The Good Asian
Writer: Pornsak Pichetshote
Artist: Alexandre Tefenkgi
Publisher: Image Comics
Beginning with its pre-release promotional material, it felt like ‘The Good Asian’ was going to be something special.
It sounded relatively atypical for an Image Comics release, let alone the majority of comics released by Marvel and DC. What finally landed was one of the most original comic books of the year. Immediately lauded by critics, the book also grew a passionate audience who jumped excitedly into its intelligent detective noir action.
Most indicative of its quality was the high praise it immediately received from many renowned contemporary comic creators. Batman author James Tynion IV called it a “smart, classic noir drenched in style and history.” Cliff Chiang, author of Paper Girls and Wonder Woman, described it as “a gripping and authentic crime story from an Asian-American POV. This is the book I’ve been waiting for.” Legendary comic book writer Jeff Lemire succinctly summed it up as “Fantastic.”
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Set in San Francisco in 1936, ‘The Good Asian’ centres on Hawaiian Detective Edison Hark, a Chinese-American lawman whose struggles seem to come from every direction. Continually finding himself stuck between two worlds, his eye for minute details and sporadic altruism are regularly overshadowed by his cold behaviour and loose relationship with the truth. Hark has finally returned to his childhood home of San Francisco on personal business. Mason Carroway, his white, millionaire, adoptive father, lies mysteriously comatose. Eddy’s adopted brother Frankie has begged Hark to uncover what the recent disappearance of Ivy Chen, Mason’s 25 year old maid, has to do with the patriarch’s interminable slumber. Edison quickly finds himself neck deep in the darkest depths of Chinatown, with bodies piling up that seemingly relate to the return of Hui Long and the Tongs. Edison needs to uncover secrets – and quickly – if he wants to save not just his estranged family, but possibly the whole of Chinatown.
As if its plot isn’t already intriguing enough, what lifts ‘The Good Asian’ even higher is its historical context and period realism it deftly draws from. In 1882, the United States passed a ban on Chinese immigrants, blaming them for the recent depression, and in 1924 the Johnson-Reed act expanded the ban to include all Asian and Arab peoples. There are few comic books whose creative team would think to include a Historical Consultant, but the snapshot of 1936 Chinatown created by writer Pornsak Pichetshote, artist Alexandre Tefenkgi, and consultant Grant Din, is built on a bed of historical truth, and includes countless genuine details within its dialogue, artwork, and story. It’s a level of accuracy that does so much to bring the book to life, helping to establish the pitfalls of the world and the shortcomings of its characters.
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The main underlying idea explored by ‘The Good Asian’ is American immigration, specifically how to be accepted within a new society, and if this is even possible. Familiar to nearly all immigrants, it places under the microscope the opposing requirements for immigrants to be both exceptional citizens and unheard of by the established population. It’s a book about ‘Knowing your place’, and who gets to decide just exactly what that misguided notion means. It’s about the common predicament faced by immigrants to take any available opportunity, and knowing that all dangers and downsides must be accepted without question, and that recourse and restitution is most likely non-existent. When Edison faces a crisis, he’s reminded by a fellow Asian-American that “We gotta play by their rules… We gotta be undeniable.” The tragedy that follows this advice is just one of many heartbreaking incidents that have shaped Edison Hark into the bitter, cruel, and mistrusting man he is.
Intertwined with its exploration of immigration is the relentless racism faced by Chinese-Americans. The book includes constant examples of out-and-out vile racism, casually ignorant racism, structural historic racism, systemic institutional racism, and, most interestingly, the internalised racism and related confusion felt by Chinese-Americans. Through its characters, ‘The Good Asian’ explores the difficulties non-white persons face learning how and knowing when to ‘act white’, and the impacts this has on their sense of identity and culture. It also bravely looks at the taboo of non-white and white people in love and having sex, and the illegality of it in 1936 America.
Importantly, for all its historic depth and poignant inclusion of complex themes, ‘The Good Asian’ is an immense example of the detective noir genre. It’s pessimistic, bleak, and nihilistic. It’s packed full of flawed characters with questionable morals and self-centred behaviour. ‘The Good Asian’ has no shortage of sex, violence, death, or corruption. It’s built around a slowly revealed mystery that the protagonist must get his hands dirty to uncover. It’s a joy as a reader to witness the book’s core mystery unfold, and reveal how it is intertwined with Edison’s family members’ side-plots. Even the character overview and plot recap at the start of each issue feel very similar to story recaps that would precede mid-twentieth century detective radio plays.
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Of course, a good detective story lives and dies by its lead character, and Detective Edison Hark is a superb protagonist. He has a tragic backstory that is portioned out slowly as it becomes relevant to that issue’s plot. He doesn’t fit in anywhere, at least not perfectly. Not as a lawman, a Carroway, or even as a Chinese-American. It’s unclear if Hark is a hero, anti-hero, anti-villain, or villain – it changes from scene to scene, and may even be defined by the reader’s own morals and point of view. It’s basically impossible to be the law when the law doesn’t trust you. Even the scar on Edison’s face is a daily reminder that he’ll never be loved by, or truly a part of, the world he aspires to. He earns our sympathies, and our disdain.
Taking things to even greater heights, the art throughout ‘The Good Asian’ is nothing short of exceptional, fitting the genre perfectly. Its colour palette is dark and washed out, muted tones that echo despair. There’s barely a bright, primary colour in sight, helping to accentuate the occasional use of blood red. It smartly switches up the colour palette to indicate scene changes, and conveys its flashbacks using variances in layout and panel shape. Most enjoyably, its constant use of Ben-Day dots gives the book a classic feel that’s reminiscent of the Golden Age of comics, a period that coincided with the classic period of American film noir.
Some of Alexandre Tefenkgi’s original ideas in ‘The Good Asian’ really need to be seen to be believed. His best may be his use of a small, red square over Edison Hark’s eye paired with bright red overlay placed over something important that he’s looking at – most often a potential danger, the bright red foreshadowing a potentially bloody encounter. His use of circular panels to indicate characters are being watched sharply raises the tension. The book’s most haunting visual would have to be Eddy’s face superimposed over his hand, dripping with the metaphorical blood that he’s responsible for.
It doesn’t end there though. The book’s grim and dangerous violence isn’t overly gratuitous. It’s not violence for violence’s sake, meaning these moments impact more significantly when they do occur. The character costumes are outstanding, and true to the period and genre. They convey unsaid details about all the characters; the detectives, the wealthy characters, and the Chinese-American characters. Even the period accuracy of buildings, interior settings, vehicles, and other objects adds so much to the quality of the book.
Not content to create one of the best books of the year, each issue of ‘The Good Asian’ is packed with excellent supplementary material. There are insightful essays by the creators’, interviews, additional art like character models, historical inspirations, literary inspirations, and letters from readers that highlight just how much this book has meant to some readers. None of this material is required to sell a comic book. But this above-and-beyond attitude is so characteristic of the effort put into the creation of this book. The creators clearly care so much about ‘The Good Asian’, which has made it so easy for audiences to care as well. And given the importance of this book, it’s easy to deem it one of the biggest comic book success stories of the entire year.
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