MattBrady
11-22-2002, 09:03 AM
<a href="http://www.newsarama.com/Image/AriaTheUsesofcvr.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.newsarama.com/Image/AriaTheUsesofcvr_t.jpg" width="175" height="268" align="right" border="0" alt="Uses of Enchantment #1"></a> Orlando isn’t the only place with a ‘magic kingdom.’ Another enchanted theme park takes center stage in the February-debuting Aria: The Uses of Enchantment, a four issue Image miniseries starring Lady Kildaire, the faerie princess and protagonist of Aria.
I'd have to say that The Uses of Enchantment is definitely my favorite Aria story we've done so far,” said Aria co-creator and writer of Enchantment, Brian Holguin. “I suppose at its heart, it's a story about magic and loss, and the dangers of getting what you wish for,” Holguin said. “It all begins when a message literally falls into Killdare's lap, an invitation addressed simply to ‘The Fairest in the Land.’ This leads Kildare - a 900-year-old Faerie princess living in modern New York, and the ‘star’ of the Aria series - to strange little ‘enchanted kingdom’ tucked away in the Catskills Mountains.”
<a href="http://www.newsarama.com/Image/ariap3.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.newsarama.com/Image/ariap3_t.jpg" width="175" height="268" align="left" border="0" alt="Uses of Enchantment #1, page 3"></a>As the story unfolds, Kildare will learn not only who created the kingdom, but for what reasons this fairytale refuge exists in the first place. Originally, ‘The Uses of Enchantment’ was a roadside theme park that flourished in the 1950s. However, changing times and tastes in entertainment have resulted in the park being abandoned (well, by human tourists) for decades. And like all fairytale kingdoms, The Uses of Enchantment has a very dark secret at its heart.
“We're playing with a lot of traditional storybook motifs and fairytale tropes and turning them upside down, sideways and inside out,” Holguin explained. “There's a lot of humor and some great tragedy all mixed together. The art that Lan Medina - who’s also illustrated Aria: A Summer's Spell and issues of Vertigo's Fables - is producing is just amazing. We're doing our best to raise the bar across the board with this series. I think long time fans will be very pleased and new readers should become steadfast converts.
”The title of the series, of course, is taken from The Uses of Enchantment, psychologist Bruno Bettelheim's book on the meaning and importance of fairy tales, the role they play not only in the development of healthy children, but also in the development of culture itself. It's about how stories shape our lives and mold our decisions and our deep-seated need to believe in ‘happily ever after.’”
That said, Holguin explained that he still has problems putting Aria into any particular genre, especially fantasy. “When I think of the term it brings to mind the endless stream 10-generation Tolkien rip-offs, interchangeable trilogies chronicling quests of various Chosen Ones searching for the Fabled Plot-Device of whatever. I'm not a fan of ‘escapism - to me, life seems to precious to escape from. I believe in metaphor, in the ‘lie that tells a greater truth.’
<a href="http://www.newsarama.com/Image/Enchantmentpg5.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.newsarama.com/Image/Enchantmentpg5_t.jpg" width="175" height="254" align="right" border="0" alt="Uses of Enchantment #1, page 5"></a> “I think any fiction using fantastic elements -- whether its folklore, tall tales, fairytales, sci-fi, fantasy, superheroes, whatever - works best when those elements link us to what's most real, most human about ourselves. That's what I've always hoped to do with Aria, and with this story in particular. It clearly has its share of the strange and wondrous -- a magic kingdom, a talking hedgehog, a supernatural hunter, an imprisoned monster -- but at its core it's about real people and real emotions.”
In other Aria news, Holguin reported that the series recently won the Youth Award at the Amadora Comics Festival in Lisbon, Portugal. Additionally, the Aria TV series for the Sci-Fi channel is still in the works – those who saw Holguin during this past summer’s convention season had a chance to see the brief, live-action trailer for the proposed series.
I'd have to say that The Uses of Enchantment is definitely my favorite Aria story we've done so far,” said Aria co-creator and writer of Enchantment, Brian Holguin. “I suppose at its heart, it's a story about magic and loss, and the dangers of getting what you wish for,” Holguin said. “It all begins when a message literally falls into Killdare's lap, an invitation addressed simply to ‘The Fairest in the Land.’ This leads Kildare - a 900-year-old Faerie princess living in modern New York, and the ‘star’ of the Aria series - to strange little ‘enchanted kingdom’ tucked away in the Catskills Mountains.”
<a href="http://www.newsarama.com/Image/ariap3.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.newsarama.com/Image/ariap3_t.jpg" width="175" height="268" align="left" border="0" alt="Uses of Enchantment #1, page 3"></a>As the story unfolds, Kildare will learn not only who created the kingdom, but for what reasons this fairytale refuge exists in the first place. Originally, ‘The Uses of Enchantment’ was a roadside theme park that flourished in the 1950s. However, changing times and tastes in entertainment have resulted in the park being abandoned (well, by human tourists) for decades. And like all fairytale kingdoms, The Uses of Enchantment has a very dark secret at its heart.
“We're playing with a lot of traditional storybook motifs and fairytale tropes and turning them upside down, sideways and inside out,” Holguin explained. “There's a lot of humor and some great tragedy all mixed together. The art that Lan Medina - who’s also illustrated Aria: A Summer's Spell and issues of Vertigo's Fables - is producing is just amazing. We're doing our best to raise the bar across the board with this series. I think long time fans will be very pleased and new readers should become steadfast converts.
”The title of the series, of course, is taken from The Uses of Enchantment, psychologist Bruno Bettelheim's book on the meaning and importance of fairy tales, the role they play not only in the development of healthy children, but also in the development of culture itself. It's about how stories shape our lives and mold our decisions and our deep-seated need to believe in ‘happily ever after.’”
That said, Holguin explained that he still has problems putting Aria into any particular genre, especially fantasy. “When I think of the term it brings to mind the endless stream 10-generation Tolkien rip-offs, interchangeable trilogies chronicling quests of various Chosen Ones searching for the Fabled Plot-Device of whatever. I'm not a fan of ‘escapism - to me, life seems to precious to escape from. I believe in metaphor, in the ‘lie that tells a greater truth.’
<a href="http://www.newsarama.com/Image/Enchantmentpg5.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.newsarama.com/Image/Enchantmentpg5_t.jpg" width="175" height="254" align="right" border="0" alt="Uses of Enchantment #1, page 5"></a> “I think any fiction using fantastic elements -- whether its folklore, tall tales, fairytales, sci-fi, fantasy, superheroes, whatever - works best when those elements link us to what's most real, most human about ourselves. That's what I've always hoped to do with Aria, and with this story in particular. It clearly has its share of the strange and wondrous -- a magic kingdom, a talking hedgehog, a supernatural hunter, an imprisoned monster -- but at its core it's about real people and real emotions.”
In other Aria news, Holguin reported that the series recently won the Youth Award at the Amadora Comics Festival in Lisbon, Portugal. Additionally, the Aria TV series for the Sci-Fi channel is still in the works – those who saw Holguin during this past summer’s convention season had a chance to see the brief, live-action trailer for the proposed series.