Five Brilliant Graphic Novels that Just Happen to Star Talking Animals
Mouse Guard
Written and Illustrated by David Petersen
This book, while being far less gritty and violent as a few others on this list, is just as engrossing a read. Think Game Of Thrones without all the incest and violence, but keeping much of the action and intrigue. Watership Down meets Game of Thrones. Bam. There it is. Took me a minute, but I found it. For those who don’t know, Watership Down is a book about rabbits and their politics that was made into a traumatizing animated movie for no solid reason, but I digress.
Petersen should teach a class on how to make mice look badass, because he has mastered it.
The story follows the Mouse Guard (duh) as they keep watch over Lockhaven, their awesome little mouse community. The Mouse Guard are exactly what they sound like: a group of Mice who are knights and fighters and such, who sort of serve and protect. Like mice cops who carry swords.
There are different towns and regions, but we focus on Lockhaven and follow Saxon, Kenzie and Lieam as they intend to find a missing merchant who never showed up at his destination to deliver goods. What seems like a simple enough story at first unfolds slowly over time, revealing traitors and false histories and imposters and all sorts of other stuff that makes fantasy stories soar. Also, there is this legendary mouse named The Black Axe, who was the king of badassery, and he may or not have come back to life, and he may or may not be good a guy, err, mouse. He may or may not be a good mouse. You know what I mean.
Dear Pixar: Please make us? Thank you. Sincerely, Mouse Guard.
The art style, much like the story itself, is of a lighter tone then the other books on the list, but it works amazingly well with the feeling of the tale being told. Honestly, it is shocking that Pixar or Dreamworks have not had the intelligence to snap up this story, because, in the right hands, this could be one of the most epic animated films of all time. It is also marketable to everyone, because it’s not brutal and doesn’t have any mouse on mouse sex. I kind of want to see how cool The Black Axe would look on film, too, to be honest. I’m selfish like that. I bet he would look like a mashup of Stuart Little and the gimp from Pulp Fiction. Oh man, that would be cool.
Boris The Bear
Written by Mike Richardson
Art by James Dean Smith
So this one is a slight stretch because this one was a comic book and has not been collected into a graphic novel yet, and we will admit all that, but it HAS to be here. Boris might be the BEST talking animal of all, and no one seems to know he exists. While Boris may not be collected into a graphic novel that we know of (yet), maybe with our help, this will change. So who is Boris and why is he here?
Yes, when you kill a creature made out of pulp comics, the sound it makes is PULP.
Boris the Bear is a Dark Horse Comics creation, and was created as a direct off shoot to all the “talking mutant ninja critter” comics that spawned after Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle hit it big (Quick fact for those who don’t know, Turtles ALMOST made the list because their initial comic outings were so dark and nihilistic, but pop culture grabbed that and shit all over it, making it bubblegum and cute, so I couldn’t put it here in good faith).
And zero f***s were given by Boris that day.
Boris was a purely satirical look at popular culture and comic books themselves, starring a sociopathic bear that killed everything. Really, it is that simple. To give you an idea why it is on the list, we’ll simply go with the title of the first issue. Boris the Bear slaughters the teenage radioactive black-belt mutant ninja critters. That is the title of the first issue, word for word. And that is exactly what he does. In progressively more violent fashion as he goes.
He was like Weird Al, if Weird Al killed the people he impersonated.
Seeing Boris pluck the eyes out of your favorite childhood characters is pretty amazing, seriously. It sounds like it could be traumatizing, but the end result has the opposite effect. The book doesn’t take itself seriously, and this was more and more apparent as the series went on. What started with Boris killing ninja critters turned into Boris killing The X-Men, Transformers, G.I-Joe, Elfquest, Batman and on and on. Nothing was sacred, and it was all visceral and hilarious. They drew it in black and white so they could get away with more extreme violence. Quentin Tarantino would later follow this model for a crucial scene in Kill Bill that would have garnered him an NC-17 had he filmed it in color.
Boris may be the most underappreciated talking animal on the list. He pretty much killed everyone and everything that anyone ever loved as a child, and for that reason alone, we love him.
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So what did you kids learn today? That talking animals don’t necessarily mean the material is something made for children. From Orwell’s Animal Farm to Crumb’s Fritz The Cat, anthropomorphic animals can be a strictly adult fare and can also be used to convey a very powerful story with more layers than one would expect upon first glance. Oh, and that cats are Nazis. We learned that cats are Nazis.
Good, class dismissed.
I’ve read some of Mouse Guard and it’s pretty good. Besides, who doesn’t like talking animals?
We have grown up with it not only through Disney but with shows like My Little Pony and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. MLP wasn’t so bad, but have you ever read the TMNT comics?
Anyway, making talking animal comics ect. for adults doesn’t seem so far fetched. It’s just the next step. If there’s more adult themed material beyond language and gore… well, haters gonna hate. I would go so far as to say that they can’t claim they never thought Gadget from Rescue Rangers was hot without lying their asses off.
No Blacksad?! Blacksad is awesome!
I’ve read Pride of Baghdad and I can say it’s a pretty good graphic novel, albeit it does get a little preachy, liberal and even a little misguided by the end. It’s still a good read.
@ Dzuksi: Who is this Blacksad you speak of? I will claim ignorance, and rather than Google it, I will ask you to inform me. Name intrigues me but I honestly know nothing of the character.
Alright, I’m bookmarking this post for the next time I get in the mood to buy a graphic novel. We3 in particular sounds great to me.
I second the fact that Blacksad needs to be on this list. Anthropomorphic animals set in a detective noir setting. An amazing read for sure. Volumes 1-3 are out so far in the US, with volume 4 out in France and Spain (I think) and no word on the US release.
Well Remy, like Mulltalica said it’s noir setting with animals as characters. It deals with some pretty heavy subject like murders, kidnapings, racial tensions – hell even nuclear problems. All that is followed with heavy emphasis on detective style of telling the story. You should really check it.
Main character, John Blacksad is really badass, just look at him:
http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs51/f/2009/289/b/1/John_Blacksad_by_thorcx.jpg
Also this is great article. I actually read 3/5 of them. Will definietly check We3 and Pride of Baghdad.
Also feel free to sugest some great indie comics (or some especially worthy moments from DC and marvel)
I always have time for good comic book/graphic novel.
Another great one is Beasts of Burden. It’s not as heavy in its topics of choice like some of the stories mentioned before, but that’s part of the charm. Basically, it’s a group of normal dog and cats who try to keep the paranormal under control in their neighborhood. Fun, easy read with some great characters. Kind of reminds me of something similar to Buffy, except if everyone from Sunnydale is a house pet.
The other one I wanted to add is Mush!: Sled Dogs. I haven’t gotten to read any more than a couple pages put up as a preview before its release, but I thoroughly enjoyed what I read. Again, it’s another comic portraying what normal animals talk and think about in everyday life (in this case, sled dogs). Great humor and just another all around good story.
There’s a couple I know that might make the bottom of the list. Sweet Tooth is a post apocalyptic comic where these half human-half animal babies are born and are the only people unaffected by the plague that is slowly killing off humanity. The other is called Elephantmen but it releases so sporadically I would need to reread to give a decent synopsis.
Little known fact: Maus creator Art Speigelman also invented Garbage Pail Kids.
Only an opinion, but I think Pride of Baghdad had good art, ambitious story, but heavily lacked on the character development, the ending lets just say that felt flat to me. Or I just didn0t get it, could be.
As others have mention Blacksad deserves some notice. Also The Mice Templar series is fantastic.
@Dzuksi, Yes, that premise does sound particularly remarkable. I won’t lie. @ Skrolnik, That fact just blew my mind. I am looking at a pack of them right now and had no idea. @ Benc, was divided between the Mice Templar and Mouse Guard, but went with MG for the shallow reasoning that I prefer the artwork, though MT has a stronger story.
No mention of the Redwall graphic novel? Those books were off the fucking chain.
Kind of surprised Cerebus by David Sims is not on here pleasantly surprised Boris the Bear is. Great choices. Already added the two I haven’t read to my wish list. Maus and Pride. Thanks again.
No Fables? Your argument is invalid.
What about Elephantmen??
Fables had too many awesome books for me to choose which one to best recommend.
Duncan the Wonder Dog is pretty amazing. It is most definitely worth checking out. It is currently out of print as the first two printings sold out, but they are doing a 3rd printing this month, according to their website.
http://www.adhousebooks.com/books/duncan.html
“Watership Down is a book about rabbits and their politics that was made into a traumatizing animated movie for no solid reason”
Uh, no, the movie was actually a pretty faithful adaptation of what actually happened in the book. Maybe you should reread it. Definitely not for children.
Blacksad should defo be on the list, and Uagi Yojimbo obvioulsy…
I am a graphic novelist and ive created numerous charaters many are talking animals but its a sci fi so as a research question how do people feel about talking animals explained though science ?
I may be a little late for the discussion, but would like to recommend the graphic novel nordguard.