. He is a risk taker and lives life on the edge. He is not afraid to share his ideas, even if a few of the times they might not be the best. He approaches problems from different angles to find different answers because he believes in the ideology of working smarter not harder. Killla-Bee associates more with science and technology then art but has been noted to create works of art with shapes and lines, although they are not professional they do help him get through his uneventful lectures. He has even created a piece made up of entirely conic sections. There are not many situations that can get him fired up, but when he does get passionate for a cause he is unstoppable.
Characters
Cato- He is a Samurai, who always carry’s his two swords and hat. He is a master swordsman, very educated, and great at writing poems.
Billy- He is a cowboy who was raised in a bar so he is accustomed to fights, drinking, shooting, and overall having a good time. He is a master marksmen who has never been seen without his gun.
Tom- He is very shy and timid, and very smart. He is innocent, kind, and has a big heart. He is also very interested in technology and loves innovation. He is from the year 2014 and always has his phone on his person.
Setting and plot
Time Town
Enigma is set primarily in Time Town. Time Town is a town that is located on a separate time line than the main official time line. The inventor of time travel could not solve the problem of time traveling from one point to another without having a medium, that medium was Time Town. Much like harbor cities such as San Diego, Time Town is an international and interchronical hub. People from all over the world and from all over the timeline come to visit Time Town. Another problem that the inventor of time travel could not fix was that time portals would randomly appear throughout time, anybody near the portal would get transported to Time Town. Because of these random portals Time Town is filled with people from all over the time line and they become an attraction for the Caramels. The Caramels discriminate against the people of the past and tag them in order for everyone to see where and when they are form. Time Town does not have any skyscrapers or buildings which adds to the tourist spectacle. Instead everything is one or two stories above ground and is built into the ground. The inhabitants of Time Town include 20% people from the past and the rest are tourist that come and go.
Plot
Tom, Cato, and Billy all arrive at Time Town at the same time, they are tagged and then informed of where and when they are. After being tagged, the trio has to go through a two year immersion camp that teaches the new inhabitants of Time Town about the new future and how they can fit in. The trio are in the same cell and bond over a bottle of whisky, they eventually become good friends. Once they are allowed to go out into Time Town they learn how much not being a Caramel effects them and the tags around their neck soon become chains. As people from the past, they are not given the same rights and are not allowed to run a business, Billy convinces them to open a bar regardless because they have nothing to lose and everything to gain. They open a bar, named Enigma, in their apartment and at first only other people from the past in the same complex come to drink but then people from other complexes decide to show up. Enigma actually becomes very successful due to a mixture of literature and poetry from Cato, rough housing and delinquency from Billy, and general accepting atmosphere from Tom. Inevitably they get their first Caramel guest and Tom leads the charge to accept him and serve him regardless of when he is from. After the Caramel has a great time more and more start showing up and eventually the Time Town government gives people from the past the same rights and allows the Enigma to become a legitimate business.
Themes & Social Critique
Enigma contains many critiques of society, especially evident arrogant racism and colonialism. Because Time Town is a hub of time travel there is bound to be diversity as paralleled by cities like San Diego and San Francisco. The only thing is that the future does not have races, everyone is mixed and one race, Caramel. Enigma explores the idea of how racism and discrimination work. The Caramels are all the same but as soon as people from the past that are only one race appear then Caramels bound together and discriminate against the people from the past. The main characters who are from all different times and are assumed by the Caramels to be racist actually become good friends and are more accepting than the supposedly more sophisticated Caramels.
Other than the racism, colonialism is also evident in Enigma. The Caramels believe that because they are superior it is their duty to civilize the savages of the past. The Caramels do so by forcing the newly arrived people from the past into a 2 year immersion camp. The immersion camp’s goal is to brainwash the people of the past into whatever the Caramels want them to learn. The parallels to Spaniards forcing Native American into becoming Catholics is evident. The Caramels that are running the immersion camps believe that they are doing the world a favor by civilizing the savages of the past, but in reality they are infringing on the basic human rights of the people form the past by not allowing them to have an opinion or option on what to believe, instead they are brainwashed din the immersion camps.
Counter Narrative
Enigma is a counter narrative. That goes against typical stories, the ones that cause change are not the high powerful Caramels but instead three normal guys form the past. All of the odds are stacked against them, they are aliens in the world of the Caramels and they have just about no power yet they are able to make a positive change to help all of the other people from the past. Not only do the three main characters make a positive impact they do so with little to no force. It is not a hostile take over at all, they cause change by accepting and treating the Caramels with respect who then understand that the people from the past are not less than them, in fact the people from the past are very similar to them because throughout all the years humans have remained pretty much the same. Tom is the unlikely hero to start the change because he allows a Caramel to drink at the bar. Tom has a big heart and never sees the bad in people, no matter the situation he only sees the good and is rarely in a bad mood. Because it is illegal for people form the past to own a business, Billy and Cato were ready to shoot and cut down the Caramel in order to keep their bar a secret.
Caramels
People from the future, known as Caramels for their Caramel like skin tone, they consider themselves superior to the people from the past because they believe that they are smarter, stronger, and more righteous for not having all of the evils of the past including slavery, sexism, war, and so on. Time Town is packed with Caramels that wear nothing but all black robes. These robes are supposed to get rid of the social classes much like school uniforms do, because everyone looks the same everyone assumes they are the same. The rest of the inhabitants of Time Town are people from the past that still mostly dress the way they did in their time. People from the past are looked down upon and seen as savages, they wear tags around their neck that allow them to communicate with people and that also show when and where they are from. Ironically enough the Caramels cannot see that they are themselves are treating the people from the past as less than human by tagging them like animals at a zoo. To make it even worse the Caramels come to see them for an attraction and not an equal.
Immersion camps
Immersion camps were created under the assumption that people of the past are savages and need to be tamed. Immersion camps are run by Caramels who believe that they are doing the world a favor. The immersion camp lasts two years and is filled with a strict schedule, from eight in the morning until three in the afternoon every member of the camp has to attend classes. Depending on the education of the person they might have to attend additional classes to learn how to read and write. If a member has complete mastery of one language, as in they can read, write, and speak it fluently then the tags around their neck translates everything. The core classes that every member takes are about the history of the world until the modern era. In a sense it is one giant spoiler of how the world ends up. After the classes are done each member is allowed free time on the fields where they can play sports, lift weight, and other things. It I very similar to a prison but a lot more field because almost everyone is just as lost and confused as the next inmate. Common activities after the schooling in the camps include playing cards, playing soccer, and occasionally exchanging tales of their time.
Influences
In a recent interview conducted by Time magazine, Killla-Bee stated that he drew inspiration of Time Town from Old Town in San Diego. He went to Old Town while he was studying at the University of California, San Diego. This is what he had to say.
“Old Town is located in San Diego, it is similar to many other historical parts of towns. It has the old buildings and the antiques and even the vibe. What really stood out to old town San Diego to me though was that it was that it was real. I studied in La Jolla which was what most people think about when they think about San Diego. The beaches, palm trees, the tans, and the rest of the southern California stereotypes. But once you go to Old Town and other parts of San Diego you see the truth. I left the bubble of Old Town and saw the other side of having a successful town with a large population. Of course there are going to be the winners who make money and drive the nice cares, and then there are going to be the settlers, people who have enough to get by and have accepted their place in society, and then there are the losers. In every large city you go to you will find that there is a problem with the homeless and other vagrants. It’s not that I haven’t seen homeless people before, but when I walked to the train station in Old Town it was the first time I realized that the bigger the city, the more the losers. These losers’ shows how the system might work and might be the best we have, but it is not future we deserve, as time goes on and the population increases we should have less losers not more.”
San Diego is one of the oldest cites in North America and one of the largest cities in California. Old Town expresses all of the history that went on in San Diego since the Spaniards had it, then the French, then newly stated Mexicans, and finally the United States of America. Throughout time Old Town has seen everything from the Spanish caste system, slavery, Jim Crow laws, racism, and currently socio-economical divide. La Jolla is made up primarily rich white citizens while areas like Escondido and Chula Vista are made up of lower earning Hispanics. These divides also are evident in many large cities, such as Oakland and piedmont. Old town is full of hate filled history, Time Town is a representation of a hate filled future.
Time then asked where Killla-Bee drew influence about the main characters.
“When I created my characters I thought of the big three. I have always been interested in Greek mythology, I grew up reading the Percy Jackson novels and myth of the big three always interested me the most. Almost everyone knows of position, Zeus and hades but not everyone knows how they became gods. The short version of the story is that all of the gods are sibling and their father ruled the world, he was greedy and did not want anyone to take his power so he ate his children. Being gods they did not die but could not escape, Zeus however did. He freed his siblings and waged a revolution. The three most powerful gods were Zeus, position, and hades” therefore they split the world into thirds. Zeus god the sky and the heavens, position go the seas and ocean, and hades got stuck with the underworld. In my eyes I see Zeus as someone who shoots first and ask questions later, someone who is outgoing and overly confident. Billy is based off my understanding of Zeus, someone who always like being the guy with the biggest gun in the room if you know what I mean. Then there is Poseidon, he is strong, smart, but also very tranquil. He was not just given the oceans, he earned them for being a great god. He was my influence for Cato, and person lay my favorite character. Cato has the same power, rank, pride, and strength as Billy but he does not place value in any of those because he is modest. Cato has every right to be cocky, but his choice of not being cocky makes him great. Lastly there is Hades, the lord of the underworld. Hades is often seen as the equivalent of a devil, but I believe he is just misunderstood. He given the underworld and in charge of taking souls to the afterlife, a job that no one wanted but someone had to do. Because he had to constantly look over the souls he could never leave the underworld and was not allowed in Olympus except for one day in a year. In reality he is just lonely and doesn’t like the cards he was drawn, he had to trick his wife into staying with him in the underworld and the rest of the world saw hated him and saw him as a monster. My influence for tom drew from hades because I too believe that hades is shy and timid and kind of allowed Zeus to walk over him, at the same time by no means is hades weak he is just as strong as Zeus and the same position but just does not possess the same confidence. Tom’s main attribute is skill of technology and his smarts, Tom himself does not realize how powerful his skill is because he cannot fight like Cato and Billy. Tom is also supposed to be character that everyone is supposed to root for because he doesn’t see how great he is although everyone around him does.
Time magazine also asked for insight on why Killla-Bee decided to use alcohol as the reason for the main characters to bond.
“Well I will tell you this much there is a reason why there is a word for wine or beer or alcohol in general in every language that exists. It is second most consumed drug after coffee. And it has been around a heck of a lot longer than coffee. It was a simple choice, people from walks of life and all cultures drink alcohol and they have been drinking alcohol since ancient Greece, one of the most civilized cultures and forefront of democracy. Not only was alcohol something that they all could have in common, but alcohol itself transcends people to another state where formalities and awkwardness and hate are set aside. Obviously not all people have the same reaction, they are many abusive and violent drunks. The reason I choose alcohol is because I believe that it brings the real you out the one that is not afraid to speak its mind and the one that does not think about consequences or has a filter. Alcohol was the obvious social lubricant that allowed Cato, Billy, and Tom to meet the real Cato, Billy, and Tom. Alcohol is also so easy to use because it rarely shown in bad light, yes there exceptions like I said earlier but around the world one of the few things that are universal are sharing a drink. It could be whiskey or rum or sake or wine or ale or vodka or even beer the point is that people have been and will continue to drink because it is seen to do more good than harm. If that is true or not is debatable but the fact remains that taverns and pubs and bars have existed for centuries and that is not a coincidence. ”
Visual References
When asked about the style of the art in the Enigma comics Killla-Bee had this to say.
“I grew up watching a lot of cartoons and especially anime. When I was I the younger I loved dragon ball Z and Pokémon. I watched dragon ball z every time a new episode was out and played a lot of the Pokémon games, once I became a teenager I started to watch more anime like bleach, initial D, and my all-time favorite one piece. Once you watch one anime you just keep going, you talk about it with a friend and they recommend another one and then you watch that one and it has an advertisement for another one and it just goes on and on. I wanted the artwork of the comic to be classic, nostalgic but at the same time unable to be effected by time. To this day I still watch episodes of one piece from the same years that I was born! I still have my Pokémon red version that I plug into my Gameboy advanced and play for hours until I beat the game. I wanted a story and artwork that would never die and live on forever to be enjoyed forever.”
Literary References
Killla-Bee uses the word “savage” to describe the people of the past from the point of view of the Caramels. The word “savage” is a reference to the novel “A brave new world” by Aldous Huxley. In this futuristic world, everyone is under the oppression of the world government, but they neither care nor know that they are being controlled. The government tells them to consume soma, a drug that makes them feel good and then live their life as they are supposed to depending on their rank. Everyone is young and beautiful and given a task to do, if you are a lower caste you are brain washed into accepting your position and a living life as a lower class. The story get interesting when a boy named john, is born outside of the control of the government and he is not brainwashed. He comes to the world state and cannot accept how the world government has taken away the people basic human freedoms of thought or even rebellion. People are not allowed to even try to get out of the lower caste they are just brainwashed into believing that that is where they are destined to be and should be for the rest of their life. This novel draws a lot of parallels to when the English first came to the new world and they called the Native Americans savages for not behaving in the way they did. Although the Native Americans did not live the same way as the Englishmen, they were not living in savage state. The Native Americans on the other hand believed that the Englishmen were savages for destroying the land without even having respect for it. At the end of the day each believe that the other was a savage for not behaving in the same way as they themselves did and that is exactly what the Caramels believe in the story of enigma, they believe that they are superior because they are not from the past and therefore more civilized.
Another reference that Killla-Bee uses in his story is the immersion camps. He draws parallels from the internment camps in the united states of the Japanese during the Second World War. Both the immersion camps and the internments were very prison like yet filled with more freedom, it was like the people living in the camps were allowed to be free as long as they followed certain conditions that don’t allow them to be free. Everyone in the camps did not seem to know each other and came from different times unless they were taken into a portal together. Because many of the people of the past realized that it was them against the people from the future they seemed to get along with each other and bonded over how the lives were simpler in their own times.
Hard Times
Hard times is the latest episode in the first season on enigma. This episode follows the three friends after their adventures form the Immersion camp. They are now free and decided that they need a place to live so they go out to explore Time Town for the first time and also find a place to live. What they learn about Time Town is surprising.
Summary
Cato, Billy and Tom have been released from their two year immersion camp and they are ready to live their lives in Time Town. They go apartment hunting to find a place to live and get rejected from every place they try to find until they are suggested a place that is in the outskirts of the town. They have to take three trains to get to the complex and when they get there they see that it is filthy, there is trash everywhere and a foul smell coming from the nearby heavily polluted lake. None of the three are particularly happy to be there but then the land lord of the building tells them that this area is where all of the people form the past live, no one in Time Town would ever rent out to a person from a past because then they would be looked down upon. He told them that if do not like this complex there are 20 more around the area of walking distance that are very similar. They then go to see their future apartment and find that it is apparently one of the better ones in the area and is larger because there would be three people living there rather than the usual single that most people have.
Analysis
This episode was mostly written to allow the characters to realize that they are second class citizens compared to the Caramels that is evident when they are looked down upon and not given a place to live unless it is in the distant outskirts of the town. This is the first time that the Racism theme is most evident tin the story.
Reviews
Enigma is a fairly new comic and has not got many reviews so far but below we were able get a review form the blog site FIRE.
Enigma is very interesting comic, it has so much to offer and is very creative. It tries to weave a counter narrative masterfully but has its faults. The social structures that are present in the novel are not clearly explained, it is hard for the reader to understand that people of the past truly are second class citizens and equally treated as the Caramels. Additionally the divide seems small, the Caramels see themselves as superior but at the same only limit the freedoms of the people from the paste rather than complexly getting rid of them. This is evident in the laws of Time Town like them not being able to own a business. They also are not contained in the immersion camps for their life but they are free to walk among everyone else freely. But is a limited freedom equal better than no freedom? That is what this comic is trying to portray.
Another thing that is surprising about this comic is the influences, it seems as if Killla-Bee only uses the Greek myth of the big three and the culture of Old Town, San Diego as a jump off point to his world. The three main characters only share similar attributes the big three gods but that is where the comparison ends, it is hard for the reader to predict anything or even expect anything based the Greek gods. On the other hand Old Town is also just the stepping stone that Killla-Bee uses to create his Time Town, but after that he goes on to make his own unique town.
References
Works Cited
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7."Old Town San Diego SHP." Old Town San Diego SHP. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Apr. 2015.
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