Comic World News

April 22, 2008:
CWN and the Grand Finale! -

February 4, 2008:
In Conclusion - David ends his CWN run with Tezuka's MW from Vertical

February 2, 2008:
Acting Like You Have Nothing to Prove -

February 2, 2008:
The Shoegazer Returns - A New Year Begins, And Our Narrator Makes A Pledge

January 30, 2008:
Tim's Reviews -

September 13, 2007:
Wizard World Chicago Loot, Part One - Stykman, Empty Chamber, the Ztarian Saga, and yes, Little Bunny Foo Foo

February 15, 2007:
I Come Not to Bury Nick Cage... - But to mourn the death of my punchline

November 20, 2006:
The End - Rich's last Chicks & Romance

November 8, 2006:
Joann Sfar's Klezmer - And a Front Racks Hiatus

October 4, 2006:
This Month's Guest: Dave Gibbons - From the pages of Elephantmen!

September 18, 2006:
Back in Berlin - or How I spent my summer

July 29, 2006:
KICKING UP A STORM - An interview with David Lloyd

June 19, 2006:
You Ain't Never Had A Friend Like Me. - Graeme looks at Spidey's "genies"

December 18, 2005:
Disappointed - Sad news for fans of Busiek's CONAN, Stephen King, and others

December 13, 2004:
JUSTICE UNPLUGGED 2 at last !!! - By Fabrice Sapolsky & Xavier Fournier

December 2, 2004:
THE TWELFTH AND FINAL STEP - Say it ain't so, Dan.

November 23, 2004:
The importance of editing -

September 29, 2004:
Mystery and Conundrum indeed! - Where in the world is Jason Pomerantz?

September 13, 2004:
Hello and Goodbye and Hello Again - Change is in the air at CWN and it smells sweet.

August 12, 2004:
The Rise of the Web Toon - New Business Model or Dumb Luck?

July 30, 2004:
The Name Says it All... - Spin Doctors revamp Boomerang.

July 27, 2004:
Bigger Isn't Always Better -

June 8, 2004:
Pre-emptive Strike: MoCCA Arts Festival - Looking forward to the con, rather than looking back at it

The Layer Method
Our top Secret time-saving technique for creating and merging balloons and tails in Illustrator.

Friday, September 3, 2010

Owly: Flying Lessons

Review by Michael May

Written by Andy Runton
Illustrated by Andy Runton

Published by Top Shelf
$10.00

There are some series where you hope that the level of quality will maintain from issue to issue. "Man, Spider-Man is really good right now� hope it stays that way." Comics fans are a pessimistic bunch; we're always waiting for the other shoe to drop.

It was refreshing to pick up the latest volume of Owly and not doubt for an instant that it was going to be just as good as the last. I had a hard time not just handing it over to my three-year-old son, for whom the climax of Owly: Just a Little Blue is now a bedtime ritual. Without cracking the cover, I knew that he was going to love Flying Lessons. That's a tribute to the strength of Just a Little Blue.

By now, I've not only cracked the cover, I've read it through. And on a night that I'd rather be doing a dozen other things, I'm pounding out this review so that I can get Flying Lessons off of my To Do pile and into my son's eager hands by bedtime. The plot of Flying Lessons is similar to that of Just a Little Blue. Owly and his pals encounter a new animal in the woods who immediately distrusts the cute little bird of prey (or as E! Online calls him, "Bird of Play"). In Just a Little Blue, it was a bluebird protecting his family, here it's a flying squirrel, the natural prey of owls.

The similarities between the stories end there though. In Just a Little Blue, Owly was concerned for the safety of the bluebird and his family and was willing to make great sacrifices to help them, ungrateful as they were at first. In Flying Lessons, he's simply curious about a new face and is heart-broken when he can't convince the flying squirrel that he just wants to be friends. It's a story about acceptance and trust, two universal principles that adults and kids alike can benefit from learning.

As with the previous volumes, Flying Lessons appeals to multiple age groups on the basis of more than just its themes. The clarity and the magic of the art are ageless, as are the symbols that Runton employs in the place of dialogue, and the feelings of curiosity, loneliness, and elation that he's able to create in his readers. And in a story about trust, it's appropriate that Runton is able to build up such a level of it in his audience that I'm already anticipating the excellence of the next volume.