It’s a well-known fact around here that I’m a big fan of
Jeff Lemire’s work. I’m proud to say
that, excluding his work for DC proper, I am the proud owner of all his works
in comics. (Keep an eye out for a review
of Underwater Welder around these parts soon enough!) So when I caught wind of
the fact that Top Shelf had plans to re-release his very first published work, Lost Dogs I was excited to own another piece of the Jeff Lemire comics
pie.
Lost Dogs, in its early stages, is the comic that won Lemire
the Xeric grant, a reward that allowed him to complete Lost Dogs and thus begin
what has become a successful career in comics.
However, there was a very limited amount of copies published in the
initial go-around, so Lost Dogs been tough to come by for folks who are fans of
Lemire. Luckily, Top Shelf decided to
republish this one, so no longer will I have to search the used book shelves
for this gem.
Lost Dogs is a story about a man, a massively huge man, who
is a simple farmer, and loves his family.
While on a trip to the city for supplies and some sight-seeing, tragedy
strikes and the man is forced to fight to prevent the loss of everything he has
ever known and loved. Lost Dogs is a
tale that is raw emotions brought up from the depths of the human soul, laid
out and exposed in a gritty, brutal display of untamed artistic talent.
As you might imagine for any artist at the start of his or
her career, Lemire’s artwork in Lost Dogs is much rougher and more disheveled
looking than his most recent stuff. That’s not to say it isn’t good though
because even though it might not look the prettiest, Lemire does a wonderful
job of tapping into that fountain of basic human emotion and letting it run all
over the pages in black ink. Lemire’s
brush strokes, which are chunkier than an NFL lineman, appear sloppy or rushed
at times, but the brush strokes seem to convey the amount of emotion Lemire was
trying to pour onto the page.
Like many of Lemire’s work in comics, Lost Dogs is a story
that cuts deep and leaves its mark both mentally and emotionally. Story-wise, this is a tale that lacks the
polish of his later works, but still delivers a story that pulls no
punches. This is a straight forward tale
with little in the way of tricks, twists or feints. Instead Lemire chooses to
batter the reader over the head with his heart-breaking tale of loss and
loneliness. Sure, this one is
uncivilized, a bit wild and only just barely presentable, but all that seems to
give the story the emotional kick it needs.
Lost Dogs might be lacking the refinement of Lemire’s later work
both in terms of art and story, but it is cool to see where it all came from
and catch a glimpse into an artist’s past to see how that work sparked the work
of today. For fans of Jeff Lemire, this
one is a must have. If you are looking
for a no holds barred work of raw emotion, then this is a good place to start
looking. Not the prettiest, or the
cleanest, but still, a winner in the end.
Grade: B
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