Fables

I was always recommended Fables when I talked about how much I liked The Sandman.

This isn’t a grand story about the power of story or a new perspective on old tales. It’s a lot of stories with the names of characters you’ve heard of before.

The characters are only loosely connected to their sources and they change abilities and temperament to suit the plot of the week.

We learn nothing, we don’t grow while reading it and one thing just sort of happens after another. There are real risks and losses though! The author doesn’t wiggle out of death or consequences, which gives some stakes to the conflicts.

I would not recommend this to someone who says they loved The Sandman.

Fables is one of the best ongoing comic series, in my opinion (although it did stop... And then has started again? This is the first compendium of four, which covers the original run of 150 issues).

Essentially, all your fairy tale characters are real, and have fled into the mundane world, living in New York. The reason for their departure from their various "Homelands" is due to an enemy known only as "The Adversary", who's swept over the various fable lands, killing and conquering.

What I think is really good, and the real strength of this series, is the sheer amount of depth that is allowed and explored in what are very familiar characters, and then how they fit in with each other and as a community.

I would, and do, thoroughly recommend this series to anyone.