Bolero with Keith Lehtinen
We’re back with another episode of Trade School! This time, we’re talking about Bolero Our host this week is Keith Lehtinen!
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Edited by Case Aiken
Scored by Bret Eagleston
Certain Point Of View is a podcast network brining you all sorts of nerdy goodness! From Star Wars role playing, to Disney day dreaming, to video game love, we've got the show for you! Learn more on our website: https://www.certainpov.com
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⏱️ YouTube Chapters
00:00 – Intro
00:08 – Pride Month and Why Bolero Matters
00:55 – What Is Bolero?
01:53 – Alternate Worlds, Love, and Self-Discovery
03:30 – The Incredible Artwork of Loana Vecchio
04:59 – Why You Should Read Bolero (Spoiler-Free)
05:44 – More Comics from Wyatt Kennedy & Loana Vecchio
06:33 – Where to Find Keith
07:31 – We Have Issues Promo
08:00 – Outro
Transcription
00:00
Welcome to Certain Point of View's Trade School where each episode a different host talks about a comic book trade paperback that they loved and why they love it.
00:08
Hello, I am Keith Bolero, host of Certain POV comic book review show. We have issues and Happy Pride Month to everyone out there. As a proud bisexual myself, one of my favorite things about podcasting is all the other LGBTQIA people I have met through it. From my co host Josue to the members of Certain POV and all the way to some of the creators of my favorite comics. It has been an honor and a joy to wrap up Pride Month. I want to talk about a book with strong queer themes. A book that absolutely blew me away and a book I still go back to often and I gift to a lot of people. It's also the book that a lot of people I get along with in comic book media also do that. They love it.
00:55
And like we can go back and forth, specifically that comic or Mars, we talk about this book. It's incredible. But enough stalling. What book am I talking about? I am talking about Bolero from Image Comics. Bolero is written by Wyatt Kennedy, drawn by Loana Vecchio, and letter by Brandon Graham. Now, I was lucky enough to interview Wyatt once upon a time and also record an episode of Jukebox Vertigo with them. And this was during Bolero's print run. So I was super excited. Wyatt has incredible taste in music and absolutely out hipstered me and it was great. I really appreciated it actually. But of course, why wouldn't I be excited? This is Bolero. So let's talk about what Bolero is. Bolero is kind of a perfect indie comic in my opinion because it's it's intimate and personal. It is a romantic story.
01:53
It's also like a coming, not coming of age, but there's a life development, there's moving on to the next step of your life and making something of yourself tied into this. But deep down it's also about love. It's about losing love, it's about making mistakes. So a lot of really great indie comics do that but with a twist. And this one has this amazing twist which is an alternate worlds premise where this character, the main character Devin, is given an opportunity to visit alternate versions of her world to try to find one that makes them happier. And it's. Oh God, it's just so good. She's offered this by this godlike creature. I'm being oblique so you can read it yourself, but it Comes with a limit. You can only hop a certain amount of times, in this case, 53 times, and then you're stuck.
02:46
So it kind of gives me vibes of the show Sliders, which I talk about constantly for some reason, where they have to. They're trying to find their way home, but in this case, trying to find the perfect version of the world. And there were episodes of Sliders where they're like, this isn't home, but this might better than what else we might find out there. And that was always some of my favorite episodes because. Yeah, well, that's this whole book. This is her trying to discover, like, is this good enough? Is this what I want? And the worlds and the variety of things that happen are just so fun and so interesting and sad and tragic and there's just so many great things. The whole thing with Devin and the love interest Natasha is just.
03:30
It's so sweet and it's just, again, that perfect blend of down to earth, but also crazy out there sci fi. I think it's just an amazing, fun story. I have to talk about the art. Luana Baccio does the art. Some of you might not know who Loana Vecchio is. You should, because Luana is one of the best artists in comics right now. I am just a huge fan of Luana and openly celebrated when they won the Eisner. I distinctly remember that happening. I was so happy for them. And this is the book that put Luana on my radar, are most people. And it's absolutely beautiful. There's so many great compositions. The character designs I love. This is a small thing, but there's a lot of tattoo art in this. And I think that's just really nicely done too. There's some tattoos.
04:23
There's an owl tattoo, specifically, that. I'm like, I kind of want to steal that design and actually get a tattoo of it. And if I do, I'll send it to Wyatt. I also want to say that one of the things I love most about this book is how much I praised it when it came out. And Wyatt, who did not have a Twitter at the time, emailed us and told us how much they appreciated our review, which just. That's the first time it's ever happened. Blew me away. I. Yeah. And that's one of those times where I feel like I became a real reviewer. You know what I mean? Like, that just blew me away. I just loved it so much. So.
04:59
But, yeah, I'm not going to tell you too much about, like, the specifics of what goes on later in the story because it is about the adventure and it is about the journey and is about, it's about the ending, which is what I'll say there. I'm not gonna get too much into it, but it's just absolutely incredible. I love that it established itself as a multi dimensional queer story immediately too. Page two, like, it's just like, here's how queer the story is and I love it. It's great. Just. I, I can't recommend Bolero enough. I, I, I love it so much. It's, I decided I was gonna do one book for Queer Month this month and I picked Bolero for Pride Month and it would be the book I would start most adults with.
05:44
I don't, I wouldn't, it's not child friendly, just to let you know, but teens certainly. I think it's all about discovering yourself. There's a lot of things that Devin goes through that I really, it really resonates with me and I just really like her as a protagonist. So I do want to recommend other things that they both have made both the creators. Luana has done the absolutely amazing series, Lovesick and the prequel to that Doll parts, both of which are way up on my list. I love them so much. And Wyatt did this book called Nights for Image that is just so good. And I love it so much I can't talk about it enough. So make sure to check both of those two things out because you won't regret it.
06:33
They're both amazing creators and of course you can always check out my things. You can find me on Bluesky at we have issues. Bsky social or on the certain POV discord. Join us on there@ certainpow.com we have a great time on there. Lots of people talking, having a good time and respecting each other. So, yeah, I highly recommend it. Well, that's everything for me this month. Happy Pride, everybody, and happy reading. All right, Josue, let's go through our new comic day stack. We have a lot to review. I know. Maybe we've gone too far. Let's see. Marvel, of course, dc. I got Image, Dark Horse, Black Mask, Boom. Idw, Aftershock, Vault, of course. Mad Cave, Ony Valiant, Scout, Magma, Behemoth. Wow, that's a lot. Well, all we need now is a name for our show.
07:31
We need a name for a show about reviewing comic books every week. Something clever, but not too clever, like a pun. It's kind of cheesy. Yeah, Something that seems funny at first but we might regret later on as an impulsive decision. A few dozen episodes in now. We'll think of something. Join Keith and Josue for we have Issues, a weekly show reviewing almost every new comic released each week available on Geek Elite Media and wherever you listen to your podcasts. CPOV.
08:00
Certainpov.com.