Cooperation: Gedeon
Publication: Relax No 40 (2022.12)
Paradise is closer than it seems. Review of "Angel" by Karol Weber
I approached "Angel" by Karol Weber twice - first I read it in "Relax" and once again just before writing the review. It's not my favorite story in the "Tales from the Ark" series, but I honestly admit that the second reading allowed me to see a lot more content in it than the first, which definitely speaks in favor of "Angel."
The first reading directed my thoughts to where the author probably assumed: towards a certain process of maturation, and with it - noticing. Toward realizing one's place in the world, and what this world gives us. And the hint that someday you just have to stop looking for happiness, because it is right next door.
This alone is valuable and deserves attention because in Polish comics you can't always count on deeper reflection. In "Angel" there is additionally graphic play and fun with frames, and all this adds up to a collected, self-reflective message of the main character.
The second reading allows me to make more insights, regarding the Ark itself - for in "Angel" it falls clear that the Ark is a kind of hermetic world. The characters who find themselves in it have been, as it were, forced into servitude, although in essence, they do not complain about this new world, despite their initial confusion and subsequent routine. After all, some "force majeure" provides them with food and shelter. And although, after all, it ties them up in its way, these people begin to get attached, ba, they even give respect and affection, because, after all, it doesn't starve them, so it must have good intentions. Although they don't know the way out of the Ark, they are guarded by a host of para-military groups, and they themselves have stopped asking about the outside world, but at the same time, they feel that it's actually not too bad...
This element became, in my second reading, so strongly multidimensional, so ambiguous, that it is difficult to include each of the possibilities in a short review. The hermetic nature of the world depicted brings to mind the obvious connotation of political regimes, in which hopeless people find that after all, they have something to eat and drink, so it's not so bad. And that it is forbidden to think? Hardly...
One can also talk about Stockholm syndrome or yet another psychological process called boiled frog syndrome. There are plenty of possibilities, and the fact that they are opened by a short comic story puts "Angel" high in the content and meaning hierarchy.