( 9 reviews )
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Posted: Jun 11 2009
After getting into the magical world of Bone, I was looking up some other books that are related to Jeff Smith's masterpiece. As it were, I stumbled upon Rose and this book. Although different and erratic from the main compilation, Stupid Stupid Rat-Tails is a humorous and enjoyable story about the Bone character Big Johnson Bone. A culmination of Smiley, Phoney and Fone Bone, Big Johnson Bone and the forest creatures he encounters stumble upon an adventure that tries to tell the origin of the rat creature tails. Though I found this story, as I already stated, enjoyable to read, I felt a little lacked compared to reading the main books. The book's aim is to merely tell a sort of "cute" story, and it indeed works, but it's no where near as creative and deep as Bone. Fun to read, nonetheless, and highly recommended for Bone fans. Also included is a short strip illustrated by Usagi Yojimbo creator, Stan Sakai.
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Posted: Apr 30 2009
Some fun stories that are prequels to the Bone series by Jeff Smith. There are actually two stories in this book done by different writers and artists. The first story is fun and creative well the second is kind of immature and just fluff. It is a fun read and highly recommended for those who have already read the Bone series, not as good on its own.
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Posted: Apr 25 2009
Coming from reading over 1300 pages of the one volume edition of Bone and wanting more, this work fell a bit short. The story has a tall tale feel instead of the fantasy feel of Bone. Because of this, the story progresses in a very silly and predictable way instead of the surprising twists of the Bone book. The situational humor isn't quite as good as bone, and the dialog is also not as well done. The artwork and production is also a little sloppy. I love Jeff Smith's art in Bone, and still do in the first section of this book, but this work seems to show just how well Bone was done. Almost every page has faint lines under the blocks of dialog where you can tell pieces of paper were placed over the illustrations. There are also times when little things are off in the illustrations. For example, Big Johnson Bone's hat is missing in one panel while falling through the air, but present in the two surrounding panels. It's not a huge problem, but all the little things compound and make it feel a bit sloppy.
