Page 45 Review by Stephen
Page 45 Comicbook Of The Month August 2025
And the rain, it pours!
It lashes down onto the European city streets from the cold wintry sky: donkey-grey by day, then purpling as evening descends. It cascades over slate-blue mansard rooftops with their garret dormer windows, streaming down the ornately framed, multi-tiered facades, before pooling between cobbles which gleam and shimmer, caught in amber, red and headlight white.
It’s all so Baroque and beautiful, but not if you’ve forgotten your brolly for the 45th time. Then it’s dark and drippy, traffic- crowded and uncomfortable.
Cigarette clenched between teeth, Francois clutches his collar close to his throat as he hops between puddles to Mary Yvonne’s newspaper stand to pick up a Sports Gazette and pop in his numbers for the National Lotto. Then it’s a waterslide stride across tram tracks to the Cafe Monico, and on every page the watery illuminations – the swirling reflections from cars, street lamps and signage – glow more and more magical.
Belgian creator Joris Mertens nails the blind spots and squeeze of rammed rush-hour traffic like Posy Simmonds so successfully gave us the Chistmas-shopping scrum in CASSANDRA DARKE. And it’s these tightly packed, barely budging yet suddenly shifting lanes of fuming heavy metal which Francois must negotiate every morning to ensure that Madame Clerckx’s clients receive their laundry, clean and fresh. So the tension is taut from the second poor Francois has forced upon him Madame Clerckx’s dopey nephew as van driver, for you just know he has blind spots of his own.
What I didn’t know was where this was oh so unexpectedly heading!
And it’s brilliant. You’ll spend hours swooning over cityscape panoramas showcasing the monumental architecture. You peer down, over and through, as if granted access to obscure areas hidden from all but the soggiest sorry pigeons.
Meanwhile, poor, kind, downtrodden but resilient, ever-optimistic Francois! All he wants is to get through the day dutifully, diligently, so that he can meet up down the Cafe Monico with Mary Yvonne, her daughter Romy and barman Leo to share in their smiles.
Even if he’s forgotten his brolly for the 54th time!
