Friday, December 11, 2009

English and Americans and David Bowie


First, check it out. That MYSTERY! comic I was talking about is about David Bowie, this is the first panel of the second page. It took me a while to draw but I think it was worth it.

Also, looking back it seems almost all of the comics I've done that aren't about women beating up monsters are about the English. (caution on the links, some of it is old and I'm not really proud of much of it) I'm not really an Anglophile at all, I should point out. And I was pretty unhappy with that comic about the Krays as I was making it, actually; at the time I was also reading Camorra and about some of the American gangsters of the same time, which really put the lie to the bullshit around the Krays and the stuff that supports their legend, like The Long Good Friday. The Krays and many of the other gangsters of the time were just celebrities, all the glamor of mobsters with only a hint of the real violence used by the Camorra in Naples or even the American mob, for that matter. A frightened American telling Bob Hoskins that he's scared of all this violence in England before Bob Hoskins gets killed by the IRA is all just so much nationalist bullshit.

Which really has nothing to do with this current biographical comic about this English man. David Bowie build his stardom over actual musical talent and to a lesser extent, the ability to wear anything and look good in it. I have nothing against him, he's great.