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Eye of the Majestic Creature #3
Time Clock
In the third volume of her series, our protagonist Larrybear meets her new nemesis, visits her anthropomorphic guitar Marshmallow, and ponders her future as she manages a restaurant in Brooklyn. Things go awry when a hurricane arrives and the bar is packed, with no deliveries and plumbing problems. This is doing nothing to help Larry’s ever-worsening drinking problem…
- GenresComicsGraphic Novels
144 pages, Paperback
First published June 19, 2016
About the author
Leslie Stein
8 books1 followerLeslie Stein is an American cartoonist and rock musician living in Brooklyn, New York. Her diary comics have been featured on Vice and The New Yorker and collected as books by Fantagraphics and Drawn & Quarterly.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
December 8, 2019
My fourth Leslie Stein book, and the third in a series she calls (for no apparent reason) Eye of the Majestic Creature. Bright Eyed at Midnight is diary comics, in part about her insomnia. Present she calls “abstract” comics, the most formally interesting for me of the group. This Creature series would seem to be semi-autobiographical comics, from Stein’s twenties, set in a bar/restaurant, where in this one our protagonist Larrybear meets her (for no apparent reason beyond just professional jealousy) new nemesis, Tim Heerling, and visits with various talking musical instruments such as her anthropomorphic guitar Marshmallow. It could be that they instruments start talking to her because she is high and/or drunk?
Let’s see if I can make sense of it, or the effect of it on me: We have a twenty-something woman who depicts herself with creepy wide Coraline eyes that just may be an indication of the hollowness of this period for her, focused on various random drunken/stoned adventures with her new coworkers and other people that just wander into the bar. It’s weird, unsettling, she’s basically alone most of the time, has her most (which is not to say very) profound conversations with her musical instruments. So its weird, using sometimes pretty coloring and experimental means of representing herself and her stories. The stories themselves are less interesting to me at this point than the amalgamation of formal experimentation that I see going on in these books.
Having read a lot of Simon Hanselmann’s Megg and Mogg aimless-twenties-substance-abuse work, this Stein’s book, begins to feel like a reflection on hollow, lonely, substance abuse to me, where the lovely watercolors contrast with the isolation, the interpersonal distance that seems to exist because of the drinking and drugs. I dunno, gimmee a break, I’m trying to figure this out and seem to keep reading her interesting looking kinda warm and kinda creepy stuff.
Let’s see if I can make sense of it, or the effect of it on me: We have a twenty-something woman who depicts herself with creepy wide Coraline eyes that just may be an indication of the hollowness of this period for her, focused on various random drunken/stoned adventures with her new coworkers and other people that just wander into the bar. It’s weird, unsettling, she’s basically alone most of the time, has her most (which is not to say very) profound conversations with her musical instruments. So its weird, using sometimes pretty coloring and experimental means of representing herself and her stories. The stories themselves are less interesting to me at this point than the amalgamation of formal experimentation that I see going on in these books.
Having read a lot of Simon Hanselmann’s Megg and Mogg aimless-twenties-substance-abuse work, this Stein’s book, begins to feel like a reflection on hollow, lonely, substance abuse to me, where the lovely watercolors contrast with the isolation, the interpersonal distance that seems to exist because of the drinking and drugs. I dunno, gimmee a break, I’m trying to figure this out and seem to keep reading her interesting looking kinda warm and kinda creepy stuff.
August 20, 2016
This is touted as Stein's first original graphic novel, at least when it comes to the Eye of the Majestic comics. The earlier volumes collected the stories that had been originally come out in signal issues. I'm not sure if the narratives in this collection are more or less cohesive, which, I think, attests to her abilities at storytelling both in serial and long-form.
September 25, 2018
I fell in love with Leslie Stein's art in Bright Eyed at Midnight, so I thought I'd give this a go. It took me a little longer to get into, since I was halfway expecting more autobio comics, but I ended up liking this quite a bit as well. The story wasn't anything to write home about, but it's so easy to get swept away by the art that I really didn't mind.
April 1, 2023
I've no idea what I'd just read...but the acid hit hard.
Read
April 12, 2021This was the first I read in the Majestic Creature series, so I'll avoid rating. Overall, good, and the similarities with her later stuff are pretty obvious here, as is the growth.
January 3, 2018
A friend recommended this one to me. I was little disappointed by the story but the art was top notch. I could see Koyama Press publishing this actually. Leslie seems to fit the vibe over there a little better. No major complaints but I wouldn't necessarily rave about it either. I think I'll check out her earlier work which has received positive reviews.
January 2, 2017
I feel bad rating this only 2-stars, but I'm basing this purely on how much I enjoyed the reading experience which, for me, was simply 'okay'. I enjoyed Stein's
Bright-eyed at Midnight
and I mistakenly thought Time Clock was going to be more autobio/memoir stuff, so this was more a case of not-getting-what-i-was-expecting (though it seemed like a lot of elements were based off of Stein's life?). I was also a little jarred by the art-style, but again, this was because I thought it was going to be more similar to Bright-Eyed (more scribbly and less smooth/rounded).
I appreciated that the story very casually used fantastical elements and there's a thread of melancholy here that feels very real and true-to-life. However, it was a little *too* weird for my tastes and I felt like a lot went over my head.
I'm still really keen to read more of Stein's work - this was just a case of skewed expectations.
I appreciated that the story very casually used fantastical elements and there's a thread of melancholy here that feels very real and true-to-life. However, it was a little *too* weird for my tastes and I felt like a lot went over my head.
I'm still really keen to read more of Stein's work - this was just a case of skewed expectations.
January 31, 2017
The cover design is so appealing. And I'm not sure why I like the world of these stories but I do. Maybe it is because Larrybear has a kind of blitheness that carries her even if she is depressed or succumbing to a drinking problem.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews