The Unwritten Vol. 1: Tommy Taylor and the Bogus Identity (DC/Vertigo)

The Unwritten Vol. 1: Tommy Taylor and the Bogus Identity

DC/Vertigo

Written by Mike Carey; Art by Peter Gross

May 07, 2010 Web Exclusive By Jeremy Nisen

The Unwritten is an ongoing comic book series from DC’s Vertigo imprint. The first trade collection, Tommy Taylor and the Bogus Identity is available, and collects issues 1-5, plus it includes some background and sketch material at the end.

It starts out interestingly enough: Tom Taylor is a sort of Christopher Robin cum Harry Potter figure. His father was a highly successful author whose popular book series starred a protagonist that is named Tommy Taylor. With his father long presumed dead, Tom Taylor, the real person, makes his living by pandering to fans of his fictional cipher; signing books and posing for photos at conventions and the like.

But when accusations regarding Taylor’s true past surface, everything he thought he knew comes into question. With those accusations come intrigue, secret societies, conspiracy theories, and seemingly meta-textual supernatural phenomena occurring.

The story ramps up quickly and is more interesting the further you get into it. Plus there’s an excellent fictional historical revisionist chapter concerning Rudyard Kipling and his importance to the ongoing tale. In fact, that’s the issue that turned Unwritten from merely “very good” into “can’t miss.” Writers (aspiring or otherwise) and fantasy fans should dig this for its text, subtext, beautiful layouts, and plain old weirdness. (www.dccomics.com/vertigo)

Author rating: 7/10

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Average reader rating: 6/10

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Eilonvi
June 9th 2010
10:54pm

I wander why it’s called the unwritten :) maybe the unwritten is the reality fiction, as opposed to fantasy which is the written fiction, and both kinda mesh in this comics.

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