BIG ETHEL ENERGY - graphic novel

 Ethel Muggs was a graduate of Riverdale High, alongside some of its better known students, such as Archie Andrews, Jughead Jones, Veronica Lodge and Betty Cooper. Ethel was the brilliant, quiet, rather frumpy looking girl generally ignored by the cooler kids and she couldn't wait to get out of town after graduation.

Now Ethel is a writer, a reporter, living the glamorous life (ha!) in New York City when she's asked to go back to her home town to write a history of the city. She doesn't want to do it and asks for an outrageous fee ... which is met, so she'll have to journey home. Could it be as bad as she remembers it?  Will anyone even remember her?

I probably shouldn't have picked this up, but I have a soft-spot for Archie Comics, plus I've enjoyed the dark reimagining Riverdale series, so I thought I might enjoy this as well.  I didn't. On too many levels - I may not list them all here.

There is a difference between a graphic novel written as a graphic novel and a graphic novel written as a series of comic books.  The latter means that each issue of the comic has to provide a little catch-up to what has gone before in case you missed an issue. So for this 200 page book, we only have maybe 100 pages of advancing story and 100 pages of reminder. Having grown up with comics, this doesn't bother me too much.  I understand the necessity.  But what I didn't like was that this was released as a graphic novel with barely 200 pages, and the actual story has just barely begun when this collection ends.  Some may call it a cliff-hanger.  I call it an incomplete story.

One of the things that drew me to this was that it was going to be Ethel Muggs' story.  Here is a chance for a minor character throughout the comic book (and television) series to shine.  It would seem to make sense to use this character, whom we know very little about, since the drawing board was so bare (metaphorically speaking). 

But that's presuming all the characters we do know, or at least more familiar with, are 'themselves'.  But they are not.

I know ... Riverdale reimagined all the characters - gave the whole thing a dark tone.  But the roots of those characters are still there.  This book also reimagines the character ... but for no clear reason. This could just as easily (and perhaps been better off if it had) been a series of completely made-up, new to the reading public, set of characters. Betty is still a little over-the-top friendly and Veronica is still rich, but beyond that, none of the characters are recognizable (both in a physical/art sense and in a behavioral sense).  There's just no reason for this to be "Ethel Muggs" if Archie isn't Archie, Jughead isn't Jughead, Miss Grundy isn't Miss Grundy, and so on. This story is not dependent on this being the Archie gang.  

The art for this is ... let's just say it's not my style.  It's badly drawn and I suspect that there's a horde of readers who really like this, and that's fine.  But I don't understand why, when a character shows surprise, they are drawn, in one panel, like Funco Pop! characters.  Huh?  

It's a choice, and I suppose readers who grew up with Anime as a favorite style of art probably really dig these moments.  This reader did not.

I think I liked the general idea of the story - now an adult but returning to high school that has many uncomfortable memories. A lot of us can identify with this.  But the story is slow in developing because of the repeating of what's gone before, and because it barely gets interesting when the pages run, I can't say definitively that the story was worth reading.

Looking for a good book? If you want an Archies graphic novel that has nothing to do with any of the Archie comics or Riverdale series, and is an incomplete story, then pick up Big Ethel Energy Vol. 1.

I received a free digital copy of this book direct from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

2 stars

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Big Ethel Energy Vol. 1

author: Keryl Brown Ahmed

artist: Siobhan Keenan

publisher: Archie Comics

ISBN: 9781645768890

paperback, 208 pages