Myst reviewed Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie
Unfortunately not on point. (reviewing the graphic novel, not the story of A. Christie)
2 stars
Unfortunately not on point. This review is specifically regarding the graphic novel interpretation of the classic, not the classic as such.
The bar is set high with (Sir) David Suchet, so anything that comes after will have to try very hard to at least reach that bar when it comes to visualising the stories of Agatha Christie. Unfortunately this graphic novel by Bob Al-Greene does not make the cut. While I do understand that as a one-man-army providing expensive illustrations and the editting of the story you have limited resources, the graphic novel still does not suffice. Al-Greene implemented many tricks to convey emotions, motion and tension in the images, just not well enough. To give one example: The construction of Poirot as a character fails as the dialogues are very brief and the drawing of Poirot is outrageously poor - he looks like the Monopoly-man! No emotions shown, no …
Unfortunately not on point. This review is specifically regarding the graphic novel interpretation of the classic, not the classic as such.
The bar is set high with (Sir) David Suchet, so anything that comes after will have to try very hard to at least reach that bar when it comes to visualising the stories of Agatha Christie. Unfortunately this graphic novel by Bob Al-Greene does not make the cut. While I do understand that as a one-man-army providing expensive illustrations and the editting of the story you have limited resources, the graphic novel still does not suffice. Al-Greene implemented many tricks to convey emotions, motion and tension in the images, just not well enough. To give one example: The construction of Poirot as a character fails as the dialogues are very brief and the drawing of Poirot is outrageously poor - he looks like the Monopoly-man! No emotions shown, no facial expressions (!). Drawing Poirot setting the cuttlery straight does not do him justice. Another example: The scenery and figures are drawn as hardly more than basic geometric shapes of one colour, the figures conveying/radiating as much emotion and personality as mannequins. What I did appreciate are the small tricks that DO work, such as the recollection of details on p. 89 or 210 or the viewing of evidence (p. 88), and the set up of dialogues - sometimes in continous boxes left and right, which really conveys the "train journey" feeling.
