European Comic Artists: Kerascoet

This week, I read comics by Kerascoet, a French duo of comic writers. The works I read were Beauty, Beautiful Darkness, and Miss Pas Touche.

Beauty is still my favorite of the three. I first read it in high school. It's one of those graphic novels that you can't put down until you've finished it. I think it's so engrossing because it's such a simple premise, yet the authors know how to escalate the situation. If a woman really did become the most beautiful woman in the world, to a supernatural level, what would happen?

An element that stands out when you read it is that the way Coddie is drawn per panel changes, since the spell she is under doesn't affect her true appearance but the way she is perceived. To me, this helps with the immersion into the story, because you are either seeing Coddie through her own eyes or through the eyes of others.

The other comic that I read for the first time this week was Beautiful Darkness. This comic was actually the first time I'd heard of Kerascoet, in high school, but I didn't read it then. My friend had brought the comic into art one class and was reading it. Even from the cover of the book alone, there was something very disturbing about it to me. In high school I would get very scared of the kind of media that would mix cute and childlike art with grisly horror art. This time, though, I gathered up the courage to read it. Its message about human nature and evil didn't scare me like I thought it would. Maybe because in the years since I was in high school, especially since 2016, I've realized how evil the world can be. What's interesting to me about the characters in the book are that the ones who are trying to hold on to their normal lifestyles instead of adapting are the ones that commit the most evil. Zelie is trying to stay the popular, glamorous princess, with beautiful gowns and servants. In the process, her husband and everyone around her perishes, but she doesn't see the problem with it. She doesn't realize she's being evil, she just thinks she's maintaining her lifestyle. It's a very fascinating book. The watercolor gore does gross me out, though.

Miss Pas Touche was the last one I read, and it's probably my least favorite of the three. It still has beautiful art and themes about human cruelty, but it's not as engrossing and fantastical as the other two. Overall, I'd definitely recommend Kerascoet to anyone interested in European comics.