Unlovable volume 3


By Esther Pearl Watson (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-737-6

I first encountered Unlovable when the second volume turned up unannounced in my “please review” mail-pile. I’d never heard of the strip nor the magazine Bust where it had run for years, but as I’m always in the market for a new graphic experience, I dutifully sat down and lost myself in the world of a Texas Teen from a long, long time ago…

Based on or perhaps rather inspired by an actual schoolgirl diary Ester Pearl Watson found in a gas-station restroom in 1995, the strip – now collected in three diminutive yet huge hardback volumes – as translated and reconfigured by the cartoonist, reveals the innermost thoughts, dreams, experiences and doodles of a dumpy, utterly ordinary American girl of the tastelessly intoxicating Eighties – forensically displayed for our examination in a catchy, breathless, effusive warts ‘n’ all cartoon-grotesque style.

In the course of these garish and oddly compulsive tomes we follow ferociously aspirational Tammy Pierce as she goes through the unrelenting daily rollercoaster ride dictated by hormones, strict, religious mom, social pressure and the twin drives to both stand out and fit in.

From my lofty male vantage point here in the future it is achingly sad and hysterically funny.

Now it’s the Summer of 1989, the party decade is almost over and this third collection covers the heady, aimless days of the vacation as ever-more mature and sophisticated (I’m pretty sure they’re the words I’m looking for) Miss Pierce of Texas increasingly spars with her obnoxious tool of a brother Willis and his annoying best bud Tim Starry… Other world-ending distractions include an overwhelming fascination with boys of the wrong sort, cars, pimples, clothing brands, bands from Pop to Punk, Reggae to Heavy Rock, adolescent poetry, violent movies, mascara, perpetual humiliation from friends and enemies alike, the idiocy of parents and the looming prospect of finally doing “it”…

Amongst the most memorable sequences in store here are the extended mixed signal interactions with psycho best pal Kim‘s loser “not-boyfriend” Erick Burns, her own mother’s constant carping on Tammy getting a part-time job, monumental make-up mistakes, a succession of inane get-rich-quick schemes, learning to breakdance, the ongoing war with mean girl Courtney Brown, petty vandalism, cheerleader tryouts, being condemned to Summer School whilst her friends get to just hang out and why Tammy had to stop practising her wrestling moves with that Tim Starry boy…

These visual epigrams reference universal aspects of puberty and adolescence: parents are unreasonable and embarrassing, siblings are scum and embarrassing and your body is humiliatingly embarrassing; always finding new and horrifying ways to betray you practically every day…

Your friends can’t be trusted, you’re attracted to all the wrong people and you just know that no one will ever want you…

Drawn in a two-colour – black and purple are this year’s tones – faux-grotesque manner (you can call it intentionally primitive and ugly if you want) the page by page snapshots of a social hurricane building to disaster are absolutely captivating.

Although this is a retro-comedy experience, behind her fatuous obsession with fashion, boys, money, fame, music, designer labels, peer acceptance and traitorous bodily functions, Tammy is a lonely bewildered child who it’s impossible not to feel sorry for.

Actually it’s equally hard to like her (hell, its difficult to curb the urge to slap her at times) but that is, after all, the point…

If you live long enough you’ll experience the pop culture keystones of every definitive era of your life at least twice more. Here the base, tasteless and utterly superficial aspects of 1980s America are back to harrow a new generation which is too young to remember them, but you and I can get all nostalgic for the good bits and blithely ignore all the bad stuff.

This big little hardback (416 pages each and 146 x 146mm) affords a delightful and genuinely moving exploration of something eternal, given extra punch with the trappings of that era of tasteless self-absorption, and like those other meta-real diarists and social commentators Nigel Molesworth, Bridget Jones and Adrian Mole, the ruminations and recordings of Miss Tammy Pierce have something ineffable yet concrete to contribute to the Wisdom of the Ages.

Modern and Post-Ironic, Unlovable is unmissable; offering a perfect opportunity to discover the how and why of girls and possibly learn something to change your life.

Now please excuse me, I need to replace the 96 batteries in my boom box…
© 2014 Esther Pearl Watson. All rights reserved.