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hmpfand I have to make up for the shocking absence of Hmpf on said lists in the last few weeks. Also, I really need to make some new converts. *eg*
While I have told you all in great detail how hot Jaeger Ayers is, and while I have posted drenloads of links to reviews and excerpts and other Finder related stuff, I have, so far, failed to really elaborate on the series as such. Since I have recently received most of the missing paperbacks and single issues – the two latest issues and the Mystery Date spin-off issues I don't have yet – I am now better equipped to talk about the series as a whole.
But first, some personal background.
Some three or so years ago I discovered Neil Gaiman's The Sandman. That was my first contact with the American variety of 'comics for grown-ups' (aka 'graphic novels', but I really don't like that expression, though 'comics' isn't much better, either, as it seems to imply a comedic element. Maybe I should use the French name for the genre, 'bande dessinée'... *g*). Thus far, my experience of comics had been limited to some Tintin, most of the run of Asterix, some Lucky Luke, and some Disney stuff. Oh, and some Little Nemo. While Asterix and Tintin are really quite good, they are a far cry from what some contemporary comics (both of the American and of the European variety, I think) are doing. I think my first – sort of – contact with more 'serious' comics was in France, in the early nineties, where I noticed the BD ('bande dessinée') sections of bookshops. I was intrigued, but lacked, at age 15 or 16, the confidence to actually go and explore. Like my lifelong fascination with science fiction that I only learned to accept in my early twenties, being interested in comics had a slightly disreputable air to me.
So, I resisted for a long time. (I broke down once, and bought an issue of 'Bone', because I had read intriguing things about it, but then did the maths and decided that actually buying it regularly would bankrupt me pretty quickly.)
I don't actually remember how I discovered the Sandman, but it was probably online. I only know that I got so intrigued that I overcame my fear of our local comic shops to buy one of the trade paperbacks there. And I liked it so much that I continued until I had the whole series. Took me a long while, as I couldn't afford to buy more than maybe one every two months or so, but after a year and a half I had the whole run, and a much clearer idea of contemporary comics.
Still, I was undecided as to which comic to try next, and then I got distracted by all kinds of things and forgot about my desire to explore comics for a while. I did read some Spiderman borrowed from a friend because I wanted to get an impression of superhero comics, as well, and she happened to have lots of Spiderman, but that was about it.
Until February 2004. We watched a movie based on a comic at the Scifi Soc. meeting and I got curious about the comic it was based on ('Mystery Men' by Bob Burden) and so did some online 'research'. One of the sites I visited also had a Finder review, and that review made it sound as if Finder was right up my alley. So, I looked for some more reviews... and, as they say, the rest is history.
So. Finder. How to describe Finder...? Let's start with the setting. The series is set in a far future that nevertheless looks remarkably like the present in many respects, which makes it almost more confusing than if it were entirely alien. As it were, you can easily forget that it's set in a strange place/time for long stretches, and then suddenly be shocked out of familiarity by things like, oh, a centaur crossing the road. Or a Laeske, which is a huge, intelligent, feathered lizard, running with the traffic. This strange mix of contemporary things and looks with a wholly alien social order, and often very alien biology, makes for a very fascinating world. It's certainly different from your standard sf setting.
The world of Finder is defined by harsh contrasts. Much of it seems to be wilderness, largely empty of humans except for roaming tribes of nomads, and the occasional 'company town'. (Think updated Wild West settlers that are all but slaves of a company that owns the town.) There don't seem to be any countries as we understand them; territories are apparently ruled by great domed cities that hold sway over the surrounding wilderness. There's a military that seems to be used as a tool for colonising parts of the wilderness, ripping the land from its original inhabitants – there are some obvious Wild West parallels here, as well as parallels with the Roman Empire.
Not all of the nomadic tribes are human, by the way.
The culture of the day is at once heavily dependent on very sophisticated technology, and almost totally clueless about technologies that used to be common in earlier ages, and in fact about some of the technologies it is based on. There is 'objective' magic, and a Pastwatch Institute that employs people who can channel the past and recover – often very garbled – knowledge of earlier times, some useful, but most of it useless. Radio stations play ancient pop music recovered that way. Current languages, strangely, include English and Arabic (as well as 'Miremai', a traders' language, and Laeske.) Hospitals experiment with 'modern medievalism'. People collect ancient credit cards.
Society in the big cities is dominated by clans that strive for the greatest possible uniformity. Clans have uniform looks, attitudes, sometimes even attire. In Medawar clan, boys are early on prepared for a life in the military of the police while girls become nurses and doctors; in Llaverac clan, everybody looks and behaves female (“There's your granddad. Isn't *she* gorgeous?”) and is a bit 'artsy' and quite often also slightly crazy. Sylvan clan look like albinos and can do magic. People who are not born into a clan have it difficult; Jaeger, the main protagonist so far, who is not only clanless but also a nomad halfbreed, doubly so.
There has obviously a lot of genetic engineering been going on, and possibly not all life on Earth is actually *from* Earth. (If Finder *does* take place on Earth. Sometimes I'm not quite sure.) I've already mentioned the Laeske; there are also all kinds of human/animal 'constructs' – artificially created anthropomorphic animals that have the intelligence of humans but do not have the same rights, as well other strange hybrid beings. As for the wildlife, that is equally strange. In Jaeger's childhood memories we see him hunting giant dragonflies, and being chased by dinosaur-like creatures.
While Jaeger is a pretty important character, his story is far from the only focal point of the series. Two of the five trade paperbacks so far have been devoted entirely to the stories of other characters, although Jaeger pops up in both of them. The universe of Finder is full of fascinating characters, many of whom we hardly know anything about yet, and the footnotes imply that at least about some of them we will find out more in the future.
As for Jaeger, he is a bundle of contradictions, which is what makes him so fascinating, of course. I'd rather not say too much here because trying to figure out Jaeger is one of the main attractions of the series. Without giving away too much, though, I can say that he is both a very nice person and, in his own, and a friend's, words, an asshole. That is to say, he can be incredibly nice while he's *there*, but as Rachel, the daughter of his lover Emma observes, he doesn't *stay*. Sedentary and monogamous he is not. (That is mainly a result of his cultural background, and some personal psychological issues that we have only begun to get a glimpse at with issue 30.) Also, he doesn't seem to have any serious compunctions about killing people. Not that he's a homicidal maniac or anything of that sort (except when you lock him up... locking him up is a *really* bad idea.) He just, err... well... doesn't seem to mind collateral damage all that much, maybe.
Oh, and did I mention he's hot? I'm sure I did. *g*
Other main characters so far include Emma Grosvenor and her kids. Emma is about 20 years Jaeger's senior, near as I can figure, and the wife of his former commanding officer and sort-of-friend Brigham Grosvenor. Emma is a Llaverac and a bit crazier than your average Llaverac because she has had a very traumatic marriage. Brigham, who is from Medawar clan, is a total nutcase who terrorized his family psychologically, keeping them in constant fear and eventually locking them up in the basement of their house in a military colony for several years. Jaeger met the family before things got completely out of hand, and had an affair with Emma; in the same year, though, he suffered a serious head injury and went into a coma, and so wasn't around when Brigham went off the deep end. The story of Sin-Eater, told in the first two paperback collections of the series, picks up some six years later, after Emma has left Brigham, and Brigham has spent some time in prison. Jaeger gets caught between loyalties, and for the duration of a about 14 issues of the comic tries to keep Emma safe and Brigham away from her and the children, but of course eventually the dren hits the fan... Over the course of the first fourteen issues, Finder deals with family, abuse, insanity, cultural conflict, gender issues, and develops a host of believable, sympathetic characters.
Go buy it. Muss ich mir hier den Mund fusselig reden? ;-)
(http://www.lightspeedpress.com)
While I have told you all in great detail how hot Jaeger Ayers is, and while I have posted drenloads of links to reviews and excerpts and other Finder related stuff, I have, so far, failed to really elaborate on the series as such. Since I have recently received most of the missing paperbacks and single issues – the two latest issues and the Mystery Date spin-off issues I don't have yet – I am now better equipped to talk about the series as a whole.
But first, some personal background.
Some three or so years ago I discovered Neil Gaiman's The Sandman. That was my first contact with the American variety of 'comics for grown-ups' (aka 'graphic novels', but I really don't like that expression, though 'comics' isn't much better, either, as it seems to imply a comedic element. Maybe I should use the French name for the genre, 'bande dessinée'... *g*). Thus far, my experience of comics had been limited to some Tintin, most of the run of Asterix, some Lucky Luke, and some Disney stuff. Oh, and some Little Nemo. While Asterix and Tintin are really quite good, they are a far cry from what some contemporary comics (both of the American and of the European variety, I think) are doing. I think my first – sort of – contact with more 'serious' comics was in France, in the early nineties, where I noticed the BD ('bande dessinée') sections of bookshops. I was intrigued, but lacked, at age 15 or 16, the confidence to actually go and explore. Like my lifelong fascination with science fiction that I only learned to accept in my early twenties, being interested in comics had a slightly disreputable air to me.
So, I resisted for a long time. (I broke down once, and bought an issue of 'Bone', because I had read intriguing things about it, but then did the maths and decided that actually buying it regularly would bankrupt me pretty quickly.)
I don't actually remember how I discovered the Sandman, but it was probably online. I only know that I got so intrigued that I overcame my fear of our local comic shops to buy one of the trade paperbacks there. And I liked it so much that I continued until I had the whole series. Took me a long while, as I couldn't afford to buy more than maybe one every two months or so, but after a year and a half I had the whole run, and a much clearer idea of contemporary comics.
Still, I was undecided as to which comic to try next, and then I got distracted by all kinds of things and forgot about my desire to explore comics for a while. I did read some Spiderman borrowed from a friend because I wanted to get an impression of superhero comics, as well, and she happened to have lots of Spiderman, but that was about it.
Until February 2004. We watched a movie based on a comic at the Scifi Soc. meeting and I got curious about the comic it was based on ('Mystery Men' by Bob Burden) and so did some online 'research'. One of the sites I visited also had a Finder review, and that review made it sound as if Finder was right up my alley. So, I looked for some more reviews... and, as they say, the rest is history.
So. Finder. How to describe Finder...? Let's start with the setting. The series is set in a far future that nevertheless looks remarkably like the present in many respects, which makes it almost more confusing than if it were entirely alien. As it were, you can easily forget that it's set in a strange place/time for long stretches, and then suddenly be shocked out of familiarity by things like, oh, a centaur crossing the road. Or a Laeske, which is a huge, intelligent, feathered lizard, running with the traffic. This strange mix of contemporary things and looks with a wholly alien social order, and often very alien biology, makes for a very fascinating world. It's certainly different from your standard sf setting.
The world of Finder is defined by harsh contrasts. Much of it seems to be wilderness, largely empty of humans except for roaming tribes of nomads, and the occasional 'company town'. (Think updated Wild West settlers that are all but slaves of a company that owns the town.) There don't seem to be any countries as we understand them; territories are apparently ruled by great domed cities that hold sway over the surrounding wilderness. There's a military that seems to be used as a tool for colonising parts of the wilderness, ripping the land from its original inhabitants – there are some obvious Wild West parallels here, as well as parallels with the Roman Empire.
Not all of the nomadic tribes are human, by the way.
The culture of the day is at once heavily dependent on very sophisticated technology, and almost totally clueless about technologies that used to be common in earlier ages, and in fact about some of the technologies it is based on. There is 'objective' magic, and a Pastwatch Institute that employs people who can channel the past and recover – often very garbled – knowledge of earlier times, some useful, but most of it useless. Radio stations play ancient pop music recovered that way. Current languages, strangely, include English and Arabic (as well as 'Miremai', a traders' language, and Laeske.) Hospitals experiment with 'modern medievalism'. People collect ancient credit cards.
Society in the big cities is dominated by clans that strive for the greatest possible uniformity. Clans have uniform looks, attitudes, sometimes even attire. In Medawar clan, boys are early on prepared for a life in the military of the police while girls become nurses and doctors; in Llaverac clan, everybody looks and behaves female (“There's your granddad. Isn't *she* gorgeous?”) and is a bit 'artsy' and quite often also slightly crazy. Sylvan clan look like albinos and can do magic. People who are not born into a clan have it difficult; Jaeger, the main protagonist so far, who is not only clanless but also a nomad halfbreed, doubly so.
There has obviously a lot of genetic engineering been going on, and possibly not all life on Earth is actually *from* Earth. (If Finder *does* take place on Earth. Sometimes I'm not quite sure.) I've already mentioned the Laeske; there are also all kinds of human/animal 'constructs' – artificially created anthropomorphic animals that have the intelligence of humans but do not have the same rights, as well other strange hybrid beings. As for the wildlife, that is equally strange. In Jaeger's childhood memories we see him hunting giant dragonflies, and being chased by dinosaur-like creatures.
While Jaeger is a pretty important character, his story is far from the only focal point of the series. Two of the five trade paperbacks so far have been devoted entirely to the stories of other characters, although Jaeger pops up in both of them. The universe of Finder is full of fascinating characters, many of whom we hardly know anything about yet, and the footnotes imply that at least about some of them we will find out more in the future.
As for Jaeger, he is a bundle of contradictions, which is what makes him so fascinating, of course. I'd rather not say too much here because trying to figure out Jaeger is one of the main attractions of the series. Without giving away too much, though, I can say that he is both a very nice person and, in his own, and a friend's, words, an asshole. That is to say, he can be incredibly nice while he's *there*, but as Rachel, the daughter of his lover Emma observes, he doesn't *stay*. Sedentary and monogamous he is not. (That is mainly a result of his cultural background, and some personal psychological issues that we have only begun to get a glimpse at with issue 30.) Also, he doesn't seem to have any serious compunctions about killing people. Not that he's a homicidal maniac or anything of that sort (except when you lock him up... locking him up is a *really* bad idea.) He just, err... well... doesn't seem to mind collateral damage all that much, maybe.
Oh, and did I mention he's hot? I'm sure I did. *g*
Other main characters so far include Emma Grosvenor and her kids. Emma is about 20 years Jaeger's senior, near as I can figure, and the wife of his former commanding officer and sort-of-friend Brigham Grosvenor. Emma is a Llaverac and a bit crazier than your average Llaverac because she has had a very traumatic marriage. Brigham, who is from Medawar clan, is a total nutcase who terrorized his family psychologically, keeping them in constant fear and eventually locking them up in the basement of their house in a military colony for several years. Jaeger met the family before things got completely out of hand, and had an affair with Emma; in the same year, though, he suffered a serious head injury and went into a coma, and so wasn't around when Brigham went off the deep end. The story of Sin-Eater, told in the first two paperback collections of the series, picks up some six years later, after Emma has left Brigham, and Brigham has spent some time in prison. Jaeger gets caught between loyalties, and for the duration of a about 14 issues of the comic tries to keep Emma safe and Brigham away from her and the children, but of course eventually the dren hits the fan... Over the course of the first fourteen issues, Finder deals with family, abuse, insanity, cultural conflict, gender issues, and develops a host of believable, sympathetic characters.
Go buy it. Muss ich mir hier den Mund fusselig reden? ;-)
(http://www.lightspeedpress.com)
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no subject
Date: 2004-03-30 02:02 pm (UTC)I "discovered" comics - and graphic novels (I like that term, and yet for some reason, it always makes me think of porn!) - through Sandman. I idly picked Preludes and Nocturnes off the shelf in a display at the local library when I was sixteen (seven years ago. EEK!), and I haven't looked back since. I didn't get to complete the series until I was nineteen, and very lucky (my library in North Wales had got them in). I managed to pick up some of the originals recently, dirt cheap, and I'm very pleased to have them.
/me thinks she should save this for her own LJ post...
Sorry for going on a bit there! But it's got me into looooooooooads of other stuff. I'll give Finder a try for sure!
:)
no subject
Date: 2004-03-30 02:04 pm (UTC)It certainly seems to be the case with a lot of people I know...