Goes Like This by Jordan Crane Review

Goes Like This is a collection of short comics and art pieces from 2002 to 2022 by Jordan Crane. And, like a lot of collections like this, it’s a mixed bag of good and forgettable stuff.

The book starts off strongly with The Hand of Gold about a cowboy who finds a corpse with a suitcase attached to the arm. The suitcase is full of gold but, rather than solve his money woes, the gold turns out to be the beginning of his troubles. It’s a great premise, a very engrossing story - a brilliantly told short comic.

The one longer story here is a two-parter called Vicissitude and Trash Night about a car mechanic taking night classes to improve his job prospects who discovers his girlfriend is cheating on him. He tries spying on her and he wonders what he’ll do if his suspicions are confirmed.

Jordan Crane can do long-form storytelling superbly well so it’s a shame he didn’t keep developing this story further - I’d have loved to have seen where he took this tantalising noir-ish narrative. As it is, it’s still the best story here and a fantastic read.

Before They Got Better is about an older man whose grown daughter and kid come to stay with him and his wife after a fight with her partner. It’s a decent story that’s got a wistful tone to it about time passing.

The other stories aren’t that great. A story about a kid who dies in a motorcycle accident is fine but forgettable. The Dark Nothing is a weak sci-fi short about a mining expedition that ends in disaster. Now is a New Now feels like a dummy run for his younger readers comic We Are All Me. The Middle Nowhere is a mysterious, unpredictable nightmarish journey involving souls and mermaids that feels slight. The remaining shorts seem more like visual experiments than anything else.

The interstitial art that appears in between the comics are consistently imaginative, beautiful and skilfully drawn. Even with the comics I wasn’t taken with, they’re still easy to read because Crane understands sequential storytelling so well. He is an undeniably talented cartoonist.

If you’ve never read Jordan Crane before and you’re interested in experimental indie/slice-of-life comics, then I highly recommend starting instead with his book Keeping Two over this. But if you’re already aware of this cartoonist, you’ll need no encouragement to check out any of his work as you’re likely a fan already.

While not as consistently satisfying as Keeping Two, Goes Like This is still worth checking out for the few standout stories included and the wonderful artwork throughout.