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Nov 08, 2014gendeg rated this title 4 out of 5 stars
Brás de Oliva Domingos has many lives and many deaths. Told in a series of well-paced, flowing vignettes, Daytripper by Fábio Moon and Gabriel Bá chronicles all these lives and deaths to show how precious life is. It's a story with strong existential hues, asking the eternal question about what's really important in life. What are the moments that matter? The answer is obvious of course, but it takes not just a lifetime but many lifetimes for Brás to get to the right answer. Each replay or turn of the wheel of Brás's life is another chance for him to mull over and figure out those questions. There is no linear time here and the narrative jumps around so that we see Brás at different ages throughout. In chapter one, Brás is turning thirty-two-years-old; and then in the next chapter, he is twenty-one. At his oldest, he is seventy-six; the youngest we see him at is eleven or so. Each life focuses on some life-turning event—a budding romance; a failed relationship; the birth of a child; a life-changing trip with a friend—and is also filled with quiet moments, the moments we usually don't remember. Each chapter ends in a finite way, though the authors disrupt the pattern tellingly in the last chapter. I think this graphic novel would have worked better for me if it weren't so mawkishly sentimental and focused so obsessively on this one, single character. Each inevitable death that comes feels more and more diminished and the repetition becomes tiresome, decreasing rather than increasing the tragedy and melancholy for me. Still, Daytripper is a lofty idea conceptually and an even better story executed in visual form. The dreamy watercolor panels are beautifully drawn and filled in. I found myself thinking, yes, life as a watercolor painting is pitch-perfect here, the way memories and events seem to soak, deepen, bleed, and fade.