Comics

REVIEW: Aama Vol. 4: You Will Be Glorious, My Daughter

The final episode in Frederick PeetersAama saga is a mind-warp of wonderfully fluid artwork and a conclusion of Biblical proportions, but Lord knows I was annoyed with it. I was annoyed because, on first reading, it felt like an absolute anti-climax. We previously left our anti-hero Verloc in The Desert of Mirrors having been forcefully merged with the renegade biotech experiment known as Aama, and throughout You Will Be Glorious, My Daughter, Verloc and Aama tango across worlds to the point where it becomes almost impossible for the reader to pinpoint whether Verloc or Aama is in control.

This is Aama at its wildest and most unpredictable, not just within the story itself, but the very tale itself now becomes all the more engrossing due to the uncertainty of what may happen. The initial problem I found here is that the actual problem is resolved in a predictable and routine manner. I shan’t spoil it for you, but when you’re telling the story of a dangerous and uncontrollable bio-alien hell bent on creating a new world, you can guess what the climax may entail.

You Will Be Glorious, My Daughter recalls Akira in its ambitious script and crisp, warm artwork. Peeters has written and drawn the Aama saga in a deftly paced manner, but here his scripting and artwork goes into overdrive. The story may loose some of it footing and be hard to follow for the reader because of this, but the artwork never fails to amaze. If anything, one could say that the near-insane nature of the plot gives way to some of the best artwork we’ve seen throughout all four volumes.

You Will Be Glorious, My Daughter is an undeniably frustrating conclusion to a tornado of a graphic novel saga. This final instalment will leave you scratching your noggin till dusk. But out of all the Aama episodes, this one has the most enchanting atmosphere of the bunch. We’re finally past Verloc’s memory loss, past his recounting of the events that led to the very first few pages in The Smell of Warm Dust, and it’s like we’re submerged in the novel itself.

Throughout the past three volumes, we’re positioned exactly as Verloc. We join him as he regains his memory, watching the consequences of his actions spill out as if they were our own. Now however, we’re left behind, struggling to catch up with the Verloc/Aama hybrid as it plays havoc on Earth. That makes You Will Be Glorious, My Daughter a sometimes frightening read, but even though the frustration remains on the part of the reader, all four volumes, when pieced together, an utterly engrossing read. The sheer scope of Aama, galvanised by this final chapter, is worth the price of the novels alone, but there’s much more to take in here. Whether its any good or not is down to the individual reader, but this is graphic literature at its most spell-binding.

Have you read Aama Vol. 4: You Will Be Glorious, My Daugther? You can buy you copy here! And why not check out our thoughts on previous Aama episodes here?

About the author

Fred McNamara