"Get your paws off me, you damned dirty ape!"
"There's no need to be rude. It isn't as if hot baths are easy to come by in the jungle."
This is volume 7 of the Jack of Fables paperbacks and it collects issues 36-40. It was again written by Bill Willingham and Matthew Sturges with a one-off story written by Chris Roberson. The art was by various combinations of Tony Akins, Russ Braun, Andrew Pepoy and Jose Marzan, Jr.
The first story is a filler from Chris Roberson called Jack 'n' Apes which is a tale from Jack's past when he was on the run (again) and pitched up in the jungle of West Africa and ran into a colony of Fable apes. The remaining four installments by the regular writing team pick up the story from the end of The Great Fables Crossover. In it Jack (along with sidekick Gary) head off on the road again without a care in the world looking for the next opportunity to make money but along the way they discover that the choices that Jack has made in the past have consequences that only now make themselves apparent. This volume has two plot lines and the second follows Jack's son, with the Snow Queen, Jack Frost as he sets out on the road to adventure and being a hero across the Fables Homelands. However he doesn't find it easy as first real quest - to save a town from rampaging monsters - is further complicated when he has to complete a quest for the monsters in exchange for the release of the townsfolk.
Although only a filler story after the major crossover event, Roberson's story was everything I love about a Jack of Fables story. It was funny and had Jack furiously trying to work an angle at every opportunity - switching allegiances every couple of pages. The riff on the Tarzan legend was great especially his relationship with Jane.
The main story looks like a change of direction, for now at least, with Jack's son taking a more prominent role and showing his father how a true hero acts - although Jack, of course, already believes he is the first and greatest hero of them all. Jack is sidelined as, Dorian Gray style, his past actions literally transform him. I will need to see how this change of direction plays out but it could be interesting with Jack Frost travelling between the worlds of the Homelands looking for adventure opens up the book to perhaps more varied and interesting story ideas. My only worry is that it may become too like the main book if they persist with the formula for too long.
First published on RevolutionSF on Tuesday Mar 22, 2011
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