Doll Parts: A Lovesick Tale #2 // Review
Madelne just wants to see the world the way that it really is. So she’s looking around in some pretty dark places on the internet. She’s going to find out that things are considerably more dark than she might be prepared for in Doll Parts: A Lovesick Tale #2. Writer/artist Luana Vecchio continues her dark, contemporary coming-of-age story with a mixture of psychological horror and straight-ahead drama. The nuances of identity come to life in another interesting entry into Vecchio’s work that seems to be moving in interesting directions that may yet yield a remarkably insightful conclusion.
There’s a boy in her class who takes an interest. It’s kind of difficult to tell quite what it is that he’s taking an interest in, though. He could be interested in her. He might be interested in doing something with her. He’s definitely interested in some pretty dark stuff, though. Blue eyes and long blond hair like some vision of an angel, but interests that suggest something altogether darker on a whole bunch of different levels that she may not be entirely ready for and she’s not certain what it is that she’s going to be able to do about it.
Vecchio moves Madeline through a series of moments that begin to get progressively moreand more dark without actually overwhelming the reader. To a certain extent, she’s just getting into dark horror that might actually be a part of some very sinister activity somewhere in the edge of it all. There is a good chance that Vecchio may be moving along in directions that might lead somewhere. On the surface, though, it’s not really doing anything that hasn’t been done before from quite a few different angles. Madeline is definitely an Everygirl on a whole bunch of different levels, but the central appeal of the series is her unique personality as it comes across on the page.
Vecchio’s art engages in some interesting dramatic renderings that focus quite a bit on skewed angles and various close-ups to amplify the awkwardness and the strangeness of the whole situation that is being presented to the reader. Some very gruesome aspects of various stories hit page and panel from various directions that don’t quite make the kind of connection that they need to make in order to have a full impact. The full reality of what’s being presented in Madeline’s online excursions rest at odd angles, suggesting that it’s a world that she’s not entirely ready to engage in.
The story feels like it’s definitely going somewhere and there could be some really interesting angles on much of what’s going on around the edges of Madeline’s psyche, but there is still quite a bit of story yet to be revealed as the series ends its second issue. There’s quite a bit of forward momentum as Madeline gets deeper and deeper into potentially dangerous territory surrounding the edges of everything as it all moves forward into the third issue next month.
