We’re taking a detour from Abe’s ongoing story to flashback to 1992 this month, in “The Ogopogo.”
Written by Mike Mignola and Scott Allie
Illustrated, Colored, and Lettered by Kevin NowlanHellboy and Abe Sapien search for the infamous lake monster Ogopogo in British Columbia, as Kevin Nowlan (Hellboy: Buster Oakley Gets His Wish) rejoins the Mignolaverse!
Mark: I’ve got fellow Mignolaverse fan (and co-editor of Multiversity Comics) joining me on this review.
Mike: Oh man, I’m excited to be here!
Mark: Glad to have you. So, this flashback story stems out of a moment from the “Hellboy: Box Full of Evil” epilogue, when Hellboy mentioned Abe getting injured by the Ogopogo. Are you familiar with that?
Mike: I am, even though I didn’t realize it at first. It was such an offhanded comment that I honestly had forgotten all about it. But that’s one of the best parts of the Mignolaverse, in my opinion. There’s so much air in the timeline and so many stories that’ve never been explored that there are seemingly endless story possibilities out there.
That said, there is certainly nothing that anyone who hasn’t read “Box” would necessarily need to know going into this.
Mark: Ah, that’s good, because that epilogue came out fifteen years ago, and when I first read it, it stuck in my head. Not sure why. But for me, this story has the weight of expectations from all those years, and I think that got in the way of enjoying it for what it is. Hopefully, you’ll balance me out a bit.
Mike: HA! OK, I’ll play good cop then.
There was a lot I dug in this story. An Abe/Hellboy team-up is always a crowd pleaser, and it was nice to just get a one-and-done that didn’t have the weight of the ongoing Abe on the run saga.
But beyond all of that, and I hope you’ll indulge me a little on this, I like how this story feels like it’s made to remind readers of the similarities between pre “In Hell” Hellboy and current continuity Abe. Thematically this story ties to Hellboy and his role in the world. Abe is being told that he’s a monster and he’s refusing to address it, he’s become disillusioned with the BPRD and has split from them, he’s even taken on the ‘wandering adventurer’ role once held by Hellboy. The longer “Abe Sapien” goes on, the stronger I think there parallels become, and Allie and Mignola returning to the Abe/Hellboy team-up days only serves to enforce that idea in reader’s minds. Am I off the mark on this?
Mark: Not at all. These flashback stories, while they stand alone, all have a relationship with the ongoing story in some way, thematically. They’re like these little beats that play into what Abe’s thinking about in the ongoing. Especially “Abe Sapien” #15 (the Roger flashback).
The Abe and Hellboy interactions here are my favorite stuff in the book. It’s nice seeing these guys without the weight of the world on their shoulders.
Mike: Exactly. What Abe’s going through in the ongoing story has a fair amount of heft to it, so this was refreshing.
But I get the sense that after years of having this adventure in the back of your mind you were a little disappointed?
Mark: Yeah. I wish I’d been able to turn off my expectations and just enjoy this one for what is, you know? The thing is, the way Hellboy described it in the “Box Full of Evil” epilogue, it’s very grim. Hellboy’s mostly lost in shadow, back to the reader, as he talks about this horrible thing that happened to Abe, and how he still survived it.
All this was said after Abe had been held captive by a monkey and tortured with a hot brand. So the context of Hellboy’s statement was that the whole monkey torture thing was nowhere near as bad as the Ogopogo incident.
But here, the Ogopogo moment was surprisingly light. I was expecting Abe to get hurt worse than any other time between 1979 to 1999. The corpse at the beginning of this issue actually had me thinking, “Man, I wonder what Abe’s gonna look like after the Ogopogo’s done with him…”
Continued belowIt fed into my off-base expectations.
Mike: You know, you’ve made some excellent points. “Box Full of Evil” was a pretty wild adventure, and this one seemed much more subdued. I guess until now I chalked that up to the substantial difference in the way Mignola and Nowlan tell stories, but you’ve got me thinking that it’s really in the narrative.
So much for balancing you out!
Mark: Yeah, and when you consider what Abe had been through in “Abe Sapien: The Devil Does Not Jest,” and that I expected this to be worse than that, you can see how how my expectations totally tripped me up here.
That said, I do expect some differences when Kevin Nowlan’s working on a book. He does everything except the story on his issues, so the familiarity of Dave Stewart’s colors and Clem Robins’s lettering isn’t there. Right away, it’s different, but also special, because this is the guy that designed the iconic Hellboy logo. You have to be willing to switch gears a bit to settle into a Kevin Nowlan story. “Hellboy: Buster Oakley Gets his Wish” was fantastic, but it’s like nothing else in the Mignolaverse.
Mike: I had the exact same thoughts about Stewart and Robins! I’m a fan of Nowlan’s work, and I really like how he approaches Mignola’s characters, but it did feel… separate?
It’s common wisdom that Stewart does a lot in terms of unifying all of the Mignola titles, and it’s weird when his colors aren’t a part of an issue. Of course, Nowlan is a hell of an artist and did a wonderful job doing his own colors, but I still couldn’t help but wonder how Stewart would’ve done it.
Even more than the colors what really screamed out at me was the lettering. Robins has developed such an iconic and instantly recognizable style for the Mignola books and, in my opinion, has become the greater of the unifying forces for these comics. I think they way he mixes font sizes within word balloons and approaches sound effects is key to the way I ‘hear’ these comics. While Nowlan has done a fine job handling the lettering of this issue, I just couldn’t help but feel Robins’s absence. I missed his sound effects! And I feel weird about saying that, since Nowlan is the one who designed the Hellboy logo.
But to end on a high note, like I said earlier, I like the way he handles these characters. So many artists seem to bend their style to fall in line with Mignola’s when they’re tapped to do one of his books. But not Nowlan. He goes in and does it without an ounce of compromise.
Mark: Exactly. He’s a bold artist, and I think he works best with stories that are equally bold (which is one of the reasons I’m looking forward to his “Lobster Johnson” story in July). This one was more subdued though, with a lot of talking.
I’m curious if you had the same experience as I did near the end of this book, when Abe and Hellboy finally check out Joe DeMille’s house. They both walk up to the house at night, all the lights off. Hellboy gently knocks on the door, Abe finds a way in and… on the page turn, the lights are on, Abe’s found the Ogopogo statue and Joe DeMille’s standing there talking to them as if he was always there. No one is surprised to see him, and he’s not surprised to see them.
If I hadn’t been reading this digitally, I would have thought I’d accidentally skipped a bit. I mean, these guys just snuck into the place, Abe is holding the item everyone is trying to steal, and Joe’s somehow OK with this? Why does he immediately trust Abe and Hellboy when only a short while ago Harry and Charlie had tried to steal the Ogopogo statue? Charlie wound up dead at the end of that scuffle.
Meanwhile Abe and Hellboy, who had just broken in to this guy’s house, don’t even acknowledge they shouldn’t be there. No sorry, no explanation… They act like they’re supposed to be there and Joe is already up to speed on the whole situation… and so does Joe, come to think of it.
Continued belowIt was just an odd moment.
Mike: Odd is a good word for it. Joe just walked in and sprung right into the exposition we needed to put a bow on the story.
The whole wrap-up to the issue was really oddly timed. Joe’s info dump seemed rushed, but then the confrontation with the locals had a bunch of pages to breath even though. The last panel with dialogue was probably an echo of how you were feeling at the end, huh?
Mark: Ha! I guess, yeah. Puzzled.
It’s interesting you mention breathing space, because there’s this thing with Abe Sapien stories I’ve noticed. Whenever there’s a body of water nearby, he has to explore it. I mean, if he didn’t, he just wouldn’t be doing his job properly. But if the next piece of exposition to propel the story forward isn’t in the water, it’s a scene the writer has to do that essentially goes nowhere.
Usually they get around it by delving into Abe’s interior world. In this case, Abe wonders about the mystery of the Ogopogo. It’s nothing we don’t already know, though, so it felt like wasted page real estate.
I wish he’d dived into the water and heard Joe singing to the Ogopogo or something. Actually, I wanted to see Joe, this man who is a friend with a lake monster, meet Abe, a fish-man. Not just to reveal exposition, but to see someone look at Abe in a way that doesn’t see him as a monster, but something beautiful.
Joe’s singing bookends the book. It would have been nice to use it to propel the story in the middle and create some atmosphere.
Mike: There was a moment when Abe was underwater that I thought was leading to a monster fight. It was the first panel on the page where Hellboy meets Charlie’s sister. It looks like Abe is startled by something, then the next time we see him he’s popping up out of the lake. It’s never addressed and the story just keeps on trucking. Another weird choice, I guess.
Man, I really thought I liked this story, but it seems like the whole thing falls apart under scrutiny. I guess I was just excited for the team-up.
Mark: The team-up bits were definitely the highlight. The back and forth between Hellboy and Abe is nice. I really miss that stuff. Sadly once the investigation begins, it fades into the background. After the scene where they investigate Charlie’s body, Hellboy and Abe don’t talk to each other until they find the Ogopogo statue at the end of the book. They’re trying to solve a mystery together, but they could have just as easily been one person in those scenes. As investigators, they were simply mouthpieces for questions that could have been asked by anybody.
That said, I enjoyed the scene with the grandmother, the way she got off topic so easily. Especially when Hellboy has to ask her three times where to find Joe DeMille, and even hold a map up in front of her.
Mike: The Hellboy/Abe banter was a great open to the story. The way they had a little catch-up made it seem like they were just meeting up after Hellboy’s return from London. After reading this I went back and reread “Box” to prepare for our talk, and I was struck by how Abe was written as the strong silent type. While there was a real sense of camaraderie between them, Hellboy was certainly the mouth piece of the duo. It’s a stark contrast when compared to the Abe of today. Or, rather, the way Abe of yesterday is written today. Now he’s got a fair bit more to say.
And the grandmother was pretty great. I couldn’t help but wonder if maybe she wasn’t playing at being the doddering old lady in order to avoid giving too many answers. But I know I’m maybe just looking too far into a pretty straight ahead story.
Mark: No, I totally read her that way too. She was totally playing Abe and Hellboy, and annoyed when they weren’t so easily distracted.
Well, I can’t think of anything else to mention. Anything you want to add before we rate this one?
Continued belowMike: I guess I just wanted to say that I got a kick out of seeing Nowlan recreate that Mignola panel of Abe flying through the air. He did the tree line exactly as it originally appeared! It’s a little detail, but I think it shows a real sense of attention and care, which helps me gloss over some of the potholes in the issue.
Mark: That bit was great. Although the recreation of the moment from “Hellboy: The Ghoul” was even better. I got a real kick out of that.
Mike: So how’re you rating this one?
Mark: I’m giving this one a six. I’d like to give it more, but I just wasn’t feeling it.
Mike: Despite its flaws, I thought this was a good palate cleanser. Let’s call it a seven.
Final Verdict: 6.5.
There isn’t an issue of Abe Sapien next month, but there is a short story from writer John Arcudi and artist Mark Nelson in Dark Horse Presents #11, a kind of sequel to Hellboy: The Chained Coffin.
