Comment one: There are more words in the publisher description, or this review, then there are in the entire book of Baboon! by Pau/Pablo Marcos, as it is a wordless graphic novel.
Comment two: I cannot say it better so word for word the publisher’s description: “After the death of its adopted leopard mother, an orphaned baboon wanders the wild in search of companionship and a sense of identity. Stumbling upon the troop of baboons from which it was originally stolen, the baboon falls in love with the troop’s head female. Initially rejected, beaten, and discarded by the alpha baboon of the troop, the orphaned baboon trains to fight and earn its respect in the animal kingdom”
Comment three: How do we know it is the baboon tribe he was taken from? And um, the baboon is only an orphan because the adopted leopard mother killed the baboon’s mother!
Comment four: Why did the leopard cub die? Did I miss something or is it “just one of those things?” But the showing you it is dead was clever, as flies are around the cub. And the reaction of the leopard is intense.
Comment five: I liked how they showed the other way a character/animal dies. Sure, there is some serious natural violence (hey, a leopard must eat, a baboon must chop down on a snake’s body to save the love of his life), but there is a thought bubble that will show the skull of the creature in question. When you cannot have text that says, “Hey, I died.” This works well.
Comment six: I liked how they showed that the baboon in several places was badly injured. Okay, they might not have used nice white sheets, and bandage up a buddy, but it gets the point across. This (along with a few other points) adds humor to an otherwise fairly dark storyline.
Comment seven: Um…. Did we really need the alpha female under the waterfall, with her hips popped out, and her nice, two cheeks sticking protruding? Seriously, I almost blushed (only the peals of laughter at the sheer silliness of it stopped that).
Comment eight: It should not have taken me over 15 minutes to read this book but honestly, there is a lot going on the page and you must study each panel closely.
Comment nine: There are some pop cultural references. To a point. Maybe you see Mr. Miyagi and Daniel during the training scenes, or some other “teacher-student dynamic” but it is there.
Comment ten: To finish saying my other thoughts will deprive you of experiencing this book on your own. I was surprised I liked it as much as I did, but then again, that is probably because I had some interesting dialogue going on in my head.
Finally, I will say while nothing is necessarily inappropriate, it might not be for sensitive readers (you see the deaths, blood, and the beatings of Baboon). Just know you reader to know what ages work best.
