Writer-artist Tony Fleecs has struck upon a fairly winning “formula” with his recent comics. There’s Silence of the Lambs, but with dogs. Night of the Living Dead, but with cats. And, my personal fave, WildCats, but with a small-town Clerks. From this approach, Fleecs and his various collaborators have been able to remix and repurpose classic story tropes/arcs with new ideas, energies, and end goals to tell some generally effective genre stories.
Now, Fleecs has joined forces with artist Dave Wachter and letterer Pat Brosseau for perhaps his most intriguing and promising “this, but” book to date, Uncanny Valley.
There’s a few ways to really describe Uncanny Valley. I like Who Framed Roger Rabbit, but with a latchkey kid. Fleecs himself has described it as Planetary or Firebreather “but what if it was cartoons.” Either way, it’s a really interesting spin, as we follow a young boy, Oliver, as his already tenuous world is thrown upside down when cartoons suddenly enter our reality.
It’s really the execution of this story that really makes all the difference. Because, as I’ve touched on already, the concept is familiar enough — lots of stories have been interested in the relationship between fiction and reality as well as notions of escapism, feeling like an outsider, and the need for a more magical world. (The aforementioned Roger Rabbit but also Neverending Story, Cool World, Space Jam, etc.) And already in its first issue, Uncanny Valley is very much interested in those same ideas, but Fleecs tries to make it different enough through a few means.
For one, we spend a lot of issue #1 getting to know Oliver — he’s a sweet, good-natured kid who is clearly struggling with a lack of identity and a larger family structure, and he acts out in a way that desperately seeks that connection. (His mother is treated sympathetically enough — her struggle to stay afloat, and manage some larger issues that are hinted at leading into the “climax” of #1, makes her a well-rounded player in this book while still extending Oliver’s own “arc.”) And through that focus on Oliver, we’re grounded in a way that makes this a compelling, sometimes painfully resonant story — a boy seeking his place in a way that feels wholly familiar to anyone, say, with divorced parents.
BOOM! Studios
But I also think it’s the speed and efficiency of the narrative’s “launch” that really matters. Fleecs gives us plenty of backstory and connective potential, but he also moves us right along with the utmost efficiency. We hit all the big beats and still get ample time for the cartoon “stuff,” and from that process, the sharp injection of magic feels more shocking and engaging. And speaking of shocking, Fleecs’ script makes little decisions to complicate what could be a pretty straightforward story (that’s about a boy’s connection to a cartoon world). It’s the stuff with his mom I mentioned earlier and even some talking crows — it’s just textured enough that until the end of issue #1, we’re left guessing what’s really going on with all of this intense fantasy stuff.
Still, I think that as you move through issue #1 into the finale, you may preemptively guess Oliver’s role in all of this. But the obviousness (or the lack thereof) doesn’t really matter — the story itself is built in a way that no matter when you realize the true and real scope of this tale, it feels all the more alluring. Your guess may be confirmed early enough, but that doesn’t change how satisfying this story is in telling a deeply human story. And while a lot of that is Fleecs’ work with nailing his approach to crafting stories, it’s also very much in the efforts of Wachter.
BOOM! Studios
Having apparently pushed himself creatively with this book, Wachter’s visuals here feel especially powerful. Just as the story begins in the “real world,” Wachter creates a really compelling version of reality. There’s some great textures and feelings here — like a more grounded Norman Rockwell painting — and yet it balances enough of a cartoony vibe to perhaps hint at what’s coming down the pipeline. And when we do get to the cartoon stuff, Wachter manages that infusion in a really effective way. For one, he expertly references some beloved characters and concepts, but in a way that pays homage to feelings and energies as opposed to anything too directly. The cartoon stuff feels both wholly disconnected from and still aligned with the real world — there’s a vividness that’s meant to grab you by the eyeballs but done in a way that you begin to see and feel the way these worlds are coming together.
Even when the cartoon stuff feels over-the-top — as with the introduction of a new family member for Oliver — it’s done as to still maintain some sense of worldly grit and heft, and that is important in our immersion here and pulling the rug out from under our feet in a way that remains effective and never too overwhelming. And, sure, I do think the real world bits are more appealing (I could spend all day experiencing the way it reflects ideas of nostalgia and this sense of Americana gone wrong). But the cartoon stuff plays its part — it’s about employing it with firmness and intention to maximize its place in our world and bring us slowly and deliberately into a world where we can’t tell up from down, real from fiction. In that process, the book’s premise comes alive in some massively important ways.
BOOM! Studios
I think there’s going to be some readers who might find Uncanny Valley too familiar and even a touch formulaic. But to those people I say, “Yeah, and?” Because in reading the various Fleecs-penned books, what I always take away from it isn’t the gimmicky nature or callbacks to beloved books/films/comics/etc. — it’s the sheer humanity of it all. The way that we reuse and rework pop culture to explore some big ideas about ourselves and give our emotions the chance to live out in the world.
And in the case of Uncanny Valley, the humanity here is deep and rich, a story about finding both your people and place in the world in even the most unexpected of places. A tale of a young man who wants to find a family no matter how it may ultimately look. Who cares about the formula when the answer is “storytelling gold.”
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