Innocent Omnibus vol. 2

Vol. 1 showcased young executioner Charles-Henri Sanson learning how public executions are meant to be handled and slowly stepping into the role of Monsieur de Paris, the executioner to the royal family of France.  Charles’ exploits then were a mixture of ripe melodrama that pitted his kind nature against his difficult upbringing, all rendered majestically by mangaka Shin’ichi Sakamoto’s art that was capable of rendering the most tortured visual metaphor or gory execution with an equal level of detail.  We get more of that in this second omnibus as our protagonist grows more confident in his role as executioner, and as someone who wants to treat those who he’s about to put to death with the respect that all people should be afforded.

If that was all this volume was trying to do, it’d likely be a success in terms of appealing directly to those who liked what Sakamoto was doing in  vol. 1.  That’s not all we’re getting here, as the mangaka has decided that there’s another member of the Sanson family who now deserves to be spotlighted as a co-protagonist.  I’m talking about Charles’ little sister, Marie-Joseph, seen briefly in vol. 1 displaying the kind of interest in the family profession that marked her as a budding serial killer in my eyes.  How you feel about this volume is likely going to hinge upon your reaction to her expanded role in this story, and whether or not you believe that an eleven-year-old is capable of composing herself and doing the things she does here.

We’ll come back to Marie as the majority of this volume is still centered around Charles.  It wastes no time in getting back into the action as the quartering of attempted royal assassin Robert Damiens is still underway.  While Charles doesn’t want to prolong his suffering a minute more than he has to, the horses are starting to lose steam and may not be able to pull him apart as required.  Then, a final execution by his father sees the mantle of Monsieur de Paris finally passed from father to son, but one more thing has to happen before our protagonist can call himself a man yet.  Then it’s off to the Court of Versailles as Charles gets to know the members of the royal family he will one day have the responsibility of executing.

All of this is portrayed by Sakamoto as if it’s the most serious spectacle that you’ve ever read.  Normally that’s a recipe for hilarity, and there were parts of this collection that made me chuckle in spite of themselves, but the mangaka has a real knack for getting you to go along with the story he’s telling here.  That’s mainly down to his incredible artistic skill in making this period come to life.  Pre-Revolution France still enchants with the decadent splendor of the high class and the grotty filth of those below them, while also amazing with the gory spectacle of the executions on display.

What’s more is that Sakamoto isn’t just content to show you things as they are.  The mangaka loves a good visual metaphor and we get plenty of memorable ones here.  From the monster made up of the throngs of bodies who have come to experience Robert’s quartering, to the ascendant spectacle seen when the man finally leaves this Earth, to the rendering of the agony an individual feels after they’ve been beheaded, the mangaka is never content to simply show just what’s happening to his characters, he’s determined to make the reader feel it as well.  He’s also not one to rely on repeating visual motifs, so you’re getting something new every single time he wants to communicate the feeling at these points in the story.

This level of visual style is something you don’t see very often in comics, regardless of what part of the world that they hail from.  Even if the story is a melodramatic coming-of-age tale that hits certain familiar tropes and has a predictable bent to it as a result of its basis on history, its visual rendering never fails to surprise or enchant..  Which is good because “Innocent” needs every bit of artistic leeway it can muster when it comes to dealing with Charles’ little sister.

Where to start with Marie?  How about with the fact that she feels way too young to be doing the things that she does here in the way that we see them.  I’m not talking about her doing things that are appropriate for her age (we’ll get to that), but that she composes and expresses herself in ways that don’t feel credible for her age.  She’s still six years old at the start of this volume, but already helping out her brother in ways that breach executioner protocol without a care, and talking down her evil grandmother with the confidence and arrogance of someone at least ten years older.

It gets better.  There’s a five-year time jump shortly after those events and now we see an older Marie now sporting a long-haired, rock-star pompadour that’s shaved on the sides as she severs a chain through the gaps in its links like it was nothing.  Then we see her butcher an execution in the name of revenge, take on a half-dozen masked assassins who come for revenge after that, and then perform what’s called an impossible execution after she plays with a man’s heart in just the right way.  All of this is done while she sports either a condescending smirk or scowl to indicate how she thinks everyone is below her and is more or less her plaything.

Marie at eleven is… a lot, and it’s going to require a lot of suspension of disbelief on the part of the reader to believe that she’s capable of what she’s doing here.  I’ll admit to thumbing my way back through the volume to verify her age at least once as I just could not believe that Sakamoto was asking us to accept that an eleven-year-old was capable of this level of self-possession.  I assume he’s doing it to keep her age relevant to her real-life counterpart, but given that while Marie-Joseph was accepted to have lived, her life as an executioner is considered to be fiction.  So would it have killed Sakamoto to make her five or ten years older here?

That would’ve also helped with the mangaka’s decision to add a sexual dimension to her character as well.  Rest assured, you don’t actually see anything as we see the worst of what’s done to her via another (in this case, regrettably) clever visual metaphor.  It’s what leads her to butcher her first execution, but things take on a different tone when she casts a spell over her second executionee… and it’s clear that this guy is just really into her as well.  Oh, and in case you’re wondering, that’s her on the cover of this second omnibus.  Even if this version of Marie is fiction and just a drawing, putting a topless eleven-year-old on the cover is certainly a choice, Dark Horse.

If you can’t get past all of this, that’s understandable.  If you do, it’ll likely be because in spite of all this, Marie’s a pretty compelling character to behold.  Her utter contempt for those around her, even brother Charles after a certain point, is refreshing and also easily grasped by the reader.  There’s also no denying that Sakamoto imbues her with a certain badass aura in showing how she’s able to compose herself with a level of confidence well beyond her years.  More than anything else is how the story actually re-centers her as its protagonist for a bit after she’s tasked with performing an “impossible” execution.  You’ll either wind up chucking this volume and its predecessor into your own “To Sell” pile after reading all this, or you’ll just go, “Fuck it, Sakamoto!  Show me what other crazy shit you’ve got in store!”

I fall into the latter camp, if you haven’t guessed.  For all of his skill, the mangaka’s visual style isn’t what you’d call “subtle” and you could feel that he was just begging to go right over the top from the first volume.  Even if the setting and characters of “Innocent” are based in historical fact, the execution of this volume shows that Sakamoto has no inclination of being beholden to them except in weird, pedantic ways that do him no favors.  In every other way, he’s going to go as crazy as he possibly can.  I can respect that and while that may not be evidence of good taste on my part, hey, at least I can say that I was entertained by what I was presented with here.