SNAPSHOT
THERE IS A GIRL. She has no memory and no name. Nothing but a GUARDIAN. An armored giant who protects her from predators and pitfalls.TOGETHER THEY WALK across an extraordinary fantasy world. If they leave the path the air itself comes alive, forcing them onwards. Why? The girl doesn’t know, but there’s worse than beasts and bandits ahead. CIVILIZATION, with its temptations and treacheries, will test their bond beyond its limits. STEP BY BLOODY STEP is a fantasy opus from the Eisner Award nominees behind CODA (sélection officielle Angoulême 2021): MATIAS BERGARA (Hellblazer, THE SCUMBAG) & SI SPURRIER (X-Men Legacy, Hellblazer, The Spire). Breaking new ground for the possibilities of sequential art, this completely wordless visual feast will delight fans of Princess Mononoke, ISOLA, and the visionary works of Moebius. (courtesy Image Comics)
Usually when I am putting virtual pen to paper to write a review of a graphic novel, my first descriptive port of call is the writing.
Not because I don’t appreciate beautiful artwork – I very much do, and that will become patently clear, soon – but because, as a writer, my first and always great love will be the use of the written word and the engagingly compelling stories they can conjure if summoned with real mastery and skill.
In the case of Step by Bloody Step by graphic novel legends Si Spurrier (story) and Matias Bergara (artwork) and absolutely arresting colour by Matheus Lopes, however, it’s not the writing that is the thing.
Oh, there’s a magnificent narrative, one full of storytelling punctuation points and an epic sense of fantasy and adventure and otherworldly fights for meaning and understanding, but Step by Bloody Step is words-free, save for some evocative scene-setting before each season of the year, and the star of the show is the artwork which bursts quietly off the page with ferocity, emotionality and a rich humanistic thoughtfulness.
The story centres around a young girl who is never named and who emerges, as if emerging from a chrysalis, into a world that if, for her barely awaken mind and heart, full of wonder and beauty.
There’s no doubt that the wonder and beauty is there, but that is only part of the story; there is darkness and and danger too, and you are barely into the gorgeously arresting artwork of Step by Bloody Step when that dramatic dichotomy is graphically represented by a stunningly beautiful double-page spread.
In a cross-section of a snow-filled forest you see the girl looking obliviously up at a delicate flame-coloured flower, her gaze and mind lost to the beauty before her; far over behind her, however, her armoured protector – we don’t see who is inside the armour at first and when we do later in the story it is intensely shocking and revealing, adding so much to an already richly involved narrative – is battling flaming wolf-life creatures, just the first barrage of beasts and enemies who seem intensely focused on taking the young girl into captivity.
This continual hunting of the young girl by all manner of weird and wondrous creatures, who look like escapees from a nightmarish take on Dr Seuss, looks almost random and opportunistic until Step by Bloody Step reveals, in ways immersively nuanced and yet stridently buoyant, in emotional and visual impact, why it is everyone wants this newly-born girl in their possession.
As she quickly and magically grows through the year, it becomes clear why it is she is so coveted, but at the start, and for much of Step by Bloody Step, all you know is that if they stay on the assigned path they are safe; step off it, however, and all manner of terrifying threats are summoned in an imaginatively verdant fantasy world which builds landscapes and those who inhabit it with lavishly evocative and fully-formed ease.
Tellingly though, it’s not the creatures off the path that are the biggest threat; as the girl and her armoured protector ventured further across the land, they encounter the dubious benefits and trappings of civilisation in beguilingly deceptive encounters that ask, not for the first time in a story penned by people, if we are not the greatest monsters of all?
Quite how that plays out must be left to this luminously alive story but suffice to say that the battles which take place, both intimate and horizon spanning, showcase the very best and the worst of what people are capable of, the story brimming with a real thoughtfulness that doesn’t outright condemn people but let the people convict themselves by their own blighted actions.
There is so much going on but in the best possible way.
Spurrier’s story is alive with humanity, hope, darkness and truth, and it all comes boisterously alive in artwork that is arrestingly vivid and lavish, like the best art in any gallery, and yet which feels emotionally intimate in ways that capture your heart with a real sense of incisive meaning.
It’s a magical combination, being both epic and interior in its thougtfulness, but Step by Bloody Step manages it with masterful aplomb, proving that while words are things of real cleverness and meaning, they can find themselves represented every bit as effectively by those who know how to mix them in with artwork which is as far from run of the mill as you can get.
The artwork is so richly beautiful and alive, conveying so much with so little, but even when the narrative is not being actively pursued, and pages exist simply for the visual sweep of colour and landscape, you get lost in the way so much is said without a word being put on the page.
With top-notch world-building, boundlessly expansive imaginative storytelling and characters who forcefully make their presence felt with a facial expression or the subtlest of gestures, Step by Bloody Step is a magnificently arresting achievement, a luscious palette of eye-catching artwork imbued with a fantastically clever and heartfelt narrative that reminds us of both the wonder and danger of the world and that how we respond to it is something we must consciously consider if we make to make a real difference journeying through this often contradictory world.
Step by Bloody Step is out from Image Comics.
