I bought this graphic novel as a remainder with some other stuff from Chapters online; the author’s name, Douglas Rushkoff, was familiar to me but I cannot figure out how. His other books range from media studies to sort-of-religious comics and stuff about expanding your mind. Club Zero-G uses all of those motifs in its Matrix-esque tale of a college student named Zeke who dreams of a club where he sees many of his classmates and has deep conversations with them. He soon learns that the club is a real place, and that when he sees other people they are sharing the same dream, but unlike everyone else, Zeke can remember the club after he wakes up. Naturally, it’s because Zeke is Special! or something.
I could probably shrug and accept this rather unoriginal story were it not for the artwork by Montreal designer Steph Dumais. It’s just not my cup of tea- reminds me a fair bit of Bernie Mireault, but without the solid draftsmanship skills. There are scenes where the text shifts in size because the page was not laid out in a way to accommodate it all, and many pages where the layout just gets in the way. The artwork is very simplistic and broad, almost like graffiti; which would be fine if it were the only element telling the story. Graffiti with word balloons coming out of it just seems wrong somehow.
