Review by Frank Plowright
When focussing on its strengths, Going Once, Going Twice is a smart and absorbing fictional biography spanning the second half of the 20th century.
In 2000 Anne MacDonald is driving along Toronto’s Don Valley Parkway. We’re about to discover that shortly after the road’s construction was announced in 1963 her life completely changed. She married into a rich family with an overbearing mother in law who looks down on her and her friends, and we learn that’s partially due to an unconventional upbringing detailed in the second chapter. The first is structured in the manner of a procedural mystery, thorough investigation following a crime, which is the disappearance of Anne’s baby.
Nelson Smith is a writer generous with the small details. It’s apparent from the well considered presentation of the police investigation, but that’s absolutely necessary, whereas Anne’s thoughts about other drivers in the present day sequences beginning each chapter are character building. Background details concerning the auction house where Anne works before marriage add colour. Yet Smith is a thoughtful writer beyond the small details. Elements of Anne’s background that initially seem merely additions of further colour have a meaningful impact on her life and worldview, and there’s no trivialising an upbringing among the Cree people. With that thoroughly established Smith moves onward to the effects of losing a child.
The limitations of illustrator Greg Woronchak are constantly challenged by a story rooted in realism, but with an accompanying spirituality. While the detail is appreciated, the people really needed more work. When using photo reference the cast have a realism that doesn’t capture a humanity, and too often when drawn freehand people lack depth or are misproportioned. In other places panels frequently accommodate too much dialogue and these sequences would be better for being broken down into smaller segments with more panels.
The first half of Going Once, Going Twice has consistently strong writing featuring a compelling lead character, but Smith is weaker when the spotlight moves away from Anne, particularly during long conversations concerning her husband’s business. They’re not needed at such length for what’s later prompted, and it also draws attention to Smith’s habit of using narrative captions to move events forward rather than comics storytelling. Bombshells are dropped, always logical and well foreshadowed, and whenever Anne is central to what’s happening this sparks back into life. There is a resolution meeting the claims derived from one of the story’s best sequences when a distraught Anne, failed by conventional therapy, seeks other answers, but Smith makes the mistake of tying up a life too neatly to supply narrative satisfaction. Two from three solutions would have been stronger.
There’s much to enjoy about Going Once, Going Twice, but it’s dependent on working through the flaws.
