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Meyer
A Breaking Bad style imaginary biography of the legendary Jewish mobster, Meyer Lansky, as he attempts to organize his very last con job…
Old Meyer Lansky wants others to believe he's wasting away in a retirement home... That way he can take care of some unfinished business in peace. But when a young janitor accidentally involves himself, the two embark on a wild and unlawful adventure -- the destination of which neither is quite sure.
An immigrant's story in the guise of an old mobster's tale...
Old Meyer Lansky wants others to believe he's wasting away in a retirement home... That way he can take care of some unfinished business in peace. But when a young janitor accidentally involves himself, the two embark on a wild and unlawful adventure -- the destination of which neither is quite sure.
An immigrant's story in the guise of an old mobster's tale...
120 pages, Paperback
Published September 24, 2019
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
November 1, 2020
Posits that Meyer Lansky went on one last caper while living in a retirement home in Florida. The story was confusing and hard to follow. Some of that was due to the art. A lot of characters looked the same, especially the thugs of the various factions after Lansky. I couldn't keep them straight. Overall just not entertaining at all. I couldn't wait for it to end.
October 23, 2019
I won this via goodreads giveaways in exchange for an honest review. All my opinions are my own.
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Artwork: 3.5 stars
Characters: 3 stars
Story: 3.25 stars
3.25 stars overall?
Anyways.. this was just "okay" for me. I think this is best read in one sitting and not over the course of a few days as happened with me (Real Life stuff happened, to make it a short story).
It felt like I was missing some info during the story and some elements felt rushed to me.
Overall, I wouldn't read it again *shrugs* You may feel differently than I did.
Meyer is an interesting figure though, I will look up more on him later.
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Artwork: 3.5 stars
Characters: 3 stars
Story: 3.25 stars
3.25 stars overall?
Anyways.. this was just "okay" for me. I think this is best read in one sitting and not over the course of a few days as happened with me (Real Life stuff happened, to make it a short story).
It felt like I was missing some info during the story and some elements felt rushed to me.
Overall, I wouldn't read it again *shrugs* You may feel differently than I did.
Meyer is an interesting figure though, I will look up more on him later.
January 12, 2020
This wants to be a senior citizen action/comedy crime movie like Going in Style, Red, or The Old Man and the Gun. Spinning off the fact that organized crime figure Meyer Lanksy actually lived to be a retired man in his 80s in 1980s Florida, this fiction imagines him going on the lam from his nursing home for one last spree to get something or other from someplace or other before something happens? The plot relies on stupid coincidences and lots of supposedly scary people running after Lansky and his accomplice, attempting to kill them but always just failing short, though lots of other people get killed along the way.
Dumb and boring.
Dumb and boring.
November 21, 2019
I’ve been “off” graphic novels for a while now, without quite knowing why. This one is not going to change that trend.
As someone who writes about Jews in organized crime, I figured I almost had to read this one. It’s described as a late-career imagining of Meyer Lansky, and it’s even blurbed by Lansky’s grandson, Meyer Lansky II. So I figured it had to be interesting as history.
Well, no. It isn’t.
Apart from a handful of references that you might get out of a Wikipedia article, there’s little insight into the nature of Lansky’s long and intriguing criminal career. Our fictional Lansky here spits out clichés about how to be tough and how to outsmart others, but none have any particular links to the particular experiences of the man.
There’s even a small point when, talking to a young Cuban Jewish immigrant he’s befriended, he says, “You look a little like Bugsy.” The reference is to Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel, but – as anyone who’s read Robert Lacey’s masterful biography of Lansky should know – Siegel’s friends were scrupulous in calling him “Ben.” That’s minor, I know, but when a man is as secretive as Lansky was, it seems we ought to respect the handful of quirks we know about when we try to imagine him in history.
And, besides, I figured, this didn’t have to be history. If it were a good story, it wouldn’t matter if it departed from the historical record.
Well, it isn’t.
For reasons we never learn, Lansky opens the novel living incognito in a retirement home. Then, for reasons that we learn only vaguely, he determines to take part in some crime (is it recovering a sunken load of heroin? Is it taking out the local “Godmother” of Cuban smuggling? Is it accomplishing something for his one-time protégé “Legs” Friedman?) which will obscurely qualify him for citizenship under the Israeli Law of Return.
As all that suggests, I’m unpersuaded by the premises and ultimately uninterested in the outcome. It makes no sense to me why this character had to be Lansky – why not an invented aging Jewish gangster – and then it makes no sense to me that he’s doing what he does.
With all that, I’m not in love with the illustrations either. I like the way they evoke a time and place – Miami in the early 1980s – and I like the story’s general evocation of that world as well.
In the end, though, I’m just not hooked by this one, and I think it may be a while before I give another graphic novel a shot.
As someone who writes about Jews in organized crime, I figured I almost had to read this one. It’s described as a late-career imagining of Meyer Lansky, and it’s even blurbed by Lansky’s grandson, Meyer Lansky II. So I figured it had to be interesting as history.
Well, no. It isn’t.
Apart from a handful of references that you might get out of a Wikipedia article, there’s little insight into the nature of Lansky’s long and intriguing criminal career. Our fictional Lansky here spits out clichés about how to be tough and how to outsmart others, but none have any particular links to the particular experiences of the man.
There’s even a small point when, talking to a young Cuban Jewish immigrant he’s befriended, he says, “You look a little like Bugsy.” The reference is to Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel, but – as anyone who’s read Robert Lacey’s masterful biography of Lansky should know – Siegel’s friends were scrupulous in calling him “Ben.” That’s minor, I know, but when a man is as secretive as Lansky was, it seems we ought to respect the handful of quirks we know about when we try to imagine him in history.
And, besides, I figured, this didn’t have to be history. If it were a good story, it wouldn’t matter if it departed from the historical record.
Well, it isn’t.
For reasons we never learn, Lansky opens the novel living incognito in a retirement home. Then, for reasons that we learn only vaguely, he determines to take part in some crime (is it recovering a sunken load of heroin? Is it taking out the local “Godmother” of Cuban smuggling? Is it accomplishing something for his one-time protégé “Legs” Friedman?) which will obscurely qualify him for citizenship under the Israeli Law of Return.
As all that suggests, I’m unpersuaded by the premises and ultimately uninterested in the outcome. It makes no sense to me why this character had to be Lansky – why not an invented aging Jewish gangster – and then it makes no sense to me that he’s doing what he does.
With all that, I’m not in love with the illustrations either. I like the way they evoke a time and place – Miami in the early 1980s – and I like the story’s general evocation of that world as well.
In the end, though, I’m just not hooked by this one, and I think it may be a while before I give another graphic novel a shot.
June 21, 2024
Dieser Comic erzählt uns von Meyer Lansky, der in einem Altersheim in Florida einen letzten Raubzug unternehmen will. Die Geschichte ist verwirrend und schwer zu verfolgen, was zum Teil auch an den Zeichnungen liegt. Viele Figuren sehen gleich aus, vor allem die Schläger der verschiedenen Fraktionen, die hinter Lansky her sind, die konnte ich mitunter kaum auseinanderhalten. Insgesamt auch einfach nicht unterhaltsam – wollte zwischendrin schon abbrechen.
Der Roman basiert auf der Tatsache, dass Meyer Lansky in den 1980er Jahren in Florida als Rentner lebt, und er aus seinem Altersheim flieht, um ein letztes Mal etwas in die Finger zu bekommen, bevor etwas passiert? Die Handlung beruht auf dummen Zufällen und vielen Gestalten, die Lansky und seinem Komplizen hinterher eilen und versuchen, beide zu töten, aber doch immer wieder knapp scheitern, wobei auf dem Weg dorthin so einige andere unschuldige Menschen getötet werden.
Ich hatte das Gefühl, dass mir einige Informationen während der Geschichte fehlten und einige Elemente wirkten auf mich übereilt. Meyer ist allerdings eine interessante Figur, da gibt’s im Internet mit Sicherheit interessantes über ihn zu lesen. Dieser Band gehört allerdings nicht dazu.
Der Roman basiert auf der Tatsache, dass Meyer Lansky in den 1980er Jahren in Florida als Rentner lebt, und er aus seinem Altersheim flieht, um ein letztes Mal etwas in die Finger zu bekommen, bevor etwas passiert? Die Handlung beruht auf dummen Zufällen und vielen Gestalten, die Lansky und seinem Komplizen hinterher eilen und versuchen, beide zu töten, aber doch immer wieder knapp scheitern, wobei auf dem Weg dorthin so einige andere unschuldige Menschen getötet werden.
Ich hatte das Gefühl, dass mir einige Informationen während der Geschichte fehlten und einige Elemente wirkten auf mich übereilt. Meyer ist allerdings eine interessante Figur, da gibt’s im Internet mit Sicherheit interessantes über ihn zu lesen. Dieser Band gehört allerdings nicht dazu.
May 23, 2021
This is another comic trying to be a buddy cop movie. It's no a bad one, story is sometimes fun, and self contained, but the art is lacking, and doesn't make it stand out at least i that department.
Just ok, but doesn't do something interesting script wise or art wise to make it memorable.
Just ok, but doesn't do something interesting script wise or art wise to make it memorable.
December 18, 2019
Interesting idea, decent art, ok story.
February 6, 2022
Well-paced Gangster story.
February 25, 2024
Garbage!
December 11, 2019
I’m ready for a sequel, farshtay!
November 25, 2019
This book was given to my son-in-law who loves comics and grapic novels.
I knew this was a book he would like and I was right.
It makes me happy to match a book with a reader.
I knew this was a book he would like and I was right.
It makes me happy to match a book with a reader.
Want to read
November 22, 2019I have not read many graffic novels. I did find this one quite enjoyable. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to read it.
October 8, 2019
An entertaining crime graphic novel; no more, no less. The Colombia/Cuban/Cocaine-in-Miami stuff was too on-the-nose for me. But I appreciated Lang's take on Meyer, especially the philosophical musings in Yiddish.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews