Thessaly

I chose this because I enjoyed Bill Willingham’s work on Fables and thought this would be a fun read. I really enjoyed it, though I saw some familiar patterns in the writing that kind of took me out of the story and made me think, “Oh, he’s doin it again.” The story itself is fine, I got a sort of, “too self aware”/adult version of Sabrina the Teenage Witch, what didn’t thrill me was how I kept comparing this with Fables, Thessaly’s world could fit right into their universe and all it would take is a maybe a couple of pages to do that. I definitely had Snow White and Bigby Wolf on my mind whenever I was reading dialogue between Thessaly and Fetch, dynamics and relationships are different surely, but the way Thessaly was turning down Fetch’s advances reminded me of Snow and Bigby before they eventually got together. Willingham’s use of tropes like the reluctant hero and the organization pulling the strings in the background seemed fresh thanks to the strength of his character writing, as well as how he is able to integrate fantasy into the mundane world seamlessly is really effective as well. The build up and resolution to the final conflict was clever as well, the story never felt like it should have this epic battle, it was about the small detail in her quest to find a way to defeat the Tharmic Null, and I was trying to figure it out before it was actually defeated Fetch, who became “Nothing and no one” to save Thessaly. Although I am a bit sad that it seems like she kind of dismissed Fetch’s sacrifice for her, it is very fitting considering her personality.