Omschrijving
Special Exits chronicles the decline of Lara (Farmersstand-in)s elderly parents (Lars and Rachel)s health. Set insouthern Los Angeles (which makes for a terrifying sequence as blind Rachel andailing Lars are trapped in their home without power during the 1992 Rodney Kingriots), backgrounds and props are lovingly detailed: these objects serve asmemory triggers for Lars and Rachel, even as they eventually overwhelm them andtheir home, which the couple is loathe to leave. Rendered in thin, confident penlines, Special Exits is laid out in an eight-panel grid, which creates aleisurely storytelling pace that not only helps to convey the slow, inexorabledecline in Lars and Rachels health, but perfectly captures thetimbre of the exchanges between a long-married couple: the affectionatebickering; their gallows humor; their querulousness as their bodies break down.Though Lars and Rachel are the protagonists of Special Exits, Farmer makes hervoice known through creative visual metaphors and in her indictment of thecareless treatment of the elderly in nursing homes.