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otherwyrld's review against another edition
1.0
I'm sure that the people who like this graphic novel will use words like edgy, dark and gritty to describe it. Well, I didn't like this story, and I'm going to use words like nasty, misogynistic, homophobic and (whatever word you use to describe someone who hates disabled people).
The story revolves around three teenage boys who are sealed in an underground bunker by their ultra-wealthy and paranoid father while the world is being destroyed above their heads. He uses his extreme wealth to develop a life suit which is designed to protect them from all harm, whilst eliminating the need for basic functions such as eating and excreting. The boys do what all ultra rich boys tend to do - lounge around expending useless energy and being nasty to the hired help. A few early tests on the suits go disastrously wrong but the boys are persuaded to finally put on the suits when one of the servants children, who has been crippled by a tumour on her spine, puts on the suit first. Determined not to be outdone, the boys also put on the suits, only to find that they have to be grafted on to their bodies and cannot be removed. Circumstances cause them to have to leave their underground bunker to rejoin the shattered world above.
So what do they do? Well, being ultra-rich teenage boys, they doss in Buckingham Palace, use the remaining servants as racehorses, and basically treat everyone like crap. Their only problem is that the life suits they wear seals off their genitalia, otherwise I'm sure we would have been treated to a few rape scenes as well. Of the three brothers the worst by far is George, who is a psychopath. Muc is meant to be the sympathetic one, but he mostly comes across as just weak. The narrator is Wilfred Aka Das Bombast (no idea why) but he is so removed from reality that he sees everything through the lenses of the films he loves.
Their cosy little dystopia is disturbed by the return of Suzie, the servant girl who they thought was dead but who turns out was something else entirely. It seems that everything they thought they knew was a lie, and in order to survive they have to destroy Suzie, or at least was she has now become. I won't try to describe the twist at all, because it really didn't make a lot of sense. In the end they succeed and decide to return to the bunker, not realising that they haven't quite finished the job. And ... that's it. There are no consequences to their deeds, no indication that they have learned anything or grown as a result of their experiences, nothing to recommend continuing to read any sequel to this story. Just three overgrown kids who get to act out all their nastiest fantasies, which we get to share with them.
So, really not something I enjoyed, but if you go for edgy, dark and gritty, don't say I didn't warn you. Oh, and why is it called UXB? Sorry, no idea.
The story revolves around three teenage boys who are sealed in an underground bunker by their ultra-wealthy and paranoid father while the world is being destroyed above their heads. He uses his extreme wealth to develop a life suit which is designed to protect them from all harm, whilst eliminating the need for basic functions such as eating and excreting. The boys do what all ultra rich boys tend to do - lounge around expending useless energy and being nasty to the hired help. A few early tests on the suits go disastrously wrong but the boys are persuaded to finally put on the suits when one of the servants children, who has been crippled by a tumour on her spine, puts on the suit first. Determined not to be outdone, the boys also put on the suits, only to find that they have to be grafted on to their bodies and cannot be removed. Circumstances cause them to have to leave their underground bunker to rejoin the shattered world above.
So what do they do? Well, being ultra-rich teenage boys, they doss in Buckingham Palace, use the remaining servants as racehorses, and basically treat everyone like crap. Their only problem is that the life suits they wear seals off their genitalia, otherwise I'm sure we would have been treated to a few rape scenes as well. Of the three brothers the worst by far is George, who is a psychopath. Muc is meant to be the sympathetic one, but he mostly comes across as just weak. The narrator is Wilfred Aka Das Bombast (no idea why) but he is so removed from reality that he sees everything through the lenses of the films he loves.
Their cosy little dystopia is disturbed by the return of Suzie, the servant girl who they thought was dead but who turns out was something else entirely. It seems that everything they thought they knew was a lie, and in order to survive they have to destroy Suzie, or at least was she has now become. I won't try to describe the twist at all, because it really didn't make a lot of sense. In the end they succeed and decide to return to the bunker, not realising that they haven't quite finished the job. And ... that's it. There are no consequences to their deeds, no indication that they have learned anything or grown as a result of their experiences, nothing to recommend continuing to read any sequel to this story. Just three overgrown kids who get to act out all their nastiest fantasies, which we get to share with them.
So, really not something I enjoyed, but if you go for edgy, dark and gritty, don't say I didn't warn you. Oh, and why is it called UXB? Sorry, no idea.
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