The Gift is exactly what it says on the tin, an absolute gift of a wee comic that’ll simultaneously have you roaring with laughter while pulling on your heart strings. As you’d expect coming from Davy Francis (Greedy Gorb, Doctor Madstarkraving, Cowpat County) it’s as unique a comic as you’re likely to find. Even its creation was very ‘Davy’.
A few months back I was having coffee with Davy and Peter Duncan of Belfast’s Sector 13 Comics when Davy pulled out a selection of random little bits of paper of various types and sizes. On each was drawn one panel of a story. He’d been randomly drawing each image whenever the mood took him on whatever he had to hand. What I saw that day was brilliant and deserved to be seen by others.
Peter was of the same opinion and had the means to make it happen. Sector 13 originally began by creating and publishing the entertaining 2000AD-inspired Sector 13 comic. In recent years they’ve branched out into publishing comics by other local writers and artists. Their latest release is Davy’s The Gift, which comes in a small square format in keeping with his original sketches.
It was released during the Enniskillen Comic Fest and there was something of an embargo on story or even character details beforehand as no one wanted to give anything away before its publication. Hence why I’ve waited until now to review it for the OiNK Blog, so that I can give you a few details in this review, although I’ll make sure not to spoil anything for you.
Part of the joy of this comic is not knowing anything about it beforehand, but that could make for a somewhat bland review. So what can I tell you? It involves a Bruce Wayne/Batman-type character called Dwayne Castle, who lives in a castle. His alter ego is… The Rook. Along with his Alfred-like butler friend the set up is a very funny take on the original Batman legend but it goes much farther than that.
How it develops is the part I don’t want to tell you about because it’s the whole point of the comic. It’s strange to be highly recommending something when I can’t mention the main plot point. What I can tell you is how funny it is. Any fan of Davy’s from OiNK or any of the other publications he’s appeared in over the years will instantly take to this, whether you’re a Batman or superhero fan or not. Thankfully, Sector 13 haven’t tidied the images up too much so you can still see the different types and shapes of paper Davy used, giving it the feel of him sharing each one with you personally and an insight into his crazy cartoonist mind.
Davy’s inimitable style shines all the more here, possibly because he was originally only drawing these for his own amusement. As such, you can feel the love that went into each image and when you read the dedication to his late dad at the beginning you’ll understand why. Having read this dedication you’ll then feel a lump build up in your throat as you read the second half of the tale, the half I’m not going to discuss.
Well, I say ”read”, but this is a silent comedy. There are some of Davy’s trademark background gags like shop signs etc., but other than those this is without speech or narrative captions. Each image takes up a full page and acts like a snapshot of a particular part in the lives of the two men at the centre of the story. Some spoofs of DC comics and scenarios from well known aspects of Batman’s life act as funny little pages in their own right, but it’s the overall story that makes this worth every penny.
I really can’t recommend this enough. Now, £7.00 might sound like a lot for a silent comic, especially since every page has just the one panel, but at 52 pages there are a lot of images here to savour. That’s the way to read Davy’s comic, taking your time to enjoy each individual drawing, laughing along with the gags and allowing yourself to get emotionally invested as it develops beyond what you thought it would be when you ordered it from Sector 13’s website.
Which you really must do. You won’t want to miss out on the experience of this one.
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