Thursday, January 31, 2019

RAd’s Page Turners | Daytripper



Whenever someone asks me what comicbook I would recommend to someone who has read little or no comics at all, I almost always recommend Daytripper by the Brazilian wonder twins Fábio Moon and Gabriel Bá. Published by Vertigo, a mature titles imprint of DC, Daytripper is available in one nifty volume that remains perennially in print, collecting all ten issues of the limited series. So one gets a complete story at once without needing any commitment to get succeeding volumes. And if it turns out to be not their cup of tea, well I have yet to encounter someone who was disappointed with this recommendation.

At the heart of Daytripper is Brás de Oliva Domingos, a newspaper obituary writer living under the shadow of his father who is a leading literary figure in Brazil. Each chapter highlights a brief moment in Brás life and then always ends with his death punctuated by an obituary that could’ve been written by Brás himself.

Brás unexpected death at the end of the first issue along with the second installment jumping back to years earlier with another snapshot of his life and then the issue ending at his death once again baffled monthly readers back then. But by the third issue, readers knew what to expect and continued to savor the glimpses of Brás life and that of his lovers, family and friends knowing that his death looms at the last page.

During one of the latter chapters, Brás was never seen and yet his presence was still greatly felt. Those with the coldest of hearts will be the only ones left unmoved by this portion of the book.

I can’t stress how essential this graphic novel is. The lush art of Fábio Moon and Gabriel Bá transports the reader to numerous exotic locales while delivering a very human story that shoots straight to the core. It is also remarkable how the two managed to maximize the serialized nature of the work and yet retaining an elegant pace when read as a collected whole.

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