Staff Pick: Joe The Barbarian

Grant Morrison is no stranger to metaphor. Nearly every book that features his name is packed to the brim with literary allusion and deep, philosophical layering. What's so surprising about Joe The Barbarian, then, is how utterly moving and heartfelt it is. While the set-up is pure metaphor--Joe, a teenage boy who is diabetic, comes home from school and falls into diabetic shock--the book grounds itself with some heavy pathos. After all, it is this lapse into diabetic shock that sets into motion the book's main conceit: Joe, aided by his pet rat, must fight his way through a metaphorical, fantastical landscape as is paralleled by the landscape of his house.


Each issue finds Joe traveling from his room in the attic (where his journey and diabetic shock begin) to the kitchen where he can find a life-saving elixir (in the form of soda). As Joe's journey progresses, the reader is introduced to a cast of wild, whimsical characters (as represented by his models and toys), but none are more touching than Joe's pet rat, Jack. It's no surprise, then, that this is also where Sean Murphy's art takes off. Parallel panels contrast Joe's hallucination with the real world and, in one particularly endearing sequence, the large Yojimbo rat, Jack, places an outstretched arm on Joe's back, comforting him, while the "real-world" panel shows Jack urgently looking at Joe (while Joe runs water over his head to rouse himself from his diabetic shock). It's subtle and touching and it adds a fair amount of pathos to a book that could've easily been lost in mere metaphor.

So far, the book is flawless; it's paced deliberately and--as Morrison's at the helm--rewards repeat readings. Little details seem all the more beautiful when revealed simultaneously in the real-world and in Joe's hallucination. As such, the book is the graphic equivalent of a Pixar film; it provides rich, mortal characters and it pushes them through near-insurmountable scenarios.

Though it's a Vertigo series, Joe The Barbarian is teen-friendly and perfect for anyone looking to get lost in a sublimely-realized fantasy world (while reading in the real world).

Issue #6 (pictured below) comes out on Wednesday, June 23rd and we'll have it here at Time Warp.


-Garry