Present day versions of the Greek gods, and schools for supernaturally gifted youngsters have been popular themes in books for decades, but Houghton Mifflin Harcourt’s recent graphic novel “Oh My Gods!” (the first in a series), just about manages to bring something new to the table, through emphasizing the sensation of discovering the unfamiliar, and by keeping the magic to the shadows.
Written by Stephanie Cooke & Insha FitzpatrickCover by Juliana Moon
Art by Juliana Moon
Colored by Whitney Cogar
Lettered by Andrea Miller & David HastingsKaren is just an average thirteen-year-old from New Jersey who loves to play video games with her friends and watch movies with her mom. But when she moves to Greece to live with her eccentric, mysterious father, Zed, suddenly everything she thought about herself — about life — is up in the air.
Starting a new school can be difficult, but starting school at Mt. Olympus Junior High, where students are gods and goddesses, just might take the cake. Especially when fellow classmates start getting turned to stone. Greek mythology . . . a little less myth, a little more eek! And if Karen’s classmates are immortal beings, who does that make her?
The book gets off to a slow start, with Karen learning her mother has to move out of town for her new job, and soberly taking the plane to live with her father in Greece. Unlike our young heroine, virtually every reader will be able to guess the identity of her father, and predict the new neighborhood is populated by other gods and creatures from local folklore — even if the target audience isn’t versed in the names of the Olympians, they’ll realize something is amiss thanks to the fleeting glimpses of magic, like the way the town is situated on a cloud circling Mount Olympus.
Sure, Karen can’t jump to the same conclusion we can with our bird’s eye view of events, but it starts to feel surreal when she sees Hermes speeding back-and-forth Flash-style to check something while welcoming her to the school. A manga-style exaggeration? Perhaps, but it’s at odds at how grounded the book’s pacing is. Maybe a younger reader will find it very funny, but it pales next to when the shoe does actually drop, and colorist Whitney Cogar fills the panels when a lurid green overlay that really makes it feel like Karen’s world has turned upside down.
Speaking of shoes dropping, it is curious that Karen’s father is depicted as a goofy but wholesome and well-meaning authority figure, with no nod towards his mythological counterpart’s darker or skeevier tendencies: it’s never exactly explained why he left Karen’s mom, so this is probably something that’ll be developed in the next book. Likewise, the story offers a sympathetic take on the Medusa myth, but it doesn’t reinterpret the internalized misogyny and victim blaming in the original character’s backstory: it may be a book aimed at kids age 10-12, but young feminists can handle those topics if they’re approached thoughtfully — as it is, the moral to not quickly condemn an outcast feels rather basic. (There’s also some subtly implied LGBTQ representation, but nothing groundbreaking.)
What does work is how — other than a brief display of thunder and lightning from Zed, and Artemis’s archery skills — the gods lack their abilities in this universe, which really sells the notion that they’re experimenting with living normal human lives, and generates a true sense of tension, as even they aren’t safe from the gorgon petrifying everyone on campus. Most importantly, it allows Karen to resolve her story with compassion and empathy for a fellow outsider to the community, instead of through discovering she’s a literal demigod — the book does a great job of emphasizing how people from different backgrounds can provide fresh perspectives, and be a huge gain for their new communities.
Moon’s art is great: she’s excellent at outlining rooms and architecture, and her characters are simple yet expressive and distinct — she’s particularly great at designing noses, simple strokes that reinforce who’s related to who. Cogar’s coloring is the real star though: it’s fantastic, saturated without becoming overtly so, and it’s greatly appreciated that she gives every character a distinct skin tone, selling the idea we’re in Greece itself. Often, she’ll replace the background of each panel with a different color gradient, heightening the emotional progression of every scene.
Miller and Hastings’s lettering is pretty basic to begin with, especially with the use of the utilitarian Amescote font: often, the only expression of intense emotions are in jagged, orange speech bubbles, and oddly, there are panels where characters seem to be saying something — like when Zed waves at his daughter as she joins him for dinner — but are left silent: as a result, the text inadvertently resembles a placeholder for a work-in-progress comic. However, their work becomes more sophisticated as the book continues, as the tone and fantasy elements grow less subdued, and the sight of little sound effects become increasingly common.
Overall, the first volume of “Oh My Gods!” is a fun and inviting introduction to this reinterpretation of Greek mythology, although adult readers are more likely to be critical of it than the young readers it’s intended for. It ends on a winning note, promising a wilder and more over-the-top second outing, and hopefully as the creators, and their characters, mature, we’ll see the training wheels truly come off.
