Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Every story must come to an end, every tale must wag in the face of the reader one final time and heroes and villains alike must bid their own individual Farewell; some though live forever, they are as immortal as the ability to relay the tales either through spoken narrative or visual aid, the hero and villain must live in the ether ready to be seen again.

For fans of Bill Willingham, a story teller to be placed in the same high regard as Joe Hill or going even further back in time to the legends such as Jack Kirby or Bob Kane, luminaries of the genre to whom the world owes so much thanks. Fables has been a joy to read, a trip in to the long forgotten psyche of childhood but in which the stories don’t always end up being neat and perfect, in which the blurred line between heroic and villainous is strained, even seen as imperfect and audacious. For where else does the Big Bad Wolf try to eat his own children and two sisters war against each other with the fate of the known world hanging in the balance of the victorious? Only on Earth can such fates collide and only in the mind of the imaginative and the intrepid it seems.

Fables has been glorious for the simple fact it has allowed the reader to live in a world that is occupied by their childhood, whether through good old fashioned fear or through thoughts of noble action, each course has been a recurring theme throughout the series and Farewell is no different, except for the fact that as in every beginning, there must be an ending…of sorts.

The creative team behind the Fables series comes out with this cracker of a collection, ends are tied up, resolutions are resolved and the story, well the story will continue, all stories must prevail unless they are to die from neglect.

With the war for independence and their lives long since over, the prospect of civil war looms in the long grass and it is a graphic novel warning to all to take care for the independence they seek, for the spectre of turning against each other for the differently held views they hold dearly is often the point where the cannibalism of the intellect and soul are to be seen taking part.

A better collection of interlocked stories will be hard to find, Fables is a find of extraordinary enjoyment.

Fables: Farewell is available to purchase from Worlds Apart on Lime Street, Liverpool

Ian D. Hall