Classics Illustrated Deluxe #9: A Christmas Carol and the Remembrance of Mugby by Charles Dickens by Rudolphe

Classics Illustrated Deluxe #9: A Christmas Carol and the Remembrance of Mugby by Charles Dickens by Rudolphe
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Classics Illustrated Deluxe (9)

You just can't mess with this classic! Everybody knows "A Christmas Carol" and if a child is reading this for the first time they had better be getting the story right. Rodolphe makes too many changes for me to allow. First Marley is the only spirit. He alone takes Scrooge to the past, present and future. A funny looking little green ghost with no chains, I was uncomfortable from the start. Omitting the changes of ghost does allow for smooth story transitions letting Rudolphe spend time keeping many of the little details of the original in this graphic version. I was almost ready to forgive this ghostly faux pas until the dreaded ending where the author chooses to go beyond the original ending and wrap the tale up with a summary of how things turned out in the future; Grandpa Scrooge, indeed! Then the most offending license an artist can take with Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" is committed with no utterance of Tiny Tim's famous line, "God bless us, every one!" The redeeming feature of this adaptation is Meyrand's wonderful, atmospheric illustration.

To finish is "A Remembrance of Mugby", another Dickens Christmas story, this time one I am unfamiliar with. I quite enjoyed it. It goes well with Scrooge as it also features a miserly, business man. But this time, the man decides to change his life and find happiness of his own free will.

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