Yeah, I know: erotica ain't about character. Story of O is mainly about flagellation, submission, sex with animals and bestial men, power and the abrogation of power, labial piercing and branded buttocks, not to mention the eerie power of walking around naked with an owl mask over your head. Crepax is such a masterful comics artist that his treatment of this material results in some truly arresting moments (a one-page portrait of O being led in chains by an ape-like man, the disturbing panels showing the bird-masked protagonist being led through a party of partying aristos), but there’s a lot of ho-hum stuff in between. Like the book on which it’s based, Crepax’s Story takes its transgressive material and makes it a bit of a slog.
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