![]() ![]() ![]() The New York Times reported that he traversed Western Canada’s “dark and icy landscapes” as a kid for scrimmages before he went pro. Like Roughneck’s similarly burly character, Boogaard was raised up north, and his time in the NHL ended while playing for the New York Rangers. The hockey minutia conjures Lemire’s popular Essex County, but I was also reminded of deceased Saskatchewan-born player Derek Boogaard, and not just for his given name. When Lemire breaks from the comic’s subdued blue gradients and deep blacks for full-color flashbacks, we see middle-aged Ouelette’s glory days as an “enforcer,” an unofficial hockey label for a player who racks up penalties when responding to an opponent’s violence. Physical attacks here viscerally call attention to a past that Ouelette spent in the penalty box or enduring the wrath of his family’s drunken patriarch. Roughneck’s broken, broad-nosed protagonist beats a bar patron senseless in the snowy present-day fictional town of Pimitamon during a violent first act. The Ouelettes’ story unfurls beneath a small Canadian province’s smoking chimneys and ash-toned winter skies. ![]() From Roughneck by Jeff Lemire (image courtesy of Gallery 13) ![]()
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