Far Out Fairy Tales Review



Review:

(Thank you Netgalley for  a copy!)

Want to tell the classic fairy tales but afraid of them getting stale? Easy, just mix them up with popular elements such as ninjas, superheroes, and zombies! Really fairy tale retellings are a favorite of mine and this one continues to do it's job of putting different spins on the classics. It doesn't hurt that this book has some big name talent behind these remakes such as Oddly Normal's Otis Frampton and comic legend Louise Simonson. Each tale has it's own unique art style to go with it's new approach that doesn't hurt at all. Just looking at the cover can give one an idea on that. As mentioned prior, these are obviously old tales everyone's familiar with already but at the end of each story there's a fact page about the fairy tale's origins and differences from version to version.

One thing the comic handles well on some stories but flubs on others is how some stories follow a mostly "silent approach." Silent comics tell their tale through just their art work with no speech balloons from the characters and at times no narration boxes either. Super Billy Goats Gruff is a completely silent comics aside from videogame sound effects and works wonderfully. By stark contrast, zombie Hansel and Gretel works as a normal comic with narration boxes and characters talking with one another throughout the story. In Ninja-rella and Red Riding Hood, Superhero they both follow the similar structure of narration boxes and/or characters talking for a couple pages on to then cut to silent pages showing actions take place, such as depositing backstory or simply moving story forward. Interesting move and when working with stories told over and over again why bother literally writing out the obvious? With these two it works and gets the story told. However, Snow White and the Seven Robots reads just like a silent comic and works well with the exception of a couple awkwardly added pages that appear near the end of the story to exposit some information on what Snow White was poisoned with which seemed clear enough when it was shown in silent panels. This just breaks up the flow and automatically goes back to silent when the obvious exposition is over. Again, an abrupt and odd choice to otherwise nice story.

Recommendation:
Overall, Far Out Fairy Tales is a fun little book for kids who will no doubt get a laugh out of imaginative re-imaginings as well as some interesting story structures from some and factoids about the classic stories. There's some very minor cartoon gore with the zombie story but overall perfectly fine for the young reader's shelves.