Product Description

Terry Zwigoff's movie of Daniel Clowes' extraordinary graphic novel "Ghost World" has brought Clowes hordes of new readers. Every one of them will be eagerly awaiting the adventures of Clowes' new hero: David Boring, a nineteen-year-old security guard with a tortured inner life and an obsessive nature. When he meets the girl of his dreams, things begin to go awry: what seems too good to be true apparently is, and what seems truest in Boring's life is that, given the right set of circumstances (in this case an orgiastic cascade of vengeance, humiliation and murder), the primal nature of mankind will come inexorably to the fore.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #28023 in Books
• Published on: 2002-11-07
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 124 pages

Review
'Boring finds love with a mysterious woman called Wanda, loses her and sort-of finds her again. He also gets shot in the head (twice) and stranded on an island with his brutish family. Meanwhile, the world may or may not be ending soon. And did I mention that much of this is hilariously funny.' Time; 'Imagine a tilted comic-book homage to Hitchcock's Vertigo, but with religious cults, fetishistic scrapbooks and scenes of underwater coupling.' Guardian

Guardian
‘Imagine a tilted comic-book homage to Hitchcock’s Vertigo, but with religious cults, fetishistic scrapbooks and scenes of underwater coupling.’

Time Out
'beautifully drawn with subtle, convincing storylines centred on everyday emotional weirdness’

Customer Reviews

Anything but Boring
I may be a little hasty writing this review (I only finished the first reading twenty minutes or so ago), but I simply cannot contain myself. This really is a truly fantastic graphic novel (or 'comic book' as Clowes states on the cover, presumably to avoid the common euphemism). When I ripped it from its Amazon packaging this morning I was peculiarly less-than-optimistic of Clowes' cold, realistic cartoon style which reminded me all too much of the mainstream '60s comics that our eponymous (anti-) hero's absent father authored. Thankfully, these feelings were quickly shattered.

To avoid ruining it, David Boring is a young man who pursues a number of doomed sexual encounters in pursuit of his ideal woman (in a nutshell, big-bottomed). This leads him to the mysterious Wanda, his relationship which whom results in a near-fatal shooting, and isolation and murder-mystery on a secluded island while the world is in danger of apocalypse. All the characters in this story are doomed and pathetic, but the story is an interesting exploration into sexual obsession and the nature of love and attraction - as well as being a suspenseful whodunit.

Where I would stray from saying this about any other comic book, 'David Boring' is filmic (in the conventional "3-act structure" David attempts in this unwritten screenplay) in the way that presumably gave 'Ghost World' the potential to make the adaptation such a cult status (the book or film of which I am still yet to have experienced). While I would love to see 'David Boring' made into film more so than any other comic I've read in quite a while, like every great work of this medium it could only possibly have been fully realised in the static pictorial narrative form.

There may only be 116 pages of actual narrative, but you will be immensely surprised by how succinctly Clowes executes so richly complex a tale in such limited constraints. You'll finish it in an hour, but you'll no doubt be drawn back. I'm just about to re-read it now.

Truly The Best Thing I've Ever Read!!!
Oh man, I've just finished reading this and I am breathless. This is just fantasic! The artwork is stylish but not thankfully isn't intrusive upon the truly awesome story. Its only real weak point is a rushed third act, but that is okay because of the amazing standard throughout.

The best comic ever written
Yes, I think this is the best comic ever made. It's even better than "Watchmen" etc. If you're only going to read one comic in your life, get this one.

No super heroes and not a lot of action, but amazing nevertheless.

For fans of red wine. Oh, I mean, for fans of good comics. I seriously doubt Daniel Clowes will ever put his name to anything as good as this ever again.