Ages ago I intended to write a review of the two Famous Five graphic novels that I have. Instead I wrote a lengthy post covering what had been published in different languages – and even more have come out since then so it’s no longer up to date.

But now I figure I really should review the actual books!

I’ve said before, but it’s worth repeating here – I often struggle with graphic novels. I don’t seem to be able to just look at them and know who’s doing what. I need to look at each panel and think about it/figure it out. I’m hoping that knowing the story already will help here.

Initial thoughts

First up I’ll say that this graphic novel actually does a really good job of explaining what’s going on using the briefest text and illustrations.

For example, the opening page.

In just 76 words and four pictures it establishes the children are Julian, Dick and Anne, and they have been dropped off for the first time at their aunt and uncle’s house for the summer. We see that Aunt Fanny is kind, and that Uncle (no name given, yet) is cross with Georgina for not being there. This was several pages in the book, but requires to be cut down immensely for a graphic novel.

George’s feelings are examined a few pages later when she complains to Timmy about having to spend the holidays with cousins she’s only met once before (not sure why never before was changed to once, though!), and her disdain for all things girly are clear.

The Five are drawn very distinctly, and there are few other characters so it’s very clear who is speaking or acting in each panel.

I actually had no problems following the story – even where it deviated from the book. Mind you, this is a children’s graphic novel so that probably helped a lot!

The story

The story is broadly similar to the original book, but it does have some changes. This is to be expected as the story has to be cut down to fit the graphic novel format – otherwise drawing a panel for every few sentences of the book would have taken years and produced an enormously unwieldy tome.

There are some changes, though, which don’t seem to reflect a need to simplify/shorten the story.

First up – early on while George is off with Timmy instead of meeting her cousins she runs into a man on the beach. He’s new to the area and wants to know how he can visit Kirrin Island. Timmy chases him off into the sea and bites his trousers, coming away with an envelope.

Soon after George sees the same man heading back towards the sea, but perfectly dry…

That night she has a bad dream about the man, waking Anne, who is firmly told that it’s George not Georgina.

The cousins making friends with George is glossed over in a caption simply saying they were so nice they broke through her prickly shell. George then tells them Kirrin Island is hers, and they meet Timmy as Alf has brought him down to the beach.

Another caption explains that they had to wait until the next day to visit Kirrin Island as a storm had blown up. When they get there the wreck has already been washed up. It’s a shame the drama of the wreck being thrown up by the storm isn’t featured. On board the wreck they find the box belonging to George’s ancestor, but for some reason the ship is called the Ayacotl, the Aztec word for beans.

The man from the beach is at Alf’s house asking for a boat to take him to the island, but at the same time he’s also at Kirrin Cottage buying the island from Uncle Quentin and demanding the box from the wreck is returned to him.

Sadly they don’t throw the box out of the window and Uncle Quentin doesn’t confiscate it, they just lever it open with a crowbar. Inside is a map of Kirrin Castle. They then realise that the envelope Timmy took is about the Ayacotl. A page and a half is given to explaining how certain merchants pretended to be carrying beans to the New World to get past pirates who were after more interesting types of cargo, with Henry John Kirrin’s ship making its last journey stuffed with Aztec gold instead of beans.

The Five head straight to Kirrin Island to hunt for the gold, (Timmy rescuing the blow-away map is preserved) as is him falling down the well shaft.

In the dungeons they find a bricked-up wall, and knocking it down they then find a wooden door. Dick somehow knocks more bricks down when trying to attack the door, and ends up with a nosebleed, getting him and Anne out of the way above ground.

The men find George and Julian who have found the gold under piles of mouldy beans, and force George to write a note to them. She writes Georgina, they know it’s a trap, and Dick goes down the well to the rescue. For some reason the men have brought two boats and plan to use George’s too, but George ties them together and uses the motor boat to escape (rather than smashing it and rowing off in her own boat like the book.)

It ends happily with the Kirrins rich and George allowed to keep Timmy.

The Characters

The characters are more one-dimensional as there isn’t room for nuance or inner thoughts in this format. The Five don’t quite match my mental image, but they are not bad and are definitely more vintage-looking than modern. The children are distinct from each other and have a good range of facial expressions which convey things that there isn’t room for in the captions. Haughty George in the panel below is a great call-back to the Soper illustration of the same scene.

George is the best expressed as she has the most dialogue and action. Her love for Timmy is well depicted, and although her early “prickliness” is brief it is shown.

Julian is shown as bossy, but not merely in the sensible older brother way of the books. He doesn’t have a ton of dialogue but it is mostly instructions on what they/the others must do. He isn’t nearly as likeable as in the books. On page 19 he abruptly shouts That’s quite enough, you two! as Dick makes a snide response to Anne, and on p39 he says On the contrary, young Dick! In the immortal words of Archimedes: ‘Give me a lever, and I’ll move the world.’ He is obviously paraphrasing there as that’s not the full quote, but either way, he comes across as an unpleasant know-it-all.

Dick is shown as having a good appetite, but he is also unnecessarily unkind on a couple of occasions – such as the snide comment to Anne above. Of course, in writing tone is hard to convey, and perhaps this was meant in a light-hearted teasing manner. This doesn’t come across in the limited dialogue though. On p4 he says to Anne Don’t be a crybaby. You’ll see Mummy soon. On p14 he tells the others that Anne is being fussy and doesn’t want any breakfast, but she said nothing of the sort.

Anne is also not entirely like herself. She kicks Dick’s ankle hard for the crybaby remark (justified, I think, but not very Treasure Island Anne. She’s not so tiger-ish until much later.) and the next morning announces that she slept like a princess. 

Timmy is pretty Timmy-ish. Loyal, strong, brave, clever.

Aunt Fanny is only briefly around – limited to serving a couple of meals and reminding them to take towels when they go to the beach.

Uncle Quentin is similarly mostly absent, but his short-temperedness is certainly shown. The panel dedicated to him slamming the door is particularly clever at showing that with just one word and one image.

I feel that if there wasn’t so much extraneous stuff about the two bad guys and the Aztec beans we might have had a little more actual Famous Five stuff.

Overall I did enjoy this, but it is definitely more like a TV adaptation in how it doesn’t stick that closely to the books so your mileage may vary!