Jonathan Baylis’ collection of slice-of-life comics, So Buttons: Man of, Like, a Dozen Faces, reminded me of Harvey Pekar’s American Splendor, wherein our man related autobiographical stories drawn by a variety of artists. They’re not as interesting as Pekar’s comics – Pekar was just a better writer – but there are some fun gems amidst some dross.
I enjoyed the anecdotes about Baylis interning at Marvel Comics in the early ‘90s where he got to see John Romita Sr draw Thor and met Joe Simon, co-creator of Captain America. I loved that they were drawn by Fred Hembeck too, known for his parodies of Marvel’s comics.
Probably because I’m a sucker for dogs, my favourite story was about how he got his beloved Boston Terrier, Mocha, couched into a history of the pets he’s owned, which was very touching. The strip about his uncle relating a traumatic incident from years ago when he was in the Navy was interesting too and I’ve added the war movie The Big Red One to my film watch list after his talk-up. And it’s always good to see the art of Noah Van Sciver and Dean Haspiel.
A number of the stories though are unremarkable and instantly forgettable. He once met R. Crumb, he once saw one of his favourite directors, Jim Jarmusch, having a smoke, and he and his girlfriend once mistook a rotting seal fin to a human hand. Some are so banal I’m surprised they even made it into the book: his dad likes a specific make of socks, moms know best when it comes to cooking, he has a weird system for eating M&Ms, and he’s very specific about his coffee…!
It’s not an impressive book but So Buttons was a decent enough read. I expect it’d only appeal to fans of Harvey Pekar-style slice-of-life comics though.