They say 'don't judge a book by it's cover.' But it was the cover that really enticed me to put this book on my wish list. The stunning sketch of actor Warner Oland in full make-up as the Chinese detective Charlie Chan really caught my eye.
I understand that the series of films starring white actor Oland as a Chinese super-sleuth is 'yellow-facing.' And to have Chan's son played by Keye Luke (Gremlins), an actual Chinese actor was a huge racist slap in the face. But there's no arguing that the quality of the movies on which this comic strip was based, were some of Hollywood film noir's best motion pictures.
I've really been falling in love with collections of classic newspaper strips. The artwork is some of the best of all time. Famous names such as Alex Raymond, Dick Giordano, Alex Toth, Russ Manning and Al Williamson got their start in the so-called funny pages. Plus, the storytelling was top-notch. Yes, there was a little redundancy in order to help readers who missed a couple of day's worth of strips get caught back up. However, I have come to see how these artists took creative measures in order to keep things from getting stale.
Alfred Andriola, the creator behind classics such as Dan Dunn and Kerry Drake, not only had to make the characters in the strip look like their real life counterparts; Andriola had the added challenge of making the mysteries to be easily solved by the readers while not glossing over important clues. Remember, some of these stories transpired over 2-3 months of time. So it was easy to forget that Character X was revealed to be left-handed in one of the earlier strips.
Andriola wasn't always successful with the plotting. On more than one occasion, Andriola would mention a clue that was never revealed prior. I think the artist was hoping people would think that they forgot such mistakes over time. But as I read this book over the period of about 10 days, I didn't forget!
One thing that never translated well in either the strips or this collection were colors. Originally printed in black and white, you wouldn't know if a character had green eyes unless someone mentioned it. Well, the color of a character's eyes has a lot to do with the big reveal of the killer. Yet, Andriola or his avatar of Charlie Chan never once mentions the person's eye color! Not at all! That's a mistake I cannot forgive!
Around 3 years worth of stories were created for the funnies. This volume by the Library of American Comics covers roughly the first 365 days of strips. I really enjoyed this read, warts and all and I hated that it ended so soon! Hopefully, the publisher will be producing a volume 2 very soon! If so, you can be sure that I will be asking for it as a gift!
Worth Consuming!
Rating: 9 out of 10 stars.
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