Review -- LACKADAISY

Lackadaisy
Written by Tracy J. Butler
Pencils by Tracy J. Butler
4th Dimension Entertainment
There are gems among graphic novels, and one of those is the lavish Lackadaisy.
The story runs 68-pages in oversize format, plus several pages of pin-up art and creative sketches. That’s a lot of material, and in the case of this book, more is most certainly better.
The final page of the story states ‘to be continued’. Thank you Tracy J. Butler for that, because this book makes you want more.
“Right now, every ounce of free time I have is devoted to producing Volume 2 of the comic and to completing enough full color art to print an accompanying art book,” she said. “I’m of course keeping the web site updated with new art all the time as well.”
So what makes Lackadaisy so special?
Quite frankly, every aspect of the book.
To begin with the whimsical cats which populate the book are wonderfully drawn.
The use of an antique brown monochrome colouring is a nice touch, since the story is based in the age of prohibition. This is a world where cats run the speakeasies and run the rum.
As I said sort of whimsical, but it works.
Butler said her training helped her develop the overall artistic feel of the book.
“My artistic background is mostly in illustration and animation, so I think it just felt natural to me to approach the art style as a sort of combination of these two things,” she said. “Before diving into formal comic production, I spent a few months nailing down character designs in which the classic animation influence is probably fairly obvious, experimenting with panel layouts and toning.
“In spite of the planning, though, I think the style has continuously evolved from the start – the sort of gradual change that’s probably inevitable with ongoing research and a progressive understanding of the media.”
Over time Butler said she grew more comfortable with Lackadaisy as well.
“I’ve definitely grown more confident about working with the unconventional panel layouts I use, and I feel I’ve developed a better sense for incorporating the art deco stylings of the Jazz Age into the artwork,” she said. “I’ve spent some time indulging in old gangster and noir films since starting on the project as well, and that’s done a lot to inspire me to try to make more artistic use of the monochrome look.
“There’s a lot more emphasis on lighting and visual depth in more recent pages of the comic, and though that diverges a bit from the appearance of earlier pages, hopefully the look has grown to serve the story more effectively.”
The story is one Butler said germinated in her mind years ago.
“Some of the story’s primary characters have been mental fixtures since grade school when I passed the hours sketching them in my class notes,” she said. College-rule notebook paper aside, they essentially existed without context until just a few years ago when I bought an old, turn of the century house in the St. Louis area. I started researching the house’s history, and became subsequently interested in local history in general -- the former golden years of St. Louis, the limestone caves winding beneath the streets, the city’s role in the emergence of jazz and such.
“For reasons I can’t quite put a finger on, all of these elements seemed to naturally congeal into some sort of story in my head, and so I decided to take it a step further and try my hand at putting it to paper in the form of a comic.”
While it might seem Butler has brought some divergent ideas together, the story works because it is an era rich in character and stories to draw upon.
Butler also writes with a good deal of humour interjected into the story, and that meshes perfectly with the fun art style.
As a writer, Butler said the era proved a rich ground to mine.
“Such a variety of things have influenced me, I hardly know where to begin listing them,” she said.
“I’ve gleaned inspiration from a multitude of shady, Prohibition era historical figures and, as I mentioned previously, a host of old films from Cagney gangster fare, to Bogart noir and Marx comedy.
“I suppose it’s almost perfunctory to cite F. Scott Fitzgerald as an influence, if not a resource, for all works of fiction relating to the Roaring Twenties but written in some later decade. Lackadaisy has been no exception. I’ve turned to his writing quite a bit to aid me in tailoring dialogue to match the characters and era.
“Bill Watterson’s Calvin and Hobbes certainly bears mentioning too. It was the comic I had the greatest affinity for growing up. My first attempts at even drawing comics as a child were imitations of Watterson’s strips, in fact. As a result, it has probably impacted my artistic approach and even my sense of comic timing (if it can be said that I have one) in ways I’m not even consciously aware of.”
Citing the influence of Calvin and Hobbes is interesting, because while it was not a connection I immediately made it reading Lackadaisy, I can certainly see common elements as I look a second time.
The overall appeal though is what is most gratifying the way things come together, with the exception of a few print concerns, such as word balloons lost under the actual art in a spot or two.
Butler said initially the title did not start as a graphic novel.
“Lackadaisy is a web comic in its native format,” she said. “When I began the project, I really hadn’t considered that it might someday wind up being a print comic as well.
“Lacking that foresight, I took advantage of the flexibility the web format allowed me, letting the vertical length of each page fluctuate in whatever way best accommodated the story.
“As a result, reformatting it into a shape resembling a book proved to be a Gordian knot of an editing job. In the midst of all of the digital chopping and pasting it required, I was concerned that it might lose any sense of cohesiveness.
“All difficulties considered, however, it turned out better in book form than I had expected it to. Credit is due to my publishers for the nicely embellished cover and for the assuring the quality of the paper and color reproduction too.
“Though we’re planning to make some improvements for the second print run, on the whole, I’m quite pleased with the book.”
This is a book that really should be part of a broad collection of simply fine comics. Find it, and enjoy.Lackadaisy Volume 1 is available from 4th Dimension Entertainment (4de.com). The comic is also freely available in its original web format at Lackadaisycats.com
-- CALVIN DANIELS

-- Appeared on Yorkton This Week WebXtra