The Nice House on the Lake 1

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all abstractions, all generalizations, treat words and images and people and thoughts as units existing in some matrix of comparison. the doctor, the pianist, the politico, the artist(s), etc. et al, all the participants in this study taking place in a nice house on the lake... all treat the story as substance. all treat their own selves as having some substance, a genuine identity, rather than a label or title to be fulfilled. all attempt to communicate. all fail. their last communication, for now, for when, is a bullet. it fails. but that was the plan all along, to fail. to fail is to keep living? I appreciated the diverse representation amongst the characters. That said, for being a diverse group they were all pretty similar. With the exception of Ryan, everyone in this group is in their 30s, educated, and established in their careers. Yet not one of these people have any children? That's pretty convenient. It's also feels like a missed opportunity. Separating a character from their child would have added another level of horror to the story and helped with the moral and ethical debate the story seems to want readers to be pondering. The closest we ever got to that was Molly mourning her husband Cam. Adams, Tim (2020-07-30). "James Tynion IV Announces Digital Horror Anthology, Razorblades - And You Choose Your Price". CBR . Retrieved 2022-07-13. I kind of hoped this would be the end of it, but no, these volumes are only 'cycle one'. Means there must be a bicycle coming. The Nice House on the Lake, written by James Tynion IV (!) and Álvaro Martínez Bueno, with Jordie Bellaire on colors, is part of the Tynion wave sweeping the current phase of comics. Tynion, one of the two or three “it” people in comics now, was just awarded 2022 Eisner Awards for Best Writer, Best continuing Series (Something is Killing the Children), and Best New Series, this one. He’s this year’s Jeff Lemire, I guess.

McMillan, Graeme (2019-08-19). "Horror Comic 'Something Is Killing the Children' Upped to Ongoing Series". The Hollywood Reporter . Retrieved 2022-07-13. Too many characters. I kept confusing them til the very end. Oh no, something happened to one of the characters, which one was that again, etc. Worst thing is probably that it doesn't matter that much which character is which. Tinion i crtač mu su zasigurno pili do jedno tri izjutra i bacali scenarije za potencijalne stripove egzistencijalnog užasa blaže forme, te je iz takve jedne večeri ovo proizašlo. Kao takvo, ima rupa - priča uzima sebe mrvu preozbiljno da bih ja u njoj potpuno uživao, a i narativna struktura se pomalo raspadne pred kraj, no crteži su kul, a dijalog i tragedija drušva u malom vrede. Podseća na Ko to tamo peva kada bi Paja Vujsić bio vanzemaljac upitnih namera, a ostatak autobusa različite sorte milenijalaca. Da li ja to čujem rimejk??? Znaš gde sam gospodin Šijane. Batman Gambit: It's revealed in the final issue of Cycle One that the plan to make the housemates ultimately accept their situation in the house isn't Walter's at all; it's Norah's, and she devised it based on her ability to predict how the group would react to the situation, and what scenarios would lead them to a path of ultimate acceptance. Walter is initially hesitant to use her plan, but after his own attempts to get them on board utterly fail (which Norah also predicted), he agrees to try it her way. And it works.Tynion tweets that this break was planned "well in advance" to give the creative team time to do all twelve issues at a high quality. Couch, Aaron (2022-11-14). "James Tynion IV Launches Dark Horse Comic Book Line (Exclusive)". The Hollywood Reporter . Retrieved 2022-11-14. There are 3 distinct time periods in this story - the past (memories), the present (nice lake house), and the future (warzone). Time jumps a lot in this series which wouldn't normally be an issue except that there are 12 main characters. Having every issue from a different POV it meant I learned a little about each character but not enough to be invested in them. The world has ended. Would the group accept this fact and be happy to live out their lives in their mini paradise? Would they be thankful to their "friend " who is the orchestrator of it all? The end of the first arc. It's pretty satisfying conclusion, and unless I hear great things about the second, I'm fine to get off the ride here.

Hidden Depths: As Walter points out, David can be "pretty stupid" a lot of the time, but he is a remarkably perceptive individual who understands people. David is the first to realise that the guests can't remember how they arrived at the Nice House, and that they can't die. He also gives Molly an empathic speech about her suicidal tendencies. Spontaneous Human Combustion: How the end of the world happens, apparently. Ryan sees through social media that people are just going up in flames. There are bigger firestorms, too, but they are probably caused by people on fire. The reason for this is Walter's "people" — one social media post even says "THERE IS SOMETHING IN THE SKY BEHIND THE FIRE. LOOK BEHIND THE FIRE, AT THE COLOR THAT HURTS YOUR EYES." Stars Volume 2 collects issues #7-12 of the comic. This was supposed to be a limited 12 issue series but the ending of this leaves so many questions unresolved that I have to assume there will be more issues. Will I read them though? Probably not.To sum it up through comparison: The Nice House on the Lake is basically Lawrence Kasdan’s The Big Chill by way of Michael Schur’s The Good Place and Stephen King’s It; an apocalyptic mystery thriller that reads like a better version of Lost as told through the medium of comics. The focal point of these disparate influences is Walter, the series’ antagonist and one of the most intriguing comic book villains in recent memory. Image: James Tynion IV, Álvaro Martínez Bueno/DC Comics Fantastic set-up for a weird end-of-the-world story. A group of people each with their own different skills or expertises are brought to, well, a nice house on a lake. The only thing they really have in common is a friendship (however dated) with the home's owner Walter. Laser-Guided Amnesia: Walter can simply make people forget things. He's mindwiped his friends before when he accidentally said too much to them, and he mindwipes them again after they find Reg and Reg tries to convince them they can break out of the House and save the world.

With Something Is Killing the Children and The Department of Truth, James Tynion IV has changed the face of horror in modern comics—now get ready for his most ambitious story yet, alongside his Detective Comics partner Álvaro Martínez Bueno! Another parallel: Tynion's own The Woods series, which now feels like a dry run for whatever is going on in The Nice House on the Lake. I can't believe the same guy who wrote the "ambitious but only pretty good" The Woods series wrote this. Such an upgrade. But I did enjoy the various aspects of the story like the weird sculptures scattered around the compound, and the questions arising from the reveals: why is there a symbol for each person, why can no-one remember travelling to the house, how is the world ending and why, and, of course, Walter himself. I wonder if the name is derived from Walter Tevis, the author of, among others, The Man Who Fell to Earth? Walter gives off a vibe similar to Newton from that novel. All of them were at that moment in their lives when they could feel themselves pulling away from their other friends; wouldn’t a chance to reconnect be…nice? In The Nice House on the Lake, the overriding anxieties of the 21st century get a terrifying new face—and it might just be the face of the person you once trusted most. I think that's all that kept it from being 5 stars, though. The story is unique, and the characters are pretty interesting if not wholly fleshed out.Although things end with the inhabitants of the eponymous house assuming that Walter has been killed and that they now live under some semblance of freedom, that couldn't be farther from the case. Not only is Walter still alive, but he knows that things are about to get harder than ever for his so-called friends. Even if his alien masters aren't aware of the trouble that has been caused in Walter's ecosystem, it is only a matter of time before they are. This is because the humans within it are so close to colliding with their fellow survivors elsewhere. The art looks nice and shiny on the surface, but characters' face look to much alike, it doesn't help with distinguishing the soap opera cast. Not to mirror the issue of ecosystem/balance/longevity too closely from the comic’s own plot but I think the whole model would need to change to keep things running.Tynion is just not quite clever enough to pull any more twists out, or at least at this frequency, as the few here feel a bit thin or frayed compared to the earlier ones (maybe it’s just the downside of reading a collected volume as opposed to the floppies). And then there was the explanations of all the machinations behind the scenes. To be honest, I actually feel like I would have enjoyed this more if Tynion and company had actually left this part unexplained and let the readers create their own theories as to what was going on.

So you DO find out what's going on in a small way. NOT what is happening in the outside world as far as the alien invasion thing, but what might be happening and definitely what some of the other inmates of the house were aware of (unaware of?). The human-seeming alien’s eerily calm and bespectacled appearance regularly erupts into a writhing, phantasmagorical mass of gnashing teeth, bone, and flesh. It’s as disturbing as it is visually inspired, made all the more so for the fact that Walter’s eyes, if he even has any, are never seen throughout the series, perpetually obscured behind the eerie reflection of his glasses. Bait-and-Switch: The Ryan from the present day is wearing bandages on her face and holding a spear, indicating something bad has happened. She also puts on a N95 respirator, indicating that perhaps there is something toxic in the air...until we get to the beginning of the story and see that she already had the respirator due to the COVID-19 Pandemic. This was interesting to read directly after plowing through three volumes of Something is Killing… in a weekend. The two are quite different in tone, while both being horror, and this one is less fun and boisterous but more atmospheric and tense. While the art is fantastic in both, I prefer his art style in Something and this one can sometimes be hard to tell characters apart but also things being fairly obscured is part of the intent. Walter is very similar to the boy in the first arc of Something, and not just that both are drawn fairly similar with their big glasses you never see through but both have an element where in high school they were encouraged to ask their best friend to be their boyfriend, were rejected, and still maintain a friendship that is making them awkward. Comparatively though, this one felt a big of a slog, starting strong and ending strong, but sort of languishing in the middle (though Dave being goofy is pretty charming). Each issue being told in what appears to be a present set decently into the future where they all seem like battle hardened dystopia vets leads me to think this is only going to get epic.

Couch, Aaron (November 14, 2022). "James Tynion IV Launches Dark Horse Comic Book Line (Exclusive)". The Hollywood Reporter. Archived from the original on January 26, 2023 . Retrieved January 26, 2023. Walter was giving off some serious serial killer vibes all through the first issue so I was pretty sure I knew what was going to happen when he gathered all of his friends together at that lake house. Adams, Tim (2018-03-24). "Two Justice League Series Announced from Tynion, Martinez, Williamson & Sejic". CBR . Retrieved 2022-07-13. Affably Evil: Walter tells his friends that he genuinely loves them, which is why he is saving them...but the rest of the world is going to die.