Review: Blacksad

Blacksad by Juan Díaz Canales
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I was going to try to open this review with a cat pun of some sorts, but I couldn't come up with anything. I just didn't leave this book with enough emotional investment to try as hard as I possibly could. This book is serviceable, even likable in some parts, but doesn't really convince me that it's worth more than a single pass. Bottom line, it's okay.

I wasn't completely sold on the idea on a noir cat story walking into this, and that's on me, but the book doesn't do a super great job selling it once you're in. The writing is just a little too standard for my tastes. It isn't bad but doesn't do well enough to fully engage me. There are sparks, but no ignition. For example, the opening to issue three is clever as all hell, but it isn't that good throughout the entire book. Plus, the narration can be nonsensical at times, which might be on par for the noir genre but is still annoying.

Probably my biggest problem with the writing was the lack of world building. It just borrows too many ideas from real-world events to create its world and characters. It mostly takes generic concepts about racism and dames to blend together with anthropomorphic characters. The thing is, if so much of this book is taken from the real world, why even bother with animal-like characters? With a little more creative world building and slightly tighter writing, I probably would have enjoyed this book a lot more.

Art-wise, I will say is fan-fucking-tasic. It's perfect for what intended purpose of the comic and is just great art in general. Some of the direction and paneling is uncreative, but that criticism is coming from a guy whose favorite method is nine perfectly same rectangles. If I graded this book purely on the art, I would have given it five stars.

If I was to sum up this book in one phrase, it would be: It's almost good. Which sucks. Because, despite popular belief, I want all books to be good. Instead, what I got was only okay. It's coke zero when I wanted a coke. I can see people loving this book, and that's okay. Blacksad isn't trash, but I wouldn't read it again on purpose.

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