Django Unchained #7 – Review

By: Quentin Tarantino & Reginald Hudlin (story), R.M. Guéra (art), Giulia Brusco (colors)

The Story: Django’s finally letting loose—everybody run for cover!

The Review: To be honest, it’s a little hard to summon up the appropriate enthusiasm for this final issue—not that the series has stretched on for too long or gotten boring or anything like that.  It just feels like the most exciting parts of the story have already passed.  The deaths of both Calvin Candie and Dr. Schultz, Django’s primary antagonist and most charismatic figure respectively, felt very much like a kind of climax; what’s left now is mostly the wrap-up.

But if one’s idea of tying loose ends involves a lot of blades and guns, even that can be quite entertaining.  Without his mentor to advise restraint, Django completely fulfills the mandate of this title and goes all out in taking down everybody who’s ever wronged him, and when I say everybody, I mean everybody.  Not even the Candyland dogs who fed upon a poor, worn-out Mandingo in #5 get off scot-free.

Django Unchained #6 – Review

By: Quentin Tarantino & Reginald Hudlin (story), Denys Cowan (pencils), John Floyd (inks), Jose Villarubia (colors)

The Story: It takes balls to pull a con on Candyland; they have ways of dealing with that.

The Review: Freedom is best described as intoxicating; it certainly encourages you to take chances and do things you wouldn’t otherwise.  It’s no wonder that most of the regrettable things you’ll ever do in your life happen between ages 18 and 30.  Away from your parents, given the power to eat, say, or do pretty much whatever you want, whenever you want, and the law of averages dictates that good sense will take a backseat sometimes.

Django has been experiencing that wild ride ever since Schultz freed him in #1, and we saw that even from the start he’s taken full advantage of his liberty.  Although satisfied to follow his liberator’s lead most of the time, he’s always made it clear that he does so by his choice alone and that he has no qualms about calling his own shots, even against Schultz’s mild judgment.  Basically, he’s been setting himself up for a fall from day one.  For us modern folk, that means drinking binges and one-night stands; for Django, it’s going to be much, much more painful.

Django Unchained #5 – Review

By: Quentin Tarantino & Reginald Hudlin (story), Danijel Zezlj (art), Giulia Brusco (colors)

The Story: As a glorified butler, it’s probably not a good idea to give lip to a man with guns.

The Review: Last issue, I talked about the hierarchy of disenfranchisement that existed for the African-American population in Django’s world of the antebellum South.  Slaves weren’t the bottom, amazingly enough; that position belonged to the Mandingo fighters, whose value and longevity lasted only as long as their last fight.  At least slaves generally had longer productive lives.  By comparison, house servants lived in the lap of luxury, some more so than others.

I had thought Cleo, with her fine mastery of language skills and social graces, represented the very top of the house servant’s life, but the introduction of Stephen, the steward at Candie’s main estate, proves otherwise.  Not only does he have a position of power in the cushy environment of the indoors, he can take liberties in his behavior to his master that probably no other slave could.  In response to Candie’s warm greeting, he grumbles, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, hello my ass…”  Undaunted, Candie asks if Stephen missed him.  “Yeah, I miss you like I miss a rock in my shoe.”  Stephen even has the privilege of addressing Candie by his first name.

Django Unchained #4 – Review

By: Quentin Tarantino & Reginald Hudlin (story), Jason Latour & R.M. Guéra (art), Giulia Brusco (colors)

The Story: Beware—the following story may be offensive to hillbillies.

The Review: Still haven’t seen the movie, folks.  I’ll get to it eventually, but I really just don’t have two successive hours to spend on anything lately.  But even without seeing it, I’ve heard a great deal about the controversy surrounding the film, though I can’t really comment on the particulars.  I don’t know how Tarantino handled it—I’m sure he added his usual fearless spin to things—but try to remember Django Unchained takes place in a controversial era to begin with.

The use of the word “nigger” is the least of it.  If we thought Schultz’s unhesitating willingness to shoot down a father in front of his son last issue was cold, Django’s lack of mercy in the role of a Mandingo “one-eyed Charlie” here is downright freezing, to the point even his mentor seems sickened.  Seeing Schultz avert his gaze when Django gives the go-ahead to set some dogs upon a runaway slave, Candie remarks, “Your boss looks a little green around the gills for a blood sport like nigger fightin’.”

“Naw, he just ain’t used to seein’ a man ripped apart by dogs, is all,” Django replies.

“But you are used to it?”

“Well, him bein’ German an’ all, I’m a little more used to Americans than he is.”

Django Unchained #3 – Review

By: Quentin Tarantino & Reginald Hudlin (story), Denys Cowan (pencils), John Floyd (inks), Jose Villarubia (colors)

The Story: At the Schultz School and you, too, can learn how to shoot a snowman in the heart.

The Review: To this date, I still haven’t seen the actual movie of Django Unchained, but even just reading its comic book adaptation, I think I’ve caught on to its unique appeal.  It’s a story of opposing forces existing side-by-side: blacks versus whites, the freedom of the bounty hunters versus the servitude of the slaves, the practice of killing without mercy against the travesty of enslaving one’s fellow man.

For an example of these strings of contrasts, you need look no further than in our dual protagonists.  Aside from the differences in their race and class, you can see that there’s a kind of tension between Schultz’s obvious kindness and patience with Django and his utter lack of sympathy for their intended targets.  It’s the kind of strange tension you see with mafia men who nevertheless love their families, and it seems to embody the fundamental paradox of humanity: a species in whom depravity and virtue can coexist very, very comfortably.

Django Unchained #2 – Review

By: Quentin Tarantino & Reginald Hudlin (story), R.M. Guéra & Jason Latour (art), Giulia Brusco (colors)

The Story: It only takes one phony tooth to take out a crowd of surly men.

The Review: It’s something of a luxury to review an adaptation when you’ve never seen the original.  Despite our best open-minded intentions, we tend to get pretty attached to the first version of any story, and anything that comes after seems pale or too different by comparison.  Maybe if I had already seen the movie version of Django Unchained, I might be a little more cautious about the comic, as I might with the cheapie “novel” adaptation of Avatar.

As it stands alone, though, Django Unchained the comic works very well.  The last issue established the premise and introduced the characters with surprising efficiency, and this issue rolls along at nearly the perfect pace, fleshing out the general direction of the story while giving us an outline of what’s to come.  I don’t know Hudlin at all, having never read his run on Black Panther, but he melds his familiarity with the original Django with his comic book writing skills very well to deliver the ideal adaptation.

Django Unchained #1 – Review

By: Quentin Tarantino (story), R.M. Guéra & Jason Latour (art), Giulia Brusco (colors)

The Story: It figures a dentist’s unflinching tolerance for pain makes him an ideal bounty hunter.

The Review: I don’t have too many unreasonable prejudices—I don’t think—and the ones I do have I usually try to suppress whenever possible, but I’ve got to say: I am not a fan of adaptations of any kind, from any one medium to another medium.  Almost always the original intent of the original author gets lost (see the Lord of the Rings films, or 2001: A Space Odyssey, the novel), even when the original author is involved.

Still, I decided to give Django Unchained a shot.  True, I’d never seen the movie (but then, none of us has at this point, presumably) and I really had no idea what the story was even about, but what the heck—live dangerously, I say, especially when the only thing it’ll cost you is three bucks.  I figured an adaptation which basically lifts the original script and provides some nice visuals ought to have a pretty good chance of being as faithful as possible.