When looking at recent OGNs that hadn’t been reviewed here yet, we were floored to discover we hadn’t covered “Blue in Green” yet, such was the reputation that preceded it. Thankfully, it doesn’t take much to rectify that mistake.
Cover by Anand RK
& John PearsonWritten by Ram V
Illustrated by Anand RK
Colored by John Pearson
Lettered by Aditya Bidikar
The dark and haunting portrayal of a young musician’s pursuit of creative genius—the monstrous nature of which threatens to consume him as it did his predecessor half a century ago. From creators RAM V (Grafity’s Wall, These Savage Shores) and ANAND RK (Grafity’s Wall), BLUE IN GREEN is an exploration of ambitions, expectations, and the horrific depths of their spiraling pursuit.
It’s hard to know where to start with a book like “Blue in Green.” Do you tackle the art and what it evokes with its scratchy, frantic lines and penciled colors? How about the story, which is nothing new but feels entirely unique? What about the characters, or perhaps the character, who slowly grows at the expense of all else, a mirror of his own self-importance and desires? Or maybe I should start with the letters, hand-drawn and set into the page, as integral and integrated as the rest? No. I think we should start with the design of the book.
Tom Muller made a name for himself with his designs on “House of X/Powers of X,” though he was no stranger to the comics world before that. Here, his work is relegated to the interstitial chapter breaks, a title page here, a credit page there, providing the ends and divisions that help frame the narrative in symbols and colors. “Blue in Green” is an album, though it’s all A-side, with the need for the proper dress and back matter in addition to the music within. Muller steps up and accomplishes this masterfully, abstracting and fracturing notes and measures, leaving us with the sense of unravelling combined with a dangerous, fractious freedom.
“Blue in Green” tells this story through Jazz Professor Erik Dieter, who, upon reckoning with the ghosts of his past, some familiar and some brand new to him, finds himself developing a long unnurtured part of himself. This part of himself, long thought exorcised by his now dead mother, is the source of the greatest moments of ecstasy in the book as well as the deepest moment of despair and horror. What makes “Blue in Green” stand out from the other “man falling into obsession over their craft/discovering forgotten secrets of their past” books, beyond the pedigree of the creators, is that “Blue in Green” is at once detached from its focal character and deeply invested in him.
This is tricky to accomplish because Erik is the one narrating the entire book and normally an aloof narrator who is also the focal character makes the narrative seem distant and hard to get invested in. In the case of “Blue in Green,” Ram V successfully makes sure that while the narration and the action feel distant from each other, the two are harmonious rather than discordant. The rhythms of Erik’s inner thoughts are regular and poetic, conjuring up images that are sometimes reflected on the page, sometimes absent, and other times supported & strengthened by completely different imagery. The collaboration is beautiful to watch and read and if one were to set a metronome going, they could swear the beats lined up perfectly, syncopated and freeform as they may be.
Beautiful though it may be, “Blue in Green” also isn’t afraid to get deeply, traumatically unsettling. RK & Pearson’s visuals are haunting and melancholic. The whole book seems like it’s viewed through the fog of cigarette smoke in a dimly lit bar, intermittently lit with neon lights or incandescent or candles, with faces no more than smudges against bodies and bodies no more than shapes in an ever shifting environment. It may not be to everyone’s tastes, reminiscent of Martin Simmonds’ current work on “The Department of Truth” (which Bidikar also letters,) but it is exactly the feel “Blue in Green” needs.
The abstract nature of the art and the smoky colors sets a gothic mood while the visuals and the narration ratchet up the tension, crafting panels that feel like dreams but are remembered as nightmares. Beyond the general nightmare fuel of the man in white, moments like Erik lighting up a cigarette on page 39, with the blues of night punctured by the harsh pink of his window & the ghostly figure on the driveway remain stuck in my mind. They’re evocative and quietly worrying because their implications aren’t fully apparently until further reflection. Even the most obvious horror is limited in its presentation, allowing the real scares to fester in your mind long after the book is done.
“Blue in Green” is not a happy book nor is it a positive exploration of a musician reconnecting to a forgotten passion. Instead, it is a harsh, unflinching descent into ambition and the ways it consumes not just the one with it but all those around them. It is a singular piece of art that is hard to look at and even harder to put down, sinister and terrifying and yet, despite all the horror, it’s hard not to relate.
And that’s the scariest part of it all.
