Benjamin Bear in Brain Storms!

Benjamin Bear returns for a third round of humorously bizarre mini-sagas. As before, each page contains a stand-alone comic strip featuring Benjamin's decidedly fuzzy logic. Coudray uses visuals effectively to consistently get laughs (many of the strips are completely wordless). The quirky animal characters are depicted in Coudray's bug-eyed yet deadpan style, making each critter the perfect straight-man for all those sight gags.

Benjamin Bear returns for a third round of humorously bizarre mini-sagas. As in the first two volumes (Benjamin Bear in “Fuzzy Thinking,” rev. 11/11; Benjamin Bear in “Bright Ideas,” rev. 3/13), each page contains a stand-alone comic strip (with title in bold) featuring Benjamin’s decidedly fuzzy logic. Here Benjamin solves the problem of how to get that last apple from the tree (by knocking all of the other apples down and standing on the pile, in the strip “Solution”); there -- in what seems to be a recurring issue for Benjamin -- how to cross a ravine (examined in three separate strips, including the aptly titled “Bridging the Gap,” in which Benjamin employs a bouncing soccer ball and some well-timed jumps). Coudray uses visuals effectively to consistently get laughs (many of the strips are completely wordless). There’s the usual quirky crew of animal characters, depicted in Coudray’s bug-eyed (yet deadpan) style that makes each critter the perfect straight-man for all those sight gags. Although not as uniformly brilliant as previous volumes, overall, Brain Storms! is another fine installment in this idiosyncratic series. sam bloom

Readers will enjoy the way Benjamin Bear triumphs over obstacles physical and metaphysical in his witty adventures. Many of these one-page comics employ only a few words, relying on visual information for comprehension of the joke. For example, when Benjamin wants to go for a walk with a friend, his friend is worried that his pet rabbits will run away; so Benjamin gets a cage-not for the rabbits, but for a carrot, which the rabbits eye hungrily until the walkers return. Benjamin Bear proves to be an endlessly intriguing and endearing character: a good friend and trusted authority figure with an unpredictable creative streak. Philippe Coudray's illustrations are simple and subtly expressive.