Legitimate Graphics
May. 18th, 2026 07:01 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
setsuledI got a Comixology subscription recently through Amazon and grabbed a few titles with covers that appealed to me, like this one:
I'd heard of Fables but knew next to nothing about the series, I was lured entirely by the bodacious naked lady, who turned out to be Rapunzel. Fables is one of those postmodern series that came out of the '80s and '90s that turned classic fairy tales and fantasy into modern pulp fiction. Though apparently this series ran from 2002 to 2015. The issue I got is a story from 2012. I enjoyed it. It felt very Buffyish with fantastic characters speaking in modern lingo to one another between action sequences and sex scenes.
One thing that took me very much by surprise is that the story largely takes place in Japan. Not only that, but a lot of it takes place in Nara prefecture, where I lived for five years. Of course, I noticed things the writers and artists got wrong. Inaki Miranda and Barry Kitson, the pencilers, and Adam Hughes, the cover artist, produced some beautiful work but somehow they generally couldn't make people look Japanese. One of them also depicts raccoons among Japan's mythological creatures despite the fact that raccoons were only recently introduced as an invasive species. I suspect this comes from a mistranslation of "tanuki" as "raccoon". Wikipedia now has a proper place for the "Japanese raccoon dog" which differs significantly from a raccoon. But I've seen old dictionaries that simply translate "tanuki" as "raccoon".
It's funny how errors about foreign cultures are more charming the older a work of fiction is. I'm quite happy to enjoy the 1940 Thief of Bagdad, chock full of British impressions of the middle east, but this early 2000s impression of Japan from Americans comes off as awkward and hokey. I think it's less because I've had experience in Japan and more because I've had experience as an American fantasy writer. I see the errors I've made in historical details on Dekpa and Deborah and I cringe. I feel a sympathetic cringe for the creators of Fables.
I enjoyed how they turned Rapunzel into a Japanese style hair monster somewhat like Sadako in Ring and then had her become a babe again.
Anyway, it was a pretty diversion.
I'd heard of Fables but knew next to nothing about the series, I was lured entirely by the bodacious naked lady, who turned out to be Rapunzel. Fables is one of those postmodern series that came out of the '80s and '90s that turned classic fairy tales and fantasy into modern pulp fiction. Though apparently this series ran from 2002 to 2015. The issue I got is a story from 2012. I enjoyed it. It felt very Buffyish with fantastic characters speaking in modern lingo to one another between action sequences and sex scenes.
One thing that took me very much by surprise is that the story largely takes place in Japan. Not only that, but a lot of it takes place in Nara prefecture, where I lived for five years. Of course, I noticed things the writers and artists got wrong. Inaki Miranda and Barry Kitson, the pencilers, and Adam Hughes, the cover artist, produced some beautiful work but somehow they generally couldn't make people look Japanese. One of them also depicts raccoons among Japan's mythological creatures despite the fact that raccoons were only recently introduced as an invasive species. I suspect this comes from a mistranslation of "tanuki" as "raccoon". Wikipedia now has a proper place for the "Japanese raccoon dog" which differs significantly from a raccoon. But I've seen old dictionaries that simply translate "tanuki" as "raccoon".
It's funny how errors about foreign cultures are more charming the older a work of fiction is. I'm quite happy to enjoy the 1940 Thief of Bagdad, chock full of British impressions of the middle east, but this early 2000s impression of Japan from Americans comes off as awkward and hokey. I think it's less because I've had experience in Japan and more because I've had experience as an American fantasy writer. I see the errors I've made in historical details on Dekpa and Deborah and I cringe. I feel a sympathetic cringe for the creators of Fables.
I enjoyed how they turned Rapunzel into a Japanese style hair monster somewhat like Sadako in Ring and then had her become a babe again.
Anyway, it was a pretty diversion.
