Cancertown: An Inconvenient Tooth

Cancertown #1

by Cy Dethan, Stephen Downey (Illustrator), Melanie Cook (Colorist)

Vince Morley is a man with big problems and a brain tumour like a baby’s fist; living with one foot in a monstrous alternate world he calls Cancertown. When the lost and dispossessed of London start tripping over the same cracks in reality he spends his life avoiding, Morley realises he must confront the residents of Cancertown – and risk finding his place among them.

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels

180 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2009

Reviews

[Roman Stadtler · Rating 1 out of 5]

I think there's a good story idea here, but what we have is a fitful, confused early draft of that story, with awful art. The premise, a brain tumor that allows Morely into another realm he calls Cancertown, about which he has more understanding and control than the other Londoners pulled into it, holds promise. Is this realm real, or a tumor-induced hallucination? If it's real, is he succeeding or failing the other humans? Are they humans? Interesting questions, and if my confusion reading it was due to a clever authorial intent to mirror Morely's mental state, that could've gained kudos, but no, it's all a mess. Morely's inner dialog narration has some crackle to it, and he seems a potentially interesting, slightly hard-boiled character.
As for the art? Yikes. Being a cancer survivor and a comics fan, I forced though to the end, hoping for some insight or interesting observation of existence with a brain tumor, how it alters reality, but nope, this only graspingly hints at those themes. Try Tumor, by Joshua Fialkov, for that exploration: a similar hard-boiled guy with a brain tumor graphic novel, but it's a crime thriller.

[Rex Hurst · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book plays like a John Constantine Hellblazer story and even though its meant to be a different protagonist, one could easily swap in Constantine here. A man with an incurable brain tumor is sucked in and out of a cancerous world of monsters and gets caught up in their power struggles. The book suffers from a lack of background and explanation as it just throws the reader into the middle of the action for a significant part the beginning. Still it has some interesting ideas and horror concepts, not very well executed. Essentially I wanted to know more of the world and was not satisfied

[Chad · Rating 2 out of 5]

More or less a John Constantine story if he had a brain tumor that kept causing him to go in and out of this Cancertown place. The story is confusing at times. There's no magic involved. Just all this metaphysical stuff. It's alright but could have used an editor to make it sharper.

[Cristian Marrero · Rating 2 out of 5]

I pushed myself to read this. Repeated story for me. I do like the artistic skills though.

[Brian · Rating 2 out of 5]

Way too weird. Couldn't follow it at all.

[Josh · Rating 2 out of 5]

Sometimes decent art. Weak try-hard story.