The Stop Button

Naifeh partially recovers Ugg this issue with a fantastic flashback about Ülga’s motherhood and then he sets her up with a friend at school. One of the teachers is actually going to help her. That sequence, with her conversations with the teacher and the flashback, is excellent and it seems like the issue is going to go well.

Even the teacher’s assignment–Ülga needs to make friends with her enemy–is interesting and could lead to a decent plot line. But then he immediately reminds the reader this other princess is hideous. Not mildly hideous, but completely so. He’s never shown a single redeeming value to the character and he makes it worse here.

So the solution has to do with Ülga taming a unicorn; because all a comic needs is equestrian training.

There’s some really nice art and the flashback’s wonderful, but the comic is still on shaky ground.

CREDITS

Writer and artist, Ted Naifeh; colorists, Warren Wucinich and Naifeh; letterer, Wucinich; editors, Robin Herrera and Jill Beaton; publisher, Oni Press.