The Crow by James O'Barr (U.S.A.) 1981-1989. In Italy published between October and December 1994 by General Press

Few works unite such heterogeneous parallel events as the famous graphic novel by American O'Barr: an expiatory novel, a representation of a subculture, and finally (with a five-year delay and aided by a famous film adaptation) a mass phenomenon that heavily and paradoxically influenced (as we will see) an entire decade, the '90s, of course.

The Expiatory Novel:

James O'Barr conceived "The Crow" following a tragic event: the death, in 1978, caused by a truck driver (never traced) of his girlfriend and fiancée Bethany. After an initial shock that led him into a self-destructive spiral for two long years, in the early '80s, James decided that he needed to find a way to exorcise his pain by making it public and the best way was to engage in what he knew how to do best: drawing. The writing of the graphic novel was slow and troubled and it turned into a cathartic journey that lasted almost a decade and ultimately produced one of the darkest and most violent stories, ever told in comics.

The world depicted in the work is dark, pessimistic, and hopeless, only violence seems to be the logical thread that connects every human affair: from an act of violence (the double murder of the protagonist and his girlfriend) the story unfolds and in a fiercely violent act (the final reckoning), almost to the point of brushing the senseless, it reaches its conclusion, which does not bring peace and serenity but only the bare awareness of having purified a desire for revenge in blood destined to remain never completely satisfied. It would be easy to grasp the metaphor of an O'Barr who criticizes the pursuit of revenge (at all costs) by portraying it in the most raw possible way, but in reality (unlike the film) this is not the author's aim, rather it is to paint a fresco where evil has no logical sense (except to feed itself) and where the "cure" lies in responding with the same devastating mechanics: only partly sweetened by the compassion that is due only to the dead.

"Eric: I am the pilot's error, the unexpected abortion, the crazy chromosome... I am the complete and total madness... I am the fear..."

Subtle flashbacks on the sweetness of a past, now buried, never serve as a refuge but, on the contrary, project both protagonist and readers into a dramatically self-contained universe, portrayed strictly in black and white, sometimes grainy, sometimes dense with details, where O'Barr lays all his nightmares and mourning and the only comfort is knowing he has managed to tell them.

Representation of a Subculture:

It is already clear from the premises that O'Barr takes with full hands from a very specific cultural layer that is not wrong to frame within the limits of the Dark-Wave British experience between the '70s and '80s (some panels magically recall melodic imagery à la Joy Division) and all the preceding influences that the same drew upon (the 19th-century English Romanticism and French Symbolism, the Enlightenment, etc. etc.).

Contributing further to these references is the intimate portrayal of a protagonist who goes to overturn all the stereotypes of the fearless and unblemished hero (the first denied by Eric's state of death and the "lucid madness," allow me the Shakespearean quote, that follows, the second by the fact that every action derives from the presence of that "original sin" that must be sought in the incapacity of the human being to protect the things we love). You may well insult me, but if I have to seek parallels with other comics, the only one that comes to mind is "The Dark Knight Returns" by Miller.

Adding one plus one, we are all capable, I think, and thus once the outlines are defined, it appears clear that the image of the Dark "Modus Vivendi" (the "beauty" in feeling defeated) appears more than clear, and "The Crow" is an anthology of all these sensations and in a sense a philosophical summa in images.

A philosophical summa that, among other things, does nothing to hide itself but, on the contrary, proudly displays all its wounds, making heroic what was born antiheroic.

Mass Phenomenon:

I omit all issues regarding the film (I can only say that I never liked it), from plot modifications to conceptual ones, which must be dealt with in a review of the adaptation, not here, but I just wanted to point out (because it is undeniable that 99% of people discovered the comic through the movie theaters) that not always do bad things bring negative consequences (I used the term paradoxical above, remember?). O'Barr's work already lends itself (for the narrative timing) to a cinematic version: what didn't work, however, was the association, subsequent to the film, of the term "Cursed Work" also to the comic because "The Crow" per se is absolutely not. It is perhaps a NeoGothic Novel, also a Horror Feuilleton but the author's intention was not to establish a "cursed" story but only to represent a nihilistic and squalid world: there is a difference between being something and wanting to be its allegory, right?

The fact is, fortunately, that the audience is not that stupid (at least the one O'Barr speaks to firsthand) and after the storm of all the layering, the concept seems to have remained, not its artificial contour, and so, if we had to resort to Hollywood to make this important example of literature in images known, it was perhaps worth holding our noses.

The important thing is that when asked "The Crow Icon of the '90s?" you should answer "No" (both temporally and philosophically).

And you know how much I love that decade...

Conclusions:

I haven't made many mentions of the plot because I think it's very well known and because I believe that in a review it can also be omitted for the benefit of those (like myself, for example) who prefer to enjoy it without knowing too much, but I wanted to finish this little piece with a completely personal reflection on it: we are not always masters of our destiny but are often children of what, despite ourselves, is imposed on us, the difference between action and blind reaction is the difference between being "alive" and "dead." Here the latter is left, indeed, to a dead man.

 

C.G. (Girlanachronism)

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