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levitybooks's review
5.0
Read on author's website in full, for free, for a few minutes.
This is really interesting.
I am being a lenient with my 5* (more like 4*) as this won't appeal to all, and the climax could have been better executed—but it gets so many things right, does it with a clear sense of style and therefore deserves so much more attention.
The mood, the pacing, the environments, the drawing, the minimalism is all excellent. It feels like classic horror anime. I almost wish the night just kept going like the insomnia that spurred it.
*spoilers below*
*Analysis*
So all I get here is that the entire night did not in fact happen but is a (hypnagogic) delusion prior to the 'final act'.
Everyone but her has facial defects, but I think the first man stands apart from the latter three.
For the latter three I thought 'see no evil, smell no evil, speak no evil': the cinemagoer cannot see the film, the popcorn seller cannot smell the popcorn she smells, the barber cannot speak to the customer. All of them do things they are held back by, things that she her does her self (sees, cries, talks, smells food) although there is less of an emphasis on smell. So I think maybe her unhappiness stems from feeling oppressed by something in a way that makes her feel disabled. Perhaps it is her hair as she sees it in the film and later on, but there are no leads to any further than that.
As for the execution of the main scene, I think it comes about too sudden with too little dread. I don't like how the environment of the barbershop is lost as the hairball appears, as it subtracts all dread and realism from it. An opportunity was wasted. Were I to continue from the haircut, these are rough examples for what I think would have made a better effect:
1. The cut hair on the floor starts moving and forming a bundle and forming the hairball. Optionally the hairball could strangle or dispose of the barber, to keep the isolated fight context relevant.
2. The barber suddenly grows hair out of his skin and becomes the hairball.
3. The hairball arrives and stares from outside, and eventually forces its way in by slamming or posting itself through the letterbox.
I think these examples make a better effect not only because they would be a bit more scary and realistic, but because they'd make the symbol for what I think the hair is, some repressed uglier part of her self, that seems to be unwanted but appears anyway like a bad thought—something that her other self is trying to run away from or ignore. Having it pop up out of nowhere and out of scene as is done here seems to spoil the flow, mood and potential symbolism the work had done an excellent job of building up to before it.
This is really interesting.
I am being a lenient with my 5* (more like 4*) as this won't appeal to all, and the climax could have been better executed—but it gets so many things right, does it with a clear sense of style and therefore deserves so much more attention.
The mood, the pacing, the environments, the drawing, the minimalism is all excellent. It feels like classic horror anime. I almost wish the night just kept going like the insomnia that spurred it.
*spoilers below*
*Analysis*
So all I get here is that the entire night did not in fact happen but is a (hypnagogic) delusion prior to the 'final act'.
Everyone but her has facial defects, but I think the first man stands apart from the latter three.
For the latter three I thought 'see no evil, smell no evil, speak no evil': the cinemagoer cannot see the film, the popcorn seller cannot smell the popcorn she smells, the barber cannot speak to the customer. All of them do things they are held back by, things that she her does her self (sees, cries, talks, smells food) although there is less of an emphasis on smell. So I think maybe her unhappiness stems from feeling oppressed by something in a way that makes her feel disabled. Perhaps it is her hair as she sees it in the film and later on, but there are no leads to any further than that.
As for the execution of the main scene, I think it comes about too sudden with too little dread. I don't like how the environment of the barbershop is lost as the hairball appears, as it subtracts all dread and realism from it. An opportunity was wasted. Were I to continue from the haircut, these are rough examples for what I think would have made a better effect:
1. The cut hair on the floor starts moving and forming a bundle and forming the hairball. Optionally the hairball could strangle or dispose of the barber, to keep the isolated fight context relevant.
2. The barber suddenly grows hair out of his skin and becomes the hairball.
3. The hairball arrives and stares from outside, and eventually forces its way in by slamming or posting itself through the letterbox.
I think these examples make a better effect not only because they would be a bit more scary and realistic, but because they'd make the symbol for what I think the hair is, some repressed uglier part of her self, that seems to be unwanted but appears anyway like a bad thought—something that her other self is trying to run away from or ignore. Having it pop up out of nowhere and out of scene as is done here seems to spoil the flow, mood and potential symbolism the work had done an excellent job of building up to before it.
bookscomics's review
Wow! I really fell in love with this. Free to read at her website.
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