Empire State [2011] (Random Comics Theatre)

Random Comics Theatre

Empire State [2011]

Subtitled "A Love Story (or not)", this is an original 144-page hardcover comic by Jason Shiga, who had previously done BOOKHUNTER and MEANWHILE, but is probably best known now for his subsequent 4-volume epic DEMON.

This is probably his most sedate and "normal" work, pretty much his take on a romantic comedy / coming of age movie narrative of a type more common in movies than in comics (at the time at least, such stories have only become more common in comics in the last decade). 

Overall I'd say this is okay. It really lacks the more audacious and experimental aspects that I like about Shiga's work (though a few bits pop up), but if you take out the expectation of that it's a nice little story with a lot of funny bits and even manages to be touching at times.

The lead of the story is Jimmy, a young man working at an Oakland library, realizing his lack of ambition and inability to grow up, but unable to do anything about it because of said lack of ambition. He's knocked out of his stupor when his friend Sara moves to New York, and he eventually decides to follow her there by bus to make the kind of grand romantic gesture he's learned from movies. Life, as it often is in comics, is not like movies, he finds.

The story is told in two main tracks, flashbacks to a time prior to Sara's departure in red and Jimmy's trip in blue. There are also some scenes that mix colours, which I wasn't sure about the first time I read it, but I'm pretty sure are the future, or maybe a possible future (one features a theatre playing HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL 4, which probably appeared imminent when the book came out, but which still doesn't exist, along with two older movies).

So an interesting book. I go to it far less than Shiga's other work (his upcoming ADVENTUREGAME COMICS - LEVIATHAN looks to be great), but it might be a better entryway to his world than the other books.