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While in the Half Price Bookstore (my crack house) I picked up a load of trades with some spare gift certificates.
Within this boundless stack of books I took out American Virgin and had a look.
American Virgin centers around a 20 something guy named Adam Chamberlain. Adam is basically a straight laced Christian dude that has made himself the poster boy for the national virginity movement, even going so far as to write a book on his “purity” and why others should save themselves. The story essentially centers around Adam’s life for the first 1/4th of the book, along with his mother’s aspirations for him, the subtext of it being, her wanting to be the power behind the boy as it were. Other then his mother the rest of Adam’s family are his complete opposites in terms of morality. The whole thing moves kinda slow till the dark bit finally kicks in, when video of his girlfriend being beheaded via terrorists is posted on the internet. From here Adam’s descent begins. He travels to Africa to retrieve his lover’s corpse head and all, accompanied by his more normal step-sister Cyndi. There is more but, I’d rather not spoil the story.
This first volume of American Virgin is good, plain and simple. The first bit of the story is slow but, is the necessary wind up before the shit hits the fan as it were. The character development is so/so at times though the development of his step-sister and Adam himself is something interesting to watch play out. Adam, in the beginning, you kinda get annoyed with, heck I am a Christian and even I was like…man…this guy’s view on things….dude is trying wayyy too hard. As the story progresses though Adam becomes less of a douchebag and more of a normal human being. His beliefs on Christianity itself are pulled into question traveling in the lands of Africa and he becomes somebody the reader relates to. His step-sister Cyndi provides a nice counter-point to things and in essence serves to act as the voice of the reader…least that’s how it seemed to me. The best comparison I can give to this first volume of American Virgin is, it reminded me of the first time I read Y: The Last Man. Now don’t get me wrong I am not saying Steven T. Seagle is as good as Brian K. Vaughan but, that same sorta feeling I got from Y: The Last Man I get from American Virgin, least so far.
Cloonan & Rugg’s penciling style both seem to be reminscent of Pia Guerra’s style in Y with a touch of Mignola’s BPRD artstyle mixed in for good measure. I don’t LOVE the artstyle but, I don’t hate it either. I think, (like with Guerra’s style), the penciling for this series will just be one of those things I get use to over time and will maybe eventually dig..who knows. I do love the fact that the cover for this first trade was the one by Frank Quitely used for the first issue in the series. I remember seeing this cover when the first issue came out and doing a double take/WHAT THE F*&$!. The intricate detail put into the textures of the mouth as it swallows Adam are amazing and make the viewer feel uncomfortable yet almost unable to look away.
Bottom Line: This book is good. Not great but good. Fans of indie titles will most likely dig this book and I am about 75 percent sure that if you dug Y : The Last Man you’ll enjoy this title too.
