blogging by Andrew Wickliffe


Phonogram (2006) #3


P03

In this issue, Gillen introduces time travel. Well, it’s not exactly time travel and I shouldn’t say Gillen introduces it. It’s basically the time travel device out of Somewhere in Time.

Has anyone else noticed I keep coming up with movie references to describe plot points in Phonogram? It’s possibly because Gillen doesn’t have a single original event in the entire comic book. He’s got some mildly original characters—though the “modern fantasy” takes off this issue and it gets pretty lame—but none of the actions are original. It’s a mix of other people’s ideas, with some pretentious music talk laid over it.

Of course, it’s not pretentious music talk. People who don’t care more about music than anything else—we learn—are total lames. I’m shocked Gillen didn’t come up with a vocabulary for the thing, like it’s Harry Potter.

McKelvie’s got more to draw, which is nice.


One response to “Phonogram (2006) #3”

  1. While it would be hard to call Gillen’s Phonogram an original work of art, sometimes it’s execution is what got me through it when it’s characters were more than a little off putting. In six(?) issues, the boys managed to keep me moving along, perhaps my better than general knowledge of hipster music helped along the bare patches of the script. I think I viewed Phono as a decent piece of development between two “newer” talents I hadn’t heard of before, allowing them their excesses. But in the end, I still wanted to read more. That pretty much sums up a lot of my experience with British comics. Not a lot of depth, but just enough flavor to make you want to slam a few more.

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