July 15, 2008

Fan:  SCALPED echoes reality

Fireworks and Fiery WorksI know I am late to the game for Jason Aaron and R.M. Guera's amazing work on Scalped. I admit, while I was growing up in San Francisco, my only real exposure to Native American culture was "Indian Summer" and "Indian Clay," which was this dark, kinda thick mud that we would dig for when we were kids--no idea if it was ever used as clay. (I'm still not sure when Indian Summer is.) Oh, sure, we had PBS specials about Native Americans and I knew that many lived on reservations, and, as I got older, that those reservations could be pretty down and out. Of course, Scalped has provided us with a story that takes place in a deeply poor and violent reservation, and although I assume some of it is amped up for story-telling purposes, I am sure that the conflicts and characters echo a sad and infuriating reality.Comment:  So a SCALPED reader thinks the Prairie Rose reservation echoes reality? Thanks for proving my point, friend. As I keep saying, people learn about Indians from the media.

As for whether reader Mike Romo is correct or not, the answer is sort of, but not really. Yes, SCALPED is an amped-up version of reality just like The Sopranos or The Shield or 24 is. Which is to say, it has a kernel of truth, but it's mostly false.

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