1 out of 5

After enjoying the first couple issues of Bubbles O’Seven, I was encouraged to check out the remainder of the series, which led to a bulk purchase from Bounce Comics. The purveyors of Bounce (or artist Matthew Rooke…) were kind enough to include several extras in my order, which includes four issues of Apes ‘n’ Capes, which I believe ran prior to (or partially alongside) Bubbles. And if the latter series was a somewhat humorous spin on spy stuff like Bond, Apes ‘n’ Capes was not that: it’s a very metered, lore-dense tale of evolved animals – bears, apes, now able to speak – and the way the world has changed after their evolution, told in shattered glimmers along the timeline, and from the perspective of enigmatic characters who know way more about What’s Going On than the reader, or even some of the leads.

Not unpromising; what was interesting about B07 is the way that it was essentially a funny animal book, and told with awareness of that genre, but backed up by some linear (and seriousy) story elements and an odd sense of world-building. If AnC was going to be the “darker” version of that, and leaning more sci-fi than spy, I’m here for it.

Whether or not that’s the case… is hard to say. Because, unfortunately, Apes ‘n’ Capes is just not a very well told story, narratively or visually, and to the point that it’s a chore to read. And before I dive into some specifics on that, I do want to acknowledge that there’s clear effort in this series; it’s far from being phoned in or conceptually lacking. Also that the issues I take with the telling are not objective, as other reviews exist out there praising the books. For this reader, though, there’s such a barrier to entry for enjoyment (or even understanding) that it’s hard to give enough weight to the positive intentions to counter that.

The main problem here is one of obfuscation. I appreciate the structure of a mysterious world – one that is immediately alien / foreign to a reader – and then slowly peeling back the mysteries along the way, which is (I believe) the idea here, dropping us in to a world led by talking monkeys and bears, then tacking on some kind of caste system with bears at the top and monkeys (generally) in some kind of subservient role. But before we can even establish that very well, an ape in a cape busts in to a business-y meetings amongst some leadership bear types, and spouts some cryptic stuff; and before we can establish much about what that means, we cut to a monkey – George – who was… at the meeting? But not shown? who flips in and out of a dream sequence that gets periodically interrupted by cryptic monkey, and a humanoid figure suited all in black, and who (sometimes) holds on to a cryptic icon of bent wood.

That’s the first issue. It is a sequence of symbols / scenes that are given no context. Can we intuit some things? Sure, but doing so goes against some comic book storytelling norms, and unfortunately, in a way that feels accidental. For example, I added a question mark to George being at the meeting: he is addressed in the meeting before we know who he is, and he’s not on panel at this point. There’s nothing about the art that necessarily confirms that “George” is off panel, nor is he in the background or any subsequent panels during this meeting. During this entire sequence, he is not shown. While this could be done as a poorly handled reveal – hiding that the bears are interrupted by this enigmatic caped ape, while in fact they’ve been interacting with another monkey in the room – there’s nothing about the scene’s construction (or the followup) that really suggests this was a reveal of any sort, since it’s kind of casually / indirectly inserted into / assumed from George’s convo with ape cape. Additionally, artist Matthew Rooke follows this same odd convention a couple issues later, where a character in a chat is 100% obscured by an awning, but is named in that scene, meaning there’s 0% chance of it being a “reveal” when they’re shown in the next panel. It… rather just seems like the artist not knowing the best way to make everything fit properly in view, which can be a charming quirk in an indie book, except when the storytelling is so obtuse that it hinders comprehension of what’s going on.

Continuing with some beat-by-beats, a followup to the meeting-interruption scene might give that some weight by following it up with a related discussion (characters talking about what happened), or perhaps do more scene-setting / world-building by going to something entirely different – making it a cold open of sorts. Instead, Grainne kind of does both? by having George bop along home and then talk to the interrupting ape, except we’re lacking context on George due to the above and their conversation only tangentially mentions the meeting. So it’s like… half followup, except we’re not actually following up, and it’s about something completely different.

Extrapolate this to four issues. You do get a high level idea of the layers of the story, but even at this point – four issues in – there’s nothing linear or concrete. Maybe Grant Morrison can get away with that structure with their earned fandom, but even Grant’s most onion-y constructions give the readers clear takeaways at various points (setting aside that a takeaway will be overwritten or deconstructed or confuzzled a page later – you at least get the fakeout of satisfaction). Besides McEntee and Rooke – I have to assume – lacking that kind of following at this point, Apes ‘n’ Capes is also not the kind of IP Grant was allowed to play with which inherited some readerly understandings from decades of history. On top of this, when the subject matter deals with talking animals, the same rules as dealing with humans applies: you need to give them very distinct characteristics so we can tell them apart. Rooke tries with slightly different hair styles on the monkeys, or face / ear shapes on the bears, but in a black and white book without color as a cue, these indicators are drawn way too subtly, and without enough consistency or framing to help us out, besides the reader not getting to spend enough time with any given character to let such cues sink in.

I don’t believe that writers / artists have to handhold a reader. I’m okay with fighting a bit for understanding. That’s just… not how I perceive this book’s structure. It seems more like the story bible was written out, with reveals stumped for issue X, and then Grainne / Matthew just got too into their subject matter to stand back and realize some storytelling basics were never communicated. I do appreciate the passion. But how that translated to the page was clearly not my style.