Review by Frank Plowright
A third and final visit to the Red Room revisits a character who’s appeared in both previous volumes, investigates a funding glitch, relates the history of Red Room films and presents the most distressing experience of the series.
From the beginning Ed Piskor has dotted back and forth through time, and we now see the aftermath of serial killer Davis Fairfield’s death, and indeed how it occurred. The primary focus is his daughter, last seen in Trigger Warnings. What’s life like for an ordinary young woman who had no idea of her father’s activities, indeed saw him as a loving parent, yet now faces public revulsion by association? That’s an introductory sideline, as Piskor then feeds in a character taking it upon himself to further darken her days while posing as a friend.
Piskor’s end of volume notes mention which illustrations he finds particularly pleasing. Many readers, though, might find themselves conflicted by excellent and thoughtful art in packed panels featuring stomach-turning activities. Such is the case for the story in which a killer livestreams the murder of someone he considers responsible for his life turning to shit. Piskor makes it abundantly clear Mark is a selfish, greedy prick who’s made his own poor choices, but it’s the most explicit and prolonged torture sequence in this collection, and so very uncomfortable.
The third story features a film director arrested by the FBI having to lecture agents on the history of Red Room cinema as part of a deal cut. In his notes Piskor mentions Quentin Tarantino being on record as finding any form of porn abhorrent, but delivers his stand-in’s interest in cinema history over-riding his distaste. It’s clever in twisting moments beloved by film historians and mimics Tarantino’s verbose enthusiasm effectively, but it’s an idea never given enough substance.
To mention a sense of optimism about any aspect of Red Room would be false, but the first three stories in this collection at least see reprehensible types getting some form of payback. With the final story, though, Piskor drags readers into a journey more depressing than any other to date for being based, at least to a point, on what’s actually happened not to one person, but to so many.
‘140 Days of Sodom’ also references a disturbing film and follows the wretched path of a young woman from a relatively happy life to perpetual abuse and degradation. It’s Piskor looking at the fate of women trafficked for the sex industry and then extrapolating that into the needs of the Red Room. It can be viewed as further exploitation for presenting the subject as entertainment in a horror comic or more charitably as explaining to some readers the appalling reality of some areas of the sex industry. Either way, because so much is based on versions of real events it makes for incredibly difficult reading.
Plenty of people would look at Red Room and be instantly repelled by the provocative and explicit content, considering it merely torture porn pandering to the worst desires within. Yet relative commercial success indicates a fair number of us possess those desires. As with pornography generally, it’s for the more qualified to elaborate on whether it satisfies particular yearnings or encourages them further.
