Nemo: The Roses of Berlin

Written by Alan Moore
Art by Kevin O'Neil

Nemo: The Roses of Berlin is the second of the Nemo graphic novels, building on the world Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neil created in The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.  Compared to the previous book, Nemo: Heart of Ice, I enjoyed this one more, but still had some problems with it.

Janni Nemo and her consort, Jack, discover that their teenage daughter Hira has been captured by the Germans (it's roughly World War II), and they head to Berlin to rescue her.  Like with Heart of Ice, we got tossed very quickly into the story, without taking any time to care about the characters at all.

Berlin has become a dystopian nightmare out of Fritz Lang's Metropolis, and we quickly learn that Maria, the robot from the movie, is as much in charge of things as Herr Hynkel (Charlie Chaplin's stand-in for Hitler).

There is a brothel, a rescue, sleeping soldiers, and a fight with the woman from the last volume.  It's all handled well, but it also feels like Moore and O'Neil are going through the motions, as if the clever references to literature and film are sufficient replacements for compelling story.

I liked it, and as always, enjoyed puzzling out some of the references (while knowing that way more of them went over my head), but never felt invested in the story at all.