American Vampire # 5
Written by Scott Snyder & Stephen King
Art by Rafael Albuquerque
Published by Vertigo Comics
When I was young, I dated this guy who I found intriguing, challenging, different and possibly dangerous. The night I met him he was wearing some sort of leather jacket, had long-ish hair and was in possession of a purple Camaro, which he drove me around in. Somewhere within the first few hours of knowing him I was told that he had once read through the entire encyclopedia (beginning with A, ending with Z), had directed a production of The Wizard of Oz all by himself (while in high school) and was studying communications and advertising but would eventually direct and produce music videos.
That's a lot, right? I mean, there's all sorts of stuff there. The possibilities of that stuff, the potential of this guy to either become some amazingly successful artsy dude or, at the very least, to just be an amazingly bad-ass boyfriend, were totally real to me at the time.
He turned out to be a complete shithead.
He treated me like shit, always acting like he had something important going on, something that was leading to his very important future, and was he crazily arrogant about these purely imagined successes he claimed he would one day have, these promises that remained forever beyond the horizon. But more importantly, when it came to dating - we didn't do anything. We just hung out. For all his creativity and seeming bad-assness, he was a totally boring guy to be in a relationship with. All promise, no production.
American Vampire reminded me of him. The first issue really rang my bell. The time period it was set in, the vampire thing. It felt new and different, and full of possibility.
But in the following issues leading up to this one, it all seems one note. It looked great from the beginning, just like that old boyfriend of mine, but it never really lived into what I was led to believe it could be. It couldn't, because we're five issues in, and it hasn't turned into anything.
Perhaps in this case, it all just hit the high note too fast. (This is where the parallel with my ex-boyfriend ends.) Pearl turned into a vampire and began seeking her revenge in the 2nd issue, and since then, it's been the same thing, over and over again. It didn't really click with me until this issue, when that story was officially "finished", how little had happened. I feel like the story climaxed in issue 2 (rather than in the Third Act) and it's been a constant anti-climax ever since. This issue had some "finale" violence tying up some loose ends for Pearl and sort of "wrapping it up" so she that can go away with her boyfriend, and another American Vampire tale can begin. There's certain elements of the story which are shocking and surprising - like Pearl's best friend being a vampire and Pearl killing her - well, as thrilling as it sounds it was just sort of like, "really? Ok." I don't know her. Why should I care? For that matter, why should I even care about Pearl? She hasn't been anything other than a screaming revenge machine since the second issue, her boyfriend's personality isn't on display. I spent the first few issues expecting that stuff to be explained, trusting that the excitement of that first stories ideas would be fleshed out, and now I'm reading some kind of conclusion...but where's all the stuff in the middle? The stuff that makes these characters more than pretty drawings, the stuff that makes their deaths and sacrifices matter? A moment like the one in issue five, (where a girl has to kill her best friend, right after a massive betrayal) that's a moment that should be a really big deal, but it felt squeezed and compressed in a lazy way, a way that made it feel like the person who came up with the initial ideas didn't have anything else to surround them with. They thought up the vampires, they came up with a setting, they named the characters. That's it, and while it's all very pretty, it's not a story. It's a bunch of drawings that have names and action next to it, like some kind of weird encyclopedia entry.
The second story line....I....I don't know what to say. Do I have to say something, just because it's Stephen King? It was just completely uninteresting. The character development didn't work. The only character I could follow was Skinner. I didn't care to know about anyone else. The weirdest part in it this issue is the single tear. The audience (in the story) that has been heckling the author (who has been telling the story the whole time) suddenly becomes sentimental. It's just an abrupt choice. The story isn't that moving because, well, it's a five issue comic book series and we didn't have that much time to really connect with this one character and feel moved by his death. Sorry. I just didn't care. So many people have died in this story inside a story. Why should I care about this one, specific guy?
I'm just over it. Just like I finally got over that boyfriend. Sometimes you just gotta make a clean break. I guess I should be happy that American Vampire can't try and track me down on Facebook.
-Nina Stone, 2010
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