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Title: Bone
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| CONSUMER ADVICE |
Parents, while this title is pretty much suitable for all audiences, there are a couple of things to keep in mind. First off is that the characters in this series occasionally drink and smoke, even the cartoony characters. Second, the rat creatures, as stupid as they are, do tend to look very scary sometimes. Third, the series becomes a little darker in tone in later volumes (kind of like the "Harry Potter" books). Aside from those minor things, though, parents shoudn't find a whole lot of things wrong with this series. Action, drama, and comedy fans will all find something to love about this series; it has a little something for everyone! |
The 90's were not the best of times for comic books. While there was a part of the 90's where comic books sold well, were the hot “collector item,” and were sought out by many, the tons of people who bought comic books were mainly buying comic books to collect and sell at a later date. During this period the comic book industry made no attempt to experiment much while comic books were at their prime to ensure that comic books survive, and thus when the comics became useless due to overexposure, originality pretty much died. However, there was one series that many people continued to buy even after they discovered their comics could not be sold for the money they thought they would, a title that has been going strong for over ten years and is still considered by many great comic book artists including Frank Miller to be one great series, and to this date it’s still one of the crown jewels to come from the '90's of comic books!
This wonderful comic book series, however, bears the strange name of “Bone,” and has an even weirder logo; however, inside the cover is a masterpiece waiting to be read with humor, fantasy, drama, and action. The story begins with three “bone” creatures in the desert, who have been chased out of their homeland, Boneville. The three bone cousins are Fone Bone (the star), Phoney Bone (the greedy money lover), and Smiley Bone (the one without a brain). Apparently, Phoney Bone was running for mayor in his town when something went wrong, and he was literally chased out of town with his two cousins. Well, now they are stuck out there, and don’t have any idea what to do. However, Smiley finds a map near the road which could help them find their way... but he’ll only hand over the map if Phoney gives him a dollar. After some reluctance, Phoney gives Smiley a dollar only to find out that the map looks like it was drawn by a five-year-old.
However, before Phoney can kill Smiley for ripping him off, everyone hears something in the distance. Before they know it, they are all swallowed up by locusts. Fone Bone wakes up at the bottom of the cliff, with no one and nothing... except for the map, that is. Fone Bone follows the map and finds a mysterious land where there are talking bugs, a dragon (which no one believes exists), and a bunch of stupid, stupid rat creatures (who easily steal the show in these early volumes). As if the land itself wasn’t strange enough, Fone Bone finds out that the stupid, stupid rat creatures are looking for someone who bears a star on his chest, and the only person who might be able to help him find his way back home is someone named Thorn. On top of that, Phoney Bone wears a shirt with a star on it, which suggests that the stupid, stupid rat creatures are looking for him... but why, and for what purpose?
I’m going to make this as simple as possible: “Bone” is a series that you SHOULD have in your collection! The series is funny beyond belief, has a story that gets deep and complicated, characters that are worth caring about, and an overall enjoyable experience! Trust me, out of all the people who got out of comic books, most will tell you that “Bone” is the one series that they continue to read to this day. And for good reason, as this series also has many story twists that you will NEVER see coming, and ultimately these twists will stick with you forever! As of this moment the whole “Bone” story is broken up into three trilogies, and I will be reviewing those trilogies too at one point. In this point in time, the “Bone” series is getting ready to wrap up after 14 strong years, and you owe it to yourself to check out Jeff Smith’s masterpiece if you haven’t already. I’d like to borrow Bandai’s quote to express my feelings for this series as this quote probably explains it best, but “Bone” is “a story you’ll never forget.”
- -Review By Kevin T. Rodriguez- -
Note: The "Bone" saga is broken up into three different trilogies, none of them having a specific name, so I'm just going to call them Act 1/2/3. The review above is for the first trilogy of Bone, and it includes the books:
"Out of Boneville" (
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"The Great Cow Race
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(
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"Eye's of The Storm"
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The first trilogy can also be found in:
"Bone: The One Volume Edition SC" ( )