Demo3

(Argh, unfortunately this image isn't the best quality. My camera was basically dead and I had a hard time even getting this before it shut off.)

By Johanna Skoog

Hurray! An actual Swedish comic, how exciting! Okay, so the scene on the cover doesn't happen in here, nor does anything even close to that happen. Instead we're presented with something that's sort of like a cross between Gon (that manga about the tiny dinosaur) and Bone (though mostly cause Demo kind of looks like a bone creature).

There's a number of comics in here of various lengths, but throughout them all Demo wordlessly (the only dialogue is in pictograms, so everybody can understand) wanders around having various adventures. The first long one is kind of strange as he encounters a bunch of goblin creatures while walking through a forest and is saved by some elves who take him home and nurse him back to health. Okay, it's not that weird (for a comic), what is is the contrast in styles between Demo (drawn very simply and cartoony) and the other characters (lots of detail and the elves have big anime style eyes). It's kind of strange and really succeeds in making Demo to look utterly alien in his surroundings.

The other long comic is rather strange, and seems to be about Demo's childhood. (I'll note here that I have no idea if the character is called Demo, but I'll call him that anyway.) Demo's parents clearly love him a lot, but Death (yes with a capital, it's the skeleton guy) is always lurking somewhere nearby. Demo's parents decide they're going to go into the sea, and swim around eating fish. They want to bring Demo with them, but he cries a lot, so they leave him on shore while they disappear into the ocean. After being abandoned a depressed Demo starts wandering the earth and has some adventures including fighting a really well drawn giant squid thing. Hurray!

I really like the cartooning on display in this comic. Skoog has kept the design of Demo very simple, but there are quite a lot of details in the backgrounds and other characters and items he interacts with. There's also a really good page with drawings of thirty different animals. That must have taken ages!

The end of one of the stories is very "to be continued"; who is that character and why do they look so much like a Pokemon? I hope that means there's more of this to read somewhere out there in the world.