Jack of Fables

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Jack of Fables
Cover to issue #1 of Jack of Fables (September 2006). Art by James Jean.
Publication information
Publisher Vertigo Comics
Schedule Monthly
Format Ongoing series
Publication date July 2006 – March 2011
Number of issues 50
Main character(s) Jack Horner
"Gary" the Pathetic Fallacy
Jack Frost
Creative team
Writer(s) Bill Willingham and Matthew Sturges
Artist(s) Tony Akins, Andrey Pepoy, James Jean, Brian Bolland
Creator(s) Bill Willingham, Matthew Sturges
Collected editions
The (Nearly) Great Escape ISBN 1-4012-1222-0
Jack of Hearts ISBN 1-4012-1455-X
The Bad Prince ISBN 1-4012-1854-7
Americana ISBN 1-4012-1979-9
Turning Pages ISBN 1-4012-2138-6
The Big Book of War ISBN 1-4012-2500-4
The New Adventures of Jack and Jack ISBN 1-4012-2712-0
The Fulminate Blade ISBN 1-4012-2982-4
The End ISBN 1-4012-3155-1

Jack of Fables was a spin-off of the comic book Fables, both of which were published by DC Comics as part of that company's Vertigo imprint.[1] It shows the adventures of Jack Horner that take place after his exile from Fabletown in the Fables story-arc Jack Be Nimble (Fables #34 and #35). A preview of the series was shown in Fables #50, and the series itself debuted in July 2006. It was written by Fables writer Bill Willingham and Matthew Sturges.

Publication

After the success of Fables, writer Bill Willingham decided to write a spin-off series starring Jack Horner; a character well received by fans of the comic.[2] The decision to kick Jack off Fables came by after artist Mark Buckingham proposed to expand the Fables' logic of "popularity equals power", and they decided to use Jack in showing how a Fable might use this theory to further his/her own gain. Both he and Willingham created a two-issue story arc entitled Jack Be Nimble where Jack manages to elevate his popularity with the Mundies by creating an action film trilogy of himself, therefore increasing his powers as well. This story arc was supposed to be the last time Jack Horner would appear in the series. Willingham initially wanted to write him off but editor Shelly Bond suggested to put him in a separate comic instead. Bond herself stated that she did this because she didn't want to see her "favorite" character in the series, Jack Horner, disappear.[3] With the new series in publication, Willingham decided to use Jack of Fables in introducing other literary characters in the Fables mythos, and also as a chance to expand its universe to the Old West, the Folklore of the United States and to other elements as well.[2][4][5] The new series also gave Willingham and co-writer Matthew Sturges more freedom in writing its universe than in the main series.

Jack of Fables was the first project that Sturges worked upon in the comic book industry. Bond and Willingham originally chose him to act as a second voice in deciding for the upcoming new series.[2] Sturges remarked that in writing Jack of Fables, he would increasingly put the character Jack in more and more dilemma. He did this because he and the team found it amusing to harm him in every story.[6] Others who worked on the main Fables series also worked on the spin-off, including long-time Fables inker Steve Leiahloha as penciller and inker in two issues.[4] Artists Tony Akins, Andrey Pepoy, Todd Klein, Russell Braun, Andrew Robinson and Brian Bolland also worked on the series as well. Todd Klein in particular, was chosen to add humor in the story, and Sturges praised him for his work while also not making it too "cartoony". Mark Buckingham also commented on how Bill Willigham worked in making of the story.[6] While the series had two writers, he stated that one of them, Willingam, had the lead on the story. In writing the story, Willingham and Sturges both made sure to keep the spin-off as its own independent character and not to be too connected to the main series like, as Willingham described, a "Fables Jr. kind of book."[7] By the last story arc, both Willingham and Sturges decided to kill off all of the characters in the spin-off series as a sort of a final humor well known in Jack of Fables.[2][5] They originally wanted to end the series abruptly in order to prank its consumers but the idea was rejected by DC editors.[8]

Plot

Jack Horner

Like in Fables, the series takes place in the contemporary world, albeit with characters from fairy tales and folklore living alongside normal humans in secret. The story follows one such popular Fable named Jack Horner who is known from stories such as Little Jack Horner, Jack and the Beanstalk, Jack and Jill, Jack Be Nimble, Jack Frost, Jack O'Lantern, Jack the Giant Killer and others.[1][9] Jack is typically portrayed as a "nigh immortal" trickster who's always looking for quick ways to make a buck. His nigh-immortality came after he created a film trilogy about himself to raise his popularity in the Mundies, and is reinforced by other causes as well such as his part-literal nature and his deals with many devils during his Jack O' Lantern days.[2] Before the start of the series, it was found out that Jack stole money from Fabletown in order to create these films and make a name for himself in Hollywood. The Fables soon found out about his deed and they sent out the town sheriff Beast to apprehend him for his crimes. Unfortunately for Jack, Beast managed to track him down in Hollywood, confiscated all the money and properties he had built, and was told that he can never set foot on Fabletown again. The series then starts off after Jack left Hollywood.

While hitchhiking, Jack was captured by an armed group of magical creatures calling themselves Literals. They imprison him in a place called the Golden Boughs Retirement Village; a magical community owned by Mr. Revise where Fables are trapped and censored, so that humans can forget about them and they lose all their powers.[10][11] Although incarcerated in the village, Jack manages to rally up the other imprisoned Fables to help him escape. After escaping, Jack became friends with a Literal named Gary the Pathetic Fallacy and together the two became entangled in further more adventures. Jack's adventures consisted of him getting married in Las Vegas and fighting a Fable mob leader named Lady Luck, getting stabbed by the Excalibur in the chest and finding out that he was just a copy of an older Fable named Wicked John, heading out into Americana to find lost treasures with Humpty Dumpty, and returning to the Golden Boughs Retirement Village in time to lead them in a fight against another powerful Literal named Bookburner.[12][13] After successfully defeating Bookburner and his army, Jack and Gary then promptly leave the Golden Bough to finally enjoy their new found treasure. However, the treasure they've hoarded had a drastic change on the two, and Jack himself suddenly lost his immortality and started aging and bloating.[14] Gary theorized that the changes were probably brought upon by the spin-off's artist taking revenge on Horner's horrible remarks about him, before Gary too loses his powers and memories. After taking refuge in a cave to stash their treasure, Jack was then transformed into a dragon (similar to Fafnir) and forced to stay in that form, until the day comes when a hero finally slays him.

Jack Frost

The story then shifts to Jack's son Jack Frost who was born from his brief romance with the Snow Queen prior from the events of the overall series. After learning of his mother's apparent disappearance, Frost, who has been locked up in her castle ever since his birth, finally leaves his home and sets out on his own adventure. He lets go of the winter powers he inherited from his mother and travels into the Homelands in order to become the legendary hero he always dreamed off.[15] His first battle in his heroic quest was against a group of scavengers he came across in the Homelands' capital city. Though he found his first battle difficult due to not being accustomed fighting without his powers, he manages to kill them all with the help of a mechanical owl. The two then became fast friends and Frost named the mechanical owl MacDuff, and they set out to help other people in need. While Frost was initially stuck helping people in their mundane tasks, his first true call to heroism came after a girl hired him to save her kingdom from monsters they called Night Walkers. Frost then discovers that the monsters themselves were also being tormented by a powerful sorcerer, who ruled both the lands of the monsters and the humans they were preying. He agrees to help the Night Walkers fight the sorcerer but in return they must also learn to coexist with the humans and to never torment them again. Jack then tracks down the sorcerer in his own castle and kills him, finally freeing the two races as well as making a name for himself as a powerful hero in the Homelands. Jack then continues his adventures as a hero, making new allies and lovers, discovering new weapons and battling other monsters of both fantasy and science-fiction.

The Very Last Jack Of Fables Story Of All Time

After becoming the legendary hero he always wanted, Jack Frost decided that his final quest before retiring was defeating a ferocious dragon rumored to be hiding inside a cave filled with treasures, which unknown to him was actually his own father Jack Horner.[16] Jack Horner himself had a premonition that he and Gary will be defending their treasures to the death against intruders who were actually some of the minor characters that have appeared in the series. Jack and Gary nonetheless prepare to defend their treasures and each other to the very end.

Frost manages to track down the dragon alongside other supporting characters of the series who ended up in the same location. Both Jacks fought an epic duel that resulted in the death of all characters that were present. After Jack Horner died, the devils that he tricked in his Jack O' Lantern days finally came to collect his soul. However, all of them ended up bickering which of them can claim him. Jack Horner's soul takes the opportunity to slip away and escapes while the devils were busy arguing. The small story arc from the main series entitled The Very Last Jack Of Fables Story Of All Time revealed the fate of Jack and his friend Gary after their apparent demise.[17] The devils did recapture Jack and they all agreed to put him in a black void alone (which was presumed to be the end of the universe). They also forced him to write down all the sins in his life and repent. While locked away, Jack discovered that he actually had a tiny portion of reality-bending powers in him due to his half-literal nature. And he used his new found powers to resurrect Gary and restore the Literal's own powers back to him. Jack then used Gary's powers to create his own universe where "he is king, tacos are grown in trees, everyone has a pet dinosaur, and every woman is buxom and in heat all the time." Both friends successfully created this universe and finally spent their eternity in luxury.

Theme and style

Unlike the gritty and serious tone of Fables, the spin-off Jack of Fables was written as a humor comic different from the original style of the main series.[18][19] While the main series was a mature comic with human drama and moral themes, the spin-off was a comedy story with slapstick, violence and fourth wall breaking. Matthew Sturges wrote the story with focus on putting the character Jack Horner into an increasing number of mishaps and troubles as the series progressed.[6] By the time of the last issue most of the characters introduced were killed off. Josh Flanagan of IFanboy remarked that it pokes fun on the serious premise of Fables by being a "bit sillier" and having a less-serious tone than the main series.[19]

The spin-off series also gave Bill Willingham more freedom in expanding the series' universe. At one point, the editors became concerned when Bill Willingham added the character of Sam from the controversial book Little Black Sambo. But Willingham nonetheless pushed on with the character in order to explore and add more concepts in the overall series.[7] Jack of Fables further introduced other locations, ideas and fables into the main series, such as the Golden Boughs Retirement Village; a prominent location where Fables are locked away so they disappear from public consciousness and thus lose power.[1] The place was named after Sir James George Frazer's The Golden Bough, a wide-ranging comparative study of mythology and religion. Americana is the American Fable-land from which characters such as Paul Bunyan, Natty Bumppo and Huckleberry Finn came from.[1] These locations are controlled by a number of literals who were written off as physical embodiment of literary techniques, metaphysical ideals and genre.[20][21] Examples of these characters include Mr. Revise who is the embodiment of censorship and revision, his brother Bookburner who is the personification of book burning, their father Gary the Pathetic Fallacy who is the personification of anthropomorphic non-living objects, Dex the Deus Ex Machina, Kevin Thorne who was the embodiment of actual writing and his archenemy Writer's Block. There were also personifications of genres as well such as Comedy, Horror, Westerns, Science-Fiction, Fantasy and others. These characters are separate beings from the Fables whom they interact with authority.

Critical reception

After the release of its first issue, Jack of Fables was received positively by critics and fans alike. While not attaining the same large sales as its parent Fables, Willingham described the series as a "pretty strong" seller.[8] It was nominated for an Eisner Award in Best New Series, and Best Writer for Bill Willingham in 2007.[22][23] The creative team behind the spin-off series also took home Eisner Awards in two different categories: Todd Klein in Best Lettering and James Jean in Best Cover Artist. Time magazine's Lev Grossman named it as one of the Top 10 Graphic Novels of 2007, ranking it at #5.[24] Brian Cronin from Comic Book Resources listed Jack of Fables as #5 in its "Top 5 Current Vertigo Ongoings", calling it Fables II and how "Bill Willingham [did] a nice job of surrounding Jack with as many other intriguing characters as possible."[25]

During an interview with Willingham, Vaneta Rogers from Newsarama praised its four years of "thrilling readers with Jack's ridiculous, wild, and often borderline-offensive acts."[8] Eric Sunde of IGN described the spin-off as either "a cheap cash-in on the Fables name" or "others that seem far more relevant and add to the Fables-verse." He also praised it for having "an identity and cast of its own, and is on a nice, steady upswing" and how it "can continue upwards to the point where it can stand shoulder to shoulder with Fables."[26] Author Matthew Peterson of Major Spoilers, gave issue #50 a 4 out of 5 stars, saying "the saddest part of all of this is the knowledge that it’s all perfectly correct, giving Jack not only an ending, but the kind of classical old-school ending that Jack deserves, in all senses of the word." He also praised the writers for pulling off a "qualified win" in its last story.

However, the series also drew negative criticism from comic book reviews as well, particularly on the character Jack Horner and his borderline selfish and sociopathic personality. IGN journalist Jesse Schiedeen praised issue #33 which he described as a "certain sense of fun and whimsy" but was critical of the character Jack, whom he thought as an "annoying braggart who did well to get himself booted out of the main series."[27] He also admitted on how he enjoyed issue #33 which showed Jack being beaten up by Bigby Wolf and finally having what "was coming to him." Richard Eisenbeis of Kotaku commented on how hard it was to root for Jack because of his personality. He also had a mixed review of the spin-off comic, describing its story as fun but not as good as the original series. He compared both Fables and Jack of Fables in his review, and he described the former as a gritty, realistic series focusing on human drama", while the latter was just a "side of slapstick humor with fourth wall-breaking moments and a focus on comedy."[18] Josh Flanagan of IFanboy criticized the story distinct tone from the main series, which he described as a "fierce counterpoint to how the story eventually end." But he nonetheless praised it for its fun and interesting ideas about fiction, writing, and genres.[19]

Collected editions

It is worth noting that Jack of Fables #33-35 is collected in Fables Vol. 13 Fables: The Great Fables Crossover.[20][21]

# Title ISBN Release date Collected material
1 Jack of Fables - The (Nearly) Great Escape 1-4012-1222-0 February 28, 2007 Jack of Fables #1–5
2 Jack of Fables - Jack of Hearts 1-4012-1455-X October 3, 2007 Jack of Fables #6–11
3 Jack of Fables - The Bad Prince 1-4012-1854-7 June 25, 2008 Jack of Fables #12–16
4 Jack of Fables - Americana ISBN 1-4012-1979-9 December 16, 2008 Jack of Fables #17-21
5 Jack of Fables - Turning Pages 1-4012-2138-6 March 10, 2009 Jack of Fables #22-27
6 Jack of Fables - The Big Book of War 1-4012-2500-4 October 7, 2009 Jack of Fables #28-32
7 Jack of Fables - The New Adventures of Jack and Jack 1-4012-2712-0 June 23, 2010 Jack of Fables #36-40
8 Jack of Fables - The Fulminate Blade 1-4012-2982-4 January 26, 2011 Jack of Fables #41-45
9 Jack of Fables - The End 1-4012-3155-1 July 13, 2011 Jack of Fables #46-50

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. December 8, 2010
  3. ↑ Willingham, Bill. Sturges, Matthew. Jack of Fables #50. Vertigo (March 2011). Chapter: "This Grand Fiasco". ASIN B00NG1HV5M
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. July 24, 2006
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. July 31, 2010
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. July 29, 2007
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. August 6, 2007
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. April 19, 2007
  9. ↑ Nevins, Jess. Fables Encyclopedia. Vertigo (October 29, 2013). p. 110. ISBN 978-1401243951
  10. ↑ Willingham, Bill. Jack of Fables: Volume 1. Vertigo (February 28, 2007). ISBN 978-1401212223
  11. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  12. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  13. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  14. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  15. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  16. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  17. ↑ Willingham, Bill. Fables Vol. 21: Happily Ever After. Vertigo (May 12, 2015). ISBN 978-1401251321
  18. ↑ 18.0 18.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. August 21, 2015
  19. ↑ 19.0 19.1 19.2 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. May 28, 2009
  20. ↑ 20.0 20.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. March 25, 2010
  21. ↑ 21.0 21.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  22. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. April 19, 2007
  23. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  24. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  25. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. October 25, 2006
  26. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. September 24, 2008
  27. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. April 22, 2009
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