Review - Black Hole by Charles Burns
May 5th, 2008 John Posted in Comic Books, Reviews |
Charles Burns’ “Black Hole,” recently re-released in paperback, is a horror novel of a different kind — one where the monsters are ourselves, but where the horror will be temporary if only we can survive it.
The best horror stories all riff from something real and honest and take it to a nightmarish extreme — works like “Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,” “Frankenstein,” “Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” all examine common human themes — alienation, rage, responsibility, conformity and the price of knowledge — and extricate them from their everyday trappings with supernatural and/or science fiction circumstances.
In “Black Hole,” Burns presents a mysterious conundrum — teens all over Seattle in the 1970s are falling prey to a bizarre disease that mutates their appearances, turns them into monsters and outcasts. Unlike your typical zombie movie, though, the beasts don’t maraud — they hide out in shame. How do they become monsters? Through sex — and not necessarily careless sex. Each teen is faced with temptation and the call to explore that side of life — resigned to the disease and what follows, each teen sees it as the price they pay for something that is just part of animal growth.
The novel follows two stories that often intertwine — Keith, an amiable doofus, and the object of his crush, Chris, whose clever and popular veneer mask a dissatisfaction with everyday life. Chris’ escape, as with so many teenagers, is to dive into the danger of an intense relationship with Rob Facincanni, who she describes as “dark and sexy.” Certainly different from Keith, a boy she barely notices, but who keeps popping up at various points to save the day in some kindhearted way.
Keith spends his time scoring pot with his friends, biding their time hoping that confidence will someday fill their chests as easily the smoke from the joints they roll. An awkward afternoon at a dealer’s house leads Keith to meet Eliza, bohemian and flirty, with her own hint of danger and — as Keith notices — a tail. In Eliza, the mutation has not become grotesque, but cute, and Eliza’s comfort with it accentuates the idea that the disease sweeping the teenagers may not be entirely bad and, in fact, manifests itself in different ways in different people. This reveals what is different about Burns’ take on coming of age as opposed to so many others — adulthood is presented as a challenge, as the result of what you make of it mixed with the luck of the draw. Some people end up with melty faces, others with cute little waggy tales. Just like real life.
Burns’ portrayal of these mutations are all the more affecting thanks to his investigation of the teen years. He captures that age perfectly and unapologetically, allowing his characters to act as if there were no adult in view. This honesty creates some cringe-worthy moments as well sweet ones from the perspective of an adult reading the book, long past even the point of embracing or rejecting the particular circumstances of his own mutation. The scenes are so deft in their portrayal of a world three decades ago that they may seem like etchings from your own personal memory. Equally, Burns’ high contrast black and white style, at times seeming more like fluid wood carvings than illustrations, gives the story an atmosphere of displacement that matches the inner workings of the characters he follows.
With “Black Hole,” Burns has achieved something monumental, crafting a complicated tale of horror that draws not only draws from the real world, but transposes itself on top it in such a way that his horrors might overtake your own memories. In many ways, that’s what “Black Hole” is about — as the characters descend into moments of nightmarish surrealism in which their unconsciousness collides with unspoken societal fear of growing up, it becomes clear that the mutated bodies they suffer from are really something imposed upon them. The sickening transformation of their bodies is something their former naivete never considered would be unleashed, as they did nothing more radical than live their lives.
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