[(On the Odd Hours )] [Author: Éric Liberge] [May-2010]

by Éric Liberge

The highly successful series of graphic novels co-published with the Louvre museum in Paris ( when the works of art come alive. Our a deaf night watchman who somehow manages to communicate with the souls of those ethereal and timeless works of art. A visual tour de force with a strong edge of the frighteningly fantastic.

Genres: Graphic Novels, Comics, Art, Fantasy, Bande Dessinée, Fiction, Graphic Novels Comics

Unknown Binding

First published January 1, 2008

About the author

Né en 1965, Éric Liberge déclare avoir toujours dessiné. Depuis 1977, il hantait déjà ses feuilles volantes avec des fresques entières de petits squelettes. En 1996 il se lance dans le projet Monsieur Mardi-Gras Descendres. Ce sont les revues "PLG", "Ogoun" et "Golem" qui, les premières, acceptent de publier quelques courts extraits du Petit monde du Purgatoire. Achevé en 1998, le tome 1, Bienvenue !, est publié par Zone créative. Prix René Goscinny 1999, l'album est réédité chez Pointe Noire. En 2002, après trois albums, il met de côté sa série phare et publie Tonnerre Rampant puis Métal, chez Soleil dans la collection Latitudes. En 2004, les éditions Dupuis rééditent les trois premiers volumes de Monsieur Mardi-Gras Descendres qui sont suivis en 2005 par la sortie du quatrième et dernier volume inédit. Par ailleurs, Éric Liberge démarre en 2003 une collaboration en cinq tomes avec Denis-Pierre Filippi, Les Corsaires d'Alcibiade chez Dupuis dont l'action se situe dans l'Angleterre du XIXe siècle. En 2008, il publie Aux heures Impaires, un album carte-blanche sur le musée du Louvre aux éditions Futuropolis. Son nouveau projet en auteur complet, L'Empire du rêve est un regard sur la violence des hommes en temps de guerre à travers une croisée de destins pendant la Seconde Guerre mondiale, est prévu chez Dupuis pour le printemps 2011.

Reviews

[April · Rating 1 out of 5]

I actually didn't like this. It's pretty and the plot has potential, but it just abruptly ends and I felt like the characters and their motivations weren't well developed. I did like the authentic feel of references to the deaf community's culture and their experience amongst the hearing, but other than that I really felt like it lacked something.

[Barbara · Rating 3 out of 5]

Like some of the other books in this Louvre-sponsored series, this book begins and ends rather abruptly, as if there's more to the story than is told in this one-off book. Again, the art is very competent, but would look better in a larger format (I am assuming the original French publication was "album" size).
What is really interesting to me about this book is the way it represents sign language in speech balloons. The panels capture one or of the relevant hand gestures, but the full text is in the balloons, which have tails pointing at the hands of the "speaker," instead of the mouth, and these tails are also more curled, so indicate the movement of the hands. Or at least, that's my reading. I've never seen that usage before and like it a lot.

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

As someone interested in the relationship between museums and sound, this book has been incredibly thought-provoking. This story of a rebellious young deaf musician who unwittingly becomes a phantasmagoric night-shift museum guard at the Louvre explores themes of alienation, madness, mysticism, musicality, the relationship between sound and museum objects, and the effects of time on the museum experience. The artwork is superb, and the storytelling is rapid without being overwhelming. A follow-up article laying out a brief history of the museum guards at the Louvre provides some real world context for the story's supernatural thesis. An absolutely fascinating read.

[Edwin Piston · Rating 3 out of 5]

Me gusta la idea del museo vivo, me encantaría ver alguna novela de ese estilo.

La creación de guardias especiales para gente sorda (como en este caso) la desconocía, buena medida para incluir a esas personas en el museo.

[StrictlySequential · Rating 2 out of 5]

Grooooooaaaaaannnn.

The premise was a great idea but it's done in such an annoying way. Are you supposed to feel sympathy for this doofus assneck because he's deaf? Because he had a rough childhood? He's about as likeable as a rankly tart fart schart to the face- he ruins the entire book!

Instead of sticking to the wonders of the museum and the interesting nature of their "releases" with the main character orchestrating them the author boors you with all the stuff you don't care about- the difficulties, all currently self-imposed, that a character who you will hate burdens himself with.

It's a long read for how few pages it comprises and without the wonders of the museum in the backdrop I would have hated it.

The art is above average and he draws moronic museum patrons in funny ways but it's not good enough to compensate in any way for the frustrations listed above.

[Elna · Rating 2 out of 5]

A wonderful idea but with poor execution. The characters are clearly pasted from one panel to another, the sequences of the artwork coming to life are muddied and hard to appreciate, and the main character is annoying and obstinate. To the detriment of the story most of the focus is on him rather than the museum at night.

[Chan · Rating 1 out of 5]

I found the main character very hard to like. Sure, a character can have their flaws, but hitting his girlfriend and his a**hole-ish tendencies just weren’t acceptable to me. I couldn’t really understand the ending. It felt very abrupt; the art works were freed and he can return everything back to normal if he gets his job back, AND THEN? Is he getting his job back?

[Tufriel · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wish the plot and nightly “freeing” process was more developed. The handover to Bastien, an unlikely successor who is depicted as a dislikeable, spoiled and violent character, was too abrupt as was the ending. Extra stars for the brilliant depictions of the freeing of the works of art.

[Todd Glaeser · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another in a series of comics co-published with the Louvre.

[H. Givens · Rating 1 out of 5]

Hitting women and teenagers doesn't make you a radical art-appreciation visionary, it just makes you a violent asshole.

[Oopsydoxie · Rating 4 out of 5]

J'ai acheté cette bd après en avoir découvert quelques planches au musée de la BD à Bruxelles, j'étais tombé amoureuse du style graphique. Et je suis bien contente d'avoir pu lire cette oeuvre.

[Jennb_9 · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5

[Fila Trece (Liantener) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Una obra dispareja. Lo que me gustó: El concepto es muy bueno, sobre personas especiales que pueden conectarse con el arte, y sobre las piezas de arte requiriendo cuidados. El arte también me gustó, bien trazado y rompiendo esquemas de orden, se vuelve muy ágil. Sin embargo lo malo opaca a la bueno: tenemos un protagonista sordomudo, con el cuál queremos empatizar, pero que el autor se empeña en hacerlo insoportable. Perdemos mucho tiempo con sus malas decisiones y sus pleitos con la gente que le rodea, en vez de profundizar en el museo y sus necesidades, las cuáles quedan inconclusas. Si el autor quería hablar en favor de los sordomudos, no lo logró; si quería hablar sobre el alma de las obras de arte, lo logró a medias; Si quería hacer una obra de misterio, tampoco lo logró.

[Alicia]

I’m not sure how I feel about this book. As others have noted it begins and ends rather abruptly. There was a moment where it’s implied those working the night shift are going slightly insane due to sleep deprivation, but that doesn’t easily go anywhere. I was expecting much different from this book, I was under the impression that the main character would have more conversations with the paintings and was looking forward to that aspect. I liked that the paintings had to be freed every so often in order to keep them better under control for the general public, this was an interesting concept. I get the feeling that the book would have been more successful if it had been longer ABS better able to explore this concept and developed the characters more. The moment when the main character punches the kid who puts gum in the painting and then promptly gets fired happened so fast and didn’t seem to jive with what the book was trying to do. I feel like we could have gotten rid of that scene and the results still would have been the same.

The art is gorgeous and I really enjoyed the depiction of sign language and a look into the world of the Deaf. I feel like it’s an important look at the marginalization of Deaf and hearing impaired.

[Jeff · Rating 4 out of 5]

This third installment in the series of graphic novels co-produced between ComicsLit and the Musée du Louvre lives up to the enigmatic standards already established in this series, and succeeds more artfully in telling a compelling story. Eric Liberge's deaf protagonist is the most fully-developed character then we have seen in this series so far, and the notion of using a deaf character to interact with the artworks of the Louvre is a highly effective plot device. In a similar vein to the Glacial Period title in this series, On the Odd Hours climaxes with a freeing of the artworks themselves, seemingly suggesting that the sequestering of these treasures behind the walls of a museum is a sad fate for them and for humanity. With a more cohesive story and some beautiful artwork by Liberge, On the Odd Hours is the best title in this series thus far.

[Stephen · Rating 2 out of 5]

Well... looks beautiful; has some interesting use of speech balloons. But... the actual panels were too busy and dense for the comic to flow nicely; and the plot made little sense, and I didn't care in the end. Was a bit of a chore to finish it.

One note on the balloons - the main character's deaf, and many people communicate with sign-language, so the tails on the balloons tended to wriggle around, indicating the motion of the characters' hands.

[Meepelous · Rating 3 out of 5]

A four star premise with a two star plot and characters. I'm willing to accept all the fantastical things happening to this guy, but he (and all the people around him) seem hardly believable as characters. The plot line does not serve the fantasy element, but rather makes it more confusing and disconnected.

[Brittany ♡ ♥ ♡ ♥ · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was not a book for me....
My choosing of the 3 stars was because this was not something that interested me.

This was a good/well put together graphic novel, but it was just not my cup of tea.

[HadiDee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Third of the Louvre graphic novels and the one I've enjoyed the most. The lead character was the well developed and the animated museum pieces worked better in this than the previous title.

[Solange Guillen · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is my second book from the Louvre-sponsored series.
The illustrations are gorgeous, but I found the plot too vague and a poor development of the characters.