cover image Maybe Later

Maybe Later

Philippe Dupuy, Charles Berberian, . . Drawn & Quarterly, $16.95 (128pp) ISBN 978-1-896597-21-8

These two famed French cartoonists are a longtime team, but here they split up for the first time to create a comic that exposes the personal side of creativity. Yet the book has more than just behind the scenes info. By the end this becomes a touching story about the lives of two artists facing middle-age. The cartoonists tell their separate stories in different styles. Berberian takes the mundane events in his life and infuses them with comical asides drawn in a loose and easy manner. This technique has more than comedic value; it also provides insight into what a life soaked in pop culture is like. He makes use of subjects like the Simpsons and Batman to examine his desire to capture a childhood that is gone forever. Dupuy starts off his comic in a similar nervous state, this time about how egocentric this book can be. Then he is told his mother has died and he sums up her life in six graceful panels. Dupuy's section deals with a deeper kind of loss and how it, too, affects growing up. Instead of looking back, Dupuy looks forward to a world that can seem very scary. Even when they're not creating a strip together, Dupuy and Berberian complement each other perfectly. (June)