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[paolojcruz]

Teenage Kicks: On Ligaya Escueta's upcoming show at SXSW Sydney 2025

As a middle-aged oldhead who still keeps up with Pinoy independent music, I consider Ligaya Escueta a recent favorite. That point will be important later on, I promise.

For now, what matters is that Ligaya Escueta’s band is heading to South by Southwest in Sydney, Australia, this October. For a Filipino professional touring act—even one backed by influential label Offshore Music—that’s still a costly proposition.

A huge global industry event like SXSW means visa costs, plane tickets, lodging costs, and their daily budget. Which is why they’re doing ongoing fundraising, including a recent matinee gig at Sari Sari, and an upcoming silent auction of signed electric guitars. With SXSW a bit less than a month away, time is short.

Ligaya Escueta earned this invite on the back of her sophomore album, Dollweb. It was released on Ligaya’s 18th birthday in January this year. Compared to her debut record, Laughing In Milk, the new album is fuzzier. The songwriting has a vibe that’s in turn shoegazey and neo-grunge.

Lead single “Novelty” (which preceded Dollweb by nearly a year) is built around a crunchy Pixies-ish riff. The lyrics speak to both the universal experience of being a withdrawn, insecure teenager, and the specific impostor syndrome of a high-school age songwriter who became critically acclaimed for incorporating 90s alt-rock sounds, against the backdrop of a pandemic lockdown.

That shuffle between recognizable 120 Minutes influences and here-and-now POV carries over into the rest of the album. The lyrics for “12 Steps” seem to be about adolescent yearning, possibly with (speculative?) undertones of Euphoria-ish substance abuse. But the vocal melody brings to mind the work of Mikey Amistoso (Ciudad, Hannah + Gabi), who also produced the first album.

It feels like the songs that open and close the album set the tone for what’s next, with the more 4AD-ish qualities of “Last Time”, “Locket”, and “Cemetery Sound” carrying over to the band’s more recent live shows. And that felt slightly jarring to me, as a listener whose first point of contact was the more baroque pop elements of Laughing In Milk.

Let me put this into context. I first heard Ligaya Escueta opening for The Purplechickens’ farewell show in February 2023, at Cafe 2.0 in Mandala Park. At that point, I had been to a few open-air gigs since the Covid quarantine was lifted (most notably, seeing Ligaya’s label-mate ena mori perform at the BGC Coffee Fest in 2022). But this was my first show in an enclosed space, after dark, since before the pandemic hit. So it felt like going through an existential reboot to watch a (then) 16-year-old channel Elliott Smith on songs like “1965” and “Twelve Sided Die”, or sing with precocious, beyond-their-years wisdom on the Nick Drake-ish “Living Is A Dying Art”.  No bullshit—it really felt like a future strand of Pinoy independent rock manifesting itself; a sonic butterfly incubated in the cocoon of lockdown ennui.

Except now it seems like that version of Ligaya Escueta may have taken a step back. When I called out a request for “1965” during the fundraising show, Ligaya admitted she hadn’t performed the song in a while. Indeed, guitarist Diego Cerrudo seemed unfamiliar with it altogether.

To me, the set at The Purplechickens' send-off feels like it happened practically yesterday. Sure, that was two jobs ago, and before my dad passed away from lingering cardiac issues. But in my head, it’s still “recent”— something that happened after that interminable lockdown experience. For Ligaya, as a teenage artist, that set might seem like a lifetime ago.

photo by Ellyphant

But that’s just it. A young artist doesn’t owe it to anyone to fit a particular version of their sound—least of all to some over-educated hipster in his late 40s who’s nostalgic for Not Radio’s heyday. If anything, the words to “Last Time” indicate Ligaya is acutely conscious of what kind of impression they might leave on the most significant listener: her future self.

Ligaya Escueta’s current direction may not be what I hoped or expected it to be. But that’s just how it is when you’re a fan of such a fledgling act. Her present sound is still dynamic, recognizable, and I’m sure there’s a broader audience for it. Hopefully, the SXSW trip will help them connect with those listeners.

[paolojcruz]

Reeling In The Years

REVIEWS : GAMES

Sleuth your way through stylized retro art films in Sam Barlow’s Immortality, an unapologetically high-concept FMV mystery

originally written for X-Box Outsider, August 2022

Immortality is the latest full-motion video (FMV) mystery by developer Sam Barlow, and his team at Half Mermaid Productions. The premise is unapologetically high-concept: actress Marissa Marcel starred in three unreleased movies, each in a different genre, in 1968, 1970, and 1999. Nobody has seen her since her last film was made. The player’s task is to watch clips from her movies to piece together what really happened to her. Aside from the unedited production footage, the game includes (fictional) behind-the-scenes clips, rehearsals, table reads, and screen tests.

Content advisory: Immortality features potentially upsetting subject matter. The game launches with a content warning that may not fully prepare audiences for more intense parts of the experience. No spoilers are provided in this review, but we felt it was necessary to highlight this.

All this archival sleuthing happens on a grid interface that simulates a vintage Moviola editing machine. However, unlike their analog counterparts, these virtual film strips can be easily reorganized by production date or the order that the scenes appear in each movie.

To unlock new film clips, you’re challenged to search for visual elements that are shared with other reels: cast members, production crew, props, and even lighting styles. This uses a standard point-and-click mechanic, familiar to graphic adventures and hidden object games, using a cursor to find “hot spots” in a static frame.

In that sense, Immortality clearly builds on many of the investigative gameplay elements from Barlow’s previous releases. Her Story (2015) had single-use keywords as a way to search for new footage. Meanwhile, Telling Lies (2020) used an in-game timer to ramp up the tension. That makes it easy to recommend Immortality for anyone who’s already a fan of his work. However, the shared aspects with Barlow’s earlier titles mean that Immortality is unlikely to win over cynics towards FMV narrative games.

Then who else will Immortality appeal to? Well, for one thing, the three movies have major arthouse cineaste vibes. With stylized aesthetics matching each genre, Immortality seems like an ideal gateway title for middlebrow film enthusiasts who don’t ordinarily play video games.

Ambrosio (1968)—Marcel’s screen acting debut—is a Gothic tragedy set in a repressive Spanish monastery that gradually explores more overtly paranormal elements. The film draws on giallo (Italian pulp cinema) tropes and the blasphemous surrealism of Alejandro Jodorowsky’s The Holy Mountain. Minsky (1970) is a noir detective procedural against the backdrop of New York’s decadent art scene, co-written by Marcel. The cinematography and production design are a heady mix of post-hippie excess and vintage cop show gravitas. Two of Everything (1999) marks the end of Marcel’s long hiatus, and takes its cues from psychological suspense thrillers like Christopher Nolan’s Memento and Darren Aronofsky’s Requiem for a Dream.

As a reviewer in my early 40s, who first rented these films in college, I hadn’t even considered that they had a distinct period-specific look, until I played through these segments. Granted, some of the visual symbolism feels a bit obvious: crosses, snakes, and forbidden fruits. But these on-the-nose elements also serve the gameplay, making the subtler clues more accessible and recognizable for less genre-savvy players.

All three segments of the game are held together by the performances of the uncredited actress who plays Marissa Marcel. Throughout frequent changes of wardrobe and hairstyle, Marcel is shown to be gifted at internalizing the nuances of her roles. There’s a veritable thrill in figuring out when Marcel has stopped being in character after a take ends, and how she puts elements of her off-camera personality into each part.

Barlow’s team does not shy away from presenting the uglier, retrogressive elements of the Hollywood studio system, as disclosed in the game’s extensive content warning. A slimy producer gets handsy with actresses. A director openly treats his crew with casual lewdness. The cast are encouraged to flirt with each other inappropriately, in the interest of screen chemistry. On-set safety appears woefully lax.

It can get especially difficult in scenes featuring carnal acts by the fictional cast. Without the help of modern intimacy coordinators, there’s an uncomfortable ambiguity between in-character ravishing and the cast members’ personal intentions. This applies to consensual love-making scenes as much as fictionalized sexual assault.

It’s clear that Half Mermaid designed these moments to be thought-provoking, but the possible end result is that Immortality can be a fraught, unsettling play experience and it’s an unfortunate crease on what would otherwise be a superior example of the game’s intended genre and style.

But on the whole, Immortality is a great example of how to push the boundaries of an FMV narrative game. The match cut feature and Moviola interface are the perfect mechanics to address the persistent critique that FMV games are ‘just’ a collection of non-linear cut scenes. Moreover, they work in the service of the larger investigative meta-arc about Marissa Marcel’s disappearance.

It’s almost impossible to discuss exactly how that mystery unfolds without spoiling crucial plot details. However, if you’re familiar with non-interactive research-based mysteries—like Archive 81 on Netflix or Elizabeth Kostova’s novel The Historian—you’ll probably guess that things eventually get spooky for the player-as-archivist. There may be sinister forces in play that are considerably more powerful than a smarmy Italian studio executive.

After logging nearly 18 hours of play, with 70% of achievements unlocked, there were still a handful of lingering uncertainties. Sure, I had answered the key question: what happened to Marissa Marcel? But the crux of Immortality is really figuring out how and why it happened. That’s an experience I would handily recommend for anyone who enjoys narrative games.

This game was reviewed on PC using a pre-launch review code provided by developer and publisher Half Mermaid.

[paolojcruz]

Insufficiently Advanced Technology

REVIEWS : FICTION

Katrina Olan’s Tablay sets up an intriguing transmedia franchise - at the cost of a satisfying novel.

A version of this review was originally written for the SEA Lit Circle readers group, June 2021.

Tablay is a sci-fi mech adventure set against the backdrop of a fortified, walled Manila, under permanent threat from bio-mechanical aswang marauders. The plot is built around the experiences of newbie elite striker Anya Valerio. There's a mix of inter-personal drama, military squad dynamics, Pinoy pop mythology, conspiracy lore, and hints of unli-wartime drama.

I respect the ambitious scope of the book, as it tries to balance the different sub-genre elements. Katrina Olan excels at snappy, Whedon-esque ensemble squad dynamics and clever ways of mashing up broad Pinoy "lower" mythology with mecha genre tropes.

However, the most intriguing world-building elements—unli-conflict resource scarcity, modern political allegory, hints at ecological themes—felt half-baked, at least in novel format. And even then, these aspects are explored via heavy exposition that tells more than it shows. At some points, it almost feels like reading the internal wiki or in-house series 'bible'.

All of this makes Tablay-the-novel feel like a soft pilot for Tablay-the-transmedia-franchise. This impression is supported by Tablay's spin-off content: limited run tie-in zines, a streaming radio play, an upcoming graphic novel adaptation, and the forthcoming Tablay: After Hours short fiction anthology (which Olan herself compared to "DLC").  It leaves me hopeful for the long-term plans, but somewhat short-changed right now.

I would cautiously recommend Tablay for open-minded multi-genre readers who might be curious about an unlikely mashup of Pinoy mythology, Shingeki no Kyojin (Attack on Titan), Ender's Game, and Pacific Rim.

[paolojcruz]

Comic Book Punks vs. Authoritarianism

REVIEWS : MUSIC

Are The Ravelos a gimmicky novelty act or legit antidote to frustration with the Duterte regime?

In professional wrestling, there's a term called ‘kayfabe’. That basically means staying in character. It’s sticking to your role, whether it’s an arrogant ladies’ man, a self-righteous environmentalist, or an undead bad-ass. Every action must fit that persona, even when you're being put in a rear naked choke or hit across the back with a steel chair.

In the same way, upstart Manila-based punk act The Ravelos practice kayfabe. According to the band, they're a group of superpowered misfits from the early 1980s. They were transported to 2019 via some kind of portal or wizard’s spell—they're not clear on how exactly it happened. Bottom line: they're here to fight supervillains, and to play three-chord punk songs about the state of The Philippines under President Rodrigo Duterte’s authoritarian rule. That's their story, and they're sticking with it.

The Ravelos first appeared in our timeline circa May this year. A veteran local comic artist (whose name rhymes with Chob Ram) drew an illustration of a punk band whose members were based on Filipino comic book heroes, all created by pioneering artist Mars Ravelo. Singer/guitarist Darnuh Vergara takes her cue from Darna—a transforming superheroine, often mistakenly touted as the Filipina version of Wonder Woman. The original artwork was part of #SigawDarna, an organic fan campaign to reinvent Darna for contemporary sensibilities. The Ravelos are rounded out by vocalist/axeman Flash Bombas, bassist Last Stick Man (inspired by rubber-limbed Lastikman), and drummer Kapitan Barbel (a pastiche of Captain Barbell, a metamorphing hero in the Shazam and henshin mold).

So far, so intriguing. But clever personas and a quirky backstory wouldn't mean a lot if they didn't have the musical skill to back it up. The identities of the actual performers is a poorly kept secret—just go to any of their shows to find out. Reliable sources claim that it may include members of seasoned independent acts like The Male Gaze, Cheats, and Boy Elroy. 

As for the songs? Well, listen to “Anuna?” (“Now What?”) for yourself:

Despite the raw-sounding mix (which may yet be another layer of their meta punk gimmick), it's clear they have legit grievances about very real issues. In the opening verse, Darnuh wails: 

Walang tubig! (No water!) Walang kuryente! (No electricity!) Walang tulog! (No sleep!) Walang diskarte! (No way out!)

It's a straightforward hit list of problems that Filipinos of all backgrounds can relate to. Then Flash responds: 

Saan napupuntang mga buwis? (Where do our taxes go?) Bakit ba tayo nagtitiis? (Why do we put up with this?) 

It's a familiar refrain, in a year marked by water shortages, rolling blackouts, and a relatively volatile economic mood.

Despite its cheeky title, “Sino Bang Tatay Mo?” (loosely “Who's Yr Daddy?”), it appears to lament kids who’ve been orphaned by the state’s questionable drug war. Meanwhile, “Asan Na Si Bantay?” calls out Duterte’s puppy-like stance towards Beijing in the country's territorial dispute with China over the West Philippine Sea.

It's worth asking: why use made-up personas to express valid political statements? A more unfavorable critic might accuse the band of performing “wokeness” for the sake of it. Especially when their manager/”hype man” Deeng reads almost the same prepared spiels off his tablet during each show. At the very least, it's a risky move in a sub/culture that pays so much lip service to authenticity. 

However, it's difficult to fault the band after seeing the groups they've supported. In July alone, they’ve played at shows for groups committed to holding the government accountable for its violations. A few weeks ago, the Ravelos rocked out at a launch for Sauron, a comic zine documenting the massacre of organized farm workers in Negros. They followed that up with a gig supporting KOLATERAL—Sandata’s rap concept album, based on street-level data about state-approved vigilante killings. 

Even with the four-color alter-egos, The Ravelos’ act has the tacit blessing of groups who’ve done hands-on grassroots work with farmers and urban poor communities. That sounds pretty damn punk rock to me. 

[paolojcruz]

Laptop Soul for Analog Hearts

REVIEWS : MUSIC

The SaGuijo leg of the Fresh Filter Vol. 1 Bar Tour presents the vinyl revival as a vital part of the Pinoy independent music ecosystem.

Originally published on Bandwagon PH, June 2015

On paper, the Fresh Filter Vol. 1 launch show at SaGuijo would most likely send a more cautious business planner into fits of rage. One might argue that the whole set-up ran counter to The New Normal of the commercial music industry. On a humid, wet payday Friday, co-organizers Jam 88.3 and Satchmi put on a show at the longest-running independent music venue in Makati, and didn’t charge any entrance fee. (For context, most gigs hover around the PhP200 range, including a standard drink.) Instead, the free gig was like a de facto come-on for listeners to buy the Fresh Filter Vol. 1 vinyl compilation, which brings together a curated slate of independent local acts, including all the ones booked at SaGuijo that night.

It almost feels like a deliberate fuck-you to the conventional wisdom of how to sell music in 2015. Instead of sharing digital tunes in the cloud, as a way to get fans to pay a premium for the live show, the Fresh Filter crew is putting the bands in front of appreciative crowds gratis, in the hope that they’ll fork over cash for a physical record. Between sets, Fresh Filter host (and Jam 88.3 DJ) Russ Davis repeated the spiel that buying the record would give direct support to the bands involved.

It’s a bold approach, no doubt – for one thing, there isn’t much reliable consumer data about how many Pinoy music fans even own a vinyl record player. That opens up a related marketing opportunity for Fresh Filter’s partners at Satchmi – they also produce the Motorino, a portable record player that’s branded as a starter model for vinyl newbies. Sure enough, they even raffled off a Motorino during the show at SaGuijo.

In effect, the organizers established that the goods – the vinyl compilation and the record player – were the real focal point of this live event. So where does that leave the actual performers?

For what it’s worth, each act delivered a set worthy of the live experience – not just a sonic advertisement for their contributions on Fresh Filter Vol. 1.

Tandems ’91 opened the show, burdened with the difficult task of pumping up a crowd right out of their weekly grind. The group comes across like a gimmick band at first, with their affected preppy outfits and the air of eager fresh grads – as if Vampire Weekend had been formed at the Ateneo. But forget about their looks – there’s a genuine heart to their laptop soul. Channeling retro New Wave pop elements, the sound they coaxed out of their pads and controllers would not be out of place at a prom scene in a John Hughes movie. By the time they worked in familiar samples from “Careless Whisper” and The Eraserheads’ “Toyang”, they had won over the jam-packed venue.

In fact, their whole cyborg pop vibe pretty much set the tone for the evening, with electronics being a normalized part of the sound. Of all the acts on the lineup, it’s Autotelic whose songwriting hews most closely to the kind of straightforward, radio-friendly verse/chorus/verse structure that rockist critics hold so dear, and yet their sound is textured by Eric Tubon’s synth lines.

Up next were Flying Ipis, whose angular dance punk set the apart as the only group without any type of keyboard. It was almost like the inverse of what the other bands were doing – creating frenetic disco beats and danceable hooks with a traditional guitar, bass, and drum setup. The highlight was a newer song “Half Brain” with a memorable sing-along refrain – “You and I won’t be denied” – that could well be interpreted as an anthem for marriage equality in the Philippines.

After that, Moonwlk made their return to SaGuijo. Let’s put aside the TMZ-esque speculation about the reasons for the duo’s long hiatus. Whatever alleged drama happened between Nick Trinidad and Gabbi Buencamino, it seemingly had the benefit of intensifying their well-crafted electronic pop.

It’s worth noting that Nick’s laptop was fiercely emblazoned with a decal that said “REAL INSTRUMENT”. Maybe the producer doth protest too much? The pair led the crowd in a gender-split call-and-response of “Right now!” (women) and “Not yet!” (men) during “Your Electric Kiss Is Late Always”. The audience followed like a congregation to their minister. With a reaction like that, the defensive posturing seems a bit uncalled for.

Yolanda Moon’s smoothed-out Prince-ly indie soul felt like a comedown after the high of Moonwlk, but it was no less captivating. Singer Cholo Hermosa started things off from behind a keyboard decked out in blue Christmas lights. His vocal melodies hinted at middle-of-the-road yacht rock influences – and it felt more like self-confident attempt to broaden musical horizons than ironic appropriation. It seemed fitting, given how much the whole Fresh Filter Vol. 1 project is about embracing whole-heartedly the format of an earlier generation.

The final slot was reserved for cult favorites Cheats, and they’re tighter than ever. By now, they’ve just owned the whole Broken Social Arcade Stars comparisons, and focused on making that sound more cohesive. Their fans don’t mind that the group wears their Canadian indie rock influences on their proverbial sleeves, and just enjoy it for what it’s worth. All the familiar crowd-pleasers like “Crash” and “Accidents” resulted in fierce shoutalongs during the high-speed breakdowns.

At the end of the night, the Fresh Filter Vol. 1 gig was a study in contrasts. It showcased artists using the tools of the bedroom producer age – midi controllers, laptops, digital synths – to replicate or even fine-tune the sounds of previous eras. It’s easy to write this off as retro faux nostalgia, but ironically, the reason so much 20th century pop music is so accessible is precisely because it’s so readily available over the web.

[paolojcruz]

Ride across the many worlds of Philippine komiks with Abangan

REVIEWS : COMICS

From heartbroken memoirs, to poetry comics, and yes, even superheroes, we can’t wait for Abangan: Best Philippine Komiks 2014

Originally published on Pacifiqa.com, April 2014

The editors of Abangan make the bold claim that their anthology represents The Best Philippine Komiks 2014. It’s a loaded statement, directed at two broad, overlapping audiences: Filipino readers (who don’t necessarily seek out local comics) and comic readers around the world (who might not be familiar with the work of Filipino creators). The editors – Rob Cham, Adam David, Carljoe Javier, and Elbert Or – have reasonable grounds to make that claim. Between them, they’ve created, edited, and taught about local comics with enough hands-on experience and formal savvy to possess a critical eye for the subject. And perhaps most importantly, they genuinely love comics – or “komiks”, as they opt to refer to the medium, locally. It’s a fact they declare in large, bold typeface at the start of their communal introduction. For the most part, their selection reflects this mix of critical curation and infectious enthusiasm for the medium.

Showcasing many worlds The editors’ introduction also spells out quite explicitly how they intend audiences to read the collection – “We wish the readers pay special attention to some of the more interesting landmarks of contemporary komiks, specifically the effort to experiment with formal and historical constraints inherent not only in comics as a form but in komiks as historical cultural production.” They go on to list a number of themes that recur in the komiks they’ve chosen, including the pervasive “kenkoy slapstick comedic aesthetic” and the transliteration of spandex-clad superheroics to a postcolonial Third World milieu, trusting the readers to figure out how these apply to the stories that follow.

There’s a deliberate push for diversity of styles, perhaps to offset the association of contemporary komiks with either traditional superhero fare or uninspired manga-fied fantasies. To that end, highlights from Emiliana Kampilan’s irreverent historical web comic Dead Balagtas share page space with Mica Agregado’s poetry comic “Blue Dust”. Likewise, Bong Redila’s whimsical, single-panel cartoons – which bring to mind old-timey children’s book illustrations by the likes of Windsor McKay – are represented alongside excerpts from Josel Nicolas’ gut-wrenching autobiographical comic Windmills V. It’s a deliberately pluralistic overview of the local komiks scene. Perhaps that might not be representative of the actual state of the medium, but it accounts for what the editors regard as its strongest work.

So that addresses editorial intent. But how do the actual komiks fare?

Playing with panels For the most part, the comics live up to the editors’ framing. The collection opens with an excerpt from Manix Abrera’s wordless “Diwata”. It’s an ideal piece to train newbie komiks readers in the basics of visual storytelling. The uniform nine-panel grid layout, the use of panel borders to frame the narrative, and cartoonish character designs all work together to tell a straightforward vignette about romance, expectations, and music. It’s a fitting introduction to the fundamentals of sequential art.

It’s quickly followed up with an excerpt from Crime Fighting Call Center Agents by Noel Pascual. The title of the series itself is a playful misnomer, and this sample just adds to the confusion. But as a story fragment, in and of itself, it continues the “komiks 101” masterclass. It takes a very mundane situation – a chance introduction of two men by common friends – and quickly turns it into a most epic “handshake battle” across space and time. Without spoiling how the conflict unfolds, let’s just say that it provides Pascual ample opportunity to show off the kind of trippy, cosmic-level events that wouldn’t be out of place in an old Jim Starlin comic. Mindscrew doesn’t even begin to describe it. Once again, the panel borders and page layout go a long way towards getting the story across, this time emphasizing the massive scope of the ‘fight’ between these two very competitive hand-shakers.

Speaking in code However, there’s more to komiks than just telling a story in pictures. Words are an inextricable part of the comic form, and it puts the issue of language front and center. Abangan is a polylingual anthology, so aside from the language of images, there’s a whole range of linguistic flavors, from street Tagalog to Filipinized English. By and large, the language choices feel appropriate.

The mock-pedagogical “Kung Bakit Lab Nating Mga Pinoy Ang Pagbibidyoke?” by the pseudonymous Dark Chapel uses casual Filipino to make its self-explanatory point. But its humor relies on so many culturally-specific references – from the Dutdutan tattoo festival, to Willie Revillame’s televised meltdown (“You don’t do that to me!”) – that its nuances would seem impenetrable even to somebody who might speak the language, but wasn’t well-versed in the details of Pinoy pop culture. To add to the confusion further, Dark Chapel throws in several gags that will only make sense to people who’ve watched World Wrestling Entertainment in the last few years. Otherwise, it all comes across like so much general absurdity. He may refer to the inclusive “natin”, but he seems to be addressing a much smaller in-group than the title suggests.

Crossing over Chapel’s work seems even more limiting when compared to the excerpt from Paolo Fabregas’ Filipino Heroes League Volume 2, which follows it. It uses a college lecture as a framing device for a flashback to a superhero battle, set during the EDSA People Power revolt in 1986. The story plays around with multiple themes from the history of Western superhero comics and post-Martial Law Philippine politics.

On one hand, it deals with the issue of super-powered individuals taking part in a real-life political movement that became world-famous for mobilizing ordinary citizens in favor of popular democracy (well, in theory, anyway). And despite its brevity, the fictional lecture comes down squarely on the side of us ‘normal’ folk. This can be read as a sly commentary on the prominent role of real-world ‘superpowers’ – from the military, traditional politics, and across the seas – who were instrumental in the outcome of EDSA ’86. Of course, that presumes a familiarity with the events of EDSA, at all.

However, there’s also another layer to Fabregas’ story. The mid 1980s were also a tumultuous era for superhero comics, in general. DC studios’ Crisis on Infinite Earths storyline undid decades of continuity in their shared multiverse, while seminal works like Alan Moore’s Watchmen and Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns problematized the role of superheroes, in terms of their effect real-world political affairs. (This also signaled a period of misguided darker and “edgier” superhero titles, which fell short of deconstructing superhero tropes with the same kind of nuance.) This is relatively common knowledge to people who are familiar with superhero comics, so it’s possible to read Fabregas’ work through that particular lens. When you tie both of these readings together, it drives home the themes emphasized by the editors in their introduction.

Filling the gaps This is just a partial sliver of what Philippine komiks have to offer. Indeed, the editors themselves admit to certain limits – for example, the Manila-centric selection of creators, and the relatively lop-sided gender and sexuality ratio among them. While most of the stories merited inclusion here, a few of them could have been swapped out to address this matter, without compromising the overall quality of the anthology. In terms of style, the work of creators like FFY of EM Zine, Danielle Rina of UP Grail, and sample comics from Stache could have easily fit in here. But these exclusions just remind us of the broad scope of the local comics scene, as is.

On the whole, Abangan succeeds as a great snapshot of the possibilities of Philippine komiks. One might quibble about the label of “Best” – in terms of gut-level preferences and formal media critique. But it’s decidedly one of the most diverse collections of local work to date.

[paolojcruz]

Can comics teach us about sexual rights?

FEATURE ARTICLE

Sharad Sharma of the Grassroots Comics Movement shows how comics can be used as a tool for promoting sexual and reproductive health and rights.

Originally published on Pacifiqa.com, February 2014

In late January, the Philippine International Convention Center (PICC) played host to the 7th Asian Pacific Conference on Reproductive and Sexual Health and Rights (APCRSHR). One particular workshop stood out among the mix of talks, plenary meetings, and symposia. “Using Cartoons in the Journey of Social Change” was a how-to session for making comics that advance social and political causes – in this case, pushing for sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR). The workshop was lead by Sharad Sharma of UNFPA India, founder of the Grassroots Comics Movement, with help from his colleague Nida Shams.

Admittedly, the idea of using comics to address politics is hardly ground-breaking: editorial cartoons have been a staple of broadsheet newspapers since the 19th century, while advocacy groups regularly hire comic artists to illustrate how their strategy will affect the communities they work for. What makes Sharma’s approach unique is the belief that community members should make their own comics. These grassroots comics are based on personal experiences – a kind of testimony, case study, and plan of action, all rolled into one. Format is a lesser concern – it can be a one-page comic strip, or a photocopied booklet, like an old-school DIY print zine. The visual storytelling itself is what really matters. Ideally, the comics will then be shared with friends, neighbors, loved ones, and perhaps most importantly, political opponents.

Indeed, the APCRSHR, as a whole, had no shortage of detractors – outside the PICC, members of Pro-Life Philippines picketed what they referred to as an “abortion conference”, while Attorney Jo Imbong of the St. Thomas More Law Society pleaded the Pasay City Regional Trial Court to issue a temporary restraining order against the event. (Mercifully, the request was shot down.) Would these dyed-in-the-wool hardliners change their minds, if they ever read the final output of the grassroots comics workshop?

One thing is certain: it would be much easier to move beyond critics’ abortion-focused blinders when one can actually see the full scope of the conference, in illustrated form. The complexity and nuance of the issues are humanized and made real by personal comics about access to birth control, and family planning. These are juxtaposed with visual tales of youth sexuality, and family pressure on 20-somethings to have kids. When individuals take ownership of SRHR concerns by representing them in comic strip form, it rightfully yanks the spotlight away from critics who are hung up on the abortion issue. This is a direct application of Sharma’s mantra – that “visuals have no language barrier”.

In spite of grassroots comics’ radical potential, the fact is that most people outside the APCRSHR – supporters and critics alike – never saw the work produced. Granted, the comics from the workshop were displayed in the conference’s Youth Village, for participants to read. Unfortunately, only a select few of those comics actually reached the general public, by way of the event’s official social media channels. The situation reveals the limits of the grassroots comics approach when it isn’t fully implemented.

Likes Manglal-lan documented the grassroots comics workshop for the official APCRSHR blog . In an email interview, she later admits that “there were no concrete partnerships” formed – “What happened was more of an expression of oneself.” Regardless, she remains upbeat about the possibilities of the medium; with more dedicated workshops and a longer timeframe, Manglal-lan is convinced that it can be pulled off at the community level.

So what will it take to get grassroots comics out of the conference halls, and into barangay community centers or public schools? The most obvious factor is capital – not just funding for workshops and art supplies, but also human capital: individuals like Sharma and Shams with the skills, know-how, and enthusiasm to share the practice.

However, there is another dimension that might not seem as intuitive. Sexual health and reproductive rights issues affect everyone – even those who might already be more affluent, educated, or savvy to digital media. Given that grassroots comics are explicitly intended to be shared, it would make sense to adapt them to channels that are designed for sharing images? The APCRSHR event and grassroots comics (in general) have such a minimal presence on Tumblr, a platform that’s particularly suited for visual content. (As a bonus, Tumblr’s format is also conducive for gathering crude engagement statistics, like reposts and feedback, to gauge the reach of the comics.) Likewise, there are no public Pinterest boards for curating or aggregating grassroots comics. Both of these channels could prove valuable, especially if more digitally active Filipinos decide to start telling their SRHR stories in comic form. Maybe then, more people would like, share, and subscribe to the idea that sexual health and reproductive rights are something we all deserve.

[paolojcruz]

Turn And Face The Strange

REVIEWS : FICTION

Is Charles Yu's Sorry Please Thank You 'slipstream'? Maybe. But when it's this engaging, labels don't really matter.

A version of this review was originally published in Fully Booked Zine, April 2013.

One might argue that Charles Yu writes ‘slipstream’ fiction. That’s English major code for “stuff that’s too weird or non-realistic to be mainstream literary fare, but doesn’t quite follow the genre conventions of sci-fi, fantasy, or other more well-defined branches of speculative fiction”.  

In this collection of short stories, Yu’s modus operandi seems to be exploring broader human themes – self-identity, loss, alienation – by applying outlandish scenarios to everyday settings.  “First Person Shooter” deals with a plucky wage slave in a multi-purpose retail superstore, consumed by his inability to ask out a co-worker, even amidst the start of a possible zombie apocalypse. “Open” depicts the breakdown of a young couple’s marriage, set against the intrusion of a seemingly multiversal portal in their apartment, beyond which lies an idealized version of their wedded life together.

Most stories are US-centric, as one might expect from a (Chinese-)American writer, so it’s laudable that Yu breaks the mold with “Standard Loneliness Package”.  He adopts the perspective of a dutiful Bangalore employee, whose job is to literally undergo painful experiences outsourced by American consumers, from grieving relatives to unfaithful spouses.

Yu does not shy away from genre tropes completely. “Yeoman” depicts the misadventures of a seemingly disposable low-ranking ‘redshirt’ aboard a Star Trek-esque exploration vessel. He deftly turns a peripheral stock character into a fully-realized protagonist, with playfully unexpected results, while poking fun at well-established space-faring clichés. Likewise, “Hero Absorbs Massive Damage” takes apart the elements of the archetypal hero’s journey – think Joseph Campbell – amidst the structured chaos of a World of Warcraft-style MMORPG and standardized fantasy gaming mechanics.

Yu’s writing is ideal for broadening one’s scope. For more conventional literary enthusiasts, it’s a gateway to nerdier genre fare. Likewise, it’s a worthy first step for readers looking to venture beyond familiar speculative fiction works.

[paolojcruz]

The Discreet Charm of the Creative Class

REVIEWS : FICTION Karl Taro Greenfeld’s Triburbia depicts the one-third-life crises of NYC’s bourgeois bohemians – and it’s surprisingly compelling.

This review was originally published in Fully Booked Zine, September 2012.

Triburbia is structured like a narrative mosaic; its intersecting pieces are tinted with various hues of ethical grey, dollar green, and mostly Caucasian. The novel’s perspective shifts among a loose-knit coterie of neighbors in New York's gentrified Tribeca area. Most of them are young(ish) parents, belonging to what sociologist Richard Florida calls the “creative class”: a sculptor, a photographer, and a sound engineer, among others. On paper, they’ve got it made – some earn handsome professional fees to do creative work; others make art subsidized by their affluent partners’ paychecks. Expectedly, the severity of their personal issues is proportional to their household income. Domestic squabbles and marital crises are inextricably fraught with aging scenester insecurities: status anxiety, self-doubt over compromised aesthetic sensibilities, and the diminishing returns from “selling out”.  It's all too easy to dismiss these as #firstworldproblems, so it's a testament to Karl Taro Greenfeld's storytelling prowess that he's able to make readers care about these characters, as real people.

What holds their narratives together is the cultural milieu of Tribeca. In the period covered by the story, including extensive flashbacks, the neighborhood has gone from low-rent industrial ghetto, to artists’ enclave, to a veritable self-contained yuppie bohemia. Many of the characters have bought in – literally and figuratively – to the fragile illusion of an arts-fueled community, one that remains dependent, however begrudgingly, on the volatile capital being traded elsewhere in Manhattan. The gradual breakdown of the characters’ personal lives coincides with the looming threat of financial decline. Recent history has already given away the context for Triburbia’s ending: nigh collapse, bailouts, stimulus packages, then Occupation. Finding out how these events impact our well-fed artists results in a heady mix of schadenfreude and reluctant sympathy.

Triburbia combines wry cultural observation and earnest character studies with the promise of juicy details and veiled insider gossip. Call it The Bonfire of the Vanities for the Gawker era.

[paolojcruz]

A Clash of Urban Kings

REVIEW : MUSIC

Beyond the polished macho swagger, Jay-Z and Kanye West's Watch the Throne is the sound of hip-hop aging gracefully.

originally published in UNO (Guam), September 2011

Watch the Throne is a testament to the significance of collaboration and teamwork in hip-hop. In theory, it would seem like epic battle of egos when these two heavyweights of urban music – each one in peak form – get together in one studio. Amazingly, both rap titans manage to bring their own unique style to the mix here, as if their drive to outdo one another created something far greater.

Tracks like “Who Gon Stop Me” match cocky boasting with frenetic synths. “No Church in the Wild” sees these partners in rhyme waxing philosophical against the backdrop of a menacing bass line. “Why I Love You” even has them riffing off a grandiose mid-tempo hair-metal chorus! But it's not all just studio magic: "Otis" strips down the mix to minimalist beats, allowing the pair to trade lyrical barbs, punctuated by a frenetic Otis Redding sample.

It's all too easy to be wowed by the slick production values and stadium-filling bravura. However, if one listens beyond the sonic grandeur, Watch the Throne is a surprisingly introspective album. The smooth gospel vocals on the chorus of “Made In America” serves as an upbeat refrain for a meditation on the duo's rise to pop superstardom, framed in the larger context of African-American history. Meanwhile, “New Day” is a surprisingly earnest collection of hopes for the lives of the pair's hypothetical children. Kanye declares “I won't let my son have an ego”, while Jay-Z promises to avoid the mistakes of his own deadbeat father. Even on angrier tracks like “Welcome to the Jungle” and “Murder to Excellence”, the aggro posturing is tempered by wry observations about black-on-black violence and the celebration of ghetto-to-riches success stories. All of this makes for an unexpectedly thoughtful release, making effective use of the tandem's star power and undeniable musical skills.

[paolojcruz]

Cool Britannia Is Out Of Bounds

REVIEWS : COMICS

The Vinyl Underground is a serviceable rehash of early 90s Vertigo themes in gentrified contemporary London.

Originally posted on the Multiply page of Sputnik Fantastik, February 2010

I feel like I’ve read Si Spencer and Simon Gane’s The Vinyl Underground before, at least during its five-part opening arc, collected in Vol 1, Watching The Detectives. And you know what? It doesn’t matter – I thoroughly enjoyed it, just the same!

The basic premise is like The Invisibles crossed with Torchwood. A motley group of subcultural misfits come together in a disused Tube (subway) station, beneath London’s magical streets, to investigate the paranormal crimes that ordinary cops don’t have the resources or knowledge to solve.

Let me get one thing out of the way, early on: the characters are total ciphers, patched together from every conceivable aspect of British urban mythology. There’s the bad-ass footballer’s son with connections to the mob, whose Pete Doherty-like public image belies a sensitive side (and residual mommy issues). There’s a feisty, tough urban shaman of African descent, who’s in tune with London’s mythical psychogeography. There’s a reckless bisexual pervert who can talk with the dead. You probably get the idea, by now...

This is formula late 90s Vertigo stuff, right down to the plots about undead Russian hookers, aristocratic cults, African black magic, and Guy Ritchie-esque gangsters. As somebody who picked up on The Invisibles in college, I’m just happy to get a fix of more of the same kind of esoteric urban adventures.

Artist Simon Gane has been accused of being a Philip Bond imitator, a charge that’s not entirely inaccurate. (Though I personally think Gane’s style recalls Warren Pleece circa Deadenders a bit more.) It’s the same kind of approach that Bond and Pleece employ so well: using very bright, cartoonish designs to realize often macabre storylines. It’s not terribly distinctive, but I don’t think it’s fair to say Gane is an outright copycat.

This isn’t ground-breaking stuff, by any means. However, I do think it’s a subject that’s been in limited supply, in recent years, at least in American comics. I’d definitely recommend it for today’s high school-age readers who may be new to the genre. Likewise, it will probably be a worthwhile read, for those who liked the quirky superheroics of X-Statix, Global Frequency, or Morrison-era Doom Patrol.

[paolojcruz]

Bridget Jones in Kirby’s Fourth World

REVIEWS : COMICS

Jersey Gods succeeds at an unlikely mashup of “chick lit” and cosmic superheroics.

Originally posted on the Multiply page of Sputnik Fantastik, January 2010

Did you ever think Bridget Jones’ Diary would be more interesting if DC’s jetpack-wearing science hero Adam Strange had been the love interest? Or perhaps you’ve always wanted to read a comic that mashes up The Devil Wears Prada with Marvel’s galactic crossover War of Kings. If so, then Jersey Gods is perfect for you.

The basic premise is relatively simple: Zoe is a willful, free-spirited gal from the suburban Garden State. Barock is a stoic, dutiful war hero, who’s caught up in the midst of a power struggle between god-like alien civilizations. By some contrived twist of fate, their paths cross, when a rogue deity opens a dimensional portal in a crowded shopping mall. But what are the odds of this star-crossed pair falling in love, let alone having a functional relationship?

Jersey Gods necessarily caters to readers with broader pop sensibilities, due to its mix of disparate influences. It obviously borrows heavily from Jack Kirby’s cosmic adventures, like the Fourth World titles, and the original 70s version of The Eternals. Indeed, artist Dan McDaid’s panel layouts and character designs feel like a ‘reimagining’ of vintage Kirby, in the same way that, say, Darwyn Cooke updates pulp adventure illustration for modern audiences.

To that end, he’s supported by colorist Rachelle Rosenberg, whose vivid, dynamic palette breathes life into the otherworldly conflict between the heroic Walkers and the nefarious Orbiters. It’s not easy to create a realm as fanciful as Neboron, with its celestial architecture and crackling space weaponry, and still be able to keep the reader involved with the plot. Thankfully, writer Glen Brunswick manages to pull it off by establishing well-defined personalities for the off-world characters, before thrusting them headlong into a potentially deadly infiltration mission.

Yet for all its sci-fi bravura, Jersey Gods is also very much a romantic comedy, with tropes that are deftly cribbed from Jane Austen and textbook “chick lit” alike. Zoe is refreshingly well-rounded, interrogating the “Jewish-American Princess” archetype (the East Coast US version of a kikay, materialistic career girl), even as we learn about the circumstances that have shaped her personality along those lines. Fittingly, her earthbound supporting cast wouldn’t be out of place in an episode of Ugly Betty, from her harried suitor in the first chapter, to her neurotic parents, and a surprisingly nuanced boss figure. It’s Zoe’s side of the plot that gives Jersey Gods a much needed human dimension, as a counterpoint to the awesome space battles and planetary espionage. Her life may be tied to a specific region, but if you strip away the dairy farms and industrial parks, the New Jersey she inhabits isn’t all too different from the social world of a typical upwardly mobile young professional in Manila.

Ultimately, Jersey Gods is a story about finding middle ground: between the ordinary and the fantastic; between lofty ideals and harsh reality; between living up to social expectations and pursuing one’s individual dreams. It obviously won’t be easy for Zoe and Barock to keep up this delicate balancing act. Nevertheless, I'm intrigued enough to find out how this unlikely couple gives it a shot.

[paolojcruz]

Ontario Gothic

REVIEWS : COMICS

A rootless cultural nomad reviews Jeff Lemire’s rural family drama The Collected Essex County.

Originally posted on the Multiply page of Sputnik Fantastik, November 2009

One measure of a truly skilled comic creator is their ability to make their readers care about people or characters that may be radically different from themselves. With the rural family drama of The Collected Essex County, Jeff Lemire doesn’t just meet this criteria; he positively surpasses it.

At its heart, Essex County is a nuanced but ultimately romantic saga about the landscape Lemire grew up in: the desolate farmlands of Ontario, in east-central Canada. More specifically, it’s about the ways an agricultural community is shaped by this harsh, unforgiving geography. Over the course of three main stories, and two loosely related shorts, Lemire gives us a sense of a close-knit small town, whose inhabitants’ lives are marked by shared traditions (hockey), fantasies (comic book superheroics), and the unpleasant secrets that lurk just below the surface of their rural idyll.

Lemire achieves this by taking full advantage of the medium. His rich, expressive linework is perfectly suited to a narrative built on the conflict between roots (the town itself) and wings (the urge to escape, or metaphorically fly away from it all). Page layouts are used to emphasize the vastness of an environment that looms over the cast, sometimes ominous, but just as often providing a comforting solitude. “Decompressed” six-panel grids allow small but crucial moments to linger, heightening the emotional weight of family secrets revealed. In scenes where dialog is kept at a minimum, close-ups often provide more hints at genuine resolution than any conversation could hope to achieve.

I’ll confess that that I kept expecting hints of magical realism, or maybe supernatural elements. Indeed, some of the recurring visual themes are positively haunting: the footprints in snow, and those seemingly omnipresent crows.

However, that just belies my own expectations derived from pop culture’s small town narratives: the everyday weirdness of TV’s Amazing Stories, the sinister hamlets that populate the Lovecraft mythos and Stephen King’s early work, or even just the oddball happenings in the Palomar stories of Gilbert Hernandez.

But there is very little that’s otherworldy in Essex County. Instead, Lemire hooks readers in with understated drama: a kid in a superhero costume dreaming up an elaborate alien invasion plot, as he longs to escape the humdrum routine of farm life; a failed hockey player dealing with senility, as past and present blur into a hazy miasma; a nurse compensating for a personal loss by making a difference in the lives of her patients. All of their stories are uniquely human, and yet integral to their connection with Essex County, the place.

For a reader like me – a perennial metropolitan boy who grew up in various South East Asian mega-cities, with no single “province” that my family calls home – Essex County would ordinarily be a difficult sell. To Lemire’s credit, he got me to care about a tale that is unapologetically pastoral by focusing on some of the most universal human emotions: loss, hope, a thirst for new experiences, or a sense of belonging. But most of all, Essex County is about the tension between holding on to a familiar past, and dealing with today’s unpleasant realities. That’s something even a cultural nomad can relate to.

[paolojcruz]

Desperate Housecat Owner

REVIEWS : COMICS

Garfield Minus Garfield offers a tragicomic portrait of a Sad Young Man.

This review was originally published in Fully Booked Zine, January 2009.

It’s easy to recognize the various unintended meanings hidden in the artifacts of pop culture. But few of us truly attempt to respond to the stuff we consume. One such person is Irish humorist Dan Walsh. Much as he recognizes the iconic appeal of Jim Davis’ Garfield character – the wisecracking, lasagna-scarfing cat – it’s the quiet desperation of Garfield’s owner Jon Arbuckle that won over Walsh’s sympathies. In order to highlight Jon’s sense of desperation, Walsh used digital manipulation to remove Garfield from actual comic strips. Without any of the fat cat’s unimpressed snide comments or manic rejoinders, the reader is left with Jon as a solitary everyman, often muttering to himself pathetically, or bursting out into seemingly random acts of manic inspiration. He began publishing these modified strips online in early 2008 as Garfield Minus Garfield, and quickly became a cult web success.

Initially, this seemed like a surefire way to end up with a hefty lawsuit. Mercifully, Jim Davis was supportive of the project, hailing it as “fascinating” and “inspired”. Recognizing a potential way to expand the franchise, Davis authorized this print edition, which not only collects Walsh’s strips, but also includes a section of new pieces, with Davis himself trying his hand at the Garfield Minus Garfield approach.

The legitimized format allows reprints of the original pieces that Walsh used as source material. This lets readers appreciate exactly what kind of content was displaced along the way, and to recognize how a few strategic tweaks can make a world of difference towards the entire mood of an ordinary four-panel comic strip.

[paolojcruz]

Kafka in the Boardroom

REVIEWS : COMICS

Dilbert 2.0 is a sweeping retrospective of corporate absurdity.

This review was originally published in Fully Booked Zine, December 2008.

By now, there is a well-established tradition of mocking the foibles and quirks of the corporate world in pop culture, from international versions of The Office, to cult faves like Office Space. It’s easy to take for granted now, long after the Asian Miracle, or the Dot Com Boom, but it must have seemed like a relatively novel concept in 1989, when Scott Adams began publishing his syndicated comic strip Dilbert. By now, Dilbert has evolved into its own veritable media empire, with multiple collections and spin-offs, and the requisite merchandise built around the iconic image of the eponymous protagonist’s upturned necktie.

Dilbert 2.0 is an over-sized bumper compendium of the strip, an ideal gift for both die-hard completists, as well as newbies hoping for an exhaustive intro. What it might lack in bells and whistles, it makes up for with sheer comprehensiveness. It’s a thorough document of the chronological development of the series. By extension, it’s a sweeping retrospective of the changes in corporate culture of the past two decades: overbearing micro-managers, budget squabbles, merciless HR policies, and inept financial advisers. All of this is shot through with Adams’ characteristic absurdist humor, emphasizing the frequently ridiculous basis of these corporate standards and practices. He’s particularly deft at mocking bureaucracy for its own sake.

One real highlight of Dilbert 2.0 is Adams’ own running commentary. It gives readers a direct access to his thoughts on the creative process, from his personal experiences of the cultural trends being satirized, to extolling the virtues of humor about “implied flatulence”. It’s a value added bonus to an already in-depth collection.

[paolojcruz]

Nerds Gone Wild!

REVIEWS : FICTION

Cloistered intellectuals become unlikely heroes in Neal Stephenson’s opus, Anathem.

This review was originally published in Fully Booked Zine, October 2008.

Neal Stephenson’s Anathem is a supreme exercise in world-building. It desires to be an encyclopedia, almanac, and philosophical treatise, wrapped around the skeleton of a three-act sci-fi adventure. Oh, and it’s roughly 900 pages long, not counting the various supplementary resources. It’s grandiose, ambitious, and shamelessly indulgent towards Stephenson’s academic pet themes, investigated earlier by titles like The Baroque Cycle. Yet I’m absolutely fascinated by it!

All you need to know, without giving away crucial plot twists, is this: a fictional world called Arbre has been long divided into two main castes. There’s the Sæcular realm – full of complacent, superstitious plebes, numbed by a steady diet of porn, extreme sports, and organized religion. Then there’s the Avout – a cloistered group of hyper-smart uber-nerds who lead a monastic existence, shunning advanced technology. They practice various complex sciences, via oral tradition and hand-scribed documents. The two groups coexist in a tense equilibrium, until a foreboding threat requires an elite cell of young Avout to Save The Planet. Yes, it’s a stock genre plot. But Stephenson masterfully uses it as a starting point for crafting a believable new civilization.

Indeed, Anathem’s true achievement is creating an entire speculative world by piecing together artifacts from our received culture – everything from Plato to Star Trek – and rendering them strange and unfamiliar. It’s perfectly suited for readers like me, who enjoy figuring out which “real world” analogs correspond to the various ideas and personas.

But all of this would be intellectual parlor games, if it wasn’t built around an engaging narrative. For that, Stephenson draws upon some familiar elements: hooded tricksters, mad scientists, and the fear of prospective alien invasion. Like a skilled literary alchemist, he mostly succeeds at fusing these various approaches, making Anathem a fascinating journey into the world of the mind.

[paolojcruz]

The Journey of a Millennium

REVIEWS : FICTION

James Luceno’s Millennium Falcon takes readers on a joyride through Star Wars history.

This review was originally published in Fully Booked Zine, October 2008.

Every vehicle, real or imagined, has its own unique life history, from the pioneering Ford Model T, to the average Pinoy jeepney. But few vessels have quite the storied past as Han Solo's dependable Millennium Falcon. Not only did it play a key role in bringing down a tyrannical Empire, it notoriously made the Kessel Run smuggler’s route in “less than twelve Parsecs”. But that’s just the tip of the proverbial iceberg, it seems…

The Falcon is the subject of James Luceno's eponymous novel, the latest book in the Star Wars Expanded Universe. Though it directly follows the events of Invincible (the final installment of the melodramatic Legacy of the Force series) it's accessible enough for readers who have a passing familiarity with the original space opera trilogy.

Largely self-contained, the narrative fleshes out the character of Allana Solo, the Force-strong granddaughter of Han and Princess Lea. The feisty youth joins her graying Lolo and Lola aboard the titular YT-1300 light freighter, for a warp speed intergalactic joyride that spans the Falcon's crowning moments, as well as the horrors to which it has been a silent witness.

But Allana's quest is more than just some indulgent nostalgia trip for Jedi geeks. As is customary, the Fate of the Universe rests on the success of her mission. So the motley group's escapades put them at loggerheads with a colorful assortment of individuals: bounty hunters, vicious space pirates, crooked officials, and even fallen comrades!

Millennium Falcon doesn’t attempt to reinvent the Star Wars canon. Frankly, it doesn’t need to. It holds its own as a fun, standalone romp, highlighting a single vehicle that’s become a darling part of the series’ mythology.