(courtesy Simon & Schuster)
It’s wonderful when a creator can make a cliffhanger moment pay off.
If you recall, the first Peculiar Woods story, The Ancient Underwater City, ended definitively, yes, but a tantalising cliffhanger moment woven in, and in its sequel, The Mystery of the Intelligents, Andrés J. Colmenares takes that “what if?” moment and turns it into quite special.
Iggie, the hero of the story, who is still in the titular town and living with his real mother again after being raised by his aunt and uncle (who he thought were his real parents; the why for this unusual arrangement is explained in book one and its ongoing ramifications explored in this volume) embarks on a new adventure, with his new inanimate/animated friends along for quite the revelatory ride.
In this most incredible of towns, which has a border to it which enforces a limit to where its magical realism can have an effect, Iggie has to race to find his irascible chair friend, Boris, who has been kidnapped by an unusual figure who seems to be feared by all of the sentient objects around Iggie, including his sentient and ever-more-braver security blanket and two chess pieces who are as ridiculously mouthy as ever.
He has aided by a similarly open mind, and new friend, Angie, but as they race all over town trying to locate Boris, the mystery of why he was taken and by whom deepens, and the two new friends discover that there is far more going on in the town than even their imaginatively fecund minds can conceive.
As riotously and yet sweetly funny as ever, Peculiar Woods: The Mystery of the Intelligents, dances beautifully between its twin roles as a gloriously sweet and funny Adventure Time meets Gravity Falls adventure where Colmenares imbues the vivaciously fantastical with the most emotionally intimate, and as an exploration of what it’s like to wonder what it is not to quite belong in the way you thought you did.
Iggie has a lot on his plate, and while his real mum, and his aunt and uncle, set to with Christmas lights and almost over-the-top familial bonhomie, to make the most wonderful time of the year feel truly magical and warm & cosy, our plucky protagonist is trying to balance working out who he is with a world of magic right under this nose.
(courtesy Simon & Schuster)
This is Peculiar Woods: The Mystery of the Intelligents really excels.
Replete with delightfully vibrant artwork which manages to be both enticingly cute and world-buildingly rich, Peculiar Woods: The Mystery of the Intelligents echoes all the great adventures of yore where the journey itself, enthralling and substantially rewarding as it is, is emblematic of some fairly intense excursions into the depths of the soul.
Think that sounds like a lot to cram into a graphic novel aimed at kids?
Then think back to any number of books aimed squarely at children which, on the surface, are light, bright adventures into all kind of super imaginative storytelling, and which, if you’re not inclined to delve too deep, can be left as escape stories and nothing more.
But for those brave of heart and self aware enough to dig deeper, and yes kids are eminently capable of this (especially those, who like this reviewer have undergone trauma, in my case incessant bullying, and have to grow up FAST), these books, and Peculiar Woods: The Mystery of the Intelligents fits right inside this tradition, are allegories for what it is like to have to grapple with emotional situations that would challenge many adults.
Colmenares balances the escapism and the meaningfulness flawlessly, using pithy, often funny, dialogue and evocatively fun artwork to realise a story which works on two very satisfying levels.
He also introduces some real nuance and subtlety to proceedings, which means that baddies may not be so bad after all (think Wicked and the revisionist Wicked Witch of the West as an example), and things that seem obvious could have many more layers to them.
Fun though the adventures on which Iggie embarks are, they are also quite meaningful too, and it’s this affecting mix of the escapist and the emotionally impactful that elevate Peculiar Woods: The Mystery of the Intelligents to something really quite joyously special, an adventure that carries so much import and emotional impact and which reminds us, once again, that connections to others and belonging somewhere and to some people, is vitally important, making life all the richer, and its adventures, whatever they may be, feel like they will redefine everything we know for the better.
(courtesy Simon & Schuster)