I LOVE YOU UFO

A short sequence of illustrations depicts mysterious happenings in the countryside in Carter’s spare graphic novella.

As this production begins, a woman watches a strange fireball crash into a field behind the kitchen of a small farm. A dark figure in a fedora, seen menacing the farm’s chickens (who don’t notice), hides in the chicken coop and lurks outside the woman’s window, on which reads a cryptic statement: “i will be better for you.” This figure eventually disappears into a field, although the text says, “You can see him when it snows in that field. As it melts, the shape shows.” What might be the same woman dances with a tall, cone-headed figure. Nearby, a crowd of faceless people in Puritan hats and necklaces gathers. Eventually, these figures dig up a strange structure in the middle of town. The entire work feels like an eerie mashup of early American history, theosophy, Stephen King’s Children of the Corn, and space beings. The grayish/black sketches (generally one per page) on sepia backgrounds occasionally show unfinished versions of humans in what might slightly approximate a story for the space of a page or two. The narrative structure is minimal. The novella includes a vague opening scene about a mysterious craft crashing into the backyard of an isolated house, for instance, but even in such a short space, there are unexplained obelisks or 20-foot-tall bonfires. In an intriguing, non-narrative succession, the dark figure in a fedora lurks in several pictures, then becomes the towering figure with a featureless, conical head, and finally a human body with a deer’s antlered head. The one spot of color—a massive rainbow—implies some sense of optimism. Some may find these images thought-provoking visual prompts for their own stories, but those seeking a more linear storyline will likely be perplexed.

A series of open-ended, visually compelling images stitched together with little narration.