I am going way off the radar this week with Hauteville House. From indie publisher Delourt, this book grabbed my attention with its wonderfully weird airship on the cover.
But is this book indie, or is does it fall below that standard and turn into just another schlock comic book with little direction? Let’s jump into Hauteville House #2 and see what we find.
1864, under an imaginary Second Empire, Napoléon III uses his army and his secret service to study certain phenomena relating to the occult and to popular legends. His goal is quite simple: achieving world supremacy. In Guernesey, in the depths of Hauteville House, Victor Hugo’s home in exile, a small group of Republican special agents attempt to thwart the Imperial projects. For his first mission, Agent Gavroche is sent to Mexico to help the Resistance to organize against Maximilian’s troops. Maximilian, a puppet Emperor set in place by Napoléon III, is doing some rather strange research in the Maya temples for his master…
Hauteville House #2 as the title would suggest picks up after book one in this new series, but does little in the way of early exposition to fill us in. I know, I know, go back and read issue one, but at this early stage the book should drop a brief summary of events, especially when the there is an entire page left almost blank, aside from some informational text on the book and publisher. Thankfully the preview blurb above gives us the need to know thanks to being digital. The first thing you are going to notice is that the art in Hauteville House is very busy, but not in a way that becomes distracting. There is a lot going on in nearly every panel with a lot of attention paid to the details. The problem crops up with the art itself; it’s very early ’90s indie fare. What I mean is that is just looks so out-of-place with it trying to be a realistic display of people, but coming off a bit to cartoon like.
The story – from what I can gather – sees our two heroes meet in Mexico on the hunt for some documents hidden away in the safe of a high-ranking government official. It’s your standard heist story which I can appreciate, but things get pretty odd, pretty quick. Hauteville House lives in this very Steampunk heavy world with all sorts of fantastic machines and tools. What makes the premise cool is that the book is taking place just after The American Civil War, with the book making some references to the battle of Gettysburg of which they took part in last issue. The story flows as you would expect with a disguises, break-ins, secret rooms, and getting caught just as they find what they are looking for, but there is one glaring problem that I can’t overlook. A problem so odd and out-of-place that it nearly ruined the entire book for me.
Late in the story our heroes find the documents, but manage to activate a French made robot that tries to kill them. This is of course very cool as a concept and I have no issue with it, but what I do have issue with is a particular panel that screws the pooch. In one panel our heroine is fully dressed in one of those old-fashioned dresses that take hours to put on blast the robot in the face, but turn the page and the next panel shows her in her underwear with zero explanation. Oh, but don’t think there isn’t a reason as the artist uses this state of undress to show off here ninja like skills against the robot in play. Fine, I get that doing those moves would be a pain in the ass in a large dress, but what I don’t understand is that they throw in a panel of the guards blowing up the door to get in to where this battle is taking place, only to show our heroines breasts becoming exposed as the blast tosses her about.
Look, it’s all fine and good to have books catered to adults with all sorts of exposed parts and pieces, but when you don’t present yourself as such, and when there is zero indication anywhere in the book of an adult nature in any way shape or form things get weird. I mean, I would have been fine if it was happening all over the place, but having it restricted to a single panel makes the book look really trashy, even more so when the only reason to undress her was to show some nipple action. Aside from that Hauteville House #2 is pretty average. The artwork is dated, the story is predictable to a fault, and the use of sex to sell part of the story falls flat. This is one title you are going to want to pass up this week.
Title: Hauteville House #2
Price: $2.99
Writer: Fred Duval
Translator: Studio Charon
Art: Thierry Gioux
Pages: 23 Pages
Digital Release Date: August 12 2015
Age Rating: 12+ Only
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