Same Difference – Derek Kirk Kim (w/a)
First Second, $16.99, ISBN: 978-1-59643-657-2
Derek Kirk
Kim is perhaps best known for his collaboration with Gene Luen Yang, The Eternal Smile — a collection of
short stories that basked in the afterglow of Yang’s runaway success with American Born Chinese. It was Kim’s illustrations that really
carried the book, though — chameleonic displays of versatility that varied from
Carl Barks to Shaun Tan stylings — with Yang’s stories often being too reliant
on their inevitable twists. So, it was
heartening to see a re-release of Kim’s 2003 debut graphic novel, Same Difference, arriving from First
Second (the original edition of which now goes for silly money on the used
market.)
It concerns
the lives of Simon and Nancy, two twentysomething Asian-Americans, shuffling
into adulthood and dealing with the existential crises that it entails — who am
I, where am I going, how has my past defined me? These feelings are anchored by two central
transgressions that drive the story and come to define who the characters
are. Nancy is hoarding the mail of her
apartment’s previous tenant, and piecing together an unrequited love story,
while Simon becomes tortured by his memories of high school and the way in
which he jilted a blind girl. And it’s
here that the story hits its first stumbling block — its protagonists are both
eminently unlikeable, shallow, selfish people.
Perhaps a
similarly angst-ridden twentysomething will be able to identify better with
them, and their aimless cod-philosophising and feelings of being an outsider
will resonate, but even still, there is not much to redeem them in the eyes of
the reader. This is partly due to the
characters’ own failings, but also due to that of the plot. For all its aspirations of maturity and
seriousness, Kim’s writing far too often diverges into the comedic in sequences
that do little to further the plot. So
much so that several story threads are set-up and never resolved — this
technique may work well for cartoonists like Adrian Tomine and Nate Powell, but
even they have a sense of narrative flow and the illusion of closure.
The book
just doesn’t know what it wants to be, and the same problems with the writing
spill over into Kim’s art. While mostly
serviceable, it does have a few flashes of brilliance, particularly the scenes
in the Pho restaurant where the characters are framed by, and often viewed
through, a fish tank. It recalls The Meaning of Life and is richly
symbolic, as well as beautifully rendered, but it is left as simply a flourish. Again, Kim too frequently falls back on
comedic stylings with his characters becoming reduced to overly-simplified
slapstick avatars. Tonally, it just
feels awkward.
No doubt if
given a strong script and a stronger editorial hand, Kim could find his
voice. As it is, he still feels very
much like an artist searching for a voice, continuing to experiment until he
finds it — even now branching off into a live-action web comedy series, albeit
a painfully unfunny one. Same Difference is not the early
masterpiece, or promising juvenilia that it might have been, but rather a sadly
failed experiment.
-- Gavin Lees
4 comments:
so what you're saying is you really like the book and derek's work
Gavin,
You wrap up your review with the comment "No doubt if given a strong script and a stronger editorial hand, Kim could find his voice." But just a few paragraphs prior, you let us know that "it was heartening to see a re-release of Kim’s 2003 debut graphic novel."
He wrote this 8 years ago! It was his debut! Of COURSE he was still finding his voice.
Leaving aside that strange declaration, I have to point out this inconsistency: if you think his current webseries is "painfully unfunny," then why are you "heartened" to see this re-release, and why would you expect this to have been an "early masterpiece"?
You say it's not an early masterpiece, but call it a debut that has "flashes of brilliance...richly symbolic, as well as beautifully rendered." A quick hop over to Wikipedia informs me that this title won Eisner, Ignatz and Harvey awards, and furthermore that Kim was only 29 when it was published. (And therefore even younger when he wrote and drew it!)
It seems many people at the time *did* consider it an early masterpiece, but supposing for a moment that they were *all* wrong, your dismissive claim that it doesn't even rank as "promising juvenilia" seems misinformed and just a little churlish. I would call a triple award winning debut graphic novel, translated into French, Korean, Spanish, German, and Italian, and written and drawn by a kid only a few years past high school, a pretty promising piece of juvenilia.
Hi Scout -- good comments -- sorry you thought the review wasn't clear enough. I was glad to see a rerelease of the book because I thought his work on "The Eternal Smile" was excellent and I wanted to read more. Needless to say, I wasn't that impressed, and I watched "Mythomania" to see what he had been up to recently.
I would never tell anyone their opinion was wrong, and I was well-aware of the awards the book won. I just didn't find much to enjoy or admire in "Same DIfference", nor did I see much of a link between its art and that of "The Eternal Smile." Also, he's yet to produce another solo graphic novel so, to me, he's yet to really find his voice, which is what my editorial comment was about.
I've reread this review twice. The first time in shock, and the second time scanning for the *wink* to the reader. Sadly, i'm either thick (and missed the joke) or you're someone who hates comics.
As a collection of work by a young artist, it may be one of the best on the shelves. Every short is fully realized. Every story story has its own visual style. He plays with the compositions, framing, and pacing, seasoned pros could learn a thing or two.
I don't want to label you a jaded art snob- you're entitled to you're opinion- but I submit that perhaps you're not suited to do this job. You know what you like, but you don't know what makes something good.
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