THE ADVENTURES OF BASIL AND MOEBIUS – graphic novel

GRAPHIC NOVEL WEEK

The tag for this book (as quoted from Goodreads) starts: “Alaric Moebius and Basil Fox are two lovable scoundrels looking to make a quick fortune.” Unfortunately I didn’t see it that way. I saw two scoundrels who lacked a strong moral compass trying to make their fortune.

This book features three stories of Alaric Moebius and Basil Fox, the latter a member of the Queen’s guard and the former a stereotyped educated playboy who gets his thrills from adventure. While Basil may not be stereotyped the way Alaric is, he is also less believable that Alaric as he somehow manages to be a part of the Guard but talks while on his standing duty and chooses to miss an assignment or two in favor of adventuring.

Basil and Moebius bump into each other (literally) when saving a pretty woman, and somehow decide to become fast friends while searching for treasure. Their first adventure together isn’t at all what it appears to be on the surface … it is much less. And that’s sort of the M.O. for the rest of this book – it’s much less than what it appears to be.

I happen to love old pulp fiction and the adventures of pulp adventure heroes like Doc Savage or The Shadow, and Basil and Moebius tries to capture that same sort of excitement, but it just doesn’t work. First of all, even the better pulp heroes haven’t done well in the graphic novel format (I think you really need that rosie prose to be in a pulp heroes world) and these new characters aren’t helped along by the inconsistent-but-mostly-bad artwork.

I didn’t have fun with Basil and Moebius and instead of being loveable, they came off as complete idiots who were selfish and hedonistic.

I requested and received the second volume before I had finished this first volume, but otherwise this would not make my reading list.

Looking for a good book? The Adventures of Basil and Moebius is a graphic novel is a weak attempt at recreating the adventure of the classic pulps heroes but may only appeal to pre-teen readers who haven’t read a lot of adventure fiction yet.