OINK: HEAVEN'S BUTCHER review
(Reviewed by Melody Werner)
So at time of writing, I'd been on a big Dark Horse graphic novels kick, reading series like Buzzkill and Bird Boy, then this. Oink is a 2014 graphic novel remastering of a 20 year old series with completely new art, stories, and additional content. Set in an Orwellian grimdark fantasy world and following the titular Oink, an anthropomorphic pig-man hailing from a time when "anthropomorphic" wasn't such a dirty word (thanks, DeviantArt). Done completely by John Mueller, it's a painted spectacle which slouches in the writing department.
Presentation-wise, in terms of the art, Heaven's Butcher is a sight to behold. It has some gorgeously painted backgrounds, characters, and so on. It's definitely the best part about Oink--it's such an exceptional looking series. The character designs are pretty awesome as well, especially some of the demented "Angels" and a few others. It truly breathes life into this dystopian society, doing a better job than the writing department. However, I have to say that in terms of how well it flows in terms of reading, it is a bit of a slog to get through--not due to how wordy it is, that's a point I'll get into later on, but because it's not very straightforward or intuitive, and at times it doesn't really adhere to how people actually read generally (top-left, top-right, bottom-left, bottom-right). Sometimes the narration boxes or dialogue bubbles are placed out of order in such a way that I found myself having to readjust and find out where I was supposed to be reading several times, which is the hallmark of a poorly designed title. It isn't horrendous, it wasn't every page where this kind of disconnect occurred, but comics are supposed to be very easy to digest when it comes to panel-work, and I expect more from a professional publishing house. This isn't some rinky-dink studio--this is one of the big names in the industry and I'd expect them to know the basics. That being said, the cover art and additional content are also really quite awesome to look at. The action sequences have a lot of shrapnel and fire and look great as well. The fire and explosions are also excellently done. All in all, if you're going to be reading Oink, it will probably be because of the impressive, high-fidelity artwork.
Oink's narrative is very half-baked, blasé, and all around just not very compelling. I was reading up on some popular opinions on the series and something that came up was someone saying it was "scatter-brained", which is a critique I disagree with. It's just not very well developed nor executed in any way which I would ever perceive as being "good". It's very run of the mill and the social commentary is practically nonexistent, if that was what you might be looking for. If there was supposed to be some sort of message beyond "yeah, authoritarianism isn't cool" then I think it should've been a bit more ham-fisted (eh?) and actually got whatever point it had across. It's extremely predictable with no twists or turns from the average stories of its ilk, meaning it just feels "okay" at best. The pacing feels way too rushed--while I'm totally cool with one and done graphic novels being a thing, this kind of story feels like it needed to be much more fleshed out for it to really work, and it isn't. The characters are cardboard cutouts, I couldn't care less about any of them, so when they all inevitably die (because this is a story you can read before you've even read it--you'd have to be lobotomized, deaf, and blind not to predict everything that happens in this story within the first 30 or so pages). The dialogue is fairly rote and passive, although it uses some nice flowery rhetoric, it's all flash in the pan in this regard. I mentioned "wordiness" before, and Oink doesn't really have much meat to its bones in regards to dialogue and narration. It's very quick reading, and for something which is supposed to be more high-minded it's really disappointing. At first I was expecting maybe The Sixth Gun kind of flavored dialogue (although this came out far before T6G), but soon I realized that was not the case. And while I appreciate how Oink himself has his own distinct way of speaking, this is not very capitalized on and comes and goes, and frankly, sometimes it's just *utter*ly (get it? Because pigs have utters) unnecessary. Like spelling month "munth". Why? Month already sounds like that, why change the "o" to a "u"? It just makes no sense and adds nothing to the story making that change. It just makes it look like nobody on the editing team knew how to spell month and said "fuck it", but they use the word multiple times and spell it right for every other character, so it had to have been a conscious decision to differentiate how it's spelled when Oink says it. Which makes no sense.
In its totality, Oink: Heaven's Butcher is not a bad GN or even a mediocre one. But it's very middle of the road irregardless and only really holds up as being exceptional in its visuals. It's very much a book you can sit back and read for like thirty minutes or however long, say "wow, very nice imagery", and then put in the back of your mind and never really think about again. It's readable, and fairly pleasant if you're fine with just seeing some cool stuff. If not, then you'll probably revile Heaven's Butcher. Perhaps you do like the premise of seeing a pig man with a hatchet fighting Orwellian dictators, and I'll admit it sounds novel, but you can basically read ten thousand other series like it and get the same out of it, more or less. Oink: Heaven's Butcher gets a 7/10.
Decent
Summary:
A very readable series, relying primarily on its art and relative competence to be enjoyable. The art is superb, however the sub-par narrative, panel-to-panel flow, characters, pacing, and dialogue as well as the nonexistent social commentary and cliche nature make Oink: Heaven's Butcher not something I highly recommend unless you are very fond of the fantastical art and don't mind sitting back and blowing through some wonder ful visuals.
(originally posted: 2/23/2017)
So at time of writing, I'd been on a big Dark Horse graphic novels kick, reading series like Buzzkill and Bird Boy, then this. Oink is a 2014 graphic novel remastering of a 20 year old series with completely new art, stories, and additional content. Set in an Orwellian grimdark fantasy world and following the titular Oink, an anthropomorphic pig-man hailing from a time when "anthropomorphic" wasn't such a dirty word (thanks, DeviantArt). Done completely by John Mueller, it's a painted spectacle which slouches in the writing department.
Presentation-wise, in terms of the art, Heaven's Butcher is a sight to behold. It has some gorgeously painted backgrounds, characters, and so on. It's definitely the best part about Oink--it's such an exceptional looking series. The character designs are pretty awesome as well, especially some of the demented "Angels" and a few others. It truly breathes life into this dystopian society, doing a better job than the writing department. However, I have to say that in terms of how well it flows in terms of reading, it is a bit of a slog to get through--not due to how wordy it is, that's a point I'll get into later on, but because it's not very straightforward or intuitive, and at times it doesn't really adhere to how people actually read generally (top-left, top-right, bottom-left, bottom-right). Sometimes the narration boxes or dialogue bubbles are placed out of order in such a way that I found myself having to readjust and find out where I was supposed to be reading several times, which is the hallmark of a poorly designed title. It isn't horrendous, it wasn't every page where this kind of disconnect occurred, but comics are supposed to be very easy to digest when it comes to panel-work, and I expect more from a professional publishing house. This isn't some rinky-dink studio--this is one of the big names in the industry and I'd expect them to know the basics. That being said, the cover art and additional content are also really quite awesome to look at. The action sequences have a lot of shrapnel and fire and look great as well. The fire and explosions are also excellently done. All in all, if you're going to be reading Oink, it will probably be because of the impressive, high-fidelity artwork.
Oink's narrative is very half-baked, blasé, and all around just not very compelling. I was reading up on some popular opinions on the series and something that came up was someone saying it was "scatter-brained", which is a critique I disagree with. It's just not very well developed nor executed in any way which I would ever perceive as being "good". It's very run of the mill and the social commentary is practically nonexistent, if that was what you might be looking for. If there was supposed to be some sort of message beyond "yeah, authoritarianism isn't cool" then I think it should've been a bit more ham-fisted (eh?) and actually got whatever point it had across. It's extremely predictable with no twists or turns from the average stories of its ilk, meaning it just feels "okay" at best. The pacing feels way too rushed--while I'm totally cool with one and done graphic novels being a thing, this kind of story feels like it needed to be much more fleshed out for it to really work, and it isn't. The characters are cardboard cutouts, I couldn't care less about any of them, so when they all inevitably die (because this is a story you can read before you've even read it--you'd have to be lobotomized, deaf, and blind not to predict everything that happens in this story within the first 30 or so pages). The dialogue is fairly rote and passive, although it uses some nice flowery rhetoric, it's all flash in the pan in this regard. I mentioned "wordiness" before, and Oink doesn't really have much meat to its bones in regards to dialogue and narration. It's very quick reading, and for something which is supposed to be more high-minded it's really disappointing. At first I was expecting maybe The Sixth Gun kind of flavored dialogue (although this came out far before T6G), but soon I realized that was not the case. And while I appreciate how Oink himself has his own distinct way of speaking, this is not very capitalized on and comes and goes, and frankly, sometimes it's just *utter*ly (get it? Because pigs have utters) unnecessary. Like spelling month "munth". Why? Month already sounds like that, why change the "o" to a "u"? It just makes no sense and adds nothing to the story making that change. It just makes it look like nobody on the editing team knew how to spell month and said "fuck it", but they use the word multiple times and spell it right for every other character, so it had to have been a conscious decision to differentiate how it's spelled when Oink says it. Which makes no sense.
In its totality, Oink: Heaven's Butcher is not a bad GN or even a mediocre one. But it's very middle of the road irregardless and only really holds up as being exceptional in its visuals. It's very much a book you can sit back and read for like thirty minutes or however long, say "wow, very nice imagery", and then put in the back of your mind and never really think about again. It's readable, and fairly pleasant if you're fine with just seeing some cool stuff. If not, then you'll probably revile Heaven's Butcher. Perhaps you do like the premise of seeing a pig man with a hatchet fighting Orwellian dictators, and I'll admit it sounds novel, but you can basically read ten thousand other series like it and get the same out of it, more or less. Oink: Heaven's Butcher gets a 7/10.
Decent
Summary:
A very readable series, relying primarily on its art and relative competence to be enjoyable. The art is superb, however the sub-par narrative, panel-to-panel flow, characters, pacing, and dialogue as well as the nonexistent social commentary and cliche nature make Oink: Heaven's Butcher not something I highly recommend unless you are very fond of the fantastical art and don't mind sitting back and blowing through some wonder ful visuals.
(originally posted: 2/23/2017)
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