We Lost The War But Not The Battle

Comic of the week has to be Michel Gondry's We Lost The War But Not The Battle. How does the director of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind fair in translating his vision to the page?

Well its amusing, nonsensical, bawdy and jolly entertaining. Four French men who had previously avoided military service,now find themselves held to account 25 years later as Paris faces an invasion from "a bunch of communists gathered from central Europe" who just happen to be women. With the entire French army away at a demonstration of their artillery might, the four friends are asked to defend Paris using a bazooka, a gun with blue bullets, a sickle and "a stupid long pistol". The fact that one of the friends had died several years earlier is no reason to be excused from duty.

At first glance the comic could have escaped from the small press section and it's been put together to have that underground feel to it, as if someone with a healthy imagination that leans to the absurd, without any great artistic ability has sat down to knock out a comic. In actuality the layouts show a great eye for comedy and the story has a nicely measured pace to it.

I don't want over-intellectualise the whole thing, though. It's funny (adult) comics - give it a try. - SLS