Love and Rockets, Vol. 11: Wigwam Bam

Love and Rockets #11

by Jaime Hernández

.html by Jaime Hernandez
From one of the Top 100 Innovators (according to Time magazine) comes the graphic novel that The Comics Journal called "one of the best stories in any medium" and named as the 13 th best comic book of all time! Beautifully drawn, "Wigwam Bam" is an amazingly rich meditation on the power memory has over one's everyday life, as presented through juxtaposition of the reality and idealization of the relationship between Jaime's best-loved characters, Maggie and Hopey. Praised by the likes of Alan Moore and Neil Gaiman, don't you miss out on one of the true comics geniuses of the 20th Century if you aren't reading Jaime Hernandez's work.
SC, 8x11, 132pg, b&w

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Fiction, Graphic Novels Comics, Comix, Romance, Sequential Art

132 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1993

About the author

Jaime and his brother Gilbert Hernández mostly publish their separate storylines together in Love And Rockets and are often referred to as 'Los Bros Hernandez'.

Reviews

[Malcolm · Rating 4 out of 5]

The finest of indie graphic novels with the coolest of characters, Wig Wam Bam focuses on the Hoppers gang, centred on Maggie & Hopey, their extended friendship and social network. Opening with Maggie and Hopey out east the narratives turns on a falling out, on Hopey’s appearance on milk cartons as missing and a seeming competition between their social circle to claim Hopey’s friendship – all woven together with those struggling to make a life in the American Dream, the casual racism so often experienced and the deep psychological scars the friends carry from the losses in the their young lives. Hernandez constructs rich and sophisticated literary texts from punk rock lyrics, sparse black and white drawings and the lives of two East LA punks…. Three decades after I started reading L&R it continues to impress, even when revisited.

[Joey Heflich · Rating 5 out of 5]

I still love this book, and yeah, I've still got a crush on Maggie.

[Neil Carey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jaime Hernandez's greatest. A poetic look at growing up and the difficulty of finding out the truth of anything

[Al McCarty · Rating 5 out of 5]

I re-read this recently as part of the Locas Vol. Hardcover omnibus just a few months ago. Just re-read it now, again, which I’ve done before and will continue to do. Sometimes, as I’ve done before, I’ll just look at the pictures, the amazing drawings, the incredible cartooning. How does he do it?
I forget sometimes that it’s mainly a Hopey story. We don’t see Maggie, except in flashback, after page 14, but what a story, such great characters, and character designs.
This is one I have as a TPB from 1994, first edition. Thirty years, already? Wish I had it as a signed/numbered hardcover (also Death of Speedy, Flies on the Ceiling)…time to hit up eBay.
I’m trying to trim my library, but these are the comics works I’m ever in awe of…nothing compares.

[StrictlySequential · Rating 5 out of 5]

¡¡¡INCREDIBLE!!!

¡¡No epic is better than Jaime's half of "Love and Rockets"!!

[D.M. · Rating 4 out of 5]

More fairly light fare from Jaime, this time covering the 'missing' Hopey's life and Izzy's haunting by her & Maggie, as well as following Ray & Danita and Doyle as they try to get their respective shit together. We're even given a little mystery in the form of those mysterious milk-carton MISSING notices, though the answer is (it must be said) a bit disappointing. We don't really see Maggie in this book, except in flashbacks and memories; Hopey is pretty much the centre of its universe, and it seems she's kind of the centre of everyone else's too as we see how she unwittingly haunts and causes obsession in people she doesn't give a second thought. The kids of Danita's neighbourhood were fun, it was neat to see a little more of Joey Glass' adult life and of course the whole thing is gorgeous...but it was all just a little too...offhand.
A great piece of Jaime's work, but just making clearer the difference between the brothers at this point.