Michael Jackson in Comics!

Pop Rock en BD

by Céka, Patrick Lacan (Illustrator), Felippo Neri (Illustrator)

Well beyond his passing in 2009, Michael Jackson remains one of the most adulated and mysterious stars in the world. Discover in this biography mixing comics and documentary chapters, how the youngest of the Jackson 5 was propelled to the front of the stage and then on to one of the most extraordinary solo careers in music. The next volume in the sellout series featuring the Beatles, the Rolling Stones and Bob Marley.

Genres: Graphic Novels, Comics, Biography, Nonfiction, Bande Dessinée, Music

192 pages, Hardcover

First published March 22, 2010

About the author

Erick Lasnel, see https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%A9ka

Reviews

[Chad · Rating 2 out of 5]

Good for the reader who is casually interested in Michael Jackson's life. The book does seem to be a bit one-sided towards Michael as a victim of the media. This is also about 50% prose as opposed to being told in a graphic format which led me to feeling a bit misled given the title. The format consisted of 20+ chapters all beginning with a page or two of text followed by a few somewhat related pages of comics.

Received a review copy from NBM and Edelweiss. All thoughts are my own and in no way influenced by the aforementioned.

[Bandit · Rating 1 out of 5]

People are a peculiarly judgmental tribe. Everyone judges and, while intellectually it is often based on the latest bylaws laid out by the rampant political correctness of the day, emotionally it’s an entire story altogether.
Which is to say if people like something or someone well enough, they’ll find a way to separate the art from the artist and enjoy the former while reviling the latter. There’s a reason a director who found guilty of having sex with one teenager once (a teenager who grew up to outspokenly forgive him, mind) gets banished from the country while certain public figures commit far greater and often infinitely creepier wrongs and get away with it. It’s all about how much you care. Who do you love, baby?
ABC, it’s easy as one, two, three. Michael Jackson is simply too good of an artist, there’s simply too strong of an emotional connection with his music, to dismiss right out, despite all the alleged (see, there, alleged) crimes he may have committed.
I’ve not actually jumped on this insanely popular bandwagon of true crime documentary serials, but did watch the recent Jackson one with two young men with tears in their eyes describing how Jacko traumatized them with his love. Add that to the other accusers (cases that got dismissed and paid off) and there’s simply too much smoke to not be any fire. But then you hear Billie Jean and your feet start tapping. You see Jackson do a moonwalk and your mind is blown. The songs get stuck on repeat in your mind. It’s still that good, still holds up after all these years. Performers like Jackson come along once in the bluest of moons. And we forgive them a lot.
But maybe not as much as this book does. This obsequiously fawning biography has outdone itself on the forgive and forget spectrum. Someone must have had the sale on whitewash, because boy oh boy, did they whitewash this thing. And no, it isn’t a stab at the fact that MJ started life as a black man and ended it as a white woman facsimile. Another fairly odd factor that the book avoids discussing.
A lot of it might be down to the act that this is a French book and the French are notoriously more permissive when it comes to certain things. They have, after all, welcomes Polanski and just look at the long career Luc Besson has enjoyed. So it’s entirely possible that they are just very comfortable and happy with MJ as he was and are perfectly willing to explain away any controversial aspects. The Frenchness of it also might explain the weird attempts to present Jackson as a sort of playboy or ladies men. No, no, and no. His most significant relationships were with older mommy types celebs, like Diana Ross (possibly the weirdest one in there for a boy who already technically had a mother).
So, as far as biographies go, this is a reasonably comprehensive, albeit insanely biased, one. It follows Jackson along from early childhood to death, with all the significant events inbetween. It concentrates heavily on his horribly abusive father. It presents (quite rightly) Jackson as a musical genius and a savvy businessman (buying up that Beatles catalog straight from under his pal Paul), negotiating with MTV for representation, etc. It barely grazes on his kids and how weird, weird, weird that entire thing was. It features Neverland heavily, and it’s worth mentioning that in a dream sequence with Pan discussing Neverland, Pan is, oddly enough, shirtless.
And it focuses heavily on how much MJ loved kids (the right way) and how many charities he had donated to. Which is all really great, but to paraphrase the old joke, it doesn’t matter if you give away millions of dollars to charity, you molest one kid and you’re a pedo for life. Except, in France, that is.
So that’s content. The rest …well, the book is structured like this, a biographical essay and a comic about it, over and over again. The essays as mentioned are biased, the comics are plain ugly. All except for the last one and the fun one with the chimp Bubbles. Just ugly, grotesque and at times caricaturish enough to be taken as offensive.
The sum total leaves a lot, a lot, to be desired. It might be educational for some who doesn’t know a thing about Jackson if such a person can be found in this day and age, but it isn’t a great or even an accurate representation of a complex character, who for all his faults, remains the King of Pop. Pass.

This and more at https://advancetheplot.weebly.com/

[Vanessa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Title: Michael Jackson in Comics!
Author: Ceka
Format: eBook
Publication Date: February 12, 2020

Thank you Edelweiss for the free eARC in exchange for a honest review!

Description: Well beyond his passing in 2009, Michael Jackson remains one of the most adulated and mysterious stars in the world. Discover in this biography mixing comics and documentary chapters, how the youngest of the Jackson 5 was propelled to the front of the stage and then on to one of the most extraordinary solo careers in music. The next volume in the sellout series featuring the Beatles, the Rolling Stones and Bob Marley.

Thoughts: As I HUGE Michael Jackson fan, when I saw this available on Edelweiss, I was definitely going to request to read and review this graphic novel/novel. And I'm so glad I did. This was a fantastic look at the life and legacy of Michael Jackson without all of the tabloid fodder. The only reason I didn't give this book 5 stars is because I was expecting a graphic novel...not a novel with graphics. Other than that, I loved the book. It didn't have much information that I didn't know was a superfan but it would be a good book for new or casual Michael Jackson fans.

Ratings: 4 out of 5 Stars

[Hannah · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is good at creating empathy for Michael Jackson and the rough life the guy had. However, the format of half text/comic was annoying. Also, the comic style changing for each section made it hard to enjoy any style as it constantly changed.

[Markus Seaberry · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this, it covered most of MJ’s life

[Bookwurm637 · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a bit of a disappointment for me. I'm a big MJ fan, and this brought nothing new or innovative to the narrative. In fact, I was really disappointed in the illustrations, which looked nothing like MJ or his brothers.

[François Guevremont · Rating 2 out of 5]

Je ne connaissais rien de la vie de l'icône, une introduction correcte, mais j'ai senti l'auteur très "protecteur" du chanteur, voire victimisant.

Y'a probablement des biographies qui valent plus la peine et qui sont plus nuancées.

[Neon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Five freaking Stars. ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

I don't know what I expected when I first picked this up, but I haven't been able to put it down.

Michael's story is so powerful, sad and mysterious.

I mean, what did we really know about him?

I know more than I did before reading this graphic novel / novel. I have deep sympathy for him and the people whose life he changed. Even with the contraversies against and surrounding him, he still leaves a place there.

I would highly recommend this book for anyone who is a fan or who is just wanting to know more.

I would buy this.

[Libby · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'd hoped this would be a supplemental biography for my library collection, but it was more of a collection of tributes. I certainly learned some things, but the lack of citations, poor editing, and somewhat scattered organization does not make this a good source for research--and despite the graphic novel format, it's not written for kids or students.

[Sammy McGregor · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is amazing! I loved every second. It addresses every aspect of MJ's life, the good, the bad, and everything in between. It is honest, even when you'd rather it wasn't and gives a true account of the man behind the legend. A worthwhile read for any fan, or anyone curious about HIStory.

[Victoria · Rating 2 out of 5]

this book jumps all over the place in art and storytelling it gets basic facts wrong in the moton section ive read a ton of books on mj snd this is the wrost ive read since he died some of ther art was nice what a bad cash grab

[Andréa]

Note: I accessed a digital review copy of this book through Edelweiss.

[Marsten · Rating 4 out of 5]

Una buena biografía sobre la vida y los logros de Michael Jackson conjugando textos con cómics.
Me gusta mucho el binomio de un texto biográfico sobre un aspecto del artista como introducción a la historia en cómic que lo complementa. Los cómics son todos de diferentes autores con estilos, enfoques y tonos diversos, pero siempre todos bastante originales y hechos des del respeto y el rigor documental. El humor también tiene cabida en algunas de ellas y tienen su gracia. En definitiva, todas tienen su interés sea por la razón que sea.
La introducción del Mag Lari es bonita. Y la encuesta tipo test de 50 preguntas para saber si eres un buen fan de MJ que se encuentra uno al final del libro está muy bien confeccionada, pues algunas preguntas no se resuelven o comentan en el libro y eso le da más dificultad y valor.
Se lee muy rápido y de forma amena, el libro da una visión amplia y con bastantes datos de la vida del cantante y creo que es una biografía y un tipo de edición apto para todos los públicos: fan y desconocedores de MJ, pequeños y adultos.

[Delphine · Rating 5 out of 5]

Une belle BD qui donne envie d’en lire plus et de se replonger dans les vidéos des moments musicaux mythiques du King of Pop. J’ai aimé le concept et la présentation de la série : chaque section commence par une courte intro, suivit d’une anecdote illustrée par un artiste différent. On retrace ainsi le parcours de MJ, les hauts, les bas, et malgré tout ce qui reste c’est son talent, sa musique, éternelle, magique.
J’ai hâte de découvrir les autres titres de la série comme Bob Marley ou encore les Beatles.